CSG21

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Boac
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CSG21

#1 Post by Boac » Fri Jul 30, 2021 10:53 am

For those interested in the journey of the Carrier Strike Group (sorry about the 'offensive' words, there, UP), this appears to be the constitution of the group:

HMS QE
HMS Diamond and Defender (still 'poncing about', no doubt) - Destroyers
HMS Kent and Richmond - Frigates
HMS Astute (Sub)
RFA Tidespring and Fort Victoria
USS The Sullivans - Destroyer
HNLMS Evertson (of the Crimean war fame) - Frigate

Air Power from 617 Sqn RAF and 815, 820 and 845 RNAS, USMC VFA-211

A journey of over 20,000NM. I wish them well, bon voyage - lots of fun and loading up Oerlikons (and maybe even squeezing off the odd round) - and poking the Chinese in the eye here and there where illegal territorial claims have been made.

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Re: CSG21

#2 Post by TheGreenGoblin » Fri Jul 30, 2021 10:58 am

Johnny their Kung Fu is strong... :)

The Chinese, no doubt, will be outraged...
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Re: CSG21

#3 Post by Boac » Fri Jul 30, 2021 11:05 am

Maybe they can all 'pop up the Bos' on the way back and have some more fun? I think QE should be OK with the bridge - they can always let the tyres down a bit.
The Chinese, no doubt, will be outraged...
I wonder who will be 'outraged' here?

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Re: CSG21

#4 Post by Undried Plum » Fri Jul 30, 2021 2:13 pm

For well over a dozen Dynasties, spread over a couple of thousand years, the Chineseness of the Chinese islands went undisputed in China's South Sea.

Then in the 1930s the ffrench used superior naval force to seize the Paracels and incorporated them under ffrench colonial rule of Indochina.

Then the Japs used superior naval power to seize the Spratleys and place them under Imperial Japanese rule through their 'ownership' of Taiwan.

Now the Brits, of all people, are trying to play the tired old neo-colonial ruse through the most crass gunboat diplomacy since the Amethyst embarrassment on the Yangtse. It's all getting very silly.

I just hope that FCO/MoD doesn't do something silly with that damned Blaircraft carrier, or with her small air fleet of wee spikey things. The Chinese dragon is rather more potent and tetchy than the sleepy Russian bear these days.

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Re: CSG21

#5 Post by CharlieOneSix » Fri Jul 30, 2021 2:45 pm

I didn't realise until just now that 617 Squadron is commanded by a RN officer for the first time in its history - the aptly named Commander Mark Sparrow. A genuine comment - not trying to have a dig!
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Re: CSG21

#6 Post by Boac » Fri Jul 30, 2021 3:06 pm

An interesting choice to 'rotate' the COs. I think it is a complete 'First', not just for 617, although historians may know better.

All sorts of 'odd' situations regarding 'discipline' etc I would have thought. Can an RN Officer write an RAF Officer's annual report, for example.

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Re: CSG21

#7 Post by Undried Plum » Fri Jul 30, 2021 3:33 pm

CharlieOneSix wrote:
Fri Jul 30, 2021 2:45 pm
I didn't realise until just now that 617 Squadron is commanded by a RN officer for the first time in its history - the aptly named Commander Mark Sparrow. A genuine comment - not trying to have a dig!
In a recent Torygraph article I saw this piece.
Navy ditches ‘grillings’ as it revamps officer training for the modern age
Tradition stretching back 200 years is jettisoned in favour of a 'holistic' feedback session
....

Lieutenant Alexandra Head, who has led on the changes, said: “The new assessment is designed to give modern-day learners holistic feedback in line with current coaching and mentoring practices, allowing individuals to identify areas for self-improvement.”

Lieutenant Head added that “people today expect modern training”.

“Our sea training needs to reflect that,” she said. “This is a different way of assessing Royal Navy officers, much more modern, much more in line with the commercial world and also much in keeping with the expectations of the candidates themselves.”
My own comment: I'm surprised that an officer as junior as a Lieutenant leads a change in the 200 year old tradition, which actually goes much further back as far as Pepys, of a serious training and assessment regime for the training and assessment of Lieutenants.

However, here's the bit that really raised my eyebrows:
Colonel Ade Morley, Commandant of the Royal Navy Training Management Group, said:

“This review of our sea-based core training allows our young officers to broaden their skills and continue their learning journeys onboard ships, and modern learning and development techniques ensure learners are engaged by their training.

