I was disappointed to learn the United States Navy recently lost a naval battle.
You didn’t hear about that, did you.
Let’s look at what happened.
The USS Gravely was escorting two ships, the Maersk Detroit and the Maersk Chesapeake toward the Bab al-Mandeb straight.
The Houthies fired three anti-ship missiles.
The navy press release said one missile impacted in the sea. The two other missiles were successfully engaged and shot down by the USS Gravely.
But that isn’t the full story.
The missle that “impacted the sea” wasn’t shot down but slipped through the Gravely’s defenses and luckily impacted the sea about 100 meters from the Maersk Detroit.
…luckily if you are not a Houthi or one of the parties very much interested in escalating global war.
The end result?
Everybody turned around and went back the way they came from.
Making the US Navy retreat with the realization they are more vulnerable than they expected is a bit of a victory.
The Houthis only need to get lucky once.
And they most probably will.
Korean Man
3 months ago
I remember when universal free lunch programs for all grades to high school students were introduced over a decade ago. The conservatives were livid with how all these free-spending programs on the future kids were going to ruin Korea into a debt-ridden nation. I shudder to think what would have happened if the lunch programs weren’t enacted.
If you want to see what would have happened, just look at Britain today, where 25% of all kids in that country are malnourished with diseases of the past like scurvy and rickets which have made a vicious comeback.
“just look at Britain today, where 25% of all kids in that country are malnourished with diseases of the past like scurvy”
If only the Limeys had some sort of preventative intervention for scurvy with years of data on safety and effectiveness.
Liz
3 months ago
Scurvy and rickets (as CH indicated) are easily preventable.
But I’ll add, there is nothing in public school lunches that would prevent scurvy (and only the vitamin D fortified milk would prevent rickets, if they still provide that). Most people would need vitamin D supplements in England to avoid a deficiency…Especially people with darker skin. It’s not like Florida, or the south of France.
…in other, similar news:
Liz
3 months ago
Update on the Navy:
According to U.S. Defense Officials, the Crew aboard the Marshall Islands-Flagged Chemical Tanker, M/T Marlin Luanda have been forced to Abandon Ship due to the Large Fire caused by the Houthi Anti-Ship Ballistic Missile Attack earlier tonight now being Out of Control; the Crew has reportedly been moved to Lifeboats which are currently being picked-up by the INS Visakhapatnam, a Visakhapatnam-Class Destroyer of the Indian Navy which is currently On-Scene to provide Assistance.
Liz, it appears America’s anti-missile defense is not perfect. I didn’t expect the Houthis to get lucky within 12 hours of my prediction but there it is.
My next prediction is they get lucky on an American warship before this is all over.
Setnaffa, a B-52 has no targets. Chances are America’s airstrikes have done almost nothing due to misinformation, decoys, and years of Houthi preparation managing Saudis with American targeting intel.
setnaffa
3 months ago
Well, CH, I was hoping my message was clear. Since I was not clear, please allow me to revise and extend my remarks. I don’t believe we always need precision-guided weapons. I don’t believe we always need boots on the ground. Sometimes, you just need glass. Sometimes, people catch on after only two applications.
BTW, a single B-52H can carry 12 AGM-86 ALCM missiles with a published range of 2,500km after launch.
B-52s were designed in the 1950s to fly from North America to the USSR with a couple air-refueling stops. Either Minot or Barksdale could be used as the starting point, as was done during the Gulf War.
Not saying it’s likely, as there is a chance Iran is paying someone in our government; but Middle East peace could be achieved with a single bomber aiming at a few key locations. And there are a lot more than one.
We have, last time Wikipedia was updated, 76 B-52H bombers certified to carry nuclear weapons. There are also 45 B-1B and 20 B-2 bombers are faster, sneakier, and could supply tons of conventional weapons, drones, and other countermeasures to distract possible air defenses.
And that doesn’t count the Navy’s contributions.
But we’ll probably dawdle around with General Milley’s thumb up his butt until stuff goes sideways.
ChickenHead
3 months ago
Setnaffa, I often lean towards hawkishness but this situation doesn’t seem like one that can be solved with carpet bombing.
If I had to manage this, I would quietly assist Israel in finishing their Palistinian genocide as quickly as possible and then make a big show of pulling support and indignantly condemning their war crimes.
