BOZO LIVES? SOMEONE CLAIMING TO BE HIM HAS ANNOUNCED THAT

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THE NAMAZU ANALYSIS OF THE LATEST NEWS OF "BOZO" (AKA Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi)

Greetings Bipeds! Might the U.S.forces actually have cut the head off of the snake called "the Islamic State?" Or IS Abu Bakr al Baghdadi actually alive ? Someone is issuing statements in his name. "BOZO" as we refer to him here at AAB is calling for "volcanos of terror". If he is not dead its real shame, but civilized forces will kill him eventually. But hoax or not another call for rivers of blood and volcanos of explosive terror are aimed at the west and incite the "lone wolves that we are so slow to eradicate.  Dead or not BOZO the self proclaimed Caliph is not ISIS , th elength of his life or tenure as head murdering scumbag is relatively unimportant. Thee IS as we previously noted is really more of a hydra than a snake, a beast that can lose one or more heads and just keep going. There are startling reports that self-proclaimed caliph of the blood thirsty self proclaimed "Islamic State Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was critically wounded and possibly dead in an airstrike near the Iraqi city of Mosul, close to the Syrian border. Rumors started to fly on Monday and then a confirmation of sorts appeared early on Tuesday when a Twitter account affiliated with Daesh-affiliated Al-I�tisaam Media, which said it would give details about the killing of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and his succession. The news has been circulating around some Arab and Iraqi commercial news sites but the U.S. Government has not claimed the kill. Now someone claiming to be the famous BOZO of Many Faces has announced that the BOZO still lives. But he has made no personal public appearance.  Here is what we do know as confirmed by official U.S. armed forces sources: 



SEE "BOZO OF MANY FACES":

Late Friday night (November 7), US and coalition forces hit a house and 10-truck convoy in the western Iraqi town of al-Qaim, near Mosul. Intelligence indicated that senior Daesh leaders, including the the self styled "Caliph" , were believed to be in the convoy. Forty deaths were confirmed by Mosul morgue officials, but none were confirmed to be the BOZO and silence continues on the whereabouts and condition of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi ("BOZO" as we refer to him) . Washington has a bounty of $10 million out for his capture.No one has collected. By late Sunday the following dead bad guys were identified :
(1) al-Baghdadi�s senior aide, Abdur Rahman al-Athaee (Abu Sajar),. (2) Daesh leader in Anbar province, Adnan Latif al-Suweidi, (3) leader in the Euphrates valley, Bashar al-Muhandi.al Athaee often traveled with "BOZO" and the target guys felt pretty certain that BOZO was with al Athaee in the convoy that was slated for attack. BOZO the Caliph was last seen in public in a mosque in Mosul in July. Other terrorist groups are maintaining silence of "Caliph BOZO's" about the attack and its results.

 Meanwhile the U.S. Central Command did confirm that they participated in air strikes targeting Daesh leaders ( allies of the BOZO and IS) near Mosul. Someone claiming to be BOZO has published statements claiming to be alive and well and urging revenge on the West.


The US Central Command said that from late Friday, air strikes targeted Daesh leaders near Mosul. Al-Arabiya and Al-Hadath news channels quoted unnamed sources saying that al-Baghdadi was killed in the raid; the Iraqi government said it would try to confirm the news (since announced the Daesh itself in an effort to rally the ranks). the town whose capture in June catapulted it to instant fame, with a view to limit its ability to move about, communicate, and commit acts of terror. It is possible the convoy was fleeing to a safer place when it came under fire. Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi may well be dead as a stone. But a dead Bozo does not a dead terror organization make. The Dream of a pedophilic, polygamists, sex slave holding, taxes on only the non believers, global Caliphate doesn't die easily.


Intelligence analysts maintain that the reaction of militant groups that had pledged allegiance to the �caliph� will have to be monitored closely. Despite the uncertainty over the death of "BOZO", the Sinai-based Egyptian militant group, Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis, pledged allegiance to the Islamic State on Sunday. Baghdadi�s death could trigger revenge attacks against small ethnicities and Christians in the area.  "Lone wolf� strikes in Europe and America  are possible. On the other hand, dead Bozo might benefit older militant outfits like al Qaeda that distrusted al-Baghdadi. The Sunni tribes and Syrian rebel outfits that did not join the Daesh might attack it. But, as Daesh still holds the big terrorist's money bags so it might just regroup and win new adherents. The airstrike might also compromise the security of countries like Iraq, Turkey, Jordan, Libya and Egypt. So it's time for Arab states to man up and provide tighter security. All things considered we think that the cowardly, over sexed, losers of IS are having way too much fun looting, pillaging, mudering, and rapeing their neighbors to pack it in now just over one dead Bozo. As I said in my previous article, the West is going to have to kill ISIL/ISIS/IS/Daesh/al-Queda et al very dead before we can expect the bloody merry go round to stop. Until young muslim men learn that the robbing, rapeing, beheading of innocent unarmed people is never sanctioned by God, and that there are no virgins waiting to embrace them as "heroes" after we put bullets into them or blow them into tiny pieces the carnage will continue.   There is mounting evidence that the tide is turning against ISIS/IS et al. But the pressure must be maintained. Many more young Islamic IS operatives must follow BOZO to hell. Let's get more women piloting those attack aircraft and let's start slathering our bullets in pig fat. The great lies of the Imams can't be defeated by merely killing the SOBs we must kill them and very visibly consign them to hell.

