After reading “No Higher Honor,” I found Brad Peniston had written another book, “Around the World with the US Navy.”

Published in 1999, the book is a travelog of just about every Navy community, short the SEABEES and the SEALS. Brad spent about 2 years covering the story, with a period in the summer of 1998 where he and his crew spend about 2 months observing the world of Navy units, traveling between Navy commands, ashore, afloat and in the air. The meat of the book are the statements made of the sailors and officers in a Navy that was seeing the shortages that came as a result of the rapid drawdowns when it was clear the Cold War had ended.

The beauty of this read is the straight forward, no nonsense descriptions of life in the Navy, with Brad’s added talent to paint a word picture of the living envirnment, physically and emotionally. from boot Seamen to senior admirals, Brad captured wonderfully illuminating insights, as well as the detail of life at sea, in the air, or under the waves.

I recognized several names of former ship and schoolmates, and found out some of the performance of Admiral Boorda’s Smart Ship Program, which I managed to sit in a meeting to get my command a seat at the table in the very beginnings of the USS YORKTOWN’s recreation.

Even with my interaction with some of the communities mentioned, which included the Special Boat Units and the VR Naval Air Logistics Operations (NALO) units, I gained a greater understanding of some of the non-Surface Warfare related communities.

Maybe it’s time for Book II of the series, with Brad and his photgraphers heading out again to sample the fleet in the wake of the major strikes conducted in support of OIF and OEF.

If you would like to get a detailed glimpse of what it’s like to be a sialor maintianing a carrier’s arresting gear, on being on a Visit Boarding & Search crew, or life beneatht he waves as you sit in the control room and dive the “boat” upon clearing the shallow water, or if you always wondered what a P-3C Orion crew did, thinking they were just there for the per diem check, this is the book for you.

From a historical perspective, it’s a documentary of the strains on the manpower of the Navy during some difficult years and worth hearing what real operators had to say about the work they did to keep things going.

Maybe you’ll find some of your old shipmates in there, too.

With the Middle East issues coming to blows, and the Naval Academy courts-martialing a Midshipman, I’m thinking it’s time to sort through our box of paradigms and toss out the old ones, and then get the new ones, which, more than likely will cost us some amount of effort, but…I think it’s necessary.

In a microcosm, the current Israeli-Hizbollah-Lebanon conflict provides a model of a new form of warfare. It’s not that other hadn’t thought of this, but it’s more that Hizbollah is showing you can run a military force (in conventional terms), without the overhead. Think about it: No uniforms to issue, then have to haggle with some lobbyists from the textile industry every few years and have to buy everyone (or cause them to buy) new stuff to wear. As far as base infrastructure, if you’re using someone’s house, they are paying the utility bills and doing the routine upkeep. You may have to help out if you plan to dig a tunnel through the area, but…it’s still on the cheap.

Like the VC, they stash weapons and ammo around, in a warehouse here, a home there, maybe hit up the local imam to use the utility room at the mosque, too. From a soldiers point of view, it’s not like they have to memorize their weapon serial number and have to account for it. In this case, the loss of capital assets has to be a bigger expense than the US Congress would allow, on a percentage basis…anyhow, Hizbollah is the proxy for Iran, which helps out on costs for the Iranians. I’m sure they aren’t putting money aside for their retirement.

Confusing…but, not if you think about it for a while. It does require that we (the rest of the world) re-look at international law and the (recently much misunderstood) Geneva Conventions. For that matter, I think the SCOTUS staff anf leadership need some serious back to school work about what constitutes a “treaty,” particularly in the INternational arean. It seems like not all that long ago, several of them thought using foreign law would be good for the us (another reason the re-evaluate how you think about the seating of judges), yet they seem to have completely missed the point on International Law.

Anyhow…and what about midshipman? Well, CDR Salamander has the lead, but a blog, The Countervailing Force, he found has blow by blow reports of the Courts-martial of Lamar Owens. Sick at the core. The woman gets immunity and spills her guts about a long list of behaviors, any ONE of which would roast you and your career as a Naval Officer, and the male is headed for possibly a Conduct Unbecoming and Officer charge, which….also gets you the boot from the officer corps. It appears when she said “no” after she had asked him to “come on down,” he did the right thing: He got up and left. So…picture a career down the tubes for two people raging hormones, which has come to be acceptable behavior in about every venue of civilian and military life, but one party took the directions and left, but the other party may still assume the office of the leader of young men and women in the Marine Corps.

