First things first: Happy Birthday (230th), USMC!

I don’t have a lot of time to round this out, but the Valour-IT Project has gone over the goal for Team Army and Navy. The Marines still have quite a hike to make it, which, surprises me, and the Air Force is stll pulling in the $$$, but they are “covering our six.” Thanks, Team AF, for guarding our tails as we take this challenge on. It’s still looking like a seesaw battle for number 1, Army and Navy fighting it out even now…

In 1980, as a young LT, I was put in charge of the Physical Readiness Test (PRT) for a 278 person department at a major training command. The CNO at the time, I think was ADM Heyward, put a renewed emphasis on the program. My ideas on why will have to wit for another day, but here’s what I learned, and how it applies to this project to collect funds.

The test was sit ups, push or pull ups, and either a 1.5 mi run or 500 yd swim. Grading was broken down not only by time/count, but also subdivided by decades of age groups. At the time, if you “exceeded 40,” you didn’t have to take it. Many of the “Old Men” opted out.

Here’s what has always stuck out about the thing I learned. I’d have 24-27 YO guys come up and ask: “How many sit ups do I have to do?” I’d ask their age, then consult the CNO Instruction on my clipboard and say something like “31.” This would be the number to achieve the minimum grade of “Satisfactory.” (Categories were Unsat, Sat, Excellent, Outstanding) When it came time to get a partner and see how many push ups they could do in the 2 minutes alloted, I’d see this guy (and many like him in excellent physcial shape), knock put the 31 “required” push ups in about 22 seconds, then the’d stand up and walk off to take a break. A few would come and ask “what’s the maximum I have to do?” I’d see these people at 1:55 staining to do “one more!” as their partner holding their feet would say to encougare the perrson with the screwed up face, eyes clamped closed, trying to press their elbows to their knees (that’s how we did it in the “Old Navy,” no “crunches” for us), while rivers of sweat in the Viginia summer ran down their faces. If they had passed the number for max points, it didn’t matter, it was about using every second alloted to do as much as they were able.

The same thing happened with the push ups, and the run times. Fine, strapping young men, most doing the minimum (“if the minimum wasn’t good enough, they wouldn’t make it the minimum” they would say), and a few doing everything they could do.

Over the subsequent years, as the PRT was done every 6 months, I saw this behavior over and over. In the work place, I saw the same thing. Guess what? It turned out that the people wanting to know the lowest performance they could turn in to get by, were more than likely to take that into their professional performance off the PT field. The ones who suffered the sore muscles from the straining for excellence for all that was in them that day, were more than likely the sailors and officers you could count on, no matter what it was going to take to get the job/mission/project done. I did note exceptions, but it was close to a 1:1 correletion in performance in the work place and for physical readiness. It’s an overall life philosophy, easiest noticed, in my observation, during the semi-annual PRT.

To bring this home today, Teams Navy and Army have met the self acknowledged “minimums” for the Valour-IT Project. Do we have it in us to use the time between now and 23:59 11/11/2005 to go for something that says what our life philosophy is?

I have emailed local and national radio talk show hosts and everyone on my personal mailing list, with a request to pass the email along. I have told others of the project as an “oh, by the way” comment when I could slip it in. And today, as I work, I’ll be thinking of who else to contact and email when work is done, encouraging them to consider this project.

Have you done it all for the wounded? Will you sweat and strain to the finish line? I think I still haven’t done enough….get creative, tell the story, help those who helped us.

I’ll see you in the virtual victory circle! Make it happen, people!

Thanks to Mudville Gazette and The Political Teen for the Open Posts!

Here Greyhawk expresses his discouragement at really neat stuff Neptunus Lex is giving out to those who donate to the Valour-IT Project in the name of Team Navy (who is now within less than $1000 of meeting their goal! Go Navy!).

If you’re reading this, Greyhawk Team, I suggest after you place your cash in Team Navy’s pot, and Lex gets your USS RONALD REAGAN ball cap (with scrambled eggs, of course) to you, you might consider leading off your blog with this picture:

MUWHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

JUST DO IT, GH! (or Mrs GH can secretly donate and get it for a Christmas present for GH!)

And now to add insult to injury, thanks for the Open Post at Mudville Gazette! (Note: Haloscan is really busy, so this isn’t there yet to taunt my favorite USAF related bloggers, but trust me, I’ll keep trying to get it there).

