Fate of the USS Iowa discussion

[SnowLeopard]

Different strokes for different folks! (sorry, couldn't resist)

But the point is that situations mean different things to different people. The Iowa turret explosion was taught to us, students in a serial murder class, as not an example homosexuals in the military, but that profiling is a tool to make a hypothesis, not one to confirm a diagnosis (my wording) ....... and how to badly mangle it by jumping the gun, concluding that the hypothesis is the answer without proof.

Three things solve crimes: evidence, witnesses, confessions. That's it!
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("One of the objections I hear from military men about gays in the military is that they are afraid that they will be secretly oggling them in the shower. Typical! They have always thought they were God's gift to women; now they think they are God's gift to gays as well!"--(wtte), joke I heard around the time that don't ask, don't tell 'came out')

[SnowLeopard]

"The military does not exist for liberals to use as a social experimentation proving grounds. It exists to defend the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic. End of story."

(first noted by TopHatter)

Exactly

Well, I'll tackle this one ever so slightly. First of all, the statement is correct. It exists for the last statement. It is not there as a social experiment anymore than it is there as a place for society to place the problems that it isn't willing to deal with. (ie, jail time or sign up).

There are, however, two problems to this. First of all, the way our society exists is that one can't reap the benefits unless they take the risks. A President is rarely elected unless he has some kind of military service. We have all these benefit programs for veterans such as reduced interest loans, preferences in civil service, educational breaks. We have all these educational programs which encourage people to sign up for reduce cost or even free education.

Take the risk, get the benefits. That's the way our society is arranged. Being a veteran, it doesn't sound like a bad way to me ................ but what if for some reason you can't join up? Then you can't have the benefits.

Now we can say that there are lots of people who can't join up. Those who don't have the mental capacity. Those with enourmously large feet. Perhaps other examples. But such disqualifications tend to be individual, not on a group purpose, not directed toward a certain group of citizens.

Further, it is something more than benefits for society in general, IMHO, tends to look down on those who never served. We'll leave out those who refused to serve here.

And essentially, societies that go around treating certain groups as second class citizens are going to have some real problems. The American society itself should know its history of those situations.

Secondly, most or all of those benefits are paid by taxes. Well, the situation where a group that pays those taxes but has no chance whatsoever to access such benefits is quite possibly a situation in violation of the law. That's the 14th amendment of the Constitution of the United States. Equal protection of the laws and if it is a public organization, paid with public monies, then when discrimination occurrs, the organization can run into trouble.

Which, in an interesting way, brings us back to the original statement. The oath that states in part ".....support and defend the Constitution of the United States.....".
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("You missaid the words so badly that I could not understand you. These words, these immortal words, "We the People" were meant for all people. Not just Chiefs, not just Yangs or Kongs, but for all people."--Kirk, (wtte), ST:TOS "The Omega Glory")

[TopHatter]

Yes, 47. If that number doesn't have any significance to you, then your head is in the sand.

It does indeed have a great deal of significance.

[RustyBattleship]

It does indeed have a great deal of significance.

Obviously those 47 Class C armor bolts have been made into some sort of a memorial for the lost crewmen. They probably have their names engraved on them. But where that memorial is I do not know. At least we couldn't find it aboard ship after five days of searching every compartment.

[Bill]

Obviously those 47 Class C armor bolts have been made into some sort of a memorial for the lost crewmen. They probably have their names engraved on them. But where that memorial is I do not know. At least we couldn't find it aboard ship after five days of searching every compartment.

Is the skipper still alive?
The XO?
Or the top master chief?

I'd think if anyone would know, it'd be one of them.

[RustyBattleship]

Is the skipper still alive?
The XO?
Or the top master chief?

I'd think if anyone would know, it'd be one of them.

That's quite possible. However, when the right time comes we will start making in depth inquiries. Right now we have other details to work out.

[Michigan_Guy]

Newbie here in the battleship forum. I'm Joe, I'm 24 years old and am from a town near Detroit, Michigan. I love navy ships (mostly battleships) and have been learning as much about them as I can. Nobody I know really knows anyhting about them or cares, so this seems like a good place for me

As I'm sure you're all expecting, I have questions. Well, one question actually. I know that the New Jersey, Missouri, and Wisconsin are all museums now, but what the heck happened to the Iowa? I read some older articles online that it was towed to Suisun Bay and is sitting there waiting to be made into a museum in San Francisco. Then I heard that the plan to put it in San Francisco was voted out, so what happens to her now?