It reminds me about a line from “Ghost Busters” about dogs lying down with cats, etc, etc, etc…

The Defense Link website, run by DoD, profiles the Valour-IT Project!

There’s a picture of one of the service members who have benefited from your contributions.

BZ, as we say in the Navy, to any and all who help with this project

PS: Donations are welcome and appreciated any time of the year!

Over the weekend of the 4^th of July, I was on the road and finally found time to stop and visit the museum for the Mighty 8^th Air Force. It’s right there on the side of I-95, just south of Savannah, GA, featuring a B-47 static display next to the interstate. I wasn’t sure what I’d find, but, the interior of the building did have some things I hadn’t seen at an air museum before.

The museum starts you out with a little walk through the history leading up to WWII, with some history of the rise of German power, and the attack at Pearl harbor. From there, it’s a lot of info on the planes and men who became the 8^th Air Force, stationed in the British Isles. I did note that the aircraft types memorialized were almost exclusively bomber or fighter models, with nothing discussing the logistical planes, which, after checking with my friend Jim, indeed discovered the C-47s and gliders of the troop carrying groups all were in the chain of command. Savannah is the appropriate place for the museum, for, as I found out on my excursion, it was the place where the unit was established in 1942.

Be that as it may, the museum is still a worthwhile side trip, if you’re traveling the East Coast. Here’s what was in the central gallery display area, which took me by surprise:

Yep, a real war trophy, the venerable ME-163B “Komet” rocket fighter! Armed with 30mm cannons, they launched this thing vertically (or horizontally with a drop away set of wheels), it then got above the bomber formations, swooped down through them in a high speed, gravity assisted glide, before it landed, sometimes blowing up when it hit the runway, due to the use of hydrogen peroxide as the fuel for the rocket motor.

Here’s a picture of the business end of this interesting piece of history:

There were displays galore, and several movie theaters looping historical films. Displays included a POW Camp barracks, forged documents from the escape and evasion efforts, aviation art, log books, etc, etc…the kinds of things you’d expect. As you near the end of the displays, there is the nose section of a MiG-21, with a walk up platform, so you can get a good view of the cockpit. One memorable display was a painting of a ME-109 escorting a battle damaged B-17. The story was the fighter swooped in to strike, and could see several of the crew being treated by others, so he flew alongside the bomber. It wasn’t until about 30 some years later, the German pilot discussed his moment of compassion, and he was able to meet some of the crewmen of the B-17 he declined to shoot down.

Here are some of the other displays:

The Rolls-Royce Merlin engine made famous for its use in the Spitfire and the later Mustangs. I came to know the sound of this Rolls-Royce/V1650 mill when it powered the Unlimited Class hydroplanes in the early ’60s. If you’re not familiar with that water sport, they were doing 200+ mph with the WWII fighter engines when I was in grade school and now they do 200 plus a little with helicopter turbines, just without the studly roar of the 12 cylinders hammering away.

There was also a Cyclone engine on a stand. The powerplant of the B-17s and B-24s:

A real P-51D hung proudly on the tail of an ME-109:

They had a PT-17 Steerman, a scale P-47 and the nose section of a B-24 Liberator in the center gallery. They also had the two waist gunner stations from a B-17, set up with an aerial gunnery simulator, where you could wield a real M2 Browning against FW-190s and ME-109s coming from various attack angles.

Static display outside included the B-47 Stratojet, a MiG-17 “FRESCO”

and one of the longest serving aircraft with the US Armed Forces, the F-4 Phantom:

So, there’s my vacation travel report.

Technology and Military Ops, particulaly in the Naval Service sense, will be the point of a 4 day conference later this month in DC.

Capt Chris Christopher, Special Assistant to the Chief of Naval Research, forwarded this heads up:

This is an update to my previous email regarding the 2006 Naval S&T Partnership Conference, July 31-August 3, at the Wardman Park Marriott Hotel in Washington, DC. This conference replaces the ONR conferences held since 2000 in Washington, DC.

