Posted on 03/09/2009 1:15:19 PM PDT by Federalist Patriot
Here is a video report by Jim Miklazewski at the Pentagon on news that the USS Impeccable, an unarmed U.S. Navy ship, was harassed yesterday by 5 Chinese Ships in International Waters. The Impeccable is a minesweeper, and reportedly used water canon to force one of the Chinese ships away that was attempting to latch onto the Impeccable with a grappling hook. The incident took place in international waters in the South China Sea, about 75 miles south of Hainan Island. The United States has reportedly lodged a protest with the Chinese Government. . . . . . (Watch Video Report)
(Excerpt) Read more at freedomslighthouse.com ...
Oh, fine. My bad, sorry.
I dunno why US should feel outraged by it. If you’re going to spy on the Chinese naval movement, you would expect them to want to block it. This goes both ways
As if your screen name wouldn’t.....
well, the name was after a para-military character in the self-named book series... not the british tommy gun
Yes they did. This is not the 1st or 2nd or 3rd time that the Chinese have harrassed this ship...and you would expect that by now we would have something more beefy escorting her to warn the ChiComms off. They are harassing her because they know full well that she is capable of tagging their new submarines.
As usual.
If the vessel were armed, it would require naval personnel to man it. There is not enough berthing and crew space for this, besides, the captain of the vessel is a civilian, contracted by MSC.
The Russians used to harass these vessels a lot in the ‘80s, except it was always in international waters and they didn’t get this close.
It was originally designed for this purpose only. The older SURTASS ships were monohulls.
You said — “The Russians used to harass these vessels a lot in the 80s, except it was always in international waters and they didnt get this close.”
I think the Chinese are still amateurs..., kind of like the Somali pirates, but with a bit more hardware... :-)
One of the reasons they are not escorted, is because the escorts would introduce extra noise.
And the Chinese and our targets of interest are not out in the middle of the Pacific either.
This is not quite the challenge it was when China bullied the new Bush administration around and embarrassed the entire country by sending our military plane home in pieces.
You said — “It was originally designed for this purpose only. The older SURTASS ships were monohulls.”
—
Quote from article — “The Impeccable is a minesweeper...”
Then why is it said to be a minesweeper.
They’re already reporting what it’s doing in using the sonar for detecting Chinese subs — so it makes no sense to report the ship as being a different kind of ship, saying a “minesweeper”... (in other words, I didn’t make up the designation... :-) ...)
If they only knew what their future holds, they wouldn't be so insecure about the circumstances today.
Because the media knows jack about the military and sucks at research
In this case they typed USS Impeccable (It's a US navy ship, right?) unto google and came up with http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Impeccable_(AM-320)
Whereas the correct query "USNS Impeccable" gives
That part of the article is incorrect. Just do a search on the ship or on US minesweepers..
These guys spend months at sea, with no port visits, far longer than any navy vessel other than subs. These incidents are rare enough that a naval detachment would be a complete waste of time. They would have absolutely nothing to do for long periods of time, no work outs, lousy food, no communications with home, the navy won’t do that.
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