And now for something completely different...

Can YOU find the leprechaun?

Make sure you see the "sketch" of the leprechaun?



"Could be a crackhead who got ahold of da wrong stuff!"

Sell out Lebanon?

That's what the JP is reporting the Baker Commission is thinking about doing. According to this article, in the tit-for-tat negotiations Syria is most concerned with stifling the tribunal investigating the assassination of former Lebanese PM Rafiq Hariri and getting tacit U.S. permission to resume its control over Lebanon. And hell, why not. Baker's already done it once before. And it's not like selling out allies is something new to the U.S. way of thinking (h/t to Chap for the article.)

It's just sad. Lebanon has gone from this:














To this:


















And this:


















And finally, back to this:












And this:










Like I said. Sad.

Evil

There's "evil" in the world, as in the sense that "the U.S. is evil," "Israel is evil," "Corporations are evil," and then there's evil that is, for lack of other words, EVIL. Seen this picture?
















Here's the story behind it. (Cheesy music warning, I personally found it much more effective with the sound turned off.)



h/t: Belmont Club

NATO kicking ass, taking names

Courtesy of the Commander, head on over to Celestial Junk to see those few countries of NATO who are willing to stand with us make their contribution...Danish troops charging into battle under their flag (kinda brings the "I support Denmark in its struggle for the freedom of speech" button below full circle), Canadian Leopard tanks rumbling towards the enemy, and UK Airborne doing...whatever it is that UK Airborne do. Mainly shooting things and killing Taliban. Well worth a visit.

Plans

"One who knows the enemy and knows himself will not be in danger in a hundred battles."

-Sun Tzu

One of the enduring truths of war is that knowing the enemies plans will make life much easier on you. In every war we have devoted the equivalent of divisions of men to deciphering what exactly the enemy is doing, what he is thinking, and what he's going to do next. During the Cold War these numbers only got larger, eventually encompassing several entire agencies of the U.S. government. It's obviously important. But in our current war, much has been made of the failure of those same agencies to decipher our enemies' intentions. However, that same enemy openly posts his deepest strategic thought out on the internet for anyone to read. Since that's the case, then anyone who wants to be able to speak intelligently about the war we're currently in owes it to themselves to go and read these two documents.

The first is entitled "Stealing al-Qaida's Playbook." It's relatively short (25 pages) and is intended as a primer to really hammer home the point that our enemies have left their playbook wide open on the internet for anyone to grab and read. You can find it here.

The second is a translation of an actual al-Qaida strategy document written by a lovely gentleman named Abu Bakr Naji, an up-and-coming al-Qaida strategist. The tome is entitled "Management of Savagery." You can get it here.

Like I said, if you consider yourself as an interested party to the current war, you owe it to yourself to read these documents and get educated as to just what our enemies are doing and thinking. They have extensively studied our political structure and ways of fighting, there's no reason for us not to study theirs.

h/t to the good CDR for both docs.

Joke of the Day

Comes from Leno--a joke I shouldn't really be laughing at but that I found hilariously funny for some reason.

"Rangel is talking about bringing back the draft, bringing back ROTC. Yeah, back in the day I was in ROTC--Run Off To Canada."

And yet more thoughts on Baker...

...from Christopher Hitchens. The bottom line is that the man who was directly responsible for the slaughter of tens of thousands of Iraqis, the 12 years of sanctions, and 15 years of terror in Lebanon is now in the drivers seat of our foreign policy.

More thoughts on the Commission

Michael Rubin has some good thoughts on the Baker Commission over at the Weekly Standard. Dovetails nicely with what I was discussing in the post below.

"New Plan" on Iraq

There's been a couple of notable headlines with regards to Iraq, coming out in front of the upcoming release of the Baker Report. First, Henry Kissinger said that, "Military Victory in Iraq is 'Not Possible.'" Of course, if you read a bit deeper, he also states that an immediate withdrawal 'would be disastrous.' And if you dig a little more deeper, you find, as Bobby points out, that Kissinger's definition of 'military victory' is a rather interesting one: ""If you mean by 'military victory' an Iraqi government that can be established and whose writ runs across the whole country, that gets the civil war under control and sectarian violence under control in a time period that the political processes of the democracies will support, I don't believe that is possible." [bold added for emphasis]" Paraphrasing Bobby a bit, what Kissinger is basically saying is that it's irrelevant whether victory in and of itself is possible because the political will of the countries on our side (namely, our own) is faltering and will not support the war for the amount of time it takes to win. This is, of course, largely the fault of the President for failing to engage the American people, but that's a post for a different day. In any case, you should go read that post over at Bobby's place that I linked to above, it's got a lot of good information and food for thought and I'll be referencing it later as well.