Meanwhile is Bozo alive or dead, terrorists sources are conflicted and allied forces intelligence don't claim to know?  It doesn't matter.  We need to be reducing the oil fields under IS control to inoperative status, destroying them everywhere that they appear in force and concentrating on inflicting mass casualties on their every enclave. These scum bags must be reduced to ashes if there is ever to be peace. The biggest lie told to Americans by their government is that this is a difficult task that will take years. We flew as many as 800 combat sorties in a day during the ouster operation on Saddam Hussein. We fly about 5 a day against ISIS/ IS. This is only difficult and lengthy because the Obama administration is going light on the Islamofascists scum. Running them of the planet will cost American lives and treasure but need not take years. If we fail to run them off the planet they will be in our streets within a decade, their agents and fellow travelers are already here.  

TERRORISM and COUNTER TERRORISM BOOK SHELF


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ITF And Others Condemn Sewol Ferry Sentences

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The International Transport Workers� 

Federation(ITF) Condemns  the Sewol Ferry 

Sentences 

The ITF condemned South Korea�s sentencing of the Sewol ferry Captain and crew, describing the 36 year sentence handed down to Captain Lee Joon-Seok as �excessive and unjust�. We, American Admiralty Information Services, (including American Admiralty Books, this blog) were highly critical in print as soon as the sentences were handed down. Like us the ITF is worried about the growing trend to criminalize all maritime mishaps. Marine accidents often are high consequence events which drive unusual levels of public concern, often anger and indignation. Such accidents are often the result of complex "causation matrixes" often involving decisions by corporate managerial personnel and government regulators ashore. But the seamen on scene are ready targets. They are there, they do make mistakes on occasion, and they are too often viewed by society as vagabond loners, as opposed to family bread winners, the actual case for most. Any professional mariner caught up in a high consequence accident has a world of trouble but governments around the world of late have added to the misery by criminalizing every aspect of high consequence marine accidents ....for the Captain and crew. 

 In the Sewol case the South Korean government knew early on that the ferry owner had built an extra deck to increase profits but negatively affecting stability. Such a plan required approval by national maritime regulatory authorities and the ship's classification society. To their credit the South Korean Coast Guard attempted to arrest the owner, who committed suicide. Apparently that ended any attempt to affix criminal liability beyond the crew. The crew of course never conspired or planned or even knew about the hidden defect that killed so many young people. Instead they were caught up in the predictable results, and made some fatal tactical errors that added to the deaths. But a scapegoat was needed due to public anger and so the Captain was put on trial for his life. Luckily he received 36 years, which since he is 67 amounts to "life in prison". What he should have faced was permanent revocation of his license, and personal civil liability. He would have died in poverty and professional disgrace whether he really deserved it or not. One professional mariner in the crew was in fact convicted of homicide for refusing to help two individuals and probably deserves a harsh sentence as a deterrent to others. But otherwise none of the convicted serving sentences from 5 to 20 years or more did anything involving any criminal intent or present any danger to society. Since they all were bound to lose their professional mariner's credentials for their faulty professional emergency judgement calls they don't even represent a latent threat of poor professional performance to the public. We can not see that the harsh sentences in this case amount to anything but the satisfaction of a mob that the government didn't want looking too closely into the government's role in the accident. That's our take on the events, here is what the ITF said:

 "The ITF believes that the judgment is based more on emotion and the need to find someone to blame than justice,� stated Heindel. �The sentencing of the captain and the other seafarers is too severe and does not take into account the actions or lack of actions by others in the industry."

 "The ITF seafarers� section committee will meet next week in London and consider an appropriate ongoing response to this tragic matter"

The ITF wasn't the only mariner's organization to note this case and the growing world trend to criminalize crews on scant facts in the wake of high consequence accidents.

"A statement Tuesday from the UK-based seafarers rights group, Seafarers� Rights International (SRI), agreed with ITF�s comments that the judgement was emotionally driven, but stopped short of condemning sentences."

"Deirdre Fitzpatrick, Executive Director of SRI, said: �This disaster has been beset with tragedies and sadness from the beginning. The reported comments of the South Korean president Park Geun-hye in the aftermath of the disaster that the conduct of the Master and some crew was �like an act of murder� will have added to the heightened emotional context and might have made it difficult for any court to be dispassionate."

