tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-88074712942269859182024-02-19T01:54:15.920-05:00Stories Of The Cold WarStories of the Cold War is a collection of various misadventures that occurred from 1950-1990. Most of the stories have a military component, and usually involves some ironic twist. Enjoy!Phil Gardockihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13213683478302437856noreply@blogger.comBlogger38125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8807471294226985918.post-57616954245393977532023-05-22T21:47:00.002-04:002023-05-25T07:52:30.545-04:00A Sea of White.<div style="text-align: justify;">I received my first copy of "The Roving Saint." And reading the article "A Not so Typical Midshipman Cruise." It brought me back to 1977...<br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /><fade out, queue harp music><br /><br />It was May, and I had just finished FTM school for the Talos missile system radar, the AN/SPG-49. I had orders to the USS Oklahoma City, CG-5, then the current flagship for ComSeventhFleet. <br /><br />But first, a final training for damage control and fire fighting. <br /><br />After 3 major carrier fires in the late 60's, it was decided every sailor would attend fire-fighting school so everyone would be useful in case a major conflagration takes out the main fire fighting teams. Which happened in one of the carrier fires. So before my flight to Japan, I had to first go to the training center in San Diego. <br /><br />On the flight down from Mare Island, I met a newly minted DS-3, also attending fire-fighting school and also destined for the Oklahoma City, KC Van Hingle. Some people get all the luck with names...<br /><br />After breakfast, we headed for where we thought the fire-fighting school was. There was a large open air building, with a cavernous opening large enough to accommodate several trucks passing through simultaneously. We made a left face and came to a full stop. In the compound was a sea of white uniforms. About 2-300 ensigns, all in their dress whites. After a second or two, I realized we were looking at the graduating class of Annapolis, 1977.<br /></div><div><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">And in every right hand, a cup of coffee.<br /><br />I muttered to KC, "I want to salute."<br /><br />He whispered back, "They'll kill you."<br /><br />"We have too. Its the rules. No cover, first meeting of the day, enlisted meeting an officer."<br /><br />A whole class who, for 4 years, had beaten into them, military etiquette. The thought of reflexive muscle memory driving hundreds of return salutes, and gallons of coffee staining uniforms was proving a difficult to resist. <br /><br />With a heavy sigh of what could have been, we approached the mass of gold and white. <br /><br />Though our decision to forgo the salute was met with some disapproval, there were ensigns who acknowledged the unusual circumstances we found ourselves in. And understood that adhering strictly to protocol might have resulted in a coffee-stained cascade of returned salutes. Respect for safety superseded the requirement for a formal salute in this particular scenario.<br /><br />Then something better occurred. Through the wide opening drove the roach coach. The driver cleared the crowd in a wide arc before coming to a stop.<br /><br />The side window of the food truck opened. A large black woman leaned out, her voice resonating with an echo that captured everyone's attention exclaimed, "LOOK AT ALL THE BABY ENSIGNS! OH, YOU LOOK SO SWEET, I COULD JUST PINCH EVERY ONE OF YOU!"<br /><br />KC and I just tried to look anywhere else at that point. This kind of embarrassment does not need to be observed. But by then, we were surrounded by the sea of white, each with a punctuation mark of red.<br /><br />It was an interesting class. The officers were sent back to don their khaki's, and class began. Just 5 enlisted and over 200 officers. All of us nubes to the fleet.<br /><br />And I got to see the new movie, "Star Wars!"</div>Phil Gardockihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13213683478302437856noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8807471294226985918.post-80552432964452732612022-09-27T19:15:00.003-04:002023-10-06T14:38:25.214-04:00The Russo-Ukraine War, a Wargamers Perspective
<p style="text-align: center;"><b>The Russo-Ukraine War, a Wargamers Perspective</b></p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">As a wargamer, I have conquered Russia a hundred times, and have repelled the Nazi's about the the same number of times. In the 80's, I built a corps level computer game on the topic,<a href="https://www.myabandonware.com/game/road-to-moscow-52z" target="_blank"> Road to Moscow.</a> In the 90's I spent years working on the <a href="https://www.ign.com/games/road-to-moscow" target="_blank">remake, down to the detail of company level.</a> What is the attraction? Some say because it was the largest war ever. Others say because no matter which side you play, you get to beat up on the bad guy.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">So I thought I knew what was going on with the latest war in Ukraine. And I was totally wrong on just about everything. </p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">The size of the land hasn't changed, but the numbers of troops fighting are an order of magnitude smaller. </p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Russia started WWII with about 2.2 million men in the army. They started the Ukraine war with about 850,000 men under arms, but only 300,000 for the army, deploying 200,000 for the war. And with the level of corruption being revealed, these numbers may be overstatements. Ukraine started the war with an army and air force of around 200,000 men.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">In a game of Russian Campaign, this would be like having 8 units fighting 6.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">When the war was launched, the Russians attacked with 10 Armies.</p>
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<td style="text-align: center;">Too many words. There has to be a picture. </td>
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<p style="text-align: justify;">While the propaganda kept promoting the Russian failures at this time. For the most part, the 49th, 58th and the 8th Combined Arms Armies (CAA) and were successful in south Ukraine at achieving their objectives. One reason I have read for this was the 49th and the 58th had a large percentage of experienced troops, and performed competently. Once they achieved their objective, they pretty much were allowed to dig in. The 8th CAA, however is a relativity new formation, recruited from Separatists elements from the Donbas region. It performed poorly. Taking 3 months to capture it's main objective of the city of Mariupol, losing 6,000 dead in the process. </p>
<p><b>What is a Russian Combined Arms Army?</b></p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">In WWII, an army would have from 5-12 divisions. 6 being pretty normal, plus supporting structures like supply, artillery and communications battalions. Today, to deal with asymmetric warfare, throwing divisions at a problem is just a waste of resources. The divisions still exist, and are fairly recognizable in formation to their WWII equivalent, but their purpose has changed. Their purpose now is to supply and support 1 or more Battalion Tactical Groups to an area. The BTG will be mostly mounted infantry, with integral support of armor and artillery. A tidy little package designed to take on insurgents over a wide area. In theory, a division could supply 9 of these into combat, but over the last decade, they were hard pressed to supply even 2. </p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">In response, divisions were being decommissioned and replaced with brigades. Brigades will have from 2-6 battalions in total, and in theory could create 4 BTG's, though 1-2 in practice. But still represented less overhead than divisions, providing practically the same bang.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">The first obvious problem with this is what if you run into a real division? How long will your BTG last in face of a regiment backed by a battalion of artillery? It's a bad accident waiting to happen.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">And over the last few month's that is what I am reading. A Ukrainian brigade mauling BTG after BTG.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">There is several reasons why the Russians have not been totally routed so far. One is that the Ukrainian Army, despite all the propaganda, is pretty much equipped as the Russians. And they don't have all that many brigades to fight with, and so pretty much have to split them up in battalions just to cover the ground. The second reason is, that for all its incompetency, the Russians have overwhelming numbers of artillery. And are fairly competent in it's use. This cannot be overstated. From the Ukrainian perspective, they cannot hold ground. If they do, the Russians will pound them. The Ukrainians have difficulty exploiting gaps in Russian lines. Because artillery can pound those gaps. Ukrainians are sensitive to casualties, the Russians are not. </p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Also, it seems, that while Russia seems to feel the need to need to attack, Ukraine does not at this time. Russian logistics are beyond their breakpoint for the little ground they have taken. Ukraine really is holding much the ground with trip wire defensive's. Many Ukrainian Brigades have been pulled out for reasons unknown. Probably training and up equipping. And when they show up, it will be bad for the Russians. Russian equipment losses are being made up for by digging ever deeper into the Soviet stockpile. Which has been poorly maintained over the decades.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Evidence of this is the missiles fired by their aircraft are sometimes 50 years old. The recent Ukrainian offensive has offered another hint at how deep the Russians have dug. A captured T-62 tank. Produced from 1961 to 1975. Implying they have worked their way through all the operational T-72's in their inventory of around 20,000.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">A couple of months ago, Russia started running out of 122mm shells for their medium guns. And had to commission their 152's. With ammunition being now supplied by North Korea.</p>
<p><b>On Training and Conscription.</b></p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">The latest call by Putin is to increase conscription by 300,000 men. But what will he get for this call up? Even before the war, the training cycle for conscripts was deceptive. Every six months, Russia would draft about 130,000 men, but only about 100,000 would actually be drafted, and according to one article I read, only about 70,000 complete the training and serve their year. </p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">The Russian training system involves newly trained officers from school to train the platoon, 20-30 men, which they would command. This system has totally broken down due to the high officer casualties. Assuming Russia gets the 300,000 conscripts called for, there are not enough academy grads to train this flood of recruits. The answer of course is to pull veterans from the front lines to train the recruits. But the front lines are already greatly decimated and I am sure commanders would be unwilling to give any up.</p>
<p><b>How decimated?</b></p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">For once, the word decimated seems a radical under statement. Some areas have battalion tactical groups (BTG) reporting only a 100 effectives out of 800. The good news is the BTG's were probably never up to strength. Instead of around 800, they may have started at around 500. And in dealing with realities on the ground, the official strength from captured documents has been down sized to around 340. <a href="https://warontherocks.com/2022/06/not-built-for-purpose-the-russian-militarys-ill-fated-force-design/" target="_blank">See Here.</a></p><p style="text-align: justify;">The total KIA's the Russians have suffered is subject to debate. Last month, Russian acknowledged 5,900 dead. Ukraine's estimate of Russian dead is 50,000. This is somewhat validated by this document that surfaced earlier in September:</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbZ1uylcbahzS8y5MLNJOfexWabqaxKBEjX1WRT0BgbnZRCByB6VeDMPSB_ADEI9Hf8aezLoYFBGWyuRgVLgucB_16ZhgJ4g4OyEARI9rjGK_0tbE8UEDEZh5ZhVRRNpX0i6miDYaX4B8VwPk1nAN4_93xUGedzcH4Jj3QPk5CWdX0wIy9aImtFfNw/s1024/RussianCasualties9Sept.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="716" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbZ1uylcbahzS8y5MLNJOfexWabqaxKBEjX1WRT0BgbnZRCByB6VeDMPSB_ADEI9Hf8aezLoYFBGWyuRgVLgucB_16ZhgJ4g4OyEARI9rjGK_0tbE8UEDEZh5ZhVRRNpX0i6miDYaX4B8VwPk1nAN4_93xUGedzcH4Jj3QPk5CWdX0wIy9aImtFfNw/w280-h400/RussianCasualties9Sept.jpeg" width="280" /></a></div><p style="text-align: justify;">It's in Russian of course. I am told it is an synopsis of the amount of money paid out to Russian families for killed members.The math is 361.9 billion rubles total, 7.4 million per fallen soldier, for 48,900 KIA's. The document may be real, but it is still suspect, not because it is falsified, but because of the layers of corruption in the whole system. Each layer can benefit for padding the numbers here. Where someone can add to the casualty list, and pocket the 7.4 million per. This document came out before the latest offensive by Ukraine.<br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;">The Ukrainians have claimed to have killed about 50,000 Russians. But that can be propaganda as well. </p><p style="text-align: justify;">Estimates on Ukrainian dead range from 5,500 to 11,000.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Wounded estimates would be from 1 man invalided per dead and at least 2 men wounded, but recoverable per dead.<br /></p><p><b>The War in the Sky</b></p><p style="text-align: justify;">In theory, the Russians should have dominated the air war. This is again, applying western doctrine to an air-force that is not a western nation. The Russian doctrine in the air evolved in WWII, and frankly, has not altered much. In WWII, they would mass fighter bombers over the battlefield, supporting the troops. Casualties be damned. Their methods of dealing with German fighter aircraft relied on numbers. Their main tactic to defeat the Luftwaffe was to never stop fighting, wear it down, and eventually, drive a tank down the runway. Overall, the single purpose of the Russian Air force is to support the army. <br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;">Western air evolved concepts of trying to defeat the enemies structures supporting the air force. Be it industry, radars, air fields, etc. Why they evolved differently is environmental. The Soviets were nose to nose with the Germans. And if they drove two hundred miles, they would be in a position to put a tank on the end of a runway. The need for deep penetration bombers, and supporting long range fighters was simply not there. </p><p style="text-align: justify;">In the west, for two years, the German bases were not vulnerable to ground attack, so different methodology evolved. When the Western Allies finally got to grips with the Wehrmacht, the doctrines of ground support for the troops had to be evolved whole cloth. While the Russians had been doing it for 3 years.<br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;">It's been 80 years since then. And frankly, neither side has changed their views on how to fight the air war. For the Russians, this means ground support. Occasionally, they send a bomber armed with "Less than precision" guided missiles to bomb a strategic target. Mostly striking things that couldn't possibly be the intended target. Of course, we only have the Ukrainians word on what was hit, and the Russians word of what the intended target was. But the point is, Russian deep penetration strike performance on Ukrainian infrastructure is lack-luster at best. Because that is not their doctrine. And the quality and the number of missiles seem to be limited.<br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;">In the initial phases of their offensive, the Russian air force was fairly active over the battlefield itself. Doing what they were trained to do, supporting the troops. YouTube is full of videos of Ukrainian missiles shooting down Russian craft in the early periods. About a hundred manned air craft in total. Mostly lost in low altitude strikes on Ukrainian positions. The difference between WWII and today is in WWII, the Soviets were producing Sturmoviks by the gross, while today, a single SU-35 costs 60 million dollars. Every loss is felt. </p><p style="text-align: justify;">Rumor has it, that Russia needs to cannibalize civilian commercial products to get the IC chips needed to build their jets. Specifically Bosch dish washers looted from Ukrainian homes.<br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;">Ukrainian air losses are about the same as Russians in numbers. But for all the news of this-or-that country donating new Soviet equipment, little has been reported in actually showing up. Ukrainian fighters seem to be dedicated to air defense.<br /></p><p><b>Drones</b> <br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;">The details on the drone war will be the most interesting read when this war is over. Every country will study the results, most of which is still secret. </p><p style="text-align: justify;">In reconnaissance, drones have proven invaluable. To be able to target real time, over the horizon targets cannot be understated. From interdicting supplies with a drone, a M777 howitzer at 18 miles, landing a shell on truck crossing a bridge. Or distracting a Russian flagship, allowing a couple of missiles blind side it to oblivion. </p><p style="text-align: justify;">Ukraine has an indigenous drone company, formed by veterans of the 2014 War in the Donbas. They have been turning out "Punishers". Small, stealthy, carrying only 4.4 pounds of bombs, transportable in small boxes, but in the right location, have blown up helicopters, and ammo dumps. The unit cost is about $200,000. It is the weapon of choice for Ukrainian special forces.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Then there is the Bayraktar, medium-size drones, made in Turkey, costing about 2 million each. They can carry 300 pounds of munitions, and have been battle tested in Syria.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Russia has fallen behind so far in drone capability, they are buying them from Iran.<br /></p><p><b>On Corruption</b></p><p style="text-align: justify;">The effects of corruption has come to has been brought to light throughout this war. Tanks without reactive armor, supply deficiencies, reserve equipment left to rust, missiles that should have been combat worthy, were not, communications equipment not working, divisions only able to send 1 battalion into combat at 75% strength, training commands only training 53% of their yearly muster. </p><p style="text-align: justify;">All evidence that if you were Putin's friend, you had a license to steal. If you were a friend of a friend of Putin, you could steal, but had to pay your share up the chain.<b> </b></p><p style="text-align: justify;">Creating an army, when put to the test, is failing badly everywhere.<b><br /></b></p><p><b>The Putin Effect</b></p><p style="text-align: justify;">Much is being said of Putin's interference in the war. More and more it is being said he is directing the army to do this or that. And this may be true. But there is a more subtle, and probably more pervasive problem of Putin's interference. Generals are <i>not </i>taking actions they know need to be done, without Putin's orders. An example is during the Ukrainian offensive earlier in September. All of us arm chair strategists looked at what was going on, and seeing disaster for the Ukrainians at every step. Their penetrations were too deep, not leaving troops to cover Russians they bypassed. The Russians need only leave their bases and close the door, trapping the Ukrainians behind enemy lines.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">And that did not happen. The shock of the attacks paralyzed the Russian high command. They waited for orders from on high, and got nothing. So they hunkered down, and hoped for the best. </p><p style="text-align: justify;">Today, Sept 27, Putin, apparently channeling Hitler from 1941, issued a no step back order for his army. He is relying on sending reinforcements to the front to stabilize things. One Russian soldier, was mobilized on the 21st, captured on the 27th.<br /></p><p><b>How is it that Ukraine has not won the war yet?</b></p><p style="text-align: justify;">First, no one expected Ukraine to go the distance. Probably they themselves are surprised. So in the beginning, the war was a desperate attempt to stop what Russian juggernaut with what equipment they had on hand. While dealing with mass migrations, and keeping the lights on against random Russian missile strikes.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">It took time for the realities of the Russian army to manifest. But they still kept moving forward, and had to be responded to. The Ukrainians got real good at defensive warfare. As things stabilized, some Ukrainian units disappeared. Some still have yet to make an appearance. Others were cycled for rest and reequip, like the 92nd Mech Brigade. When the war movies are made, the 92nd will be center piece in them. That unit has been the bane of several Russian armies. It's commander will be their Patton. </p><p style="text-align: justify;">But the question is, can Ukraine attack? And we had our answer this month, yes. But they still have to cautious. Ukraine is sensitive to casualties, and Russian artillery is still the key player to beat in this game. </p><p style="text-align: justify;">But also, is Ukrainian success on the attack this month an indicator of their effectiveness? Or of Russian incompetence? Frankly, the force multipliers of Russian corruption, Putin's interference, and poor training levels is making Ukraine look like supermen. <br /></p><p><b>The End Game:</b><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;">What is the end game? Dangerous ground here to make predictions here. At this point, I think Ukraine is going to go for recovering all lost territory, including that lost in 2014. And not one square foot more. Crossing the Russian border would be a propaganda coup that Putin could capitalize on to legitimized full mobilization, and possibly authorize nuclear strikes. He is already trying to make claims of Ukrainian agents operating in Russia. No one believes him, but to provide actual proof is a different matter. Regardless of how well Ukraine is doing right now, they cannot conqueror Russia. <br /></p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p>
