Trump is known for his obsessions, wildly irrational beliefs that he holds on to despite any evidence to the contrary. One is his hatred of windmills. While that is well known, less known is his obsession with the technology used to rapidly accelerate fighter jets from the decks of aircraft carriers. Older ships have largely a mechanical system of catapults but more modern ships have shifted to an electromagnetic system. Trump, for some reason, hates the newer systems.
What is troubling is that he seems determined to impose his will on a new aircraft carrier that is being built and demanding that they change the system to his preferred one.
After nearly a decade of loudly complaining about the fact that modern US aircraft carriers use electromagnetic systems to launch fighter jets instead of steam-powered catapults, Donald Trump has directed the Pentagon to redesign a new aircraft carrier to replace the modern system with the old-fashioned catapults he prefers.
Trump signed a national security memorandum on Thursday directing the defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, and the acting navy secretary, Hung Cao, to make the change he has had his heart set on since at least 2017, when he first described his idea to Time magazine.
The memorandum gives the Pentagon leaders 60 days to come up with “a plan on the required measures to replace the Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System and Advanced Weapons Elevators with steam and hydraulic systems for the construction of” the USS Doris Miller, a Ford-class aircraft carrier, which is already two years behind schedule.
It seems incredible to me that anyone would take seriously Trump’s changes, given that the design, developing, and construction of these ships take a long time. To change one component because of the whim of one man seems astounding.
Senator Mark Kelly, an Arizona Democrat and a former astronaut, was more blunt in his reaction to the news.
“I’ve launched off the front of aircraft carriers hundreds of times, have a Master’s degree in aeronautical engineering, and am a test pilot and even I wouldn’t suggest to the Navy how to engineer specific systems on its ships,” Kelly wrote on social media. “Donald Trump should stick to what he knows best – ballrooms, bankruptcy, and bullshit.”
What I think may be behind Trump’s madness is his suspected desire to have an aircraft carrier that is currently under construction and to which that change would apply, named after him.
The Trump administration has been accused of delivering a “slap in the face” to US military veterans after reports that a navy aircraft carrier set to honor a Black war hero may, instead, be named after Donald Trump.
The US navy had previously announced that the carrier under construction would be called the USS Doris Miller, in tribute to a sailor celebrated for his heroism during the attack on Pearl Harbor in the second world war.
But the navy is now working to rename the carrier, CNN reported, citing three sources familiar with internal discussions. Two of those sources said there have been conversations about renaming it to honor Trump, according to the network.
Any defense and navy secretary worthy of the office would have threatened to resign if the designs of the professionals were to be cavalierly overruled. But Pete Hegseth and Hung Cao, who occupy those roles, are toadies who will go along with anything Trump does.
To honor the Supreme Mango Engineer, maybe the whole new aircraft carrier should be powered by steam engines, without electricity. /s
ditto the aircrafts
What the world needs is a steampunk aircraft carrier.
I’ll bet anyone beer and bragging right that the people actually in charge of building the ship will say “you got it, consider it done” and then carry on with the existing design.
Trump has been senile for a while now.
I’m sure whoever is building this aircraft carrier will smile and nod and spend enormous amounts of time designing this steam catapult for a nuclear powered ship and make sure it takes at least two years.
And hope he dies or forgets about it before they actually have to build it.
Another recent example of Trump being totally lost.
It is nonsense and more or less impossible to use the US military on the bond market. This is a worldwide digital market. Much of which is carried out in the USA by US citizens.
The real answer is that Trump is senile and has no idea what is going on any more.
Actually, he has a hatred of wind “turbines”. Windmills are Mediaeval wooden structures for grinding grain into flour (hence “mills”).
kenbakermn and raven, you are right. The way to dodge stuff like this is to stretch it out forever while quietly putting in the correct design, as if inadvertently.
Lots of ways to do this: give him a wholly-fabricated “design” in 60 days (anything will do), then pretend to work on it and say, everytime he asks, “Oh, that didn’t work, we had to change it.” “Oh, that was too expensive.” “Oh, that isn’t finished yet. But, we’re still doing it!” Just repeat the same thing over and over, if you like, he won’t remember that you said that last time.