Great forum you have here, I look forward to being a part of it!

[T_igger_cs_30]

Welcome ..........."FEAR NAUGHT"...I personally know very little about ships, but I am sure that you will find it hard to come up with a question that cannot be answered there is a wealth of naval experience on the WAB I have learned already

[Michigan_Guy]

Thanks for the welcome!

BTW, I'm having trouble figuring out what that is for your avatar, it looks like one of those tanks that I can't remember the name of!

[RustyBattleship]

I know that the New Jersey, Missouri, and Wisconsin are all museums now, but what the heck happened to the Iowa? I read some older articles online that it was towed to Suisun Bay and is sitting there waiting to be made into a museum in San Francisco. Then I heard that the plan to put it in San Francisco was voted out, so what happens to her now?

Three groups have put in applications for donation of the Iowa. One group wants to put it in San Francisco but of the only three available sites previously recommended, the city doesn't want the ship there. Stockton has also applied for the ship but it is way upriver and the leading Congressman pushing for it lost the election. Also many entities in Stockton do not want the ship.

The third group originally requested the ship 9 years ago when it was taken off of Class B reserve and scratched from the rolls. However, Congressional actions have again place the Iowa and Wisconsin in "sort of" a Class B status. Their letter of conditions is that the ships be kept in such condition that they can be reactivated again in case of National Emergency. No swimming pools allowed on board and no removal of guns.

This group is centered out of Vallejo and want to put the ship at the quay wall of the old Mare Island Naval Shipyard. The city of Vallejo is totally backing the plan and have even sent city representatives (such as the fire department) along to attend the inspections (2 last year) I have led of true Battleship experts.

When I say true experts, I mean the people who worked with or for me at the Long Beach Naval Shipyard when I was the hull, structure and armor configuration manager for the reactivation and modernization of all four ships. One of my team members was MY boss from NAVSEA.

Right now it's the standard military procedure; Hurry up and Wait.

PS: My avatar is me aboard the New Jersey returning back from gunnery trials in 1982.

[dave lukins]

MICHIGAN I think you may have just struck lucky with RustyBattleship,apparentlly he knows a "little"about "boats"LOL

[Michigan_Guy]

The man with all the answers! Thanks RustyBattleship!

It must have been pretty cool to be a part of reactivating all 4 Iowa class battlehips, and to still be a part of them after their decomissioning. I envy you!!

Thanks again, I'm sure I'll have more questions eventually. I'm in the process of building a model of the USS Iowa, just building it from scratch. The company I work for owns a metal shop and after hours I go there and grab all the scrap sheetmetal I can, so far I've made the hull, but the project is on hold for now until I get my dragster back together.

[RustyBattleship]

. I'm in the process of building a model of the USS Iowa, just building it from scratch. The company I work for owns a metal shop and after hours I go there and grab all the scrap sheetmetal I can, so far I've made the hull, but the project is on hold for now until I get my dragster back together.

Contact Lee Upshaw at scalshpyrd@aol.com. He builds fiberglass hulls of dozens of warships. His Iowa class hull is 9'-3" long. He also resin casts most of the fittings including the superstructure. He can even provide photo-etched sheets of the radar antennas and ladder railings.

Still it is considered "Scratch Built" because YOU have to fit and trim the pieces together, add all the details for what era you want and paint it yourself.

Oh, and Lee is also one of my Battleship Experts on my inspections as he worked for me during the reactivations of the New Jersey and Missouri. We met briefly a few years before that when he was an apprentice gunsmith in a gun shop I was part owner of.

[Ytlas]

Oh, and Lee is also one of my Battleship Experts on my inspections as he worked for me during the reactivations of the New Jersey and Missouri.

Is your inspection team earning a salary during the inspection periods or are they doing it just "for the love of being around battleships?"

[RustyBattleship]

Is your inspection team earning a salary during the inspection periods or are they doing it just "for the love of being around battleships?"

For now it's our desire not to see them cut up for scrap. We only get paid for transportation.

However, if they do get the ship a couple of job offers have been proposed. But they hope a lot of the grunt work will be done by volunteers, of which several have already put their names in.

In some cases we will have to higher professional contractors for certain jobs. Some materials such as new teak decking has to be bought. The after crew's head converted to men's and women's heads and both handicap accessible.

Going to be quite a challenge for the Ship's administrator and the Ship's Chief Engineer.

P.S: Still need somebody to train and inspect insulators on how to recognize asbestos and how to remove it properly.