Phil Gardockihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13213683478302437856noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8807471294226985918.post-85317208538301654862022-07-17T10:49:00.003-04:002023-03-17T08:29:18.365-04:00On Hypersonic Missiles<p>On Hypersonic Missiles</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Hypersonic is classified as something traveling faster than 5 times the speed of sound. 3,800 MPH at sea level, about 2,700 MPH at 30,000 feet. Roughly a mile a second. All the great nations are researching hypersonic weapons to some degree or another, and have been for many decades. </p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">The task is daunting. First, you need an engine capable of generating the thrust. Then the materials capable of withstanding the heat. The thrust of a large rocket engine is more than enough, providing the materials can survive the atmospheric friction. Any of the rockets sent to the International Space Station has to go 5 times that fast. The missiles require exotic materials to survive the heat generated during reentry. But these technologies are decades old, and a secret to no one. </p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Both Russia and China are making claims of having Hypersonic Weapons. There is no doubt that they do. China has officially deployed a system, the DF-ZF hypersonic glide vehicle (HGV). Russia has deployed the Avangard. Both of these systems launch from an ICBM rocket to speeds up to mach 20, where they then glide at hypersonic speeds towards their targets. The Russian weapon is more problematic, as it is a strategic weapon, it's target of choice are cities. It probably can do what it is advertised it can do, since it carries a nuke and only needs a to get within a mile of it's target. </p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">The Chinese weapon, has been labeled a carrier killer. And the propaganda is that it can kinetic kill a US aircraft carrier out to 1,800 miles. They have tested the HGV about 7 or so times, each with the propaganda deluge in western press about it's ability to destroy a carrier, at range. It is clear, that this is an attempt to put the fear of this weapon and cause our navy to keep it's distance, as China expands it's influence into the Pacific, and they do not want the competition. </p>
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<td>DF-17s on display. Image stolen from the internet without permission</td>
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<p style="text-align: justify;">And the USN's response is usually nothing. No denials of enemies capabilities, no counter arguments as to "Well we have...". The propaganda trolls in the east are facing a wall of nothing in response to their claims. It is almost like the USN doesn't really care.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">It could be they don't. The USN certainly understands the problems involved with fielding such a weapon, and the threat it imposes. The USN, like it's Chinese counterparts, also understand The Fire Control problem. I was a Fire Controlman 1976-1982. At that time there were 72 variables required to put a shot on the target. This was just a simple ballistic program. Beyond certain ranges, you cannot know all the variables. For long range shots, you have to rely on Mid Course Guidance. Beyond that, Terminal Homing. Without these, all you are going to do is make a big splash in the water.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">As an example. The Nimitz is steaming at 20 knots at a range of 1,000 miles. The HGV's time of flight is 8 minutes. If the HGV hit it's precise targeted position, the Nimitz will have moved on 3 miles. Even if the HGV leads the target by 3 miles, the Nimitz will only need to change it's course by .1 degree to avoid being hit. Frankly, the prevailing current will be enough of a jink to cause a miss.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">The HGV will need some way to upgrade it's course along the way, referred to as Mid Course Guidance. This will require something putting their eyes on the target, provide feedback to the control systems, which will update the missiles targeting computer. I requires that something is tracking the target. It could be satellite, which would need to be overhead at just the right time. Or a drone. or a high value target like an AWACS. </p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">One thing the current war between Russia and Ukraine has revealed is that drones are going to receive a much high priority in getting destroyed. Any AWACS is going to have a very limited life span when it breaks the radar ring what would be circling Carrier task force in a hot war situation. </p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Even if there are "eyes on target", getting a guidance signal to an HGV will be difficult as well It's surface temperature will be exceeding the melting point of steel, see <a href="https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-physics-and-hype-of-hypersonic-weapons/" target="_blank">Scientific American</a>. This will have the effect of creating ionizing radiation "noise" across a universal spectrum. Getting a signal to update the HGV course becomes problematic. Especially if it is over the horizon.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Accuracy further degrades as the HGV has to deal with being jostled due to it generating random atmospheric vortexes from it's own heat, as well as from the pressure wave in front of it.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Another question is what is the minimum range of these weapons? At ranges where ground systems can provide the guidance updates may be too close for the missile to climb to altitude, then glide back at the speeds necessary to be effective . All missiles have a minimum effective range. For these weapons, that range is going to be excessive. I truly don't know what the minimum range of the HGV is. I have seen Intermediate Ballistic Missile minimum ranges between 240 and 500 miles. </p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">There are estimates that the surface temperature of these missiles will be heated to at least 2,000K, the electronics for this missile will have to be well insulated. Possibly sealed in a Dewar flask. Which also means it is effectively isolated electronically, like in a Faraday cage. The electronics would be vulnerable any break in the control wiring, be it from melting wires, violent shudders, or stretching hull. All of which could disable the mid course guidance systems. </p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">I think the only way this missile works, is they fire and pray the terminal seeker will pick up a signal in the last 15 seconds of flight. The terminal seeker will have to be shielded for most of the flight, and uncovered just in time. It has to be able to "see" the target through the shock wave of compressed, heated gas in front of it, before extreme temperatures destroy the delicate sensors required. Then they have to hope their aileron surfaces didn't weld together, or their electronics didn't fry. Because at these speeds, this missile cannot maneuver too much, because it could come apart from the forces involved.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">I have some experience with near hypersonic missiles. In the late 70's, I was a Fire Controlman for both the Talos and Terrier Surface to Air missile radars. Both of these missiles are capable of speeds in excess of mach 2. In 1980, the USN was retiring the Talos system. And it was decided to spend the Talos missile inventory as targets for other ships and planes. </p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Talos missiles are powered by ramjets, and could travel at mach 2.5. There were at least 3 such "Buzzard Ex's". In total, about 4 of these missiles were shot down. Two by the Terrier Mod 8 systems on the the USS Jouett, CG-29 and the USS Dale, CG-19. A third was shot down by the Norton Sound, the test ship for the future Aegis system. For a more humorous sides of these operations, see <a href="https://storiesofthecoldwar.blogspot.com/2011/11/buzzard-ex.html" target="_blank">Buzzard Ex</a> and <a href="http://storiesofthecoldwar.blogspot.com/2011/11/spontaneous-teleportation.html" target="_blank">Spontaneous Teleportation.</a></p>
<div><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGJXk90PCbOrcz0MBOC9eCZcihg77H5QDnsbYNmp-46ecnV7_BM0LobAlJZlwzp-hIpEpWrsNrqfR3YI5xOAZ-xY_VjAGGx9UkBUIl4NqBv0dWafhwUjNLlx7ilruSvhyGy_w7bVQkSq46YBn_oACmGs_ICtdvrCDduFlWmQg15CTmD8ciz4g7rVia/s800/Talos.webp"><img alt="" border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="800" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGJXk90PCbOrcz0MBOC9eCZcihg77H5QDnsbYNmp-46ecnV7_BM0LobAlJZlwzp-hIpEpWrsNrqfR3YI5xOAZ-xY_VjAGGx9UkBUIl4NqBv0dWafhwUjNLlx7ilruSvhyGy_w7bVQkSq46YBn_oACmGs_ICtdvrCDduFlWmQg15CTmD8ciz4g7rVia/s320/Talos.webp" width="320" /></a></div>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Admittedly, Talos is only half the speed of what is considered hyper sonic, but this was also over 40 years ago, using equipment designed in the 50's, later updated in the late 70's.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">In 2008, using a SM-3, an Aegis equipped ship, the USS Lake Erie, intercepted a satellite with a kinetic kill warhead. The satellite USA-193 was traveling at 4.8 miles per second, about <b><i>mach 23</i></b>, when intercepted.The actual target was not the satellite, but a specific spot of the satellite that would fragment the fuel tank. Causing it to fragment as to vaporize the hydrazine in the upper atmosphere.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">The US Navy is now deploying 30 kw lasers, capable of shooting down sub sonic missiles. There are higher powered lasers, planned, up to 300kw. The 300 kw probably would be powerful enough to shoot down an HGV. Hypersonic missiles cost many millions to produce. The lasers are a buck or two a shot.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">It could be the Chinese weapon system is only effective as a propaganda weapon. designed just in time to be obsolete. Such is rapidly advancing technology.</p>Phil Gardockihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13213683478302437856noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8807471294226985918.post-34921194450317254352022-04-18T22:04:00.008-04:002022-07-05T07:22:27.829-04:00The Sinking of the Moskva, Part 2<p style="text-align: center;"> The Sinking of the Moskva, Part 2</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">There is nothing like making a posting and wake up 8 hours later and have new evidence to look at. There are photos of the damaged ship before it sunk. It is showing about a 15 degree list to port, and damage to the port side superstructure.</p>
<div><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhoN9Z3Fcrwxh0ONvhxPqhjACLNyCPIzFo8yduLHEolFiIc43XyZc9uIXaiTidEKGmFLQLTyB9FfMvnD37_me4yf8W0lRxhWTtJg0dDKJfUe7NeTpq5Mu9IgnlcuT1UYXSNCckiGauLGMonxbdE8W6BaXz0xo1uEOubryALQtYhG2KELguMKCtXaWeo/s932/MoskvaCloserTugInView2.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" data-original-height="659" data-original-width="932" height="452" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhoN9Z3Fcrwxh0ONvhxPqhjACLNyCPIzFo8yduLHEolFiIc43XyZc9uIXaiTidEKGmFLQLTyB9FfMvnD37_me4yf8W0lRxhWTtJg0dDKJfUe7NeTpq5Mu9IgnlcuT1UYXSNCckiGauLGMonxbdE8W6BaXz0xo1uEOubryALQtYhG2KELguMKCtXaWeo/w640-h452/MoskvaCloserTugInView2.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
<p style="text-align: justify;">It does not show damage to the Vertical Launch SAM system midships. Between the stacks and the nippled radar dome. So I was wrong predicting a hit occurred there. I do see a little damage to the hull aft, and under the radar dome. Possibly that is fire water runoff. It looks too intact for a missile strike.</p>
<div><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_pEA6Gnfdbk92d4HLNgc0Ujp-q_jmwzeWz6NIGBfHGul3iU7vZ5J_pEz84fDq6hjO8OAGdfscdj5HYuakVvk_vV-ARnO2gnMJjkspcdkXKyWEF6364cIu8HjSoPyD_xE-dagae4exP8jH3WEgJJek79rtwJicy4XLXrp7a0unAIJs19OcOhb_1wuw/s772/moskvaCloserView2.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" data-original-height="660" data-original-width="772" height="548" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_pEA6Gnfdbk92d4HLNgc0Ujp-q_jmwzeWz6NIGBfHGul3iU7vZ5J_pEz84fDq6hjO8OAGdfscdj5HYuakVvk_vV-ARnO2gnMJjkspcdkXKyWEF6364cIu8HjSoPyD_xE-dagae4exP8jH3WEgJJek79rtwJicy4XLXrp7a0unAIJs19OcOhb_1wuw/w640-h548/moskvaCloserView2.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Going to the close up. In the area still smoking you can see flames deeper in the interior. This photo is in the daylight, and sunrise is around 6 am local. So this is at least 5 hours after the strike.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">I see two dark circular patches in the smoke, which could be the impact sites. Ukraine said that there were two missiles fired. I do not see any structural damage from those strikes. Which implies the warheads exploded on the surface, and most of their energy was diverted around the superstructure. Ukraine should take note and make the missile semi armor piercing. If it wasn't for the fuel fire, the Moskva would have gotten off light.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Which takes us to the Vulkan, surface to surface missile canisters. They are gone. Their warheads did not explode, or this would be a very different picture. But it does seem like their fuel caught fire and burned, about 24 tons of of it. </p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Then I see a lot of rectangular spots on the hull which looks like hull plates have been blown out. Many are at the main deck and look too regular to be accidental. They may be blow out plates for some munitions stored there. Oh for some blue prints. But two are larger and below the waterline. This is probably why she is listing to port.</p>
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<td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaWPtffLkx8xMmJCnzqAGR83_1L3mFFj-PejJseQQbmJjV1itndCpgyK1VbeSS-X4HMmJHxB4pxj_Py7Y93ZtIjr1IBuFqz0NIorhWKkP_XGotTonwDKoNyzEmPRhDZkDrZWjQCzJu04wv3U-9sm-8ACGn82cCjQhDNvuPevMD_Wg6gXU2pFcQvSca/s1024/MoskvaStarbordSide.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" data-original-height="571" data-original-width="1024" height="356" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaWPtffLkx8xMmJCnzqAGR83_1L3mFFj-PejJseQQbmJjV1itndCpgyK1VbeSS-X4HMmJHxB4pxj_Py7Y93ZtIjr1IBuFqz0NIorhWKkP_XGotTonwDKoNyzEmPRhDZkDrZWjQCzJu04wv3U-9sm-8ACGn82cCjQhDNvuPevMD_Wg6gXU2pFcQvSca/w640-h356/MoskvaStarbordSide.jpg" width="640" /></a></td>
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<td style="text-align: center;">Moskva in pristine condition. Note there are no black rectangles below the main deck.</td><td> </td>
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<div style="text-align: justify;"> </div><div style="text-align: justify;">I did see two videos of one impact. One was an obvious forgery. The other looked real, but I couldn't find it again. It looked real because after the impact, the smoke trail upward was a characteristic mushroom cloud, and yes, normal explosions do that, but in addition, the churning upward smoke was bright in spots, evidence of a fuel fire from the Vulkan's jet fuel. </div>
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<br /><br /><br /></div>Phil Gardockihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13213683478302437856noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8807471294226985918.post-92165102410581424852022-04-16T20:29:00.148-04:002022-09-26T14:05:15.831-04:00The Sinking of the Moskva<p style="text-align: center;"><b>The Sinking of the Moskva, Part 1<br /></b></p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">This is part 1. <a href="https://storiesofthecoldwar.blogspot.com/2022/04/the-sinking-of-moskva-part-2.html" target="_blank">For part 2, go here...</a></p><p style="text-align: justify;">As a wargamer and a former member of the US Navy, the sinking of the Russian Black Sea's flagship Moskva, is of extreme interest to me. A US Sailor has many jobs on a ship. My primary job was to maintain and operate anti-aircraft missile radars. The slew of secondary jobs included security watches, damage control, fire fighting (which is not the same thing as fire control), hull preservation and of course, cleaning. <br /><br />Other than the Internet, warships are the most complected machines built by man. And they require countless man hours to keep the ready to fight. As such, the US Navy has extensive schools to train their personnel. In my case, I was trained in their advanced electronics program, and from boot camp to stepping onboard my first ship was 20 months. And after that another 27 weeks on other equipment and logistics. My example was higher than normal compared to the average sailor, but it offers an insight on how seriously the US Navy regards training to keeping their ships operational. But a machine can only take so much, and regardless of the quality of the crews, ships have to be retired. <br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;">The sea is a harsh environment. The salt air is corrosive, and choppy water is constantly vibrating the equipment, causing loose connections and breakages. And in high seas, both man and machine take a battering. I have a lot of stories my tenure in the Navy, from 1975 to 1982, and I wrote them up in a blog called, Stories of the Cold War at <a href="https://storiesofthecoldwar.blogspot.com/">https://storiesofthecoldwar.blogspot.com/</a> <br /><br />My time in the navy has given me an insight into the sinking of the Russian Cruiser, Moskva, née Slava. When I was in, the Slava's were the Soviet's latest and greatest achievements. They were described as "Fleet Killers." Their specifications were amazing. 16 Vulkan missiles. Each missile weighs over 5 tons, carrying a 1 ton warhead at mach 3 to a range of 300 miles. And as impressive as that is, their fire control was amazing as well. The Vulkans were designed to operate in swarms, in order to overwhelm the defenses of their targets. One missile would go to altitude and scan the target area, and try to pick out the carrier in the fleet, and assign the targets to its mates that were traveling at 50 meters. If the targeting missile was shot down, another of the swarm would rise and take its place. In theory, half the swarm would target the carrier, the other half in 1's and 2's would target the carrier's escorts. Would it have worked? No one knows. If it had worked as designed, a single Slava would ruin the day for a carrier task force.<br /><br />When the Slava was designed and built, this is what we Americans would have to defend a carrier. A couple of cruisers with twin Terrier AA missile batteries, a couple of destroyers with a single terrier or tarter missile battery. The Phalanx Close in Weapon System existed, but was not widely deployed. The Aegis system had not yet been deployed. <br /><br />What does a Terrier or Tarter battery look like? Terrier was a mid range missile, official range was 40 miles. Tarter was 20 miles. Officially Terrier had already been renamed Standard Missile Extended Range, SM/ER<br /></p>
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<td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXW6iUkI_cjsnjQsouYVaqSPxQ83HMnyULooJ1Df_K2EPT3AVdoGyzwFyaCOsfJfBKJvnE32ooB4Xm0PYFnxRt0rxf8r76HIUBV6uRbQFFM-hubeu2UJBhmSi2y6iJSPd4ygxSOmBNCcjalDO2BdxOONH-2IGCR3dKYrBTYCoW5g6ACX6u9LTgAH0E/s449/Terrier.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" data-original-height="336" data-original-width="449" height="478" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXW6iUkI_cjsnjQsouYVaqSPxQ83HMnyULooJ1Df_K2EPT3AVdoGyzwFyaCOsfJfBKJvnE32ooB4Xm0PYFnxRt0rxf8r76HIUBV6uRbQFFM-hubeu2UJBhmSi2y6iJSPd4ygxSOmBNCcjalDO2BdxOONH-2IGCR3dKYrBTYCoW5g6ACX6u9LTgAH0E/w640-h478/Terrier.jpg" width="640" /></a></td>
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<td style="text-align: center;">Two Terrier missiles on the rails. Terrier has been renamed Standard Missile, Extended Range, SM/ER for short, while Tarter, was the same missile, sans booster was renamed Standard Missile, Medium Range.<br /></td>
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<p style="text-align: justify;">Terrier and Tarter were "Beam Riders", meaning they were launched into a radar beam that was pointing at the target. They had enough intelligence to stay in the beam until they got a signal to go active. The beam and the signals were radiated from their fire control radars.<br /></p>
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<td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3JgifcLielHkVrvCEsQUt9xdc72avQ93SHCz86BV1J8fLRRsX1ciIde36zxj-dlcO6VZCUbPeYpSChrV90mQfv8j337b-i0hLPHiC3H5rJI0tPKB4V15E7LaNQJA2uWm9McPntnU_jmiA42GVCJ4OACeCa1ZipzfEK06XPlC9yqVS_8tvwCb3rAQg/s928/bbb.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" data-original-height="928" data-original-width="602" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3JgifcLielHkVrvCEsQUt9xdc72avQ93SHCz86BV1J8fLRRsX1ciIde36zxj-dlcO6VZCUbPeYpSChrV90mQfv8j337b-i0hLPHiC3H5rJI0tPKB4V15E7LaNQJA2uWm9McPntnU_jmiA42GVCJ4OACeCa1ZipzfEK06XPlC9yqVS_8tvwCb3rAQg/w416-h640/bbb.jpg" width="416" /></a></td>
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<td>The Fire Control Radar AN/SPG-55B for Terrier. FYI, these were my babies for a couple of years.<br /></td>
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<p style="text-align: justify;">Fire control radars are designed to point exactly at the target. Right out that white Teflon dot in the middle of the lens. As long as they were pointing at the target, the missile was pretty assured of hitting it. In the final seconds before contact, the radar would send radiate a continuous wave signal, lighting up the target like a search light, and the missile would guide in on it in what was called, "terminal homing".</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Why am I telling you this? This is to give you an idea of what it takes to defend against an incoming missile. There are a lot of steps involved.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">It goes like this:</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">The search radar, the kind you may be familiar with, sweeps the sky at about an 8 second interval. If the target is high enough, they could see it at up to 300 miles away. A very comfortable distance. After a couple of sweeps, they get a vector and speed and decide if there is a need to assign a fire control radar to it. Remember, the range of the Terrier missile is 40 miles. Lots of time.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Once assigned, the fire control radar points in the area where the search radar saw the target, and does some pattern searches until it finds it, then "locks on", meaning the electronics of the radar will keep the target in the center of the radar beam. Assuming speeds of mach 1, and the target is heading straight at the destroyer, we have about 12 minutes before the target is range.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">The missile men pull a missile out and put it on the rails and point the launcher at target and wait.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">The missile house has room for 4 missiles to be "Ready", the remaining missiles are stored in missile rings of 20 each deeper in the ship. It takes time to bring the missiles from the rings to the ready room. So the destroyer can fire 6 missiles fast, but after that, the rate of fire slows down somewhat. </p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Which is not really a defect, as the missile battery can only have 2 missiles in the air at the same time. One per fire control radar.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">If swarmed, it was judged that a single battery could destroy 6 targets before being hit. Assuming they are at altitude, and traveling at a stately speed of mach 1.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">But the Vulkan missiles are traveling at mach 3, and that changed the math of the game. Most of the Vulkan swarm is only 50 meters off the waves, where they are visible only at 20 miles. From the time they show up on radar to impact is now 33 <i>seconds</i>. Search radar has to pick it up, assign fire control, point the fire control radar, it begins to search for the target. By then, the first Vulkan hits, but the missile launcher is now synced with the fire control radar and another Vulkan hits, and we are done here. Time for damage control.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">So even if you are ready, this was an impossible shot for the equipment of the day. </p><p style="text-align: justify;">The answer was in the near future, with Aegis and Phalanx. But Aegis would require new hulls. Phalanx could be put anywhere, but was always the last defense It is always better to shoot things down "out there", rather than "right here.". As a stop gap measure, older ships were upgraded with New Threat Upgrade, or NTU, where the missiles could be fired in the general direction of the incoming threats. </p><p style="text-align: justify;">Mid course guidance was handled by 4 receivers that were placed around the superstructure, through which the missiles updated the computers about every 4 seconds or so. The fire control system was then be used to send an uplink to the missiles if necessary, and during the final phases to illuminate the targets. This allowed for Terrier systems to engage 8 targets at a time, vice 2.<br /></p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Fast forward to now. Aegis radars scan the entire sky at a sub second rate vice 8 second sweeps. The search and tracking radars are now one and the same, so no time lost for lock on. No missile launcher to point. The missiles just launch straight from their canisters. Targets that are missed are subject to SeaRam short range missiles, and if that fails, the Phalanx CWIS system. Providing 3 layers of defense that can effectively negate the swarm.<br /></p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">So why have I subjected you to 3 pages explaining fire control systems? To provide some insight as to how many pieces have to work together for a successful, and timely intercept. I hadn't gotten into command control, the computers or the 78 variables of the fire control problem.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">All this brings us back to the Moskva. Remember the Moskva? This is an article about the Moskva. As built in the 70's, with the latest Soviet technology. So about equal to USA's late 60's tech. It's main function is to take out enemy fleets, it's secondary function is to serve as a flagship, its tertiary function is to provide anti aircraft missiles to defend the Black Sea fleet. For this it has an 64 SAN 6, "Grumble", missiles in canisters, not unlike the Aegis vertical launch system. They are mid to long range missiles, about 100 miles. And like the Terrier/Tarter missile systems, they have a low rate of fire, limited by their single fire control radar. Possibly they can have several missiles going in the same direction but different targets. But I doubt it. It also is armed with Anti-Submarine mortars and Anti-Ship torpedoes, both of which are not useful in a war with Ukraine, a nation without a fleet. <br /></p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">For short range, they have 40 SAN 4 missiles. The launcher is in what has been described as a "Pop-up Trash Can" launcher. With two fire control radars, one port, one starboard, and like the Terrier/Tarter systems of the day, probably can only have one salvo of missiles in the air per battery.</p>
