Thursday, August 06, 2015

Navy: May be okay for Military Servicemen to defend themselves

Navy unlikely to charge officer who fired at gunman:
(August 05, 2015)
 Lt. Cmdr. Tim White, the CO of Navy Operational Support Center Chattanooga, has not been charged with "illegally discharging a firearm on federal property," said Cmdr. William Marks, despite the claim of a conservative commentator. "Stories of Navy personnel being charged with an offense are not true," Marks said in a statement. "There is still a long way to go in reviewing the facts of this tragic incident, but at this time we can confirm no service member has been charged with an offense."
This statement by a U.S. Navy spokesman may be a result of pressure from the public at large, or it may be that the military is beginning to wake up to the FACT that Negligent Discharges by armed servicemen is a lesser consequence than having unarmed members assassinated because they are unable to defend themselves.

I chatted with my son "The Squid Kid" about this last week.  He is a Navy Master at Arms Petty officer, and one of his duties is to provide arms training to other Navy personnel.

He was quite vocal about the low quality of the people who he had to train, in terms of their initial training.  Essentially, they had NO familiarity with firearms, and often seemed to be afraid of holding a gun.  As a consequence, they were a danger to themselves and to others.

The Navy and the Air Force are basically formed in support of "Weapons Platforms": Ships and Airplanes.

The Marines and the Army are the services who leave to the concept that "Every Soldier/Marine is a Rifleman".  The other services ... not so much.  So when a Naval officer accepts the duty of defending his fellows by force of personal arms, that is (in the caustic terms of the despicable Joe Biden) ".. A Big F*CKING Deal!"

It think that if one American is injured or killed accidentally by another American who is trying to provide armed support, then that's a tragedy.

If one American is killed or injured deliberately by a Terrorist who is not opposed by force of arms because of a chicken-sh*t high-level policy, then that's an outrage.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Maybe no charges, but who is to say his career is ended at O-4. He may retire as an O-4 or he may conveniently be RIFed.