The $1 Million “CNR Challenge” announced by ONR

Chief of Naval Research (CNR) Rear Admiral William E. Landay III, USN, has announced the $1 million “CNR Challenge” for innovative science and technology ideas brought to the Office of Naval Research during the 2006 Naval Science and Technology Partnership Conference. The CNR Challenge is targeting $1 million for innovative ideas or technologies brought to ONR’s attention through the Open Innovation Marketplace at the Naval S&T Partnership Conference.

The Open Innovation Marketplace gives registered conference attendees the opportunity to schedule face-to-face meetings with personnel from ONR, other parts of the Naval Research Enterprise, industry, or academic institutions, to ask specific questions about naval science and technology research, or to present new and innovative concepts and technologies. Marketplace participants must submit an abstract in advance. More information on the Marketplace and conference registration
is available on the 2006 Naval Science and Technology Partnership Conference web site at http://www.ndia.org/meetings/6200/. More information about the CNR Challenge is available at http://www.onr.navy.mil/.

“There are always a number of good ideas coming to ONR through the Open Innovation Marketplace,” said Admiral Landay, “so I have allocated one million of our precious research dollars to more rapidly develop those ideas. One of the drawbacks in the Open Innovation Marketplace in the past was that we could not move out quickly on good ideas. Our budget process often causes a year or more delay before funds become available.

“If there are any good ideas that meet Navy or Marine Corps needs, we want to move very quickly to develop them. This should allow us to jumpstart ideas we receive through the Marketplace.”

2006 Naval S&T Partnership Conference

Presented by the National Defense Industrial Association (NDIA) with technical support from the Office of Naval Research, the 2006 Naval S&T Partnership Conference is the successor to, and builds upon the success of, the six annual partnership conferences previously presented by ONR. The 2006 Naval S&T Partnership Conference will provide key insight into
the Navy & Marine Corps drive to enable revolutionary naval operational concepts that meet the challenges of the 21st century through strategic investment in S&T research. The Conference will inform government, industry and academia of the direction, emphasis, and scope of the Department of the Navy’s investment in science and technology research, and how companies and universities can do business with the Naval Research Enterprise.

An impressive list of speakers has been announced for the event, highlighted by confirmed speakers Secretary of the Navy Donald Winter; the Assistant Secretary of the Navy for Research, Development and Acquisition Dr. Delores Etter; Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Navy for Research, Development, Testing and Evaluation Dr. Michael McGrath; Chief of Naval Research Rear Admiral William Landay III; and Commanding General, Marine Air Ground Task Force Training Command Brigadier General
Douglas Stone, USMC. Additional speaker announcements will be made in the days to come to come.

In three and one-half days of the Conference, attendees from government, industry, and academia will:

* Hear from the senior leadership of Congress, the Department of Defense, the Department of the Navy, the Office of Naval Research, and the Naval Research Enterprise
* Gain an understanding of S&T research partnership opportunities for industry and academia
* Meet one-on-one with program managers from ONR and across the Naval Research Enterprise, including Naval laboratories, Naval warfare centers, and University Affiliated Research Centers in the Open Innovation Marketplace.
* Learn how to participate in the challenge to creative innovative solutions to meet Fleet and Force requirements in the Future Naval Capabilities (FNC), Innovative Naval Prototypes (INP), and Discovery and Invention (D&I) efforts;
* See and discuss innovative technologies from industry, National and Federal labs, and academia in the conference exhibit hall.
* Enjoy stimulating scientific debate and discussion at Ben Franklin’s Scientific Salon.

In a one-half day training session before the Conference opens, industry and academic attendees will learn how to do business with ONR and the Naval Research Enterprise. The theme of the 2006 Naval S&T Partnership Conference is “The Navy After Next…Powered by Naval Research.” The challenges of providing power and energy to the Fleet and Force will be
in the spotlight, and speakers from all segments of the energy industry will be invited to participate in discussions that will focus of the potential future sources of power and energy to enable the Navy-Marine Corps team to execute its mission in the 21st century. NDIA is presenting a gala dinner to salute 60 years of world class S&T research by ONR.

Information

Information on attending and exhibiting at the Conference is available on the NDIA Conference web site at http://www.ndia.org/meetings/6200 , or at the ONR web site http://www.onr.navy.mil/.

Sounds like a great opportunity to “get an oar in the water” with the future of the Navy. Any takes?

Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post.

I received my copy of “No Hgher Honor” by Bradley Peniston last week.

I read it in two evenings, and would have liked to have stayed up the first night and make it all the way through. It is easy to read, well laid out, and with plenty, but not to much detail to chase off the non-Navy reader.

The basic “one liner” to describe the book is “the mining of the USS ROBERTS (FFG-58),” but that doesn’t do justice to the scope of the writing. The book is a multi-faceted discussion of many topical areas, all relating directly to the events of the day, when the bow lookout, Seaman Bobby Gibson, steadied his binoculars on some objects ahead of the ship in the Persian Gulf on April 14th, 1988.

Over the years, I have read two other books that have followed a similar format, for similar topics:

“Typhoon, The Other Enemy” by C. Raymond Calhoon. This book discusses the typhoon that the Third Fleet sailed through during the later part of WWII. Capt Calhoun was the skipper of one of the MAHAN Class DDs that survived the massive waves and winds. I discussed some lessons learned from that book here. As with “No Higher Honor,” it is engaging writing.

and:

“Sailors to the End” by George Freeman. This book is about the raging fires aboard the USS FORRESTAL (CV-59) in the summer of 1967.

All three of these books cover the genesis of the problems, from an engineering and leadership standpoint, gripping descriptions of the actual incidents from many first person accounts, and also the follow up inquiries and fallout that resulted. In this regard, “No Higher Honor” brings you to the mine strike with an extensive knowledge of the ship design, the mission requirements, and the command structure and philosphy. Once the mine was hit, the story details the timeline of events, and the desperate, but pre-planned responses carried out. In the aftermath of the event, Brad gives you the upper level geo-political response, which resulted in Operation Praying Mantis. He also provides the tactical details of that operation, followed by the subsequent return of the ship to the States and how the Bath Iron Works expertise put this ship back in operation.

I hope that is enough for you to want to get your hands on the book.

I also enjoyed this book because it was, in addition to the story described above, an excellent report on leadership, command priorities, and the value of training, training, and, yes, more training. For three years, I rode the ships of the Atlantic Fleet as the Type Commander’s Combat Systems Assessment Officer. I had the almost twice weekly opportunity to observe (mostly) and train (sometimes) “upper deck” crews. I believe I saw just about every way you could run a command in this area of ship readiness. I also was Engineer Officer with an operational deployment, a 10 month ROH (in Bath Iron Works) with the Light Off Exam (LOE) and the following trip to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba for refresher training and an Operational Propulsion Plant (OPPE) equivalent.

Brad’s writing takes you inside the very foundations of the crew of the ROBERTS. Commander Paul Rinn set out a philosophy of excellence, with a center piece of damage control training. It paid off. The reading on this topic is useful for anyone bound for a pre-comm crew, specifically anyone in any leadership/supervisory position. It’s valuable reading for other leaders, for the context of re-establishing a functioning crew, prepared to take the fight on when it comes, because they trained for it in advance.

For those interested in ship design and engineering, the book is a great read about not only initial design decisions, but also how equipment issues can be dealt with under severe damage conditions.

For historians, there are points describing the role of the US Navy in the Persian Gulf region in the late 80’s, and also details on the tactical and strategic decisions and actions of the conflict between the US and Iran.

For anyone who wonders what life aboard a small surface combatant is like, during crew training operations, as well as on deployment, this is a book that open that window.

For people interested in the psychology of training and people under stress, there are bits and pieces here that will provide insight into the human condition.

For those who’s professional work deals in leadership, mostly for the military, but also for other large organizations with significant structure, I believe you won’t be disappointed with the material provided by “No Higher Honor.”

In closing, Brad’s book is written with enough, but not too much detail. As I read the book I could easily visualize the places, equipment, or situations he described, and know the technical detail is exacting.

For you readers in the Norfolk, VA area, Brad will be at Borders in Newport News July 29th, 2006.

The full calendar of book events is here.

Here is a link to more history on the USS SAMUEL B ROBERTS (DE-413) of WWII fame, the namesake of the modern day ROBERTS. The book that chronicled the Battle off Samar, “Last Stand of the Tin Can Sailors” by James Hornfischer, is another fine read.

Update 07/10/2006:

Neptunus Lex has a link to this post and has some comments on Operation Praying Mantis from his experiences.