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<td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPXBcXr1oWOzAP2M6k2pOf2MQCTEdabQq9CWg0hgMfx75R8whMHizdcEo8YHUmKQV1EqSaHTYhbZ4q_jpmO9xdEgR3zykT3EO_L9tjb1R4qqdYKmPoXsObcmvRjVn-UmG0jdILvV5Imm5OOKL9rXmcK_osoKDasSKgvBH40evZ5m72JPB21fpQG04u/s1920/SA-N-4.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" data-original-height="1545" data-original-width="1920" height="516" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPXBcXr1oWOzAP2M6k2pOf2MQCTEdabQq9CWg0hgMfx75R8whMHizdcEo8YHUmKQV1EqSaHTYhbZ4q_jpmO9xdEgR3zykT3EO_L9tjb1R4qqdYKmPoXsObcmvRjVn-UmG0jdILvV5Imm5OOKL9rXmcK_osoKDasSKgvBH40evZ5m72JPB21fpQG04u/w640-h516/SA-N-4.jpg" width="640" /></a></td>
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<td style="text-align: center;">The nippled dome, upper left is the fire control radar for the long range SAN 6 anti aircraft missiles. The round can in the lower center is the pop up missile launcher for the short range SAN 4 AA missiles. Just forward of the SAN 4 launchers are their FC radars.</td>
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<p style="text-align: justify;">Lastly, they have 6, 30mm, Close In Weapon Systems, like US Navy's Phalanx. If turned on, they have the short reaction time required to shoot down incoming missiles.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Regarding the Russian crew. As I mentioned earlier. Western navies are crewed by well trained men and women. Some do come nearly straight from boot camp. But not many. The core of the service are the enlisted Petty Officers. The Officers are largely in the role of business managers.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">In the Russian system, a fair portion of the crew is straight out of boot camp. Enlisted men that are trained on the systems get that training only after serving a period of service, and that training is offered as an incentive to reenlist. It is the Officers that provide most of the technical expertise, when their time as managers allows. It was said that the Alpha Class submarines, the worlds deepest diving and fastest subs, with titanium hulls, had a 100% Officer crew. Someone will correct me if I am wrong.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Whoever was crewing this ship, they were not as well trained as their western counterparts, and this has been blamed for the loss of the ship in the news media, most of which are just repeating themselves. <br /></p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">I have written much about the threat the Moskva poses to an enemy fleet. But for this war, it is not going to use those hypersonic missiles for shore bombardment. The main reason for that is the Vulkans just too expensive, and they probably don't have many of them to reload with. There is no mention that the admiral was on board, so being a flag ship is out. So it's mission seems relegated to what technically, is what the Moskva does third best, providing anti aircraft protection for the Black Sea Fleet.<br /></p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Lets look at the Neptune Anti Ship Missile.</p>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMLhEw9hW2TIgoCEQ6j636z3WaRdv--dbhza7z4mSsBqliYJ08Trz1Y4_EfbFUe4h6mQpzaHeBGK4fEIySCcUNO0JKaLuRK_BLUUd8t171g4EQi-MP-1HpR47CoYnWk2w1Wcv8Kk-PovIBpTfytCicRcTIxsDgQp4VoeIPMhVWjFHT42y5ws-9gjkh/s916/imrs.php.webp" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" border="0" data-original-height="735" data-original-width="916" height="514" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMLhEw9hW2TIgoCEQ6j636z3WaRdv--dbhza7z4mSsBqliYJ08Trz1Y4_EfbFUe4h6mQpzaHeBGK4fEIySCcUNO0JKaLuRK_BLUUd8t171g4EQi-MP-1HpR47CoYnWk2w1Wcv8Kk-PovIBpTfytCicRcTIxsDgQp4VoeIPMhVWjFHT42y5ws-9gjkh/w640-h514/imrs.php.webp" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Image stolen from the Washington Post without permission.</span><br /></td></tr></tbody></table>
<p style="text-align: justify;">This missile weighs in at about a ton, one fifth the size of the Moskva's Vulkans. It carries 330 pound warhead at a speed of about mach 1. For comparison, a French Exocet is about 350 pounds, and a Harpoon, 500 pounds. In WWII, most anti-ship bombs were in the 500-1000 pound range. While a tidy little package, it is a bit on the light side.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">The Neptune travels about 50 feet above the water line, and so only becomes visible to radar at about 9.5 miles. From there to impact is about 50 seconds. </p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">For the Moskva's missile batteries to even have a shot, they would have to be radiating and pointing in the correct direction. For the long range SAN-6, no. Because the missiles launch vertically, and then have to roll over towards the target. By the time the radar was assigned, locked on, missile launched, rolls over, the Neptune would be within the minimum range.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">The SAN 4 could have a shot, just one, if everything is working correctly.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Their AK 630's, 30mm Close In Weapon Systems should have been able to handle the engagement though. They have 4 on a side. If they were turned on. And probably they were not.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">How do I know they were not on? Because there is no report of the Moskva defending itself. They would have at least shot at the incoming Neptune's. They didn't, so they must not have been turned on. The Soviets had a policy of leaving equipment off when not needed. Because equipment that is off, doesn't break. They never had enough trained men, or parts, to keep their equipment functioning. Corporate culture is a hard thing to change, and the Russian Navy seems to be still run like it did with under the Soviet rule. <br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;">I have some experience here. In 1981 I was onboard the USS King, and we had an encounter with the flagship of the Soviet Mediterranean fleet, the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_helicopter_carrier_Leningrad" target="_blank">Leningrad</a>. She was the sister ship of the Moskva's predecessor. We snuck up on the Leningrad one morning. And during that encounter, the Leningrad broke down!. The details I wrote up in my blog post, <a href="https://storiesofthecoldwar.blogspot.com/2011/11/by-philip-gardocki-it-was-september.html" target="_blank">A Bad Day For Communism.</a></p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Once hit, the Moskva is nothing but exposed fuel and explosives. That it went down fast was not surprising. Where it took it's hits is conjecture. The Neptune's seem to just go straight into the ship at an altitude of about 50 feet. It doesn't seem to have a fancy curve at the terminal homing phase for a straight down shot into the engine room, like Harpoons do. Also they do not hit below the waterline. But the Moskva did take on water, so the hull had to be cracked by the fires that ravaged her. </p>
<div><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIQ8OnmS_MALg4VK_CgM9gZlyyIs31IAOb2Bx3Q9hHxpso8FAIPfRjriUxEmbiJYVEsfbLWhVf0IbPLsaoNbfAFElWArdOU7IfKcTjydKIJHTeZssMiX8Rqr-YGwSKAIqp8JF-gfTlhZf3GNP-OAK2Bw4A_hvUV7aDb4cZ9gdDyEttrEB3EwDL0k5m/s962/moskva3.png"><img alt="" border="0" data-original-height="604" data-original-width="962" height="402" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIQ8OnmS_MALg4VK_CgM9gZlyyIs31IAOb2Bx3Q9hHxpso8FAIPfRjriUxEmbiJYVEsfbLWhVf0IbPLsaoNbfAFElWArdOU7IfKcTjydKIJHTeZssMiX8Rqr-YGwSKAIqp8JF-gfTlhZf3GNP-OAK2Bw4A_hvUV7aDb4cZ9gdDyEttrEB3EwDL0k5m/w640-h402/moskva3.png" width="640" /></a></div>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Along the side of the Moskva is a lot of space dedicated to weaponry. Note the large missile canisters from midships to the twin 4 inch gun mount near the bow. They each contain a Vulkan missile. These missiles are liquid fueled and have a 1 ton warhead, and there are 8 on a side. I don't think they took a direct hit, because ship would blown up and just gone down. The captain of the Moskva is reported KIA from the initial explosion, and he was likely in his sea cabin behind the bridge. So a hit near the Vulkans is a strong possibility. Causing the casings and missiles to crack, spilling tons of volatile fuel waiting for a the spark that would doom the ship. </p><p style="text-align: justify;">The explosive power of the fuel cannot be ignored. I worked with Talos Missiles, at 4 tons each, and were close to the size of a Vulkan and also liquid fueled. At Talos school, there was a picture of a target ship that took just one hit from a Talos. Above the waterline was a bow, a stern, and nothing else. And that was mainly from the fuel, as Talos had only a 60 pound warhead. </p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">I'm pretty sure the Neptune's did not hit the bow or stern. Because damage there would have been easily contained. I think one of the hits occurred just behind the engine funnel. Where the SAN-6's are stored in their canisters. It's about the right altitude. There are 64 missiles there, and once they start cooking off, the fire would be inextinguishable. The US vertical launch systems have a quenching system that violently fills the containers with water. I don't know if the Moskva had a similar system, or if it just didn't work. </p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Setting off the solid fuel rocket motors could be violent enough to crack the hull. There is evidence of this in a satellite image of the Moskva that night where the brightest point is in the center of the ship. </p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">One report had the Moskva on it's side within 90 minutes. That would require a couple of thousand tons of seawater. So the hull had to have been cracked.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">The Moskva is not the first Russian warship sunk by a fire. In 1981 a Krivak class destroyer was lost in the Black Sea when it caught fire and sank.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">This is one of the reasons EVERY sailor in the US Navy goes to fire fighting school. </p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">But the indescribable hell that that kind of missile storm would cause wasn't going to be put out by any crew, no matter how well trained. This is evidenced that a Turkish ship was already picking up survivors at 2am, a little more than an hour after the strike. <br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;">So what sank the Moskva? Much blame is placed on the lack of a well trained crew. I contend that no amount of training was going to save this ship. They had 50 seconds, maximum, warning of an incoming missile to impact. For systems designed in the 70's, that is just not enough time.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Their CIWS could have made the shot, but how many of them were operational? The number could be zero. They would have to have been up and running before missile detection. If they were off to keep them from breaking, then they are not a factor. This ship has been war time steaming for 6 weeks. So what equipment they did have running in February was probably having issues. </p><p style="text-align: justify;">What sank the Moskva was a design philosophy emphasizing weaponry over survivability, followed with decades of corporate culture that relegated maintenance to the lowest priority. The ship had no escorts, had no warning, was assigned a mission it was not prepared for, or even capable of performing. The crew quality at this point is irrelevant to the equation. It was clearly and upper management issue. </p><p style="text-align: justify;">I blame first the design bureau for designing what can only be described as a glass cannon. Then upper brass in the 90's for keeping the ship when it was going to be sent to the scrap yard. And finally the Russian Admiralty for deploying a ship, alone, for a mission it was technically unprepared for (providing AA cover for the fleet) when all it was designed to do was make one large bombardment strike, then run home for more ammo.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">How many sailors died here? Reports are across the board. Russian propaganda has stated all were rescued. The Turks pulled about 50 out of the water. So the number is between 0 and 450. </p><p style="text-align: justify;">But then consider where did those two missiles hit? Warships do not have a lot of spaces that are not either occupied by crew, or occupied by flammable liquids and or explosives. Yes there is the chain locker, and a couple dozen fan rooms, or the laundry room was unoccupied, but then if strikes hit those spots, there would not have been the catastrophic fire that was in evidence. We know how catastrophic it was because a Turkish ship that was first on the scene about an hour after the hit, was pulling sailors out of the water.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">But for a warship to go from wartime steaming to abandon ship, within an hour, and <b><i>not </i></b>take casualties in an attempt to save the ship, defies credulity. I will say, unequivocally, that a sailor will go into cold water, at night, only when he knows for certain he will die otherwise, and probably has proof that his death is imminent. <br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;">Additional...<br /></p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">This is not the first Moskva to have been sunk by enemy action in the Black Sea. On June 26, 1941, the Soviet destroyer Moskva was sunk while bombarding the oil storage facilities in Romanian city of Constanta. It and its other ships were successful in their mission, but the Moskva was lost during the bombardment. <a href="https://xray-mag.com/content/what-sank-soviet-destroyer-moscow">https://xray-mag.com/content/what-sank-soviet-destroyer-moscow</a></p>Phil Gardockihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13213683478302437856noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8807471294226985918.post-38334338632445648972020-06-18T20:54:00.002-04:002020-06-18T20:54:31.291-04:00Shock of Impact<div style="text-align: justify;">
Naval Station Great Lakes, 1976. The temporary home of almost all United States Navy sailors at one time or another. The training center is huge. From boot camp on one side of the base to advanced training in engineering and electronics on the other.</div>
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I was filtering my way through Great Lakes taking Basic Electricity and Electronics (part II) and was assigned to the 200 Barracks. At the time, the 200 Barracks was the oldest barracks on the base. I'll describe it for the benefit of other branches, and the younger sailors, as I don't think it exists anymore. Designed in WWII, they were made out of cinder blocks, with an "Open Bay" architecture. This meant 4 men to a bay that had no doors. And one common bathroom per floor. There was next to no privacy. It was where the fresh out of boot camp personnel were assigned until they proved worthy to be promoted to their "A" schools, for technical training. Then they would be assigned to one of the more modern barracks, 300, 400, 500 or 600. </div>
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This may sound awful, but since we all just got out of boot camp, with 80 men to a room, it was actually a step up in the world.</div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtdfMuQ4lzO3mst0wC1nKV25WrZHsfE9csmSpGoInjh3L3FAcBoHfsJLbYrH8-BWXmKW7vQfmewdLlVQM7RwyRtV9NohRo1hBtUARSSTVA1qNXEqHU9pyhwkvzuOg7gcB6MPHDQ4QpSyI/s1600/GreatLakesCommandBldg.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="295" data-original-width="634" height="296" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtdfMuQ4lzO3mst0wC1nKV25WrZHsfE9csmSpGoInjh3L3FAcBoHfsJLbYrH8-BWXmKW7vQfmewdLlVQM7RwyRtV9NohRo1hBtUARSSTVA1qNXEqHU9pyhwkvzuOg7gcB6MPHDQ4QpSyI/s640/GreatLakesCommandBldg.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Command building, built in 1906</td></tr>
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I lived on the third floor. One night, after taking an after midnight pee, I observed a late to bed, staggering, and obviously very drunk squid stumbling down the hallway. He paused next to the water fountain, and passed out. Slamming his head on the fountain with a resounding crash. I started to run to his aid, when he got up, and staggered down the hall, where I lost him in the darkness. </div>
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"Well, if he can do that, he must be all right", I thought.</div>
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The next morning, I went to get a drink, and saw from the paint lines, that the fountain had moved 4 full inches downward. It was amazing he walked away for that!</div>
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A week goes by, and I was standing the barracks watch, which involved roving around the floors and reporting to the front desk every now and then. </div>
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The second floor fountain had also moved downward, 4 full inches.</div>
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My first thought was, "Oh my god, he must have fell on this one too!" </div>
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The second thought was a bit more rational, and I confirmed it a minute later on the first floor.</div>
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4 inches. Yes he moved the plumbing in whole building with his head.</div>
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Ouch.</div>
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Phil Gardockihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13213683478302437856noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8807471294226985918.post-74628891308798549712019-12-07T18:13:00.004-05:002021-12-06T22:43:40.983-05:00Pearl Harbor Day, From the Family Oral History<div style="text-align: center;">
Pearl Harbor Day, From the Family Oral History.</div>
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Every Dec 7, I think about this story passed on down to me via my family.</div>
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It is around 3 PM, Sunday afternoon. 4 (out of 5) of the Ramsay boys and their wives have gathered at Ginna and Charlies house for a game of pinochle and dinner in Paoli, Pa. The game is moving along, the ladies working on dinner, and the radio is playing music. </div>
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"We interrupt this broadcast to bring you this important bulletin. . . <span class="body_text" style="color: black;">The Japanese have attacked Pearl Harbor
Hawaii by air, President Roosevelt has just
announced. The attack also was made on all
military and naval activities on the principle
island of Ohau." </span></div>
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<span class="body_text" style="color: black;">Silence around the table. Finally broken by a bid, "23", then "24", followed by a couple of passes.</span></div>
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<span class="body_text" style="color: black;">The game continued and was concluded, the winning score announced. Then, the four men got up, and put on their coats.</span></div>
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<span class="body_text" style="color: black;">Elanor, Howard's wife, asked "Where are you going?"</span></div>
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<span class="body_text" style="color: black;">Howard replies, "We are at war. We're are going to enlist." And with that, the men went out the door.</span></div>
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<span class="body_text" style="color: black;">Upon reflection, I cannot imagine what went through the ladies minds, as all their husbands just up and left.</span></div>
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<span class="body_text" style="color: black;">And about two hours later, returned. </span></div>
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<span class="body_text" style="color: black;">"What happened", asked Mame? </span></div>
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<span class="body_text" style="color: black;">With some chagrin, Charles replied, "It's Sunday, everything was closed."</span></div>
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<span class="body_text" style="color: black;">Over the next few weeks, all 5 of the Ramsay boys enlisted. Howard was rejected as too old. Of the remainder, Arthur fought in the Pacific onboard a nameless PT boat, while Robert served onboard a Pearl Harbor survivor, the USS Phoenix, Charles in the coast guard, and "Babe" in the Army, marching across France. All came back.</span></div>
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<span class="body_text" style="color: black;">The Greatest Generation.</span></div>
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<br />Phil Gardockihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13213683478302437856noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8807471294226985918.post-82630980843395323622016-02-23T17:06:00.003-05:002020-04-10T08:09:41.113-04:00Safety, Secrecy, Diplomacy, Near Tragedy and Finally, Sanity.<script>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">An essay in evolutionary
