Jack, being a Navy brat this story outrages me, and then today there was the story of the destroyer, USS Benfold, that was powerless and adrift in the South China Sea for 4 days…having been sent to see with existing mechanical issues and then had their engines fail. The way our military is being mismanaged is unconscionable, our military is being put in harms way! Hegseth needs to be hauled in front of Congress and explanations demanded, the man is incompetent and that’s just the first of many of the reasons he needs to be removed. I am fuming and sadly, I don’t see anything getting better, it’s getting worse by the day. How do we help these sailors, how do we change what’s been doing to our military!!
My husband served on the USS Nimitz during the Iranian hostage crisis. He tells me about his life on that ship all the time. It’s a hard job. And you don’t get days off.
This is not a good thing and there are going to be more accidents and possibly deaths from accidents on the flight deck. I think there have been more than 2 attempted jump off the deck incidents from what Malcolm Nance reported this AM and like you Jack he has been there, and he has been on a submarine too. This is not acceptable and then to hear that there is talk they will return to a port in Washington state which will require their families to move there if that happens. I also listened to Ken Harbaugh that is former Navyy pilot that flew over the gulf states. He says on t of his military (former) fiends had been given a dishonorable DC for hi PTSD and took it to court and his case is one that Got PTSD as a legit dx so he could get his VA benefits and that is suppose to be written into law. His initial evaluation was done by a podiatrist not a psych doc. That is also a requirement to be evaluated by th proper physician. I hope Mrs Loma's spouse is able to get the proper treatment and any others having these breakdowns. Ken also stated that the person is suppose to be removed from th ship to get proper treatment. None of this is decent. The denial train in this corrupt regime is insane. I hope all these military people are able to get lawyers that will help them. There should be plenty of former JAG officers available. It would be fair game to put kegsbreath on the ship in the condition things are and make him stay for at least a week.
Teri...you've pulled together a lot here...and the piece I'd hold onto is the one about evaluation standards.
If it's TRUE that a discharge determination got made on an initial evaluation by a physician...outside the relevant specialty, that's not a policy disagreement; that's a PROCEDURAL failure with a paper trail...and PAPER TRAILS are what actually get people their benefits back.
That's ALSO the answer to what Annabelle Loma's husband is afraid of.
His fear isn't irrational...BUT... it isn't the ENTIRE picture either: mental health separations have a process...that process has rules...and the rules have been litigated.
Right now...he needs someone who knows that body of law...more than he needs reassurance.
Two organizations do exactly this work for free: the National Veterans Legal Services Program and the Veterans Consortium Pro Bono Program.
Very much worth having in your pocket...just in case this thread reaches anyone in that situation.
On the homeport talk; I'd wait for that one. Homeport shifts get rumored constantly and confirmed RARELY.
Your instinct about the flight deck is right down the pipe! Spot on. Fatigue is the leading indicator...and the accidents are the lagging one, Teri!
This whole situation just breaks my heart what is happening to these military persons. I hope his wife is able to get someone to help get her spouse off the ship and to get the proper legal assistance that he needs. I also wonder how the females are doing with regards to their own person hygiene situation if we are in a situation with limited bathrooms and personal care. I am sure I am just a small part of the uproar this is going to bring with former vets and former commanders. I almost feel like I don't even know how to put into words the anger I feel. It almost seems like this could create the outrage this country had during Vietnam when there were the protests for that was. Maybe it could???
Any deployment can be difficult but they know the end date.. the Orange Shitstain who has never served and Hatesgeth is a fucking moron and overly long deployments make the entire crew inefficient.. it’s a recipe for disaster.
Rachel...NOT ignorant; it's the right question...and the answer is yes...they can, and they do.
Carriers get regular deliveries by air.
The CMV-22 Osprey and C-2 Greyhound run mail...parts...and personnel out to the ship constantly. That's not the constraint.
The constraint...is what FITS.
An Osprey carries a few tons. A carrier...with 5,000 people aboard eats through tons of food a day. Approximately 15,000 meals each day.
Bulk supply comes by ship; underway replenishment...alongside at sea...hoses and cables strung between TWO vessels...doing fifteen knots.
That machinery works fine...thankfully.
What NO aircraft delivers...is a functioning plumbing system...a repaired evaporator...or a rested crew. Those need a maintenance period in PORT...and that's the thing an indefinite extension strips away.
Air can bring things. It can't bring time...and TIME is what is needed.
Thanks. I know it isn’t what’s needed most. I read elsewhere that they aren’t delivering mail. The only positive I can think of is that some may refuse illegal orders if they come. I feel so bad for these sailors and marines and their families. They are so young. Will call and email, but my Senators are bozos. 👹
I once heard this description of landing an aircraft on a carrier at night from a documentary back in the 1980s: Put a postage stamp in the middle of your living room and turn off all the lights. Now from the farthest wall, take running jump and land on the stamp. The interviewed pilot said they all hated night landings. They were counting down until had to land. They said it was the worst part of the mission.