We believe that this growing global tendency to criminalize officers and crew immediately in the wake of high consequence accidents is generally an attempt to limit the scope of investigations. The fast track to criminal indictments of crew members is meant  to turn blind eyes towards the others in the accident causation matrix, often people who acted out of profit motives with real reckless and negligent attitudes for the traveling public or marine environment. These "pillars of society" have their behaviors and decisions go unexamined while professional mariners who may make faulty decisions while under extreme duress get jailed and investigations are concluded as soon as the keys to their cells are thrown away. 

KOREAN BOOK SHELF








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IS ISIS 'IS 's BAGHDADI DEAD? DOES IT MAKE ANY DIFFERENCE?

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THE NAMAZU ANALYSIS OF THE LATEST NEWS OF "BOZO" (AKA Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi)

Greetings Bipeds! Might the U.S.forces actually have cut the head off of the snake called "the Islamic State?" Or is the IS really more of a hydra, that can lose one or more heads and just keep going. Personally I worry that the beast is a Hydra. There are startling reports that self-proclaimed caliph of the blood thirsty self proclaimed "Islamic State Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was critically wounded and possibly dead in an airstrike near the Iraqi city of Mosul, close to the Syrian border. Rumors started to fly on Monday and then a confirmation of sorts appeared early on Tuesday when a Twitter account affiliated with Daesh-affiliated Al-I�tisaam Media, which said it would give details about the killing of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and his succession. The news has been circulating around some Arab and Iraqi commercial news sites but the U.S. Government has not claimed the kill. Here is what we do know as confirmed by official U.S. armed forces sources: 



SEE "BOZO OF MANY FACES":

Late Friday night (November 7), US and coalition forces hit a house and 10-truck convoy in the western Iraqi town of al-Qaim, near Mosul. Intelligence indicated that senior Daesh leaders, including the the self styled "Caliph" , were believed to be in the convoy. Forty deaths were confirmed by Mosul morgue officials, but none were confirmed to be the BOZO and silence continues on the whereabouts and condition of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi ("BOZO" as we refer to him) . Washington has a bounty of $10 million out for his capture.No one has collected. By late Sunday the following dead bad guys were identified :
(1) al-Baghdadi�s senior aide, Abdur Rahman al-Athaee (Abu Sajar),. (2) Daesh leader in Anbar province, Adnan Latif al-Suweidi, (3) leader in the Euphrates valley, Bashar al-Muhandi.al Athaee often traveled with "BOZO" and the target guys felt pretty certain that BOZO was with al Athaee in the convoy that was slated for attack. BOZO the Caliph was last seen in public in a mosque in Mosul in July. Other terrorist groups are maintaining silence of "Caliph BOZO's" about the attack and its results.

 Meanwhile the U.S. Central Command did confirm that they participated in air strikes targeting Daesh leaders ( allies of the BOZO and IS) near Mosul. 


The US Central Command said that from late Friday, air strikes targeted Daesh leaders near Mosul. Al-Arabiya and Al-Hadath news channels quoted unnamed sources saying that al-Baghdadi was killed in the raid; the Iraqi government said it would try to confirm the news (since announced the Daesh itself in an effort to rally the ranks). the town whose capture in June catapulted it to instant fame, with a view to limit its ability to move about, communicate, and commit acts of terror. It is possible the convoy was fleeing to a safer place when it came under fire. Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi may well be dead as a stone. But a dead Bozo does not a dead terror organization make. The Dream of a pedophilic, polygamists, sex slave holding, taxes on only the non believers, global Caliphate doesn't die easily.


Intelligence analysts maintain that the reaction of militant groups that had pledged allegiance to the �caliph� will have to be monitored closely. Despite the uncertainty over the death of "BOZO", the Sinai-based Egyptian militant group, Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis, pledged allegiance to the Islamic State on Sunday. Baghdadi�s death could trigger revenge attacks against small ethnicities and Christians in the area.  "Lone wolf� strikes in Europe and America  are possible. On the other hand, dead Bozo might benefit older militant outfits like al Qaeda that distrusted al-Baghdadi. The Sunni tribes and Syrian rebel outfits that did not join the Daesh might attack it. But, as Daesh still holds the big terrorist's money bags so it might just regroup and win new adherents. The airstrike might also compromise the security of countries like Iraq, Turkey, Jordan, Libya and Egypt. So it's time for Arab states to man up and provide tighter security. All things considered we think that the cowardly, over sexed, losers of IS are having way too much fun looting, pillaging, mudering, and rapeing their neighbors to pack it in now just over one dead Bozo. As I said in my previous article, the West is going to have to kill ISIL/ISIS/IS/Daesh/al-Queda et al very dead before we can expect the bloody merry go round to stop. Until young muslim men learn that the robbing, rapeing, beheading of innocent unarmed people is never sanctioned by God, and that there are no virgins waiting to embrace them as "heroes" after we put bullets into them or blow them into tiny pieces the carnage will continue.   There is mounting evidence that the tide is turning against ISIS/IS et al. But the pressure must be maintained. Many more young Islamic IS operatives must follow BOZO to hell. Let's get more women piloting those attack air craft and let's start slathering our bullets in pig fat. The great lies of the Imams can't be defeated by merely killing the SOBs we must kill them and very visibly consign them to hell. 


