Pfishy (Submarine) Stuff

Intelligence matters. Where links have not been provided, please consider using your own intelligence on a rainy day perhaps.
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What really happened to USS Halibut's (SSGN-587), NavSource Submarine Photo Archive? Halibut was never considered a slack submarine and it has been decommissioned since 1976.
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Doubt that it had anything to do with this record catch:
How many realize that submariners (volunteers in the Silent Service) may not answer direct questions because they have been bound to secrecy, or even kept in the dark due to their individual needs to know ( So Silent it is The Mute Service? )?
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When a submariner denies certain things, it could be due to a required oath of secrecy, compartmentalization of secret facts to which he has not been made privy based on need-to-know, or simple honesty. Nothing is wrong with any of these possibilities.
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November 24, 2010 WIRED.com/DANGER ROOM Super-Silent Jimmy Carter Ready to Spy on North Korea

It carries Navy SEALs to slip into enemy ports undetected. And its class of subs have 26-and-a-half-inch-diameter torpedo tubes, wider than the rest of the submarine fleet, in case the Carter has to take out rival ships. “That’s a Seawolf, the most powerful attack sub in the world,” says Robert Farley, a maritime and international-relations scholar at the University of Kentucky.

According to Norman Polmar in The Naval Institute guide to the ships and aircraft of the U.S. fleet, Though the class carries the 21-inch Mk 48 ADCAP (Advanced Capability) torpedo, the [5-inch] larger-diameter tubes permit quiet, 'swim out' launch. Dr. Polmar also notes that Soviet-Russian attack submarines have both 21-inch diameter torpedo tubes and 26 1/2 -inch torpedo tubes---plus in some units (SSG/SSGN)---large diameter missile launching tubes.

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Which brings up the next question: Have you heard about the MOP (Massive Ordnance Penetrator)? Now you have.
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Have you heard about the supercavitating mine fields? You have now. UPDATE (2009): Transitioning Mine Warfare to Network-centric Sensor Analysis. It was only a matter of time.
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Finally, what else could 26 1/2-inch torpedo tubes be used for these days? Suppose there were an underwater (torpedo) version of EMP (electromagnetic pulse) ordnance. What could several underwater EMP bursts do to any detected or undetected submarines within their activation range? Very few people actually know, including M.E. ... Related science and technology, as far as the public knows, has involved airbursts. Seawater conducts as well as attenuates, much better than air, however.
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Submarines are always silent and strange.

PREVIEW of NEW, Colorless, Homeland Security Advisory System - - what to be on the lookout for and what to prevent.

.................New, Colorless Threat Advisory System
............Nuanced Grays even a 5th grader can understand

Thank you, General Napolitano, now voters know much better what to look for and try to prevent!
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Moreover, sensitive Muslims and CAIR attorneys who had griped about the original color-coded scheme are less likely to be offended (perhaps only 96% offended, as opposed to 100%) by the nuanced shades of gray used in the proposed, new advisory scheme.
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Submarines are always silent and strange.

Thanksgivings Tribute to Submariners at Sea

With our utmost gratitude to U.S. submariners! - Vigilis and Juan

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Submarines are always silent and strange.

N.C.I.S. Busts St. Mary's Resident - IP address was traced back to Naval Submarine Base Kings Bay

... was searching for pornographic images or videos that had identifiers contained on a list of known or suspected child porn images cataloged by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children in Washington, D.C. The computer's IP address was traced back to Naval Submarine Base Kings Bay....
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November 22, 2010 (News4Jax.com) KINGSLAND, Ga. - Search Of Base Housing Finds Child Porn

A Navy man was arrested Friday on a charge of possession of child pornography after an investigation by a Kingsland Police Department detective and a Naval Criminal Investigative Service agent.

Authorities said heightened online activity of images cataloged by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children in Washington, D.C., led investigators to Martin's account, then to his residence. The 29-year-old suspect's laptop was seized as evidence, and he is being held in the Camden County Jail.
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Photo and sailors' comments can be followed here.
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Submarines are always silent and strange.

Learning from Slow Leaks

This is another in Molten Eagle's reading between the lines series designed to suggest hidden news to more capable readers and curiosity to those less practiced in abstract issues or their critical thinking abilities.

