This ain't Hell, but you can see it from here

Category: Military issues

  • Zero trust in the professional force

    This next stroke out of genius of the Department of the Navy’s leadership is along the same line of thought as that targeted by my recent rant over Lt. Daniel “Lock ’em Down” Durdin’s desire to rescind the boot-leave (and, realistically, massively popular PR program) for the 99.987% of bootcamp graduates who make it through that ten day minefield unscathed.

    According to Fox News, the Navy and the Marine Corps are planning to install breathalyzers on their ships and in their units for Sailors and Marines as they report to duty. No sarcasm, no hyperbole. That’s a 100% true statement, irony free. From Fox:

    The U.S. Navy will start giving Breathalyzer tests to Marines and sailors reporting for duty aboard ships and submarines and at squadrons, Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus announced Monday in a worldwide call to forces.

    Another winning initial from Obama’s new Navy Secretary. One would think that only a severe and immediate crisis would prompt such a dramatic and service wide effort. Instead it’s this:

    The testing is part of a new 21st Century Sailor and Marine initiative…

    I trust everyone’s alarms bells are sounding at this point, yes?

    a multi-prong program aimed at reinforcing healthy lifestyles both on and off-duty. The program emphasizes healthy lifestyles through nutrition, responsible alcohol consumption, zero tolerance for drug use and fitness programs as well as suicide prevention, family and personal preparedness and financial planning.

    Ah, yes. Of course.

    Not only will sailors reporting for duty watch have to submit to alcohol testing, random Breathalyzers will be done elsewhere “to reduce the occurrence of alcohol-related incidents that can end careers and sometimes end lives,” the Navy confirmed to Fox News.
    “This is not done to punish, but to help. We want to help sailors and Marines make good choices before something happens that can’t be undone,” Mabus said during remarks given aboard the USS Bataan in Norfolk, Va., which were televised and web-streamed live to the fleet.
    Mabus said the goal is to maximize readiness, fitness and safety.

    —

    According to Federal News Radio, a senior Navy official said the Breathalyzer tests would be non-punitive nor legally admissible, and is intended to let commanders of individual vessels get a heads-up about potential alcohol-related problems.

    Now anyone that knows anything about the US military knows there are no such things as non-punitive actions when it comes to this sort of thing, especially when it’s constructed in the paradigm of “integrity checks” or “substance abuse”. Then again probably the only worse thing than a sailor or Marine hit by this “wellness” program getting ran up the flag pole for not quite sleeping all of last night off is a sailor or Marine failing a breathalyzer when reporting for duty and getting a good long talking to about living a balanced lifestyle from someone with a ponytail.

    When I read about things like this my mind goes to dark places. Is this another attempt at infantilizing Americans? Is it an ideologically motivated initiative to “cleanse” those of the old school who don’t embrace the Left’s New Military? After all, I’m not exactly old salty over here and when I came in the Marines our SNCOs were still complaining about not being able to have a couple beers at lunch at the E-Club anymore. Or maybe, most frightening of all, the people at the top of the DotN really do think so little of their sailors and Marines.

    Because, ultimately, this isn’t about “sometimes young sailors and Marines can make bad choices”, as we all know is true. This is about replacing NCOs with a piece of technology and treating the entire force as pending miscreants. It says, “I don’t trust my enlisted leadership.”

    Regarldess of how you cut it I can’t say that we’re sending the message that we have a capable and trustworthy force of professionals guarding our nation when the Navy finds it prudent to make sure the 155 Officers and Petty Officers it has entrusted a $2 billion dollar vessel with enough nuclear weaponry aboard to incinerate a quarter of the world’s population be given a breathalyzer first. Or that the Marine Corps needs treat the Marines who just spent 9 months living in blood, sweat and shit while making truly life and death decisions everyday need to be treated like DUI offenders trying to start their car in the morning.

    Hopefully it’s more cock-up than conspiracy and this can just be chalked up to stupidity.

  • The odd and tragic death of Sgt. Luis G. Serrano

    ROS sends us a link to the story of Sgt. Luis G. Serrano, who was apparently attending a military school in Florida when he went for a long walk off a short pier. Well, not exactly. Tampa Bay Online says that Serrano was walking on a dock and when he got to the part where the dock turned, he kept walking straight and into the water;

    According to Fort Carson’s Public Affairs Office:

    “Following initial training at Fort Benning, Georgia, his first assignment was at Fort Drum, New York, where he served as an Infantryman, Fire Team Leader, and Anti-Tank Team Leader. From there he served as an Assistant Squad Leader at Fort Richardson, Alaska and in November of 2011 he served as a Chemical Operations NCO in the 10th Special Forces Group’s (Airborne) Chemical Reconnaissance Detachment. His deployments include three tours in Iraq and one in Djibouti.

    “SGT Serrano’s major military education includes Airborne School, The Javelin Gunnery Course, Signal School Course, the Field Sanitation Team – Individual Course, Air Assault, the Warrior Leader Course, The Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear Defense Course, The Force 21 Battle Command Brigade & Below Course, the Combat Lifesaver’s Course, the Joint Intelligence Course, The Transport and Storage of Hazardous Material Course, and the Electronic Warfare Signal Intelligence Tactical Operations Officer Course.

    That’s a lot of training and a lot of deploying to end so abruptly and so strangely. And it looks like he had a lot to live for, too;

    He is survived by his wife Jocelyn, and their two sons D’Angelo and Davin.

    I hope they find the strength to deal with this.