Eagle1 has a link, and comments on a similar case of the USS WARRINGTON (DD-824) during the Vietnam War, except the outcome was not the same.

Cdr Salamander also linked here with this post.

For those of you who get here via other links, or random reading, all three of those blogs are worth your time to check out.

Also, Brad left me a note and reminded me the entire first chapter of the book is posted at this link.

Hopefully, the trackback to Mudville Gazette’s Open Post for 7/12/06 will work…

Click “more” to read about my FFG-7 background

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Since retiring, I haven’t lived in an area where there are military bases, except one, which has two major headquarters in it….

I spent the last week on the road, and got back up into the Norfolk, VA area. Things have changed, boy, have they changed!

Of the five gates at Naval Amphibious Base, Little Creek, most were closed. Gate 3 has had the proscribed modifications for the security, and Gate 5 is closed, with barricades up around the massive construction. Inside the base gates, the number of ships, fro “the old days” is quite reduced.

Then I took a drive to the Naval Operating Base. I got a late start, having slept in from the long drive before, and making a few stops enroute. After a late lunch, I glanced at my watch and an involuntary shiver went up my spine, as the numbers 3:40PM stared back at me. OH, NO! BASE TRAFFIC! I decided to drive about the base anyhow, since I had other things to do later in the week. I turned into the massive gate at the “D&S Piers,” and began the drive west. There were no masts visible ahead of me, along the banks of the southern branch of the Elizabeth River. When I got about 3 blocks from the piers, and at the north and south ends of the piers, there were three CGs and four DDGs. When I drove closer, there were two subs.

The parking lot across from the piers, normally still overflowing at this time of day, was about 1/2 empty. I remember days when officers got tickets for parking in the CPO section, but enlisted in officer parking were left alone. It seems the base police were just about exclusively retired Chiefs…anyhow, it certainly made for some good sea stories and ribbing in the wardroom and/or the Goat Locker, but…no more.

The Carrier piers were similarly empty, but I did get a look at LPD-17, with it’s enclosed mast.

About 4:30PM, I drove over to the NEX complex and looked at Hampton Blvd. I saw two cars heading east to I-64.

I recall the days when Hampton Blvd from I-64 to the base was two lanes of construction and rush hour was every bit as heavy as any other major city. I also used to wait and work an extra hour on the ship, if I couldn’t get off the base by 1600, because I actually get home at about the same time, if I left about 1700.

In retrospect, the double strands of concertina on top of all the fences, the security measures at every gate, just made me think that the military members will be protected behind jersy barricades and pop up barriers, while those bases, when hardened, just push the adversary out to the places the general public will be, for those soft targets will still generate more publicity if they are attacked.

More on other stops of significance over the next few days.

A few posts back, I discussed the contrast between two of ship commanding officers, and how they handled being the best ship in the fleet.

This post will be a contrasting article, again between two commanding officers, and I submit, a discussion of how a good leader handles the days of their “watch.” In doing so, it tells a story of today’s political leadership. For the purposes of this discussion, know that references to “Captain A” refer to the same named character of “Act One,” the prior post linked above. “Captain B” here is not the same person discussed in the other post, but he is also someone I served with, so the details are accurate in the depiction.

Once again, the goal of the two captains was to be the best ship in the fleet, a great strategic statement of purpose. They differed on the tactics implemented to the get there.

Tactics:

Captain A: The Ship’s schedule was just that. It was not his schedule, nor his command period schedule. I came to work for him after he had been CO for a year, with a two year tour. Within a few days of relieving the prior XO, the CO asked me how the Plan of Action and Milestones (PO&M) for the upcoming major inspection was coming along. This was mid Oct, and the inspection was happening in mid-February. Quickly culling the on board databanks of very recently accumulated information, I could not recall that being a turnover item, so I said: “I’ll find out.” What I found out, when I asked the Department Heads, is…there wasn’t one. I relayed this to the CO, knowing my newness still was a shield. He took it in stride and had me get to work on it. On cracking the TYCOM instruction on this inspection, the dummy POA&M began with the line “-12 months.” I gulped and got to work.

