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US NAVY ESSENTIAL SUPPORT What is Going on With Shipping? ... For Want of an Oiler: The Fragile State of America’s Afloat Logistics Fleet PLAY YOUTUBE VIDEO Original article: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vpm7_BGRP-4 Peter Burgess COMMENTARY No fuel and the greatest ships in the world cannot fight. There are important lessons in this! Peter Burgess
For Want of an Oiler: The Fragile State of America’s Afloat Logistics Fleet What is Going on With Shipping? Dec 2, 2024 340K subscribers #logistics #navy #pacific For Want of an Oiler December 2, 2024 In this episode, Sal Mercogliano—a maritime historian at Campbell University (@campbelledu) and former merchant mariner—discusses the grounding of the US Navy's Military Sealift Command oiler USNS Big Horn on September 23, 2024, and compares the state of US Navy afloat logistics to early in the Pacific War of 1942 when the Japanese sank the oiler USS Neches. Also, the first refueling of an American aircraft carrier at sea from a commercial tanker in decades. #logistics #navy #pacific #naval Support What's Going on With Shipping via: Patreon: www.patreon.com/wgowshipping Twitter: @mercoglianos Facebook: @wgowshipping Email: mercoglianosal@gmail.com Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0B9AHrs... 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The US Navy's Military Sealift Command New Workforce Initiative Aims to Increase Readiness of Ships The United States Military's Fleet of Commercial Sealift Vessels is OLD and NEEDS Replacement! Army Withdraws from the Pacific and Indian Ocean \| Army Plans to Lay Up its Prepositioning Fleet The State of Army Watercraft \| GAO Reports That Less Than 40% Are Mission Capable Six Oilers - USS Neosho, Cimarron, Platte, Guadalupe, Kaskaskia & Sabine - in early WWII Transcript 0:00 the Navy Oiler a tanker designed to refuel other ships while at Sea shuttered from the hit almost immediately water began to flood into the engine room and at least one of the ship's Rudders was out of service the damage and flow of water proved challenging for the crew as the only US Navy fuel ship in the area capable of supporting a carrier strike group came to a stop the vulnerability of the thin Lifeline of American afloat Logistics became apparent how would an entire carrier strike group remain operational without fuel for its planes and escorts with one stroke the hitting power of a substantial portion of the US Navy was reduced I'm your host salmer kagano welcome to today's episode so I just penned an article for G captain for the want of an Oiler the fragile state of American afloat Logistics Fleet I want to talk about that article and highlight the case of the usns Big Horn a ship recently grounded out in the Arabian Sea with that of the USS niches and an American Oiler sunk just shortly after 1:02 the attack on Harbor if you're new to the channel hey take a moment subscribe to the channel and hit the Bell so be alerted about new videos as they come out also don't forget we're now on Spotify you can catch our videos as podcasts on that platform so 82 years ago the US Pacific Fleet went on the offensive following the attack on Pearl Harbor Admiral Chester Nimitz the new commander of the Pacific Fleet dispatched his three carriers Enterprise Yorktown and Lexington on a series of strikes to disrupt the Japanese offensive Enterprise in Yorktown along with the fast Oilers platin Sabine sail down to the Gilbert and the Marshall Islands while Lexington aimed at the recently captured American base at Wake Island early in the morning of January 23rd 1942 the Japanese submarine i72 spotted a lone American ship on the horizon making its approach under low clouds at night the sub fired a single torpedo that struck the ship on the 2:01 starboard side at 0310 but it proved a dud continuing its approach it fired again scoring a successful hit 9 minutes later the ship came to a halt as the engine room flooded i72 continued to circle the vessel and at 328 fired a third torpedo that detonated against the port side forward with flooding four and AF and on both sides the ship was finished the commanding officer Commander William Bartlett Fletcher ordered the crew to Abandoned Ship 120 Mi west of Pearl Harbor the ship sank an hour later taking 57 crew members with it leaving 126 to be rescued the ship was a lowly auxiliary vessel of the US Navy the Navy's fifth Oiler the USS Nez Nez was slated to be the oiler that would support the Lexington as it went out to strike Wake Island while the Lexington could get to Wake Island and back it couldn't maneuver it at high 3:00 speeds in and away from the island and more importantly it would not have enough fuel for its escorts and its carriers to perform its Mission so the loss of nees forced vice