process development.</span></span>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Unlike all my other <span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Stories of the <span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Cold War, I have no first person source for this. This is a collection of things "I heard" and <span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">then<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> connected the dots. Feel free to call <span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">bullshit if you want. </span></span></span> </span></span></span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> </span></span></span> </span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Contrary to Hollywood’s
stereotyping, the military actually does a lot of thinking about how it does
things. And most of the time, it has good
reasons for what it does. But also being
an organization of over 2 million people, mistakes are made, through neglect,
stupidity, or ignorance. But a process can be set up to be nearly perfect. In business terms, the term "Six Sigma", had concepts rooted in ammunition handling long before it was popularized by a few gurus. </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">The following is actually a
series of stories I have heard, each individually, and then one night, in a minor
epiphany, I realized that they were all related.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">The first starts with an
explanation. For reasons of safety,
missile warheads, and the missile <span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">boosters</span>, were kept in separate areas. Like high caliber guns of old, where the
gunpowder was kept separate from the shells.
In addition, every missile had a code on it to identify its particular
characteristics, like beam riding, anti-radiation, nuclear, and test. For the last two, to make sure there were no
mistakes, were also color coded purple and blue. Test boosters, since they had <span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">no</span> actual engines, were also pain<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">ted blue.</span></span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"></span></span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">The first story was a short
and anecdotal. A missile cruiser was
doing morning missile exercises, </span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">known as DSOT (</span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span class="st">Daily Systems Operability Test)</span>,
</span></span>which
involved putting the test missiles on the rails and slewing them about. This was, in turn, observed by personnel on
nearby ships. Reportedly, a junior
seam<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">a</span>n mentioned to a buddy that the cruiser had nuclear missiles on
launcher. </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">His buddy said, “How do you
know this?”</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">The seam<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">a</span>n replied, “Everyone
knows that the Nuc’s are painted a different color.”</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">The fact that he only had
half the <span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">facts </span>didn’t matter. He was
overheard by an Admiral, who was appalled by the fact that it was general
knowledge that Nuc’s had a different painting scheme. A short time later, the order went down to
paint all the Nuc’s white.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7Bq5w3mUtH1FPse8ammSBn1bRwznPPgfOfSCtnUClZiV6_rYAOwWpuckc_OvYQzirLklyQkSqX9pCBRAKf8omBN-dUDD_5v6tiANjC54NucbQZ1IGb7sYbyDrBxjRo696GcWF_DUrbZo/s1600/TalosTsam33.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7Bq5w3mUtH1FPse8ammSBn1bRwznPPgfOfSCtnUClZiV6_rYAOwWpuckc_OvYQzirLklyQkSqX9pCBRAKf8omBN-dUDD_5v6tiANjC54NucbQZ1IGb7sYbyDrBxjRo696GcWF_DUrbZo/s320/TalosTsam33.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Talos T-SAM onboard USS Oklahoma City</span><br />
<span style="font-size: xx-small;">Copyright 2008 Phillip R. Hays.</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">The second story took place
on the Oklahoma City, CG-5. A tour was
being given to visiting Japanese dignitaries.
These tours usually ended with the visitors being taken to the rear of
the ship, and treated to a roll out of the Talos missiles. Being over 32ft long, this roll out is a very
impressive sight.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Somewhere along the tour, the
very sensitive subject of nuclear missiles came up. The official statement was always, "I can
neither confirm or deny the presence of nuclear weapons aboard USS Oklahoma
City<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">"</span>. But, during this tour, the tour
guide mentioned as an aside, that you can tell if you were looking at nuclear
missiles, because regular missiles are all painted white. It seems that the word on the new paint jobs had
not filtered to general knowledge.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Out rolled the blue test
missiles, known as T-SAM's. The touring Japanese <span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">reportedly</span> freaked
out in a number of ways, including fainting.
</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7lq_Cl_RoqzsyxemQok-pZ5ic0QGCcBfsm7AhDsGPhS_lRcklJnepU81Qc_CWV0n-Qz9X5o1BTBKBLeVMNPsrSXEEQsNLx9mJyg1cFPQBXmEm3AyzOSBeAjIumVtx6x7kKoPYyB80y0o/s1600/Tartar.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="259" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7lq_Cl_RoqzsyxemQok-pZ5ic0QGCcBfsm7AhDsGPhS_lRcklJnepU81Qc_CWV0n-Qz9X5o1BTBKBLeVMNPsrSXEEQsNLx9mJyg1cFPQBXmEm3AyzOSBeAjIumVtx6x7kKoPYyB80y0o/s320/Tartar.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Tartar launch from U<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">SS Chicago</span></span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">The order came down fleet
wide, to paint the T-SAM’s white as well.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Some time later, on-board USS Chicago, berthed in San Diego. While performing its morning DSOT (see above),</span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span class="st"></span>
the missile house personnel accidentally loaded a live Tart<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">a</span>r missile onto the
rails instead of the T-SAM. When the
computer generated target reached the correct range, the firing officer pushed
the pickle, and instead of an light going on to indicate the completion of a
circuit in a T-SAM, the rest of the ship was awakened to the<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> whoosh and roar of depar<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">ting Tartar missile <span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">that was just fired over <span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Coronado Island. At this time I cannot verify the ship and launch<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">, but several <span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">y<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">ears ago I was able to. <span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">If someon<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">e has more information, please let me know.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">By the time <span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I was in the <span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Navy<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">, sanity had p<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">revailed<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">, and the color code<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> schemes were <span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">re-instituted</span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> </span></span></span></span></span></span></span> </span></span></span></span></span></span></div>
Phil Gardockihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13213683478302437856noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8807471294226985918.post-81732516609427868662015-12-26T12:30:00.005-05:002015-12-26T12:30:49.574-05:00Too Close to God.<div style="text-align: justify;">
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
It is 1969, and FTG3 Dimson* was in a sad state.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He was going to have to deliver some bad news
to a close friend of his.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He was asked
by his friend if he could organize a ship wide blood drive for the Red Cross,
and in return, the Red Cross would forgo any fees for blood needed for a
critical operation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This would save
someone hundreds of dollars.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Which in
1969, was a substantial amount.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
There was an understood quid pro quo here.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Any sailor who gave blood got the rest of the
day off.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was a win for the Red Cross,
who could easily get 100 pints at one session, a win for the Navy marketing as
a force for good, a win for the poor person requiring the operation, and a win
the individual sailor, who got the day off.</div>
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<br /></div>
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But some people didn’t see it that way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In this case, the XO of the ship, who
approved the blood drive, but not the liberty chits.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>With that piece of news, FTG3 Dimson** found
his list of potential donors dwindling to below the minimum number that the Red
Cross required to set up a station.</div>
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<br /></div>
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So, he had to make a phone call to his friend with the
bad news.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He explained the sad story to
her, and was somewhat surprised at her nonplussed response,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“That’s ok, you did you best, I’ll see what I
can do”.</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
He hung up the payphone and took the long walk down the
pier and rejoined his division in their efforts to repaint their Mk 56 gun
director.</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
A day went by when a message was passed on the 1MC.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Petty Officer Dimson, lay to the XO’s
Stateroom.”</div>
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<br /></div>
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Now any E4 would think, “What have I done wrong now?”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And with Dimson’s character, maybe, “What did
they find out?”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But no matter what you
have done, it is still highly unusual to be summoned to the 2<sup>nd</sup> in
commands quarters.</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
Well sweated from a day in the sun, and with a uniform
full of rust and paint chips, he headed for the wardroom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He read the plaques on the doors 1 by 1 till
he found the one for the XO.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The door
was closed, but there was some loud voices emanating from within, not enough to
make out the words, but louder than expected.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>He assumed the parade rest position.</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
A minute later the Captain strode down the passageway,
and after exchanging salutes he commanded Dimson to go in and have a seat.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
The Captain entered the room, and said, “XO, I told Petty
Officer Dimson to be seated”, and then left the room.</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
Inside was a disheveled and very sorry looking
Commander.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The XO was on the telephone
and the conversation went something like this:</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
“No Sir.”</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
“Yes Sir.”</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
“Yes Sir.”</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
“No Mister Secretary.” </div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
“Yes Mister Secretary.”</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
“Yes Mister Secretary.”</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
“No Mister President.” </div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
“No Mister President.” </div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
“Yes Mister President.”</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
“Yes Mister President.”</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
The beratement went on for some time, after which he hung
up the phone and looked at Dimson with an expression of both dread and
relief.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He then handed Dimson a special
request chit for 96 hours liberty, checked approved, with the XO being the only
signature.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Get off my ship”, he
growled.</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
At this point Dimson still had no idea what just
happened, but packed a ditty bag and left for four days.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When he returned, he was greeted at the
gangplank with another 96 hour liberty pass.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>This was repeated 5 more times for the next month.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After which he was allowed on board, but was
transferred soon afterwards.</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
As Paul Harvey would say, this is the rest of the story.</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
Petty Officer Dimson finally contacted his friend, and
related these strange events, and she explained what she knew.</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
Sometime in the past, she had dialed a wrong number, and
the phone was picked up by then President Kennedy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There was some chuckles and conversation, and
basically she wound up on the Presidential Christmas Card list.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Once a year she would make a call wishing
Kennedy a Merry Christmas.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After his assassination,
her contact was maintained through his successors, Johnson and Nixon.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When she got word of the broken promise she
decided that this was worth her one wish, and made a call to President Nixon.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Her plea was something like “I thought the
Navy always helped.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To which Nixon
replied, “Why yes, the Navy always helps.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And with that she rebutted, “But it didn’t.”</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
And within 24 hours, there was a response.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Befuddling one low ranked sailor and
blindsiding a Navy Commander.</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
As to the number of 96 hour liberties, and subsequent
transfer, the thought on that is that FTG3 Dimson, was just too close to God
for anyone’s comfort.</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
*Not his real name for obvious reasons.</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;">
**Still not his real name.</div>
Phil Gardockihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13213683478302437856noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8807471294226985918.post-86453013422853988802014-06-11T21:14:00.001-04:002017-06-22T07:28:29.794-04:00The Swimming Pool is Secured While Refueling.<div style="text-align: justify;">
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<![endif]-->One of the missions of the Navy is to project ground troops on shore.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Initially the Navy took to this mission like a fish to flight, but was embarrassed into accepting the role in WWII only after the Army solved most of the “Last Twelve Mile” problems involved with amphibious landings.</div>
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Now, the Navy has an impressive fleet of ships whose sole purpose is to transport, land, and support landing operations.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was to a task force of these “Gator Freighters”, that the USS King was assigned for a while as an escort and referee.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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Supporting US Marines as they invaded islands in the Aegean Sea were the combined Greek and Turkish Air Forces.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Even though both signatories of the NATO treaty, the Greeks and the Turks have had held extreme animosity towards each other since the sacking of Troy****, of which the recent war for Cyprus seven years earlier in 1974 was only the most recent outbreak of hostilities.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Our job was to monitor the aircraft and make sure they stayed in their areas, and if someone fired anything, we would have a record of who it was and what was shot at.</div>
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It was a boring time for fire control.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Turks and the Greek airmen obeyed their orders, and we were not called on even once to light up an offender with our AN/SPG-55B anti-aircraft radar. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This to an pilot is the equivalent of a police officer drawing and aiming their weapon.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6GNbP4aX4fZKcwQ_PgPchKGnCnprfJ93xuAtXCf0vLRQ4y5HxuFICjFYAc8l4pSi-vMJo77-GY2VQoBKFE0ZwFU_WxLmdl4BnGvnfOVMLz0X1Sd5iYWevf2gX8N5ZBYgYcbNNmoiCWBA/s1600/HaleP250Pump2.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6GNbP4aX4fZKcwQ_PgPchKGnCnprfJ93xuAtXCf0vLRQ4y5HxuFICjFYAc8l4pSi-vMJo77-GY2VQoBKFE0ZwFU_WxLmdl4BnGvnfOVMLz0X1Sd5iYWevf2gX8N5ZBYgYcbNNmoiCWBA/s1600/HaleP250Pump2.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Navy dewatering pump P-250, made by Hale Products.***</td></tr>
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The operation wrapped up, and it seemed like we had time on our hands, so someone decided to try something different and we would refuel from one of the LST’s using a P-250 pump and a fire hose.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As the name implies, the P-250 is a pump that can pump 250 gallons per minute.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is normally used for dewatering compartments, and is sufficient for that task.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But for refueling several hundred tons of fuel oil, this was not a well thought out idea.</div>
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A special adapter was created to attach a 2.5 inch fuel hose to the fuel port, and since neither ship had the cranes or high tension cabling of a normal tanker, the hose was simply carried across in a whale boat and attached.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Both ships were at anchor, so the navigation difficulties normally associated with underway refueling were mitigated.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The pump was lit off and there was nothing to do but wait.</div>
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And listen to the announcements over the 1MC (The ships PA system) every 5 minutes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Queue the bosun pipe, “On the King, there will be no, eating, drinking, or smoking, outside the skin of the ship while the UNREP is underway.”</div>
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Followed a minute later by another bosun pipe from the LST, “On the Newport*, there will be no, eating, drinking, or smoking, outside the skin of the ship while the UNREP is underway.”</div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLHsls8Dx2JfevKNhoDQrGr52DTYHYFeacW7ze4Ay_l899G9CaUl61mMyaWd3tA4nJJIXaDk-eIWRrc8uxpkxKj6KJEDf2n3sf2qX_ouXzkQEdZpa8nLVL251aqmXogmCqW3YWvKq_dJ4/s1600/USSNewport.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLHsls8Dx2JfevKNhoDQrGr52DTYHYFeacW7ze4Ay_l899G9CaUl61mMyaWd3tA4nJJIXaDk-eIWRrc8uxpkxKj6KJEDf2n3sf2qX_ouXzkQEdZpa8nLVL251aqmXogmCqW3YWvKq_dJ4/s1600/USSNewport.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">USS Newport LST-1179</td></tr>
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And wait.</div>
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Repeat announcements.<br />
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And wait.</div>
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How long is this going to go on?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A normal refueling would take 15-25 minutes once the hose was hooked up. I had a calculator on my watch and did the math.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Since my normal refueling station was as the phone talker between the tanker and our engineering department, I knew the numbers quite well.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If the pump was running at peak capacity, this was going to take 300 minutes, not including hookup and breakdown.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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The boredom of this hit all levels, and then, the Newport decided to change things up a bit, “On the Newport, the swimming pool is secured while the UNREP is underway.”</div>
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Chuckles erupted from both crews.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And it made some sense, my father served on an older LSD, the Alamo, and he told me they would have swim calls in the well deck.</div>
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Not to be out done, the King’s PA system blasted, “On the King, the billiard room is secured while the UNREP is underway.” <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Which was kind of lame, yes we could have a billiard room, but unlikely, as you couldn't really play the game at sea.</div>
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I have to say though the next one from the LST skunked us, “On the Newport, the bowling alley is secured while the UNREP is underway.”</div>
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“On the King, the bocce ball court is secured while the UNREP is underway.”</div>
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“On the Newport, the tennis court is secured while the UNREP is underway.”</div>
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This livened things up for the next hour or so.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But clearly the LST command personnel were more glib of tongue than ours.</div>