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I don’t turn the TV on much, but last night late, I clicked on over to the Military Channel and they had a show on the Coast Guard in Combat in Vietnam. Good story, describing the development of their deployments and duites, early in the Me Cong Delta area, then later in the Rung Sat Special Zone.

How timely a bit of knowledge, given the NYT feels compelled to disclose another National Security program that is being used to keep their city from being attacked again. I maybe watch 20 minutes of TV a week, and there this story was when I fired up the tube….

One side light was about a LORAN-C Navigation System being put in place well from shore. The Chief Petty Officer who set it up was told it was to help with search and rescue efforts. The reality the Air Force had it put in so the bombers could more accurately bomb (stated as 50 YD error system). The project was named “Operation Tight Reign”.

In 1965, a New York Times reported visited the site, and later published an article saying the base was put in with the navigational system to support strategic bombing. The Chief’s boss called to chew him out, but the Chief never had a clue that’s what it was used for. It turns out someone in the Air Force, I believe at the Pentagon, leaked the information.

I think it’s time for a new marketing slogan for the NYT:

The New York Times: Contributing to the loss of America lives for over 40 years!

Interesting side note from the Tight Reign history document (link above): The C-123 began it’s life as a haevy assault glider. The engines were added later, but the design had no room for fuel tanks in the wings. All fuel was carried in external drop tanks…talk about re-use of engineering work!

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Outside the Beltway

The purpose of the post is to discuss a similarity between our national leadership issues of the day and the manner in which I closely observed two men lead ships. The names will remain anonymous, but suffice it to say, I know them both well, as I served with both of them.

The President’s poll numbers go down and I suggest, that means something good. The left and the press think it’s bad, but…consider for a moment the coaches and teachers in your life. When you consider those that helped you not only pull yourself up by your bootstraps, but in reality (which you can only see now, many years separated from the days of your discontent) were the ones who lifted you so you could climb that awfully tall wall in front of you. That’s a metaphor for challenges you faced, mentally, physically or emotionally. I would wager that the times when you were saying “I just CAN’T DO IT!” to them, they put on their game face, got in yours and told you, in any of many ways, that yes, you can and not only that, I say you will. You had the feeling somewhere between mild dislike and hate just about then, but….look where that moment took you? Right now, “we” (using the polls published by the HBM/MSM) soundly dislike our President. My thesis is that will change.

In mulling over the topic the last few days, I think I have settled on the functional, short and to the point definitions of “strategy” and “tactics.” Strategy is what you want to do, and tactics are how you get that done. In the case of the national strategy, most people seems to agree. It’s how “we” do it that is the root of the political problem just this moment.

Two captains, two ships, same strategic goal, polar opposite tactics, kind of like America right now.

Goal: Be the best ship in the fleet.

Tactics:

Captain A: You achieve this goal by caring for the crew. You care for the crew by not letting them fail. You set them up for success.

Ok, sounds simple, but, you ask, “how did it look?” It looked like a lot of unhappy sailors and officers, who couldn’t understand why they had to stay aboard until 2000 while inport, re-doing every single damage control (DC) planned maintenance system (PMS) check on the entire ship. It also looked like, when the Board of Inspection and Survey (INSERV) Plan of Action and Milestones (POA&M) was written 4 months before the inspection, in the fall of the year (yep, two major holiday periods were between the POA&M and the INSURV), a whole bunch of upset people who all of a sudden had to make sure the maintenance (not the hard part) and administration of things that should have been taken care of daily, had to be checked and re-checked a few times. Sometimes publications, special tools or consumables had to be located and obtained, consisting of much hiking the piers and “begging.” It looked like drills, drills and drills in all areas of the ship’s required warfare areas beginning right after the INSURV and before heading to GTMO for 4 weeks of refresher training. You get the idea. Work to be done per the regs and tactical and tech manuals, and people, on the ship with the highest operational tempo on the entire coast the 12 months preceding this, who wanted some downtime to see their families. The result, was officers and sailors who would, as they walked the piers in search of “gouge” or stuff, would bad mouth the CO. He was, the spawn of the devil, and just here to make their life miserable.

Captain B: You achieve this goal by caring for the crew. You care for the crew by making sure they are happy and get to do what they ask to do, like seeing family, a lot. How did that look? It looked like a smiling crew that loved their CO, and knew he would make sure they got max time “on the beach.” Not much more to say about that.

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