Her entire tenure only increased my suspicion of how much the East Germans had corrupted the new Germany. Merckel lived in East Germany, from an age of 4 months until the Wall came down, when Merckel was 25. Once a commie, always a commie.
Turn down all nuclear power plants, to make Germany dependent on Russian gas - check. Import the third world, to weaken the society - check. Pretty good service record!
I'm going to play the old "Mad Libs" game with your last paragraph: "There are a lot of very good (random western nation here) who are serious about being full members of the Western nations standing in support of our view of how our planet should be run, but those (same random western nation) are not in power." Until a couple of weeks ago, could have substituted United States for German and not changed a thing. Now with new leadership will we truly change? We'll see...fingers crossed.
We're fortunate we've "only" had the USS Miami in 2012 and the 2020 BHR. 3 billion in lost ships we'll never replace. So we've got our own closet demons.
Who had German "security" as the Oxymoron of The Day!
The BHR affair was a real mess, and I am not unconvinced that investigators pursued and/or manufactured a path of inquiry explicitly in order to ignore another path of inquiry that would have centered on a more jihad-adjacent motive.
The investigation was as just underwhelming as the officers onboard her that day. The entire saga was shot-thru with poor leadership, lack of initiative and glaring gaps in training.
In America, we don’t need the Russians to mess up our ship building, torch our cruisers, shoot down our own planes, crash our destroyers with merchant ships, etc. because we are quite capable of doing that ourselves.
Pete, we are so good at messing up our shipbuilding, we can make the failure of a program a certainty before the requirements analysis for a new warship is even complete.
New ship, new engines. Are they sure the engine/gearboxes didn't make it's own metal? It's not a terribly uncommon problem. And not to point a finger at MTU, but you can bet they'd prefer sabotage over a warranty claim. (And once rotating gear starts shredding itself those kilograms of metal will self-propagate.) Color me skeptical.
They must have also left all the cigarette butt's I found in a fuel pick-up screen in a factory fresh F-14. Or the dozens of loose bolts that were found near the flight controls in another factory fresh F-14.
The question is now "What country is not compromised?"
There's been over 30 years with the reduction in security measures since the end of the Cold War. We have to return to those restrictions for good reason.
I remember Willi Brandt and his "Ostpolitik." He compromised his country in many ways and found spies in his office, no less. The Germans have long been weak when it comes to Russia, Soviet, or otherwise.
Having been a US soldier in Germany 1975-77 as a middling German speaker, I can tell you it's hard to overstate the nuclear dread the Germans lived under for 40 years. A war would have meant the vernichtung (extermination) of the German people and culture.
Nevertheless, they hosted Pershing II, nuke tube artillery, Lance missiles, Davy Crocketts, Nike Herc, and still host B-61 bombs.
metal shavings into the engine? There is something lost in translation about 'cleaning' the ship. What are the labor relations like at the shipyard? It shouldn't be that hard to track who was on the ship and when, or don't they track that kind of thing in Germany?
Nicht gut.
I've often wondered how much more compromised (formerly West) Germany became when the Wall came down and the two Germany's were united.
Well, I hope the election of Angela Merckel set your mind at ease.
Her entire tenure only increased my suspicion of how much the East Germans had corrupted the new Germany. Merckel lived in East Germany, from an age of 4 months until the Wall came down, when Merckel was 25. Once a commie, always a commie.
Turn down all nuclear power plants, to make Germany dependent on Russian gas - check. Import the third world, to weaken the society - check. Pretty good service record!
Putin thought so. Merkel left Germany far weaker and more vulnerable than she found it.
I'm going to play the old "Mad Libs" game with your last paragraph: "There are a lot of very good (random western nation here) who are serious about being full members of the Western nations standing in support of our view of how our planet should be run, but those (same random western nation) are not in power." Until a couple of weeks ago, could have substituted United States for German and not changed a thing. Now with new leadership will we truly change? We'll see...fingers crossed.
We're fortunate we've "only" had the USS Miami in 2012 and the 2020 BHR. 3 billion in lost ships we'll never replace. So we've got our own closet demons.
Who had German "security" as the Oxymoron of The Day!