Then let the Houthis fire all their missles at Tel Aviv and Israeli ships in exchange for leaving American ships alone.
Ah… but it is not to be.
Throw away everything I just said because that addresses a problem which doesn’t exist except in the narrative fed to the Little People.
In reality, the Houthis are doing exactly what America wants them to do.
Look at everything you see happening through the perspective that America has gone to war with Europe and it all makes sense.
Europe’s cheap energy from Russia has been stopped. Energy from the Middle East has now been made more expensive. America is happy to step in and supply high-profit energy. But it is too expensive for European industry to be competitive.
The same with raw materials and anything else coming from the Asian supply chain.
Somehow, EU politicians have been bought off to have a War on Farming and to import the worst foreign invaders who are actively building nations-within-nations.
Military leaders across Europe are telling the population Russia is losing in Ukraine but to prepare for war with Russia, as if they really believe Russian tanks will never beat the Ukranians but will be in Lisbon in a fortnight.
One way to look at it is they are just promoting panic so there will be less resistance to coming hardship. But perhaps some are saying all the EU-approved acceptable things but masking their true message which is to prepare for civil unrest and the shortages that go with it. The Dutch general comes to mind.
By now, we should all know when there is no definition of victory because there can be no victory, the real goal is something entirely different and entirely winnable.
setnaffa
3 months ago
The problems right now are caused by Iran. One bomber with 20 nukes could eliminate that threat.
No more Iran, no money for Houthis, Hamas, Hezbollah, etc.
Carpet bombing was a WW2 thing.
Read Victor Davis Hanson’s book, Carnage and Culture. It’s not pretty; but the way the West used to prosecute wars was the way we won them quickly. The current nonsense just kills more people and prolongs the suffering.
ChickenHead
3 months ago
Child trannies and shoplifting rings are one thing but normalizing the casual use of nukes seems a bit more risky.
“The current nonsense just kills more people and prolongs the suffering.”
As intended.
Korean Man
3 months ago
The person who attacked a PPP lawmaker was a deranged 14-year-old boy who was sent to a mental hospital.
So much for all the conspiracy theories provided by all the right-wingers.
Liz
3 months ago
Drone missile hit an outpost in Jordan, 3 US servicemembers dead and 30 more injured.
Last edited 3 months ago by Liz
ChickenHead
3 months ago
Jordan swears the base in across the border in Syria but somehow the western media as picked up Jordan.
My feeling is it must be in Syria. Eventually, I will look into it and see who is more credible.
Spoiler: probably Jordan
Anyway, this is exactly the regional escalation everyone is looking for.
Time for some revenge for that reprisal which was for the retribution for that payback for that etc.
It is going to all play out exactly as expected.
Nothing to do but sit back and laugh at all the people who get what they ask for.
That will extend from Gaza to Los Angeles.
setnaffa
3 months ago
Curtis Lemay once said, “if you kill enough of them, they stop fighting.”
So, while I choose to not own firearms, spears, swords, flamethrowers, cannons, tanks, etc , I know folks who do.
And some of them are crazy enough to look forward to mass terrorist attacks, a boog, or some other shtf scenario.
I really hope our government is not as corrupt and clueless as they present. There is still time to get the attention of those causing trouble and “counsel’ them to “straighten up and fly right”.
As CH writes, they may not be wise enough to smell what’s cookin’…
ChickenHead
3 months ago
America swears the attack happened at Tower 22 in Jordan and Jordan swears it happened just across the Syrian border at al-Tanf.
This seems pretty easy to get straightened out.
Jordan could be wrong about this becasue… Jordan.
America has good communications, so if America is wrong, it is unbelievable (but not impossible) incompetence or a malicious attempt to escalate the conflict within wider intetests.
This is certainly worth keeping an eye on.
ChickenHead
3 months ago
“So much for all the conspiracy theories provided by all the right-wingers.”
Korea Man, kindly quote some of those right-wing conspiracy theories.
Stephen
3 months ago
The ROK came out on top of Saudi Arabia last night in the Asia Cup.
How will this affect ROK arms sales in the Middle East?
Turkiye, Saudia Arabia’s main rival for leadership in Dar al-Islam, will increase military and economic cooperation with the ROK.
