FYI:
From Marad Amin. address to Navy League Wed., reported in USNI News today:
No solutions but at least the need clearly stated!
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The comment section at the bottom shows a remarkable lack of knowledge about the US flag and MSP in particular
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Why do you say that DamnYankee? You don’t think your family would like to come live aboard the ship with you year around like Vietnamese & Filipino fishing families do it? You’ll have & nurse & a school teacher on board too.
Why do we need so many ships for “war needs”? Maybe, as a country, we all should step back and analyze this police the world concept?
There is also the fact that the USA cannot build large ships anymore. Yes, I said CANNOT. The .mil and $800 mil new icebreaker are not “building” ships, they are disgusting examples of if you throw enough money at something, it can eventually float and move.
Without the ability to build new ships (in a cost effective manner), there is no point preach we “need more ships”. It’s a nonstarter.
How can anybody take these “leaders” seriously when they count these POS rust buckets that are floating as available resources for a “wartime sealift”. The junkers wouldn’t even make it out of the rivers they are anchored in before they would break down (or break in half).
The future is simple: charter commercial for moving materials and put military personal aboard to ensure nothing fishy happens. Has anybody paid attention to how troops have been moved around the world the last 20 years? Hint: it’s mostly in commercial charter planes.
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Unless they can find a way to allow more militarily useful ships (ro/ro, con/ro, heavy lift, some tankers) sail profitably in register trade under the US flag, until wartime when they can be STUFT, then all of this seems to be a non-starter.
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Almost every other country in the world subsidizes and gives generous tax breaks to their merchant marine and mariners. Seems like a good start to me.
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Yeah, it seems we’re one of the few countries where we have to pay taxes on all our earnings.
When I said find a way, what I should have said was will Congress ever do anything?
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