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Insider's Look at High-Tech High-Speed Navy Vessel
Xidus writes "Computerworld is running an article on the technology behind the US Navy's newest HSV (High Speed Vessel), focusing on interfaces designed to reduce the number of personnel needed on the bridge. Lots of pretty pictures. No word on OSes, although Mozilla is mentioned, and UNIX-ish desktops are visible, along with some nifty virtual-reality tactical displays. Would you like to play a game?"
"Nearly every function of the ship, from navigation and steering to engine and damage control, is conducted and monitored using commercial, off-the-shelf hardware and software."
hmm I guess I've been shopping on the wrong shelves
Does it know how to play tic tac toe?
Here's a close-up look at the ship's cutting-edge IT ...followed by a picture of a strange-looking bald man. At first I thought he was the IT.
Some impressive IT, that, if that's the state of the AI / cyborgs on board.
I bet SCO aren't going to turn up and demand money.
Mod parent up!
The Fire Scout will be flown by a computer operator using a joystick controller in the Combat Information Center
Finally!!!!! A military carreer for the overweight masses of X-box, Nintendo and PlayStation owning couch-potatos.
Only to idiots, are orders laws.
-- Henning von Tresckow
["Currently, the USS La Salle has a 3Mbit connection. We think we can get a 6Mbit connection and up to 24Mbit using accelerators," said Dick Pearson, a systems engineering consultant at Dataline Inc.] :p
Yea, i think netzero tried to sell me on that crap about six months ago
You can see the ship from the outside here and here
The ~HSV portage tree!
Hope they have lots of armor around the servers, and a backup bridge.
"uses paperless charts"
It worries me that China is working on an anti-satellite warfare, and the military keeps marching down the GPS for everything road. WWIII could see a lot of pretty hardware sitting at the docks while the navigator runs down to supply to see if they have any "old fashioned" compasses and charts.
Oh well. The military knows what they are doing, right?
I'm sorry Dave I cannot do that...
Given the previous story on increasing virus/worm activity, whether the DOD has any rules concerning the use of Windows in military settings.
Ceci n'est pas une signature
Where?
this looks liks windows to me. This even has the windows default titlebar fade action going on.
Your hair look like poop, Bob! - Wanker.
The Chinese won't blind US satellites as we'd likely interpret that as preperations for a first strike. Which means they are 45 seconds from Cerenkov radiation themselves. Not even the North Koreans are squirrle enough to pull that rabbit outta the hat.
That said inertial guidence. And the first target of anti-satellite weapons would be the spy satellites and not the GPS constellation(s).
If you've got a country out there that is crazy enough to pull a stunt like that on the US, the charts paperless or not are of precious little consequence once that shit hits the fan. At least until they close the technology gap with our cruise missle payloads.
The Navy is renting this vessel for 11.4 million dollars a year (including operating costs).
python -c "x='python -c %sx=%s; print x%%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))%s'; print x%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))"
I'm sure they have old-school backup plans and navigational equipment. The option not to would be total stupidity in an age of electronic warfare.
Also, I hope these servers are protected against EMP (Electro Magnetic Pulse) bombs.
Life is not for the lazy.
The next phase of development is for the Navy to control this ship from an iPod running Linux.
So, is it like other dual hulled speed boats, crap in big swells?
-- Free software on every PC on every desk
But see, the idea is that (hopefully) other countries will follow suit and build automated, unmanned, killing machines too. Then if war ever breaks out, it'll be our machines against their machines with a bunch of 14- to 35-year-old guys controlling the action from an RTS-style interface. We'll televise the results and both countries will make a fortune in advertising revenue. Boom-pow, everybody's happy!
Reducing the number of people required to man the ship is great and all, but, if memory serves, one of the debates about reducing the number of people required to man the ship is the subsequent reduction in number of people available for damage control. If the ship takes damage and there aren't enough (remaining) people able to control the damage, the ship is even more likely to be out of the fight or even lost completely.
So your argument is what? -- That defenselessness will always lead to peace and never function (as it has historically) as a magnet for risk-free aggression? "Those that will not bear swords can still die on them" (Tolkien)
I am a Nigerian Colonel,... just kidding. I am writing this in the hopes that I might spare you the horror of your own hypocrisy.
Please cease the use of any of the following: Computers, all frequency hopping radios such as a cellphone, any device making use of transistors of any sort, aluminum cans, modern four wheel drive vehicals, any civil project which might have involved explosives (most roads, power generated by dams, and possibly drinking water), weather forecasts produced with aid of any satellites/computers/radar (ie all of them), trauma medicine, some insecticides, nuclear medicine, nuclear power (which provides a major fraction of the worlds power needs), underwater and space exploration, and, of course, any political system that doesn't involve you being the wholly owned an insignificant subject of someone else.
If those pump parts were badly needed in a village important to the people outside of it, they'd have the resources to buy them. And since I don't see you putting your money where your mouth is, feel free to start leading by example we'll follow along at our earliest convienence. It says something that a 9 year old in the US has a great enough availability of resources that he can get a well built in Africa where the native africans can't.
FYI War pre-dates weapons. Weapons were invented to settle wars quicker. It turns out that while a person can beat another to death with their bare hands, it's exhausting, and time consuming.
Maybe the problem is there just aren't enough american nine yearolds. That must be it.
And so concludes this episode of Oversimplification Theater.
Wow, gives new meaning to wardriving. Or would it be warsailing in this case?
If you check the manufacturer's (Incat) website, they are pretty actively pushing off-the-shelf passenger/freight catamarans to militaries. Only minor modifications (apart from the IT) were necessary to turn a perfectly normal ro-pax cat into the "Swift".
For sure the cheapest way to obtain a new fast vessel class for a navy! Common sense, really: use commodity hardware.
US Navys's HSV 1 "Joint Venture" is a similar arrangement (it's actually Incat's first 96-metre ship, in previous civil life served as "Devil Cat"). Compare to Royal Australian Navy's "Jervis Bay".
Also, I hope these servers are protected against EMP (Electro Magnetic Pulse) bomb
With everything being "off the shelf" hardware, how much emp it can take is a good question. There are test facilities.
I can understand mil-rad hardened transistors surviving, but all that stuff clearly has to use low voltage CMOS that can be blown if there is a nearby lightning strike.
I think most worrisome is a computer glitch (not to mention a bullet) hitting the right server at the right place to cause the ship to be dead in the water because engine/navigation controls don't work.
If it could bring down an Osprey helicopter, one has to wonder about ships also.
Being the military, they probably (or should) have taken such things into account when deploying the systems.
You also have to wonder how much time they spend patching all the software.
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
You can see the AOL "Accelerator" in one of the screen shots I think.
Wow! You're AMAZING... I bet NOBODY in the ENTIRE US MILITARY considered that EVER. You may have just SAVED the WORLD for DEMOCRACY!
Insightful, +5? Fucking idiot moderators... a product of simplistic Tom Clancy plots, no doubt.
It looks like the work of Sun Microsystems with the GUI. You just can't forget those pastels.
where the Navy was able to remotely control a ship more than 3,000 miles from shore.
Now that's what I call war driving!
I was able to have a tour of the bridge of another Incat ferry (builder of this boat) which uses similar technology - they did have paper charts for backup (mandated by law actually) on that boat, as well as some more standard equipment, as well as the computerised bridge.
It's pretty cool how they steer this boat - it can move any direction as it powered by steerable water jets. The wheel on the bridge is 10cm across, which just seems weird compared to traditional bridges. One of the big selling points of the Incat ferries is that they dock quickly and in a small area, because they can come in sideways.
I was on it for some experiments in 02 and it was a real impressive boat. The vessel is a proof of concept for what a future command and control ship would be like. Basically the budget is large and they throw everything they can on it to see what good solutions come out.
Not to be outdone the Army also has it's on vessel aptly called the TSV (Theater Support Vessel).
On the HSV the exercise servers/work stations run Windows, if there were "UNIX-ish" systems there they must have been hiding.
The boat itself is sweet, actually very similar to the "Cat" in Maine. That's the ferry from Nova Scotia to Bar Harbor with a top speed of 55(?) knots or so.