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Finally, with our sunburns firmly in etched for the season, the hose was disconnected and pulled back to the Newport.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then with a deafening roar and a whoosh of spray, the LST heeled over to port an pulled away.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Their 1MC blaring the “The William Tell Overture”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">, best known as the theme to the Lone Ranger. </span>Their pride had no limit, and we didn't have a breakaway song to compete against them anyway.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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Since I was on the night shift, I headed for my rack.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I pondered how we were totally skunked in this game of one-upmanship.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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I don’t know how long I was out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not long though.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Being on the night shift, you learn to sleep through all the chatter and announcements that permeate the work day life on board ship.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But I woke up with the extreme clarity when this message was broadcast.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Anyone with a copy of the William Tell Overture, or the theme from Patton, lay to the bridge with same.”</div>
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I instantly knew what this was about.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Our command staff was as embarrassed as I thought they were over today’s verbal exchange, and were looking for a breakaway song to compensate in the future.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Since imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, they were looking for the same song that the Newport picked.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I had copies of both the William Tell Overture and the movie score from Patton in my locker. I thought though that Patton, was an odd choice.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It showed a lack of experience in this sort of thing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I like the theme from Patton, but it was a slow starter, the other ship will be out of hearing before you get to the blood pumping part.</div>
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But I’ll be damned if I am going to listen to the the Lone Ranger every two days for the rest of the voyage either.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But just maybe I can influence the decision.</div>
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I called the bridge.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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“Bridge, Boatswain’s Mate of the Watch speaking”,answered the phone.</div>
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“Was that last announcement for the 1812 Overture, or the William Tell Overture”, I asked?</div>
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“Wait one.”</div>
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In the background there was muddled conversation, where the word, "overture", was clearly not in the normal lexicon of the participants.</div>
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Finally, there was an answer, “The William Tell Overture.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Well then, Patton it is then.</div>
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“I have the theme from Patton, send someone down to get it.”</div>
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“Bring it up to the Bridge.”</div>
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“Look, I am on the night shift, and already lost 6 hours sleep during the refueling today.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You want it, here is my rack number.”</div>
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They sent the Messenger of the Watch down to retrieve my cassette tape, and that was our break away song for the next 18 months.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I don’t know what other ships felt about our Breakaway Song.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They always started in the beginning of the tape, where the sound of the needle hitting the vinyl is recorded, then 45 seconds of the haunting bit, then finally reaching marching /driving section that would be recognizable, but by then, even at 15 knots, we would be almost a mile away.</div>
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*I don’t remember the actual name of the LSD/LST, so I picked one out of 6<sup>th</sup> Fleets Order of Battle for 1981. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If anyone knows the actual name, I’ll do a rewrite, no problem.</div>
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*** Not really related to this story but as a personal aside, the Hale Pump company, is headquartered in Conshohocken, PA. Every one of my Great-Uncles, and my Grandmother worked there. Before, some during, and well after WWII.<br />
<br />
****Yes, I know, the Turks actually arrived in the mid 1400's. It was a deliberate overstatement for the sake of humor. The Greeks can't seem to get along with anyone on the other side of the Aegean Sea.<br />
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Phil Gardockihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13213683478302437856noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8807471294226985918.post-9142751623293945222014-04-30T14:22:00.002-04:002021-01-22T10:27:07.779-05:00Guarding the Missile House<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<![endif]-->Everyone on a warship wears many hats.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You may have your primary job classification,
but there are just too many tasks required to run some of the most complicated machines
ever built by man to have specialists trained for all of them.<br />
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<br /></div>
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At my day and age, all the security patrols were performed
by the Weapon’s Department Advanced Electronics personnel.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In theory we were considered the most
reliable of the enlisted crew as most of us were vetted for secret clearances
and possessed higher than normal education level.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqgA4mL1ahCf3ZB5WrY3jjR9WcjrkB6tFt7Jlsnhf0oN0sv_c9LumhyKgkMN09I9lzAndcpCwjTgJxIEcTFOq1FkzkHnLpb0bZqcu2M1h6NWHCl8uvPoe8Wnak3okhZemUPy8u_S3Myg0/s1600/Terrier.JPG" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqgA4mL1ahCf3ZB5WrY3jjR9WcjrkB6tFt7Jlsnhf0oN0sv_c9LumhyKgkMN09I9lzAndcpCwjTgJxIEcTFOq1FkzkHnLpb0bZqcu2M1h6NWHCl8uvPoe8Wnak3okhZemUPy8u_S3Myg0/s1600/Terrier.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small;">Somewhere in the Atlantic, a Terrier Missile is </span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small;">launched by the USS King, DDG-41.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: xx-small;">As photographed by the author.</span></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
One of these jobs was as a security guard for the Missile
House.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The door was locked outside of
normal working hours, but when unlocked, an armed member of the Guard Force was
present to not only prevent undesirables from entering, but to maintain a log
of who had entered, and a running count of how many members of the Missile
House team were in there.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At no time
could there be less than two men in the Missile House.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
So, even at sea, in the middle of the Atlantic, anyone that
wanted entry to the Missile House had to present an ID card that corresponded with
list of allowed entrants.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They basically
were the GMM’s of the Missile Division, all the weapons officers, the XO, and
the CO.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Period.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>All told, about 20 men.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Anyone else was turned away, and even the passageway around the Missile House had restricted access.</div>
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We took our Guard Force duties very seriously, and had been
tested by for proficiency by Navy inspectors several times and always earned the
highest grades.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The six weeks of
training leading up to those inspections were periods of high anxiety and
stress.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Often the officers would come up
with unusual scenarios to see how we behaved, and we always shined.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After the inspection, the silly games would
cease, but we continued to take pride in our actions and performed our roles
well, even under unusual circumstances.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For
one such unusual circumstance, see my story <a href="http://storiesofthecoldwar.blogspot.com/2011/11/road-to-leavenworth.html" target="_blank">The Road to Leavenworth.</a> </div>
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This was about another strange situation, but not so potentially career shaking as in "The Road to Leavenworth", but worth reporting. To this day I have no explanation how it happened.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I was standing watch on the Missile House, when
the XO asked for entry.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As the second
senior officer afloat, he garners special attention.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I can’t say I had ever had him request entry
into the Missile House before, but certainly it was within his rights to do so.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Following the rules I asked him for his ID
card, which he presented.</div>
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<br /></div>
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I ran his card down the list of allowed entrants, and
stopped at his name.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
“What,” I thought, “Was going on here?”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>His name was on the list, but the ID card in
my hand was not his ID card.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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It was my Division Officers ID card.</div>
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<br /></div>
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Now in the weeks leading up to the security inspection, this
sort of thing happened as a test.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And woe
betide you if you failed.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
But the last security inspection was six months previously,
and the next one not for another year or more.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And our officers just don’t play silly buggers like this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They have too much to do.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Now the rules were very clear on this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I will have to deny him entry until a proper
ID was obtained.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I was within my rights
to deny and was going to do so.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But saying
no to the XO is never a good thing, right or not.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I was working on the diplomatic phrase to tell
him leave the area.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
By the time I worked through all this, enough time had
passed had already told the XO that something was off and I really don’t have a good poker
face, and was about to question what was wrong, when the answer to my dilemma happened walk
on by.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
“Mr. Carmody,” I called to my Division Officer, “Your ID card sir!” I stretched out my hand past the XO, offering him the ID card.<br />
<br /></div>
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Surprise ran across their faces, I could see this was not a
test.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
The XO look totally baffled, as did Lieutenant Carmody.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They both looked at the ID Card, then the XO
left the area.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Lieutenant Carmody pulled
out his wallet, replacing the card.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Other
then puzzlement, no explanation as offered.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The XO later returned with his ID and was granted entry, and nothing was
ever said afterwards.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<br />
For you in the corporate world, this would be tantamount to going to work with someone else's card on a lanyard and getting stopped by security at the door. By accident, just how do you get someone else's ID?</div>
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Phil Gardockihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13213683478302437856noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8807471294226985918.post-14728718442155291202013-03-22T22:37:00.001-04:002020-05-25T10:18:28.140-04:00Connections <div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">This is the second eulogy for a Cold War Warrior I have written. The first was for my step father, </span><a href="http://storiesofthecoldwar.blogspot.com/2011/11/biography-of-inadvertent-cold-warrior.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Robert Eugene Brantly</span></a><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">, I pray I don't have to do it again.</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">My father eloped with my mother in the summer of 1953, just before joining the Navy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As an </span></span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">Engineman</span></span>, he was assigned to the LST USS Alamo, home ported in San Diego.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A brilliant man, he was rapidly promoted, and when discharged in 1959 he was the second youngest, by one day, man to be promoted to the rank of Chief Petty Officer in the Post WWII Navy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwKgzyugEtszSLzsQu3uQTlG7qGRMpmAW9260s7AspMUpEvP7CleybDz20RezHiZxVT1lfJH8fsteG2khAhAu4ywkMbIojud6pyn3WAYmNeAr0U8oRtd6IKI-c2Mrb605uWMoFAbl7hAk/s1600/WarrentHatPhil.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="298" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwKgzyugEtszSLzsQu3uQTlG7qGRMpmAW9260s7AspMUpEvP7CleybDz20RezHiZxVT1lfJH8fsteG2khAhAu4ywkMbIojud6pyn3WAYmNeAr0U8oRtd6IKI-c2Mrb605uWMoFAbl7hAk/s400/WarrentHatPhil.jpg" ssa="true" width="400" /></span></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div align="center">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"> <span style="font-size: x-small;">The claim was my father was the second youngest "Chief" in the </span></span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">post</span></div>
<div align="center">
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">WWII Navy. But did I assume "Chief Petty Officer"? </span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">The hat I </span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">found </span></span></div>
<div align="center">
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">was </span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">a "Chief Warrant Officer" which </span><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">was never mentioned.</span></span></div>
</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">He spent his remaining years working in the Post Office.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He divorced one wife, buried another, widowed a third.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He fathered two children, raised five other children, and was Pop-Pop to 16 or so grand children.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In his retirement age, he continued to be active.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He worked part time as a driver at a local car dealership, served as the go-to guy for home work support for the innumerable grand children, and provided support for his sister and their mother.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0in 10pt; text-align: justify;">
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">But this as a Cold War Story and frankly having read this far, you are already lining up the back button and so I will start again.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
</div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">In the early 50’s, Philip Gardocki heard his country’s call and he volunteered to defend this country’s freedom. Like every enlistee, he was given a battery of tests to see what skills and potentials existed. They revealed a very high IQ, and a proficiency with tools and languages. Since he already was fluent in Polish, Engineman Gardocki was sent to an immersion language school to learn Russian. Upon completing that, he was sent to his first assignment, the USS Alamo, LSD-33. Which was home ported out of San Diego, but Phil and his young wife were sent to live in Honolulu. The reason for this was Phil’s real job was not as an Engineman, but as a listener, an electronic spy, on Soviet Submarine communications with Mother Russia. And the USS Alamo, unlike the other 7 ships of the Thomaston class, was purpose built and specially equipped for that mission. <br /><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">He only revealed this different view on his military service in the final years of his life.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>His favorite was that he delayed the departure of the USS Nautilus, SSN-571, the world’s first nuclear powered submarine, for 3 days because he had lost track of the Soviet Submarine assigned to follow her.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After he related this to me, my only answer was one of disbelief, “Dad, you’ve read too many Tom Clancy novels.”<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">His reply took me aback, “Why do you think we lived in Honolulu?”<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I connected the dots.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The military doesn’t house its enlisted personnel a substantial distance from their bases.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Usually there is housing available on the base. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> I</span>t is just too cost prohibitive to house a low grade Petty-Officer, on another island from his ship, where the main method of commuting to work is by aircraft. It is absurd, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">unless</i> there was a very good reason for it.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">He filled in the reason, “They didn’t want me mingling with the crew and possibly revealing what I was really doing there.”<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">He mentioned the initial conflicts between his division officer, and the head of engineering, who thought Petty Officer Gardocki should be down in the engine room with the rest of the snipes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But his work was Top Secret, and there were only 4 men on board with the “need to know” of what he was up to.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Now that he is gone, I have been on a mission to fill in the blanks, and found some very interesting connections.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Why the Alamo?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>More to the point, why an LSD for this kind of mission?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>How much of this is true?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Wikipedia has offered some insight on some of this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The USS Alamo has about 4 <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><b>pages</b></i> of entries on her.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>All her sister ships have maybe a single page.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Only ships with more panache like Battleships and Carriers have longer articles. Now since Wikipedia is written by volunteers, the article could have been written by someone with self interest, like a former crew member, so this does not constitute any measure of proof.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But I looked at the detail listed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The article says where she went, and what she was doing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And in the late 50’s, all she was doing was <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">hauling freight!</i> The mission of the LSD is to land Marines on hostile shores.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Usually those Marines are permanently assigned to the LSD.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But the Alamo, seemed to have only had loaner Marines.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She picked them up for a specific training exercise and then dropped them off.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Sometimes she only picked them up just to transport them elsewhere.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The rest of her missions seem to be just cargo runs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And while the LSD is more than capable of doing this, it is a waste of man power and material.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is what freighters were for.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you compare the Alamo’s service history against those of the other Thomaston class ships, you notice 2 things.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The other ships have far shorter histories, and their missions seem to be dedicated to practicing landing operations.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">But this makes sense if the Alamo’s primary mission was really a sub chaser.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You have to operate where the submarines are.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Those subs were not off of coasts of random islands suffering from beach assaults.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The subs we were most worried about at the time were the Soviet Golf and Zulu class subs, with their short range nuclear missiles, off of our shores. <span style="font-family: "times new roman";"></span></span></span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrcCBAWf-BFfuJFmWGN-jzrMrLuxvT-KpazEKdWYoclyDezjLxz-9pw-N3UjbyBuLNwECK8WkAWErZ6eY9GoYKiPJY6n9L9CuOAuwuo6Mu3r8RdMUmmD4LjnzTjODUq6jatDXGD8SZcN4/s1600/CapnFatso.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; cssfloat: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrcCBAWf-BFfuJFmWGN-jzrMrLuxvT-KpazEKdWYoclyDezjLxz-9pw-N3UjbyBuLNwECK8WkAWErZ6eY9GoYKiPJY6n9L9CuOAuwuo6Mu3r8RdMUmmD4LjnzTjODUq6jatDXGD8SZcN4/s320/CapnFatso.jpg" ssa="true" width="207" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">In a true coincidence, I read this book in the early 80's, </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">not aware that the main character's ship was my fathers ship.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">I have tracked down a copy, and it is still a good read.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">I highly recommend <span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-family: "arial";">Admiral </span></span>Gallery's books.</span></span></td></tr>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Another interesting thing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I do not think this is a coincidence, but a deliberate “nod and a wink.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The USS Alamo was commissioned by Vera Lee Gallery, wife of Admiral Daniel V. Gallery.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>During WWII, Captain Gallery, with his ship the USS Guadalcanal, CVE-60, captured the German submarine, the U-505, along with the late model enigma machine plus the code books onboard it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This was the first capture of an enemy warship by the US Navy since the War of 1812.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What better person to commission a future sub hunter?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Captain Gallery also wrote a series of books, all navy based.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In one book the hero is Cap’n Fatso.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A First Class Petty Officer in charge one of the landing boats assigned to the USS Alamo.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Why that ship?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Another nod and a wink?<o:p></o:p></span></span><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Other coincidences.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> And t</span>hese are coincidences.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The U-505 is still afloat, in Chicago, and I took an opportunity to tour it back in the mid 70’s.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In the 80’s I read Cap’n Fatso, but at that time I didn’t know my connections to the ships mentioned therein.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I had been inactively looking for this book for more than a decade.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That search became a quest while I was putting the together the other connections.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Alamo, click, Admiral Gallery, click, U-505, click, back to Admiral Gallery, and there was his literary bona fides.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The reason I didn’t find Cap’n Fatso when I last looked was the spelling of the word Captain.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My father would have loved this book.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">But how much of this is true?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I don’t know.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Going through my father’s effects, so far have only added to the mystery.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I have two copies of his discharges, and neither list his rank as a Chief Petty Officer, one as Petty Officer 2<sup>nd</sup> class, the other as a 1<sup>st</sup> Class.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But then there was the hat, a Chief Warrant Officer’s hat, in his drawer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That it was his can be little doubt.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My Father had a small head, about a size 7, and the hat had a patent number on it, the patent was from 1958, so it is the correct era.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I sent for his records, but they offered no light on the mystery. He was discharged twice, once as an E5, the other as an E6.</span></span><br />