Update 11/10/2005 0800 EST:

Team Navy surges ahead by a few hundred $$$, AND HAS EXCEEDED THE GOAL OF $21,000!!!! Yes, we “slid in” behind Team Army (Great sprint at the end Army – BZ!) at the planned finish line, scoring a second home run for the wounded service members. Lets see if Team Army was in a short sprint yesteday, when they finally passed Team Navy, or if they have the “legs” (yes, pun intended, you dogfaces!) to saty in the race as long as it leasts.

If you haven’t donated to Valour-IT Project, please consider sending your funds via Team Air Force, or at least Team Marines, even if you love the Navy (or Army).

This “thread” of consciousness began as I chased a link on Chapomatic.

He referenced an editorial Iraq: Learning the Lessons of Vietnam, posted in Foreign Affairsfrom Melvin Laird, who was Richard Nixon’s SECDEF.

Having been closely related to that war from 3rd grade, and having just missed it when I was graduating from high school, I have read quite a lot, trying to merge in my mind the conglomeration of first person stories, the Stars and Stripes view and that of the “Main Stream Media.” To this day, it seems all three repoprted a different, but the same war.

In Melvin Laird’s editorial, he discusses how our Vietnamization plan (turning over the ground warfighting effort to the ARVN) was coupled with negotiaions with the Soviets, which would limit our and their direct and financial interplay in the Vietnam War. Melivin also points out that the ARVN soldiered on for about two full years, despite our withdrawal, and relatively light funding (which was in compliance with the negotiated settlement of the Superpowers. The contrast is more remarkable whne you find oout the Soviets, from before the ink was dry, never conformed to the spending limits and kept pumping resources and money to the NVA. Our allies still held the line for a few years, despite this egregious violation. That gives me new respect for the ARVN. Here is an excerpt of his analysis that supports my comments above:

“The truth about Vietnam that revisionist historians conveniently forget is that the United States had not lost when we withdrew in 1973. In fact, we grabbed defeat from the jaws of victory two years later when Congress cut off the funding for South Vietnam that had allowed it to continue to fight on its own. Over the four years of Nixon’s first term, I had cautiously engineered the withdrawal of the majority of our forces while building up South Vietnam’s ability to defend itself. My colleague and friend Henry Kissinger, meanwhile, had negotiated a viable agreement between North and South Vietnam, which was signed in January 1973. It allowed for the United States to withdraw completely its few remaining troops and for the United States and the Soviet Union to continue funding their respective allies in the war at a specified level. Each superpower was permitted to pay for replacement arms and equipment. Documents released from North Vietnamese historical files in recent years have proved that the Soviets violated the treaty from the moment the ink was dry, continuing to send more than $1 billion a year to Hanoi. The United States barely stuck to the allowed amount of military aid for two years, and that was a mere fraction of the Soviet contribution. “

One particular sentence jumped out at me:

“Documents released from North Vietnamese historical files in recent years have proved that the Soviets violated the treaty from the moment the ink was dry, continuing to send more than $1 billion a year to Hanoi.”

For the last few days, I’ve thought about that one comment and here some of my thoughts as a result:

1) Vietnam is referred to as a war. I think in a greater context, it was an over a decade long battle in the greater conflict between the Superpowers. I believe most people follow and subscribe to that, but it makes me think of today and the naysayers. Vietnam was one of the hot points in the Cold War, something that came to center stage and captured our attention.

2) As Melvin points out in the beginning of his editorial, one must be careful in drawing parallels, yet I have one. It speaks to me that we have faced a fearsome enemy before. It was the Soviet Bloc/Communism. In that conflict, ranging from the fall of Berlin in 1945, up to the falling of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the subsequent demise of the Soviet Union, we confronted an enemy that followed no rules, and readily violated treaties when possible. We most certainly had moments when our moral compass needle was bent, too, yet I’ll submit that that was the exception, rather than the norm. Between oversight from Congress and pressure from our citizens, we played fair. Along the way to winning the Global War, our media labeled us as losers and imperialists. In the grand scheme, we won the Cold War and never resorted to nuking any one. Considering the thermonuclear firepower “potential energy” in both ours and the Soviet’s arsenals, I’d say the casualties, each one being a lost life, were far, far less by many orders of magnitude that it could have been. We, as humainty, should rightly pat ourselves on our collective back for this accomplishment.