When the ship is finished, if he asks, tell him it’s finished now, don’t mention the correct design, see if he even asks about it. “Oh yes, we put in as much of that as we could”, if he does. Explain with a lot of fabricated big engineering words, he’ll pretend that he understands, and assure him that it’s what he wanted. Style is all he wants, not substance.
If his name gets forced through, change it back to the real name after a while. He won’t notice for a long time.
A lot of this is out of our direct power and in the control of some terrifying sleazeballs.
The correct thing to do would be to demolish whatever parts of the ballroom that exist in two years. It is likely the no-bid slimeball folks who are constructing it did not do it properly. It is likely they did not use sturdy materials. Or build it to-code. It will likely collapse upon dignitaries, and this should be a bad thing. It is also politically sensible to destroy it. I for one will be voting to whichever candidate promises to turn it into golf course rubble.
Why do I say this? I promise I read Mano’s post!
The correct thing to do would be to mothball and use for spare parts the aircraft carrier being modified. We already have more carriers than we need, our purchase was predicated upon an armed forces would still be getting an absurdly bloated and unaudited quantity of the public monies. The pretext for this then didn’t need to be a good one. It was prosecuting a full world war which we do NOT have the personnel for, and based upon a significant number of the carriers always being broken. It turns out that Congress accepted our 12 new aircraft carriers incomplete and defective, so both parts of this have proven to be true.
Rename the Lincoln for an African American lady. He wanted to free the slaves, right?
re seachange@8:
No, the changing name has already been called out as bad luck, but the Harriet Tubman would be a FINE name for the next US fighting ship. And don’t name ANYTHING after The Orange Turd other than maybe a garbage scow. And even the crew of a garbage scow shouldn’t be saddled with that loser coward’s name.
… the USS Doris Miller, in tribute to a sailor celebrated for his heroism …
Waitaminnit, the US Navy wants to honor a (nominally) transgender sailor on Hegseth & Trump’s watch? One with a high melanin count and no known testosterone measure?
That’s not the kind of homicidal heroism they want!
Surely it would be easier to (sssh…) keep the electromagnetic catapult, but install a cooling system on its electromagnets that emits copious clouds of steam just like he remembers from Top Gun?
More seriously… the landing gear on planes can only take so much acceleration and only so much jerk unless you’re prepared to sacrifice payload for something built like ship’s anchor.
Wanna launch a plane with its landing gear still intact and a pilot with their helmeted head still on their shoulders? Electromagnets do it better.
re EigenSprocketUK@11:
Wind and solar power are better too. Do you think The Orange Turd, who is an expert at EVERYTHING(**gag**sarcasm**gag**), cares about that?
I guess I’m saying what GarnetStar had already said, just with wholly unnecessary amounts of extra steam. Promise him the jet blast shields are lined with Corinthian granite and flag-blue polyurea internals. Tell the world he was allowed to choose the colour.
The Hill: Trump’s aircraft carrier demands may lead to waiting game for Navy
They will end up waiting him out. Trump isn’t likely going to be convinced to change his mind once he has issued orders. The Navy can easily take it’s time with analysis of the change, redesign work, and contracting to make the change. Even if they rushed the remaining time Trump is in office would be a tight schedule.
They don’t mention it in the article but Congress could also get in the way. This is a big enough project it will require it’s own line item in the budget and the Democrats will object just as a negotiating point on the budget.
Trump wants them to move the command tower forward just so it looks more like a WWII carrier. This will never happen, the Navy will simply delay the design work until Trump is out of office. The analysis and redesign will take much longer because it’s a much larger change and effects the operational procedure of the ship along with structural changes.
So if I understand correctly, The Orange Turd is going to fuck up something else, a carrier this time, and rename it to the Donald J. Trump carrier, along with the Donald J. Trump ballroom and the Donald J. Trump reflecting pool. I guess it will all stand as a warning for future generations.
#9 @ johnson catman
DJT did cosplay as a garbage man.