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Tales From the Goat Locker:
Non-rates


Vic, the stories about Sydney were Interesting, though the waters I cruised in my career were a little closer to home. You wrote about sea-stories yesterday. I have a few of those, too on the way to a career that culminated as a Master Chief Boatswain�s Mate, United States Coast Guard. I don't mind your officer-centric approach- I suppose there is a need for you guys, but sea stories really are the province of the Goat Locker- the Chief�s Mess.
My first ship after Great Lakes RT was a Fletcher-class destroyer out of Mayport doing mostly Eastern Caribbean patrols off of Cuba, Haiti, and the Dominican Republic.

Add A Fletcher class destroyer, Photo Credit; USN
Being a 17-year-old E-3 (I picked up an extra grade out of boot camp for having graduated as honor man) I had little clue at the time why we were maintaining a naval presence there. I was more interested in perfecting my helmsmanship and convincing the BM-2 that despite my "gratis" status as a full seaman that I ought to be assigned more technical gigs like pointer or trainer on one of the mounts vice extra lookout, bow or stern hook on one of the launches, line handling instead of stand in ranks with the other teenaged SAs (E-2s) at special sea detail.
It's really interesting now to see what that portion of the Atlantic Fleet was actually a part of. It was while on that first Navy ship that I met and saw the Coast Guard in action and met my first Coasties in person.
Comparing non-rated life, the Coasties didn't seem to have to campaign for Boatswain mate-like assignments. Whatever they were willing to learn they were quickly assigned to. I was a two-year naval reservist on active duty. I went to visit the CG recruiters and learned that I could cross over by signing up for the CG regulars for a 4-year active duty contract.
But I had to get on a waiting list. I got on the waiting list and proceeded to agitate for a jump-up, arguing that I wasn't a boot recruit and I'd save 'em $10,000 on boot camp. It took awhile but eventually reason or annoyance factor won out. I ended up on a much smaller CG ship patrolling the Campeche Flats off Yucatan on Piracy Suppression before anyone had even heard of piracy suppression patrols.
On reporting aboard, my billet included helmsman watch, gun crew and boat crew duties, and a spot in the landing/Boarding party.  I also drew mess cooking, which sucked, but went with being non-rated.


The maintenance on the old tug built in 1938 was intense but I got to use power tools, learned fancy rope work which covered a lot of ugly aged stuff on board, and gave the cutter a sort of "Yacht-like" feel.
On the USN destroyer, new non-rates did get to stand helm watch but most of our time was spent "soogeing", sweeping down, painting in remote corners where it was more important to get the steel covered than to have the paint also present a decent appearance.
I often wonder if life for new Naval non-rates has improved any. I worked much harder in the Guard, but learned something new every day and after 3 months felt like a skilled craftsman even though I was non-rated.
On the destroyer, mostly I was bored until GQ was called or it was time for helm watch.  Anyway thanks for the trip down memory lane and distant ports of call with the insight of history. It was nice to be a part of history, but my part was pretty boring. 
Boats  
Copyright 2014 Vic and Boats
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SOUTH KOREAN FERRY DISASTER; WAS THE TRUTH AND PUBLIC SAFETY SERVED BY THE TRIAL?

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http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/11/11/us-southkorea-ferry-idUSKCN0IV0CK20141111?feedType=RSS&feedName=wtMostRead

South Korea Court Jails Captain of Doomed Ferry For 36 Years (Headline from Reuters full story @ REUTERS)

Photo Original source S.Korean Coast Guard

"(Reuters) - The captain of a South Korean ferry that capsized in April killing 304 passengers was jailed for 36 years on Tuesday after a court found him guilty of negligence, but was acquitted of homicide for which prosecutors had sought the death penalty."   Full Story

 We provided our analysis of this event some time ago and noted that the proximate cause of the accident  was a loss of stability. The proximate cause of that loss of stability was an additional deck added by the ship owner to increase revenues. Ship's officers do their stability calculations based on information contained in their stability letter usually issued after an incline experiment. The incline experiment is supposed to be done under the supervision of the national maritime authority. No one is supposed to add  anything to a vessel that might change it's "righting moment" without first providing a design and technical details to the relevant national shipping authority for review and approval. The classification society and /or national shipping authority are supposed to inspect the vessel during the construction process to assure the new construction adheres to the approved design. When complete the national maritime authority and / or the classification society are supposed to oversee the incline experiment and the issuance of the resulting "stability letter".

