Quotulatiousness

November 11, 2023

In memoriam

Filed under: Britain, History, Military, WW1, WW2 — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

A simple recognition of some of our family members who served in the First and Second World Wars:

The Great War

The Second World War

  • Flying Officer Richard Porteous, Royal Air Force, survived the defeat in Malaya, was evacuated to India and lived through the war
    (my great uncle)
  • Able Seaman John Penman, Royal Navy, served in the Defensively Equipped Merchant fleet on the Atlantic convoys, the Murmansk Run (he may have been on a ship in convoy PQ-17, as we know he spent a winter in Russia) and other convoy routes, was involved in firefighting and rescue efforts during the Bombay Docks explosion in 1944, lived through the war
    (Elizabeth’s father)
  • Private Archie Black (commissioned after the war and retired as a Major), Gordon Highlanders, captured during the fall of Singapore (aged 15) and survived a Japanese POW camp (he had begun to write an autobiography shortly before he died)
    (Elizabeth’s uncle)
  • Elizabeth Buller, “Lumberjill” in the Women’s Timber Corps, an offshoot of the Women’s Land Army in Scotland through the war.
    (Elizabeth’s mother)
  • Trooper Leslie Taplan Russon, 3rd Royal Tank Regiment, died at Tobruk, 19 December, 1942 (aged 23).
    Leslie was my father’s first cousin, once removed (and therefore my first cousin, twice removed).

My maternal grandfather, Matthew Kendrew Thornton, was in a reserved occupation during the war as a plater working at Smith’s Docks in Middlesbrough. The original design for the famous Flower-class corvettes came from Smith’s Docks and 16 of the 196 built in the UK during the war (more were built in Canada). My great-grandmother was an enthusiastic ARP warden through the war (she reportedly enjoyed enforcing blackout compliance in the neighbourhood using the rattle and whistle that came with the job).

For the curious, the Commonwealth War Graves Commission the Royal British Legion, and the Library and Archives Canada WW1 and WW2 records site provide search engines you can use to look up your family name. The RBL’s Every One Remembered site shows you everyone who died in the Great War in British or Empire service (Canadians, Australians, New Zealanders, South Africans and other Imperial countries). The CWGC site also includes those who died in the Second World War. Library and Archives Canada allows searches of the Canadian Expeditionary Force and the Royal Newfoundland Regiment for all who served during WW1, and including those who volunteered for the CEF but were not accepted.

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, MD Canadian Army Medical Corps (1872-1918)

Here is Mark Knopfler’s wonderful song “Remembrance Day” from his Get Lucky album, set to a slideshow of British and Canadian images from World War I through to more recent conflicts put together by Bob Oldfield:

October 29, 2023

The Battle of Leyte Gulf – WW2 – Week 270 – October 28, 1944

Filed under: Germany, History, Japan, Military, Pacific, Russia, USA, WW2 — Tags: , , , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

World War Two
Published 28 Oct 2023

This is it — the big showdown between US and Japanese Navies, and the largest naval battle ever fought in terms of total tonnage. American landings on Leyte itself are still in progress, and the Soviets’ Debrecen Operation comes to its end.
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October 23, 2023

Hero-worship of Admiral Nelson seen as (somewhat) harmful

Filed under: Britain, History, Military — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

On Saturday, Sir Humphrey noted the anniversary of Trafalgar and indicated that the Royal Navy’s idolization of Admiral Nelson somewhat obscures the rest of the Royal Navy’s historical role:

“Danish privateers intercepting an enemy vessel during the Napoleonic Wars”.
Oil painting by Christian Mølsted, 1888 from the Collection of the Museum of National History via Wikimedia Commons.

There is an argument, which the author has sympathy with, that the RN has perhaps idolised Nelson too much. That while he did much good, the adoration of him comes at the cost of forgetting countless other leaders and battles which have relevance to this day. This is not to denigrate or play down the impact of Trafalgar, but to ask whether we should be equally aware of other parts of Royal Navy history too. Understanding the Royal Navy of the late 18th and early 19th century can provide us with much to consider and learn from in looking at how to shape the Royal Navy of the early 21st century. If you look at the Royal Navy of today and of Nelson’s time (and throughout the Napoleonic Wars), a strong case can be made that although the technology is materially different, the missions, function, and capability that the RN offers to the Government of the day are little changed.

