The USA is no longer the United States of America, it is the United States of Diversity. And diversity is not exactly a strength when it comes to IQ or military capabilities:
The loss of a US Navy ship to a massive blaze was “a completely avoidable catastrophe,” but management lapses on multiple levels, including the failure to activate a firefighting system, made the task impossible, a report claims.
Some three dozen officers aboard the USS ‘Bonhomme Richard’ were named as responsible for the loss of the ship, which caught fire near a San Diego naval base in July 2020, according to a 400-page investigation report obtained by the Associated Press on Tuesday. While one particular sailor, Seaman Apprentice Ryan Mays, was charged earlier this year for initially starting the conflagration, the report alleges that the vessel could still have been salvaged if not for the commanders and the crew’s lack of basic training and skills.“Although the fire was started by an act of arson, the ship was lost due to an inability to extinguish the fire,” the report said, as quoted by the AP. It concluded that “repeated failures” by an “inadequately prepared crew” led to an “ineffective fire response.”
The report, prepared by Vice Admiral Scott Conn, outlined major lapses in training and preparedness, poor communication and coordination between personnel, bad equipment maintenance and broader breakdowns in the overall command-and-control structure on the vessel.
For instance, the investigators found that while the ship was fitted with a firefighting foam system that could have slowed the spread of the fire, no one on board was aware of how to put the system into operation, that is to push a certain button.
“No member of the crew interviewed considered this action or had specific knowledge as to the location of the button or its function,” the report said. Even if the sailors had prior knowledge of the intricate mechanism, it’s not clear if they succeeded in stopping the flames. The report claims that about 87% of all fire stations on board were plagued by equipment issues or had not been inspected at all.
This is why Ukraine will not be joining NATO and why Taiwan will be reunifying with the mainland. The US military is no longer a global superpower, it is now merely the largest, if not necessarily the most formidable, of the regional powers. While it still has the ability to intervene outside of its zone of control, it no longer has the ability to do so with any real degree of confidence in doing so successfully.
If Great Britain is any guide, it will take at least 10 years, and probably at least one more major military failure, before Americans and other US citizens begin to accept this decline in relative military power and adjust US foreign policy accordingly.