May 29, 2025
The Status of Forces
Korea has always had a tug on my spirit. Maybe it goes back to my fourteen-month assignment in what had, originally, been the steam bath for Japanese Forces assigned to occupy the ancient capital of a unified nation. We looked at the frontier a couple dozen miles to the North, and the irksome antics of […]
May 23, 2025
Local Story
That picture is the way part of the Jewish Museum in Washington used to look. It was fifteen minutes across town, and is about the way it looked the last time we saw it in person. The majority of it, in fact, before Lillian and Albert Small made a commitment to move the original synagogue […]
May 20, 2025
Fleet Week at The Trilliumv
Morning, Shipmates! Busy morning coming up here at The Trillium, although not as busy as Fleet Week up in New York! The run up to our Memorial Day explains why the Mexican Navy’s Tall Ship Cuauhtémoc, was in New York and the tragic crash into the Brooklyn Bridge last Sunday, resulting in two fatalities and […]
May 18, 2025
The Newest Socotra Book! Dick Ranger, Third Eye!
This is the all-new special edition of the book that started it all back in 1980 or so. I will quote Roger Hull in the below introduction he wrote at the time, not realizing the next 46 years would have many a drop and tittle in them. With war with Iran looming again, we thought […]
May 18, 2025
Rough Riders
The word about Truman’s entry to the Med came in through the dozen or so addressees in the Old Salt Collective distro. The Salts are as tough a lot as I have been privileged to know in this world, and their grizzle was earned in brilliant day and dusky night out on the World Ocean. […]
May 13, 2025
The Rains Doth Come
And they came- two inches worth-today. We had been dry, and God knows the consequences of itchy dry and a brisk wind and a spark in the night. So we will let the Santa Anna sleep for a while and get the green to grow as we head toward birthdays coming in June. There was […]
April 26, 2025
Target Three
I had to take a wave off on Target Two yesterday, and though I regret it, the decision was correct and pulling the ejection handle was the right thing to do. Target Three was accomplished this morning with a modicum of effort, since I only had to roll full left and nearly full right for […]
April 2, 2025
Liberation Day
The title yesterday should have read “April Fools” or something and will refrain from any commentary on the outbreak of hostilities with Iran, the use of thirty-thousand pound bunker-busting aerial delivered ordnance, or the name of the big body of water west of Key West. Are we clear yet? With the deck suitably cleared of […]
March 23, 2025
The Real Navy
Gentle Readers, I beg your forgiveness for this short departure from traditional Daily Socotra format and braggadocio. If you take a short look at the image of USS Nimitz (CVN-68) above you will get a hint of her vastness. Forgive her the running rust on her elevator bays. That is a symptom of a different […]