The primary role of the US Navy in peacetime is to keep the sealanes open. The only reason you can get those Reeboks for $30 is because the US ensures safe shipping throught the world. Even so, piracy is on the rise since most European nations have killed their navies and the availability of small watercraft in third word countries is greater.
"God fights on the side with the best artillery." - Napoleon, Marshal of France - speaking truth to power
I used to work in military research here in the UK, and worked on a project not *too* dissimilar to the COMBATSS/InfoScene bit mentioned in this article (I probably shouldn't divulge exactly how similar or not, for obvious reasons :) ). At least, from the brief mention in the article, it seems to be a similar kind of system, in principle at least.
Our stuff was written as a kind of proof of concept, with a fairly basic GUI (x/motif iirc), and most of the work being done on the data processing to ensure it was an accurate representation of reality.
we once had a meeting with a team from the US who were working on a similar system to our own, the plan being to see if we could benefit from each other's work. they gave us a demonstration of their product, which initially seemed much closer to completion than our own. it had a beautiful 3D interface (much like the screen shot in the article) and they demonstrated how a user could easily pan round in real time and see what was happening with a simple drag-and-click of the mouse.
then we asked them about how they actually processed the data, as this was the most important part of the system (obviously, no matter how good the interface it's a bit pointless if the stuff you're looking at is just plain wrong), which is where things fell apart a little. the actual backend of their system had hardly been started - the stuff we were seeing was all manufactured data created for demos, which kind of negated the entire point of the exercise from our point of view. they had a much larger team working with a much bigger budget than we did, but had effectively just come up with a nice GUI - and it didn't actually do anything that our basic motif GUI didn't, it just had more colours and more 3D stuff. we weren't really interested after that...
the point being that even in the military, even if something looks great on screen is no indication of whether it's actually any use or not. our system was actually deployed and used (on a testing basis) by the UK armed forces - what became of it since then i couldn't say as i got another job soon after, but it was clear that the US system was many months behind our own in terms of usefulness.
and on a slight tangent...
the whole thing reminds me of the well publicised FIST system that was featured on UK TV a few years back - basically trying to bring the infantry soldier into the 21st century using in-helmet HUDs and super smart targeting/comms systems etc... it was developed at the same place I worked but had so many problems i think it was shelved - after huge spending. but then, it did use windows as the underlying OS (don't ask me why), which for a mission-critical system always seemed a bit... stupid.
I often wonder for some of these things whether they were instigated by military ppl out of necessity or genuine improvement, or by politicians who just want things to look good
All of that technology, to serve what end? Killing people.......As long as there are men making weapons, there will be war.
No military weapons were involved when some islamic terrorists drove airplanes into the World Trade Centers and Pentagon killing 3000 people.
In fact, they didn't even use guns, but "box cutters".
Perhaps a more accurate statement would be "as long as there are men, there will be war".
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
I don't think the Chinese are rational thinkers when it comes to Tiawan, and if they decide to take the island by military means (I think they will manage it using dirty island politics) I don't for an instant think they would hesitate to blind and damage the US military with a satellite strike.
Would we counter with a nuclear strike against the Chinese based on their satellite strike? Absolutely not - in the Western world if no life is lost you don't toss nukes.
The entire space based infrastructure needs to be throughly reviewed. Or, we can wait until the after strike "review board." Maybe we can get the national security advisor to testify?
Shit. Now the Yanks can accidentally kill their allies from the comfort of their PCs. Great.
I'd just like to point out that death by friendly fire as been around for as long as projectile weapons have been on the field. Yeah, the US military screws up and kills the wrong people, even in peaceful situations, but so does every other military with projectiles and vehicles. That's why they're called "accidents". :)
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"Can't we use some of this incredible technology to shoot food at hungry people?
Or something like that.
From the pictures it looks like that ship is running Windows 2000.
Unlike the story submitter who would obviously love it to be running Linux.
Hmmm...but in a world where everyone hates you, and some countries hate each other, what stops (for example) China from making it look like North Korea did it? Or is it just that if someone does it, the bombs that will be dropped will end the world anyway? Is it a good idea to end the world, even if there may be some nuclear missles coming for you?
...or that wars would be harder to wage if we - the people - only agreed to fight defensive wars?
Incidentally, Andora (between Spain and France) had, not that long ago, a defense budget that stretched to a clip of ammo. Andora hasn't been invaded recently, not even during the 20th century when pretty much all of Europe was occupied at various points. There are other examples of pacifist nations within the American hemisphere, too. (I forget where, and wikipedia is acting up, but possibly Costa Rica?)
It's a logical fallacy to presume that those that oppose wars are pacifists - there are those who oppose certain wars while recognising that defense is preferrable to occupation.
This is where the serious fun begins.
Perhaps you are thinking of a "Small Waterplane Area Twin Hull" kind of multihull, not a wawe-piercing catamaran?
SWATH vessels are slow though, so they are in (scientific and heavy-industrial) uses where speed doesn't matter but stability is paramount. Not too good for Navy use.
(a SWATH catamaran rolls less because in each hull the bulk of the hull is deep under, avoiding the impact of the surface wawes, and the hull is narrow at waterline. Sort of like two hourglasses side by side...)
Um, a couple of minor caveats.
All that technology to serve the end of having fewer people be needed to risk their lives.
This doesn't necessarily result in less men in the military. Rather, it could easily result in the same number of men, but more firepower distributed to each man. After rate of fire, individual firepower is something that will decide wars. Just having a machine gun is one thing, but having a machine gun in the hands of every troop is quite another (historical precedence for that). Yeah, this doesn't defeat your statement, and it wasn't intended to. Just add to it. :)
First we stopped the draft, now we reduce the size of the military while maintaining its power. I think it's improvement.
Um, didn't Clinton reinstate the draft? Also, as in my first paragraph, we won't reduce the size of the military, we'll just increase its power dramatically. Reducing the size would be great while maintaining its power, but not under this president, and I don't really know if we should at this time. I think there's another world war brewing, and whether we're the good guys or not, I'm not interested in losing.
Like what I said? You might like my music
In a bid to clear to my mind of the cobwebs, I took ~1 year off, and worked as a deck hand aboard a 656 foot shipping vessel (as a merchant marine).
At the time, I was mid-way through completion of a computer science degree, which I am currently finishing. I was completely shocked by the lack of pervasive computing on board the ship - a complex environment, where any and all silicon help could prove to be highly advantageous.
Two newly acquired computers, running NaviSailor were onboard, and provided (what most of my fellow mates/luddites took as) advanced information in a no-hassel manner.
There is a great deal of money to be made in the shipping business. It is a complex and intricate profession, and most of the people onboard shipping vessels exhibit a great degree of perfectionism. Afterall, wrecking a multi-million dollar ship with hundreds of thousands of dollars of onboard cargo would be quite disasterous to one's career.
The long and the short is that these people need attention. Here is a niche market ripe for the taking. Custom software geared towards making watches, navigation, and docking less error prone has yet to be made. All you who complain of a lack of work -- that fattest worms are found only by lifting the heavier stones.
-pararox-
"death by friendly fire"
This term always annoys me. What's so goddamn friendly about shooting your allies anyway?
It's just a way of avoiding saying "Sorry, but we screwed up and killed some of you when we're supposed to be on the same side."
And I know that I'll probably get modded to hell for saying it, but the Americans do cause most of the "friendly fire" incidents. Something to do with having bigger guns than everyone, less training on when NOT to fire, and a John Wayne attitude.
'Don't worry' said the trees when they saw the axe coming, 'The handle is one of us.'
As I understand it, these ships are basically a Faraday Cage to start with. Because of the possibility of NBC warfare, the ships are basically competely sealed. Note that the steering picture only shows computer screens, not windows. There are no portholes, and donly the minimum number of external walkways for mooring etc. All doors are RFI tight. So all you need to do is make all the (many) cable ports EMP proof (not easy, but feasible) asnd the ship is EMP tolerant. You need spares for all the bits outside the shell (CCTV cameras, Antenna amplifiers), but inside the shell, lofe (and war) continues as usual.
EMP is not now a new threat. You can bet the Navy have thought of it.
Consciousness is an illusion caused by an excess of self consciousness.
This term always annoys me. What's so goddamn friendly about shooting your allies anyway?