While we tend to fix attention mostly on the major battle of Trafalgar, the RN fulfilled a wide variety of different missions throughout the war. The fleet was responsible for blockading Europe, monitoring French movements, and providing timely intelligence on the activity of enemy fleets. Legions of smaller ships stood off hostile coasts, outside of engagement range, on lonely picket duties to track the foe. The Royal Navy also maintained forces capable of strategic blockades in locations like Gibraltar and the Skagerrak, relying on chokepoints to secure control of the sea.

The UK was a mercantile nation with a heavy reliance on trade, and with the land routes of Europe closed by Napoleon, the Merchant Navy was vital to victory. The Royal Navy played a key role in escorting ships in convoy, ensuring their protection from hostile forces and helping ensure vitally needed trade goods arrived in British ports. This included timber from colonies in North America, vital to building and repairing warships. Similarly British policy to defeat Napoleon relied on supporting continental land powers, and a steady flow of munitions and materiel were sent by sea, escorted by RN warships to Baltic ports to help support nations fighting France.

The Royal Navy maintained forces of small raiding craft to hold the French coast at risk throughout the wars, sending vessels to attack French coastal locations, capturing intelligence and tying down hundreds of French coastal artillery batteries and thousands of men who could have been deployed elsewhere to protect French soil. More widely the UK engaged in strategic raiding and blockade, for example operations in the Adriatic Campaign (1807-14) where a small number of British warships blockaded ports, conducted amphibious operations and engaged in surface combat with different foes. In the same vein the UK found itself targeted by Danish & Norwegian raiders too, who fought the so-called “Gunboat War” from 1807 to 14 against the UK, where many small scale actions between British brigs and small ships against gunboats in the Baltic. This often forgotten campaign saw violent clashes and victories on both sides with the sinking and capture of many RN vessels to protect convoy trade.

More widely the Royal Navy worked closely with the British Army in a variety of amphibious operations, providing ships to deploy and sustain the Army on campaign. There were a number of impressive amphibious failures, but also some successes too, particularly in the West Indies and Egypt, where working as part of a jointly integrated force, the Royal Navy provided fire support (and even operated Congreve land attack rockets for shore bombardment) as the British Army fought the French ashore. In the Peninsular War the RN was vital for ensuring the supply of Wellington’s forces and, where necessary evacuating them, such as during the retreat from Corunna.

October 18, 2023

Why the Canadian Surface Combatant (CSC) program will cost so much more than equivalent US or British ships

Filed under: Business, Cancon, Military — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

In The Line, Philippe Lagassé outlines the Canadian Surface Combatant (CSC) program — the next-generation front-line combat ships for the Royal Canadian Navy intended to replace the current Halifax-class frigates and the already retired Iroquois-class destroyers:

Building warships is an expensive business, especially if you’re getting back into it after a few decades. Take the Canadian Surface Combatant (CSC). Fifteen CSCs will be built at Halifax’s Irving Shipbuilding to replace Canada’s current frigates and decommissioned destroyers. According to a 2022 study by the Parliamentary Budget Officer (PBO), the CSC acquisition will cost $80.2 billion. Given that defence inflation is well above regular inflation, and that regular inflation is running hot, that number isn’t going to go down.

Canada’s CSC will be a variant of the Type 26 Global Combat Ship originally designed for the Royal Navy. The Canadian variant includes significant changes to the original Type 26 design, notably to the combat systems. With the estimated per unit cost of each ship topping $5.6 billion, the National Post‘s John Ivison warns that the CSC is out of control. Ivison notes that the United States Navy (USN) acquired its Constellation-class frigates for $1.66 billion. Why, he understandably asks, is Canada paying so much for the CSC, and to what end?

