Russia is getting better at own goals lately. An SU-35, an SU-25, now a patrol craft. If the trend continues, they'll self destruct a sub or destroyer next.
I plan to have a talk with him in a day or two, and that is one of the programmed subjects. He is normally very good with his outdoor safety, so I was surprised that he had allowed that to happen. Scared the shit out of us.
I got a call from my daughter in Oregon a couple of hours ago that her fiance is missing. He went kayaking on his day off and hasn't returned. She can't find him or his truck at the reservoir that he said he was heading to, and his phone just goes to voice mail. He's not the kind to up and disappear, and he didn't take his stuff from the apartment, so he doesn't appear to have bugged out on her. Now I can't go back to sleep worried about them both.
Update: he had a spill, soaked his phone, and ended up spending the night in his truck. He is ok and home. Now I can sleep.
Ok, a little searching seems to show that this is correct. I haven't kept up. In my day (many years ago) every Carrier Air Group included Marine attack squadrons for air strikes as needed. It looks like the aging of the F/A-18 fleet and the delay in getting the F-35 into service has led to no or few Marine squadrons aboard full carriers, at least for now. Still, Navy F/A-18 squadrons still have strike capabilities and can provide close air support.
Every single F/A 18 on those carriers with MARINES painted on the side is flown by a crew well trained and dedicated to putting bombs, rockets, missiles, and hot lead on close air support targets called in by personnel on the ground. Any Marine squadron, and most Navy squadrons, on those carriers can provide an enormous amount of close combat fire support in addition to the roles Felix mentioned.
In WW II we bypassed Rabaul, mostly cutting off supplies, and let it wither and die on the vine. The island was much too powerfully defended to make a direct attack on it, so it was just left alone and cut off. It eventually stopped being a threat and tied up thousands of Japanese troops and sailors.
A lot of people who back vouchers think that the money is the only thing keeping Johnny or Suzy out of a good private school without realizing that private schools aren't required to accept their kids. My wife briefly taught at a private school. Only a certain type of student was accepted, and the only people included in that type enjoyed a certain amount of wealth. Many students whose families can afford the tuition to that school are turned away because their families do not fit that type. Just because they have vouchers won't automatically mean that their kids get a decent education.
Shades of Jeb Stuart's letter to his father-in-law complaining about the quality of the Union mules and horses that he had captured in his ride around McClellan. His father-in-law was General Philip St. George Cooke, Quartermaster of the entire Union Army.
I have some former co-workers who are all ate up with stuff like this. I think I'll wait 30 minutes after the test, then forward the message in the test to them via text, then text them 10 minutes later telling them that the [name not to be mentioned here] government-in-exile hacked my phone and used it to forward the message to make sure that it got to everyone. See where that goes.
Reminds me of Jerry Clower's description of one of his characters, Dammit Ray: "That boy would climb a tree to tell a lie when he could stand on the ground and tell the truth."