Tag Archives: ray mabus

White House on Navy rate petition: Go pound sand

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navy-rates-cover

As you may remember, there was a We The People/Change.org petition to halt the wholesale scrapping by SECNAV Ray “I hate the Navy” Mabus of the Navy’s 241-year rating system. 

It garnered more than 100,000 signatures and thus required a comment from the White House in response.

Repeated thus:

The Navy’s recent announcement about Navy Occupational Specialties has garnered attention from many veterans and supporters like you who cherish naval tradition.

This new classification system, which was produced by a comprehensive review led by the Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy and his senior enlisted leadership, moves toward occupational specialties titles similar to the other armed services. Modernizing this system provides many benefits within the Navy, such as increased flexibility in training and assignments. It also affords our Sailors opportunities when transitioning to the civilian workforce by aligning their specialties with civilian occupations.

This Administration believes that providing widely-recognized credentials will improve service members’ chances of success in the private sector. Improving hiring opportunities for veterans remains a high priority for this Administration, embodied in efforts such as the First Lady and Dr. Biden’s “Joining Forces” initiative.

Organizational changes that require a cultural shift can cause friction during transition periods, but the President has confidence in the decisions made by U.S. Navy leaders and agrees that the benefits in future years will outweigh growing pains in the next several months. Whether one’s Navy career occurred under the former rating structure or today’s modernized system, the President maintains his steadfast pride in Sailors who have sacrificed and worked hard to serve with distinction.

On the bright side the /sarc/ Duffleblog is reporting the Coast Guard will now receive all the leftover and unused rates.

“Turning over the rates is bittersweet. They have served as a long and distinguished tradition within the U.S. Navy with much good work done in terms of pride in one’s rate. And I know that it means a lot for us to know that it will be in the service of the Coast Guard in continuing the custom of creating weird and obscure rates with painfully specific job titles,” Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy Mike Steven said.

Bring back those beautiful rates!

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130924-N-XZ912-002 MEDITERRANEAN SEA (Sept. 24, 2013) – Gunners Mate 3rd Class Amelia Sandoval, left, and Gunners Mate 2nd Class Samuel Ervin perform maintenance on a torpedo tube aboard the Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Barry (DDG 52). Barry, homeported in Norfolk, Va., is currently on a scheduled deployment supporting maritime security operations and theater security cooperation efforts in the 6th Fleet area of operations. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 1st Class Christopher B. Stoltz)

MEDITERRANEAN SEA (Sept. 24, 2013) – Gunners Mate 3rd Class Amelia Sandoval, left, and Gunners Mate 2nd Class Samuel Ervin perform maintenance on a torpedo tube aboard the Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Barry (DDG 52). Barry, homeported in Norfolk, Va., is currently on a scheduled deployment supporting maritime security operations and theater security cooperation efforts in the 6th Fleet area of operations. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 1st Class Christopher B. Stoltz)

Just in case you didn’t know, there is a Change.org petition to halt the scrapping by Ray Mabus of the Navy’s longstanding rating system.

For 241 Years Navy personnel have been identified by their Job specialty, known as a “Rating”. The oldest rates such as Boatswain Mates, and Gunners Mate predate the founding of this country. Being known by your job title was a sense of pride. A sign of accomplishment. The Secretary of the Navy and Chief of Naval Operations just senselessly erased this tradition. One only has to visit Navy social media pages to see the disgust and outrage of current and former personnel. One by one current leadership continues to erode the very things that set the Navy apart from the other services. Mr. President, I and the others signing this petition request you use your authority to restore to our Sailors what they have earned.

Click here if you want to see, sign or share.

So long, Blueberries! Goodbye, Aquaflage!

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NWU III, It's not just for Bees anymore...(U.S. Navy photo illustration by Mass Communication Specialist 1st Class Julia A. Casper/Released)

NWU III, It’s not just for Bees and Brownwater anymore…(U.S. Navy photo illustration by Mass Communication Specialist 1st Class Julia A. Casper/Released)

I personally think Ray Mabus (who used to be my governor before Clinton tapped him for ambassador to Saudi Arabia and Obama for SECNAV) hates the Navy.

I’m not getting into the whole “Naming convention? What naming convention?” argument, or the sillier parts of the Great Green Fleet, or the cultural evisceration of longstanding naval traditions– which are all low hanging fruit, but there are many other reasons to compare him to the Great Josephus “cup of joe” Daniels that are beyond the scope of this post.

However, the decision to eliminate Navy Working Uniform (NWU) Type I and replace it with NWU III (effective Oct. 1, 2019), is just great. The best thing about the aquaflauge is the NWU Type I black fleece liner (buffalo skins) which will be kept moving forward (I have one and love it).

I often wondered why it was a good idea to be camouflaged to look like water?

These two types of navy camo, as well as the four types of army camo, two types of USAF camo, and the Marines MARPAT could all be homogenized into a single uniform guaranteed to make everyone equally miserable!