The Canadian government always views major military purchases for the Canadian Armed Forces primarily as regional economic development projects and always attempts to get all or at least a major part of the construction done in Canada. To most people this sounds sensible: big military equipment acquisitions mean a lot of money being spent, so why shouldn’t most of that money be spent inside Canada? The answer, in almost every case, is that it will be significantly more expensive because Canadian industry doesn’t regularly produce these ships/planes/helicopters/tanks, so a lot of money will need to be spent to construct the factories or shipyards, import the specialized equipment, hire and train the workforce, etc., and no rational private industry will spend that kind of money unless they’re guaranteed to be repaid (plus profit).

Ordinary items for the Canadian military like clothing, food, non-specialized vehicles (cars, trucks, etc.) may carry a small extra margin over run-of-the-mill stuff, but it will generally be competitive with imported equivalents. Highly specialized items generally won’t be competitively priced exactly because of those specialized qualities. The bigger and more unusual the item to be purchased, the less economic sense it makes to buy domestically.

There are also the conflicting desires of the elected government (who generally want to target the spending to electoral districts or regions that benefit “their” voters), the permanent bureaucracy (who want to ensure that programs last a long time to ensure jobs within the civil service), and the military procurement teams (who have a tendency to over-optimistically estimate up-front and long-term costs because they want to get the procurement process underway … it’s tougher to stop something already in-process than one that still needs formal approval).

Once there’s a budget and capabilities are identified, the requirements for individual projects are prepared. It’s here that the comparison with lower cost, off-the-shelf alternatives runs into difficultly. The USN has lots of different types of ships that do lots of specific things. The above-mentioned Constellation-class is one of many different types of warships that the USN will sail, each with specific mission sets and roles. The Canadian military has only been directed to acquire fifteen CSCs, but the government expects the CAF to do a variety of missions at sea — not as many as the USN, of course, but still a good number. Canada has other military ships, including the Arctic Offshore Patrol Vessels (AOPS) also being built by Irving, but the CSC will be Royal Canadian Navy (RCN)’s primary expeditionary platform. Canadian defence planners, therefore, need those 15 ships to be capable of undertaking various missions and roles. Compounding this challenge are technological changes and the ever-evolving threat. The requirements for the CSC need to be continuously updated, and in some cases expanded, to keep pace with these developments, too.

An artist’s rendition of BAE’s Type 26 Global Combat Ship, which was selected as the Canadian Surface Combatant design in 2019, the most recent “largest single expenditure in Canadian government history” (as all major weapon systems purchases tend to be).
(BAE Systems, via Flickr)

On purely economic grounds, it would often make sense to add Canada’s order on to existing US, British, or other allied military orders to benefit from the economies of scale … but pure economic benefits don’t rank highly on the overall scale of importance. There’s also the understandable desire of the government to buy fewer items with wider capabilities as the government’s requirements for the military change with time and circumstance.

Were Canadian defence planners too cavalier in their requirements and design modifications? Maybe. Looking at it from their perspective, though, we should appreciate that they thinking about capabilities for a ship that Canada will use until the 2100s.

Doubts about the CSC are going to keep multiplying. The per unit costs can only increase so much before people start seriously discussing reducing how many of them will be built. You can be sure that some within government are already asking “Why 15? Why not 12?” Serious concerns are also being raised about whether the defence budget can afford to maintain CSC and keep them technologically up to date after the fleet is introduced. Given the CAF’s personnel recruitment troubles, moreover, it’s unclear if the RCN will have enough sailors to operate the full fleet. The first CSC that hits the water, furthermore, will have all sorts of kinks and problems that will need to be sorted out. That’s standard for first ships off the line, but you can be sure that every failing will be met with handwringing and charges of incompetence.

To address these concerns, the government must let DND/CAF better explain what the CSC is designed to do and why it needs to do it. Simply telling Canadians that it’s the right ship isn’t enough when it’s easy to point to lower-cost alternatives. As well, the government needs to be far more transparent about estimates of costs and what’s driving them. Political and public support for the CSC shouldn’t be taken for granted, and growing concerns about the program can’t be simply brushed away.