Friendly fire refers to some very distinct situations. For example, your flanks come in faster than expected, and since they're opposite each other, their bullets are likely to fire into each other. If they stop shooting, the enemy that's sandwiched between them will get the upper hand, but if they keep shooting some of their shots will hit the other flank, resulting in casualties by friendly fire. Also, you might find yourself standing next to a group of the enemy, firing away, and then your buddy with the grenade launcher sticks a grenade in the middle of them. Boom, some of the shrapnel hits you. Friendly fire.
Thanks to mass media not understanding jack and shit, Friendly Fire now also refers to a pilot losing control of his helicopter at the base and crashing into another helicopter. :( (I don't think the military use the term that way ever, but I don't really know)
And I know that I'll probably get modded to hell for saying it, but the Americans do cause most of the "friendly fire" incidents.
I wonder if you have statistics to back this up. It certainly appears that way, with the Brits coming in next for stupid accidents, but I'd be interested in seeing some real statistics, along with length of deployment, strength of deployment, and so forth.
Like what I said? You might like my music
Have a look at the photo showing the hand on the joystick. Correct me if I'm wrong but thats a left hand on the joystick ( we see the thumb on top ). Correct me again, but isn't that hand coming from the right of the flabby torso ( standard for the US military ). So whats the story, only people with two left hands can drive this thing ? Or do sailors have a third arm attached to allow them to manage the complexity of the controls ? Where were the other two hands in the photo ? What in Sam Hell is going on over there ????
Um, didn't Clinton reinstate the draft?
No. Those selective service cards that have been filled out as a pre-requisite for government financial aid for university have been around for at least the past 3 generations.
And it takes an act of congress to reinstate the draft. That's a law issue. The president can only exercise the powers given to him under the constitution and enforce the laws made by congress, not create them himself (and vetos can still get overridden, and are used quite sparingly due to the potential political ramifications).
Andorra might not be the best example, as you have to go all the way through spain or france to attack them; they can afford to be pacifistic.
And if spain decided to attack them, they wouldn't stand any chance whatsoever; if France attacked them..I was going to say something predictable there, i'll leave it at that.
Why, yes, I AM a Pagan Libertarian.
Isn't this the same military that wants the OICW? (Well, the senior officers seem to, anyway. The guys who are actually going to trust their lives to it don't seem so sure.)
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
Also, as in my first paragraph, we won't reduce the size of the military, we'll just increase its power dramatically. Reducing the size would be great while maintaining its power, but not under this president, and I don't really know if we should at this time
The size of the military was already reduced, under Clinton, through reduction of budgets and the military itself increasing the entrance requirements (turning more people away), as well as removing more people from the military by being more strict with the requirements to stay in. Of course, most of the causes of the size reduction really haven't been reversed by Bush.
-PainKilleR-[CE]
You don't have to shoot down a GPS satellite to confuse a GPS receiver. All you need are a couple well-synchronized transmitters with some forged signals. The algorithm used by xntpd/tickadj is sufficient for *introducing* imperceptible drift into the timecode.
Of course, you might have a problem deploying your transmitters near enough to a Navy vessel to be effective, unless you happen to have your own LEO satellites, carrying otherwise legitimate earthbound communication/TV/etc....
-- *My* journal is more interesting than *yours*...
All military navigators know how to do it the old fashioned way.
A good part of my officer training was spent on navigating without GPS, a compass and a map you saw the other day is all a trained officer needs to get where he is going.
my expirience is not with the US army(IDF) but I have reason to believe the US army/navy does things quite the same way.
Me.
Looks cool. I always wondered why navies never seemed to use multi-hulled ships, given their speed and handling characteristics. I guess in the days when all that mattered was the size of your gun and the thickness of your armour, it was a bit irrelevent.
If the rules are changing and speed/tactical operations are the New Way, I wonder whether high manoeuvrability "tanks" will be back on the agenda as well, then? They were never much good in the old days, when the accuracy of your opponent's gun was so bad that even if you dodged you might take an unlucky hit anyway (when armour would still protect you, of course) but if we're all about agile units able to get in and out quickly and stealthily now...?
Incidentally, am I the only one who spotted loads of cool things about the ship in the original article... except for any offensive capability (other than via aircraft)? If it's a multi-role vessel, you'd have thought it would carry some sort of firepower, even if only for self-defence!
If you'd have to kill me, don't tell me. :o)
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
but it loses its high-security status if you install any recent patches.
You can't judge a book by the way it wears its hair.
and has an experimental wireless LAN that allows anybody who comes aboard to simply plug in their laptop
Hmm. Yep, radical new development in wireless right there...
the vessel is a commercially available catamaran that the us navy is renting. this isn't a battle vehicle people, it's a technology testbed. there's little chance of this craft ever seeing combat. the boat is simply there as a platform to test the computer hardware and software.
"It certainly appears that way, with the Brits coming in next for stupid accidents,"
Would you care to give some examples of British 'friendly fire'? Almost every example of 'friendly fire' I can think of in recent years has been trigger-happy Americans in aircraft shooting British vehicles which were clearly marked as such (the majority of exceptions being trigger-happy Americans shooting other trigger-happy Americans on the ground).
Maybe if Americans thought a little more before shooting, the British military wouldn't take more casualties from our American 'allies' than our 'enemies'.
If there's another world war brewing, it's probably because of two things: religious extremists (and the nations whose governments support them) and the belligerence and meddling foreign policies of the United States of America (or, to be fairer and more precise, the current government of the United States of America). Neither of these things is going to be fixed by spending a military budget larger than the next several nations' combined on super-powerful weapons. Ships like this and tactical, small-scale warfare may be the way forward, but big spending on military hardware in general isn't. You're far enough ahead already to make it a formality, and all your attitude is going to do is provoke another arms race.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
Would read the article if I could, evidentally slashdotted to heck and back...
... is not a US ship! In fact, it's leased from the Australian navy. Go figure. Of course, this could be covered in the article but see above disclaimer.
As a squid who has actually been on board...and whose command was thinking about claiming the ship as our flagship to replace our old one(Gogo Second Fleet!) One interesting fact: The HSV Swift
Between that, and the fact that there's essentially no armor or weapons, I'd personally prefer not to serve on that ship, but then again the final designs that the Navy would have built would presumably be able to take some kind of beating and dish a bit back out.
The U.S. Navy has a new ship in its fleet that officers say may be the most technologically advanced vessel produced to date, with IT capabilities that are revolutionizing naval warfare and may play a vital role in responding to potential terrorist attacks in the U.S.
Officers would say anything to promote their plans. But how such a fine military vessel can play a vital role in responding to potential terrorist attacks, is beyond me. Terrorists most usually attack by carrying explosives with them, into crouded places, or drive ground and air vehicles into their targets. The one exception of sea terrorism that comes to mind is USS Cole, but the vessel described above would be incapable of preventing the USS Cole bombing the way it happened.
When the military talks about terrorism, I run away. They usually talk in order to keep the money coming in. Otherwise, terrorism is something that secret and intelligent services deal with, not the military. The military is unable to defend against terrorism; it can only defend against visible enemies. Terrorism is invisible, especially if t is low tech.
By the way, does the new vessel use Microsoft Windows ? There was an incident, back then, about a US military ship that went dead because of a Windows network bug that propagated itself to all the ship's servers, causing the ship to be dead for over two hours.
All of that technology, to serve what end? Killing people.
Fucking A. killing very very bad people. People who are out to destroy me and my family. People who kill at random, using the most terrifying methods as possible.
I cannot believe you are trying to write off the benefit to the world brought by the whole American experiment because of its military-- the same military that defeated the Nazis, the Communists, a whole peanut gallery of pirates, dictators, and terrorists, BTW.
davejenkins.com |
if americans used their technological prowess to solve the problems that these box-cutter weilding people thought that blowing up skyscrapers in new york would solve, perhaps they wouldn't be blowing up skyscrapers?
i know, that sort of thinking requires just a little too much responsibility... too bad there's no such thing in the world of 'defense spending', eh ?
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
There was a time when knowing how to read charts, use a sextant, and basicly know where the hell you are at in the world with the use of some very low tech tools was required serve onboard a ship but it seems even in the 1990s this true and proven system started to phase out in the civilian circut. I'm not familiar with the current military stance on the subject.