On to the next piece of news: "Pentagon study narrows down Iraq options." The three options are, in a nutshell: "Go big, go long, or go home." Send more troops for one last push, lower troop levels but stay longer, or simply withdraw. First, I"ll just state that this is kind of a "duh" moment, in the same sense that it would be if I said that your three options at a poker table were to check/call, bet, or fold. It's rather obvious. Second, I'm a little worried because the way this is being spun is that all three options are equally viable as far as the Pentagon is concerned and that there are no real severe consequences of any of the three actions. Of course, I'm certain that the report lays out, in no uncertain detail, just exactly what the consequences, positive and negative, of all three actions would be. But it's unlikely we'll actually hear those reported. (Appears that I was wrong on this point; see link to BBC article near bottom of the page.)

Finally, we have the upcoming Baker Report. I have to be honest, I'm not particularly hopeful for this Report. First, let me just say that whatever the Report recommends will be heartily embraced by the President and both parties in Congress. Everyone's looking for a way out, and the Baker Report offers that. I should emphasize that anything else I say about the report is pure conjecture and educated guessing. The Report has been rather closely guarded, and the information we've been getting out about it has been spotty, very open-ended, and sometimes contradictory. I should also add that, while there is a Commission, in reality this report is probably going to largely written by the two leaders: James A. Baker and Lee Hamilton.

That said, let's get into the problems I am forseeing with the Baker Report. First and most fundamentally, the Report is going to be written from a realist point of view. The problem with this is that the war we're engaged in cannot be approached from that realist point of view. This is a long war, a war in which internal affairs of countries actually play a bigger role than their external actions, and a war in which ideology matters. All three of these things are anathema to a realist. Realists crave stability over all else. More specifically, realists value stability in the short term regardless of the long term consequences. Witness 1991, when we avoid a chance to take out Saddam because it would upset our "allies" in the ME, and it would be too chaotic. 12 long years later, and we go back in to finish the job at much greater cost and with much lower support among the Iraqi people, due in part to the fact that we sold them out in '91 (another Baker creation). Realists don't care how a country treats its own people; all they care about is how that country acts externally towards our country.

Unfortunately, this kind of thinking won't get very far in today's world. Saudi Arabia and Egypt are both "allies" of the United States. We aren't at war with either country, and we cooperate with both of them on counter-terrorism efforts. Yet on 9/11, most of the hijackers came from one of these two countries. Most of al-Qaeda's top leadership is either Saudi or Egyptian. Why? These countries are outwardly on "our side," yet their population seems to harbor a deep hatred for the United States. A couple of things must be true: first, with the rise of transnational organizations and 4th GW, we can no longer use a country's outward statements and actions to truly gauge the overall feelings/opinions of their people. Second, regardless of what the government says, there must be some kind of correlation between the way a government treats their people and the people's opinion, and more importantly, actions toward the U.S.

This brings me to the third failing of realists in today's world. To a realist, it does not matter if a country is democratic, liberal, theocratic, totalitarian, or zen utopia. All that matters is, as I stated above, the way that country acts externally. Unfortunately, as I've shown above, this isn't the case in today's world. In fact, since internal government actions are just as, if not more, important as external actions, it stands that the kind of government a country has and the society that form of government is based on are quite important. The more repressive a government, the more violent the people will tend to be in their actions.

But really, all this realist vs idealist talk is a discussion for another post. I just wanted to discuss a bit of background as to why I think the realist direction U.S. foreign policy appears to be heading in is the wrong direction, since it appears that realism will be the main thrust of the Baker Report.