October 12, 2023

KAMIKAZE: HMS Formidable, May 4, 1945

Filed under: Britain, History, Japan, Military, Pacific, USA — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Armoured Carriers
Published 18 Apr 2020

It was the height of the invasion of Okinawa. Japan was throwing a last-ditch effort at unseating US Marines from their beachheads. Kamikazes swarmed the skies. HMS Formidable, part of the British Pacific Fleet interdicting attacks from Formosa (Taiwan), was to suffer a direct hit on her armoured flight deck. Here’s what happened — in the words of those who were there.
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October 9, 2023

THE BATTLE OF SYDNEY: Sabres, Meteors, Sea Furies And Two Blokes With A Bren Gun Battle A Runaway

Filed under: Australia, History, Military — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Not A Pound For Air To Ground
Published 23 Jun 2023

On the morning of the 30th of August, Anthony Thrower of Lavinia Street, Granville was out for a pleasure flight when his Auster Archer decided to make a break for freedom. What followed was a madcap three hour chase involving four jet fighters, two Hawker Sea Furies and two blokes with a Bren Gun.

Given that this incident pre-dated the more famous Battle Of Palmdale by a year, I thought it was interesting to compare how more conventionally armed aircraft fared against a slow, but determined piston-engined intruder. I hope you find it entertaining. I have to admit that as a Brit, I enjoyed poking a little fun at my Australian friends … hopefully they can take it in the spirit it’s intended.

Final point of note is to thank Bryanwheeler1608, whose comment put me onto this story in the first place. I hope you think I’ve done it justice!

September 19, 2023

Jeremy Clarkson’s The Greatest Raid of All

Filed under: Britain, France, Germany, History, Military, WW2 — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

North One
Published 4 May 2020

Due to copyright restrictions, some music and scenes have been altered or removed in this upload. You can find the original unaltered documentary here: The Story Of The …

Jeremy Clarkson tells the story of the audacious commando raid on the German occupied dry dock at St Nazaire in France on March 28th 1942. Made for the BBC in 2007 by North One.
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September 9, 2023

The US military’s recruiting crisis

Filed under: History, Military, Politics, USA — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 05:00

As I joked earlier this year after one or another of the US services reported falling significantly short of their recruiting goal, “I find this hard to believe now that Uncle Sugar is not only willing to fund your gender transition, but will then guarantee that you won’t be sent into a combat zone.” Kulak has been reading some histories of the 20th century and was surprised to find that the recruiting problem faced by most military organizations in that time was having too many good recruits:

This was after WW1! Millions of young men had just died as part of regiments many little different than this. And yet there was this much demand from young men to be part of the martial world.

This is because the Military and military life was ACTUALLY a good career move, and ACTUALLY formed life long bonds in the early 20th century.

Amidst the population boom of the early 20th century and all the excess young men with little inheritance… the military and militia life was a major vehicle for social mobility and aspiration and forming social connections…

So what changed? Why is it almost completely the opposite in early 21st century America?

These attitudes survived the world wars, even the western front of WW1 …

But they were devoured by Vietnam and the Civil Rights era.

Implicit in a lot of 19th and 20th century militarism was the vision of “Every Soldier a Citizen, Every Citizen a Soldier” this ethos was first expressed during the french revolution … It was aspirational. The subjects divorced from the state and military were now armed and able to participate in civic and military life, they were now citizens … of course by the early 20th century this sounds very menacing… Soldiers must obey orders, every day … if every citizen is a soldier, and bound to obey, on pain of death, that’s Totalitarianism.

You can make a strong case that US military recruiting never fully recovered from the Vietnam era, even through the temporary boost of the post-9/11 patriotic rush.

America has gone from over 1% of the population actively serving at any one time to nearly a third of that.

The “Professionalization” of the US military to an “All Volunteer force” has in effect just been a cover for this collapse in recruiting capacity.

America’s military isn’t significantly structurally different. These aren’t really professionals.

Your average 3 year contract private isn’t making some obscene Yuppie amount of money for his ambitious professional commitment. A private makes under 30k a year. A Second Lieutenant, with a university degree and years of professional development, who may have had to plan out his career from 16 years old getting a Congressman’s letter of recommendation to attend West Point or another service academy … Makes 40-60k a year.