 Had the additional deck been added in full compliance with international standards this accident never would have happened. The person most responsible for cutting corners and hiding ill effects was the owner. The South Korean Coast Guard searched for the owner and found him dead by his own hand. The moment we learned that, we expected the worse for the Captain and crew. With the real guilty party gone, and perhaps the second most guilty parties being members of the national shipping authority, and/ or classification societies either beyond the reach of South Korean Courts or closely connected to the government's national shipping authority we suspected the demand for a scapegoat was on. Angry parents wanted the deaths of the captain and crew men, not out of any reasoned consideration, but out of emotional response to an overwhelmingly tragic loss. Despite two sentences of over 30 years for the Captain and one other officer and numerous lengthy sentences for other crew members the parents vigorously protested the court out come. Frankly they wanted the entire crew marched off to the gallows immediately.

 All thirteen of the surviving crew beyond the Captain and one officer who drew 30 years drew sentences of five to 20 years. The one officer who drew 30 years was convicted of homicide for refusing to help two individuals who allegedly could have been helped. Interestingly he drew six years less than the Captain who was not convicted of homicide but of negligence. The other crew members mostly non officers seem to have drawn sentences that are extraordinarily harsh for crew who were not of the decision making level who were for the most part carrying out orders from officers who they had a right to assume were competent. The officers were in turn entitled to the presumption that their stability information was accurate and certainly not inaccurate due to tampering, possibly with official collusion for profit. The real causation chain has yet to be described and with the virtual burial of the captain and crew probably never will be. Perhaps much to the relief of certain members of the government. 

 After the stability malfunction, unpredictable based on the contrived data coming out of the flawed deck addition process there is no doubt that the Captain and others made serious miscalculations and errors of judgement that costs lives. In terms of regulatory and civil law there was no way that any of them were not going to lose their merchant marine occupational licenses and permits, or not be found liable for civil damages that would ruin them for life. Certainly a few who refused to help may have been eligible for some jail time. But instead their lives were demanded by an understandably angry crowd and the government came as close as they could to satisfying the crowd without resorting to judicial murder. 

 Two important things were killed in this judgement. First the lessons that should have been learned about stability regulations and their enforcement including hull addition permitting and post construction testing. Second, if you were a young South Korean considering a career in the merchant marine wouldn't this case give you pause in your career choice? merchant mariners are asked to take command of highly complex and dangerous equipment and shepherd it through its mission in commerce. A life long career with no accidents is difficult to achieve, now you realize that any accident can be criminalized. The officers and crew of this ill fated ferry ended their careers with this accident. They are no longer a danger , if they ever really were to the maritime traveling public. Certainly none woke up on that fateful morning with any intention of harming anyone. As merchant mariners, through the vetting process you can bet that none of the crew had any real past history of anti social behavior they had never been a danger to society. The only conceivable purpose in imposing such harsh criminal sentences is as a deterrent to others. Unfortunately the deterrence is most likely to be against choosing a maritime career. Too many people had their unintentional behavior criminalized to a degree with some of the worse enemies of society. Outside well informed maritime professionals will view these trials as a scapegoat exercise, but the practice is not limited to South Korea but is spreading around the globe including in the United States, where one judge compared an accidental polluter to the NAZI's hanged at Nuremberg. 

 These accidents won't be reduced by discouraging the best and brightest from seeking maritime careers, shifting national shipping to open registries, and forcing individual and corporate legal planning to avoid liabilities. Criminal charges should be leveled only in the face of real criminal acts and intent. Accidents must be thoroughly examined for the real causation matrix. Once found, if criminal charges are warranted, as we feel they were against the ship owner in this incident, so be it. But to impose the harshest possible criminal penalties on the  merely hapless or mistaken is to warn people away from the nautical trades and professions. Thirty six years imposed on a 67 year old Captain is a sentence to die in prison. It serves no purpose protective of society, just protective of the powers that be who don't want things too closely examined.
Our Previous analysis: 

Additional suggested readings:


                                  




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TALES FROM THE GOAT LOCKER, NON RATES ASHORE

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Tales from The Goat Locker:
The Apprentices
 
PHOTO OF THE USS FLETCHER FIRST IN HER CLASS UNDERWAY PHOTO COURTESY USN

I talked to the LTJG via the miracle of Google Chat the other morning, and we discussed a couple clear differences between my Navy and his. It is a lot more correct these days, and not nearly as hung over as my class of hard-partying liberty hounds.

Of course, I was a couple years older than the norm in my Fleet days in WESTPAC. I had worked for a book publishing concern out of New York, stationed in exotic Detroit, before getting a touch of the wanderlust and shipping out for Aviation Officer Candidate School, and the tender treatment from Staff Sergeant Ronald C. Mace, USMC.

So, I was in my late twenties by the time I emerged from the pipeline and reported to the World Famous Vigilantes of VF-151, embarked in Ma Midway (CV-41) and had pretty much set all the bad habits I have worked hard to maintain ever since.
That wasn't the case for most of the men- and is was an all-male fleet then- who composed the bulk of the crew. I have been having a back-and-forth with Boats, the retired Coastie Master Chief about the difference in eras and ages. He wrote me yesterday to explain some of the challenges that would not have occurred to a smart-ass college grad, and what he described is a system that brought young men into the safe-harbor of maturity.