So, on to specifics. First, the commission will probably recommend that we engage Iran and Syria in order to help Iraq become "stable." So in order to help one country become stable, we're going to start talking with two enemies of this country, enemies who also have been actively working for the past 4 years to help destabilize the very country we hope they can help us make stable. Head spinning yet? As far as I'm concerned, the only "talking" we need to be doing with Iran and Syria is of the "assured destruction" kind. The report will probably also recommend a big increase in U.S. troops for "one last effort" that, in combination with a "shut-down" of the Syrian and Iranian supply lines, would leave the country in some form of stable condition, enabling U.S. troops to withdraw with honor, mission accomplished. Of course, this is like putting gauze on a massive arterial wound...it might stop the bleeding for a bit, but it's just a band-aid solution. The supply lines will inevitably open again, the insurgency will restart, and Iraqi security forces will be unable to deal because they aren't fully trained up yet. But, you say, U.S. forces will be in a QRF located in Kuwait/Turkey/Kurdistan/somewhere where they won't be shot at and will be able to respond. I think Fred Kagan dealt with that fantasy appropriately.

So in exchange for short term stability and being able to "close the book," so to speak, on the Iraq problem, we'll get an emboldened Syria and Iran and a failed state right in the center of the ME. Basically Lebanon from the Taif Accords (a great Baker "success story") to the Cedar Revolution, increased by several orders of magnitude.

In stark contrast to the political view, we have the reality of the situation from the professionals: "A US military review of strategy in Iraq is likely to back a limited troop increase focused on training, officials have told the Washington Post. Senior defence officials said a review panel appeared to favour an option dubbed "Go Long", the paper reported." This has been the plan since the beginning, but most people have no idea.

Anyway, I'll let Bobby have the last word. Here's what he had to say:

"I've long since come to the conclusion that what is needed is not more American troops, but fewer troops-- albeit strategically assigned to the Military Transition Teams (MiTT) as advisors embedded in the Iraqi Security Forces, backed up by three to five Brigade Combat Teams for quick reaction response and deliberate operations, and supported by the incomparable firepower of the US airforce (to turn the tables-- fast-- in a decisive engagement). If you combine the MiTTs with the expansion of interagency Provincial Reconstruction Teams (PRT)-- like my own-- which are charged with overseeing reconstruction and development of infrastructure, building the capacity of Iraqi political and administrative institutions to stand on their own, and maintaining information superiority at the lowest levels, and (for that matter) an overhauled and proactive information operations campaign that is supported by kinetic operations (and not vice versa), and-- oh by the way-- the proliferation of improved counterinsurgency operations and tactics in an organization that still has too many who think that we can use kinetic operations to achieve victory through the application military force alone, well, then I think we'll be on to something.

But what do I know."

Well, a helluva a lot more than most of the policy makers in this country, it seems.

Tarmac Saturday, Valour-IT edition

As you may recall, SJS and myself made a wager with regard to the Valour-IT Project. The deal of course being that if my Zoomies won, he would defile the pages of his blog with a fragile, no-tailhookin' Air Farce aircraft, while if, through some miracle, his Squids pulled off a victory, I'd besmirch the honor of this blog with an ugly no-class Navy shadow of an airplane.

Somehow, and I have no idea how, the Navy pulled it off, and crossed the finish line before the Air Force...and we're still trucking towards that finish line. But Valour-IT *did* reach it's overall goal of $180,000, and in fact surpassed it by a considerable sum. And after all, the real winners are the troops at Walter Reed, Bethesda, Balboa, etc. who are going to be able to communicate with their families and friends through the efforts of Valour-IT. So, in light of that fact, and in the spirit of jointness, SJS and myself have agreed to each host a reciprocal Flightdeck Friday/Tarmac Saturday. His is up on the BUFF, and I must say it is damn good. Really quite impressive, and you should head on over there to take a look. SJS's choice of aircraft for me was the Grumman F4F Wildcat, a fine choice if I do say so myself. A tough little bird that, while outclassed by its adversaries such as the A6M "Zero," still managed to hold the line in the Pacific and contributed to our first victories at Midway and Guadalcanal that started the turning of the tide. The F4F continued to serve on escort carriers for the remainder of the war where it performed yeoman service as a CAS aircraft flying off those carriers in support of countless amphibious assaults and helped hunt down U-boats in the Atlantic. Without further ado, the Wildcat...

The story begins in 1936 when Grumman was designing their next fleet defense fighter. The design was the XF4F-1, which, like its predessors, was a biplane design. This design was inferior to the Brewster F2A Buffalo and as such, was forced to be redesigned into a monoplane configuration. The new monoplane was designated the XF4F-2, but was still inferior to the Buffalo, largely due to powerplant issues. Grumman returned to the drawing board and launched into an extensive redesign, installing a more powerful P&W Twin Wasp supercharged engine. The increased weight from the new engine and its associated supercharger, intercooler, and ductwork led to increases in wing span and area and a redesign of the tail surfaces. This new design was given the designation of XF4F-3, and in August 1939 the Navy awarded an intial contract for 54 F4F-3 airframes. The first production fighter flew in Febuary of 1940.