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<b><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Update:</span></span></b><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">It has been nearly 7 years since I first wrote this, and I have an update on my mystery. I was talking with an old pal from my navy days and he mentioned that he left the navy as a frocked first class, but his DD-214 had him as a 2nd class. For the laymen, this means he was promoted to the next rank, but without the pay increase. And at some time in the future, he left before this was finalized, and so his separation papers only showed his current pay grade. If my father was frocked to warrant officer, then his separation papers would only show E-6, or Petty Officer 1st class. This resolves the conflicting evidence nicely. </span></span><br />
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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Phil Gardockihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13213683478302437856noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8807471294226985918.post-755284442186468372013-01-01T16:27:00.000-05:002013-04-15T11:36:56.519-04:00Arab Spring, Minus 30 Years<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">The “Arab Spring” of 2011 was a poignant time for me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> Thirty years ago, </span>I was onboard USS King, DDG-41 in the eastern Mediterranean in 1981 when Anwar Sadat was assassinated.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We were operating with 4 LST’s at the time, and were sent to the Egyptian coast as a show of support for the new Egyptian President, Hosni Mubarak.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Anchored 15 miles off shore, it was quite booring for us, and I am sure there was no way we would have ever landed the attached Marines in Egypt, regardless of the outcome of their power stuggle.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But Mubarak was peacefully installed as President, and announced that Egypt would honor all its treaties and obligations.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Thirty years later, I was at a get together of my wife’s high school group, watching the news on a monitor at a bar, and trying not to look as bored as the rest of the husbands present. I nudged the husband next to me and said, “I was there when Mubarak took power.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">He replied, “Really, so was I.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">I explained I was part of the task force off of the coast of Egypt, and he said so was he.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">That’s quite a coincidence.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“You were on one of the Gator-Freighters?” refering to the LST Marine transports.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">He said, “No.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">“Well, you weren’t on my ship”, I declared.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">He said, “That’s true, I was about 500 feet below you on the sub assigned to trail you.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Subs and targets.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Too true.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
Phil Gardockihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13213683478302437856noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8807471294226985918.post-84439032308284011082012-12-25T04:31:00.002-05:002012-12-25T04:31:44.933-05:00Old Navy Christmas<span style="font-size: large;">'Twas the night before Christmas, compartments were still, <br />The sailors were sleeping, as most sailors will. <br />The ditty bags hung by the lockers with care, <br />In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">The men were all peacefully dreaming in bed <br />As visions of liberty danced in each head.<br />The Chief in his skivvies, hopped into his rack, <br />Having just came from town and a quick midnight snack. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">When out on the deck there arose such a roar, <br />I ran to the porthole to find out the score. <br />I stuck out my head and started to shout, <br />"Just what in the world is this noise all about?" </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">A moon made for boondocking showed with a glow, <br />It was downright cold out, 'bout seven below.<br />What I saw out there looked like those Mardi Gras floats, <br />'Twas a Captain's gig drawn by four white Navy goats. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">In the boat was a man who seemed quiet and moody, <br />I knew in an instant St. Nick had the duty. <br />As quickly as Monday his billy goats came, <br />He whistled and shouted and called them by name. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">"Now Perry, now Farragut, Dewey and Jones, <br />What's the matter John Paul, got lead in your bones? <br />A little to Starb'rd, now hold it up short, <br />No fluffing off now, or you'll go on report!" </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">He was wearing dress "Reds" that fit like a charm, <br />His hash marks they covered the length of his arm. <br />The gifts to be issued were all in his pack, <br />The gedunk was ready to leave on each rack. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">His eyes they were watering, his nose caked with ice, <br />He wiped it with canvass, then sneezed once or twice. <br />He opened his mouth and started to yawn, <br />It looked like the Sun coming up with the dawn. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">The stump of a pipe, he held tight in his teeth, <br />And took a small nip from a bottle beneath <br />He wasn't so big, but he must have been strong, <br />I figured he'd been in SEALs early and long. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">He was chubby and plump, a right jolly old Tar, <br />Who said "Evenin' Matey, here have a cigar." <br />He filled every seabag with presents galore, <br />And left us all leave papers, right by the door. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">With "Anchors Aweigh" he climbed back into place, <br />A broad smile was creeping all over his face. <br />One look at his watch and he started to frown, <br />"This mid watch is certainly getting me down." </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">Then out to the breakwater and into the night, <br />The gig started fading, the landscape was bright. <br />"Merry Christmas" he said, as he drove on his way, <br />Now I'll finish my rounds and sack in for the day."</span> <br />
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Phil Gardockihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13213683478302437856noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8807471294226985918.post-25946876629358746152012-12-01T11:05:00.001-05:002014-04-30T10:15:04.187-04:00The Greatest Veteran of the Cold War<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: x-small;">by Phil Gardocki</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">This is note to honor the passing of one of the greatest veterans of the Cold War, CVN-65, USS Enterprise.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Enterprise is a time honored name.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Though the US holds the dominant franchise on the name, warships holding that name have been found in the French and English navies as well.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The name captured the imagination of geeks worldwide in the sixties when Gene Roddenberry named his starship Enterprise.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">When built, the Enterprise had a number of new features.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She was the first aircraft carrier powered by nuclear reactors.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Instead of rotating search radar, her island sported one of the world’s first “phased array” radars, giving her a 360 view without any gaps in the updated imagery.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This unique piece of naval architecture made the Enterprise stand out in many a movie where carrier footage was required.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Her last appearance was in the movie “American Warships”, where she was sunk in the first 5 minutes, only to be mysteriously resurrected, and resunk at the end of the flick.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">My own personal encounter with the Big ‘E’ was early one morning in 1977.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I was walking from my bunk to the mess deck for breakfast.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I opened the port side hatch, and there she was, and 200 feet away.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Apparently we were refueling from her, for while the carrier was nuclear powered, almost none of her escorts were and she had dedicated fuel tanks for them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I quickly ran back to my bunk, grabbed my Olympus, and snapped this photo.</span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdjw9j7wVJJs4AQ7Bwp0ekR89hjjhTIkJGmi2DbeGrDB_TGm_ENH1oXGjXIQBjbrLZjHWCF1wLZe8KR_-41sx0zG9mIA0udaYorW3_2Pq35OodoRdJaNwufNDlaXQQrCa0iXEWkGYpyRA/s1600/Enterprise.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdjw9j7wVJJs4AQ7Bwp0ekR89hjjhTIkJGmi2DbeGrDB_TGm_ENH1oXGjXIQBjbrLZjHWCF1wLZe8KR_-41sx0zG9mIA0udaYorW3_2Pq35OodoRdJaNwufNDlaXQQrCa0iXEWkGYpyRA/s1600/Enterprise.jpg" tea="true" /></span></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small;">Somewhere in the West Pacific, the Enterprise serves the cause of freedom.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: xx-small;">As photographed by the author.</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">The Enterprise was one of the first responders to 911. On September 11, she was in route to Cape Town, South Africa, while watching a U.S. morning news show live, although locally in the early evening, the crew saw the terrorist attacks by the al Qaeda terrorist network against New York's World Trade Center and on the Pentagon. On his own initiative, the Task Force's Admiral ordered Enterprise to turn around and head back to the waters off Southwest Asia. She was the first ship to arrive on station 100 miles south of Pakistan. Over the next few weeks, USS Enterprise conducted combat flight operations in support of Operation Enduring Freedom executing primarily night strike flight operations, including a period of 36 hours continuous of flight operations. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Farewell Enterprise, you will be missed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Here is a link to a YouTube honorium of Enterprise with Julia Ecklar singing her song “Enterprise.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I heartily recommend listening to this.</span></div>
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<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pmhOS1ywdjs"><span style="color: purple; font-family: Calibri;">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pmhOS1ywdjs</span></a></div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">UDATE!!</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">On Dec 1, 2012, </span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Navy Secretary Ray Mabus, in a video played towards the end of the ceremony, announced that CVN 80, third ship of the new GERALD R. FORD-class carriers, will be named <i>ENTERPRISE</i>, thus becoming the ninth American naval ship to bear the name.</span><br />
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<br />Phil Gardockihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13213683478302437856noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8807471294226985918.post-25776894570849696362012-11-28T22:12:00.000-05:002012-12-21T22:06:38.170-05:00Three Veterans <div style="text-align: justify;">
By Philip Gardocki </div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 10pt;">In America, we don’t know our history. And in some cases this is a good thing. How many conflicts reemerge when the next generation comes of age because of those dirty so and so’s across the river killed your grandfather’s cousin and his two brothers. So hopefully, this is a sign of the new age.</span> <br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDDudC5sLQmEA_oKPorNuMJBBwMVn1efYMP0rziYcLm5YJfHtPZ7SWclnCIuu-9kqUn2x4KXDuk4_4PYOHW_vgJZhh1vdAjKPbLxJV9L9WuXO_epabIsppHnnTdgkHMpYTgb_IdR3evwI/s1600/pager.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="158" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDDudC5sLQmEA_oKPorNuMJBBwMVn1efYMP0rziYcLm5YJfHtPZ7SWclnCIuu-9kqUn2x4KXDuk4_4PYOHW_vgJZhh1vdAjKPbLxJV9L9WuXO_epabIsppHnnTdgkHMpYTgb_IdR3evwI/s200/pager.jpg" tea="true" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A Motorola Pager, Circa 1990.</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 10pt;">In the late 80’s I was a Field Service Engineer for Siemens Medical Systems, specializing in digital imaging systems. At this time I was working on aligning the receiving coils for a MRI machine along with two other men when my pager went off.</span> </div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 10pt;">For those of you under 30, a pager is what was used to notify people of messages when they were working a wide area. Basically if someone needed to contact you, they would call a service, and leave a phone number. The service would then punch in your ID number, and the phone number to call. The pager would vibrate or beep, you would read the number. Then you would have to go in search for a pay phone to call the number on your pager. The service would then give you your message. Since most of the numbers you needed to call were “long distance”, we were issued telephone credit cards that we would have to punch in so all this communication was logged in and paid for. This took 37 digits. Later pagers were upgraded to display text messages, 30 character display, with a limit of 140 characters per message. But they also would receive random, usually useless news information items as well. A portend of things to come.</span> </div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHPpxk8io096rzmq5JoWM_4Qn38HkM3O_Nae5Ffmtb3AYVpnFNlpIPQVZ_pNFv5Vjiw_kU3OGy24WKKsnFn1COChXHwZ2jGJbhsESVSVElvd-UAWIxS-o1l8bDnM8aEXmcjJx7nEzADBM/s1600/motorolaBagPhone.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHPpxk8io096rzmq5JoWM_4Qn38HkM3O_Nae5Ffmtb3AYVpnFNlpIPQVZ_pNFv5Vjiw_kU3OGy24WKKsnFn1COChXHwZ2jGJbhsESVSVElvd-UAWIxS-o1l8bDnM8aEXmcjJx7nEzADBM/s1600/motorolaBagPhone.jpg" tea="true" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A Motorola Analog Cell Phone. <br />
3 watts signal strength, with battery pack and bag.<br />
Weight, 3.5 pounds, Net price $1,995.</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 10pt;">It wasn’t that cell phones didn’t exist, but they were expensive to buy, about $4,000, expensive to run, about $1-3 per minute, were large and heavy, about the size of a brick. The battery alone was about the size of 6 I-Phones, and lasted about 4 hours. </span> <br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 10pt;">The phone number was not one I recognized, but had a 908 area code, northern New Jersey, so it was probably Siemens Corporate HQ, so I made the call. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 10pt;">A woman's voice answered, “Siemens Medical Systems, how may I help you?” </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 10pt;">“This is Phil Gardocki, I was paged to call this number,” I replied.</span> <br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 10pt;">“Yes Mr. Gardocki, are you a veteran?” she asked.</span> <br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 10pt;">Ah, I understood. The US Government offers corporate incentives, usually in the form of tax breaks, for companies that hire and employ veterans. Occasionally corporations will take a census to inventory their veteran count. Siemens was more sensitive to this than most corporations because they were a German based company, and competing against several major American companies, and needed to show it can be a good corporate citizen in the USA as well. </span> <br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 10pt;">“Yes, I am,” I replied.</span> <br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 10pt;">“Did you serve during the Vietnam War?” she continued.</span> <br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 10pt;">“No, I did not,” I replied.</span> <br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 10pt;">“Thank you,” she said, and then hung up.</span> <br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 10pt;">Some veterans are worth more than others as far as the tax code goes. I missed being a “Vietnam War” veteran by 6 months. </span> <br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 10pt;">I came back into the room just in time for Sorin’s pager to go off. </span> <br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 10pt;">“Is the area code 908?” I asked.</span> <br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 10pt;">“Yes it is,” He replied.</span> <br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 10pt;">After I explained what it was about, Sorin said, “I was a soldier during the Vietnam War.” I raised an eyebrow at this, and ran through my mental notes. Sorin immigrated to the United States from Israel, and from before that, <i>Romania!</i></span> <br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 10pt;">“You were in the Warsaw Pact,” I asked?</span> <br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 10pt;">“Top Sergeant,” he declared proudly!</span> <br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 10pt;">This tickled my sense of humor, as the Siemens rep didn’t ask which country I was veteran of, and that a veteran of a Soviet ally would be counted as well, so I advised him, “I would tell them you’re a vet.”</span> <br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 10pt;">At that time, Chang loosed his pager, waiting for its prompting, and asked me, “What do you think I should tell them?”</span> <br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 10pt;">I didn’t know much of Chang’s backstory, but I knew he originally hailed from mainland China. So I asked, “What were you doing during the Vietnam War?” </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 10pt;">Then he floored me with his quiet statement, “I was mercenary pilot for People’s Liberation Army Air Force flying MIG-21’s for North Vietnam.” </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 10pt;">Chang’s pager went off, and we stared at it. “Chang, I would be quiet about this, that wound is still a bit fresh.”</span> </div>