I percieve this technology as being really damned useful. Even back in 1983... I was the only person who could figure out how to use the LOMAR(sp) system to gadge our posisition, but never the less took readings with a sextant. For 10 days our readings were within minutes of each other, the new system proved it self, but was still a good practice in the event the electronics failed.
I'm all for technology. GPS is a wonderful thing! Digitaly displayed charts are much easier to deal with then protractor and compass. Electronic and remote controls I can see as being useful. But all these wonderful tools are dependent on electricity to operate. It's my hope they would see the wisdom of using humans, paper charts, compass and sextant in the event of a catastrophic failure. After all, being military and sea salt water and technology don't mix. When push comes to shove, you gotta fight for flee... not continue pushing the crosswalk button in the hopes it does something.
There is no sanctuary. There is no sanctuary. SHUT UP! There is no shut up. There is no shut up.
a new ship that can take out the swift by the press of a button.... a canoe with an EMP :D
|/________
|\A|ALYS|
Andorra might not be the best example
True (although Spain or <ahem> France might find it quite easy to invade...), but I think this just demonstrates that there are reasons besides superior firepower that might make any given country less desirable for invasion. Britain, historically, was weakly armed (no "standing" navy until Henry VIII, no standing army until Cromwell) but rarely invaded. In contrast, Russia has a vast population, a standing army for most of recent history, and history (the Russian Winter) on it's side - yet it's been invaded several times (albeit unsuccessfully).
This is where the serious fun begins.
perhaps it would be better to say "as long as a person holds any kind of power over another, there will be war"
Anyone remember a movie where aliens used a video game to find people to pilot their advanced fighters? I am going to start my kid on the combat ace game today !
forgivness is easier to get than permission
In any case, the problem with aluminium is that it is softer and melts more easily, which is also part of what happened to Columbia. There's more on aluminium in ships here.
If you have powdered alumimium (or indeed most metals, including iron) and preferably a strong oxidiser mixed with it, then you can get aluminium to burn. In a thermite reaction, powdered aluminium reacts directly with powdered iron oxide in an extremely exothermic reaction which is self-sustaining. But these aren't the conditions you'd get on a ship under attack.
Realistically, the missile and or explosion would just rip more easily through the softer metal, and any resulting fire would weaken the structure. In a vessel of that size and with the thinner dual hulls, that would be fatal enough even with a steel hull. A ship like this really has to rely on stealth or countermeasures to survive.
...is the willingness and ability of the attacked side to defend itself.
Ask people from Bosnia.
The trouble is that the US is often perceived as a bully, even though this is not always fair, it is the truth. And perceptions are what people react to, not "reality".
What have Bill Gates and Ben Laden have in common? They both want the US Military to use Micosoft operating systems...
This may or may not be on topic, or even news, but the "box cutters" were Leatherman-type utility knives.
The 9/11 attacks were a pre-emptive strike by the Taliban against what it viewed as an imminent threat from the united states. a $$$ high-speed-navy-ship running linux wouldn't have stopped that.
The united states made a pre-emptive strike against Iraq. george bush has since admitted there was no link between Taliban and Iraq. Colin Powell has admitted the pre-invasion arguments he used at the United Nations early 2003 were based on shaky evidence.
If somebody could plz explain what the hell's going on, i'd really appreciate it. Besides the obvious slide towards a Police State, that is.
fred
It allready has - this boat was HMAS Jervis Bay. It was used to transport 3RAR (parras) to East Timor for peace enforcement in Sept. 1999 . It was shaddowed all the way by at least one Indo Sub and I can tell you the diggers onboard were a bit nervous about it...
Well, it seems like a great many Iraqis actually do argue that "fact". Under Saddam, they had relative safety, sanitation, electricity, hospitals, education etc. They lacked many liberties - most of which they still lack - while having all the basic necessities of life.
No there wasn't. The fact that a great number of Americans still believe that there was a link proves that the American media is the fscking Pravda (the Soviet "news" source which trumpeted the official Soviet "thruths") of our days.
-=- 4ntifa -=-
And yup, he's looking where the ship's going. These vessels dock stern first so that the ramp giving access to the vehicle deck can be lowered and cargo moved. That's the time when precise adjustments to the steering are needed.
I was aboard one of these vessels not long ago - the same basic design is used to provide a high speed ferry service between the North and South Islands of New Zealand. A very smooth, comfortable and fast ride. There's a small observation deck above the stern and it is exhilarating to stand there at speed watching the two enormous rooster tails of spray kicking up behind.
I know what you're saying, but the US has far, FAR more friendly-fire accidents than other nations. I mean, it's not often you can think many accidents off the top of your head that you can attribute to one nation: The Canadian observers blown up by USAF figters. The RAF Tornado shot down by patriot missiles. That Iranian passenger airliner shot down by that USN ship. Those US soldiers shooting each other when a missile landed in their compound in Iraq. The A10 attack on the US convoy that left british/iraqi journalists dead, and many injured.
Of course, this pales into insignificance against the actual ordered killing of what would be deemed "friendlies" by other countries - such as the systematic attack of Baghdad residential areas by US attack helicopters, etc. I guess once people are called "collateral damage" they stop being people, and 1 American == 20 Iraqis.
This is not an attack on you, but an attack on the US military, who seem to think that numbers == effectiveness, and weapons == good soldier. They've got a LOT to learn, and unfortunately it'll be innocent people who have to teach them that lesson.
and UNIX-ish desktops are visible, those look like HP keyboards to me.
The 9/11 attacks were a pre-emptive strike by the Taliban against what it viewed as an imminent threat from the united states
No. They wanted to see Americans die, and their social agenda (a worldwide islamic state) furthered.
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
There's not much to disagree with, here, so I won't waste our time doing so. :)
Instead, I direct you to US history, where the last serious war we fought in was WWII. Sure, the rest were "serious" in the sense that they involved killing and so forth. Viet Nam was fought with conscript troops, and conscripts are the worst troops you can have. I forget about Korea. Other than that, we've had small engagements, and UN-supported engagements, and very little else. The US doesn't have a long history of war. Our first war was a revolution, and we lost the next couple of wars in a row, pretty much. Let's see, there was 1812, some fight with Canada (the French-Indian Wars?). Of course we had our Civil War in which the official US military had numerous problems.
So we don't have a long military tradition, and our military tradition is strangely deficient in discipline. I'd say that 99% of all incidents involving US troops can be attributed to a lack of discipline, and our military's peace-time affairs (Tailhook, anyone?) certainly don't lend themselves to a display of discipline.
Yes, it's a problem. No, throwing more technology at the problem isn't making it better. And it's a problem that needs to be solved, since most of our volunteer servicemen really want to do good things but wind up doing bad things. Kinda like 5-year-olds. ;) As far as maturity, I suppose you can probably liken the US military to, say, any military unit in Europe in the 17th century. Our standing military is very young as an organization, with several branched that didn't even appear until the latter part of the 20th century.
When you look at it like this, our military isn't that bad, and in a fight they're second to none, but that doesn't mean we can't use some improvement. Best thing you guys can do is show what a well-disciplined military is capable of accomplishing, set a solid example, and hope that we'll follow it somehow. But don't lose sight of the fact that the top officer of the military is an elected president, and those types of officers are notorious for a lack of discipline. So who else are they going to get their example from?
Like what I said? You might like my music
The Navy's track trecord with skelton crews and automation is not flawless.
The Yorktown didn't survive a divide by zero calculation.
I like automation and I love computers, but are they really going to have a technically savvy crew? A crew that could fix the onboard systems if they break, not just utilize them while they are working?
I like the idea of some manual controls to get them out of a pinch.
Shaky evidence from all over the world, even the French. We know that they have WMD's because the US helped them make them in the 1980's. We have pictures of them as recently as 2/2001. They exist just as the other things you can't see exist - Like the terrorists in your country... wherever you are. I hope you are not like the stupid Spanish who voted in the communists as a result. I used to think a lot more of them as a people until they did that. Now they are more like the French.
