There is plenty we could talk about this morning. We could talk about the apparent surrender to cyberhackers of the North Korean Army, who have succeeded in vanquishing the American First Amendment, and to which I have seen no credible response. Nor any to the Chinese who are merrily penetrating every computer network in the country.
I am staying away from social issues. Those are too weird to deal with. Iraq? There was a another brutal ISIS massacre yesterday, but I am not hearing anything about it. I guess we don’t care.
I could fulminate about the normalization of relations with Cuba, but on the whole I agree with trying something different. The state of siege has been going on all my life it seems, and I have been trying to go to the island (legally) for quite a while. The Cuba that is not GTMO, that is. I don’t mind the place, but it feels sort of- well- claustrophobic.
I am willing to bet that there is some fine print we have not been told about yet, so I will reserve judgment. It might be a “two-fer;” normalization of relations and the end of Camp X-Ray with the turn-over of the US Naval base.
That got me thinking about the Navy again, and the impending collapse of Russia’s currency. Mr. Putin has constructed his economy around petro-chemicals, and thought he was quite clever in holding Europe over a barrel, so to speak. As a general matter, we called the post-Soviet state as “Upper Volta with Rockets.” Today, it is “Upper Volta with new rockets, troops in Ukraine and a fever of desperation.”
I am leery of them, and what they might do. Our SECSTATE has done the usual conciliatory statements about helping, but Mr. Putin needs an external threat and we are the designee for that. Their expertise in cyber-war is world-class and they have been hacking our Government and Commercial networks for decade.
This is not the first time I have been a little jittery about the collapse of a Russian government, and thought perhaps I would share a day when we heard that they were going to pull out of Germany, unilaterally. We were in Italy, in gritty but fun Naples, about halfway through a Med deployment when the Wall Came Down and no one knew what it was going to mean.
03 FEB 90: Bella Napoli
Up at 0800, then down to planning for the Ops O meeting at 0900. All the boys get in their places around the two long tables and have few public concerns. Scooter keeps it down to exactly 56 minutes. I get caught up in trying to build FITREP shells on my twelve ducklings and miss lunch in the wardroom. Lutt-man calls.
I bilged him on lunch, but he says that is OK because the plan has changed. CAG is going ashore at 1230 and we have identified an emerging requirement to be in the car with him on the way to Bagnoli.
I immediately cancel plans to do anything constructive. I change and am on station to hang around CAG admin as we coordinate the Staff departure en masse. There are entirely too many of us to all go in CAG’s car, so we join up with the CARGRU bubba’s.
Then we wait for the Admiral’s barge to get off the ship. And wait. We watch the tail end of a fabulously sexy film called “Blame it on Rio” with Michael Caine and an unidentified young lady with the most spectacular scenery this side of the pyramids.
Per usual, we are about an hour late when we wind up on a utility boat (not the Barge because it is broken) for the three-minute ride to the Fleet Landing.
It is a magnificent day and even grimy old Naples looks good.
There is enough haze that I can’t see the top of Vesuvius but the sun shines warm and the castle on the hill lends a certain raffish majesty to the city.
Once ashore we find the CARGRU van and CDR Ed Dicey takes command. He even gets the thing started on the fifth try (why does this van have two ignition keys?) and we start the roll out the gates into the cheerful anarchy of Italian traffic. Ed is magnificent and fearless behind the wheel.
He pulls out with abandon and refuses to make eye contact with the competition; as in Japan, if you acknowledge the presence of other traffic you have ceded the right of way. We blast out past the castle, through the tunnel that has been under construction since 1910, through the bustle of the city and finally out to the NATO AFSOUTH compound.
The good CDR is moving a little fast past the Carabinari check point and the turret operator starts to track on our foreheads; no shots are fired, however, and at exactly 1357 we are deposited on the steps of the Allied Officer’s Club. The van roars off and we discover to our horror that everything is closed. The bar doesn’t open until 1700; the stereo store closes at 1400 (the minute before we find it) and the concessions are just shutting their doors for nap-time.