In addition to this initial Navy order, the French and British militaries both expressed interest, and orders were placed by both countries. Unfortunately, there were only 7 aircraft from the French order on the production line when France capitulated. There aircraft were folded into the RN's order of 100 Martlets, as they called the F4F. In October of 1940, due to a shortage of two-stage superchargers, Grumman came out with the F4F-3A which was a variant that featured a modified engine that was equipped with a more primitive single-stage two speed supercharger. The USN ordered 65, with an additional 30 going to Greece. As was common with war material deliveries early in the war, the aircraft didn't arrive before the fall of Greece, so, as often was the case in these kind of events, the aircraft were delivered into British service.

The F4F-3 was a well designed and balanced fighter, with only one major flaw: the gun ammo feed was poorly designed, which resulted in frequent jams, a common occurance among early U.S. built fighters. Also, the -3A was universally disliked due to its slightly inferior performance because of the single-stage supercharger. However, since it was overall a well designed and balanced fighter, they just had to go and screw things up, which leads us to the F4F-4. The F4F-4 was a variant that had two major differences with the -3: folding wings, and an additional 2 .50 machine guns. The increase in guns was dictated by the British, who needed the extra firepower against sturdy German and Italian fighters. However, the ammunition load did not increase; this meant that instead of the F4F-3's 450 rounds per gun and approximately 34 seconds of firing time, pilots would now only have 240 rounds per gun, with less than 20 seconds of firing time. As Jimmy Thatch, one of the most famous Wildcat pilots (more on that later) said, "A pilot who cannot hit with four guns will miss with eight". The folding wings and extra guns increased weight, which led to degraded performance. In line with the American view of war, the extra firepower and increase of number of F4Fs per carrier offered by the folding wings outweighed performance considerations and the F4F-4 became the definitive (Grumman-built) version.
The picture to the left may look rather ordinary, but in fact the pilots are probably the two most famous men to ever fly the Wildcat: Adm. (then LCdr.) John Thach and LCdr. (then Lt.) Edward "Butch" O'Hare. And this provides a convenient stepping off point into the Wildcat's extensive combat career. However, we'll have to go back in time a bit from those two gentlemen's exploits.

The first kill of the Wildcat was by a FAA Martlet which downed a German Ju-88 over Scapa Flow, Christmas Day 1940. In mid-1941 six Martlets went to sea aboard the escort carrier HMS Audacity. While conducting extremely successful convoy escort operations supporting Gibraltar convoys they managed to shoot down several Luftwaffe Fw-200 "Condor" long range recon/strike aircraft.

However, it was with the U.S. that the Wildcat would have its greatest achievements. First among them was the heroic defense of Wake Island by VMF-211, where Marine aviator Major (then Capt.) Henry T. Elrod would become the first aviator to be awarded the CMH for his efforts in the defense of the island, which included breaking up a flight of 22 Japanese bombers and downing 2, several low-altitude strafing and bombing runs, single-handedly sinking the Japanese destroyer Kisaragi with small caliber bombs during one of these runs, becoming the first man to do so, and leading the remnants of the squadron in intense ground combat until he was mortally wounded on 23 Dec. 1941 while providing cover for his men.

The F4F next saw service in several carrier nuisance raids. It was during one of these raids in the Rabaul area where LCdr. O'Hare would become the Navy's first ace and flying winner of the CMH. On 20 Feb. 1942, the USS Lexington was cruising in waters near New Ireland when it began to be attacked by Japanese long range bombers out of Rabaul. The Lex's CAP was busy engaging enemy bombers at a stand-off distance when suddenly the carrier's radar picked up 8 contacts only 12 miles away and closing fast. The only fighters within range to intercept were Butch's and his wingman. Unfortunately, as I mentioned above, the earlier Wildcat variants' guns had a tendency to jam. This was the case here, as Butch's wingman's guns jammed, meaning that Butch was literally the only line of defense for the Lex. Using deflection shooting, Butch was able to down 5 of the Japanese bombers and damage a sixth, breaking up the attack. Quite an impressive feat of shooting considering that this meant that he used only 60 rounds per kill.

