In the 1990s a naval exercise was held between friendly NATO sea powers. During the first exercise a US carrier was sunk by a Dutch submarine without the escorting destroyers and aircraft ever finding or catching it. They simply ignored the outcome and restarted the exercise pretending it never happened. The Dutch submarine captain was berated for going outside of the script. Just saying..
I am wondering how all of the impressive vessels and weapons can combat the new enemy, climate change.We barely even realize we are being attacked. Insidious, slow motion asphyxiation.
the Swedish were able to “sink” an US carrier during exercise 2003, the France 2009 and the Italian 2013, all Nations were able to pass rough the defensiv “Shield” of the carrier fleet!!! that’s why the US has in 2020 chosen to buy an Italian*French frigate as their new ship against submarine and other hazards!!! but i always love this US propaganda machine, never mentioning any failure
0:25 good job hiding that environment friendly smoke
Things like this make me sleep good!!! God bless🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸
All good and well, the Germans thought the BISMARK was unsinkable with its heavy steel plating and huge guns, they all have an Achilles heel. Hopefully this will never be tested. I always said aircraft carriers were floating ducks in the water due too their size and slow speed. God bless and protect all those who sail on her.
May God keep America the strong 💪💠🇺🇸🙏💐
@Anthony Casso I’m only speculating.. Missiles can travel many times the speed of sound, many times faster than jets. Yes, satellites will pick up a barrage of incoming missiles, and missiles can have many times the explosive power than the largest of cannons on ships, meaning that when they talk about all the bulkheads that can seal off compartments to keep a ship from sinking, a direct hit from a large missile, my guess, would do BIG damage period. Also missiles have their own radar etc. guidance systems as well as pre planned flight maneuvers,, they don’t have to come straight down at a ship, they can spiral, zig zag, whatever. Hard to lock onto with a rapid fire cannon especially when there are another 99 missiles coming in at the same time. The cost of 100 missiles is a fraction of the cost of one of these carriers. Not to mention stealth submarine technology. As mentioned before, satellites can chart the exact location of each and every carrier 24/7. Would not surprise me that for each super carrier we have there is a sub following it.
Isn’t the current naval doctrine of the US and allies at risk given China and Russia’s advances in anti-ship missile warfare, against which the west has little in the way of countermeasures?
Thank god for Uncle Sam. Respect from 🇬🇧
Nothing can inspire you early in the morning like this video. GOD BLESS united States of American for ever…..
Nothing is unsinkable. Japanese thought yamato was invincible.
The best defense is not to send them to combat or don’t start one and waste tax payer’s money!
Thank God I’m an American and we got these things to protect us. 🇺🇸 🦅
+Wild Iron This video is at the level of its outstanding contents. The highhest of the highest. The US is at sea, number one in front of China and Russia and the whole of Europe. A century would not be enough to China to level the US at sea. WONDERFUL, ASTONISHING, IMPRESSIVE AND MARVELLOUS EVERYTHING I SAW IN THIS VIDEO. CONGRATS TO ALL OF YOU WHO TOOK PART ON THIS PROJECT!
People forget that it only takes one nuke to sink a whole fleet
For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. John 3:16 KJV, Jesus Christ is the only way……….
Pride of The Department of War!
These ships, ships, planes, missiles are beautiful from a distance, but these are ambassadors of death, who knows how many children and innocents have been killed by these beautiful weapons? I hate every war and every weapon of war in the whole world, I dream of a world without war and bloodshed and without any weapons of war for humanity
The phrase, “My Country, Right or Wrong!” may seem like a rambling of a drunk soldier, but this phrase has an interesting history behind it.
Stephan Decatur: Was He the Original Creator of This Phrase?
The story goes back to the early 19th century when a US naval officer and commodore Stephan Decatur was gaining immense admiration and accolades for his naval expeditions and adventures. Decatur was famous for his daredevil acts of valor, especially for the burning of the frigate USS Philadelphia, which was in the hands of pirates from the Barbary states. Having captured the ship with just a handful of men, Decatur set the ship on fire and came back victorious without losing a single man in his army. British Admiral Horatio Nelson remarked that this expedition was one of the boldest and daring acts of the age. Decatur’s exploits continued further. In April 1816, after his successful mission of signing of the peace treaty with Algeria, Stephan Decatur was welcomed home as a hero. He was honored at a banquet, where he raised his glass for a toast and said:
“Our country! In her intercourse with foreign nations may she always be in the right; but our country, right or wrong!”
This toast went on to become one of the most famous lines in history. The sheer patriotism, the blind love for motherland, the egotist zeal of a soldier makes this line a great jingoistic punchline. While this statement has always been contested for its highly narcissistic undertones, you cannot but help the prevailing sense of patriotism that is the hallmark of a great soldier.