Also, people seem to have missed those articles that showed those Al Quaida dudes being arrested in the shadow of Saddam's palace. Not just underlings, a number of their leaders. Some terrorists wanted for over 20 years. Even the Aquillo Lauro (sp?) hijacker. Iraq was a modern Libya that the US took care of when the US was just a very new nation (Marines - to the shores of Tripoli!)
We were headed to a police state under Clinton - look at Waco and Ruby Ridge (Criminal misconduct on the part of ATF - or so it would seem). Bush brought us back to sanity. You probably think the patriot act is bad... Look at what Senator Feinstein had to say about it. You are probably one of those people she is talking about who don't understand what it is and does.
The bottom line is a lot of our problems today all go back to 1993 when Clinton castrated the CIA by not letting them pay informants. Ironically 1993 keeps coming up with these investigations lately - WTC bombing the first time, other intellegence problems, not following up on US comittments in the middle east after Gulf War - I (Lots of trouble from that). Nobody seems to want to say Clinton had something to do with our problems now. Some people even say he didn't kill anyone - tell it to those in Bosnia (Madaline Albright's war... we should get out of there, where is the outrage that we are still in Bosnia?), Suddan.... and so on. He has my vote as the worst president we have ever had. Next from the bottom is FDR by the way for all the Unconstitutional things he did. FDR remains the only dictator that we had so far (had the power to single handedly repeal a Constitutional ammendment - prohibition. Did it quickly too).
From the article (talking about the unmanned "Fire Scout"):
Here is one hoping, their encryption is up for it, and their SSL implementation is reliable. Otherwise, "man in the middle attack" may get a new meaning and that "another aircraft" may not be a friendly one...
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
No. They wanted to see Americans die, and their social agenda (a worldwide islamic state) furthered.
And this is different from wanting to see Muslims die, and the world-wide furtherment of a World American State, how exactly?
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
A highly efficient water pump, designed by rocket scientists, functioning in the middle of the Gobi desert, delivered by caring individuals under no moral pretext other than simply to -help- would be a far more defensive mechanism than that same pump, sitting in a bunker as part of a missile system, idle, waiting for the day that it has to be used against some other persons weapon.
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
Tm
Support TBI Research: http://www.raisinhope.org
How we handle Taiwan is important for their internal stability. If we can push them around, are they really a peer? And I think they are. The Chinese are very American in a lot of ways, or the want to be. They just have a different world outlook. Did you know that USA in Chinese is mei guo, or brutally translated rose country? They revere the contributions of the American Volunteer Group, or Flying Tigers, during WWII. They're not as predisposed to venerate the individual, are less blunt, and mercurial in their approach to things, particularly national affairs. While they want to be the one and only China, a nation whole not divided, the leadership knows what an invasion of Taiwan would really mean, and they don't want that. Now, who can be certain if we'd hold to our obligation to defend Taiwan against a mainland invasion, in this political climate, I doubt it. Even on its own Taiwan would inflict horrendous casualties on an invading force, probably requireing months of prepatory bombing by the Chinese. And that's assuming Taiwan didn't restart another illegal nuclear weapons program. Faced with invasion, I've no doubt they'd use it, and the technology would certainly be within their means.
Even in that scenerio, the blinding of US satellites would be nearly useless. The taking of Taiwan would not be an afternoon out. We fly intelligence aircraft looking into china more or less routinely as it is, and there are still SR-71s. If they're not doing it as part of a first strike scenerio (which would just be insane), the only motive they'd have to do it is if expecting direct combat with US forces to deny us real-time imaging. But they couldn't sustain that, not like we could. They may have the boots and rifles, but we've got the force multiplyers. Besides, they'd never bite the hand that's spinning up their economy. It'd be suicide.
I don't have the "In case of WWIII" playbook. But if the Chinese blind a satellite they don't want us to see what they're doing in the next few hours, not days, weeks, months. I would imagin Norad would find few things more provokitive. And with a warheads flight time of under an hour, there isn't much time to decide what happened. Consider that even in the Cuban missle crisis while the Soviets could have taken out almost every US satellite, they didn't. And didn't plan to even as they were mulling over going foreward into WWIII. I doubt that was an oversight.
There's a similar ship here for those who feel a strong Bond for these sort of ships.
There is nothing so silly as other peoples traditions, and nothing so sacred as our own.
"As long as there are men making weapons, there will be war."
As long as there are MEN, there will be war. There was war when we had nothing but stone tools, and there will be war long after we're gone.
So in the meantime, I'd just as soon see that my country's military can WIN those wars, thanks.
Life is hard, and the world is cruel
Yeah, why can't everyone just get along? M'kay?
Oh well. The military knows what they are doing, right?
Actually, in many cases they do.
Speaking as an ex-tanker, tank gunnery qualification involves numerous "degraded mode" exercises. Some engagements you have everything- computer, thermal sight, rangefinder, healthy gunner, etc. For others you only have parts of that, or perhaps just the backup optical telescope with an aiming reticule (M105D for my tank).
Very very smart. Then again, I knew a fair number of gunners who *only* used the M105D in every daylight exercise, no matter what they were allowed to use. (It's obviously useless at night) They generally got good scores- you can guesstimate the target distance pretty well and with a bit of windage correction you can get shots off a lot faster than with all the bells and whistles.
"Seven Deadly Sins? I thought it was a to-do list!"
where did you get these 'facts' from? lets see the actual reports, not heresay, not 'interpretation'.
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
Britain was basically sorrounded by a moat; in order to attack, you had to cross the channel, something that is not all that easy to arrange. and while they had no standing NATIONAL army, the feudal system supplied them with levies from the standing armies of the lesser and great feudal lords.
Russia, on the other hand, was big. and had borders with a bunch of other countries, where all they had to do to invade was take a step.
Britain, by it's nature just really needed a well trained reserve and a decent watch system, which is what they had; Russia needed a army big/powerful enough to fight all it's enemies at the same time to be secure from invasion, something they were rarely able to manage.
Why, yes, I AM a Pagan Libertarian.
Mmm, yah. Spain is having a lot of success at that right now, aren't they?
Idiot.
We are not out to kill muslims, the folks we are fighting happen to be muslim, and also happen to be attacking us because they are muslim and we are not. However, if you look, we are not killing all muslims, inface we are killing specific people, who happen to be muslim, because they are trying to kill us.
We (as a USian) desire to see USians live. Period.
You kill us, we will kill you.
You use terrorist method, we will kill you.
You allow terrorists to be harbored in your country, we will kill you.
You support terrorists in your country, we will kill you.
The, on the ashes of your former terror supporting corpses we will create a country that is more to our liking. Ideally a democracy or republic and then turn your bass ackwards, hate teaching, anti-human rights country into one that respects human life and freedoms.
Norris/Palin 2012
Fact: We deserve leaders who can kick your ass and field dress your carcass.
Sources? AFAIK the supposed "links" between al-queda and Iraq turned out to be falsehoods, and has been known for well over 6 months (and in fact nearly got Tony Blair's head chopped off).
we are killing specific people
...
no, you are not. 10,000 iraqi's have died in this war. there is nothing specific about that, and to an on-the-ground observer, it sure looks like Americans don't care enough about killing muslims, as much as they do about protecting their Valued Christian Soldiers.
Its an exercise in viewpoint, dude. if you can't see why some people would think that America is killing Muslims, its because your news media is not showing the pictures of demolished mosques, daisy-cutter charred corpses, and limbless kids.
You kill us, we will kill you.
This argument works for THEM as much as it works for YOU. Just like this one:
You feed me, I feed you.
What's the difference? The difference is, idiots like you who are incapable of escaping your little box
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
Unless, of course, the Chinese think that American leadership would be too weak-willed to respond.
You have to have more than the capability to deter an enemy. You have to have the will to use the capability.
You can lay money on the fact that the Chinese are watching how the psychological war against America regarding Iraq is currently being waged. You can also lay money on the fact that many of the generals in this war are Americans is not lost on them.
You can tell a great deal about the character of a man by observing those who hate him.
It's much easier than that. All China has to do is demand a UN investigation into the whole affair (where China has veto power) and paint any nation who fails to agree to the UN resolutions on the matter as a rogue nation acting against the wishes of the international community.
Whether or not this strategy becomes viable depends in large part on how the current psychological civil war Americans are in over Iraq plays out.
