My curiosity on the subject is why a woman is in uniform with her kids in a place where she is breast feeding in the first place? You can't take your children to work with you, so that means you went home, scooped up the kids, and went to a public place and decided it was feeding time. All without changing uniform.

I'm not going on some "DON'T GO TO PUBLIC PLACES IN CAMMIES" rant, because I go to public places in cammies. But it's always on the way home from work. I don't come home in uniform and decide it's time to go shopping at Target without changing first.

Also, jealous as hell of the two kids on the left. I'd nom on that senior airmans nipples any day. In public.

edited 30th May '12 7:03:48 PM by Barkey

Your too much man, too much!

Barkey: TMI man TMI

Hey, she's hot.

But she's also a Guardsman. I don't see why she is making an issue of it if it's one weekend a month.

I always ponder why those women who are all super pro breastfeeding never consider that going to the bathroom or somewhere out of the way is a better decision. That article makes it sound like they want the right to whip their shit out in the middle of the chow hall, which is unacceptable.

Edit: So, I have a bunch of Amazon.com gift cards I got for my birthday. I have no fucking clue what to buy.

I'm thinking a new set of oakleys, mine are pretty battered. When it comes to weird little military knick knacks, I really have... Enough. I don't want anymore fucking flashlights, knives, or camping gear right now.

edited 30th May '12 7:39:39 PM by Barkey

some DO. I dont know why, but some want to be able to do it where ever, when ever...

edited 30th May '12 7:39:28 PM by Joesolo

^

Well tough titty.

Cool picture a buddy sent me.◊

edited 30th May '12 7:59:08 PM by Barkey

I bet money the breast feeding article has nothing to do with military responsibilities and is more just riding on the coat-tails of the Times' breastfeeding hoopla. Just another angle on a issue that shouldn't be.

That is a nice pic. Btw, is the guy on the right holding a M240 or a M249 machine-gun?

249 SAW

Fuckin azn with the 203 wizard sleevin it.

AMMO doesn't get cool pictures like that one. We'd invariably screw off.

As to the earlier question about moving equipment and personnel around on the flightline, my observation from sitting in my bobtail and watching the maintainers and the load toads is that they use the big blue box vans, which we refer to as bread vans, when vehicles are used. Usually, though, the maintainers/loaders get their little rolling tool kit from the AMU and walk it out to the aircraft.

I was skimming through some posts on a military forum dealing with phony Navy SEA Ls. Apparently, most frauds choose to identify themselves as SEA Ls due to their widespread popularity, and I find it interesting that they have a nasty habit of claiming to be former members of SEAL Team Six.

Have any of you encountered people fraudulently identifying themselves as former military personnel? Better yet, have any of you encountered people claiming that their friend of a friend of a friend is a member of some elite unit?

I remember the part in that "Inner Veteran" video where the co-worker stated that his brother was a Navy SEAL in response to the veteran's note that he served as a Ranger. Even when people are telling the truth about their work experience or the service of someone else, it gets a little grating to hear that. When I first started hanging around this thread, I remember someone humorously asking "Geez, Aprilla, how many SEA Ls do you know?" Honestly, I know maybe three or four somewhat personally, but I know very little about what they do beyond what anyone could find on Wikipedia or YouTube.

One of my colleagues, a man who studied martial arts with me, was very subtle and roundabout in his mentioning that he was a SEAL, and he wasn't lying about his profession. I've noticed that people in the SOF community won't really tell you any sexy, exciting secrets about what they do, and the ones who do are either fraudulent or just inherently showy. The latter is more plausible because commandos tend to be very outspoken and aggressive, and they won't shy away from an occasionally arrogant proclamation. I'm not sure what my uncle did in the Army beyond being a Green Beret and Ranger (I have this somewhat well-founded theory that he might have been in Delta Force or something similar), but he has that mean streak that, while frustrating, does speak toward his authenticity. To put it frankly, he's a real jerk, but in all the times I've trained with him, I've picked up priceless lessons not just about martial arts, but about life in general.

I think the people who actually served in the military and lie about their experiences are more jarring than civilians who lie about having served at all. One man who claimed to be a Green Beret turned out to be an armorer of some sort, and he was basically taking various stories he had heard from Rangers and Green Berets and mixing them together to form a composite of his own fictitious past. I recall Tom Clancy or some similar author once joking that military/SOF frauds could put him out of business with some of the stories they create.