US GDP per capita is 72k. If that Lieutenant had gone to a second tier school and gotten a Computer Science degree he’d be making 6 figures and have vastly more control over his life.

It’s not a good career move, in the 1780s or 1900s and ambitious scion of a decayed noble family desiring to conquer the world might want to become an artillery officer… Today he wants to work on wall street or at Google.

Even if you’re starting out from a very rough place there ar almost certainly a dozen better things you could do to advance yourself faster, for better money, and with less effort than joining the Military.

The only appeal of the US military, for decades now, has been to people who really want to escape their situation, who really felt they needed to hard reboot their life, or who are really drawn to military life out of sheer love of it.

And then the Army went woke.

The long-serving senior officers of every branch of the US military are now locked in to pushing diversity in all its manifold ways, to the point of knowingly discouraging non-diverse service members out of the way to make room for this month’s gender, racial, or other quotas.

So America’s effective recruitment capacity and civic feeling will continue to collapse even as Americans hate each other and their government even more.

You think recruit capacity is bad now? Wait til they imprison Trump.

September 6, 2023

Some key planks from Scott Alexander’s presidential platform

Filed under: Education, Military, Politics, USA — Tags: , , , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 05:00

I was a bit surprised to find that Scott Alexander has decided to toss his hat into not one, but two party primaries for the 2024 presidential nomination:

The American people deserve a choice. They deserve a candidate who will reject the failed policies of the past and embrace the failed policies of the future. It is my honor to announce I am throwing my hat into both the Democratic and Republican primaries (to double my chances), with the following platform:

Ensure Naval Supremacy And Reduce Wealth Inequality By Bringing Back The Liturgy

The liturgy was a custom of ancient Athens. When the state needed something (usually a new warship) it would ask for volunteers among its richest citizens. Usually one would step up to gain glory or avoid scorn; if nobody did, the courts were allowed to choose the richest person who hadn’t helped out recently. The liturgist would fund the warship and command it as captain for two years, after which his debt to the state was considered discharged and he was given a golden crown. Historians treat the liturgy as a gray area between voluntary service and compulsory taxation; most rich Athenians were eager to serve and gain the relevant honor, but they also knew that if they didn’t, they could be compelled to perform the same service with less benefit to their personal reputation.

Defense analysts warn that America’s naval dominance is declining:

    Only 25 per cent of America’s 114 commissioned surface combatants (cruisers, destroyers, and littoral combat ships) are less than a decade old. By comparison more than 80 per cent of China’s 141 destroyers, frigates, and corvettes have been commissioned in the past decade. In the same time period, the United States commissioned 30 surface combatants … The nearly 600-ship Navy of the late 1980s deployed only 15 per cent of the fleet on average. Today, with fewer than 300 ships, the US Navy deploys more than 35 per cent to service its global missions, contributing to a material death spiral.

So America is short on warships. But it is very long on rich people with big egos. An aircraft carrier would cost the richest American billionaires about the same fraction of their wealth as a trireme cost the richest Athenian aristocrats. So I say: bring back the liturgy!

The American rich already enjoy spending their money on exciting vehicles — yachts for the normies, rockets for the more ambitious, Titanic submersibles for the suicidal. Why not redirect this impulse towards public service? Imagine the fear it would strike into the hearts of the Chinese when the USS Musk enters Ludicrous Mode in the waters off the Taiwan Strait, with Elon himself at the wheel. Imagine how efficiently the USS Jeff Bezos will deliver its payloads! And does anyone doubt that billionaires – usually careful to avoid taxes — will jump at the chance to do this?

The Athenians had a parallel liturgy for rich people who would select and sponsor theater productions, but I think we can skip this one for now.

[…]

Legalize Lying About Your College On Resumes

Colleges trap Americans in a cycle of burdensome loans and act to reinforce class privilege. I have previously advocated making college degree a protected characteristic which it is illegal to ask people about on job applications. But this would be hard to enforce, and people would come up with other ways to communicate their education level.