As a society, we have a couple generations who have come of age after the draft was abolished in 1973, and we have seen the consequences of the impact of households that have no father to assist in the transition to adulthood.
�An after thought I've had about the difference in experience on liberty between myself as a painfully young non-rated sailor and "young" junior officers experience on liberty in foreign ports,� he began, and then he told me a story that was poignant and kind of sweet and sad at the same time. What he talked about was a system that doesn�t exist any more because society and the Services have changed. It might have helped some of the lost young men whose deaths are so prominently reported these days.

Boats described it this way: �As was not all that unusual in the 1960�s, I entered the Navy immediately after high school and I graduated young. I was 17 when I arrived at Great Lakes Naval Training Center. I spent the years between 17 and 22 transitioning from Seaman Recruit to Boatswain's mate First class. Six pay grades in five years was aided by skipping E-2 after boot camp, my only "meritorious" promotion.I was far from the only teen in the fo�c�scle back then. On our first liberty in San Juan, the XO arranged for an escorted tour of the Island for a dirt-cheap price. He encouraged all of the teen aged non-rates to go on it, and he came along on the tour and spent the day with us.

The over-21 seamen and petty officers hit the dives and few of them made it more than a few blocks from the ship. Most spent a month's worth of pay on day one. I learned a lot about foreign liberty that first out CONUS liberty.
I experimented a few times but basically decided that it was cheaper and more enjoyable to avoid the dives and sex clubs. I think I managed to avoid a lot of trouble that would have slowed down that lightening-fast ascension to First Class.
When I first reported aboard the Thetis-class Medium Endurance Cutter Triton (WMEC-116) down in Corpus Christi with post-patrol liberty in Tampico I noticed that the first Class Engineman that everyone called "Papa White" typically did something similar to what the XO did on the destroyer.
CGC TRITON PHOTO COURTESY FRED'S PLACE SOURCE UNKNOWN


Not only was he there steering the teen-aged non-rates away from trouble on the beach at Tampico by arranging and encouraging economical and enjoyable outings, but he took about half the teen-aged liberty section home on Friday night. His wife served up hot dogs and fries. Then we usually watched a movie on TV, ate, and slept on the living room floor.

A typical Saturday was a softball game with some of the youth group from his big Presbyterian Church, lots of attractive but "decent" Presbyterian girls at the game, occasionally a girl�s game preceded or followed ours.
On Sunday morning we all went cheerfully to Church, including us Catholics and our one Jew. As a Catholic, used to a fast one-hour service the idea of spending the morning in different bible study groups, then a prayer service and barely getting out the church complex before noon was unusual but I have to say I actually enjoyed it.
Generally the Congregation accepted us as just a sort of another youth group and no body got too far out of line. After church, Mrs. White (they had no kids) made a big chicken dinner. About 1600 we started drifting back to the ship by liberty van, city bus, the rare non-rate's car.Sundown often found us fishing off the fan-tail. Liberty wasn't very exciting but it was pleasant and a real break from the weekly routine.

 The XO on TRITON  had struck a deal with the local cops and a North Beach Bar where we could go and get a limited amount of beer and late-night Mexican food only a few blocks from the Buoy Depot gate.A woman named "Millie" who must have been around sixty years old oversaw the place. If any of us had more than two beers in an hour or showed any signs of inebriation we'd be cut off. Make a fuss and "Aunt Millie" called the cops and you were unceremoniously dropped off at the Buoy Depot gate.

 All things considered, the years between 17 and 20 and the transition from Seaman recruit to Boatswain's mate Second was characterized by a lot of almost imperceptible mentoring by some senior officers and petty officers,  who unlike BM-2 Morrison and BM-1 McElroy weren't trying to teach me my rate. They were trying to teach me how to be an adult.Of the six teen-aged non-rates on TRITON, two of us retired as Master Chief Boatswains mates. One became an officer, and the other three left the service after four years and went to college.The last I heard from them, they landed pretty decent jobs and had wives and families. I don't think that I realized it until I was much older that while the teen-aged seamen were certainly exposed to the "perils of the sea," we were actually pretty carefully protected and mentored about the perils of the beach, and we were mentored constantly by more than our rating coaches in areas ar beyond seamanship, navigation, gunnery and signaling. They were teaching us to be grown-ups.

 What was most unusual was that the Navy Destroyer had this informal system going and I passed right from it to the system on TRITON. It was years before I realized how unusual the level of care and concern for the non-rates was on those two ships. This unusual and constructive atmosphere was not created by military fiat.
This is awfully politically incorrect to say; but I believe that my early life as a teen-aged sailor was graced simply by Christians who were doing what Christians do, and who happened to be older and senior to me.Nothing could make a sailor�s apprenticeship physically safe, but the Christians I happened to have appointed over me kept the experience morally safe and constructively educational. My friends who spent the same years drinking and partying their way through LSU thought I'd been handed a raw deal. After my first cruise, I wouldn't have traded places for anything. But I know I was very fortunate.

