Right Wing Granny

News behind the news. This picture is me (white spot) standing on the bridge connecting European and North American tectonic plates. It is located in the Reykjanes area of Iceland. By-the-way, this is a color picture.

Right Wing Granny

Tag Archives: Navy

Stepping On The Capitol Grounds Is More Serious Than Spying For The Chinese?

Posted on by

Recently the Justice Department has claimed that they are going to arrest hundreds of more Americans for being on the Capitol grounds on January 6th. I have friends who attended the rally on that day then went back to their hotels that are nervous. They did nothing wrong, so technically they shouldn’t be worried, but the current regime is very good at intimidation. We  have already seen how ridiculous the sentences are for January 6th protesters accused of trespassing.

On Tuesday, Front Page Magazine posted an article that illustrates how perverse our justice system is right now.

The article quotes a Department of Justice Press Release:

A U.S. Navy service member was sentenced today to 27 months in prison and ordered to pay a $5,500 fine for transmitting sensitive U.S. military information to an intelligence officer from the People’s Republic of China (PRC) in exchange for bribery payments.

According to court documents, Petty Officer Wenheng Zhao, 26, aka Thomas Zhao, of Monterey Park, California, pleaded guilty in October 2023 to one count of conspiring with the intelligence officer and one count of receiving a bribe.

Between August 2021 and at least May 2023, Zhao received at least $14,866 in at least 14 separate bribe payments from the intelligence officer. In exchange for the illicit payments, Zhao secretly collected and transmitted to the intelligence officer sensitive, non-public information regarding U.S. Navy operational security, military trainings and exercises, and critical infrastructure. Zhao entered restricted military and naval installations to collect and record this information.

He used sophisticated encrypted communication methods to transmit the information. He also destroyed evidence and concealed his relationship with the intelligence officer. Zhao’s conduct violated his official duties to protect such information and the oath he swore to protect the United States.

And for that he gets two years. And a fine that’s about a third of the money he got for his treason.

The article concludes:

The damage here in the event of a war could have been and could still be catastrophic. And yet there was a light slap.

Zhao could have been sentenced to up to five years for the conspiracy count and 15 years for the bribery charge, and prosecutors sought 37 months, claiming that the defendant had tried to obstruct their investigation. Zhao’s lawyer sought 12 months. US District Judge R. Gary Klausner took the middle ground and settled on 27 months.

That’s an interesting interpretation of middle ground. Why were prosecutors only asking for three years after all that?

China certainly got its money’s worth here. And more.

Meanwhile, the January 6th prisoners…

We Are At War

Posted on by

On Tuesday, Red State reported that  the Arleigh Burke-class Aegis destroyer USS Laboon (DDG-58) in the southern Red Sea  shot down a total of 17 Houthi drones and missiles during a tense 10-hour engagement. The Houthis are a terrorist group in Yemen funded by Iran. The Biden administration keeps giving Iran money. We are funding attacks on our own military.

The article reports:

Details of the engagement are sparse, but the Arleigh Burke-class Aegis destroyer USS Laboon (DDG-58), a member of the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower carrier strike group (CSG), as well as several F/A-18 launched from the Eisenhower shot down 12 attack drones, three-antiship missiles and two land attack missiles. The engagement began at 6:30 a.m. local time Tuesday and continued for 10 hours. None of the attacking weapons hit a target.

At least Iran is not giving them accurate weapons.

The article concludes:

The general location of the Eisenhower CSG indicates they are pushing up into the Bab el-Maneb Strait to provide coverage for maritime traffic at this chokepoint. The presence of the F/A-18 indicates a combat air patrol covering the Bab el-Maneb strait as well as destroyers of the CSG. All of this indicates that Biden’s “Operation Prosperity Guardian” may be taking shape as a US-only affair.

While we must acknowledge this engagement’s success, it is not sustainable. The Eisenhower CSG is not playing the game to win; they are playing to not lose. They are like the team sitting on a one-point lead at halftime and trying to run out the clock. The Eisenhower must be successful 100 percent of the time; the Houthis only need to occasionally have a missile or drone leak through to achieve their mission.