So let’s think different: let’s make it legal to lie about your college on resumes (it is already not technically illegal to lie on a resume, but companies can ask for slightly different forms of corroboration which it is illegal to lie on). Everyone can just say “Harvard”, and nobody will have any unfair advantage over anyone else.

Start An Internet-Pop-Up Trade War With The European Union

For too long, Americans have groaned under the weight of foreign cookie-related-pop-ups which they and their elected representatives have no control over. It’s time to fight back.

When I am elected, I will mandate that all American websites serve popups to European Union residents explaining why the GDPR is annoying and why it affects even Americans who have no say in it. If the Europeans want to be able to access Google, Facebook, Twitter, or any other US-based site without clicking “I understand” every time they reload it, they’ll have to pressure their government to do something about GDPR.

Appoint Donald Trump Constitutional Monarch

This would require a constitutional amendment, but I’m sure I could convince enough people.

The British experience suggests that the role of a constitutional monarch is to flaunt how rich they are, get 24-7 news coverage regardless of whether or not they do anything interesting, and have scandals. Donald Trump is the best person in the world at all three of these things

Trump wants to be on top, but is not that interested in governing. Meanwhile, American liberals (by revealed preference) want to continue thinking about him every hour of every day forever, but also don’t want him to govern. Constitutional monarchy would satisfy everyone’s preferences. If Trump is destined to destroy democracy — and everyone agrees that he is — let’s make it happen as gently and non-destructively as possible.

Obviously the royal family can’t participate in regular electoral politics, which means no Trump would ever be able to run for office ever again. This is the only way we are ever getting rid of them, you know this is true, please don’t throw away this chance.

I would support reverse primogeniture-based inheritance — ie the youngest son takes the throne — just so we can have a “King Barron”.

August 18, 2023

One Day in August – Dieppe – Part 2 – The Plan

Filed under: Britain, Cancon, France, Germany, History, Military, USA, WW2 — Tags: , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

WW2TV
Published 17 Jan 2021

Part 2 – The Plan With David O’Keefe

David O’Keefe joins us again. In Part 1 he talked about the real reason for the raid on Dieppe in August 1942. In Part 2 we talk about the plan for Operation Jubilee and David will share his presentation about the intentions of the raid and how it was supposed to unfold.

A final show sometime in the summer will come live from Dieppe to explain how the plan unravelled and how the nearly 1,000 British, Canadian and American commandos died.
(more…)

July 25, 2023

If you bet on Admiral Franchetti becoming the next CNO for the US Navy, collect your winnings

Filed under: Military, USA — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 04:00

I don’t follow US military appointments closely because I’m not in the military, nor an American, so the first time I think I heard of Admiral Franchetti was back in May where Brent Ramsey’s report touted her as the one to watch for the upcoming appointment as the Chief of Naval Operations (she became VCNO in September 2022). Now, CDR Salamander confirms that Admiral Franchetti is almost certainly now the “CNO in waiting”:

Admiral Lisa Franchetti, Vice-Chief of Naval Operations, US Navy.

I am sure that everyone here understands that at the end of last week white smoke rose over The Navy Yard signaling that we had an official nominee for the next Chief of Naval Operations (CNO).

Barring some Ottomanesque bureaucratic defenestration like we saw as Admiral Moran was set to be CNO after Admiral Richardson, the nominee to replace Admiral Gilday as CNO will be Admiral Franchetti — presently the Vice CNO.

Because people in DC can’t seem to keep their mouths shut when they should, unfortunately in mid-month there were some leaks coming out that Admiral Paparo would — surprisingly as the general consensus was the Franchetti was slotted to be the next CNO — be recommended to be the next CNO.

Read the link above it you’re interested in the state of play on the 13th, but things wound up heading as most thought with Franchetti getting the nod. Exceptionally well prepared for INDOPACOM, Paparo will head to there where he is expected to continue to do great and important things for the Navy and the nation it serves at at time where we have no luxury for a learning curve.