That impressive gunnery leads to the third famous pilot of the Wildcat that I'm going to talk about: Adm. John Thach. Then-LCdr. Thach served with Butch O'Hare in VF-3 as CO, making Butch his wingman and instructing Butch in his vast knowledge of fighter tactics and marksmanship. Adm. Thach is best known for his maneuver known as the "Thach Weave," which enabled the Wildcats to more than hold their own against the nimble Zero and is in fact still a valid WVR combat maneuver today. This maneuver contributed to the large kill ratio the Wildcat was able to rack up at Midway and in service with the outnumbered Cactus Air Force at Guadalcanal.

After the victory at Guadalcanal, the next generation of naval fighters started coming online: the F6F Hellcat and F4U Corsair. This meant that prior to this Grumman ended production of the Wildcat in order to concentrate on the Hellcat. However, the Wildcat's career was by no means over. GM's Eastern Aircraft Division picked up production with the FM-1 in the summer of 1942. The FM-1 was largely a F4F-4 modified with four .50's instead of six, and an increased ammunition capacity. In 1943 production passed over to the FM-2 variant, which featured an engine with increased horsepower and a redesigned, taller vertical tail surface to deal with the increased torque from the engine. The FM-1 and -2 saw service for the remainder of the war on the USN and RN's smaller escort carriers, where its small size and slower landing speed made a good fit compared to the larger Hellcat and tempermental Corsair. On the escort carriers the Wildcat saw yeoman service as I mentioned above, escorting countless convoys and helping support numerous amphibious landings. However, it was at the Battle of the Leyte Gulf and the stand of Taffy 3 where the Wildcats took part in the most famous escort carrier action of the war, when Adm. Clifton Sprague's force of 6 CVEs, 3 DDs and 4 DEs fought off the IJN center force off Samar, saving the Leyte beachhead and sealing the fate of the IJN. Wildcats from the composite squadrons, along with Avenger torpedo-bombers, made numerous bombing and strafing runs on the Japanese ships, hoping to cause whatever damage they could and distract from the relatively defenseless CVEs. The aircraft continued to make runs even after their ammunition was expended, hoping to keep up the pressure on the Japanese force.

Overall, the Wildcat was a workman fighter. It wasn't as nimble as its major adversary, the Zero, nor was it as powerful or popular as its replacements, the Hellcat and Corsair. However, the Wildcat held the line in the Pacific in those first dark days of the war, and eventually helped the U.S. turn the tide. In addition, it saw service worldwide, escorting convoys and hunting U-Boats in every corner of the Atlantic theater. In the hands of a competent tactician such as John Thach, the Wildcat could more than hold its own against the Zero. In addition, the Wildcat packed a much heavier punch with its .50 cal. machine guns, and, in typical American fashion, provided much better protection in the form of self-sealing gas tanks and armor for the pilot. Also, the F4F featured a homing beacon that was the saving grace of many Navy pilots caught in poor weather conditions and running low on fuel. The Wildcat did have its shortcomings: the previous mentioned jamming issues, the controversy over number of guns and ammunition capacity, and its narrow-track hand-cranked landing gear, which led to landing accidents being a fairly common occurance.

Overall though, the Wildcat was a tough naval fighter that really started the Grumman tradition of fleet defense fighters. SJS wrote in an email to me that the Wildcat was the "prototypical naval fighter." And I think that's pretty accurate. Tough, heavily armed, and more than able to hold its own, it started a fine tradition of Grumman aircraft being the protectors of the fleet.

As a postscript and a personal note, SJS also mentioned in that much of the manufacturing equipment at Grumman's Bethpage, NY manufacturing plant later was used much later on the production line for the E-2 Hawkeye, which as you know was his steed while in the service.

Tarmac Saturday - preview

My Tarmac Saturday post is in the works, but unfortunately I've had a rather late night due to a poker game. I plan on getting it up sometime Saturday around lunch, but you know how I am about deadlines on my blog. Anyway, to tide you over, here's a teaser...it's a Navy airplane. *SHOCK*

More to come...

Valour-IT

It's that time of the year again...time for the Valour-IT inter-service fundraising drive. If you don't know what Valour-IT is, go here. They're legit and they do great work to help out those who've given their all for us. In a nutshell, if you are serving and can't type due to your wounds, it sucks to not be able to communicate with your loved ones, email, blog, etc. So Valour-IT steps in and provides you with a laptop and voice-recognition software so you can do whatever you want with a computer regardless of your wounds.

