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WASHINGTON – Lt. Gen. H.R McMaster recently learned that even though he is the president’s national security advisor, he is only authorized to stay in three-star hotels while on official government travel, sources confirmed today.

McMaster was particularly irked when he learned some other officials, however, such as retired Gen. James Mattis, the Secretary of Defense, and retired Gen. John F. Kelly, the Secretary of Homeland Security, are both authorized to stay in four-star lodgings.

via www.duffelblog.com

It’s about a five minute read, but quite thought provoking.

For years, sentinels guarding the Tomb of the Unknowns at Arlington National Cemetery voluntarily had their lives defined by four constant and silent witnesses: the Unknown of World War I, the Unknown of World War II, the Unknown of the Korean War, and the Unknown of the Vietnam War. Until 1998. That’s when the Unknown of the Vietnam War was identified as First Lieutenant Michael Joseph Blassie. The tombs—the first of which was erected in 1921—represent the American soldiers who died in conflict and were never identified. Blassie was originally tallied as one more unidentified service member lost to the war, either missing or killed in action. In the longer course of history, however, he came to occupy a place at the nexus of old and new in how the United States cares for its dead.

CTII Raven has a very good game in the Tier VI US Destroyer, the Farragut.

Just a collection of some good devastating strikes, citadels and sinkings from the past couple weeks.

In 1944, the Liberty ship SS John Burke was part of a convoy supplying the invasion of the Philippines. Hauling a load of ammunition for the Army, she was beset by a small kamikaze raid. Foul weather had precluded friendly air cover, and a single Aichi D3A Val dive bomber plunged into the John Burke.

Moments later, the ammunition aboard exploded, and the entire ship,  and her entire crew, were lost.

Incredibly, this stunning explosion was caught on camera.

Everybody focused on the detection range changes in patch 0.6.3, but I was excited about the range buff for low tier battleships. As you can see, that worked out pretty well for me.

First, each of them was steeped in technology, to the point that Raymond Spruance and Arleigh Burke had to fight the naval engineering community to get to the Pacific War. Their technological background and prowess were value adds in different ways because technology and tactics are two sides of a single coin. The second oddity is that none came from a coast nor grew up in a seagoing family. You may take that for what it is worth, but in my own case, growing up in Illinois I was caught up in the romance of the sea and dreamed of winning battles. Perhaps fortunately, I was only shot at twice, once by friendly forces.

Only a whisker separates the rankings of my dream team, but I present them in order of my love for each. I start with Spruance.

via foreignpolicy.com

Spruance is an obvious choice. I'm curious to see who the other three will be.

Here’s a fun little video showing the Indian Navy’s Tupolev Tu-142M Bear-F in operation. India has operated the Maritime Patrol version of the famous Tu-95 for almost 30 years, and is now retiring them in favor of the Boeing P-8I Poseidon.

Via.

So, the World of Warships is abuzz with the  news that the British battlecruiser HMS Hood will soon be released into the game.

And one of the first things virtually  the entire community noticed was the AA guns. 178mm rocket launchers? Really?
Really.

In the years before World War II, the Royal Navy recognized the ever  growing threat to surface ships that airplanes posed. A good deal of effort was put into improving the long and short range air defenses of the ships of the fleet. Usually this consisted of high angle secondary batteries of 4” guns, and a host of 40mm guns.

But one interesting approach was what became known as the 7” Unrotated Projectile.

A small, lightweight mount could be bolted on to just about any  flat surface on a warship (and deck space is always at a premium), with an array of 20 tubes designed to fire a short range 7” fin stabilized rocked. That fin stabilization gave rise to the odd name, in that unlike many rockets, these were not spin stabilized.

A salvo of 10  rockets would be fired in the path of an incoming enemy aircraft. Here’s where things got weird. Rather than simply exploding, the bursting charge released a small explosive charge supported by three parachutes on 400 foot long lines. The thought was this would effectively form an aerial minefield. As a plane ran into one of the suspension lines, the charge would be drawn to the plane, and destroyed.

Alas, it didn’t really work.

Further, the wind could easily cause the charges to drift back to the launching ship, or its escorts. While the charge was too small to do serious direct damage, it’s still less than optimal.

HMS Hood did actually still have it’s UP launchers aboard when she was sunk by the Bismarck.

The RN however, by that time, had realized the launchers were essentially worthless, and they  were soon removed from those ships that still had them.

A while back, there was a quick video of Keanu Reeves training for the role of John Wick, shooting a three gun match scenario.  And he was damn good.

But what about normal people? Can they be trained to perform as well? What about in one day?