Despite Ramsey’s article not-so-subtly raising doubts about Admiral Franchetti’s qualifications for the post, CDR Salamander seems to be signally unruffled with the news:

Her wiki page has a nice concise summary;

    Since promotion to flag rank, Franchetti has held appointments as: commander, United States Naval Forces Korea; commander Carrier Strike Group 9; commander, Carrier Strike Group 15; and chief of staff, Joint Staff, J-5, Strategy, Plans and Policy; and Commander, United States Sixth Fleet, Naval Striking and Support Forces NATO; deputy commander, United States Naval Forces Europe; deputy commander United States Naval Forces Africa; and Joint Force Maritime Component Commander.

  • Western Pacific: she knows Korea and all associated areas. She also has Pappy coming in to INDOPACOM — an exceptional partner. I hope they have a solid professional relationship already.
  • Fleet Challenges: from maintenance to readiness, her time leading CSG-9 and CSG-15 gave her a first person look at it. She knows it.
  • JS J5: that speaks for itself.
  • C6F et al: she knows Europe and has already built a working and personal relationship with many of her peers in NATO. She’s seen up close what they do and how they do it. Invaluable.
  • VCNO: the most important. She’s seen OPNAV and the Potomac Flotilla up close. The greatest danger to her tenure as CNO — and as such our Navy and the nation it serves — is not spotty relationships with the SECNAV and his staff; it not Congress; is not the press; is not the economy; and it sure isn’t her Sailors writ large — no — the greatest threat is the long-dwell nomenklatura in a commuting distance of The Pentagon and The Hill who do not see their job as adjusting their responsibilities to support the CNO, but to bend the CNO towards their personal agendas, projects, and job security. There are some exceptional and valuable people there to support the CNO, but the organization is worm-ridden with rent seekers and bad actors. She’s seen that up close. She knows it.

Since making Flag, she managed to walk around all the rakes, had good luck and timing (part of any success), and she did a solid job as assigned. She has the right experience and performance.

I know a handful of people, some friends of mine for over two decades, who know her personally and have since they were both JOs. With one mild exception, these people I would trust my family with speak well of her. That combined with what I’ve seen in open source works for me.

July 18, 2023

Seaplanes? How 1940s. No, we’re seeking to “leverage emerging technologies” instead

Filed under: China, India, Japan, Military, Pacific, Technology, USA — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

CDR Salamander wonders about a modern need for military sea rescue capability that the US Navy filled with flying boats and seaplanes during the Second World War, then supplemented with helicopters during Korea and Vietnam. For ocean search-and-rescue in a combat environment in the present or near future, what are the USN’s plans?

I will be the first person to admit that good, well-meaning, and informed people can disagree with seaplanes in general or the US-2 specifically, but they have to engage the conversation. Directly argue the requirement or offer realistic alternatives.

This does neither. If anything is demonstrates the narrowness of thought and fragility of substance used in opposition.

What an patronizingly toxic stew that answer is. I highly doubt Lung typed out that answer himself, so my commentary below is not directed at him personally, but … and it is what comes after the “but” that counts — but at the three-digit J or N code that extruded that from the random acquisitions professional statement subroutine from ChatGPT.

Let’s give that answer a full Fisking;

  • “The Indo-Pacific operational environment has evolved significantly since World War II”:

    • Let me check my WWII Pacific chart, my Vietnam War era globe, and GoogleEarth … and … no. The geography has not changed. The distances have not changed. The requirement of thousands of years to take and hold territory or eliminate your enemy from access to it has not changed. All the little islands, regardless of what Al Gore and John Kerry say, are still there. As we are seeing in the Russo-Ukrainian War, a million PPT slides saying so does not change the fundamentals of war.

    Sentence one is invalid.

  • “The employment of seaplanes today would not meet the operational demands and current threat scenario.”

    Is there an operational demand for us to rescue downed airmen and to be able to reach remote islands without airfields? Yes. Does your “current threat scenario” run from Northern Japan through to Darwin, Australia? Yes.

    Sentence two is invalid.

  • “However, we support the continuous development of new and innovative solutions that may provide solutions to logistical challenges.”

