The attachment is a photo dated sometime in 1981. It features the Gang assigned to the US Pacific Fleet’s Ocean Surveillance Information Facility. We knew it as the FOSIC. It was a component of a global system intended to track the motion of Soviet Naval Units worldwide, with emphasis on the ballistic missile submarines that could launch rockets at the American homeland.

It is difficult to imagine a more interesting duty assignment. The picture was taken downtown, in Waikiki, and shows the spirit we had as a group. We have pals who are still swept up the geographic disbursal to places like Huntsville, Alabama, where elements of the German rocket system wound up providing the base for a credible response to the one the Russians carried off after the end of World War Two.

Old Salt Mike T was one of them, and he is still down there. They say Huntsville has the highest concentration of PhDs of any university area in the world, and that was part of the Deep State we talk about today.

A bunch of us made decent careers out of our government service, and some of us wound up retired right here in what we call the National Capital Region that reflects the chunks of Maryland and Virginia swamped by the various components of the Executive Branch. Some of us intend to get together on the west side of the Potomac River on Monday evening and share some recollections of that struggle, and the ways we all dealt with the last conflict on which we had an actual victory.

The Ukrainian Special Military Operation is at day 500 this morning. It has not gone quite the way it was promised to Mr. Putin by his generals. The NATO conference is coming up next week in Lithuania, once a member of the Warsaw Pact alliance determined to thwart NATO ambitions, and now a fully fledged member. There is talk that charter-member Turkey will opposed expansion of NATO, since admitting Ukraine would spark immediate kinetic action between Europe and the Kremlin.

We will see how that plays out. It is a stark landscape that echoes old rivalries in Asia, East Europe and the Middle East. China is asserting a need for global prominence. Iran is reaching out to influence passage of civilian tanks in the Strait of Hormuz. Those who have sailed those seas are naturally interested in those who are doing it now. Some of us remember what it was like to rise to execute the Plan of the Day with those elements as part of what might happen before or after lunch. We are back in that sort of world. We will see how this weekend goes. We dispatched Secretary Blinken to China to make nice with the rulers there. Secretary Yellen is just back from some economic dialogue. We understand the next symbolic visitor may be Climate Czar Kerry, who will assure Beijing that changing the weather is the answer to our global problems.

We doubt it, but do have an idea about a Gang of folks that could take on these sorts of improbabilities and have a good time with them! We will keep you posted on what comes out of the Old Salts this week!

Copyright 2023 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com