You can tell a great deal about the character of a man by observing those who hate him.
First of all, I tend to the conservative end of the political spectrum myself. I thoroughly enjoy intellectually tormenting local liberals who lack critical thinking capacity. Of course I do the same for conservatives, fascists, commie pinkos, and every political shade between the extremes. I just hate ignorant.
So let me pick one of your 'facts'.
> Bulgarian intel has proof of meetings between Mohammed Atta, the ringleader of the 19 hijackers, and one of the heads of Iraqi Intelligence.
Bulgarian intel - nope, was the Czechs.
one of the heads of Iraqi Intelligence - nope, Iraqi diplomat believed to be an intel agent
meetings - nope, didn't happen. Czechs government now says so. US government now says so. Hell, even most conservative news organizations are saying this one just doesn't hold water.
HMS Trinidad was the ship that torpedoed itself.
It's never too late to have a happy childhood.
In 90% of the world the phrase "we the people" doesn't mean jack squat. If you learn nothing else in your life, you need to learn that.
You can tell a great deal about the character of a man by observing those who hate him.
This was tried in the 70s under Carter. All it got us was increased Soviet Agression in Europe.
This was tried in Viet Nam under Johnson, who would order the bombing of jungles without anything in them to show the North Vietnamese what we could do to them if we really wanted to. He also ordered continual bombing pauses so that the North Vietnamese could think about how hopeless their odds were and stop fighting.
The results was an even more agressive North Vietnamese campaign because they perceived America's position as one of weakness.
Your naivete is charming, but is nothing but naivete. You have no understanding of human pscyhology, and have a tremendous ignorance of the world outisde the United States. That can be the only explanation for this totally irrational conclusion that war exists in the world because the US is a military power.
You can tell a great deal about the character of a man by observing those who hate him.
Hehe, The US military recognizes Windoze for what it is which is a memory leaking crash prone operating system not worthy of consideration for many mission critical system. The first Windoze OS weapons platform is being built buy BAE in England and will not be ready several years (2010 comes to mind). Should be fun to watch that train wreck. Almost all Navy software ran on UNIX, and probably still does.
I loved the C64 game PHM Pegasus base on real hardware; A.
Missle equiped hydrofoils
If the USN wants to bust terrorist/pirate bad guys in the costal shallows or the open seas this is a possible weapons system that met an untimely end.
For more info on the PHM program
The part about being second-to-none struck me as slightly strange, as any coverage of Iraq would show that's not the case. I know the US soldiers want to do a good job, and various factors inhibit this, but they really aren't as effective as a combat force as most people make out. Good training means a 4-man team can do what 20 other guys can. When most countries will send 300 elite or top-notch troops, the US will send 30,000 guys screaming "hoo-yeah!" at each other. Big guys with guns != effective army. The fact they kill anyone is more down to statistics and collateral damage than training.
I know everyone out there who's fighting for what they believe deserves my utmost respect, but more of them would be coming home if the US military realised these horrible shortcomings and did something about them.
I hear ya about Bush et al - professional politicians never make good role models for troops, especially seeing as troops should be totally removed from politics. Take, for example, the British armed forces' top officer: an old lady from London... they still pack one of the fiercest punches out there, though ;) I guess a lot of it is down to tradition and rigorous training (The RM's training is the longest of any regular troops in the world). Once they have discipline, they're set.
Opportunity knocks. Karma hunts you down.
If the rules are changing and speed/tactical operations are the New Way, I wonder whether high manoeuvrability "tanks" will be back on the agenda as well, then?
Okay, so I watch the History Channel and I love Mail Call with R. Lee Ermey. The fact is that there ARE high speed "tanks" of a sort. The army and marines both have light attack vehicles which are fasted and armored, but not nearly as well fortified as a M1A1. The Marine's main assault vehicle is in fact amphibious, useful for beach landings and fording rivers. The Marine's vehicle is also wheeled and mounts a 30 mm gun, much smaller than the devastating gun mounted on the M1A1.
I wish I had links for you, but those types of tanks have been in existence for years. The navy may be behind a bit because with the size and cost of the craft, the development cycle of new naval tech is often a little longer.
"All great wisdom is contained in .signature files"
Since I'm not willing to turn the United States into an Islamic Theocracy under Sharia law, the terrorists will just have to deal with me trying to kill them instead.
You can tell a great deal about the character of a man by observing those who hate him.
The ships are made by a New Zealand company which makes catamaran ferrys for use in that part of the world. Keeps cost down. I'm sure in the next year or so the navy will want to build one from scratch at 100 times the cost.
======= ~\_/~\_O Burmese
The last I checked, the United States government wasn't using straight pins through the cheeks of women to fasten burqas and executing men who shaved and letting girls burn to death in a flaming high school because the religious police wouldn't allow them to leave without their islamic garb or engaging in honor killings or publicly stoning adulterers and homosexuals to death in crowded arenas with forced attendance.
Now, are you seriously maintaining that Islamic Sharia dictatorships are morally equivalent to representative democracies?
You can tell a great deal about the character of a man by observing those who hate him.
Of the vessel itself.
Here's One
That picture doesn't really do it justice though, truely an amazing ship design that's attractive to look at. (I think the Australians have a slightly smaller one of similar hull design in service.)
For great pictures, skim through back issues of "Proceedings" magazine. (Basically, Time magazine for old Navy brass.)
You have no understanding of human pscyhology,
... all i said is, "Americans, use your Technological Prowess to MAKE PEACE, not WAR!" ... but its interesting how so few people actually understand that this is possible in light of the mob rule of 'guns make good' ...
It is precisely this arrogant view, that some people do have an understanding of 'human psychology' and some people do not, which gives us the bigots in command who are writing the purchase orders for more, bigger, massive weapons.
a tremendous ignorance of the world outisde the United States
I actually have lived all over the world, including America, and including places that most Americans would not dare to go. I dare say I'm more aware of the situation than most Americans...
but hey thanks for the free psychological evaluation. i'll be sure to note that you are an expert.
and, for the rcord, i never made that conclusion
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
And this is different, exactly, from "Iraq is now an American Oil-producing State, run by Radical Christians", how?
Look. Just Put Down The Weapons and Feed Each Other. The more people do this, the less likelihood there will be a need for war.
It IS that simple.
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
Well, last I checked, you can find hundreds and thousands of drug-addled 'products' of the American systems on your streets, countless human rights abuses in your jails, undeniable evidence of social deterioration in your Columbines, mass irresponsibility for human consumption and greed in your media, mob mentality in your court rooms, and endless police state aggression.
...
If you want to make 'moral equivalences', lets talk about Ruby Ridge or Waco
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
It's running Windows (looks like Windows 2000). I don't see anything UNIX-ish about the desktops, but I can sure as hell make out the blue gradient title bars in the pictures.
In fact, they didn't even use guns, but "box cutters".
They used another weapon -- the assumption on the part of "peaceful" civilians that civilians weren't targets, and were unlikely to be harmed if they "cooperated" with the enemy.
I think most worrisome is a computer glitch (not to mention a bullet) hitting the right server at the right place to cause the ship to be dead in the water because engine/navigation controls don't work.
You mean like the USS Yorktown in 1998?
The only reason we have the rights we have is that people just like us died to gain those rights. -- Cheerio Boy
>
> And this is different from wanting to see Muslims die, and the world-wide furtherment of a World American State, how exactly?
Well, someone else has pointed out that militant Islam is - by any objective measure - immeasurably more cruel than anything we've done to ourselves. Hack off your daughter's clit? No problem! Murder your wife because she got raped? Well, the bitch shouldn't have been showin' it off! Hey, it's their culture, and all cultures are equivalent, right? That's what your moral relativism implies -- fine by me. For one post, I'll accept your premise (even though I vehemently disagree with it) and argue from the basis of moral relativism.
If someone says their life's goal is my extermination, I have no ethical qualms about using everything in my arsenal against them. It's not a pleasant task, but it is a necessary one.
To the moral relativists who say that I'm no different than the enemy -- "so what?" If all moral systems are equivalent, please accept my arbitrary choice of the one that allows me to live as I choose (Evil Kapitalist Western Imperialism) over the one that requires me to submit or die (militant Islam).