If you watch football, you know that prevent defense is never a good idea.

This Day In History

Posted on by

(Originally posted on December 7, 2020.)

From The American Patriot’s Daily Almanac:

Pearl Harbor

Sunday, December 7, 1941, began as a serene morning at the U.S. Navy base on the island of Oahu in Hawaii. The warships of America’s Pacific Fleet rested at anchor. Many sailors were preparing for church or relaxing, and all was quiet at Pearl Harbor.

At about 7:55 a.m. a buzz from the sky broke the calm as a dive-bomber bearing the red symbol of the Rising Sun of Japan dropped out of the clouds. Seconds later, a swarm of Japanese warplanes followed. Sirens wailed as explosions sounded across the harbor and black smoke poured into the sky.

American sailors scrambled to battle stations while the Japanese planes screamed in for the kill. The main targets were several huge battleships moored in the harbor. Antiaircraft guns roared to life, but they did little good. Bombs and torpedoes hit ship after ship: the Arizona, the Oklahoma, the California, the West Virginia, the Utah, the Maryland, the Pennsylvania, the Tennessee, the  Nevada.

Sailors fought to save their ships, their comrades, and their own lives. Much of the California’s crew abandoned ship after flames engulfed its stern. When the captain determined the battleship might be saved, Yeoman Durrell Conner hoisted the American flag from the stern. At the sight of the colors, the sailors returned to fight the fires and keep her afloat.

Despite such heroism, the attack reduced much of the fleet to smoldering wreckage. The Japanese planes disappeared into the sky, leaving 2,400 dead, 1,200 wounded, and 18 ships and more than 300 American planes destroyed or damaged.

News of the disaster left Americans stunned, but not for long. A remark attributed to Japanese admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, who planned the attack, sums up the result of Pearl Harbor: “I fear we have awakened a sleeping giant and instilled in him a terrible resolve.”

Mixed Emotions On This

Posted on by

Just the News updated its article about Michael White, a Navy veteran who was recently returned to the U.S. from Iran.

The article reports:

An Iranian doctor living in Florida has in recent days been allowed to return to his country in an apparent exchange with Tehran in which a U.S. Navy veteran was returned last week to America.

The doctor, Matteo Taerri, pleaded guilty late last year in connection with attempting to export a filter to Iran that he said was for vaccine research. However, U.S. authorities said the filter required a license because it could be used for chemical and biological warfare, according to the Associated Press. Taerri was also accused of orchestrating a series of bank deposits less than $10,000 to evade federal reporting requirements.

The article further reports:

Last week, Michael White, the Navy veteran, was returned to the U.S.

White, of California, was detained in July 2018 while visiting a girlfriend in Iran. He was convicted of insulting the country’s supreme leader and putting private information online, the wire service also reports. White had been released from prison in March on a medical furlough and was awaiting his return.

Earlier last week, Iranian scientist named Sirous Asgari returned to Tehran after being acquitted in a federal trade secrets case and deported. He was working on a U.S. Navy project at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland.

I am glad that Michael White was able to return to America, but I am concerned about the price we paid for that return. How many more Americans will Iran take hostage in order to get their intelligence assets out of America?

The Drug War Continues

Posted on by

The easiest way to end the drug war and the power of the cartels would be for Americans to stop using illegal drugs. Unfortunately that has not happened and is not likely to happen. However, that is the true answer to the problem. Meanwhile China continues to smuggle illegal drugs into America–either through the porous southern border and through our ports. A drugged out nation will eventually be very easy to take over.

Sara Carter posted an article today about a recent incident in the Eastern Pacific Ocean.

The article reports:

The U.S. Coast Guard intercepted a vessel in the Eastern Pacific Ocean on May 14 carrying 1.5 tons of cocaine valued at over $28 million, according to the Department of Defense.

A U.S. Navy aircraft first spotted the low profile vessel (LPV) and quickly alerted Law Enforcement Detachment (LEDET) and The Arleigh Burke-Class Destroyer USS Pinckney (U.S. Southern Command) to the scene, according to a press release.