Edmund Burke: The Inspiration Behind the Phrase
One cannot say for sure, but perhaps Stephan Decatur was greatly influenced by Edmund Burke’s writing.
In 1790, Edmund Burke had written a book titled “Reflections on the Revolution in France”, in which he said,
“To make us love our country, our country ought to be lovely.”
Now, we need to understand the social conditions prevailing during Edmund Burke’s time. At this point in time, the French Revolution was in full swing. The 18th-century philosopher believed that along with the fall of the French monarchy, there was also a fall of good manners. People had forgotten how to be polite, kind and compassionate, which led to depravity during the French Revolution. In this context, he lamented that the country needs to be lovable, in order for the people to love their own country.
Carl Schurz: The US Senator With a Gift of the Gab
Five decades later, in 1871 a US senator Carl Schurz used the phrase “right or wrong” in one of his famous speeches. Not in the exact same words, but the meaning conveyed was quite similar to that of Decatur’s. Senator Carl Schurz gave a fitting reply to a haranguing Senator Mathew Carpenter, who used the phrase, “My country, right or wrong” to prove his point. In reply, Senator Shurz said,
“My country, right or wrong; if right, to be kept right; and if wrong, to be set right.”
Carl Schurz’s speech was received with a deafening applause from the gallery, and this speech established Carl Schurz as one of the foremost and distinguished orators of the Senate.
Why the Phrase “My Country Right or Wrong!” May Not Be So Right for You
The phrase, “My country right or wrong” has become one of the greatest quotes in American history. It has the ability to fill your heart with patriotic fervor. However, some linguistic experts believe that this phrase could be a bit too potent for an immature patriot. It could foster an imbalanced view of one’s own nation. Misplaced patriotic fervor could sow the seed for self-righteous rebellion or war.
In 1901, British author G. K. Chesterton wrote in his book “The Defendant”:
“My country, right or wrong’ is a thing that no patriot would think of saying except in a desperate case. It is like saying ‘My mother, drunk or sober.’”
He goes on to explain his view: “No doubt if a decent man’s mother took to drink he would share her troubles to the last; but to talk as if he would be in a state of gay indifference as to whether his mother took to drink or not is certainly not the language of men who know the great mystery.”
Chesterton, through the analogy of the ‘drunk mother’, was pointing out to the fact that blind patriotism is not patriotism. Jingoism can only bring about the downfall of the nation, just like false pride brings us to a fall.
English novelist Patrick O’Brian wrote in his novel “Master and Commander”:
“But you know as well as I, patriotism is a word; and one that generally comes to mean either my country, right or wrong, which is infamous, or my country is always right, which is imbecile.”
How to Use This Famous Quote, “My Country Right or Wrong!”
In the world we live today, with growing intolerance and terror breeding in every dark alley, one has to tread carefully before using jingoistic phrases purely for rhetoric. While patriotism is a desirable quality in every respectable citizen, we must not forget that the first duty of every global citizen is to set right what is wrong in our country.
If you choose to use this phrase to pepper your speech or talk, use it diligently. Make sure to spark the right kind of patriotic fervor in your audience and help to bring about change in your own country.
British lawmakers on Tuesday rose up against Prime Minister Boris Johnson, moving to prevent him from taking the country out of the European Union without a formal agreement. The epic showdown has Britain on the verge of a snap general election.
After losing his first-ever vote as prime minister, Mr. Johnson stood up in Parliament and said he intended to present a formal request for an election to lawmakers, who would have to approve it.
A little over a month ago, Mr. Johnson, a brash, blustery politician often compared to President Trump, swept into office with a vow to finally wrest Britain from the European Union by whatever means necessary, even if it meant a disorderly, no-deal departure.
Now, Parliament has pulled the rug out from under him, and Mr. Johnson is at risk of falling into the same Brexit quagmire that dragged down his predecessor as prime minister, Theresa May.
The lawmakers forced his hand by voting by 328 to 301 to take control of Parliament away from the government and vote on legislation as soon as Wednesday that would block the prime minister from making good on his threat of a no-deal Brexit.
That prompted an angry response from the prime minister.
“I don’t want an election, the public don’t want an election, but if the House votes for this bill tomorrow, the public will have to choose who goes to Brussels on Oct. 17 to sort this out and take this country forward,” Mr. Johnson said, referring to the next European Union summit.
Tuesday was a critical moment in Britain’s tortured, three-year effort to extract itself from the European Union. The saga has divided Britons, torn apart the ruling Conservative Party and prompted complaints that Mr. Johnson has trampled the conventions of the country’s unwritten constitution.