To add a bit of fun to the drive, there are four teams: Army, Navy, Marines, and Air Force. Each team is assigned to raise $45,000 for a grand total of $180,000. As I did last year, I'll be joining the Air Force team. Hopefully we'll do a bit better than last year when we got our butts kicked soundly by the three other teams. There's a donation button off to the right, so please...donate generously. It's a chance to put your wallet behind your "I support the troops" magnet on your car.

As a programming note, this post will stay on top until Nov. 11, so scroll down for new content.

And remember...GO AIR FORCE--AIRPOWER!!

8th of November

Courtesy of B5, something worth remembering in all the hoopla surrounding the elections. On 8 Nov 1965, the 173rd Airborne had a tough day in the jungle of Vietnam. B5 has all the details.

Valour-IT update (II)

Air Force is currently just a little short of halfway of our goal, with a little under a week to go. So good job for that, but we still need to keep pressing on, especially to pick up the slack from the Navy, who are still over $3,000 behind us. For motivation, just remember...Captain Wedley will find you if you don't contribute:



Edit: CAPTAIN WEDLEY IS PISSED!! And so am I...the Navy pulled an end around overnight, somehow coming up with 5,000 odd dollars worth of money to go from last to first. This is completely unacceptable, for numerous reasons, the least of which is that I refuse to be forced to defile these pages with a bumpy, ugly, no-flairin' NAVY aircraft. Come on Team Air Force! Don't let me down...

Anniversaries

First, over at Milblogs, Soldier's Dad reminds us that today was a rather active day in history.

"50 years ago today,Nikita Kruschev sent Soviet tanks to crush a Hungarian Independence Uprising.
27 years ago today,Iranian Militants took American Embassy workers hostage.
26 years ago today, a man named Reagan was elected."

Quite a day.

More importantly, the second best aerial demonstration team in America has its 60th birthday today. Happy birthday, Blues. You'll never be as good as the T-Birds, but at least you keep trying. In honor of the birthday, I'll play what's possibly the sweetest music video...ever. Van Halen's "Dreams," from 1980, featuring the Blue Angels flying their A-4 Skyhawks. Enjoy!



Some of you may be wondering why I'm posting a Navy video on here given the Valour-IT competition, but the Navy is just so far behind I think they need a little help, so I'm willing to give it to them. If you want to see what a REAL fighter jet can do, just look at the video below. Music is again courtesy of Van Halen.

Runways are unsafe...

...and it's all Bush's fault. So sayeth Sen. Frank Lautenberg. ""Our runways are out of shape, and the Bush administration has failed to move to correct the problem...If we don't get serious about runway problems, the result could be disastrous."

Well, pardon my french, but no shit sherlock. It's a travesty that runways don't have safe overrun zones, especially considering that even airports such as LAX and Midway that are surrounded by development can instal EMAS beds that arrest the plane with the same effect of a 1,000 foot overrun zone. But it's been like this since the '80s, and attempting to attach Bush's name to it is a stupid crass political trick that will be seen as such.

GO AIR FORCE!!--BEAT ARMY!!

Air Force-Army game is tonight, a game that Air Force actually has a chance to win. In honor, here's a video I posted a couple of weeks ago. Plus, the video slams Navy, which is always a good thing. Enjoy. (And remember, contribute to Valour-IT!)

Valour-IT update

First, good job Team Air Force! Currently in second place and within striking distance of Army! A little over a third of the way towards our goal and still a week to go. To get things going, Richard S. Lowry has chosen to generously donate signed copies of two of his books to the highest bidders. The two books are Marines in the Garden of Eden and The Gulf War Chronicles. Check out the links and bid if you're interested.

Finally, SJS has generously agreed to do an Air Force plane for his next Flightdeck Friday. Assuming, of course, that the Air Force continues its already substantial lead over Navy. I have great confidence in our ability to secure funding. Of course, an Air Force-Navy post isn't complete without an appropriate picture, so we're going to go waaaaaaay back for this one to when a certain General Mitchell attacked a certain ex-German dreadnought, and the results, well...


























Reminiscient of...SJS's chances, perhaps?

GO AIR FORCE!--BEAT NAVY! (And everyone else!)