…The Trump administration ramped up counternarcotics operations on April 1 after the Pentagon received intelligence that the drug cartels were planning to exploit the coronavirus crisis. In response, General Mark Milley, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, announced that the U.S. wouldn’t let the cartels “get past jump street.”

The President and Secretary of Defense Mark Esper confirmed that a number of U.S. vessels had been moved into the eastern Pacific and the Caribbean Sea to counter growing threats from the drug cartels in Latin America. Speaking with reporters at the time, Trump said of the move, “we are tired of drugs pouring into our country from other places.  And we’re tired of seeing drugs pouring into different parts of Latin America, South America, and just coming into our country.”

“Now we’ve got them stopped at the border and they’re trying to do it by sea,” Trump explained. “So we stop them at the border with — and, frankly, with the help of Mexico.  Mexico, right now, has 27,000 soldiers on our southern border.  They never had any soldiers. They’re doing that because I’ve asked them to do it.  That’s the only reason they’re doing it.  They have 27,000 soldiers.”

He continued, “So now they’re trying to bring it in by boat and by ship — the drug lords and the people doing drugs — and trying to destroy our country from inside with drugs.  And we’re hitting them very, very hard.  And that’s why we’re doing that.”

This is another example of President Trump exercising leadership to protect the American people.

Information That May Be Important In Controlling The Coronavirus

Posted on by

Up until this point, one of the ways that people have been checked to see if they have the coronavirus has been with temperature scans. If they have no temperature, it is assumed that they are not carrying the virus. Well, there is some new information about the virus that puts that test in a different perspective.

On Thursday, Just The News reported the following:

Coronavirus infections among Navy personnel have been harder to spot because symptoms among sailors are different from those in the general population, a four-star admiral warned.

Admiral John Aquilino, who commands the U.S. Pacific Fleet, sent the warning this month in a memo to commanders throughout the Navy. The memo described the fleet’s findings on how COVID-19 has presented among sailors.

“While the symptoms largely mirror [Centers for Disease Control] findings there are differences, possibly owing to our younger demographics, a healthy cohort, and rapid medical care,” Aquino wrote in the April 20 unclassified memo viewed by Just the News.

Noting that the CDC names fever as the most common first symptom of COVID, Aquilino wrote that the Pacific Fleet found that among infected sailors, fever appeared last.

“In order of reporting, the symptoms most often reported by sailors are: cough, headache, muscle aches, sore throat, loss of taste/smell, difficulty breathing, and finally, fever,” the admiral wrote.

As opposed to a common assumption that COVID-19 presents first in a way others can detect, Aquilino wrote, sailors’ symptoms are less obvious.

“As our initial symptoms may only be noticeable to the individual sailor, immediate reporting of symptoms to the chain of command and medical department is essential,” Aquilino wrote.

Early reporting will help stop the virus from spreading through ships and work spaces, the commander wrote. The key, he said, is for crews to self-monitor and report health issues as soon as possible.

This may explain why some of our ships have had outbreaks of the virus–it is probably not unusual for a sailor to have a headache or muscle aches after a hard day of work.

What Were They Thinking?

Posted on by

Right now, New York is a hot spot for the coronavirus. Samaritan’s Purse has erected a hospital in Central Park, and the USNS Comfort, a Navy hospital ship with 1,000 beds for patients, has arrived in New York harbor. New Yorkers have been asked to stay home to avoid further spread of the virus. So have they listened?

Yesterday The U.K. Daily Mail posted pictures of New Yorkers celebrating the arrival of the USNS Comfort.

Here are some pictures:

Obviously the arrival of the ship is a historic moment, and represents hope for the city. However, how many of the people in the crowd that came out to watch will be in New York City’s hospitals within the next two weeks? We need to learn to follow directions. At this point in time, that is a critical skill.

 

What A Wonderful Gesture

Posted on by

The following is a press release put out by Chick-Fil-A on December 4th:

Chick-fil-A is now an official associate partner of the 119th Army- Navy Game presented by USAA. One of the most storied and iconic rivalries in all of sports will take place on Saturday, December 8 at 3:00 p.m. ET at Lincoln Financial Field with the broadcast on CBS. The Chick-fil-A partnership includes a pop-up restaurant in Philadelphia that will be part of an experiential watch party for military service men and women. Chick-fil-A will host active duty military, veterans and their families at the private event.