“It is essential to a modern Navy that individuals can learn anywhere.”
A Colonel?! The Commandant of the Royal Navy Training Management Group is a Colonel?

Oh good grief.

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Re: CSG21

#8 Post by Boac » Fri Jul 30, 2021 3:42 pm

Royal Marines?

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Re: CSG21

#9 Post by llondel » Fri Jul 30, 2021 3:50 pm

Undried Plum wrote:
Fri Jul 30, 2021 3:33 pm
Colonel Ade Morley, Commandant of the Royal Navy Training Management Group, said:

“This review of our sea-based core training allows our young officers to broaden their skills and continue their learning journeys onboard ships, and modern learning and development techniques ensure learners are engaged by their training.

“It is essential to a modern Navy that individuals can learn anywhere.”
A Colonel?! The Commandant of the Royal Navy Training Management Group is a Colonel?

Oh good grief.
Do the marines have colonels? I could see one of them being assigned to such a role, given that marines are naval troops.

As for the rest of it, making a mistake is hopefully a learning experience and shouldn't necessarily blight a career, because one hopes that having screwed up, it's not something a person will repeat. Also, sharing small mistakes without penalty might help prevent others avoid the same mistakes - a principle of the aviation industry, at least until the lawyers moved in.

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Re: CSG21

#10 Post by Undried Plum » Fri Jul 30, 2021 4:02 pm

llondel wrote:
Fri Jul 30, 2021 3:50 pm

A Colonel?! The Commandant of the Royal Navy Training Management Group is a Colonel?
Oh good grief.

Do the marines have colonels? I could see one of them being assigned to such a role, given that marines are naval troops.
Ah. Yes. That would explain it. Well done. :YMAPPLAUSE:

As for the rest of it, making a mistake is hopefully a learning experience and shouldn't necessarily blight a career, because one hopes that having screwed up, it's not something a person will repeat.
Louie Battenberg never learned from his mistakes. He was a lifetime serial ****, that guy. The trail of British carnage (not to mention the millions who died in his incompetent dismantling of the British Raj) in his wake went right on to the day of his own destruction.

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Re: CSG21

#11 Post by PHXPhlyer » Fri Jul 30, 2021 4:05 pm

As someone here previously said:
Good judgement comes from experience.
Experience comes from poor judgement.

PP

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Re: CSG21

#12 Post by Undried Plum » Fri Jul 30, 2021 4:11 pm

Experience is what teaches you how to recognise a mistake the second time you make it.

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Re: CSG21

#13 Post by TheGreenGoblin » Fri Jul 30, 2021 4:13 pm

Undried Plum wrote:
Fri Jul 30, 2021 2:13 pm
For well over a dozen Dynasties, spread over a couple of thousand years, the Chineseness of the Chinese islands went undisputed in China's South Sea.

Then in the 1930s the ffrench used superior naval force to seize the Paracels and incorporated them under ffrench colonial rule of Indochina.

Then the Japs used superior naval power to seize the Spratleys and place them under Imperial Japanese rule through their 'ownership' of Taiwan.

Now the Brits, of all people, are trying to play the tired old neo-colonial ruse through the most crass gunboat diplomacy since the Amethyst embarrassment on the Yangtse. It's all getting very silly.

I just hope that FCO/MoD doesn't do something silly with that damned Blaircraft carrier, or with her small air fleet of wee spikey things. The Chinese dragon is rather more potent and tetchy than the sleepy Russian bear these days.
It is a harsh, ugly, world, unfair, cruel, and our primitive, base human urge to dominate each other, our environment, other creatures and the world will result in an terrible outcome for all of us one day and the universe won't notice, and not a tear will be wept across the eternity of time and space at our passage into extinction!


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You must have somewhere
To go
Your destination remains
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Re: CSG21

#14 Post by Undried Plum » Fri Jul 30, 2021 4:24 pm

TheGreenGoblin wrote:
Fri Jul 30, 2021 4:13 pm
And the epitaph will be spoken in plummy English tones.

It won't sound like some Cantonese kitchen porter in a chinky restaurant who's whacked his thumb with a chopper when dismantling a duck carcass.

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Re: CSG21

#15 Post by TheGreenGoblin » Fri Jul 30, 2021 4:32 pm

Undried Plum wrote:
Fri Jul 30, 2021 4:24 pm
TheGreenGoblin wrote:
Fri Jul 30, 2021 4:13 pm
And the epitaph will be spoken in plummy English tones.