Here’s my connection between now and then: We are once more faced with an enemy who follows no rules. They do what ever they can, from hiding behind children, to dressing as women, to driving cement mixers full of explosives towards a hotel full of reporters, as well as chopping off civilians heads with dull knifes. We keep playing by the rules. I suggest, that despite what the press says, and even knowing there is some heartfelt opposition to the war that does not involve the simplistic and obsessive hatred of President Bush, should take heart in seeing how the high road taken has proven the best once before in our not too distant history.

If Congress pulls funding, and we have to come home, and we have to endure a president or two who force us into an virtual, or practical isolationist/non-interventionist mode, we still have a fighting cnahce of winning the bigger battle. I certainly don’t want to think about “going there,” but if we do, we soldier on.

Thanks, Melvin for pointing out that the light at the end of the GWOT is maybe brighter than we perceive right now.

I’m sure this cartoon will boost visibility….Thanks you, Cox & Forkum!

Let me take a moment to gloat, before the tables are turned….

First: Here’s the link to my post on Valour-IT.

Next: Well, the Navy got off to slow start being leaderless in this blitz to pull in some cash for the cause, but, the USN and supporters have been leaving the competition in the dust since day 2…How do you other services like that?

I’m thinking the USAF can’t step up to the plate because of a bunch of wanna be SEALS (and I think they have a leg up on getting to BUDS after painting the F-4 at the USFA grounds with Blue Angel’s colors) embarrassed them on the home field! My advice to the flyboys: Get on with life and get over it…:)

As to the Amry and Marine Corps: To paraphrase a quote from the game Battlefield 2: “Fight harder, or I’ll have to get someone who will!!!”

Stats worth that provide bragging rights:

As of 2046 EST:

Navy: $10691.00
Army: $9049.99
USMC: $7030.00
USAF: $2990.00

Total (as in nothing to sneeze at): $30030.99!

And, to make a point, there are 6 more days of this, so no excuses as to not being able to ante up some $$$, the Navy team has the chance to put up the goal of $21K by it’s lonesome. How about the rest of you? I think going for $21K/service team would help out a lot more of the wounded troopers…what say we go for $84K?

Geez, why stop there if we can bring in 6 figures? Dream big and ask all your friends….

Just idle web surfing produced this jewel on the Security Watchtower blog, as a follow up to the NRO article of a few days back.

With Uncle Sam’s Mguided Children joining up with the snake eaters, I only predict bad, seriously bad news for the bad guys…

Well, it looks like us squids have been caught out at sea in receive EMCON “A.”

No one had volunteered to lead the Navy effort to raise money for the Valour-IT project, which provides computers and software to our injured warriors (of all branches), so they can function by using voice activated technology. It’s a quality of life issue, let alone serious morale issue.

We have used technology to hunt down and destroy our enemies on the land, sea (on and under), and air. It’s time we use that same advancement of science and technology to give the wounded a fighting chance to be normal, despite the physical disabilities.

The donations go thru Soldier’s Angels, which is a 503(c) organization. That group has done many more things than this for our service members. Scan Holly’s site and see how you can help with other things she is workin on, too.

The Army, Air Force and Marines are already moving out and we’re looking pretty lame. Does it remind you of that feeling when you missed the last Liberty Boat back to the ship? Yep, lame….

Someone may have beat me too the duty to handle this, but if not, I’m on it….

Update: Get over to The Indepundit (LCDR Smash’s blog), where his wife is leading the charge for the Navy team.

Pass the word.

Part XIII – Constructive Plagiarism

Short advertisement before the main feature: Valour-IT Project details are here. Help fund computers and software for wounded service members, so they can use vioce activated technology to send emails and write. A worthy cause if I every heard of one….Thanks for your interest.

Index to the Series:
Part I: Initiative, marketing, sales, project planning and program management skills
Part II: Auditing Skills
Part III: Operations 24/7/365
Part IV: “Point Papers”
Part V: Collateral Duties
Part VI: The “Git ‘er done!” Factor
Part VII: “Total Care”
Part VIII: Communications in the Workplace
Part IX: “Give a smart person with potential a chance”
Part X: Process Engineering, Continuous Improvement, Total Quality Management, Total Quality Leadership, or what ever you call it. The bottom line title: Making “it” better
Part XI: The Military’s Supply System
Part XII: “Red Blood or Red Ink”
Part XIII: Constructive Plagiarism

Yep, that’s right…plagiarism. In any sort of management position, from the non-commissioned officer level to the top, we learn to scope out what the other person did/does in order to make our unit more effective. Is that bad? Well, certainly it’s not a bad idea in an environment where there is no copyrighted material or trademark issue to worry about.