Biden is sending updated F-16s to Turkiye. Erdogan is sending TB2s and TB3s everywhere.
ChickenHead
3 months ago
Is the 8th Fighter Wing going to change its name to the 7th Fighter wing or does it not work like that?
Korean Man
3 months ago
The US-Japan plan to supply Ukraine with 155mm shells fell through last summer. Now the UK-Japan plan to supply the Ukraine with 155mm shells also fell through.
Once again, it shows that when the chips are down, it’s South Korea that always comes through for their allies, not Japan which is better at making itself look good on the surface by giving lip service and pretending to be on the same page when they’re not.
ChickenHead
3 months ago
For those of you keeping track, the Houthis fired a missile at the USS Gravely.
Normally, the USS Gravely would shoot a missile at the incoming missile, there would be an explosion way over there by the horizon, and everybody would go back to updating today’s pronouns on their Grindr profile.
But this Houthi missile made it quite close. CIWS goes brrrrr. The explosion happened close enough they had to do a FOD walk on the deck.
Then everybody went back to updating today’s pronouns on their Grindr profile with shaky hands.
As we have seen from Ukraine to commercial shipping in the Red Sea, missile defense is not 100%.
Rumor has it CIWS doesn’t miss… ever.
There have been fewer comments on what happens if it has to engage multiple targets.
@Chickenhead, I don’t think anyone is claiming missile defense is 100% effective. That is why you have a defense in depth with various systems. Even then you could have human error or bad luck happen that allows something to slip through. As we recently saw in Jordan an Iranian drone slipped through defenses there due to human error.
With that said considering the amount of intercepts the Aegis ships have been having their missile defenses have been pretty darn effective. The problem becomes the cost analysis of expending expensive interceptors on much cheaply produced drones and missiles. This cannot be kept up indefinitely.
ChickenHead
3 months ago
“That is why you have a defense in depth with various systems.”
What it seems we just saw was a Houthi missile go through all of that depth and only get taken out by the last link in that chain.
(He said with a mixed metaphor.)
We have also seen a few non-military ships hit because they didn’t have this last link.
If the American presence there had a defined victory and a clear pathway to achieve it, it would be easy to support.
But what we have seen in the last 20 years is military action that doesn’t seem to care about any sort of victory and ends with the same situation it started with, only worse.
Since America is crafty and not at all stupid, the next assumption is victory wasn’t defined because the real goal was masked behind incompetence.
It seems the withdrawl from Afghanistan went according to plan with armed and funded factions keeping the region in toxic disorder for generations. Good job, America!
In the case of the Houthies, doing nothing would have been the correct course of action.
Israeli shipping would have had to go the long way. American and British shipping would have been business as usual.
American involvement make a lot more ships into targets and have endangered American warships in a battle that can only be won by defence contractors. For the navy, it can only be an expensive tie (so far) or a loss (when some part of a complex system doesn’t work as expected).
So what is the real goal, since it clearly isn’t “winning” against an enemy that cannot be beat in any classical definition of the word?
I propose:
– endangering American warships, as a successful attack is a statistical probability which can escalate the coming global war while pointing out the navy did its best but just had bad luck… America has a bit of rhyming hostory here
– a second front in a war against EU industry by raising their prices for energy and Asian supply chain items while increasing their dependence on American economic output
Perhaps I am wrong on the motivations, and crediting America with too much strategic thinking… but that is exactly what is happening.
A further observation is that American industry is being quietly increased to be less dependent on Asia and to supply (and control) allies. It is being done in such a way that major global supply chain disruption would benefit America rather than hurt it.
Also…
There is always a distinction between America and Americans. Benefits to Americans are incidental and not part of the equation, as it is far easier to distract and manipulate them than base policy around their desires.
setnaffa
3 months ago
A shorter way to communicate CH’s message may be that the people in charge want a war that will devastate everyone but the USA.
Unfortunately, wars tend not to be so easily controlled.
Ooops!
https://www.foxnews.com/media/british-pianist-says-viral-clash-authoritarian-chinese-nationals-badly-backfired
Apparently, Korean American aren’t happy with Yoon.
Anti-Yoon search light banner in LA’s Koreatown.
https://x.com/koryodynasty/status/1750467027767271797?s=46&t=CpWLVhvS25wXKdzq6qpDAw
If Korean-Americans were important to South Korea, they would be Koreans. If they were important to America, they’d be Americans.
