USS Blue Ridge (LCC 19) out to sea in #7thFleet rare stern shot while underway, click to big up.
Here we see a great stern close-up of the USS Blue Ridge (LCC 19), the 46-year-old lead ship of her class of amphibious command ships and the oldest deployable warship in the fleet. At 20,000-tons, she and her sister USS Mount Whitney, were the same size as the Iwo Jima-class helicopter assault ships of their era but instead of carrying a battalion of Marines along with their landing craft and choppers, they were designed as floating command post with advanced commo and information equipment and dedicated spaces to be used by an amphibious force commander during large-scale (think Inchon) style operations.
As such, she and Mount W (who is the flag of the 6th Fleet at Gaeta, Italy) can carry a flag group of nearly 600.
While a relative youngster (born in 1979) his work has gained international acclaim. The son of a military pilot, he earned his own pilot’s license at age 17.
With his first work, Le Dernier Envol, was published in 2005. Since then he hasn’t turned back and in the past decade has become a favorite aircraft illustrator of airshow posters, calendars, military prints, and the like. Among his best-known work is his illustrated novels Le Pilote à l’Edelweiss, and Le Grand Duc.
Then there is scriptwriter Yann who along with Hugault created “Angel Wings” which delves into the universe of the actual 10th U.S. Army Air Force’s 80th Fighter Group, specifically the 89th FS known to history as the famous Burma Banshees.
The story takes place in the heart of the Burmese jungle during the Second World War, and introduces the WASP (Women Airforce Service Pilots). In 1944, the Japanese forces occupy the whole of Burma and continue to advance towards India and China. The pilots of the American forces are attempting to help their allies by carrying out continuous airlifts with these two countries.
Angela Mc Cloud, a female pilot at the controls of a “C-47 Dakota”, is on an official mission to fly over the “Hump”, the eastern Himalayas, in order to provide the Chinese troops with weapons and equipment and tip the scales in the war. More secretly, her superiors have entrusted her with a more perilous mission – that of investigating what is disrupting air traffic on the Burmese front.
Even though women pilots are not authorized to fly over the Burmese front, “Angel” will have to prove herself in order to win the respect of the “Burma Banshees”.
P.S. For reference, below is real-life U.S. Army Air Force pilot, Shirley Slade, a WWII WASP who ferried B-26 and B-29 bombers and, I think, carries a passing resemblance to Angela McCloud. Just saying.
While the Germans during WWII became some of the best tank makers in the world (ever heard of the Tiger, Panther and King Tiger?), the Kaiser’s armor game in the Great War really kinda sucked. The only tank they ever fielded in quantity, and then only in the last six months or so of the conflict and in pitiful numbers, was the Sturmpanzerwagen A7V.
This 33-ton elephant had upto 30mm of armor, carried a captured Russian 57mm Maxim-Nordenfelt gun field gun and a full half-dozen MG08 Spandaus with a pallet of ammo for each. They needed a 18-24 man crew and their twin Daimler-Benz 4-cylinders could lurch them along at about 4 mph for a few hours.
The crew needed to staff one of these landships was staggering…
Just 20 were made and a few of those were famously captured by the Brits and their allies in April 1918 after the Second Battle of Villers-Bretonneux.
Australian soldiers of the 26th Battalion AIF inspecting their war trophy, Mephisto; 1 of the 20 German A7V tanks ever made. August 1918. Note the 57mm hood ornament.
French and British officers by the German A7V tank “Elfriede”, captured near Villers
A7V interior plan Elfriedle, with the gunner above marked
Why am I so keyed up about Elfriedle? Well, that’s the name of my great aunt, born in Wernigerode in the 1930s, and she was every bit as tough as a tank.
Tragically, Elfriede, like most of the A7Vs met the scrappers sometime after 1919. One even made it to Aberdeen Proving Grounds, but was scrapped in the 1940s. For shame.
The only one still intact is Mephisto (shown above with the ANZAC troops) which is currently and rightfully at the Australian War Museum in Canberra, though the 57mm cannon from Schnuck is at the IWM.
The replica Wotan, made in the 1980s largely from Mephisto‘s plans, is on display at Deutsches Panzermuseum in Munster, Germany.
Here we see the nearly 50 year old Philippine Navy flagship BRP Gregorio del Pilar (PF-15) on a calm day in the Pacific with an AgustaWestland AW109E Power on her helicopter deck. The Navy acquired two AW109s in December 2013 and has been working hard the past couple years to integrate them into fleet operations.