And assuming you live in the industrialized West, why on earth would you choose to defend militant Islam? The religion is itself a political movement (as defined in its own holy writings), and moral relativists tend not to live very long in Islamic theocracies. If you're suicidal, fine - either seek professional help or just kill yourself - please, in the name of the very moral relativism you preach, keep your self-destructive tendencies from negatively impacting on the other 6 billion of us.
Yep. I used to write artillery control software. CONOPS (continuity of operations) and graceful degradation were important requirements.
The only reason we have the rights we have is that people just like us died to gain those rights. -- Cheerio Boy
Uh, have you read what the Taliban routinely did to prisoners? It was like reading a Nazi medical journal...
Trust me - the darkest American prison is a Taj Majhal compared to what they did in public stadiums under the Taliban.
I won't say that the US is without its abuses - but these are present in just about any country. Generally speaking the US population dislikes these abuses and tries to get rid of those who carry them out.
On the other hand, in some societies you get promoted by being barbaric. Iraq under Sadaam comes to mind, for one...
Consider that Ruby Ridge and Waco made the press only because we have a free press.
Don't even get me started on brining world peace by giving free food to everyone. The US gives out a LOT of free food in a LOT of countries...
And, was somebody starving out the Japanese prior to World War II, or the Germans prior to World War I? War is part of human nature. Most people that have only $5 tend not to club their neighbor with $10 over the head to take their money. However, some people do. If you put enough people like that in charge of a country, the next thing you know they are trying to take over the world...
The reason that nobody has invaded the continental USA in the last 100 years is because we fight our wars offshore. I'd rather irrational idiots who hate the USA trying to figure out how to blow up tanks in Iraq than trying to figure out how to blow up buses in the USA...
You can lay money on the fact that the Chinese are watching how the psychological war against America regarding Iraq is currently being waged.
That is one of the most insightful things I've read on slashdot in months, and well-phrased at that -- and I blew the last of my mod points yesterday.
Slashdot quality declines as the number of hot grits posts decreases. - Provolt's Law, Apr-09-2005
Yeah, WWII was over food. Germany was hungry and thought Poland would feed them? You are a simplistic twit.
The fact is WAR is about Power. The US, with all of its power has abused it FAR LESS than others would have. While not perfect, it is better than most.
Japan, France and Germany is good evidence that the US doesn't really care about territorial conquest, but rather a free world.
The "peace loving" Islamist countries don't just fight with us and Israel, they fight and hate each other. It is just that they measure their allies by how little they hate their friends, not by how much they like them.
Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.
If you look at the pictures that accompany this quote, you'll see that the instrument clusters are reversed, ie; the "STBD" cluster is on the left and "PORT" on the right. The Chief steers the boat with his hand behind his back?
How odd. Why would the helm be facing aft?
I don't think the Chinese are rational thinkers when it comes to Tiawan, and if they decide to take the island by military means (I think they will manage it using dirty island politics) I don't for an instant think they would hesitate to blind and damage the US military with a satellite strike.
I wouldn't put an outright attack on Taiwan past them. In fact, they've almost come right out and told everyone they're planning one. In the past few years, their annual reports which outline their military posture to the party have openly identified the United States in the section reserved for "enemies" (this began in the last few years of the 90's, roughly when their jet ran into that P3). Previously the US was identified with more neutral language. Recently they have made fairly ominous statements about their plans for Taiwan including blunt predictions of warfare in the region in 2005 or 2006 (I forget which). Simultaneously, there have been massive buildups in the regions of China near Taiwan. The little bit reported by the mainstream press makes it sound like nothing more than typical political bickering, but this is all a matter of public record (search sites like FAS.org for things like "Chinese defense posture" for some really interesting reading on the subject).
That said, I would not expect them to risk taking out American satellites mainly because we have so many other forms of effective espionage available to us -- particularly extremely high altitude fly-overs which they are unable to counter should we choose to use them (and we would). Killing our satellites would be annoying to us, but by no means would it be a crippling blow to our ability to monitor their activities.
What would be more troubling is somebody with actual power, such as France (the French Navy is wargaming with the Chinese Navy this week), siding with them. The French WOULD have the ability to interfere with our second-string recon options, and we'd be a lot more hesitant to treat them to a smackdown. They wouldn't have to side with the Chinese outright, they'd just have to run interference, like announce that they're trying to "contain the situation" and declare an exclusion zone. Granted, probably the French wouldn't risk pissing off the US that way, particularly if the Chinese did make a move against us, but who knows -- the French always seem to go off on a tangent when you least expect it.
(No offense intended to anybody from France or China, I love the place and all the people I've met. Like people are fond of saying about the US, it's the governments I have a problem with.)
Slashdot quality declines as the number of hot grits posts decreases. - Provolt's Law, Apr-09-2005
In WW II, several U.S submarines are believed to have torpedoed themselves. One known to have had this happen was the Tang (there were some survivors).
The torepedoes were defective.
Modern torpedoes have interlocks to prevent circular runs; if the torpedo turns through too large an angle (say 300 degrees), the torpedo either shuts down or at least dis-arms itself.
Al Bonnyman
Community Broadband Networks
The Osprey (which is not really a helicopter) was designed 20 years ago. That comparison is like referring to an original IBM PC when somebody asks whether their quad-processor BSD server configuration can survive a slashdotting. :)
Also, the crash you refer to had two causes. A software failure contributed to the wreck, but there was already a hydraulic failure extant.
Slashdot quality declines as the number of hot grits posts decreases. - Provolt's Law, Apr-09-2005
Au contraire.
Let me explain. I'm not a US citizen, never even lived in the US. I'm a New Zealander, living in Scotland, with experience of living in numerous countries around the world. Despite this, I recognise that the phrase "We, the People" is a revolutionary phrase, and just because it's commonly associated with one great republic, doesn't mean that citizens of other (non-republican) nations can't aspire to it.
...dammit! You'll be suggesting that someone's called dibs on "Live Free or Die!" next!
This is where the serious fun begins.
"The first ship of this class to be used by the Navy, HSV 1 Joint Venture, proved its military mettle during Operation Iraqi Freedom as a forward staging platform for Marine Fleet Anti-Terrorism and SEAL (SEa, Air, Land) teams in the shallow waters of Umm Qasr, Iraq. The Navy hopes to build upon lessons learned from Swift and its predecessor, and eventually use the information to create a new class of Littoral Combat Ships."
Some other links:
http://www.news.navy.mil/search/display.asp?stor y_id=9671
http://www.cmwc.navy.mil/HSV%202%20SWIFT.htm
http://www.msc.navy.mil/sealift/2004/January/swi ft.htm
http://www.dod.mil/news/Apr2004/n04022004_200404 025.html
======= ~\_/~\_O Burmese
Perhaps a more accurate statement would be "as long as there are men, there will be war".
I blame the chicks. if women didn't select mates based upon relative strength, influence and wealth, there would be less war.
This is idea is old news. With the goal of reducing total personnel aboard ship, the USN did this same thing with a Tico class cruiser years ago, running a special version of Windows NT. ( Remember it made the news as a Windows joke once when the system crashed, leaving the ship dead in the water ) This idea has done nothing but grow over time. Not revolutionary, but evalutionary.
It only makes sense that they would put a mature system based on this idea in a new ship.
You know what's really freakin impressive at high speed? The newest aircraft carrier, the Ronald Reagan (bummer about the name, though). During sea trials, there was footage of this huge freakin ship doing 30 knots. 30 knots! And the top speed is classified. Just impressive as hell to see a bunch of sailors, standing on a metal island, leaning into the turn that the island is making.
I mean, damn.
J
-=- 4ntifa -=-
Ok im surpried nobody has mentioned this.
But how much cred would a teen hacker get if he goes to his friends.
heres the password to a really cool ship lets go blow somthing up!!!
just a thought!
The publisher of the article you cite later backed away from it and labeled it early speculation. After printing this early speculation by shoreside Unix advocates someone eventually talked to the Chief Engineer on board at the time and the software developer who wrote the code. They said it was not WinNT. If the OS had been Linux the ship would have been just as dead in the water after having a server app corrupt it's database and client apps trying to use the incorrect data. In any case:
h tml
http://www.sciam.com/1998/1198issue/1198techbus2.