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While slow leaks may encourage continued complacency among the passive, to the swift such leaks may compel both immediate action and better survival plans. - LCDR Horace T. Broder (1908)

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First, consider this:

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Nov. 16, 2010 (AP) Two researchers want NASA to punch one-way tickets to Mars

The colleagues state that humans must begin colonizing another planet as a hedge against a catastrophe on Earth.

The main point is to get Mars exploration moving, said Dirk Schulze-Makuch of Washington State University, who wrote the article in the latest Journal of Cosmology with Paul Davies of Arizona State University.

President Obama informed NASA in April that he “ ‘believed by the mid-2030s that we could send humans to orbit Mars and safely return them to Earth. And that a landing would soon follow,’ ’’ said agency spokesman Michael Braukus. Nowhere did Obama suggest the astronauts be left behind.

The colleagues state that humans must begin colonizing another planet as a hedge against a catastrophe on Earth.

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Next, consider this:

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Nov. 21, 2010 (AP) Leaking Siberian ice raises a tricky climate issue

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They say 1.5 trillion tons of carbon, locked inside icebound earth since the age of mammoths, is a climate time bomb waiting to explode if released into the atmosphere.

Gas locked inside Siberia's frozen soil and under its lakes has been seeping out since the end of the last ice age 10,000 years ago. But in the past few decades, as the Earth has warmed, the icy ground has begun thawing more rapidly, accelerating the release of methane _ a greenhouse gas 23 times more powerful than carbon dioxide _ at a perilous rate.

More than 50 billion tons could be unleashed from Siberian lakes alone, more than 10 times the amount now in the atmosphere. - Katey Walter Anthony, , Ph.D, University of Alaska Fairbanks

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"In another 30 years all of Chersky will look like this." - Sergey Aphanasievich Zimov, a Russian scientist, and the director of the Northeast Science Station in Cherskii in the Russian Republic of Sakha in northeastern Siberia.[1]

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Questions for thought

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In your opinion, is methane a climate time bomb due to explode in 2030?

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Could Zimov's methane forecast have anything to do with the need Schulze-Makuch and Davies have expressed for colonizing another planet as a hedge against a catastrophe on Earth?

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Does any of this have anything to do with President Obama's stated belief that by the mid-2030s we could send humans to orbit Mars?

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CAUTION: BMW expands landfill-methane electrical generation - Care to reconsider your answers now?

Since 2002, BMW's assembly plant in Spartanburg, SC has been using methane captured from a nearby landfill site to fuel electrical generators. ... The co-generation system also uses hot water in addition to the electricity to provide 60% of all the energy required for the entire plant.

Were AP journalists being too one-sided?

Submarines are always silent and strange.

Preview

To regular readers:

Thanks for stopping by. Vigilis has been quite busy commenting on other blogs...

A few examples: here, here, here, and here.

Do not despair, M.E. returns again with new stuff at 7:03 AM tomorrow.
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Submarines are always silent and strange.

Latest Nuclear Sub Thriller or Flopper

Based on the very entertaining book Thunder in the Deep: A Novel of Undersea Military Action and Adventure by Joe Buff ...

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U.S.S. Challenger (SSN-803), a high-tech, 'ceramic hulled' submarine.
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Synopsis

After destroying a German weapons lab, U.S. submarine captain Jeffrey Fuller goes head to head with his archenemy, German sub commander Kurt Eberhard. Fuller is assisted by a team of Navy SEALs and a sexy South African woman named Ilse. link
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Publisher's Note

Coming off a tactical nuclear battle at Durban, South Africa, the crew of the damaged submarine USS Challenger, under the command of acting Captain Jeffrey Fuller, heads for the northern German coast to destroy a lab developing unstoppable Mach 8 cruise missiles and find themselves in a vicious duel with their nemesis Kurt Eberhard, captain of the SMS Deutschland. [ibid]

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Wikipedia

Tactical nuclear warheads are now the weapon of choice with a gentleman's agreement not to hit any civilians. link
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The Planned 3D Movie

Movie Negatives (4)

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from M.E.

Production is going to be delayed well beyond the tentative start (spring 2011) since little over 25 percent of the production budget has been raised and 65% of projected costs are needed for filming in CT. Lengthy production delays often result in serious cost escalations and extra promotional expenses. PREDICTION #1: Richard Meyer's film script will not result in a 3D-blockbuster, and, more likely than not, never be released nationwide.