    • So, you define “new” as something that only exists on PPT slides? By “continuous development” you mean never matures as a design that goes into production. By “innovative” you mean high on technology risk. Undefined program risk. Unknown design risk. No known production line or remote estimate to IOC, much less FOC when we know that the next decade is the time of most danger of the next Great Pacific War.

    Sentence three is irresponsible and professionally embarrassing given the history of transformational wunderwaffe this century.

  • “As an example, DARPA’s Liberty Lifter X-Plane seeks to leverage emerging technologies that may demonstrate seaborn strategic and tactical lift capabilities.”

    • Well, goodness, we will have to micro-Fisk this gaslighting horror show of a sentence. To start with, they are talking about either this from General Atomics;

    … that could only be used on a very few select beaches under ideal weather in a completely permissive environment and could only be used for one specific mission and nowhere any possible hostile aircraft or ground forces. Also looks like we’d need a whole new engine and a small town’s worth of engine mechanics to maintain the maintenance schedule on those engines.

    Then we have this offspring of an accidental mating of the Spruce Goose with the Caspian Sea Monster idea from Aurora Flight Sciences;

    I give the odds of either one of those taking to the air prior to 2035, if ever, on par with a return of the submarine LST of Cold War fame (deck gun not included).

    Let’s get back to the wording of that dog’s breakfast of a final sentence. Feel slimy reading it? You should;

  • “seeks to leverage” — that is just a way of saying, “hope in magic beans.” Gobbledegook.
  • “emerging technologies” — oh, you mean something that hasn’t left the computer, white board, or PPT slide.
  • “that may demonstrate” — so, even if our magic beans managed to fuse unobtainium with Amrita, we’re not really sure if the strip mining of strange blue creatures’s holy sites and drilling holes in the soft pallet of whale-like thing will result in something of use.
  • “strategic and tactical lift capabilities” — I’m sorry, an eight or ten-engined aircraft that any goober with a 1960s-era iron-sighted RPG-7 could target at maximum range is going do anything “tactical” — especially at the expected price of those things and the resulting precious few that wind up displacing water. Oh, and you admit that it will only be used for cargo, so it can’t do the full range of possible missions the US-2 can … just cargo. On just a few beaches that are fully surveyed ahead of time. At the right tide. In the right weather. In a 100% safe and permissive environment.
  • The final sentence is a caricature.

Rep. Austin Scott (R-GA) should feel at least mildly insulted by this reply. It was a serious question given a canned answer that, slightly modified, could have been provided at any time in the last quarter century by the lethargically complacent maintainers of the suboptimal habits of the mistakingly entitled acquisitions nomenklatura

July 10, 2023

Echoes of War: Accounts of Operation Husky and the Allied Landings in Sicily

Filed under: Britain, Cancon, History, Italy, Military, USA, WW2 — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

OTD Military History
Published 9 Jul 2023

On July 9/10 Allied forces launched Operation Husky, the invasion of Sicily. This video presents accounts from various Allied military personnel who were there that day.
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Remington-Lee Model 1885

Filed under: History, Military, USA, Weapons — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Forgotten Weapons
Published 5 Sept 2015

The model of 1885 (a modern collector designation; Remington called these the “Remington Magazine Rifle” and did not differentiate between the different versions) was the final iteration of James Paris Lee’s bolt action rifle made by Remington. It incorporated a number of improvements from the earlier versions, including a relocated bolt handle, improved bolt head, and a magazine that could now hold cartridges securely without the use of a sliding catch at the nose.

These rifles were made in .45-70 caliber for US use and in .43 Spanish for export sales. The US Navy purchased most of the .45-70 guns that were made, and this particular rifle is one of those Navy guns. By the time these rifles were actually in production, Great Britain had also decided to adopt the Lee system in 1888, which would go through several iterations and ultimately become the iconic SMLE that would be the mainstay of British infantry during the First World War.
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July 3, 2023

Three Forgotten Roman Megaprojects

Filed under: Europe, History, Italy, Military — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

toldinstone
Published 31 Mar 2023

The longest tunnel in ancient history. A highway suspended over a raging river. A secret harbor for the Roman navy. These are three of the most impressive Roman engineering projects that you’ve probably never heard of.
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