If the GdP looks familiar, she started life as the USCGC Hamilton (WHEC-715) in 1967 and was decommissioned in 2011 after 44 years of very hard service to the Coast Guard and transferred to the PN in largely disarmed condition. Since then she has been busy in standoffs with the PLAN in disputed waters. President Obama toured the ship on his visit to the Philippines in 2015 and her two sisters, Ramon Alcaraz (ex-Dallas)and the as yet to be renamed ex-Boutwell are set to expand the reach of the fleet. The 2900-ton USNS Melville (T-AGOR-14), the oldest active vessel in the U.S. academic research fleet will also transfer sometime this year.
Big Blue is looking to get up to 1,000 additional Archerfish mine destructor vehicles (tiny, really maneuverable, slow torpedoes) for the AN/ASQ-235 Airborne Mine Neutralisation System (AMNS).
Developed by BAE Systems, the Archerfish vehicle was selected as the Common Neutraliser to equip AMNS, part of the USN’s airborne organic mine clearance capability, is deployed from the MH-60S helicopter and is intended to neutralize bottom, close tethered, and moored sea mines. Meant largely for Hawks deploying on littoral combat ships, they could conceivably be used fleet wide.
In a $8 million sole-source pre-solicitation notice published on 29 January 2014, NAVSEA announced its plan to contract BAE Systems “to produce up to 966 Archerfish Neutralizers (Destructor, Mine Neutralization, Airborne EX 64 Mod 0 Archerfish, EX 65 Mod 0 Archerfish, and EX 66 Mod 0 Archerfish)”, together with fibre-optic spools, neutraliser interface boards, neutraliser interface and deployment packages, and support equipment.
Testing of the Airborne Laser Mine Detection System (ALMDS), another component of the system, started with the LaserHawks of HSC-26 in August 2014
140804-N-WX059-219 NAVAL SUPPORT ACTIVITY BAHRAIN (Aug. 4, 2014) An MH-60S Sea Hawk helicopter from the Laser Hawks of Helicopter Sea Combat Squadron (HSC) 26, Detachment 2, equipped with the Airborne Laser Mine Detection System (ALMDS) conducts flight operations. Operated from the MH-60S helicopter, ALMDS provides rapid wide-area reconnaissance and assessment of mine threats in littoral zones, confined straits, and choke points. The Laser Hawks began the operational testing and demonstration of ALMDS in the U.S. 5th Fleet area of responsibility on the system’s maiden deployment. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Sean Furey/Released)
The last time you’ll see this on the newsstand is this month…
I’ve met and spoken at length with “The Colonel” so this came as a blow of sorts.
Long the beacon in the newsstand for those who yearned to meet interesting people in far off lands– and maybe get into a firefight with them, will fade away to digital only starting in April.
Founded by renowned international man of mystery, Vietnam-era Green Beret Lt. Col. Robert K. Brown, “The Journal of Professional Adventurers” based in Boulder, Colorado will no longer appear in print form moving forward
“Yes we are now an online magazine with much more content including current events and updates and industry news. And now we have a much larger and broader audience,” reads a post on their Facebook page.
Since 1975, SOF provided an outlet for legitimate and would-be mercenaries professional military contractors and assisted with filling hard-to-find positions in Africa, the Middle East and South America as well as fueling untold Walter Mitty fantasies in the more chairborne commando.
Noted contributors over the past four decades have included Col. David Hackworth, Lt. Col. Oliver North and sniper guru Maj. John Plaster.
SOF pulled a number of coups for the good guys over the years including effectively grounding Sandinista Mi-24 Hind helicopters during the Contra years after Brown published an offer of a $1,000,000 reward for the defection of a Nicaraguan pilot with his gunship. Brown also spirited out the first bulk caches of the then-new Soviet 5.45x45mm round seen in the West as well as other equipment from Afghanistan in the 1980s.
At least six correspondents from the magazine have been killed while on assignment in such third world hotspots as Burma, Angola, and Sierra Leone, going that extra mile for the story.
As noted by the Wall Street Journal, SOF has declined from its peak readership of over 150,000 a month in the 1980s, but its Facebook page remains active with nearly a million followers.
Brown remains a power in the gun rights community and has long sat on the board of the National Rifle Association.
In this photo from the mid-1950’s, a Woman in the Air Force or WAF plots air defense information on a huge Plexi-Glass surveillance board in the Continental Air Defense Command Combat Operations Center, located at Ent Air Force Base near downtown Colorado Springs.
She’s writing backwards so the battle staff seated in front of the board can read and analyze the information. All “tracks” of unknown aircraft approaching or near the United States were plotted on this board.
Ent closed in 1976 and is presently the US Olympic Training Center, located at Union Boulevard and Boulder Street in Colorado Springs.
