AMAN 09

We recently participated in the multi-national exercise AMAN 09, hosted by Pakistan. "Aman" means "peace" in Urdu.

Here is an official Navy press release.

God's country

At first, it was fishing boats. Wooden, simple, brightly (we Westerners say "garishly") colored. Hundreds upon hundreds of them, glaring and cluttered in the dirty water, air heavy with trash-burnt haze hanging low.

The slightly sooty white ships (snapped in a sepia-toned world of yesteryear) passing close aboard, sailors at attention formed up on every deck, sweaty, saluting smartly, holding salutes into the distance, long past "carry on". Chinese fishing nets draped delicately, cobwebbed, on the tarnished shoreline.

"We call this 'God's country'," crowed the smartly-togged commander at my elbow, resplendent in faded whites. As we approached the pier, the conning officer's helm and line commands were drowned out, raucously, by a tired band in sagging formation, two sweating petty officers posing at either end of a briskly-lettered sign, red on white: "Indian Coast Guard Welcomes USCGC BOUTWELL to Kochi."


The music at times petered out, but given an important command to the lee helm or bow prop operator, the plaintive strains overswept our hearing again, instantly, stridently. It was hot, and hazy, and the whole pier area, everything in sight, was swept clean of people, just for us, rabble cordoned just out of reach. I squinted even through polarized lenses. Still, all the eggy whitewash in the world couldn't cover the mess of Cochin.

We swayed through the crowded streets in shabby luxury buses, worn with time, seats filled incongruously by officers in trops, gleaming white combo covers on laps, peering out through ragged curtains at the world of dust and dirt and grime and striving poverty just the other side of thin glass, inches away at every intersection, chaos and teeming livelihoods undaunted by a cacophony of car horns, moped horns, shouting, pushing, shouldering.

At night, the air was thicker, ashy with burnt trash, red, thick with fat bugs eager to bite, the back of your throat seared. Lights swam back and forth on the water, dark, oily. We clustered in a "safe" hotel, slouched on soft leather couches, five-star on the water, under the verandah, smoked with incense, icy, expensive cocktails in henna'd hands.

Outside, the sewage ran raw through the streets under concrete-block sidewalks. A large, rusty pipe fitting protruded from a cracked wall; above it, a hand-lettered sign: "Potable Water Connection". Every shopkeeper was a hustler, every meal suspect, every transaction scrutinized. Mopeds swarmed around us, driver smartly attired and helmeted, wife side-saddle behind him, child clinging to gas cap, passengers all bare-headed, husband clutching a couple spare helmets in front of him, heedless of hazards.

We disembarked from the musty bus into an oasis, the training center for our hosts and counterparts, colonially time-warped, deep mahoganies and linen-draped wicker, white lights strung through trees in the humid evening, china cups of milky tea in the hot afternoons. Strictly divided: enlisted in the rear, officers up front, captain on a low, velvety couch inches down from the stage, served silver-trayed delicacies by junior personnel. A nine-gun salute. Flamethrowers. Choreographed acrobatic stick-fighting. A long, static, epic mime-opera in drag. Delicious, spicy curries and breathtaking, colorful silks.

A world grasping and unregulated, scrambling over the ruins of a colonial, civilized, casted past. Marked by our words, our skin, our first-world tastes, we struggled to play both gracious host and humble guest, stumbling through ceremony and ritual unfamiliar to us artless Americans, hardening our hearts against questionable need and inescapable touts and beggars. A free market spurning every attempt at regulation.

And in the evenings, around sunset, before the incinerators sparked up and the bug swarms thickened, strains of music wafting across the water, low, determined, calls to prayer.

Underway on the other side of the world

Another update from our CO follows...

BOUTWELL Family and friends,

I'm not sure I'm going to be able to say "It's a small world" ever again. It's hard to believe that we are about one quarter through this deployment, and we are just now getting over here to do the job we were sent to do. But, it's true - except for some of the work we did during some of our port calls along the way, everything so far has been preparation for this. The real work begins now.

Let me tell you about what we've done since my last email. We've made two port calls and worked with the Coast Guards of India and the Maldives. Both of them were very excited about our visit. As you can imagine, they don't get a U.S. Coast Guard Cutter stopping by very often. The Indian Coast Guard really rolled out the red carpet for us. First, they greeted us with a military band on the pier. Then, they invited us to a demonstration of some of the cultural aspects unique to that region of India, including a martial arts demonstration and a very interesting, stylized performance that combined music, singing and I guess you could call it acting, but it was really an intricate display of eye, facial muscles, lips and hand movements mostly. It was called Kathakali - you can probably Google it and get a better description than what I gave, if you're interested.