In the “outside world,” this translates into a set of eyes and ears that can be constantly tuned into articles, news clips, conferences, or conversations that have something of interest. Toss into that mix that we generally have no shame about asking “can I get a copy of that?” because we see two positive fallouts of the condition at a personal level, beyond the larger implications of the benefit to our employer: 1) We look like a more valuable asset when we come back and either present it, or implement it and 2)it certainly shortnees the time it will take us to “re-invent the wheel.” You might call that being lazy. I see it as making more time available for other pursuits…:)

What dis this look like in my career (and emulated by just about anyone else): It was November, and we had a big inspection coming in mid-February. I had been in the billet for about 5 weeks and the CO asked for the Plan of Actions and Milestones (POA and M) for the upcoming major, shipwide inspection, INSURV. I paled, when I realized I hadn’t had one turned over by the outgoing XO, but I said “I’ll find out and get back to you, sir.” The first call I made was to the Squadron Material Officer, and he told me of the ship in the squadron who had had one recently and had done well. Next item was to see where this ship was. Luckily, it was not at sea, but right there a few piers away. I hiked over, introduced myself to the XO, and over a cup of coffee, asked for a copy of his POA and M. He had one copied and I was on my way back to the ship. The net result, we did very well, many thanks to the success of the other crew. We regularly spent time asking leading questions of our counterparts, looking for the “gouge” for all types of things, then we shared and things went well.

How does this play out in real life? Two very astute Naval Aviators retired and used their working knowledge of the Navy’s Tag Out system. In the OSHA/civilian terms, this is called “Lock out/Tag Out” and is a system by which you prevent people and equipment hazards while preforming maintenance by making sure everyone who needs to know knows not to turn things back on. The Navy system was developed after some hard lessons, but is very effective. By the way, it exceeds OSHA standards in it’s implementation. These two smart men are not for hire, as they created their own successful company. You can see their product line, TagLink, here.

In another case, as I worked with the PQS Development Group, they told me the story of a retired Navy Captain that came back to them and asked for some materials, so he could implement a personal qualification program for the company he worked for.

Bottom line: “We” look for ways to make business easier by borrowing ideas. The ex-military person can not only bring to you a wealth of ideas from the time in, but then they are acclimated to keeping their sensors out for more of the same in your industry. It’s a valuable resource for your company.

See Little Green Footballs for the Open Thread…

Another “THANKS!” to The Political Teen for an Open Post…

I spent last evening ravaging the magazine shelfs, reading several November issues.

I enjoy CPU Magazine and look for that one first during my forays into Borders around the 20 something of the month.

In the November issue of CPU, they had a short article on the Bionic Dolphin. No, it’s not Flipper and Col. Austin merged, but a you can buy it (for $60K) real thing that will do about 55 mph on the surface and also do about 10 mph submerged. Two people sitting in tandem and it can boach the surface and slam back down and keep going.

Update 11/1/2005: Bionic Dolphin on a trailer

I’ll have to start looking for a source of disposalbe income in that range. I feel the same as Capt Hiller (Will Smith) in “Independence Day.”

How about Subsunk and Chapomatic? Thing we can even talk Neptunus Lex into getting one? I think Skippy San could use one as the ultimate babe magnet in the far east, too. Of course, Cdr Salamander would need one…

After a while, we’d have enough for a squadron, then we’d have to put someone in charge of operations. Hmmm…maybe not as much fun as I first figured.

Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post!

Found on Little Green Footballs Open Thread…

A link to an NRO article on Unconventional Marines

Thanks to MUdville Gazette for the Open Post!

What will those scientists think up next?

How about remote control for humans?

I heard someone on one of the radio talk shows discussing this yesterday and it sounded interesting enough to look up. Later in the evening, it was on another talk show, and the editor of Christian Computing Magazine was talking about the technology. Beyond being able to have your spouse make you get up and take the garbage out, it’s also being looked at as the method by which more realism could be added to simulators, in particular, PC gaming. By making you feel off balance, the sim program could provide the sensation of the movement of the vehicle, complete with the g force acceleration.

I vote for use restricted to simulators, just to curb any impluse by spouses to control their partner….

When this comes around, then Neptunus Lex will know we really get what he’s writing about in this serial web novel “Rhythms.” Part XXXV, the most recent entry is here (in case you haven’t been enjoying this fine work of digital literature).