As it is, they’re just whingey bots who protest for or against people or topics based on who pays the most.
Kinda like the chinabots on the ‘Drop…
Haha!
Babylon bee is so funny. 🙂
https://babylonbee.com/news/airlines-offering-100-upgrade-where-youre-guaranteed-an-old-male-pilot-named-steve
Is anybody out there paying attention?
No, you sillies, not to Taylor Swift.
I mean to global events.
I was disappointed to learn the United States Navy recently lost a naval battle.
You didn’t hear about that, did you.
Let’s look at what happened.
The USS Gravely was escorting two ships, the Maersk Detroit and the Maersk Chesapeake toward the Bab al-Mandeb straight.
The Houthies fired three anti-ship missiles.
The navy press release said one missile impacted in the sea. The two other missiles were successfully engaged and shot down by the USS Gravely.
But that isn’t the full story.
The missle that “impacted the sea” wasn’t shot down but slipped through the Gravely’s defenses and luckily impacted the sea about 100 meters from the Maersk Detroit.
…luckily if you are not a Houthi or one of the parties very much interested in escalating global war.
The end result?
Everybody turned around and went back the way they came from.
Making the US Navy retreat with the realization they are more vulnerable than they expected is a bit of a victory.
The Houthis only need to get lucky once.
And they most probably will.
I remember when universal free lunch programs for all grades to high school students were introduced over a decade ago. The conservatives were livid with how all these free-spending programs on the future kids were going to ruin Korea into a debt-ridden nation. I shudder to think what would have happened if the lunch programs weren’t enacted.
If you want to see what would have happened, just look at Britain today, where 25% of all kids in that country are malnourished with diseases of the past like scurvy and rickets which have made a vicious comeback.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=QPKxFZkFQgA
“just look at Britain today, where 25% of all kids in that country are malnourished with diseases of the past like scurvy”
If only the Limeys had some sort of preventative intervention for scurvy with years of data on safety and effectiveness.
Scurvy and rickets (as CH indicated) are easily preventable.
But I’ll add, there is nothing in public school lunches that would prevent scurvy (and only the vitamin D fortified milk would prevent rickets, if they still provide that). Most people would need vitamin D supplements in England to avoid a deficiency…Especially people with darker skin. It’s not like Florida, or the south of France.
…in other, similar news:
Update on the Navy:
According to U.S. Defense Officials, the Crew aboard the Marshall Islands-Flagged Chemical Tanker, M/T Marlin Luanda have been forced to Abandon Ship due to the Large Fire caused by the Houthi Anti-Ship Ballistic Missile Attack earlier tonight now being Out of Control; the Crew has reportedly been moved to Lifeboats which are currently being picked-up by the INS Visakhapatnam, a Visakhapatnam-Class Destroyer of the Indian Navy which is currently On-Scene to provide Assistance.
https://x.com/sentdefender/status/1751049424342544844?s=20
If only the USA had the weapons to stop the Houthis…
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=kfy-a1QiNBg
Liz, it appears America’s anti-missile defense is not perfect. I didn’t expect the Houthis to get lucky within 12 hours of my prediction but there it is.
My next prediction is they get lucky on an American warship before this is all over.
Setnaffa, a B-52 has no targets. Chances are America’s airstrikes have done almost nothing due to misinformation, decoys, and years of Houthi preparation managing Saudis with American targeting intel.
Well, CH, I was hoping my message was clear. Since I was not clear, please allow me to revise and extend my remarks. I don’t believe we always need precision-guided weapons. I don’t believe we always need boots on the ground. Sometimes, you just need glass. Sometimes, people catch on after only two applications.
https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/eQIAAOSw2OtjFjHK/s-l1600.webp
BTW, a single B-52H can carry 12 AGM-86 ALCM missiles with a published range of 2,500km after launch.
B-52s were designed in the 1950s to fly from North America to the USSR with a couple air-refueling stops. Either Minot or Barksdale could be used as the starting point, as was done during the Gulf War.
Not saying it’s likely, as there is a chance Iran is paying someone in our government; but Middle East peace could be achieved with a single bomber aiming at a few key locations. And there are a lot more than one.