admiral Wilson Brown the commander of that Strike Force to turn around and abort the mission in much the same way that Nez was lost to Lexington on September 23rd 2024 usns Big Horn was returning from an underway replenishment operation with the USS Abraham Lin lcol carrier strike group now Big Horn had performing double duty in the Arabian Sea supporting not just Lincoln but the Theodore Roosevelt strike group the ship a Kaiser class Oiler was crewed by civilian Merchant Mariners of the military seff command and had become the standard method of refueling for US Navy ships at Sea with the houthi attacking shipping in the Red Sea Bob Al manab region and the Iranians making threats against Israel due to their incursion into Gaza us carriers 4:00 were sailing on deterrence patrols the Roosevelt group had Departed the area in September leaving Big Horn to provide fuel for Lincoln but the high pace of supporting two carrier strike groups and then shuttling Deport placed a heavy premium on the military seift command crew the commander of MSE rear admal lower half Phil SOC had announced a plan to shift Crews off 17 support vessels to prioritize the replacement of personnel on forward deployed ships like big horn a series of earlier accidents including the grounding of Alan Shepard and the hersel Woody Williams along with crewing issues had raised concerns for the logistics Fleet of the US Navy I feature this all in a video I did earlier this month on sea change for sea lift as Big Horn returned to the port of dukem and Oman the ship passed over SB kunan or San Carlos bank and grounded that was the image you saw earlier in this video the ship suffered flooding of the engine room and Dam damage to at least one of 5:00 its Rudders this resulted in the ship being towed into Port as you see here the damage to Big Horn left Lincoln and its strike group without sufficient aty fueling capabilities two dry store ammunition ships in the area the usns Amelia aard and Alan Shepard could provide limited amount of fuel each of them maybe about 17th the amount of fuel but transferred it at a much slower rate the mission loss of Big Horn meant that the US fif Fleet had to ify its operations specifically its ability to sustain Lincoln and its escorts this necessitated the dispatch of most of Lincoln's escorts into the Red Sea to be closer to fueling sources in Saudi Arabia on September 27th the destroyer spru and Stockdale along with the loral combat ship Indianapolis sailed through the Babel menb and came under attack from the houthi who failed to hit the ships not a big surprise they remained in the Red Sea until November 11th Lincoln and its diminished escorts 6:02 maintain their presence in the Arabian Sea supported by the two hardworking akes and eventually two other reinforcements with the loss of Big Horn the US Navy had to get reinforcements into the area quickly to support the Lincoln battle group it used one Historical Method and it shifted a vessel over to provide that Aid the first method was the use of a commercial tanker chartered by military SEI command now military SEI command in the past had used commercial tankers to shuttle fuel out to MSC Oilers at Sea matter of fact the very concept of the military sea transportation service in 1949 had a fleet of 55 T2 tankers to do this mission to bring fuel to forward bases and to shuttle fuel out to ships providing underway replenishment in this case the military seift command used one of it consoling tankers to do a very 7:02 unique Mission the concept was that the commercial tanker would go into Port load and then head out to see but in this case the tanker met not with a msse Oiler but actually met with the Abraham Lincoln Abraham lincol had the ability to fly a stream rig that is an underway replenishment rig directly to the console tanker and in the first decades before this had happened in the past a commercial tanker provided fuel directly to the Abraham Lincoln the second method was the dispatch of one of Big Horn sister ships in this case usns ranic one of four Oilers deployed to the Western Pacific to the fifth Fleet to support him this deprived the Western Pacific of one of its crucial logistical elements and it took weeks before rapaic arrived on station to relieve Big Horn she did not transfer the straight of malaka until mid October and the deployment was brief as both vessels left the area in 8:02 November now the loss of NES in 1942 and the damage to Big Horn in 2024 highlights this vulnerability we've seen this happen more times than we like to say and it's become a everpresent problem starting back in 1972 the US Navy started transferring some of its afloat Logistics platforms over to civilian control started with the US NS tuuga in 1972 by 2010 every Au ilary in the US Navy had civilian Merchant Mariners on board that