The partnership and event are an extension of Chick-fil-A’s active involvement in college football which includes the Chick-fil-A Kickoff Game, the Chick-fil-A College Football Hall of Fame and the Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl, which is part of the College Football Playoff,” said Keith Hester, Sports & Entertainment Partnerships at Chick-fil-A. “Chick-fil-A is proud to support and honor the men and women in the military and their families who have served, are serving, and will serve our country.”

The Chick-fil-A pop-up restaurant is designed to bring fans of rival football teams together by creating a shared table. Members of the military will attend the event to participate in spirited competition, a shared meal and a watch party. Army and Navy active military and veterans can register to attend the event by RSVP via this link:

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/chick-fil-a-army-navy-watch-party-tickets-52313236298

Other activities include a card writing station to show military appreciation, giveaways, food and much more. Chick-fil-A will also be flying in Army and Navy veterans nominated by local franchise Operators located across the country to attend the pre-game ceremonies and the game.  

Chick-fil-A founder Truett Cathy was a World War II veteran himself, and the company is proud to count many veterans among the more than 120,000 Operators, Team Members, and staff who represent the brand nationwide. The company plans to continue its commitment to hiring and honoring veterans, recognizing the value in their unique skills and easing the transition to civilian life after service. Recently, Chick-fil-A was named No. 2 on Indeed’s list of Top-Rated Workplaces as ranked by military veterans.

There are many reasons I love Chick-Fil-A.

This Is What Happens When People Not Familiar With The Military Try To Honor Our Military

Posted on by

Yesterday’s Navy Times posted a story about the tribute to veterans that took place at the Democratic National Convention. It seems that the patriotic display of military power taking place on the screen behind retired Adm. John Nathman, a former commander of Fleet Forces Command, as he spoke was of Russian ships. Oops.

The article reports:

“I was kind of in shock,” said Rob Barker, 38, a former electronics warfare technician who left the Navy in 2006. Having learned to visually identify foreign ships by their radars, Barker recognized the closest ship as the Kara-class cruiser Kerch.

“An immediate apology [from the committee] would be very nice,” Barker said. “Maybe acknowledge the fact that yes, they screwed up.”

The background — featured in the carefully choreographed hour leading up to the president’s Sept. 6 speech accepting the Democratic Party’s nomination — showed four ships with radar designs not used in the U.S. fleet.

A follow up article in the Navy Times today reports:

Democratic officials apologized Wednesday for mistakenly displaying an image of the Russian Navy during a tribute to America’s veterans at last week’s Democratic National Convention.

This is the text of the DNC statement:

“Due to vendor error, incorrect images appeared briefly on screen behind fifty-one veterans during the convention and the DNCC apologizes for this mistake,” the statement said. “This error should not distract from the words of Admiral Nathman and others who spoke to President Obama’s strong record on issues that impact those who have served our nation. We’re proud of the service and sacrifice of our veterans and military families, and while they were an important and active part our of convention, Mitt Romney failed to even mention them in his speech in Tampa.”

Notice that it was ‘ “vendor error.” They are not taking responsibility for the mistake. That is just too typical.

Enhanced by Zemanta

There Is No Real News Value To This Story–It Is Simply Nostalgic !

Posted on by

On Monday Business Insider posted a series of pictures taken inside the Intrepid–the parts where tourists are not allowed. Since my husband was in a Naval Air Squadron that was stationed on the Intrepid in the late 1960’s, I stopped to look at the pictures. Please follow the link above for the tour!

There are some lights on back here so it's easy to spot the odd items that make this feel like a time-warp — this type of soda was popular in the 1970s

This is one example of the time warp they discovered. When was the last time you saw a patio soda can?

The Navy brought us to New England and we stayed because we fell in love with the people and the scenery. I still have not gotten used to the climate!

Enhanced by Zemanta