This has been sticking in my mind since trouble on the Lincoln was first reported months ago. Then the recent news came to light.
One mistake. One tiny mistake that takes less than one second. One fucking mistake that costs so many lives. Lives on board the ship, and lives of families and friends.
The anger I feel caused by this administration was already high, but this latest “development” has sent me into a whole new level of rage.
Todd...that analogy holds up...and the pilots are NOT exaggerating.
Night traps are the thing EVERYBODY counts down to being done with.
Here's the part that doesn't make the documentaries: everything you just described...is happening...while a couple hundred people are working around it in the dark. I had some buddies who loved launching aircraft at night...as it was cooler...or somewhat lol. I did some night launches...but MUCH preferred the daylight.
The aircraft is ONE moving object among many...and every damn one of them is being handled by somebody in their early twenties...if that... reading hand signals off a wand.
That's the system that VERY tired...and...exhausted people are being asked to run right now. Not one exhausted pilot; an exhausted deck FULL of people.
Your instinct on the margin is dead on. It's not seconds. It's less than one.
The anger's earned. Just point it at the specific thing: an open-ended extension with no plan for the crew. That's the decision. That's what somebody has to answer for!
My heart hurts for those service members and their families. It makes me furious because it’s all so unnecessary. They didn’t sign up for a war of choice with no end in sight.
My dad served in the army before I was born. I know little to nothing about his time there. He wouldn’t talk about it but something happened that haunted him. He eventually received a medical discharge. I don’t know why. He was entitled to a military funeral. He declined vehemently and I was the one.. the only one.. who made the arrangements when he unexpectedly passed away in 1986 on Halloween (40 years ago).
That’s really my only military family experience except for some uncles and a couple of relationships. One saw no real action and the other came back with mental health issues I couldn’t even understand at 16, much less fix. There’s much I don’t know so I have little to contribute here.
Thank you for writing this, Jack. I know it comes from real experience and is accurate. It doesn’t make me feel better but it helps me understand.
I thought I was tired.. they are dealing with possibly lethal exhaustion. I wish there was some way we could help. Is there?
File the date. August 13, 2026, six days after Blumenthal’s letter, more than two hundred and sixty days into a deployment nobody scheduled to run this long. Note which fact carries the weight in this piece: not the jump attempts themselves, but the discharge paperwork a man in crisis was afraid of. That is the tell. A system that has trained its own people to fear the bureaucracy more than the water has already told you what it optimizes for.
Note also this is not the troops’ fault. Jack is careful to place the failure upstream, and he is right to. The nineteen-year-old on watch did his job. The man who went over the side did thirteen years. Neither of them wrote the deployment schedule, and neither of them decided the war would have no announced end. When an institution asks its people to absorb an engineering failure with their own bodies, and then blames the bodies for showing strain, that is not accountability. That is displacement.
Note what Hegseth has done twice now, not once. In April, he called the food-shortage reports “fake news.” On Thursday, facing new reporting on jump attempts and a sitting senator’s formal letter, he called it “completely misrepresented.” Same target, same dismissal, different month. A single denial can be a misjudgment. A second one, delivered after a Senate Armed Services letter and two independent outlets’ reporting, is a pattern — and a pattern is a policy, whether or not anyone calls it one.
The maintenance-cycle framing is the piece’s real argument, and it is the right one. Authoritarian and merely negligent governments share a habit: they treat the people executing policy as infinitely renewable, the way they treat headlines as disposable. An indefinite deployment is not a strategic choice, it’s the absence of one — and the absence of a choice is still a choice, made by someone with a rank and a name, who is not the sailor standing watch.
Jack is correct to end where he does. Support for the troops that costs nothing is not support. It’s a shield, and shields are for the person holding them, not the person they’re pointed at.
This is how a Totally Incompetent regime is managed, utter chaos 🤬 We need to stop this illegal war Now and bring our troops home. Good read Jack, and will reStack ASAP 💯👍
Jack, being a Navy brat this story outrages me, and then today there was the story of the destroyer, USS Benfold, that was powerless and adrift in the South China Sea for 4 days…having been sent to see with existing mechanical issues and then had their engines fail. The way our military is being mismanaged is unconscionable, our military is being put in harms way! Hegseth needs to be hauled in front of Congress and explanations demanded, the man is incompetent and that’s just the first of many of the reasons he needs to be removed. I am fuming and sadly, I don’t see anything getting better, it’s getting worse by the day. How do we help these sailors, how do we change what’s been doing to our military!!