We hosted them on board for a reception the next night, and they had the wardroom back for another reception on the final night. In between parties, we had a friendly game of basketball with them. We jumped off to an early lead, but they pulled ahead in the second half. We managed to tie it at the end of regulation, but they outlasted us in overtime and got the victory. Also, several of our crewmembers participated in a community relations project, repairing and whitewashing a wall at a senior citizens' home. [Let's just say we were scraping off the old paint with coconut husks.]

On the day we left, we conducted an exercise with the Indian Coast Guard. We both did SAR demonstrations - they hoisted a swimmer out of the water to one of their helicopters, we hoisted a dummy from our small boat to our helo using our rescue basket. We did some tactical maneuvering with the ships, a fly-by of all our aviation assets, some great photo ops, and did mutual mock boardings with our LE teams. They put on a demonstration of air-to-surface gunnery that was pretty impressive as well.

Our next stop was in the Maldives, near the capital, Male. The Maldives are a beautiful set of coral atolls, about 4-8 degrees above the equator. Tropical island paradise, with crystal clear water, beautiful beaches, fabulous scuba diving, snorkeling and surfing, and really really expensive. We were anchored within the Male atoll, and most of the islands around us charged the crew a 'landing fee' if they went ashore there, going as high as $60 or $75 per person. Hotels started around $200/night. Still, it was very pretty.

We worked with the Maldive National Defense Force Coast Guard there. We gave them some law enforcement and use of force training, did a mock boarding and a SAR demonstration for them, and flew their Director General around in our helo. It was a nice, productive, low key visit with an opportunity for most of the crew to get a chance to relax and have a little fun.

This brings me back to my opening statement about the real work starting now. [We're part of a Naval expeditionary strike group, or ESG.] We've been spread out during our transit from Hawaii, and we'll be doing different things in different places while over here, but we will remain part of that group until we leave. On Friday, the head of the ESG came by for a visit. During the visit, he asked several of the crew, "What have you done for your country today?". It was an interesting question, and I believe it took a couple people by surprise, until it dawned on them that every bit of work they do on board is for their country. It reminded me of a story I heard, that, in the 60's, if you went to NASA and asked one of the janitors who was sweeping a floor what he was doing, he'd say he was putting a man on the moon. It's an important reminder that everyone's job contributes to mission success, and, in our case, it extends to all of you back home as well. The sacrifices you make on a daily basis enable us to do our job - so, thank you for YOUR service!

I know that this deployment is not like typical Coast Guard deployments. I'm giving you less information than I normally would, but I think it's for a valid reason. It might be frustrating, but there isn't any practical reason you need to know where or when our next port call will be. And, for those of you who do know what the current schedule is, there's no reason to give that information to anyone else. Even if you're sure the person you're telling is trustworthy, public communications aren't secure, and believe me, people ARE listening. [In fact, they've told us that every "ship's cell" phone is being tapped.] There are many reasons why it is in the best interests of the crew to keep that information as tightly held as possible.

The next few weeks are going to be pretty hectic and also pretty exciting. I should be able to write again sometime in the next couple of weeks, before St. Patrick's day, anyways. Until then, keep us in your thoughts and take care of yourselves!

CAPT Kevin J. Cavanaugh
Commanding Officer
USCGC BOUTWELL (WHEC 719)

DoD Bloggers' Roundtable: Coast Guard's Anti-Piracy Efforts

Here's a link to a transcript from an interesting "bloggers' roundtable" discussion with two Coast Guard O-6's from CGHQ talking about the Coast Guard's role in anti-piracy efforts.

Bloggers' Roundtable

The blessings of liberty

They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety. -Benjamin Franklin

It is when I am furthest from home that I tend to appreciate America the most.

Not that every place I visit or live doesn't have its unique and intrinsic charms; but never do I regret winning the birth lottery of natural-born American citizenship. Developing countries tend to exude early-American entrepreneurship and eager, heartfelt service, but run terribly arid on all the splendid little conveniences we grow accustomed to enjoying. Other first-world countries drip with those niceties like drinkable water and flushable toilets and driveable roads, but whirr with a cold efficiency, demonstrating little of the creativity or joie de vivre, the multiculturalism, the daring, the refusal to be confined or defined, the irrepressable variety of our melting-pot society. And you cannot seem to escape castes and class systems, more deeply ingrained than even the color line in America, that deep divide that today seems so joyously to be vanishing, ever so slowly, filled in by the endless toil and shoveling of an endless line of heroic laborers.