It is different today. Recruits tend to be over 21, and are often married of have had some college. But I think the nation is missing something with the great reduction of teen-aged naval apprentices. I think it would be a great experience if some of the off-duty care and nearly invisible "supervision" that I experienced could be institutionalized.With all of the continuing education "distance learning" programs today why not skip that burdensome student loan, let Mom and Dad retire in peace and plenty and enlist with the dual goal of completing the apprenticeship of a rating and earning that degree while serving. It might take six to eight years to do both. However, young people would leave with out debt, and highly employable. The lower and middle enlisted grades would gain a lot of stability and experience while still having enough movement to allow an encouraging rate of advancement.
I think we need to sell our military services as a great place to get a real education, not some place to "earn money for college". The naval ratings are the last great "Master, Journeyman, Apprentice� system.  Its very structured but structured around the great adventure of naval operations.

Our older new recruits today actually come for the structured learning/advancement system after some disappointments in the civilian post secondary educational system and job market. It seems a shame that so many young people between 17 and 22 have to waste so much time. Unfortunately today a Muslim Imam will be welcomed into a public high school gladly to explain to the student body why they all now have to eat Halal food, while I would be viewed with utmost suspicion.
The naval apprenticeship program has been saving impressionable teen-agers since 1776 from the stupidity that has destroyed our nation.  

Oh, and TRITON, my first Medium Endurance Cutter? She was laid down in 1933, and served on active service through my time aboard her. In 1967, she was sold as government surplus and converted into a twin-deck passenger excursion vessel for Circle Line Sightseeing in New York City. She is serving still.
Sometimes the old ways are the best, you know?�

"Boats"! 

THE TRITON'S FINAL SERVICE , CONVERTED TO AN EXCURSION BOAT FOR THE CIRCLE LINE OF NEW YORK, SHE PROBABLY EVACUATED CIVILIANS FROM MANHATTAN ON 9///11

Copyright 2014 Vic and Boats
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SAILORS ON LIBERTY FROM TWO PERSPECTIVES

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 Editor's Note: The life of a sailor can become pretty confining during a long deployment haze grey bulkheads, the same people every day, the same routine, after a while a ship can seem like a prison vice a vehicle of adventure. "Liberty" is that time allowed a sailor off ship when in port not chargeable against annual leave. Its on "liberty: in foreign ports that sailors "see the world". The actual experience differs greatly between and among sailors depending on age, rank, personal finances, companions, etc. The experience of the two youngest groups the non rated enlisted and the newly commissioned junior officers can be quite marked. The officer group in the 1960s and 70s was generally about five years older than the non rates but in both cases these were young men ( few women served back then) just out of school. Namazu's pal Vic Socotra (www.vicsocotra.com) recently published a couple of short memoirs of liberty as a junior officer. This started a dialogue with his pal "Boats", a retired Master Chief and a comparison of notes. In a series of three articles reprinted with permission from the DAILY SOCOTRA over the next three days we will bring you a look at sailors ashore in very different places in times now past from the unique perspective of the youngest members of the naval services, the teen aged enlisted apprentices and the newly minted early twenties officers. So here is Namazu's pal Vic's remembrance of Bangkok Summer of 1979. Namazu always likes to remind you that if you aren't reading your DAILY SOCOTRA you are missing a real "infotainment" experience.
BANGKOCK 1979
Nick�s Number One
It was summer in 1979. I had a list of things to do when I got to Bangkok, and a couple things to keep a weather eye on.
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I made the first liberty boat- local hire, painted pastel pink and watched the sliver of the new moon rising above the sunset as the gigantic gray steel flank of the ship slipped away. The Thai boatman's apprentice sold us cold Amarit beers at exorbitant prices. Halfway in, the smell of JP-5 jet fuel that permeated the big ship  changed to a rich mixture of spice and wet soil, the interface between the land and the sea.
We rammed the beach and I swung over the gunwale and into the surf up to my knees and waded up to the beach. Past the tee-shirt sellers, the Thai-stick hustlers, the beggers and the USS Midway Wive's Club, across the beach road with the gaudy jeepneys, and onto a stool at an open-air cocktail lounge. One beer later I was in the back of an air-conditioned VW micro-bus and on the high-road to Bangkok.
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The traffic was crazy. The automobile is a recent innovation for the Thais, and since they believe in reincarnation, traffic fatalities are cheerfully accepted. We saw our first corpse on the road in twenty minutes. Travelers on the road up to the capital the next day saw nineteen, the result of a crash on one of the ubiquitous buses. It is part of the whole experience, you know?

