From Navy Times

 

Commander confident Navy can control Pacific

By Philip Ewing - Staff writer

Posted : Tuesday Mar 13, 2007 8:11:13 EDT

 

Forward-deploying the aircraft carrier George Washington in Japan will help the Navy keep Southeast Asia, home to the world’s most populous Muslim nation, from becoming a “front line in the war on terror,” Pacific Fleet commander Adm. Gary Roughhead said in an online chat session March 5.

 

Roughhead chatted with readers of the Honolulu Advertiser’s Web site in a moderated question-and-answer session about his command, the world’s largest, which includes 102 million square miles, 190 ships and submarines, 1,400 aircraft, 191,000 sailors and Marines and 30,000 civilian workers.

 

He cited the George Washington deployment in response to a question about how the Navy was reacting to terrorist activity in the Philippines and Indonesia, where the population includes about 196 million Muslims. The nuclear-powered George Washington will replace the 46-year-old conventional carrier Kitty Hawk, which is to be decommissioned next year.

 

The Navy has also war-gamed with the Indonesian Navy, Roughhead said, and its commander visited the American headquarters in Hawaii last year.

 

Roughhead was asked several times about environmental concerns, including the effect that Navy sonar training has on marine mammals.

 

“The number of sophisticated submarines is growing in the Pacific,” he wrote. “They are quieter, and more difficult to detect. Active sonar is our most effective detection method. We must be able to train using that system if we are able to operate against these increasingly quiet and deadly submarines.”

 

Nonetheless, Roughhead said the Navy was trying to be better about harming whales and other marine life — he pointed to last year’s RIMPAC war games and said they hadn’t harmed any marine life.

 

But he was oblique in his response to concern about sailors’ behavior when they’re on liberty. A questioner wrote that women in Waikiki, Hawaii, were “terrified” of being assaulted by “packs of young military men,” which caused “countless fights, lewd conduct and lawlessness when the ships arrive.”

 

Roughhead wrote back that thousand of U.S. and foreign sailors visit Hawaii each year “without incident,” that U.S. sailors “are great ambassadors of our country,” and encouraged readers to “immediately report any misconduct to local law enforcement, or the Navy, so appropriate action may be taken.”

I dont believe it, sailors who have been stuck on ship for 6 months getting rowdy when they finally get away from it? Doesnt happen

From Navy Times

 

snip-snip

 

But he was oblique in his response to concern about sailors’ behavior when they’re on liberty. A questioner wrote that women in Waikiki, Hawaii, were “terrified” of being assaulted by “packs of young military men,” which caused “countless fights, lewd conduct and lawlessness when the ships arrive.”

 

Roughhead wrote back that thousand of U.S. and foreign sailors visit Hawaii each year “without incident,” that U.S. sailors “are great ambassadors of our country,” and encouraged readers to “immediately report any misconduct to local law enforcement, or the Navy, so appropriate action may be taken.”

Wishful thinking and belief that the definition of behavior is "relative". As Dewayne mentions liberty call after months at sea with little to spend one's creative energy, and money, leads to quite a display by those who may be dicipline/decorum-challenged at the first port call.