Thanks Jack…
Christie
Christie...the anger is earned...and being a Navy brat...you KNOW families feel the strain LONG before it shows up in a readiness report!
On the Benfold...I am familiar with the story...but can't confirm it just yet..I'll get back with you on that one.
The Lincoln story is solid...sourced...and has a senator demanding answers. That's the fight worth having!
Keep the pressure on past next week. That's the whole trick, Christie.
-Jack
Exactly!
Yes… Urgent… this is urgent!!
My husband served on the USS Nimitz during the Iranian hostage crisis. He tells me about his life on that ship all the time. It’s a hard job. And you don’t get days off.
Patricia...Nimitz sailor here! Yes...plenty of work to go around, both top-side...and below decks. No question about it.
-Jack
This is not a good thing and there are going to be more accidents and possibly deaths from accidents on the flight deck. I think there have been more than 2 attempted jump off the deck incidents from what Malcolm Nance reported this AM and like you Jack he has been there, and he has been on a submarine too. This is not acceptable and then to hear that there is talk they will return to a port in Washington state which will require their families to move there if that happens. I also listened to Ken Harbaugh that is former Navyy pilot that flew over the gulf states. He says on t of his military (former) fiends had been given a dishonorable DC for hi PTSD and took it to court and his case is one that Got PTSD as a legit dx so he could get his VA benefits and that is suppose to be written into law. His initial evaluation was done by a podiatrist not a psych doc. That is also a requirement to be evaluated by th proper physician. I hope Mrs Loma's spouse is able to get the proper treatment and any others having these breakdowns. Ken also stated that the person is suppose to be removed from th ship to get proper treatment. None of this is decent. The denial train in this corrupt regime is insane. I hope all these military people are able to get lawyers that will help them. There should be plenty of former JAG officers available. It would be fair game to put kegsbreath on the ship in the condition things are and make him stay for at least a week.
#HOLDFAST
Teri
Teri...you've pulled together a lot here...and the piece I'd hold onto is the one about evaluation standards.
If it's TRUE that a discharge determination got made on an initial evaluation by a physician...outside the relevant specialty, that's not a policy disagreement; that's a PROCEDURAL failure with a paper trail...and PAPER TRAILS are what actually get people their benefits back.
That's ALSO the answer to what Annabelle Loma's husband is afraid of.
His fear isn't irrational...BUT... it isn't the ENTIRE picture either: mental health separations have a process...that process has rules...and the rules have been litigated.
Right now...he needs someone who knows that body of law...more than he needs reassurance.
Two organizations do exactly this work for free: the National Veterans Legal Services Program and the Veterans Consortium Pro Bono Program.
Very much worth having in your pocket...just in case this thread reaches anyone in that situation.
On the homeport talk; I'd wait for that one. Homeport shifts get rumored constantly and confirmed RARELY.
Your instinct about the flight deck is right down the pipe! Spot on. Fatigue is the leading indicator...and the accidents are the lagging one, Teri!
#HOLDFAST
-Jack
This whole situation just breaks my heart what is happening to these military persons. I hope his wife is able to get someone to help get her spouse off the ship and to get the proper legal assistance that he needs. I also wonder how the females are doing with regards to their own person hygiene situation if we are in a situation with limited bathrooms and personal care. I am sure I am just a small part of the uproar this is going to bring with former vets and former commanders. I almost feel like I don't even know how to put into words the anger I feel. It almost seems like this could create the outrage this country had during Vietnam when there were the protests for that was. Maybe it could???
#HOLDFAST
Teri
Any deployment can be difficult but they know the end date.. the Orange Shitstain who has never served and Hatesgeth is a fucking moron and overly long deployments make the entire crew inefficient.. it’s a recipe for disaster.
I’m sorry for a probably ignorant question, but is there no way to at least resupply them by air?
Rachel...NOT ignorant; it's the right question...and the answer is yes...they can, and they do.
Carriers get regular deliveries by air.
The CMV-22 Osprey and C-2 Greyhound run mail...parts...and personnel out to the ship constantly. That's not the constraint.
The constraint...is what FITS.
An Osprey carries a few tons. A carrier...with 5,000 people aboard eats through tons of food a day. Approximately 15,000 meals each day.
Bulk supply comes by ship; underway replenishment...alongside at sea...hoses and cables strung between TWO vessels...doing fifteen knots.
That machinery works fine...thankfully.
What NO aircraft delivers...is a functioning plumbing system...a repaired evaporator...or a rested crew. Those need a maintenance period in PORT...and that's the thing an indefinite extension strips away.
Air can bring things. It can't bring time...and TIME is what is needed.