We arrived at the turn onto Sukumvit Road presently and headed into the city proper. At Soi 4 I was dropped at the Nana Hotel where I had made reservations.
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�Sleep With Me!� it said on the Nana�s T-shirts. I dumped my stuff in the airy room and made preparations to go out. I flagged an open pedicab down on the street and climbed in, saying: "Patpong Road, driver, and step on me."
I was down in the legendary bar district, by ten-thirty. The Flying Machine Bar was the most interesting, and had many signed photos of Western celebrities who had relaxed there, including Greg Morris of the Mission Impossible television show. It seemed completely appropriate. The bustle was amazing as hustlers worked the crowd. There were expat Yanks and Aussies, Germans and perhaps a few Icelanders. The hustlers were a blend of Thais, and Khmers, Lao and Malay. They were very attractive, the girls and the ones who certainly looked like girls, and the cab rides were cheap.
We dined that night at the Famous Nick�s Number One Hungarian Inn, located in a huge musty old palace festooned with the business cards of thousands of patrons on the walls. There was a 1978 University of Michigan football schedule on the wall. They say the place is haunted, and I was prepared to believe it.
I chanced to meet Nick himself over a plate of marvelous Kobe beef I could never have afforded back in Japan. He was a thick-set suave Hungarian of a certain age with a story. He had been a prisoner of the Japanese as a young man, later an entrepreneur extraordinaire, and currently a Thai national.
�Try the Kobe Steak al la Nick,� he said. �It is the least objectionable thing on the menu.� The smoke of this Dunhill curled over his fingers as he sipped a martini. He was the master of the innuendo.
We dined with him several nights as my shipmates cycled through the city from Pattaya Beach.
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We haggled for gold in Chinatown, bought tribal silver fashioned as baht chains and reclined in the heat of the day by the Nana�s pool that was as tepid as a bath. Late at night, after the real bars closed down, we discovered something that was quite extraordinary: the coffee shop at the Grace Hotel.
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As a restaurant, the �coffee shop� stayed open when the rest of the bars started to close down. Everyone who had not found something better to do- or someone to be with- washed up there. Thais, Khmers, Lao, Chinese, Malay, Burmese, even some Hmong tribal folks, not to mention a few pale slavs. The cantina scene in Star Wars had nothing on the Grace.
When it was finally the night before the ship was going to pull out, I stopped by Nick�s and invited him to tour the aircraft carrier. He graciously accepted, and offered to meet me the next morning and give me a ride down to the Fleet Landing in Pattaya.
Saying farewell to my latest best friend, went down to the lobby, paid my tab and took a cab from the hotel down to the major road junction at Sukumvit Road, noting that the cheap cabs had been transformed by the brief American presence into major expenses. My supply of red-hued bhat currency was running low, though a few of the bills that were in my pocket that day are in an envelope in my bureau.
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The next time I would need them I was carrying a black diplomatic passport and in a hurry.
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Thus, on the morning of my last day in Thailand, I found my self ensconced on the leather bench seat of the largest lime-green Cadillac in Southeast Asia, riding down to Pattaya in luxury, looking out and accepting the stares of the locals. Nick had his wife in the front right seat and drove with the same cool nonchalance he displayed as a restaurateur.
She fumbled in her purse for more Dunhills when Nick called for them, lighting them from a silver Dunhill lighter. She was a lovely woman, thick black hair curling below her shoulders, and thickening just slightly with maturity. She seemed to care for him deeply, though with the hint of irony that a long marriage brings.
As he drove, he spun tales of what it had been like to be there when the Japanese came, and how his status as a Hungarian �Ally� of the Empire of the Rising Sun had been useful. He said he had been able to help some British and American prisoners, and some commercial internees. That is what got him in trouble, and why the Japanese detained him, too, �Ally� or not.
He complained about the taxes and corruption that doubled the cost of this fine automobile. He talked about the real cowboys that came in 1946 when the city was made of mud the color of the river, flying in war-surplus C-47 transports.
Those were the days, he said wistfully. That was when he started reporting to the Hungarian Intelligence Service through their Embassy. He was a useful asset to them. The war began to heat up next door and Bangkok became the Rest and Recreation destination of choice for thousands of Americans taking a mid-tour break from the horror.
They drank and they talked loudly at Nick�s bar, and after he finished pouring the drinks and the soldiers tool cabs to the Grace Hotel he would write up his notes and pass them to his handler at the Embassy.
It was a pleasant and painless way to supplement his income, and doubtless the intelligence on the American disposition in the War next door helped to pay the taxes on the car in which I was riding.
He parked the car near the Fleet Landing and he and his wife enjoyed a tour of the ship. I suspected that he was listening for intelligence on our capabilities and next port of call. I figured it was the least we could do for him. Intelligence after the end of the Southeast Asia war was pretty thin for him, and he was getting on in years.
I figured it was about the least I could do in exchange for the ride home.
Copyright 2014 Vic Socotra
Twitter: @jayare303
Republished with permission

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