The practice was not just a U.S. one. Here’s a vintage photo from Canada of a RCAF member in a NATO facility in Metz, France writing backwards on plotting board there.
Hattip, Peterson Air and Space Museum, Canadian Forces Museum of Aerospace Defence
Among many accomplishments in life, Mr. Einsley Delmer Berg was a member of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade, an all-volunteer group that went to Spain during the Spanish Civil War to fight against the Hitler and Mussolini-backed forces of Gen. Franco. Among its members were Mississippi gadfly and soldier of fortune Bennett Doty, screenwriter Alvah Bessie (Objective Burma), composer Conlon Nancarrow, and novelist William Herrick. Both Hemingway and Orwell bounced into these hard-fighting anti-fascists in Spain during the war.
The Abraham Lincoln Brigade suffered over 30% casualties in the three years of war fighting the fascists in Spain. Berg was one of these, suffering wounds during a German air raid.
Berg, who had bought out his U.S. Army contract to go to Spain in 1937, rejoined the Army in 1939 after Franco’s victory, becoming a member of the 389th Anti-Aircraft Artillery (AW) Battalion and seeing service in the Pacific Theater of Operations in WWII. That unit saw a good bit of combat, including the invasion of Morotai.
Sadly, Mr. Berg is the last surviving Abraham Lincoln Brigade Volunteer
From Robert Coale with the ALBA project.:
Delmer Berg (December 20, 1915 – February 28, 2016), the last known surviving veteran of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade, died peacefully in his California home today. He was 100 years old. Though hard of hearing in his old age, Del was voluble and forthcoming about his experiences in the Spanish Civil War and beyond, recently authoring a piece for the NY Times Magazine and interviewing with El Diario and El País.
We honor Del for his lifetime of activism and his dedication to ALBA-VALB. His death marks the silent turning of a historic page.
Del was born in 1915 outside of Los Angeles – “Where Disneyland is now,” he said wryly in a 2013 video interview with ALBA – to a family of poor farm workers. Seeking better economic opportunities, the Bergs moved to Oregon. But, as the country foundered in the Great Depression, teenage Del dropped out of high school to assist his father. Del’s political consciousness was forged in these early years:
“Being poor, being a farmer, I automatically felt part of the downturn,” he said in a 2014 interview with Friends and Neighbors Magazine. “You don’t need to go to school to learn what’s going on; just sit out on the farm and look around.”
Del found his way out of agricultural labor with a stint in the 76th Field Artillery in the Presidio of Monterey but soon bought his discharge for $120 in 1937: he saw the threat of the rise of fascism in Europe and wanted to travel to Spain. A billboard advertising the “Friends of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade” brought Del into the fold of stateside organizing for Spain. After “licking 10,000 stamps,” in the winter of 1938, Del was on a ship to France and would make the trek across the Pyrenees, following in the footsteps of so many volunteers before him.
While in Spain, Del served in a field artillery and anti-aircraft artillery battery, ultimately laying communication lines from the Republican headquarters to the front during the momentous Battle of the Ebro River. His next and final post in the city of Valencia was quiet until his unit’s lodgings in a monastery were bombed by a fascist airplane aiming for a railway station.
Yanks in the Dimitrov Battery: standing Sam Slipyan, Conlon Nancarrow, Ed Lending, Charles Simpson (?), Delmer Berg, Norman Schmidt, kneeling two Spanish Chauffers.
Despite the shrapnel in his liver, a personal reminder of the bite of fascism, Del’s life after Spain was an active one. While many Lincoln Brigade vets were prevented from serving in WWII, Del was drafted into the Army. He feared discrimination because of his political affiliations but instead was surprisingly given his choice of outfit by his recruiter. He was called to appear before the House Un-American Activities Committee during the postwar era but “they could never find me to serve a summons,” he gleefully told Nadya Williams in 2012.
Del’s political commitments were various: the Young Communist League, United Farm Workers, his local NAACP (he proudly recalls being at one time the Vice President of the Modesto chapter which had no other white members), the Mexican American Political Association, the anti-Viet Nam War movement, the Democratic Club, the Congress of California Seniors, and peace and justice committees. In his final years, Del lived comfortably in his self-built home in the Sierra Nevada foothills.
When the vets would muse about who would be last to survive, perhaps none wagered it would be Del. He revealed his secret to longevity in 2014: “I think staying politically active keeps me alive… It fills my life. I never slowed down – I’m right in the middle of things yet.”
Del was predeceased by his wife June Berg.
Salute!
While Del will undoubtedly be remembered and memorialized, the Volunteers left behind in the soil of Spain, are largely lost to time, their graves unmarked.