represents 20% of the Battle Force the problem with that is that the ships lack defensive Weaponry they have no means of defense against anti- ship missiles or drones as we've seen repeatedly in the Red Sea from the houthis uh this concept was meant to save money and more importantly keep ships forward deployed because you don't have the purse Tempo the Personnel tempo or operational temple on civilian 9:02 ships as you do with navy ships you can keep them at Sea longer this however has resulted in issues with crewing that we're seeing manifest now following the loss of Nez Admiral nimts required that all Oilers and replenishment ships be escorted although that would prove insufficient when USS Neosho and its escort USS Sims was discovered and sunk during the battle of the Coral Sea this is Neosho at Pearl Harbor during the attack attack on Battleship row uh neosia was instrumental in supporting not just Lexington but the Yorktown carrier strike groups down in the Coral Sea in May of 1942 however the ship was discovered and subsequently sunk unfortunately for the Americans they also lost Lexington which eased their logistical burden but had Lexington not been sunk the Lexington and Yorktown could not have operated in the Coral Sea for a protracted period of time following Coral SE the invasion of 10:01 wild Canal once again proved this issue the reason that vice admiral Frank Jack Fletcher had to withdraw from covering the invasion wasn't just a shortage of aircraft on board his three carriers but it was a critical and botch Logistics plan that sent his ships heading south to refuel later that month at the Battle of Eastern Solomon he faced the Japanese with just two out of three carrier strike groups because one of his strike groups that of the wasp had to head south to replenish at late Gulf Admiral williiam F Hy faced battle against the Japanese with only three out of the four task force 38 groups because he had to send one off to ulthi for replenishment upkeep and maintenance now as the Trump Administration is bringing in new leadership in both the Department of Defense and the department of Navy they're going to have to look at these issues they're facing not just the shortage of underway replenishment ships but we're talking about the Aging out of 11:01 the US sea lift Fleet the average age of ships in the US ready Reserve force and sea lift Fleet is 44 years old that means that the crucial Fleet needed to transport the Department of Defense from the continental United States to a battlefield is relying on vessels beyond their service life the US Army and Marine Corp a float prepositioning program is being degraded as both the Marine Corps and army are cutting their Fleet the Army watercraft used during the Gaza operation highlight the fact that they are poor and not in good Readiness condition with a Readiness of only about 40% that means that the US Merchant Marine and the Sea lift Fleet is willfully unprepared to face a situation akin to that face by Admiral limitz in the Pacific Fleet in 1942 I talk about that Logistics in a video I did entitled six Oilers that really highlighted the situation facing the American Logistics Fleet at the 12:01 start of World War II in the Pacific so the underpinning for American Naval success which started way back in 1917 when we deployed a squadron of Destroyers to Europe has really been diminished and today potential adversaries like China are looking and conducting studies on past present and future American logistical operations without a found Logistics system in place afloat the United States is a SE power with a finite window of operation in much the same way that the Japanese went to war in World War II and was defeated by a nation that embraced the true Alfred T Mahan principle of sea power today the US doesn't we have the naval component we don't have the commercial compon whereas China Embraces both to paraphrase a famous proverb in which I base the title of this essay for want of an Oiler the battle may be lost that was proven when nees went down in 1942 and Lexington abandoned its raid on 13:02 Wake Island it was affirmed again when Big Horn was damaged in 2024 and Lincoln found itself without sufficient fuel to maintain strike room I hope you enjoyed today's episode if you did hey take a moment subscribe to the channel and hit the Bell to be alerted about new videos as they come out leave a comment share it across social media and if you can support the page how do you do that you can hit that super thanks button down below or head on over to patreon and become a monthly yearly sub subscriber uh don't forget we are on Spotify now and also follow us on all social media uh Twitter Blue Sky LinkedIn you name it we're on all of them until our next episode to S signing off

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