Phil Gardockihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13213683478302437856noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8807471294226985918.post-66732199405130483092012-11-15T22:30:00.000-05:002013-01-23T12:33:50.694-05:00My First Day in Boot Camp<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">By Phil Gardocki</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The military is well versed in new hire integration, as they take “boots” in large groups at a time. So it takes a bit of doing to throw the well-oiled machine of the processing center out of kilter, but I managed it.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It was my first long train ride, some 22 hours in a sleepover car on Amtrak from Philadelphia to Orlando. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span>Because I tested highly in the Military Entrance Tests, I had an early promotion and was placed nominally in charge of two other recruits, and holding their records.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I also had “The” phone number to call when we arrived at our destination station.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We had plenty of company, because as it turned out, this train was chartered by the Navy, and was picking up recruits all the way down the eastern seaboard.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Once we disembarked, a line formed at the pay phone.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There were quite a few of us “in charge” of other groups, and we all had exactly the same instructions, to call the number and get instructions.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I now realize what an annoyance it must have been to the receiver at the other end to get 30 calls in a row, from the same location, asking the same question.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When it was my turn, I called, and a woman simply said, “The bus would be by in an hour.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">An hour!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I had an hour to look around. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span>Maybe I can find Disneyworld!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, without telling anyone what I was doing, I took off down the road, to see what I could see.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEginYw7aR_aaeXb1vjfnNXf2Gu_p_zqcgQUwZYDMLwRZgFAek95NctnAeIVxbr7VF7d0stAwsAKaoK2dHydcTJZA7feKnP62dfmjJU4enxoD6NM0iRUmb1sqqTqEmABxOnIDpJQcnQeoLA/s1600/WelcomeToRecruitTrainingCommand.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="126" rea="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEginYw7aR_aaeXb1vjfnNXf2Gu_p_zqcgQUwZYDMLwRZgFAek95NctnAeIVxbr7VF7d0stAwsAKaoK2dHydcTJZA7feKnP62dfmjJU4enxoD6NM0iRUmb1sqqTqEmABxOnIDpJQcnQeoLA/s320/WelcomeToRecruitTrainingCommand.jpg" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It wasn’t much.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Very boring really.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There were a lot of things wrong with this decision in retrospect, but I was young and on an adventure.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I returned in about half an hour to find the station vacant save a railway porter with an amused expression on his face.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He told me a bus had picked up the recruits and left already.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I was indignant.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That wasn’t an hour!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I looked at the station clock and only thirty minutes had passed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I found a map of Orlando, and the camp was only six miles away.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I studied the map carefully, noting some of the major roads to cross to use as waypoints, and set out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If I was lucky, it would only take about two hours.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I did note, with some sadness, that Disneyworld did not seem to be anywhere between here and there.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Meanwhile, unbeknownst to me I had upset quite a number of people, and had triggered a number of events.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The most immediate people affected were the two recruits whose records I was carrying.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They showed up, without papers, and uncertain of what would happen to them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And of course for them the processing center had to deal with a couple of unknowns.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The second group was everyone else on the train, who looked upon this with some amusement.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They thought I was deserting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It looked to them I got off of the phone, and ran for it, and that is what they reported.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The man who recruited me got a phone call to tell him of my desertion, along with some commentary along the lines of “You sure know how to pick ’em.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It must have been fairly caustic or unsettling, because he then committed what can only be referred to as a real brain fart.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He called my mother.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Now picture this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You are a parent.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Saturday, you kissed your oldest child goodbye, and teary eyed, sent him into the world, in the hands of a military recruiter.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Now it’s Sunday, you haven’t slept, <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span>having spent the last 24 hours sobbing at your loss, and the phone rings.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Hello?”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Mrs. Gardocki?” says a voice.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Yes, who is this?” she replies.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“This is Dave Ladley, the recruiter.” And she thinks, “Oh my God! <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span>What’s happened?”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Do you know where your son is?” continued the recruiter.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“I left him with <em>YOU</em>!” she screeched.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And still not realizing just how deep Dave has stepped in it, he continues, “We lost him.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To which he hears, in an octave range never before achieved by any human being, “<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-size: large;"><em>HOW COULD YOU POSSIBLY HAVE LOST MY SON</em>!</span></span>”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Every syllable cracked in such a way as to act like a badly wobbling dentist drill applied directly to your skull.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And then it got worse, my mother went into maximum wailing, holding the phone in a death grip, repeating over and over, <span style="font-size: x-large;">“<span style="line-height: 115%;">HOW COULD YOU POSSIBLY HAVE LOST MY SON,”</span></span> ignoring my<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Step Father’s attempts to liberate the phone to get some useful information.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Dorothy, give me the phone!”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“<span style="line-height: 115%;">HOW COULD YOU POSSIBLY HAVE LOST MY SON?”</span><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Dorothy, give me the phone!”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Eventually, he gave up, put on his coat, and got in the car.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Being my Step Father, Robert was only peripherally involved in the recruitment process.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He knew the recruting center was in the Century Building, the largest building in Lansdale, which at 4 stories, is not saying much, but not exactly where in the building it was. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span>But it was a short drive, less than 2 miles.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It was Sunday, the building was vacant, but uncharacteristically opened.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The ground floor map had the recruitment center listed as on the second floor.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> He got in the elevator, pushed the number 2 button and when the door opened</span>…<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><strong><em><span style="line-height: 115%;">“</span><span style="line-height: 115%;">HOW COULD YOU POSSIBLY HAVE LOST MY SON?”</span></em></strong><span style="line-height: 115%;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Roberts first thought was, “How did she beat me here?”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But the truth quickly dawned.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He guided in on the steadily increasing font size.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><strong><em><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“HOW COULD YOU POSSIBLY HAVE LOST MY SON?”<o:p></o:p></span></em></strong></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And turning the final corner, he was greeted by a miserable sight.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A grown man, face flat the desk,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>sobbing, his hand and phone as far from his ear as possible, and pleading, “I’m sorry lady, I’m really sorry.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Hang up the phone”, Robert said quietly.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A tear stained face looked up, expressing both horror and relief.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Hang up the phone”, Robert repeated.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Are you the father”, he asked?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Yes, I am.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Oh God!”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And treating the phone like a viper, the recruiter placed the phone on the cradle.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“<em><strong><span style="font-size: large;">HOW COULD YOU POSSIBLY</span>…”,</strong></em> click.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Okay”, said Robert, “We are going to make some phone calls.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I never fully appreciated how well connected my Step Father was.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Brantly name was well known in the South.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Before the Civil War, they were quite rich, but afterwards the family went into decline in wealth, but not in name recognition, or respect.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Yes sir, Mr Brantly”, said the Sheriff of Orlando.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“I have a deputy out in that area right now, just tell me what he is wearing and I’ll have him look for him.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Hanging up, Robert told the recruiter, “Now we will call the base commander.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Realizing how many rungs of the chain of command he would have to jump, the recruiter balked, “I can’t do that!”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“I can.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The base commander was not in, and they had to settle for the Duty Officer, a Lieutenant Junior Grade, who had not yet been informed that someone in his charge was missing, possibly AWOL, and now had to take a direct interest in finding a wayward recruit.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Now we’ll call the Chief of Naval Operations on the Joint Chief’s of Staff.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Fortunately for my naval career, that phone number was not easily available.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So it was into this bear trap, a tired, but successful Seaman Gardocki arrived at his first command, threw a sloppy salute to the gate guard, and was sent to the office.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Where the shouting began.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Recruit!” he yelled, “Why did you walk away, what did they tell you to do?”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“SIR, they said the bus would be there in an hour, SIR!”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“No they didn’t, he told you wait!” <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“No SIR, they said the bus would be there in an hour, SIR!”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Don’t lie to me recruit, I was there and he told you to wait for the bus.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“SIR, He was a <em>she</em>, SIR!”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Shocked at being caught in a lie, or having someone stand up to him, he stormed off.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">At that point, things got silly, and I realized even then, that a lot of this wasn’t really personal, it was just for appearances, part of the “Boot Camp Experience.” <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I was told to stand in the corner.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Like a 5 year old.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So I did.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There was a mirror in the corner, and I got to watch “The Rockford Files”, till a van picked me up to take me to the barracks.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There I was greeted like a minor hero with a freshly minted reputation for being crazy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The deputy arrived a little later at the gate, found I had been signed in, and reported back to the Sheriff, who called my Step Father.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Who went home to tell his wife that he had found her only son and that all was well. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span>The base commander received a report the next day that all recruits were accounted for, even if one was a late arrival.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He probably was puzzled when he got a call from his Admiral later in the day over the incident.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">All other processes that were started over this incident quietly unwound. It was more than a year before I had all the pieces of this story. Maybe...</span></div>
Phil Gardockihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13213683478302437856noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8807471294226985918.post-437009223430717322011-11-26T12:02:00.000-05:002014-05-06T11:30:57.225-04:00What Surprise?<div style="text-align: justify;">
By Philip Gardocki </div>
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The fall of communism in the Soviet Union in the late 1980s has been much ballyhooed as a "surprise". An ignorant press reported that the CIA failed to report on the eminent demise of the Soviet Union. I am sure that the CIA just grinned, accepted the criticism and went back to work, because, in the Intelligence game, it is better for you to be thought a fool and have your opponents lower their guard. </div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzoMdPQuKtzTiD3Xxr5UAyC0NNCk4nWt6ZIpdriL_UPPhnJJu62rDTTHReCpLwNBcr_RTDEW4-I77UwK8lzay06goAoMf0EIk9h-lvc2OdSrUXnvSXSL-aA5nT0p-oPraxl9CDl_3QkPI/s1600/berlinWall.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; cssfloat: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzoMdPQuKtzTiD3Xxr5UAyC0NNCk4nWt6ZIpdriL_UPPhnJJu62rDTTHReCpLwNBcr_RTDEW4-I77UwK8lzay06goAoMf0EIk9h-lvc2OdSrUXnvSXSL-aA5nT0p-oPraxl9CDl_3QkPI/s320/berlinWall.jpg" hda="true" height="221" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Berlin Wall Left</td></tr>
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Our policy against the Soviet Union during the Cold War was one of "Containment". This basically meant confronting any expansion and suppressing any dangerous trade links. The Containment policy was formulated by George Kennan (1904-2005) in 1947, and was followed by all presidents up through George Bush Sr. George Kennan predicted that this policy would either cause the collapse of the Soviet Union or force them to change their policies. </div>
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In 1975, I attended a Christmas party with other military friends including one Air Force cadet. He told me that he had recently attended a lecture given by a CIA representative. The representative had predicted that the Soviet Union would economically collapse in about 6 years – the CIA was obviously wrong about the date but not the event or the cause. </div>
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With the creation of the so-called "Star Wars" program, Ronald Reagan opened a new avenue to spend money on the military. We could barely afford it but the Soviets definitely could not. They tried and failed to keep up with us. <br />
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There were many critics of the "Star Wars" program; some was just the usual knee-jerk reaction against anything military but much of the criticism was valid, because, first and foremost, "Star Wars" was a fraud. Its major purpose wasn't to protect the US and our allies from Soviet missile strikes, it was to push the Soviets over the economic brink. If anything good came out of the program itself, so much the better. This conclusion has been validated by the memoirs of both Margaret Thatcher and Alexander Haig. </div>
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I am sure there were more indicators than this but I wonder why I still hear that communism’s fall was a "surprise". </div>
Phil Gardockihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13213683478302437856noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8807471294226985918.post-86981483438078539942011-11-26T11:55:00.000-05:002014-05-06T11:30:32.841-04:00A Swede's Story<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCGR8wLvWgu_A0z8jlOI45uexFAPIjuBN9CqmG_TtWaLCmkhAoifl5psXYIjquKn5TT5At60VPwykeO-sS_jaKkN-qDKwuj3ckvd5Aa92U0drLMj_eBbeeuDHUUlYBLPTddVqgeeYAXWc/s1600/dr960.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCGR8wLvWgu_A0z8jlOI45uexFAPIjuBN9CqmG_TtWaLCmkhAoifl5psXYIjquKn5TT5At60VPwykeO-sS_jaKkN-qDKwuj3ckvd5Aa92U0drLMj_eBbeeuDHUUlYBLPTddVqgeeYAXWc/s1600/dr960.jpg" hda="true" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Technicare's DR-960 Digital Subtraction <br />
Angiography X-Ray Machine. </td></tr>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">Related to Philip Gardocki by Jon Johansson </span><br />
One of my classmates in Technicare's Digital X-Ray class was Jon Johansson, who was from Sweden, and this is his Cold War Story – Phil. </div>
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My company had sent a group of us to an electronics convention in Vilnius, Lithuania, then a reluctant part of the Soviet Union. We were to man a booth for a few days, showing off our products. On the first day, one of my co-workers discovered a listening device planted in our hotel room. We were surprised at the clumsiness of this effort and had nothing to hide. </div>
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For the rest of the convention, we amused ourselves by talking into every vase, picture frame, and inanimate object we could find. It was great fun! </div>
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The jokes stopped when the minders showed up. We were breaking down our displays when two rough looking men started watching us. They had long coats, hats and just stared at us as we worked. It was like a movie. They then followed us onto the ferry we took to cross the Baltic Sea to Stockholm. Then, they even got onto our train. They did not leave the train station and I assume they went home, but the message was clear, "We know where you live and we can get you when we want." </div>
Phil Gardockihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13213683478302437856noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8807471294226985918.post-5487548958698241012011-11-26T11:51:00.000-05:002014-06-30T09:12:34.466-04:00Another Attempt to Start World War Three<span style="font-size: xx-small;">By Philip Gardocki </span><br />
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Shortly after the Arab-Israeli 1967 war, a US Navy cruiser was patrolling the eastern Mediterranean. The search radar started picking up an aircraft. The course was plotted, and it was determined to be heading towards Egypt. Signal returns were so strong that it had to be a very large aircraft, probably a Soviet Bear. The Bear was a large, four-prop, long-ranged bomber that was also commonly used for air transport and resupply tasks. </div>
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Shipboard standard duties involved watching all aircraft in range and the late night and boredom made this aircraft the main topic of discussion on the cruiser. Since it was a slow moving prop plane and search radars have a very long range, it was going to be observed for over an hour.</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghtMYDuM1xsDpN32FsTxH95VjvkZG5q5kE2hiHBOaXvteF6yENrts_VGTLvGYAkCl_hgSF1FfYDIWC-MQO6__o9rxF-SkrvErncx_lUofpgLDo_zSSwJshh_4GeJFEkey4rqUowaKIr4s/s1600/bear2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; cssfloat: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghtMYDuM1xsDpN32FsTxH95VjvkZG5q5kE2hiHBOaXvteF6yENrts_VGTLvGYAkCl_hgSF1FfYDIWC-MQO6__o9rxF-SkrvErncx_lUofpgLDo_zSSwJshh_4GeJFEkey4rqUowaKIr4s/s1600/bear2.jpg" hda="true" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Soviet Tupolov-95<br />
Nato Codename: Bear</td></tr>
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When the plane came into missile range, the Captain came into CIC and ordered tracking radars onto the target. This in itself was not unusual and was part of the normal hassling of the opposing sides when in close contact. It was unusual when he ordered missiles on the rail, and started the launch sequences. The realization of the situation started filtering through the combat team; this Captain was going to shoot down the Russian Bear and possibly start a Third World War. No officer challenged the Captain on his intentions. In the radar room in the aft section of the ship, the fire control radar men turned off their radars. In that day, the radars were Tube driven, and, once off, could not be restarted for 15 minutes.</div>
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The Captain ordered the radars restarted, and had explained to him that the radars were vacuum tube driven, and once off, their oscillators would not synchronize for 15 minutes, rendering them useless. No one reminded him that since the radars were were on and in reality were already warmed up, that there was a special mode called "Battle Short" that would have brought them up in 15 seconds.</div>
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The Captain ranted, threatened, and then looked on helplessly as the Bear slowly pulled out of range. Two days later, the Captain retired, and a new Captain showed up by helicopter. </div>
Phil Gardockihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13213683478302437856noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8807471294226985918.post-61029567992279592082011-11-26T11:45:00.000-05:002014-05-06T11:29:52.355-04:00What Was More Dangerous Than the U.S. Airforce?<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: xx-small;">By Philip Gardocki </span></div>
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The winter weather over Germany is fairly hostile to aircraft, particularly to pilots with low levels of training and with poorly maintained equipment that was not designed with an all-weather capability. The Soviet Air Force, while huge, was not very well maintained, and, in spite of an effort to maintain combat readiness, the fear of pilots defecting meant the planes were not often flown. This led to a condition where it was dangerous to fly in inclement weather.</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAJOaz-fvaO0KJnH77Tqt9LW8xWozuX8kOXYyK-y97ch1m7W3N6Ij3D10DdMRoDd0ymXXH22VQEdWxK0sPtz9ANb6jzm6pZizabG3iFc9876lzesLGgoxOr1-7N6uEgAmXZX_i94smnNw/s1600/deadmig2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; cssfloat: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAJOaz-fvaO0KJnH77Tqt9LW8xWozuX8kOXYyK-y97ch1m7W3N6Ij3D10DdMRoDd0ymXXH22VQEdWxK0sPtz9ANb6jzm6pZizabG3iFc9876lzesLGgoxOr1-7N6uEgAmXZX_i94smnNw/s1600/deadmig2.jpg" hda="true" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Dead MIG-23</td></tr>
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This situation was exploited by the U. S. Air Force. Whenever the weather would turn bad, a training flight was scheduled along the East German border. The Soviets would respond with their own matching flight along their side of the border, and occasionally, they would lose an aircraft due to their poor maintenance and training.</div>
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However, the competition was not always so one-sided.</div>
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No war is completely unbalanced and no nation with military aspirations wants to be caught out of date, either technically, or doctrinally. The Korean War was no exception. Most nations were above board with their support and participation, but some were not. For political reasons, the Soviet Union chose not intervene with military forces in the Korean War, though it certainly provided most of the heavy equipment for the Chinese and the North Koreans.</div>