It won't sound like some Cantonese kitchen porter in a chinky restaurant who's whacked his thumb with a chopper when dismantling a duck carcass.
Charles Gray did have a very plummy accent indeed. Very theatrical, and probably adopted purposely. I bumped into him and two other rascals sitting discussing a faulty waste disposal unit with much thespian gesticulating and artifice, by the assembled dramatis personae, in a pub opposite Regents Park, many years back. I was so taken by their ability to make the mundane a little less drab, Gray undoing the grey as it were, that I was prevailed upon to buy a round of whiskies and thus the afternoon faded into evening...
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Your destination remains
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Re: CSG21

#16 Post by Undried Plum » Fri Jul 30, 2021 4:36 pm

TheGreenGoblin wrote:
Fri Jul 30, 2021 4:32 pm
Undried Plum wrote:
Fri Jul 30, 2021 4:24 pm
TheGreenGoblin wrote:
Fri Jul 30, 2021 4:13 pm
And the epitaph will be spoken in plummy English tones.

It won't sound like some Cantonese kitchen porter in a chinky restaurant who's whacked his thumb with a chopper when dismantling a duck carcass.
Charles Gray did have a very plummy accent indeed. Very theatrical, and probably adopted purposely. I bumped into him and two other rascals sitting discussing a faulty waste disposal unit with much thespian gesticulating and artifice, by the assembled dramatis personae, in a pub opposite Regents Park, many years back. I was so taken by their ability to make the mundane a little less drab, Gray undoing the grey as it were, that I was prevailed upon to buy a round of whiskies and thus the afternoon faded into evening...
Gray undoing the grey as it were
If you'd said that, at the time, he would have bought the round, I'd guess.

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Re: CSG21

#17 Post by TheGreenGoblin » Fri Jul 30, 2021 4:43 pm

Undried Plum wrote:
Fri Jul 30, 2021 4:36 pm
TheGreenGoblin wrote:
Fri Jul 30, 2021 4:32 pm
Undried Plum wrote:
Fri Jul 30, 2021 4:24 pm


And the epitaph will be spoken in plummy English tones.

It won't sound like some Cantonese kitchen porter in a chinky restaurant who's whacked his thumb with a chopper when dismantling a duck carcass.
Charles Gray did have a very plummy accent indeed. Very theatrical, and probably adopted purposely. I bumped into him and two other rascals sitting discussing a faulty waste disposal unit with much thespian gesticulating and artifice, by the assembled dramatis personae, in a pub opposite Regents Park, many years back. I was so taken by their ability to make the mundane a little less drab, Gray undoing the grey as it were, that I was prevailed upon to buy a round of whiskies and thus the afternoon faded into evening...
Gray undoing the grey as it were
If you'd said that, at the time, he would have bought the round, I'd guess.
Yes, I regret that that particular bon mot eluded me on the day. They were all clearly "resting" as actors are wont to do, but they all clearly had a few bob as well, and did stand their rounds so it was a good afternoon all round.
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Your destination remains
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Re: CSG21

#18 Post by CharlieOneSix » Fri Jul 30, 2021 4:57 pm

Navy ditches ‘grillings’ as it revamps officer training for the modern age
Tradition stretching back 200 years is jettisoned in favour of a 'holistic' feedback session
Heaven help us! How long before this reflects life rather than a comedy skit....although some may say it's already fact.....
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Re: CSG21

#19 Post by Undried Plum » Fri Jul 30, 2021 5:04 pm

=))
Your message contains 3 characters.
You need to enter at least 4 characters.
Oh, Gosh. Who to choose from these characters hereabouts?

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Re: CSG21

#20 Post by TheGreenGoblin » Fri Jul 30, 2021 5:21 pm

"Holistic"! More like a whole lot management psychobabble. Right up there with "come and scuba in my think tank" in its cringe worthiness!

I hired a Scottish ex nuclear submarine officer and worked with him on a large IT/infrastructure management project for Railtrack back in the day. Calum was very switched on, and was a good people manager, who picked up the role quickly and was a nice guy to boot. Clearly the Navy must be doing something right!

C16 might have found it interesting, as we used helicopters equipped with lasers to help count rail assets in areas where it was impossible to put humans due to the need to keep lines open while the audit was going on. Twas one of the more stressful projects I have been involved with over my varied career, as it was imperative to keep the crews on the lines safe. Two people were killed doing the work, but not on my watch thank goodness!
Though you remain
Convinced
"To be alive
You must have somewhere
To go
Your destination remains
Elusive."

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