"Others insist that NT was not the culprit. According to Lieutenant Commander Roderick Fraser, who was the chief engineer on board the ship at the time of the incident, the fault was with certain applications that were developed by CAE Electronics in Leesburg, Va. As Harvey McKelvey, former director of navy programs for CAE, admits, "If you want to put a stick in anybody's eye, it should be in ours." But McKelvey adds that the crash would not have happened if the navy had been using a production version of the CAE software, which he asserts has safeguards to prevent the type of failure that occurred."
Yup. I have been looking for that link for ages. Thnx.
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
gets modded down viciously
i agree with you
if our budget for helping fix our own and everyone elses problems exceeded our budget for killing eachother (ourselves) the world would be a much better place
isn't the gov't supposed to do what we want with our tax money? when was the last time they put it up for vote whether we need a whole new arsenal of bigger better planes/tanks/boats/guns instead of shelter/food/stability for our GROWING numbers of homeless and lower class as the jobs seap out of the country at a record rate...
thanks GWB i knew you had my best interest at heart. dying in a pointless foreign war for your personal vendetta and daddy's oil deals
You're welcome. I couldn't remember either, so I googled for Yorktown and Windows, I think.
The only reason we have the rights we have is that people just like us died to gain those rights. -- Cheerio Boy
Whoops! What I googled for was (including quotes): "smart ship".
The only reason we have the rights we have is that people just like us died to gain those rights. -- Cheerio Boy
No, you're wrong. These "absolutely evil" people you're referring do not exist. There are few, if any, people out to destroy you and your family.
I assume you're referring to terrorists (BOO!!!). Terrorism, by definition, isn't about hating someone's guts enough to kill one self in the process of killing that someone. Terrorists do not hate democracy, law and apple pie, they have actual motives and goals. Some of which might be quite fucked up, but anyway...
Writing of terrorists as envious savages who hate our way of living, our technological and economical provess and our religion, is extremely naive. Sure, people might be envious and dislike people based on their worldview and religion, but hell no, they don't go blowing themselves up because of that! The problem is more deeply rooted and is largely based on (real or perceived) injustice combined with poverty and hopelessness.
(DISCLAIMER: as a European atheist leftist hippie scum, the "us" or "our" refer to a larger Western civilization)
-=- 4ntifa -=-
The ship had to be towed into port because the crew couldn't solve a computer problem. That's a fact. Don't miss the point that a dead ship, that has to be towed into port is a catastrophe. The navy said all sorts of things about the Yorktown, including that it returned to port under it's own power. I read an article at the time of the incident (which I can no longer find... it was 6 years ago) which explained why ALL the computers crashed. It referenced some bad programming and a divide by zero error as well. If you think NT wasn't to blame that's fine by me. We all need to cling to the idea that our favorite OS is superior than others. I'm not one to start a religious war on the subject. Especially when the only point I'm making is that every ship needs some manual controls.
No, actually it was Carter who reinstated Selective Service. Yeah, next time someone tries to tell you how peace loving and good hearted he is, you can remind them of that little fact.
"The question of whether a computer can think is no more interesting than that of whether a submarine can swim" -EWD
"...has an experimental wireless LAN that allows anybody who comes aboard to simply plug in their laptop."
IMHO, that's not an "experimental wireless LAN", it's just a LAN...
Don't miss the point that a dead ship, that has to be towed into port is a catastrophe.
The ship was a test platform. It was running test software that permitted the problem to propogate. As the software developer pointed out the production version of the software would not have corrupted the database.
I read an article at the time of the incident which explained why ALL the computers crashed.
Then you misread at the time or your recollection is faulty. This original article said that "LAN consoles" had crashed. This was largely misread and misquoted to be that WinNT or systems crashed when in reality all that happened was that client applications crashed. These client application were controlling the ship.
It referenced some bad programming and a divide by zero error as well. If you think NT wasn't to blame that's fine by me
A divide by zero does not take down WinNT. That myth was debunked within hours of the original article being published years ago. A server app had a divide by zero, the server app corrupted its own database.
We all need to cling to the idea that our favorite OS is superior than others.
Don't assume your motivations are shared by others. WinNT has enough genuine problems that you shouldn't need to use fabricated ones. My understanding is that a naive server app corrupted its own database and naive client apps (the infamous "LAN consoles" that crashed) needed that database to function properly and to operate equipment. Those failure are OS independent and could have just as easily happened under Linux, BSD, Mac OS X, etc.
you say, "You probably think the patriot act is bad... Look at what Senator Feinstein had to say about it. You are probably one of those people she is talking about who don't understand what it is and does."
from http://www.aclu-sc.org/Action/Newsletters/100599/
"Feinstein reported in a hearing on October 21 that her constituents have registered opposition to the USA PATRIOT Act by a margin of 21,434 to 6. Nonetheless, the Senator dismissed her constituents' concerns"
is that what she has to say about it? asshat.
You're far enough ahead already to make it a formality, and all your attitude is going to do is provoke another arms race.
Alright, then let's do it. The last big arms race took us to the moon, where's the next one going to take us?
Like what I said? You might like my music
Yeah, it was one of those C-names. Sorry. ;) I knew it was a Democrat whose name started with a C, and I remember Clinton taking a lot of flack for something along those lines. Maybe it was debate about whether or not he would actually call up some conscript troops for some UN peacekeeping mission or other. (Oxymoron: UN Peacekeeping mission)
But yeah, so the GP post is still a little off when he says we don't have the draft anymore.
Like what I said? You might like my music
The fact you even ask this question shows just how much of a fool you are. Last I checked, American soldiers weren't pinning burqas to women's cheeks with safety pins or executing men who refused to shave.
However, the last time I checked, I did find "radical Christians" rebuilding schools, sending medical supplies, food and other necessities for the Iraqi people to ease their suffering. I think it has to do with something in the Q'ran that says: Kill the infidel, and something in the New Testament that says: Love thy Enemy.
You can tell a great deal about the character of a man by observing those who hate him.
A classic fallacy of false equivalence. You equate social deterioration with a perverted social system backed by brutality.
You've never been in a police state or spoken to someone who has. They'd laugh in your face at your charge of endless police aggression.
I will give you an example of police state aggression:
Forcing open a door to a home at 3 AM. Dragging the entire family out into the street. Raping the mother in front of the children and husband, often repeatedly, then beheading the mother and putting her head on a pole outside the home as a warning to the neighbors.
This was a routine occurrence in Iraq before the US liberation. Now, tell me again how America is an aggressive police state.
You can tell a great deal about the character of a man by observing those who hate him.
Will you finally reveal your sources? I've been waiting for a while now and posted my own sources.
Uh, or maybe your "sources" are simply a) the US government PR office and b) right-wing nutcase websites?
-=- 4ntifa -=-
The US, with all of its power has abused it FAR LESS than others would have. While not perfect, it is better than most.
only americans believe this bullshit.
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
This was a routine occurrence in Iraq before the US liberation.
... umm... actually I have been in a police state, more than one.)
Says who? Your Media?
Hitler said the same thing about the Poles before he sent in his blitzkreig.
Has History Taught You American Sheep NOTHING?!!
(And
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
Heh, this is the same ship as the local passenger ferry here on the Isle of Man - the Seacat (There are actually two designs: the Seacat and the Seacat Rapide - see the photos here, here and here. To pull a quick excerpt from the above link:
"Built by InCat Australia for Sea Containers in Tasmania, SeaCat was the worlds' first vehicle-carrying catamaran. The original 74 metre craft have subsequently been joined by a new 81 metre length SeaCat design, also built by InCat."
Having travelled on the thing a few times I can confirm that it's fast (with a service speed of 35 knots), but in anything above a force five it "shudders/vibrates" and is rather uncomfortable - much more so than a monohull. Still, it gets you where you need to go and beats hitching on a trawlerIn a world full of people who hate you so much they'll give their very lives just to hurt you, who have no care for diplomacy or negotiation, who fall outside the normal rules of engagement, who are hard to track with intelligence, and who have the sympathies of several countries likely to join in that arms race, I'm guessing it's going to take you straight to hell. Just don't take the rest of us with you when you leave, OK?
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.