-Jack
Thanks. I know it isn’t what’s needed most. I read elsewhere that they aren’t delivering mail. The only positive I can think of is that some may refuse illegal orders if they come. I feel so bad for these sailors and marines and their families. They are so young. Will call and email, but my Senators are bozos. 👹
I once heard this description of landing an aircraft on a carrier at night from a documentary back in the 1980s: Put a postage stamp in the middle of your living room and turn off all the lights. Now from the farthest wall, take running jump and land on the stamp. The interviewed pilot said they all hated night landings. They were counting down until had to land. They said it was the worst part of the mission.
This has been sticking in my mind since trouble on the Lincoln was first reported months ago. Then the recent news came to light.
One mistake. One tiny mistake that takes less than one second. One fucking mistake that costs so many lives. Lives on board the ship, and lives of families and friends.
The anger I feel caused by this administration was already high, but this latest “development” has sent me into a whole new level of rage.
Fuck Trump and everyone who supports him.
Todd...that analogy holds up...and the pilots are NOT exaggerating.
Night traps are the thing EVERYBODY counts down to being done with.
Here's the part that doesn't make the documentaries: everything you just described...is happening...while a couple hundred people are working around it in the dark. I had some buddies who loved launching aircraft at night...as it was cooler...or somewhat lol. I did some night launches...but MUCH preferred the daylight.
The aircraft is ONE moving object among many...and every damn one of them is being handled by somebody in their early twenties...if that... reading hand signals off a wand.
That's the system that VERY tired...and...exhausted people are being asked to run right now. Not one exhausted pilot; an exhausted deck FULL of people.
Your instinct on the margin is dead on. It's not seconds. It's less than one.
The anger's earned. Just point it at the specific thing: an open-ended extension with no plan for the crew. That's the decision. That's what somebody has to answer for!
Thanks for the intensity, Todd!
-Jack
My heart hurts for those service members and their families. It makes me furious because it’s all so unnecessary. They didn’t sign up for a war of choice with no end in sight.
My dad served in the army before I was born. I know little to nothing about his time there. He wouldn’t talk about it but something happened that haunted him. He eventually received a medical discharge. I don’t know why. He was entitled to a military funeral. He declined vehemently and I was the one.. the only one.. who made the arrangements when he unexpectedly passed away in 1986 on Halloween (40 years ago).
That’s really my only military family experience except for some uncles and a couple of relationships. One saw no real action and the other came back with mental health issues I couldn’t even understand at 16, much less fix. There’s much I don’t know so I have little to contribute here.
Thank you for writing this, Jack. I know it comes from real experience and is accurate. It doesn’t make me feel better but it helps me understand.
I thought I was tired.. they are dealing with possibly lethal exhaustion. I wish there was some way we could help. Is there?
#Holdfast
~Susan
File the date. August 13, 2026, six days after Blumenthal’s letter, more than two hundred and sixty days into a deployment nobody scheduled to run this long. Note which fact carries the weight in this piece: not the jump attempts themselves, but the discharge paperwork a man in crisis was afraid of. That is the tell. A system that has trained its own people to fear the bureaucracy more than the water has already told you what it optimizes for.
Note also this is not the troops’ fault. Jack is careful to place the failure upstream, and he is right to. The nineteen-year-old on watch did his job. The man who went over the side did thirteen years. Neither of them wrote the deployment schedule, and neither of them decided the war would have no announced end. When an institution asks its people to absorb an engineering failure with their own bodies, and then blames the bodies for showing strain, that is not accountability. That is displacement.
Note what Hegseth has done twice now, not once. In April, he called the food-shortage reports “fake news.” On Thursday, facing new reporting on jump attempts and a sitting senator’s formal letter, he called it “completely misrepresented.” Same target, same dismissal, different month. A single denial can be a misjudgment. A second one, delivered after a Senate Armed Services letter and two independent outlets’ reporting, is a pattern — and a pattern is a policy, whether or not anyone calls it one.
The maintenance-cycle framing is the piece’s real argument, and it is the right one. Authoritarian and merely negligent governments share a habit: they treat the people executing policy as infinitely renewable, the way they treat headlines as disposable. An indefinite deployment is not a strategic choice, it’s the absence of one — and the absence of a choice is still a choice, made by someone with a rank and a name, who is not the sailor standing watch.
Jack is correct to end where he does. Support for the troops that costs nothing is not support. It’s a shield, and shields are for the person holding them, not the person they’re pointed at.
Definitely a day to #HOLDFAST
Thank you Jack!
This is how a Totally Incompetent regime is managed, utter chaos 🤬 We need to stop this illegal war Now and bring our troops home. Good read Jack, and will reStack ASAP 💯👍
I am so angry and offended by this treatment of our military I cannot reply. May those responsible rot in Hell before dying.