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In an effort not to fall behind in jet combat doctrine, the Soviets sent the 176th Guards Fighter Regiment to fight on the side of the North Koreans. This unit, which was populated with a fair number of Soviet World War II aces, was flying the first production model Soviet jet fighters and became a major thorn in the U. N. side. Some of their pilots became the first jet fighter aces in the world. Overall, they claimed a kill ratio of almost 3-1, despite the fact the Russians and North Koreans were outnumbered 10-1 in the air and the Russians were not allowed to communicate over their aircraft radios, except in Korean. </div>
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To be fair, the 176th numbers are in dispute and their professed "kills" exceeded the losses that the U. N. experienced. It still is a testament to of what can be done when you mix the right skills with good equipment.</div>
Phil Gardockihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13213683478302437856noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8807471294226985918.post-67638687758456291812011-11-26T11:41:00.000-05:002015-07-10T10:51:51.653-04:00Living On The Line Of Death<div style="text-align: justify;">
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">By Philip Gardocki </span></div>
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2011 was a poignant year for me. The “Arab Spring” has me thinking back to 1981, when our destroyer was cruising in the Mediterranean. Having a standoff with Libya’s Colonel Kaddafi, and later as a show of support for the newly minted Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. </div>
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This story occurred in 1981, shortly after the "Gulf of Sidra Incident", and after the events described in the Cold War Story, "A Bad Day For Communism." <a href="http://storiesofthecoldwar.blogspot.com/2011/11/by-philip-gardocki-it-was-september.html">http://storiesofthecoldwar.blogspot.com/2011/11/by-philip-gardocki-it-was-september.html</a> This takes place in an environment of heightened military readiness. </div>
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I was asked by the Weapons Officer, otherwise known as "Weaps", to come to his office for a discussion. At this time, our ship was hovering about 15 miles from Libya, where we were being offered as a "dare". While we were 3 miles outside of Libyan territorial waters, we were 185 miles inside of Libya’s declared "Line of Death." </div>
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Once Weaps assured me that I was not in any trouble,* the conversation began in earnest. It was a confused and disjointed affair as Weaps didn’t know exactly what he wanted, but was trying to explain the situation in a round about manner, and thought we had a method for dealing with the situation. And if this makes no sense to you, then you have a good feel of the how the conversation went.</div>
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Eventually he went to the black board and drew out the tactical problem. In short, he wanted to know if we could shoot at aircraft that were operating from an airbase that had a mountain between us and them.</div>
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I informed him, that as a beam riding missile, as soon as the mountain cut the beam, our missile would self destruct. Weaps stated that he knew that, but he thought we had a mechanism that would allow us to shoot over the mountain at the airfield beyond it.</div>
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The lights went on. "Oh, you are talking about shore bombardment, yes we can do that!" Weaps brightened, this was the answer he was looking for! I thought rapidly, dredging up what was, at most, a 15 minute lecture on a "worse case scenario," from a class two years earlier, while knowing that this was nothing we practiced, but was possible. This was in the day before the Navy had access to cruise missiles, and most of the navy’s guns were 5". A mode of operation called "Shore Bombardment" with Terrier missiles was set as a contingency plan, just in case… </div>
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Got it! </div>
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My body language must have shifted, from pensive thought to full realization, and Weaps could see that, and looked on with great anticipation at the epiphany I was about to invoke. He might have had thoughts of his next yearly review, with mentions of innovation and diligence. </div>
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"We can set one of our missiles to detonate at a Cartesian coordinate point that is just about the point where it would lose the beam." </div>
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"How will that help?" asked Weaps. </div>
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"That should be close enough for the airburst to take out most of the aircraft on the airfield." I said. </div>
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Paling slightly, he asked, "Air burst?" </div>
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"Oh yes, shore bombardment is only with nuke’s." </div>
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In retrospect, I have often wondered about this conversation. The reputation I had with the chain of command must have been a conflicting one. On one side I am sure I was considered flaky, temperamental, and held our officers with low regard. On the other side, I was an excellent troubleshooter, a team player, scored in the upper 2% of the Armed Forces Qualification Test, and was an armchair military historian. Somehow, despite the anti-fraternization rules separating the officers from the men, the Weapons Officer thought that I was probably the only person that could answer his question and on later examination, he was right. </div>
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*I was not a troublemaker, but at least thrice, through no fault of my own, I have embarrassed the XO, once in front of his subordinates, once in front of the Captain, and once to the US Ambassador to Peru. See the Cold War Story "The Road to Leavenworth" <a href="http://storiesofthecoldwar.blogspot.com/2011/11/road-to-leavenworth.html">http://storiesofthecoldwar.blogspot.com/2011/11/road-to-leavenworth.html</a> for one of these events. </div>
Phil Gardockihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13213683478302437856noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8807471294226985918.post-17843733737375228412011-11-26T11:29:00.000-05:002020-05-25T09:42:57.341-04:00Requiem for an Inadvertent Cold Warrior<div style="text-align: justify;">
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">By Philip Gardocki </span></div>
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This is not a real story. There is no plot, no point to be made, and no punch line at the end. It is an example of how life can throw weird curve balls at you, and how one can adapt to unexpected circumstances. This is the story of Robert Eugene Brantly (1925 – 1985). While I knew him, he was a poet, rogue, father, manager and union leader - an overall renaissance man. His history before I knew him is rather vague; not that he was keeping secrets, but because we didn’t talk much. I was his step child and if he wanted to marry my mother, then I was just part of the deal.</div>
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There were leaks about his past and, when I thought about them, they didn’t always add up. He had stories of being drill sergeant in the Army, delivering ice in Cuba, served as a bodyguard all around South America, had a officers commission in the Merchant Marine, had dealings with the CIA, spoke fluent Spanish <i>and</i> Korean(?), was a boxer, robbed a bank and once broke a friend out of jail. He was descended from a rich southern family with extensive political connections. His father was part of the team that invented the cathode ray tube and he grew the stock rewards from that into a comfortable life. </div>
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While Robert was intellectually gifted and skipped grades in elementary school, he was also a typical "only child" rich kid. When he proved uncontrollable he was sent to a military school, the Valley Forge Military Academy. World War II broke out and the students were graduated early to provide manpower. Using the family’s political pull, he received the rank of commissioned midshipman. This is a rank below that of ensign but above any of the enlisted ranks. In that role, he traveled the Atlantic convoy routes to England, Morocco, and France, but, other than storms, he was never in any combat. </div>
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Following WWII, he left the service and spent most, if not all, of his time down south. It was around this time he broke one man out of a Mexican jail. However, the event that directed the rest of his life, started with barroom brawl. The fight ended with a plain-clothes, off duty deputy being knocked out by him. He was arrested and bail was posted by his father. This was the Deep South in the late 1940’s and, if you hit a cop, you were going to do time on a chain gang. </div>
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Realizing this, Robert skipped bail, and caught the next boat to Cuba. For doing this, he was forever disowned by his father. He made ends meet by delivering ice, and after a while, this english speaking Ice Man was noticed by an executive of General Electric. Who hired him to be a bodyguard for his business travels around South America. As the son of an electrical engineer, he knew a bit about electricity, and, when the executive was reassigned state side, Robert was offered a job managing electric barges in Seoul, South Korea. At the time, it was a common practice to build electric generation plants on barges and then ship them to needed areas around the world. </div>
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Very early on June 25th, 1950, there was a knock at the door. It was opened quickly as Robert’s manservant entered. His manservant had an unusual military background. In World War II, he had been a Korean corporal in the Japanese Army, where all the Japanese bias and bigotry normally kept any such recruits in the rank of private. To have achieved non-com status in that environment implied a high degree of competence. He said simply, "Chinese come, we go." The Korean War had just erupted, and Seoul was overrun on day 1. Robert Brantly had just become an inadvertent Cold Warrior. </div>
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With a bent towards scorched earth, they sank the three electric barges and hot-wired a jeep, which got them half way to Pusan before running out of gas. Joining the hundreds of thousands of refuges on foot, they made their way to the Pusan Perimeter, where the United Nations forces (mostly American) dug in their heels. The refuges were not evacuated, possibly as a sign of our determination to stay but more likely because Japan would not have accepted them. Eventually, this fluent English speaking refugee was noticed and he was approached there by the Central Intelligence Agency and spent the war as a security guard for an antiaircraft radar installation. </div>
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When the war ended, and now certain that the law wasn’t looking for him any more, he returned to the United States. He joined the army, and, being a former near officer and well connected, landed a job as a drill sergeant. He also got married and had two sons. Army life didn’t really suit him and, after a few years, he left. </div>
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October 1956 rolled around and he got an unusual request for a meeting in Philadelphia. When he told the story later, he described it thus: "You wouldn’t believe it. It was right out of a movie. I was given the address of an abandoned warehouse on the docks of Philadelphia. It was dark and foggy. When I got inside the building, I was hit with blinding lights and could barely make out three figures. They were all in suits and they all were named Mr. Smith. They wanted me to accept a job, without telling me what the job was. It didn’t take long for me to figure out they wanted me to parachute into Hungary, to help with the revolt against the Soviets. Of course, I turned them down. It would have been a suicide mission." </div>
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Robert spent the next 20 years in a variety of jobs. He divorced and remarried, was a manager in some jobs and was a union president in another. Over the course of time, he rescued a payroll from a burning factory building, got an award for efficiency and was fired for incompetence later in the same month. He also <i>never</i> filed federal income taxes but was never charged for it, although the local IRS chief knew exactly who and where he was. </div>
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A month after we buried him, my mother’s house was burgled. My mother’s 80 pound Elk Hound was found hiding behind the furnace, a pee spot on the floor to mark the spot where she must have been when the burglars entered the house. Nothing was stolen but everything was ransacked. I suspect the CIA was looking for something. But do they typically search homes of long retired auxiliaries? There just might be more to this Cold War Story than I will ever know. </div>
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Phil Gardockihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13213683478302437856noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8807471294226985918.post-90785318613673067622011-11-26T11:13:00.000-05:002014-05-06T11:19:44.352-04:00Did the Cold War Save Lives?<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: xx-small;">By Philip Gardocki </span></div>
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Despite the press’s increasing focus on the wars around the world, you are far safer from war than you think.</div>
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Because of efforts to avoid the unthinkable, the world has avoided another world-wide war of the sort that have been occurring periodically for the last 500 years. Spain fought for world dominance in the 1500s. Later, all the European powers were involved in power struggles to one degree or another. By the 1700’s there was a world wide conflict between France and England, of which the French and Indian War, our Revolutionary War, and the Napoleonic era were just continuations. With France subdued, the English proceeded to establish and consolidate conquests all over the world against indigenous peoples. </div>
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By the late Nineteenth Century, the Germanic peoples pulled themselves together and became the dominant force in Europe. With a more modern infrastructure, and better organizational skills, they defeated France in 1870 and began to surpass England in economic power. When Germany tried to establish trading enclaves elsewhere in the world they found that all the choice spots were taken and were forced to establish themselves a niche empire whose very presence helped lay the groundwork for two world wars. </div>
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The hard numbers can never be known for previous centuries but, in this century, if you lived from 1900 to 1950, your odds of dying as a result of war were in the 4.5% range. About three billion people have lived in that timeframe and about 140 million were killed due to war or associated purges. From 1950 – 2000, your odds were around .8% or less. About 7 billion people have lived in that timeframe and about 60 million died from war or associated purges. If you avoided living in a communist country, the odds shift downward to 4.1% in the early part of the century and .2% of the later half. </div>
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Also consider that, if you extrapolate about 1% of the worlds population died in World War One, and 5% died in World War Two, the cost of a late Twentieth century World War Three, even without nukes, could easily have been 250 million, and more likely, a billion. </div>
Phil Gardockihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13213683478302437856noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8807471294226985918.post-1838944215469600992011-11-26T10:33:00.000-05:002014-05-06T11:19:23.603-04:00Be Careful What You Ask For<span style="font-size: xx-small;">By Philip Gardocki </span><br />
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Refueling at sea is probably the second* most difficult and dangerous operation that is performed regularly by the navies of the West. It is performed far less often by other navies of the world and almost never by the old East Bloc navies. It is the reason why the West can force project everywhere in the world. </div>
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMsiznM7vP5mpE8S8IkYkUTr6xa9tkAEqEhO0cg-SNYxxYQhBbP-u64Qcam6Qa2cDXMR8SzYhdBJd2TiKA3G2Lujz3a7xk0k89KwAjlvmQk4aqJNdr0l73XBGnwRzkWcbl4TCtxRahS4M/s1600/ddgSplashing2.GIF" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; cssfloat: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMsiznM7vP5mpE8S8IkYkUTr6xa9tkAEqEhO0cg-SNYxxYQhBbP-u64Qcam6Qa2cDXMR8SzYhdBJd2TiKA3G2Lujz3a7xk0k89KwAjlvmQk4aqJNdr0l73XBGnwRzkWcbl4TCtxRahS4M/s1600/ddgSplashing2.GIF" hda="true" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>DDG cutting through the waves.</i> <br />
Note this is a normal clear day, and not<br />
hurricane conditions described here.</td></tr>
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It is easy to see why refueling at sea is so dangerous. You have two or three ships, over 500 feet long, moving in parallel courses around 120 feet from each other for extended periods of time over a surface that is moving them up and down, port and starboard. While the ships are working against their destruction because of the venturi principle, you have between them, high tension cables, communication lines and fuel hoses. On these platforms you have the men who are tending the cables, moving the goods and communicating the information through multiple layers of command. If it doesn’t work perfectly, supplies could get drenched, men could be lost overboard or, in the worse case, ships crash. </div>
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To prevent accidents, the US Navy practices refueling just about every other day when a ship is at sea. It becomes so completely routine and boring that you forget just how dangerous it is. At one point, my job in this evolution was serving as phone talker to the other ship. I would pass messages from the tanker to the our First Officer and to another phone talker who was hooked to our Engineering. </div>
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One Sunday**, we were waiting for our turn at the pumps. This was one of those days that writers of the sea love to describe, in their most overused and picturesque prose, as, "The sea was made of glass." I say this, because up until then I can’t say I ever saw such a flat surface on the ocean. Due to a mechanical problem with the oiler, we had been waiting for several hours. In a fit of pique, I went to the First Officer in charge of the forward operations, and asked him, "Where is the adventure?" </div>
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I had a reputation for being a wise-ass, and his eyes narrowed; he didn’t want to be made a fool of, but couldn’t see where I was coming from. "What?" was all he replied. </div>
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"The Navy promised me an adventure and I haven’t had it yet." </div>
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The lights went on. The current Navy recruiting slogan was "It’s not a job. It’s an adventure." As he made a faux backhand at me he retorted, "Get out of here." </div>
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Within three days, I ate those words. More accurately, I had them hurled back at me by the 90 mile per hour winds of a force 2 hurricane. The violent pitching and the yawing of the ship had made even the hardened sailors a bit queasy. We were taking on white water on the O2 deck (Translation, the waves were breaking over the second level of the ship above the water line.), this is normally about 45 feet above sea level. To increase the stability of the ship, it was decided to top off the tanks with an extra hundred tons of fuel. How we found a British oiler at night and in that hurricane, I’ll never know. The only way the First Officer could find <i>me</i> was to go the phone jack I was plugged into and then follow the wire, hand over hand. </div>
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"Were hooked up, tell them to start," He shouted over the wind! </div>
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I yelled into the microphone, "How much pressure can you give us?" On a normal day, I would expect an answer like 50 pounds per square inch, which would take us 25 minutes to refuel and hope for 75 pounds per square inch, which would then take only 15 minutes. This, however, was not a normal day. </div>
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"We can give you 150 pounds per square inch," replied the British-accented voice. </div>
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I paused a second, as I have never had a 3 digit number offered to me before.<br />
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"Of course. Now, if number 4 wasn’t acting up, we would be giving you 175." Thank God for interservice rivalry one-upmanship and showing off!</div>
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I screamed into the ears of the engineering phone talker, "Can we handle 150 pounds per square inch?"</div>
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Despite being only a foot away, I couldn’t see the shock on his face, but there was a significant pause before he repeated my request into his headset. After only a few seconds he screamed back, "Go! Ahead!" </div>
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"Give us 150," I shouted into my headset. </div>
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Then, over the noise of the waves crashing into the ASROC launcher, and the hurricane force winds, was a new noise. A humming sound that grew steadily louder and louder. It was the sound that oil makes, when 3,750 gallons per minute travels through a reinforced rubber hose that is suspended in air by a steel cable that is tensioned to 10,000 pounds per square inch. I peered into the dark at the barely illuminated hose and like everyone else, backed away, pondering the forces involved. The First Officer ordered all nonessential personnel indoors. For eight minutes we wondered if the hose would blow. </div>
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Thanks to excellent nautical engineering, coupled with monitored routine maintenance, it didn’t blow, but it did take sledge hammer to bust the hose loose, and the residual pressure of the fuel oil ruined several uniforms when it released. </div>
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The Captain ordered medicinal brandy to be issued but it was actually Jack Daniels whiskey. I don't really care for whiskey, but I never had a drink at sea before, and as this oppurtunity was not likely to ever happen again, I endulged. Everyone in the refueling detail got one very carefully measured shot, issued by the corpsman. Who, in turn took advantage of the situation to get royally crocked, and subsequently found out why you don’t want to drink heavily in ship that is bobbing like a cork. </div>
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* The most dangerous is carrier air operations. </div>
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** You always refuel on Sunday.</div>
Phil Gardockihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13213683478302437856noreply@blogger.com1