A majority of lawmakers are determined to block a withdrawal from the European Union without a deal, which they believe would be disastrous for the country’s economy. Tuesday’s vote suggested they have the numbers to succeed.
Mr. Johnson’s aides had made clear that, in the event of a defeat on Tuesday, he would seek a general election on Oct. 14 — just a little over two weeks before the Brexit deadline of Oct. 31.
Phillip Lee with the leader of the Liberal Democrats, Jo Swinson, after defecting from his Conservative Party on Tuesday.CreditRoger Harris/U.K Parliament
The accelerating pace of events suggests that Britain’s Brexit nightmare may finally be approaching an endgame after years of paralysis.
Tuesday’s vote also marked the moment when Mr. Johnson’s hardball tactics, for once, were met with equal resistance.
On a day of high drama, Mr. Johnson lost his working majority in Parliament even before the vote took place, when one Conservative rebel, Phillip Lee, quit the party to join the Liberal Democrats, who have managed to stage a resurgence by positioning themselves as an unambiguously anti-Brexit party.
The practical effect of Mr. Lee’s defection for Mr. Johnson was limited, however, because the government would fall only if it were defeated in a confidence motion.
But in moment weighty with symbolism, Mr. Lee walked across the floor of the House of Commons and sat beside Jo Swinson, the leader of the Liberal Democrats, as the prime minister was speaking about the recent Group of 7 summit. Mr. Lee accused Mr. Johnson of pursuing a damaging withdrawal from the European Union in unprincipled ways, and of “putting lives and livelihoods at risk.”
Mr. Lee’s break with the Tories was most likely just the first of many.
On Tuesday, Downing Street said it would press ahead with plans to discipline those rebels who voted against the government by expelling them from the Conservative Party in Parliament. They include two former chancellors of the Exchequer, Philip Hammond and Kenneth Clarke, and Nicholas Soames, the grandson of Winston Churchill.
That could threaten Mr. Johnson’s ability to manage day-to-day business in Parliament, underscoring the need for a new election.
The extent of the Tory civil war was on full display as several of Mr. Johnson’s Conservative critics, including the former chancellor of the Exchequer, Philip Hammond, lobbed hostile questions at him, making it plain that they had not been brought back into line by threats of expulsion from the party.
Opponents of a no-deal Brexit argue that Mr. Johnson’s promise to leave the bloc without a deal, if necessary, would be catastrophic for the British economy. Many experts say it could lead to shortages of food, fuel and medicine, and wreak havoc on parts of the manufacturing sector that rely on the seamless flow of goods across the English Channel. Leaked government reports paint a bleak picture of what it might look like.
Mr. Johnson says he needs to keep the no-deal option on the table to give him leverage in talks in Brussels, because an abrupt exitwould also damage continental economies, if not as much as Britain’s. The prime minister appealed to his own lawmakers not to support what he called “Jeremy Corbyn’s surrender bill,” a reference to the leader of the opposition Labour Party.
“It means running up the white flag,” he said.
Mr. Johnson also claimed to have made progress in talks with European Union leaders, although his own Brexit secretary, Stephen Barclay, on Monday gave a much less rosy assessment of the state of negotiations.
Demonstrators protesting Mr. Johnson and Brexit marched outside Parliament on Tuesday.CreditAndrew Testa for The New York Times
Britain’s main demand is for the European Union to ditch the so-called Irish backstop, a guarantee that the bloc insists it needs to ensure that goods flow smoothly across the Irish border whatever happens in trade negotiations with Britain. Mr. Johnson said he planned to visit Dublin next week for talks with his Irish counterpart, Leo Varadkar.
Conservative rebels believe Mr. Johnson is more interested in uniting Brexit supporters behind him ahead of a general election than in securing an agreement in Brussels.
One former chancellor of the Exchequer, Kenneth Clarke, accused Mr. Johnson of setting impossible conditions for the negotiations, attaching as much blame as possible to the European Union for the failure to get a deal and then seeking to hold a “flag-waving election” before the disadvantages of leaving without an agreement become apparent.
The bitter dispute has taken Britain into new political territory.
Last week, Mr. Johnson provoked outrage by curtailing Parliament’s sessions in September and October, compacting the amount of time lawmakers would have to deal with the most crucial decision the country has faced in decades.
Mr. Johnson’s allies argue that it is the rebels who are subverting the principles of Britain’s unwritten constitution by seizing control of the proceedings of Parliament that are normally the preserve of the government.
The European Commission said on Tuesday that while the frequency of meetings between its Brexit team and the British negotiator, David Frost, had increased, little headway had been made toward avoiding a hard border between Ireland and Northern Ireland.