  • Probing the Koran burning

    Melvin sends us a link to a Washington Post article about the US military’s investigation of the Koran burnings in Afghanistan which resulted in the overblown riots there over the last several days;

    Investigators appointed by Marine Gen. John R. Allen, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, found that the soldiers removed the Korans from a prison located at Bagram air base after they were found to contain extremist messages.

    The books were then placed in an office for safekeeping, according to the inquiry. But they were mistaken for garbage and taken to a landfill on the base.

    Afghan employees identified the books as Korans just as their pages caught fire, a major desecration, according to Muslim teachings. The discovery led to a week of unprecedented tension between U.S. and Afghan military officials.

    U.S. military officials said that although the five soldiers will be reprimanded, it’s unlikely that their names will be released or that their punishment will approach the seriousness of what some Afghans are demanding, including trial in an Afghan court.

    “For the soldiers, it will be serious — they could lose rank. But you’re not going to see the kind of public trial that some here seem to want,” said one U.S. military official.

    Yeah, I don’t think the military has the standing to punish those guys. I wouldn’t know a Koran if you hit me on the side of my head with it. The Afghans that were with them didn’t recognize them as Korans until they began to burn. When you send a private out to burn trash, they just burn trash, not pick through it.

    I don’t see anyone getting upset at the little thugs who wrote in and thereby defacing the Korans in the first place. And how do you destroy a defaced Koran? I’m guessing that you burn it, and everyone I’ve talked to and heard agrees. That makes them experts, just by the virtue of my attention. What I know about a Koran would look like a BB in a thimble.

    Nonetheless, if the Army raises a hand towards those troops, the entire leadership will be watching the troops draw themselves down.

  • Court upholds conviction of gay porn star Marine

    We first discussed Matthew W. Simmons last Fall when a military appeals court said that his conviction for wearing remnants of his uniform in a gay porn movie was improper. Well according to McClatchy, another appeals court has overturned that appeals court decision and upholds his conviction;

    He took leave to appear in several commercial pornographic videos that involved sodomy with numerous other men, by his own account being paid $10,000.00 for his performances. Some of the videos included shots of him wearing his Marine dress blue coat with the Marine Corps device, decorations, and rank insignia affixed; others showed him wearing a Marine physical training jacket; and at one point he mentioned that he was a Marine.

    All three members of the panel agreed;

    The very essence of this pornography, styled, branded, titled, and marketed with a military theme, took on a distinct Marine Corps flavor and, on the facts before us, a prohibited service endorsement by the appellant at the institutional expense of the Marine Corps.

    It’s nice to see the military finally standing behind their wear and appearance standards for a change.

  • Life of Duty: 3 Echo 9 HazMat responders

    The latest video offered by our friends at NRA and Brownells’ Life of Duty Series is about 3E9 HazMat responders – certainly a job I wouldn’t want to have any part with;

  • Bravery is not this

    The Washington Times reports that the media has gone apeshit over a gay kiss between two Marines as one returns from his overseas deployment.

    “This is TRUE bravery!” reads one [comment on Facebook]. “The most insidious enemy we face in the struggle for equality is internalized homophobia. Kudos to any and every one who comes out for any and all to see!!”

    Yeah all of you whiners who’ve been blown-up and shot and carried your friends on your back to get them out of the line of fire, or dragged them from burning vehicles with ammunition zinging around your head, this is what true bravery looks like (content warning – if you don’t want to see two men kissing, don’t click the “More” link. If you don’t want to see an iconic photo ruined by political correctness, don’t click the “More” link);
    (more…)

  • Another somber reminder: Training is dangerous.

    Just a few days since the Marine Helo Crash there has been another training accident. This time it is the US Coast Guard.

    Authorities sent divers and sonar-equipped boats Wednesday to the sunken wreckage of a U.S. Coast Guard helicopter that crashed in Alabama’s Mobile Bay on a training mission, leaving one crewmember dead and three others missing.

    The MH-65C helicopter crashed Tuesday evening near Point Clear, Ala. One crewmember was found unresponsive and later declared dead, the Coast Guard said.

    The man who died was a rescue swimmer, said Capt. Don Rose, commanding officer of Coast Guard Sector Mobile. The three missing crew members were the pilot, the co-pilot and the flight mechanic.

    I think that this has to be one of the hazardous jobs in the Coast Guard and the fact that these crews going out regardless of the conditions or danger. So far the only silver lining is that the three missing had the possibility to turn into recovered safety. I will be following any new development of this story. Here is to hoping for thier quick safe return. ALso our thoughts and prayers to go out the fallen diver.

    Here is a quick video of what these crews do to help those on the high seas.

  • Training for war is dangerous, too

    Old Trooper sends us a link from Fox News which reports the death of seven Marines in the deserts of Arizona;

    The helicopters, an AH-1W “Cobra” and UH-1Y “Huey,” were conducting a routine training exercise at 8 p.m., the statement said. The helicopters were over southeast California in the Chocolate Mountain Aerial Gunnery Range, Dustin Dunk, the public affairs chief from the air station, said.

    Maureen Dooley, a Miramar public affairs officer, told Fox News Radio that Marines use the training area because the terrain is similar to what they would face in Afghanistan. These training sessions help them gain some familiarity before they deploy.

    The cause of the crash is still under investigation. But it’s a reminder that although war is dangerous, training for it everyday is just as dangerous. That’s why just making it to twenty years deserves a pension and life-long medical care. Garrison life is not all boot shining and polishing floors.