Also announced in NAVADMIN 174/16:
* The Navy will transition to the black Cold Weather Parka (CWP) starting Oct. 1, 2018, as outerwear with the Service and Service Dress Uniform. Navy All Weather Coat, Pea Coat and Reefer coat will become optional items. Mandatory wear date for the parka is Oct. 1, 2020.
* Women, E7 and above, are now authorized to wear men’s uniform khaki pants without the belt and buckle with the khaki over blouse. Gig-line issues prevent wear of the male slacks with the tuck-in shirt.
* The rollout date of the male Service Dress Blue uniform at Recruit Training Command has been moved to Oct. 1, 2017, due to manufacturing delays. This change also aligns the uniform release with the introduction of the new E1-E6 Service Dress Whites.
* Navy sweat shirt and pants logo has been replaced with silver reflective lettering “NAVY,” which is similar to the logo on the Navy Physical Training Uniform shirt and shorts. The sweatshirt and pants are now available for purchase at Navy Exchange uniform centers.
* Commands may now authorize the wear of a “Don’t Tread on Me” and Reverse U.S. Flag patches on NWU Type II and Type III.
* Approval for the replacement of the Special Warfare Combatant-craft Crewman (SWCC) insignia. Going forward, there will be three separate insignias to denote a Sailor’s specific qualification level, which are SWCC basic, SWCC senior and SWCC master. The implementation date is Aug. 19, 2016, with a mandatory wear date of Oct. 1, 2016.

In other news, there is a petition to rename the United States Navy Ship Harvey Milk to USS Harambe. Just saying.

Goodbye LCS, hello Fast Frigate

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A coupled weeks ago I ran a post on the new up-gunned LCS that the Navy is considering to fill the shoes of the retiring OHP FFG-7 class frigates and at the time wondered, “Hey, why dont they just call them frigates instead of LCS 2.0, or the then-official Small Surface Combatant?”

Well I guess other people had the same idea.

According to the USNI the modified LCS class will be designated as frigates, Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus announced on Thursday at the Surface Navy Association 2015 symposium on Thursday.

“One of the requirements of the Small Surface Combatant Task Force was to have a ship with frigate-like capabilities. Well, if it’s like a frigate, Let’s call it a frigate?” Mabus said. “We are going to change the hull designation of the LCS class ships to FF. It will still be the same ship, the same program of record, just with an appropriate and traditional name.”

An LCS by any other name...

An LCS by any other name…

The new class will be designated ‘fast frigates’ which historically had the old “FF” hull number prefix. The last fast frigates in the Navy were the old 1970s era Knox-class steam powered ships, the final hull of which, USS Moinester (FF-1097) was decommissioned from U.S. Naval service on 28 July 1994, just shy of her 20th birthday.

With that ship in mind, should the navy keep the same numbering sequence, the new frigates should pick up with hull number FF-1099.

Why not 1098? Well in 1979 the 15-year old research ship USS Glover (AGDE-1) was re designated FF-1098 in 1979 and reclassified formally as a frigate.

Now these supped up LCS’s are still woefully under armed, but hey the FFG-7 class that they are replacing only has a CIWS, a 25mm gun, a 76mm mount, and torpedoes, so its really kind of a apples to crab-apples type of thing.

And I would like to go on record that, as fitting frigates, they should also be named traditionally after naval heroes too, rather than politicians and cities, but that’s a whole different cup of coffee there…

The US Navys Oddball Name choices lately….

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So Ray Mabus, former democratic Mississippi Governor, has chosen several names for warships lately including the USS Mississippi (that’s a surprise) the USS Jackson (whats the capitol of Mississippi?) and several after democratic party politicians (including Gerald Ford , JFK and Gabrielle Gifford) and leftist farm-worker organizer Cesar Chavez (who thankfully was at least in the Navy for a couple years in WWII). JFK is ok as a former USS John F Kennedy was a naval carrier and the only catholic President was also a naval hero. The name of Ford however is shocking as the USS Enterprise, with more than 50 years of service is being stricken soon and will her name will be available.

The JFK....he was a naval hero and should be remembered as such. However other choices my the current SECNAV are kinda odd...

Thankfully the navy is going forward with a plan to name some destroyers and LCS’s (wanna be frigates) after naval heroes and cities that aren’t in Mississippi.

One destroyer will be named for Marine Corps Staff Sgt. Rafael Peralta, a San Diegan who was posthumously awarded the Navy Cross for his actions in Iraq, when he “selflessly covering a grenade with his body to save his fellow Marines from the blast,” the Navy said.

Another destroyer will be named for the late World War II veteran John Finn, who received the Medal of Honor from Adm. Chester Nimitz for displaying “magnificent courage in the face of almost certain death” during the Japanese attack on military installations in Hawaii. Finn, a longtime resident of San Diego County, retired from the Navy as a lieutenant and died in 2010 at age 100. At the time he was the oldest living recipient of the nation’s highest award for valor in combat.

A third Arleigh Burke class guided-missile destroyer will be named for Marine Corps Pfc. Ralph Henry Johnson, who was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor for his actions in the Vietnam war.  Johnson was serving with Camp Pendleton’s 1st Reconnaissance Battalion when he saved another Marine’s life by shouting a warning and hurling his body onto a grenade thrown into their fighting hole, preventing the enemy from penetrating his sector of the patrol’s perimeter. The 19-year-old Marine from Charleston, S.C. was killed instantly in the attack on March 5, 1968.

Two LCS;s will be named after cities, a tradition going back to Attack submarines of the 1980s-90s, cruisers of the 1900s-1960s and back to sail frigates of the 19th century.

However i just think The Navy just isnt Salty anymore.

Take these names of submarines from the turn of the century:
USS Plunger / A-1
USS Adder / A-2
USS Grampus / A-3
USS Moccasin / A-4
USS Pike / A-5
USS Porpoise, A-6
USS Shark, A-7
USS Tarantula
USS Viper
USS Cuttlefish

How much of a seadog are you if your ship is the Tarantula!

Sounds much better than the USS Jimmy Carter or USNS Caesar Chavez.…