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from Library Journal

Despite almost nonstop action, ... this novel fails at several levels. ...Thunder and its predecessor include premises that stretch plausibility. The first is that the fossilized Hohenzollerns could somehow regain control of Germany and reinstate both the monarchy and the militaristic Prussian aristocracy. The second is that both sides could explode tactical nukes like popcorn without any real concern about escalation toward mutually assured destruction. The book just doesn't work. link

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from Poten & Partners

Richard Meyer, the executive producer, ...is also the screenwriter and co-star,... Even though he'd never written a screenplay, ...Meyer then wrote the script, and plans to star as the villain. He has little movie experience, but has acted Off Broadway. link

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The film does not [bold added], however, have official cooperation of the U.S. Navy, which has a submarine base in Groton. The reason: Germany is a U.S. ally.

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Movie Positives (4)

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from Poten & Partners (cite to The Hartford Courant)
The big-budget production will be in 3-D. [ibid]

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The big-budget production [has] ...a storyline about a nuclear war... [ibid]

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The big-budget production ... [has a storyline] with German fascists in 2030,... [ibid]

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from M.E.
Movies about submarine ops have had little traditional appeal to a rather large segment of our population -- females. Even a blockbuster film like Tom Clancy's Hunt for Red October attracted females through casting Sam Neill in a leading role. Apart from that, there were only 3 female speaking roles credited (Ryan's wife, young daughter, and flight attendant). In Thunder in the Deep Meyer has an opportunity to cast and portray a leading female role (Ilse). If clever enough, Meyer's script and casting can make Ilse's role the movie icon for female submariners, the general image for which is being promoted, free of cost to the filmmaker by the U.S. Navy. In M.E.'s opinion, the actress Minnie Driver is a natural pick for the role of Ilse.

PREDICTION #2: If this ambitious film is ever produced, producers will force Meyer to cast a voluptuous, relatively unknown actress as Ilse, to attract a male audience.

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PREDICTION #3: Within the next 7 years or so we can expect a book and hollywood film about the one-way pioneers to the planet Mars, mentioned in the news for 2030 departure. Any related Mars movie would be released before Thunder in the Deep.

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Submarines are always silent and strange.

A tale of High-tech ‘grifters’, International tax avoidance, and high profile donors

The alleged crime began August 2004, when Roger Davidson went to Bedi's computer service shop in Mount Kisco, NY to rid his computer of a virus. The couple were arrested about November 4, 2010. Davidson, a grammy-winning pianist and heir to a family fortune, said Wednesday that he was the victim of a "sophisticated theft scheme involving grifters of the highest order." Source: November 11, 2010 -LoHud.com
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The engrossing story has largely escaped mainstream media attention in the U.S., so far. A simple reason news coverage has been lacking may be guessed from the composite photo above. Political bias could be the easiest part of this strange story to understand.
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The Icelandic woman, Helga Invarsdottir, was arrested on suspicion of extortion over a week ago. Earlier this year, Invarsdottir and Bedi had donated $20,000 to a Democratic Party election fund and had their picture taken with President Barack Obama.

Alleged extortion

The couple are accused of extorting almost $6 Millon from Davidson, a wealthy Schlumberger heir. The stranger-than-fiction story began when Davidson asked Mount Kisco computer store owners Vickram Bedi, 36, and his Icelandic girlfriend Helga Invarsdottir, 39, to rid his computer of a virus.
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The crime allegations contain elements likened to a movie plot. According to police, the pair convinced Davidson that the virus was part of a scheme by government intelligence agencies, foreign nationals and even priests associated with Catholic organisation, Opus Dei. The victim is said to have agreed to pay the pair $160,000 per month for 24-hour protection against the fictitious threats; payments continued until recently. Opus Dei was described in Dan Brown's fanciful book The Da Vinci Code, which later became a movie. source
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Alleged Pornography and Tax Evasion
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According to authorities, Bedi allegedly made a series of claims; first that the source of the computer virus was traced to Honduras by his uncle, and that Davidson was the target of Polish priests linked to Opus Dei. Bedi also allegedly claimed that he had been picked by the Central Intelligence Agency to stop the priests from infiltrating the federal government.
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Bedi gave a rebuttal to the criminal charges this week in an interview with The Journal News and presented a different version of events, including that Davidson willingly gave the money. Among his claims are that Davidson was importing $400 million from a tax shelter in Europe and evidence of that activity was found on his computer. source: newrochelle.patch.com
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According to Bedi, Davidson entered his Mount Kisco store in August 2004 with a computer virus and was worried about the content stored in his hard drive, including decades of musical compositions, "massive amounts" of pornography and, most importantly, e-mails between Davidson's family and lawyers addressing their effort to transfer a portion of the family's wealth to the United States from Lichtenstein, where they were evading taxes from the United States, France and other countries. source
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The American media were aware of this story and contacted the White House because of it. They were told that because of the extortion case, the donation will be given to charity, Fréttabladid reports.
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Submarines are always silent and strange.