We wait for the shuttle bus for about twenty minutes until we figure out that it either isn’t going to get here, or if it does it is going to be full, and all that we are doing is cheating ourselves out of some decent exercise. We stride forthrightly out the gate and start pounding our way down Hooker Hill.
There isn’t anything interesting to look at, unless you count the disquieting number of used condoms that litter the street. At this hour only Humpty Dumpty’s Daughter is out and she is acting as sidewalk superintendent to a group of ditch-diggers who are installing a cable beneath the pavement. Humpty Junior is about fifty pounds overweight, twenty years of hard living showing and wearing a bizarre costume which features large portions of her thighs bulging out above tight parti-colored stockings.
We turn the corner and amble past the checkpoint to the Naval Support Activity- NSA, the other one- and are thoroughly checked before being allowed into this part of Italy that is forever America. Place is jammed with the Airwing, Ship and people assigned to Naples. We wind up at The Cube, the NSA version of a hot dog cart, which is selling delightful draft beers in large paper cups. We join CAG and a large component of the Embarked Staff. We are on a large patio and the sun is pleasant and the newspapers are current.
We are reading of the strange developments in this craziest of years. The Russians are proposing a vote on the reunification of Germany! The speculation is incredible. Someone points out that the FID was on station in the North Arabian Sea to end the Iran-Iraq unpleasantness, and we deploy this year and the Warsaw Pact crumbles and the Communist Party of the Soviet Union itself is quivering.
They had better not make us mad!
Two beers and we leap in the bus for the Opening of the Allied O Club. The results are predictable. We teach Chop how to roll dice for drinks. CAG starts on Martinis, which is clearly the drink of choice and within about two hours the entire Air Wing is bellied up to the bar. The decibel level is increasing in direct proportion to the lack of coherence. DCAG finally announces that hunger is setting in and he has got the perfect restaurant for us to try up the coast. Clearly it is time for a road trip. The Staff divides into two cars; Dad has one and Mom takes the lead to get us there. Me, Lutt-man, Mark and Toad ride with Mom. Dad has Scooter, CAGMO, Gunner and Chop.
You must remember that CAG HATES to follow, and there are no clear directions, so there is a fair amount of pandemonium on the road. We are traffic jammed and stuck, flying around blind corners and heading into the confusion of Nighttime Napoli. The muttering in the backseat about “How lost IS the Deputy?” was just getting to the audible stage when DCAG cuts boldly across traffic on a red light and we arrive at the marvelous little bistro La Placienta overlooking the Bay. It is all whitewashed stone and wood and glass and a perfectly delightful place.
Dinner is great; we start with an antipasto that consists of several unidentifiable items (pickled peas? Eggplant sauté?). The Deputy digs into a giant mound of real mozzarella and prosciutto. The wine is wonderful and the pasta course about finishes us off. The conversation is loud and fun and the brandy and coffee are superb. By the time we are finished the place is full. It is eleven o’clock and the Italians are just getting on a roll. It is time for us to roll home, though, so we once more pile into the rental cars for the race home.
Now all players have at least a general idea of where we are, so the fight is on. CAG gets the lead, we are scrambling around and through slower moving traffic, ignoring the lights and generally having a ball. We get stuck in traffic down near the castle and a staff officer who shall remain nameless demonstrates his contempt for the junior occupants of the other car by pressing his nude hams out the window. He couldn’t have been pointing that thang at the CAG, could he?
At length we roll into the pier complex and save for the three minute ride to the ship, we are done for the evening. Home by 0100. Not bad. A day of relative moderation. Lutt-man is off to France tomorrow for the Exercise Harmonie Sud-west debrief with the French, and he is escorting Skipper Hoff Lewis from VA-56.
He has to get up at 0730. I’m glad it’s not me!
Copyright 2014 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com
Twitter: @jayare303