Not a special topic. It was something else that crossed my mind today when I was talking to a friend about fraudulent black belts and people who essentially buy their way toward their rank.

Aprilla: For me I dress them down in public and point out how full of crap they are. In my younger days I would goad them into a fight and then woop their asses if they were dumb enough to try it. I can prove I was in the military most of them can't.

Not unique to America. (Warning, contains strong language and a slightly childish sense of humour. Be forewarned, all who enter here.)

The breastfeeding thing can get really annoying... My mom told me about that one time she completely screwed up the negociation of a contract (maybe a loan, I don't remember) because it was breastfeeding time and her breasts stared hurting like fucking hell and she wasn't the sort to just feed me in the middle of the office.

As for breastfeeding in public? I don't care, myself, military or not.

Milk-engorged mammories are no fun, so I'm told. Might look nice, but they're sensitive. It's actually painful for the mother to wean the child off of breastmilk.

Photo of the breastfeeders: Please kindly toss a something or other over that, as us d men, being visually-minded, don't want to be accused of gawking in public and the target of a sexual harassment lawsuit; kthxbai.

There are ways to breastfeed in broad daylight that are quite modest.

^Well said. Heck, a piece of cloth might be...

...

$$$ I've just thought of a possible ad hoc apron that would be specifically designed to allow discreet public breastfeeding that's comfortable for both parties and allows the mother to see her so, and no one else. Also, you can carry it in your pocket if your pants aren't too tight... which, as a mom who just gave birth, they shouldn't be.$$$

BAE Systems plans to cut 620 jobs across UK

---

So, it is the end of the Armstrong Works*

By the way, Armstrong made cannon for both sides of The American Civil War

, after over 150 years. Bastards.

What do you think about this: http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/afp_asiapacific/view/1204385/1/.html

Comments? Opinions?

^ Short form: I'll believe it when I see it.

At the risk of dipping into off-topic politics discussion, I find myself rather skeptical regarding the claims of the current administration, even more so than of politician claims in general.

Since this is the Military Thread, I am not looking at the political aspect but at the pure military aspect of it. Is the US military fully capable of containing China in the region?

On the naval side, I don't doubt any second the U.S. can stop any projection capability China has and will have in the next five years. On land... no way. The Japanese and Korean bases would be incapacitated in a few hours and any logistical train would be a nightmare. IMHO, the USN is limited to defensive ops around China, i.e. preventing hostile action done through the oceans, but not attacking ground forces or supporting an invasion.

^

This.

So I'm an idiot, thinking about this whole vegas thing, it completely slipped my mind that my grandma is the Director of Operations for Ameristar, a large Casino company. She asked me to send her my resume so she can forward it to the VP of Security & Surveillance.

Herp derp networking fail.

I do know a legit former SEAL, but being military, it's rather hard to fool me in that regard. I found out about it because I peeked in his personnel file while I was renewing his Security Clearance. I'd been friends with this guy for several years and it took me being nosy to find out, once I knew though, he started actually talking about it.

edited 31st May '12 7:48:39 AM by Barkey

Nice to have assets available, and even nicer to remember you have 'em, Barkey. Good luck.

On the china subject, I honestly think we could strike them on land, eventually. It'd take months of rebuilding air bases in japan, and(hopefully) Korea. Once that's done we could deploy the Air Force's full strength and whittle them down for at least a year, we've got enough fighters to do it. F-22s would be needed, and maybe even break out the F-117s from the hangars. There'd be huge casualties in the mean time, keeping Korea and we'd NEED cooperation with other nations in the area. We'd also need to go info a full blown war economy too, we'd be in a fight on a scale not seen since World War 2.

My main concern would be reaching a point where they'd go nuclear. If that happens we're all in trouble.(We really neeed a better missile sheild)

edited 31st May '12 9:03:17 AM by Joesolo

We could strike, but we could never occupy.

The population and size of China makes it unconquerable unless you can get the locals to side with you. The exact same goes for the USA. We could smash the shit out of all their toys, and anything they had, we could find it and destroy it. The problem is that we could never invade.

Occupy a city or two, maybe. I can't even begin to contemplate the amount of troops it would take for us to take and hold, say, Beijing.

Honestly, we wouldn't need to go into full scale war production or anything like that. We would just make it an air and sea war. Massive bombardment and strikes from naval and air assets to ground their air force and sink their navy. At that point though, there wouldn't be anything else productive we could really do.

edited 31st May '12 10:18:50 AM by Barkey