What Goes Around, Comes Around...Nigerian Government Stung by Nigerian US Law Firm Partner

Maryland's ECU Law Group and three of its lawyers are accused in a civil suit of failing to remit $1.55 million to the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

The embassy of Nigeria filed civil suit against ECU Law Group in U.S. District Court Tuesday. The suit alleges Ephraim Emeka Ugwuonye, a Harvard educated attorney and a Nigerian himself, who handled a real estate transaction for the embassy, has not returned an IRS tax refund to Nigeria.

Ugwuonye, the complaint said, promised to return the tax refund. The suit accuses Ugwuonye of keeping the money as payment for other services he performed for Nigeria. The embassy, according to the suit, paid Ugwuonye 3.5 percent of the sale price of the M Street NW property.

In August 2008, ECU lawyer Bruce Fein, representing himself as Ugwuonye’s attorney, said Ugwuonye was keeping the tax refund as payment for work he performed in the Northern District of Illinois representing a former member of the military junta that ruled Nigeria in the 1990s.

Ugwuonye, according to the suit, never informed the Nigerian embassy that in 2008 he was suspended from the practice of law in Maryland for 90 days for, among other things, taking a fee for a frivolous case. Lawyers for the embassy charge that Ugwuonye continued practicing law during his suspension. Ugwuonye was not immediately reached for comment Thursday afternoon. source

PREDICTION: The outcome of this litigation, in M.E.'s clairvoyant opinion, is for an out-of-court settlement. Otherwise, either the Federal Republic of Nigeria will feel a reverse financial sting, or an embarrassing Installment In the Public's Benefit should be forthcoming for at least one more lawyer.
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Brings back memories of things (Nigerian fraudsters jailed for $240m bank sting) that have come around before.
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Submarines are always silent and strange.

Carnival Splendor (Cruise Ship) Connection to Women in Navy Nuc Propulsion

Time has published Nuclear Cruise Ships Ahoy? , an article that could link women sailors in the U.S. Navy's Nuclear Propulsion program to cruise ship's of the future.

...Lloyd's Register, the international standards organization for the classification and design of ships, announced that it has begun a two-year project with a consortium of companies to look into the feasibility of nuclear-powered commercial ships. The primary application will be for cargo ships, but all large vessels, including cruise ships, could use the technology if Lloyd's Register endorses it.

When and if nuclear cruise ships are launched women with navy nuclear propulsion training will certainly be available to crew or command them, as will men. Meanwile, in other cruise ship news, Two Arrested After Crippled Cruise Ship Arrived in San Diego:

Two passengers on the beleaguered Carnival Splendor were arrested today on suspicion of a felony crime and taken off the cruise ship in handcuffs after the vessel limped into port, an official told AOL News.

Few women will be drawn from the navy's future submarine crews, however, because so few will have gone through the navy's submarine pipeline relative to the nuclear carrier pipeline.
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Submarines are always silent and strange.

Unwittingly revealed?

Making news while a 'mystery missile' commands national attention can be somewhat difficult. Reporter Jennifer McDermott manages a bit of East coast competition with her 11/09/2010 story

Mystery ship pays brief visit to New London

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Ferries, submarines and sailboats are common on the Thames River, but not 510-foot guided-missile destroyers.On Monday the U.S. Navy destroyer famous for helping foil the hijacking of an American container ship by Somali pirates last year was spotted turning around on the Thames near Electric Boat. ...

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The Bainbridge did not pull into the EB shipyard or go to the Naval Submarine Base or even notify the local Coast Guard station of its arrival, according to officials at those sites....

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A spokesman for the Navy's Second Fleet finally solved the mystery — the Bainbridge was here to use the local degaussing range.

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Very, very interesting; read the rest of the story (particularly between the lines).

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Submarines are always silent and strange.

