Chinese Vessels Harass UNSN Impeccable and USNS Victorious

[JDay]

More reason to quit importing everything from China.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/03/...ina/index.html

[c.captain]

Me thinks the Chinese and not being the brightest bulbs with this one. They will never match us militarily especially their submarines but economically they already own our asses but most Americans don't know this yet.

Instead of mooning the US ships, their government only needs to say that their central bank is going to sell dollars (unless of course the ships leave the S. China Sea) and see how suddenly those ships go back to Singapore or Guam!

[john]

I just heard this on NPR. The announcer reported, with a straight face that "After being sprayed by fire hoses the Chinese Navy vessel steamed off 1 mile to remove their uniforms. Shortly after they returned to the US vessel and performed a war dance in their skivvies."

I swear, I am not making this up, and have the coffee stains on my dashboard to prove it.

If anyone has pictures of this "war dance" or knows a crew member of the MSC ship PLEASE contact me... I have to get this up on the blog!

[john]

REWARD: We have just allocated free gCaptain t-shirts for anyone aboard the TAGOS vessel USNS Impeccable who participated in the filming (photo or video) of Chinese sailors in their underwear!

We'll throw in a free iPod shuffle to the photographer if it makes me spit up my coffee (again) or fall off my chair in laughter!

[john]

USNS Impeccable Video Report:




What do you guys think? I know I have a face for radio but did I get all the info right?

[cmjeff]

John, not bad but you should leave video to the professionals:



Bottom Line: Christina Brown is easy on the eyes, John is...(fill in the blank).

[cmjeff]

What... no one wants to fill in the blank? Anchorman??

Anyway, I'm still waiting on the Underwear-Gate photos but here's one of the "Chinese Navy Ship". Looks more like a trawler to me.

[c.captain]

Be afraid...be very afraid!



The music alone will have you running for the shelter at DEFCON III

Six major wars...six major victories! Name one? Dropping trou on the mighty USN?...WEAK!

What a bunch of maroons!

[john]

The official Navy stances is that MSC personnel acted bravely. The unofficial US Navy stance...

NOT in the finest traditions of the Naval service.


I bet it's eating away at the navy guys for the media to be calling it a U.S Navy vessel rather than what it is... a civilian manned MSC ship.

Either way, I'd take a bunch of merchant sailors into contested waters long before I joined a US Navy ship. We may not be the Navy's "finest examples" but there is far less chance of my fellow merchant mariners doing something stupid!

[c.captain]

Damn if this pic doesn't look like it was taken off the deck of a semi somewhere out on Walker Ridge

[Jemplayer]

Its just case of the Chinese seeing what they can get away with, they tried it with Bush when they hit a recon plane in `01.

Iran, North Korea, and Russia are doing the same thing.

[Mikey]

It's just a matter of time until those photo's surface. The question is: who's going to find them first?

[ds]

John, I think this guy has you beat

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_iKh2ElWKvM#t=5m45s

[c.captain]

Originally Posted by ds

John, I think this guy has you beat

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_iKh2ElWKvM#t=5m45s

Is that fat ass sitting there NUDE?!? You can tell he ain't wearing a shirt!

[trekleader]

Yahoo news is saying that the vessels were tracking subs... thats pretty punk rock for civmars.

Go, Merchant Marine...

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090310/...china_incident

[john]

I've never sailed on one, but from talking with people who have, it's anything but Punk Rock. Long, boring deployments with little/no port time, low pay and lots of Navy BS.

For a few years in 2000, 01... the only jobs available to 3/m's were T-AGOS gigs and most people chose to take AB jobs instead.

But maybe things have changed in the the past few years? Have any of you been on one recently?

[gCaptain]

A defense official, speaking on background, confirmed Wednesday that the destroyer Chung-Hoon is keeping a close eye on the surveillance ship Impeccable, which continues to operate in the South China Sea.

The Impeccable, which is unarmed and manned by civilian mariners, deploys and tows sonar equipment used to locate and track submarines. American officials contend the ship has been careful to stay in international waters.

The United States says five Chinese vessels approached the Impeccable, ignoring requests to keep their distance, and that one got so close that the Americans employed fire hoses to repel it.

The new U.S. effort to protect the ship came as Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi conferred at the State Department, their second meeting in less than a month.

“The important point of agreement coming out of my discussions with Minister Yang is that we must work hard in the future to avoid such incidents and to avoid this particular incident having consequences that are unforeseen,” Clinton told reporters.

Yang, who did not speak after the meeting , is to meet today with President Barack Obama and his national security adviser, retired Marine Gen. James Jones.

On Capitol Hill, Rep. Randy Forbes, a Chesapeake Republican who is co-chairman of the Congressional China Caucus, said he expects to introduce a resolution today condemning the Chinese “harassment” of U.S. forces. Sunday’s incident was one of a series, and the close approach “clearly a deliberate action,” he said.

Forbes praised the Navy’s assignment of a warship to protect the Impeccable but added that Congress must send “a clear, loud message” that the United States will protect the right of its ships to operate in international waters.

The latest incident appears to be “part of a wider and dangerous cat-and-mouse game between U.S. and Chinese submarines and their hunters,” Hans M. Kristensen, a nuclear weapons analyst at the Federation of American Scientists, wrote Tuesday on the group’s Web site.

Kristensen said it’s likely there have been more close encounters, so far unreported by either country. “We don’t know what’s going on below the surface,” he asserted.

The Obama administration is seeking Chinese cooperation on a host of foreign policy matters, including efforts to confront Iran and North Korea over their nuclear programs, stabilize Afghanistan and Pakistan and help sta nch the worldwide economic meltdown. (Source)