We have, last time Wikipedia was updated, 76 B-52H bombers certified to carry nuclear weapons. There are also 45 B-1B and 20 B-2 bombers are faster, sneakier, and could supply tons of conventional weapons, drones, and other countermeasures to distract possible air defenses.
And that doesn’t count the Navy’s contributions.
But we’ll probably dawdle around with General Milley’s thumb up his butt until stuff goes sideways.
Setnaffa, I often lean towards hawkishness but this situation doesn’t seem like one that can be solved with carpet bombing.
If I had to manage this, I would quietly assist Israel in finishing their Palistinian genocide as quickly as possible and then make a big show of pulling support and indignantly condemning their war crimes.
Then let the Houthis fire all their missles at Tel Aviv and Israeli ships in exchange for leaving American ships alone.
Ah… but it is not to be.
Throw away everything I just said because that addresses a problem which doesn’t exist except in the narrative fed to the Little People.
In reality, the Houthis are doing exactly what America wants them to do.
Look at everything you see happening through the perspective that America has gone to war with Europe and it all makes sense.
Europe’s cheap energy from Russia has been stopped. Energy from the Middle East has now been made more expensive. America is happy to step in and supply high-profit energy. But it is too expensive for European industry to be competitive.
The same with raw materials and anything else coming from the Asian supply chain.
Somehow, EU politicians have been bought off to have a War on Farming and to import the worst foreign invaders who are actively building nations-within-nations.
Military leaders across Europe are telling the population Russia is losing in Ukraine but to prepare for war with Russia, as if they really believe Russian tanks will never beat the Ukranians but will be in Lisbon in a fortnight.
One way to look at it is they are just promoting panic so there will be less resistance to coming hardship. But perhaps some are saying all the EU-approved acceptable things but masking their true message which is to prepare for civil unrest and the shortages that go with it. The Dutch general comes to mind.
By now, we should all know when there is no definition of victory because there can be no victory, the real goal is something entirely different and entirely winnable.
The problems right now are caused by Iran. One bomber with 20 nukes could eliminate that threat.
No more Iran, no money for Houthis, Hamas, Hezbollah, etc.
Carpet bombing was a WW2 thing.
Read Victor Davis Hanson’s book, Carnage and Culture. It’s not pretty; but the way the West used to prosecute wars was the way we won them quickly. The current nonsense just kills more people and prolongs the suffering.
Child trannies and shoplifting rings are one thing but normalizing the casual use of nukes seems a bit more risky.
“The current nonsense just kills more people and prolongs the suffering.”
As intended.
The person who attacked a PPP lawmaker was a deranged 14-year-old boy who was sent to a mental hospital.
https://www.ctvnews.ca/world/south-korean-police-investigating-14-year-old-boy-as-suspect-of-attack-on-lawmaker-1.6743180
So much for all the conspiracy theories provided by all the right-wingers.
Drone missile hit an outpost in Jordan, 3 US servicemembers dead and 30 more injured.
Jordan swears the base in across the border in Syria but somehow the western media as picked up Jordan.
My feeling is it must be in Syria. Eventually, I will look into it and see who is more credible.
Spoiler: probably Jordan
Anyway, this is exactly the regional escalation everyone is looking for.
Time for some revenge for that reprisal which was for the retribution for that payback for that etc.
It is going to all play out exactly as expected.
Nothing to do but sit back and laugh at all the people who get what they ask for.
That will extend from Gaza to Los Angeles.
Curtis Lemay once said, “if you kill enough of them, they stop fighting.”
So, while I choose to not own firearms, spears, swords, flamethrowers, cannons, tanks, etc , I know folks who do.
And some of them are crazy enough to look forward to mass terrorist attacks, a boog, or some other shtf scenario.
I really hope our government is not as corrupt and clueless as they present. There is still time to get the attention of those causing trouble and “counsel’ them to “straighten up and fly right”.
As CH writes, they may not be wise enough to smell what’s cookin’…
America swears the attack happened at Tower 22 in Jordan and Jordan swears it happened just across the Syrian border at al-Tanf.
This seems pretty easy to get straightened out.
Jordan could be wrong about this becasue… Jordan.
America has good communications, so if America is wrong, it is unbelievable (but not impossible) incompetence or a malicious attempt to escalate the conflict within wider intetests.