Asked whether the British government was using reports of its talks with the commission for political purposes at home, the commission’s spokeswoman, Mina Andreeva, said that the body was “an honest broker, as always.” She said she could not “report any concrete proposals having being made that we have seen.”
Mr. Hammond, a senior member of the cabinet two months ago, told the BBC on Tuesday that Mr. Johnson’s claim of progress on the negotiations was “disingenuous.”
To add to the turmoil and confusion, the opposition Labour Party suggested it might thwart Mr. Johnson’s attempt to push for a general election, should it come to that. Under a 2011 law, the prime minister needs a two-thirds majority to secure a snap election, although it is possible that the government might try to legislate to set that provision aside, a move that would mean it needs only a simply majority.
There is so little trust in British politics that Mr. Johnson’s opponents fear that he might request an election for Oct. 14 but then switch the date until after Oct. 31 as part of a move to lock in a no-deal withdrawal.
Labour has said that its priority is to stop Britain leaving the European Union without a deal, because of concerns about what such a departure would mean for the economy.
But Labour’s stance underscores that the backdrop to everything in British politics is a sense that a general election is looming, with key players maneuvering for the most advantageous moment.
The narrative that Russia is under attack has long dominated Kremlin propaganda, with Putin positioning himself as the commander of a fortress besieged – militarily, economically, and even in the domain of international sports – by a hostile West. This propaganda, already building in volume in 2012, after Putin won his third presidential term, reached a crescendo in 2014, after the annexation of Crimea.
So far, there has been no diminuendo, and there is unlikely to be one so long as Putin’s siege narrative strategy continues to yield political dividends. Prior to the annexation of Crimea, his approval rating had dropped to record lows; afterwards, it surged to more than 80%.
But, since last summer, Putin’s approval ratings have again dropped precipitously, to 66% in October and November. Beyond “making Russia great again” on the international stage, Putin was supposed to improve Russians’ standard of living. Instead, after four years of falling real incomes, the government announced deeply unpopular pension reforms, which included an increase in the retirement age.
Addressing Russians’ economic grievances will not be easy. Russia’s economy is under severe strain as a result of the sanctions imposed by the West over Crimea. More important, Russia’s state-capitalist model has led to weak competition and declining incentives for private investment and entrepreneurship.
With few options for rallying public opinion, Putin may well have decided that it is time to “remind” Russians that they are under attack. (Ukraine’s president, Petro Poroshenko, may also benefit politically from escalating tensions as he seeks to lift his dismal approval ratings ahead of his reelection bid in March.)
.. To be clear, Ukraine is not attacking Russia. The Ukrainian naval vessels were in full compliance with a 2003 bilateral treaty governing access to the Kerch Strait and the Sea of Azov. But, by asserting that the vessels entered Russian waters illegally, not to mention escalating tensions with the West, Putin may be hoping to breathe new life into the siege narrative, thereby inspiring the kind of primitive patriotism on which he has long relied.
.. But Putin is likely also to draw more public attention to Russia’s military-industrial complex and weapons development, while celebrating past glory, especially the mythologized version of World War II that he has established as a component of his own legitimacy.
.. For example, the veneration of Stalin, with whom Putin shares more than a few traits, has no doubt contributed to many Russians’ greater willingness to accept repression. The grand military parade commemorating the anniversary of the end of the Siege of Leningrad, planned for January 29 in St. Petersburg, may inspire patriotism, but it will in no way reflect the real drama of the city’s starving inhabitants.
.. In the “Great Waltz” of July 1944 – which the Novgorod event will reenact – 57,000 German prisoners of war were marched through the streets of Moscow, Stalin’s goal being to humiliate the Germans and remind Muscovites of their hatred for their enemies. But, in the event, many Russians pitied the prisoners, and some even threw bread to them.
.. When sociologists from the Levada Center recently asked 20-year-old Russians to identify the country they view as a model for others, they chose
Germany, followed by
China and Putin’s favorite villain, the
United States.
While these young people support Russian greatness, they define greatness not only in military terms, but also on the basis of economic prosperity and social progress.
.. It does not help that Putin’s foreign-policy gambits have become increasingly dubious. It is hard for many Russians to see why their leaders have channeled so many resources to Syria when there are such pressing challenges at home. Watching a Russian boat ram a Ukrainian boat is no substitute for economic opportunities.
For a long time, the slogan “we can repeat” – a reference to the Soviet Union’s WWII victory – was popular in Russia. But the truth is that we cannot. We lack not only the resources, but also the will to let our young people die fighting another country’s young people. Indeed, the last thing Russians want is to repeat a war that left 27 million of their countrymen dead.
