"He deserves no "benefit of the doubt"."
Sure he does. What if he had a stroke? What if there was a major malfunction, or sabotage? What if this is a cover up for something clandestine? What if? Hey, I'm all for being a conservative, pull-yourself-up by the bootstrap sort of person, but that doesn't mean we have to act like A-holes too.
Some of us are not acting.
You run aground, you're fired.
Period.
I saw it happen often in Vietnam with LST's.
In civilian life the boss makes a mistake, it costs money, in the military, the boss (CO) makes a mistake, you pay for it with lives.
STROKE-- The capt doesn't drive. sorry.
MALFUNCTION-- The Capt should have known.
SABOTAGE--Nuke submariners are perhaps the most vetted people in the world. Sorry, this isn't a shoe bomber.
CLANDESTINE--We don't order our subs to "clandestingly strike the bottom".
It don't wash. With one sailor critical, the Capt screwed the pooch on this one.
No military experience huh?
Rocks and shoals..
article 4 section 10
http://www.history.navy.mil/faqs/faq59-7.htm
" What if this is a
cover up for something clandestine?"
Worth repeating. What if they hit something man made...or something man made hit them?
You raise a good point. One concern I have with our military is that, as our weapons grow fewer but hugely more expensive (a new F-22 costs, what, as much as a whole squadron of WW2 B-17's), those entrusted with them will be forced to be more conservative and take fewer chances to avoid career-killing SNAFUs like this. Which sounds good -- until a wartime emergency requires them to know how to push the envelope.