This is certainly worth keeping an eye on.
“So much for all the conspiracy theories provided by all the right-wingers.”
Korea Man, kindly quote some of those right-wing conspiracy theories.
The ROK came out on top of Saudi Arabia last night in the Asia Cup.
How will this affect ROK arms sales in the Middle East?
Turkiye, Saudia Arabia’s main rival for leadership in Dar al-Islam, will increase military and economic cooperation with the ROK.
Biden is sending updated F-16s to Turkiye. Erdogan is sending TB2s and TB3s everywhere.
Is the 8th Fighter Wing going to change its name to the 7th Fighter wing or does it not work like that?
The US-Japan plan to supply Ukraine with 155mm shells fell through last summer. Now the UK-Japan plan to supply the Ukraine with 155mm shells also fell through.
https://archive.ph/RFcB9
Once again, it shows that when the chips are down, it’s South Korea that always comes through for their allies, not Japan which is better at making itself look good on the surface by giving lip service and pretending to be on the same page when they’re not.
For those of you keeping track, the Houthis fired a missile at the USS Gravely.
Normally, the USS Gravely would shoot a missile at the incoming missile, there would be an explosion way over there by the horizon, and everybody would go back to updating today’s pronouns on their Grindr profile.
But this Houthi missile made it quite close. CIWS goes brrrrr. The explosion happened close enough they had to do a FOD walk on the deck.
Then everybody went back to updating today’s pronouns on their Grindr profile with shaky hands.
As we have seen from Ukraine to commercial shipping in the Red Sea, missile defense is not 100%.
Rumor has it CIWS doesn’t miss… ever.
There have been fewer comments on what happens if it has to engage multiple targets.
It feels like the Houthi are testing.
@Chickenhead, I don’t think anyone is claiming missile defense is 100% effective. That is why you have a defense in depth with various systems. Even then you could have human error or bad luck happen that allows something to slip through. As we recently saw in Jordan an Iranian drone slipped through defenses there due to human error.
With that said considering the amount of intercepts the Aegis ships have been having their missile defenses have been pretty darn effective. The problem becomes the cost analysis of expending expensive interceptors on much cheaply produced drones and missiles. This cannot be kept up indefinitely.
“That is why you have a defense in depth with various systems.”
What it seems we just saw was a Houthi missile go through all of that depth and only get taken out by the last link in that chain.
(He said with a mixed metaphor.)
We have also seen a few non-military ships hit because they didn’t have this last link.
If the American presence there had a defined victory and a clear pathway to achieve it, it would be easy to support.
But what we have seen in the last 20 years is military action that doesn’t seem to care about any sort of victory and ends with the same situation it started with, only worse.
Since America is crafty and not at all stupid, the next assumption is victory wasn’t defined because the real goal was masked behind incompetence.
It seems the withdrawl from Afghanistan went according to plan with armed and funded factions keeping the region in toxic disorder for generations. Good job, America!
In the case of the Houthies, doing nothing would have been the correct course of action.
Israeli shipping would have had to go the long way. American and British shipping would have been business as usual.
American involvement make a lot more ships into targets and have endangered American warships in a battle that can only be won by defence contractors. For the navy, it can only be an expensive tie (so far) or a loss (when some part of a complex system doesn’t work as expected).
So what is the real goal, since it clearly isn’t “winning” against an enemy that cannot be beat in any classical definition of the word?
I propose:
– endangering American warships, as a successful attack is a statistical probability which can escalate the coming global war while pointing out the navy did its best but just had bad luck… America has a bit of rhyming hostory here
– a second front in a war against EU industry by raising their prices for energy and Asian supply chain items while increasing their dependence on American economic output
Perhaps I am wrong on the motivations, and crediting America with too much strategic thinking… but that is exactly what is happening.
A further observation is that American industry is being quietly increased to be less dependent on Asia and to supply (and control) allies. It is being done in such a way that major global supply chain disruption would benefit America rather than hurt it.
Also…
There is always a distinction between America and Americans. Benefits to Americans are incidental and not part of the equation, as it is far easier to distract and manipulate them than base policy around their desires.
A shorter way to communicate CH’s message may be that the people in charge want a war that will devastate everyone but the USA.
Unfortunately, wars tend not to be so easily controlled.