US Navy, 7th fleet

[joetechParticipant]

I read that the admiral of the 7th fleet got replaced after this last incident. How can a fleet admiral be responsible for this? There’s an officer of the deck and lookouts posted when a ship is underway. And no one is going to hack into the DRT…it’s analog and hardwired. If their radar is malfunctioning they should still be able to see other ships in their path with lookouts. Damn strange if you ask me.

"Don't follow in my footsteps...I stepped in something."

[Anonymous 3]

It is said that Russian can spoof their ships to appear on an airfield. (and these were normal water-ships and not Zeppelin air ships or star destroyers, just saying)

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2143499-ships-fooled-in-gps-spoofing-attack-suggest-russian-cyberweapon/

it is said, that GPS satellites are far away and only emit tens of watts radio wave, and it can be “shouted over” by something that is closer.

But if the personnel gets watered down in the way many of you say, then be happy about that nothing blew up. I mean, really, diversity instead of choosing the correct people for the job? that is bad enough in the civilian life, but in war is life or death to do good job. What’s next? special snowflake shoots a rocket on someone who hurt her feelings?

[OldBillParticipant]

joetech wrote:

How can a fleet admiral be responsible for this?

He’s responsible in the same way the captain of the Fitzgerald who was asleep in his bunk at the time of that collision was responsible. The buck stops with the men in command.

The CO of the Fitz – who was badly injured and was removed from his nearly destroyed cabin only after the damage control party worked their way through the wreckage with hydraulic tools – was the man ultimately responsible for the training and qualifications of the people on watch. His was the final signature. They could not stand watch until he was satisfied with their abilities.

Now, the captain isn’t personally conducting all the testing, training, and evaluations. He does, however, appoint the people who do all that. If he appoints incompetents or allows the system to be run incompetently, it’s on his head.

As for the 7th Fleet, it’s been more like the Three Stooges than Kinkaid’s WW2 ass kickers for a couple of years now. These collisions get all the press, but there’s been all sorts of shipboard mishaps, aviation crashes, groundings, and other screw-ups lately. Through it all the Fat Leonard scandal has been hovering over it all like a pickled egg fart in church.

The institutional culture of the 7th has gone wrong and needs to be changed. You do that by scaring the ever living f~~~ out of people and the best way to do that is to s~~~can the people everyone thinks are untouchable; i.e. the flag ranks.

Do not date. Do not impregnate. Do not co-habitate. Above all, do not marry. Reclaim and never again surrender your personal sovereignty.

[Anonymous 3]

There was a movie titled “Down periscope”, that’s what comes to my mind if I read the stories in the topic.

[AstroParticipant 2045]

OldBill wrote:

This happened during the Reagan era’s fleet build up and the Navy was starving for qualified personnel. Accordingly, word went out to get as many warm bodies as possible “out to the fleet” and let the ships separate the good from the bad. None of that was put in writing, naturally, but it was an order nonetheless.

I was in the USN/USNR during the 80’s and 90’s. Yes, we had our moments when things went TARFU like the Tailhook scandal but from what I have heard, the military has changed allot since then by taking it to the other extreme. It looks to me like the greatest goat-f~~~ in the history of the US military. All the sensitivity training would be a joke if it were not so damaging. My CC was a SEAL and didn’t give two s~~~s about sensitivity. I’m afraid that the day will come that we will not be able to fight our way out of a paper bag. I recently talked to a Master Chief who left it all because it was too much a s~~~ storm for him to tolerate anymore.

[Mr. SmithParticipant 686]

NerdTunneler wrote:

Time to use good old radar or a pair of sharp eyes on the deck and plenty of common sense…

Don’t forget most modern navy vessels are some kind of stealth and probably not so good seen by commercial vessels. Most commercial vessels have anti collision systems but it relies on Radar.

I concur the analysis of others here. It’s mostly a question of organization on sides of the commercial vessels as well as on the navy vessels. There should be a guy somewhere at any bridge with a pair of binoculars. Instead of using this centuries old and proven means of navigation they rely on electronics easily to be fooled and known to be not really reliable.

This is a result of a deeper problem. All over the western world there is a tendency to sabotage the military. I don’t know if it is intentionally or just out of stupidity, but there is a clear path it follows. I don’t talk about mistakes and failures, such things happens, but decisions made by politicians and leaders known in the very moment they made it it was a stupid idea.
I don’t even see a conspiracy here. It can all be explained by greed and corruption. The manufacturers send a guy in a suit and a Powerpoint presentation to some politician. They promise something and the politician has no idea what the man is talking about, but it looks good. Those companies also offer to fund the politicians next campaign, maybe he gets an offer for a nice job after his political career. He uses his contacts and influence to get the government buy this stuff and our soldiers have to live (or die) with it.

Except the F-35 and some frigates I have not heard about crappy decisions in arms deals by the US, but I can tell some of the Germany army and navy. The German navy bought helicopters (NH-90 Sea lion). The floor in this things is so fragile it can be damaged by military boots. Additionally it is not allowed to fly over sea, because it was not build to withstand the conditions in the North Sea. The main role of this helicopter is transportation of special forces, search and rescue and medical evacuation. The winch on the helicopter is too weak to lift people and it cannot be just replaced by a stronger one, because the structure of the air frame does not allow it. I wonder how they want to lift in wounded or set down special forces? I bet you all heard about the G36 does not like the sun light and there are much more of this kind of failures. In all cases the people who made the decisions was not military, but politicians and of course there are no consequences for them.

"I need men, real men, men with balls, certainly not sissies. I would never ask them to take an enemy position, but I insist that they follow me to that position. If you are one of those men, raise your hand." Napoleon Bonaparte

[OldBillParticipant]

Mr. Smith wrote:

Don’t forget most modern navy vessels are some kind of stealth and probably not so good seen by commercial vessels. Most commercial vessels have anti collision systems but it relies on Radar.

That’s not the case in the McCain and Fitzgerald collisions. GPS and other electronic navaids were not spoofed. As for the DDG’s low radar cross section, warships routinely hoist radar reflectors aloft during routine operations.

The failures in both cases were systemic training and organizational ones on both the commercial and warships. While you expect the merchant mariners to be more sloppy, the Filipino crew in the case involving the Fitzgerald didn’t have anyone on the bridge, the USN should have performed better.

The root cause is the USN’s failure to take SWO training seriously, previously substandard performances then became normalized, and lax watchstanding operations resulted.

Until 2003, prospective SWOs attended a strict 6 month program at the Naval War College in Newport Rhode Island with a fairly high wash out. After that, prospective SWOs stood watch under the supervision of qualified SWOs until being certified to stand watch alone.

After 2003, the SWO school was replaced with a set of training DVDs issued to a prospective SWO and constituting self-paced course which the individual was expected to finish on their own. When these self-taught SWO candidates still stood watch with formally trained SWOs, the defects inherent in the self-paced course could be corrected. As the formally trained SWOs advanced in rank or left the service, qualified self-taught SWOs began teaching prospective SWOs instead and the quality of training took a big hit.

The USN hasn’t been training SWOs in any real sense for nearly 15 years now and the chickens are finally coming home to roost.

Do not date. Do not impregnate. Do not co-habitate. Above all, do not marry. Reclaim and never again surrender your personal sovereignty.

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