Prepostorous Nuclear Submarine Operations or Nuclear Subterfuge- Take Your Pick

Rule Britannia!
Britannia rule the waves
Britons never, never, never will be slaves.
Rule Britannia!
- Lines from Rule, Britannia by James Thomson and set to music by Thomas Arne in 1740.[1]

Keep this well in mind: Either the series of attention-getting mishaps that have reportedly befallen HMS Astute this year are a sign of the British Empire's imminent collapse, or it is a clever subterfuge designed to divert attention from something else involving the UK government. Could the UK's MOD simply want out of the nuclear submarine business?

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The British MOD (Ministry of Defense) does not wish the public to believe the latter, so it has suddenly confessed to the following mishaps, previously undisclosed mishaps, including a total of eleven (11) groundings:

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October 2010 HMS Astute grounded off the Isle of Skye
April 2009 HMS Torbay grounded in the Eastern Mediterranean
February 2009 HMS Vanguard collided with the French submarine Le Triomphant in the Atlantic
May 2008 HMS Superb grounded in the Red Sea
May 2003 HMS Tireless struck an iceberg while on Arctic Patrol
November 2002 HMS Trafalgar grounded on Fladda-Chuain, north of Skye
November 2000 HMS Triumph grounded west of Scotland
November 2000 HMS Victorious grounded on Skelmorlie Bank in the Firth of Clyde
July 1997 HMS Trenchant grounded off the coast of Australia
July 1996 HMS Repulse grounded in the North Channel off south-west Scotland
July 1996 HMS Trafalgar grounded off the Isle of Skye
March 1991 HMS Valiant grounded in the North Norwegian Sea
November 1990 HMS Trenchant snagged the fishing vessel Antares off Arran
October 1989 HMS Spartan grounded west of Scotland
November 1989 HMS Sceptre snagged the fishing vessel Scotia near Lewis
July 1988 HMS Conqueror collided with the yacht Dalriada off the coast of Northern Ireland

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Inadequate coincidences, you say? Try this next little gem.

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Well, which do you choose: sudden incompetence or subterfuge? HINT: The British Senior Service (Royal Navy) has rarely appeared so incompetent. As to their Silent Service, the Brits have been pacesetters, until now.

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FINAL QUESTION: Which submarine, Astute or the soon to be launched Ambush will actually perform clandestine operations earliest? Hmmm!

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Submarines are always silent and strange.

Uncased Reward

The right of voting for representatives is the primary right by which other rights are protected. To take away this right is to reduce a man to slavery, for slavery consists in being subject to the will of another, and he that has not a vote in the election of representatives is in this case. — Thomas Paine, 1795

What has changed, since 1795, for our elected representatives?

Today's politicians accord themselves much better pay and benefits. Helped by all the free media publicity they can generate, free postage for mailings to constituents, contributions from lobbying groups, and the power to redistict, congressional incumbents wield formidable advantages over their potential challengers. This has helped them to make careers of pretending to represent you.

Lobbyists wine and dine our representatives throughout every year and in locations around the globe. As individuals, our influence is infinitessimal and seldom felt. Once every 2 or 6 years, however, our combined influence as voters can be decisive, and our representatives know it.

Only when and if we dependably exercise our right to vote do our representatives get reminded of those of us who ultimately make them accountable.

Wonder what kinds of things politicians might do if they even suspected we were too lazy or aloof to even vote? They would gradually revise our Constitution, stripping our other guaranteed rights to make their rule easier for themselves. Thomas Paine knew it, and so should you and I. Human nature never really changes, it merely gets confined.

Preserve your rights as those before you have done for you.

Rare submarine news

The Polish Navy played a role in the 2003 invasion of Iraq, when it provided logistical support for the United States Navy. Since 2005, Poland has participated in NATO's operation Active Endeavour to help thwart maritime smuggling.
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When was the last time, however, most of us had news about one of Polska Marynarka Wojenna's (the Polish navy's) 5 subs?

The submarine remains invisible while it sees everything, said Lieutenant Commander Artur Zajda.

October 29, 2010 - "Bielik" submarine has set sail from the Gdynia military shipyard. It went on a four-month-long mission to the Mediterranean Sea. The Polish boat will participate in NATO's anti-terrorist operation Active Endeavour. more .

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Well, there you have some Polish sub news at last.

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The author of last week's mystery quotation just happens to be a submariner, as well.

If one is returning from the underworld, one should travel first class only. - Lt.Cdr. Jan Grudziński VM DSO

Submarines are always silent and strange.