The BHR affair was a real mess, and I am not unconvinced that investigators pursued and/or manufactured a path of inquiry explicitly in order to ignore another path of inquiry that would have centered on a more jihad-adjacent motive.
The investigation was as just underwhelming as the officers onboard her that day. The entire saga was shot-thru with poor leadership, lack of initiative and glaring gaps in training.
True
Replacement cost is close to cracking 10 billion.
We can agree on two things.
First, the Emden of WWI was a great raider.
Two, the German government has not invested enough in its own defense, making NATO a weaker deterrent.
The amount the Germans spend on defense is the least of their problems. Their defense budget is already more than twice that of Israel.
"Spee vs. Spee"
<<<laughs in German>>>
Germany has a navy? Who knew!
This is a country whose military has been known to train with broomsticks. Painted black for authenticity!
As has ours.
How well did they clean those engines?
In America, we don’t need the Russians to mess up our ship building, torch our cruisers, shoot down our own planes, crash our destroyers with merchant ships, etc. because we are quite capable of doing that ourselves.
The USN is attacked daily by the Rust-ians.
OhioCoastie never sleeps. ©
But I do lurk in the shadows
And "La!" we fight like we train.
Pete, we are so good at messing up our shipbuilding, we can make the failure of a program a certainty before the requirements analysis for a new warship is even complete.
We can even take a proven design for frigates and mess that up too.
Seriously, Sal is every mishap now going to be the fault of Russia? Easy way to avoid any sort of accountability.
New ship, new engines. Are they sure the engine/gearboxes didn't make it's own metal? It's not a terribly uncommon problem. And not to point a finger at MTU, but you can bet they'd prefer sabotage over a warranty claim. (And once rotating gear starts shredding itself those kilograms of metal will self-propagate.) Color me skeptical.
"Are they sure the engine/gearboxes didn't make it's own metal?"
Russians didn't leave debris in the Boeing KC-46 fuel tanks. Or at least no one has suggested that it was Russians.
They must have also left all the cigarette butt's I found in a fuel pick-up screen in a factory fresh F-14. Or the dozens of loose bolts that were found near the flight controls in another factory fresh F-14.
Another example of Hanlon's razor?
"Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity."
I have thought of that several times in this thread.
Sadly, for years I've had advice for Germany that doesn't seem to fully take hold:
I keep reading that the Germans hate their militaristic past so much that they don't want to fight.
Let's try applying the clue bat to Germany's collective skull on this issue.
Conquering and setting up death camps under the shield of a powerful military? That's bad. By all means, don't do that.
Having a military capable of fighting death cult enemies or stopping the Russians from moving west? Well, that's a good thing. Try doing that.
"carrying the name of one of my favorite ships"
My biggest disappointment when I was in Vienna was discovering that the Danube is not beautiful and blue.
It's rather muddy and brown.
But, with my father, I took a cruise up the river to the Benedictine Abbey in Melk.
Just about to board the ship, I noticed it was the "Prinz Eugen".
I said to the guy checking tickets "hier ist Prinz Eugen, aber wo ist Bismarck".
He had no [expletive deleted] idea what I was talking about.
They've done their best to Bowdlerize history.
The question is now "What country is not compromised?"
There's been over 30 years with the reduction in security measures since the end of the Cold War. We have to return to those restrictions for good reason.
Agreed!
I remember Willi Brandt and his "Ostpolitik." He compromised his country in many ways and found spies in his office, no less. The Germans have long been weak when it comes to Russia, Soviet, or otherwise.
Having been a US soldier in Germany 1975-77 as a middling German speaker, I can tell you it's hard to overstate the nuclear dread the Germans lived under for 40 years. A war would have meant the vernichtung (extermination) of the German people and culture.
Nevertheless, they hosted Pershing II, nuke tube artillery, Lance missiles, Davy Crocketts, Nike Herc, and still host B-61 bombs.
metal shavings into the engine? There is something lost in translation about 'cleaning' the ship. What are the labor relations like at the shipyard? It shouldn't be that hard to track who was on the ship and when, or don't they track that kind of thing in Germany?