Here, in Singapore, you emerge into a most modern, economically successful, clean, superbly-equipped, crime-free, and indeed beautiful city, but its residents flit through the well-swept streets like so many timid ghosts, afraid to even breathe the wrong way for fear of a hefty fine and arrest by police unconstrained by laws of civil liberty.

As trammeled and twisted as our Constitution has been over the past two hundred and twenty-some years, it yet remains the unshaken basis of our laws (laws copied and envied the world over, even and perhaps particularly by those who "hate us") and our concept of a society built on the ideal that something as ephemeral and proclaimedly self-evident as the "pursuit of happiness" was worth enshrining, protecting, and defending in our founding documents.

Happiness and liberty cannot be taken too lightly. Freedom may be messy; but it is irreplaceable, bought only by blood and sacrifice. Never discount it, never sell it short, and never give it up. No matter how superficially attractive the alternative may appear.

From the Captain

BOUTWELL Family and Friends,

Sorry it's been so long since I've been able to get you an update. I'll try to do better in the future, but I have a feeling things are only going to get busier over the next few months. Hopefully, I will still have time to keep you informed every few weeks or so. Besides the pace of operations, there are other things that limit my ability to let you know what's going on, however. While we are working with the Navy, most of our activities and just about all of our capabilities become classified, so I can't tell you where we are going or when, specifically, or write about any equipment casualties we might have.

I can and will tell you about where we have been, and as much about what we have done as I can. And as for equipment status, I can tell you that we have received great support from both the Navy logistics organization and our Coast Guard maintenance commands. Necessary repairs are completed as quickly as possible, much more quickly than I've seen on our usual patrols. Trust me, neither I nor the Navy will allow us to operate in any condition that is unsafe.
We've been gone for just over a month now, and have been mostly transiting during that time. The weather during the trans-Pacific crossing was a little worse than what I have seen in the past, and coupled with the need to get to our port calls in a certain amount of time to meet commitments or maximize time available for inport work, the ride was not the most comfortable I've ever had. For many of our shipmates, this was their introduction to shipboard life, and there were a lot of anti-seasickness patches handed out.

I mentioned needing to be certain places at certain times. The Navy refers to this as PIM, which stands for Plan of Intended Movement, and together with the SOE (Schedule of Events), it kind of rules our lives. People get very excited if we are 'behind PIM', and even a little excited if we get too far ahead of PIM. And, if you want to get something done, you had better make sure it gets entered into the SOE. When I was an XO, I used to jokingly tell people that our meal times weren't in the SOE, so they were optional. This level of control and rigidity is somewhat foreign to us, but when you get the chance to look at things from the perspective of the strike group commander, or higher, it becomes clear how complicated the schedule is and how quickly it turns into chaos if everyone is just acting independently.

Our first stop of the deployment was in Hawaii. Not a bad place to visit, and actually, living there doesn't look too bad either (my emphasis!). We topped off our fuel tanks, picked up some needed repair parts, got some more people qualified at the rifle range, and got the rest of our aviation detachment and some other crewmembers on board. This was a working port visit, so we kept normal tropical work hours during the day, but the crew was able to get out and enjoy the island somewhat.

During our transit after we left Hawaii, we got to experience our first 'strait transit'. A strait transit, something we practiced during our workups with the Navy last fall, is different from open ocean transit and challenging on 3 different levels. First of all, there is the navigational challenge. You're closer to shoal water, there's more traffic, and there's less room to maneuver to avoid it. Second, there's a force protection challenge. You're closer to land, so if someone wanted to do us harm, it would be easier for them. And finally, there's an international law challenge, since during part of the transit we are in the territorial sea of another country. That's okay under international law, but there are certain protocols that have to be followed pretty closely, and they change based on the location and the situation. So, we put together a plan in advance of each transit, make sure everyone who needs to be is briefed properly, put additional people on the bridge and in our Combat Information Center, and make sure we are ready to defend ourselves in the unlikely event we are attacked, but at the same time avoiding the appearance of an aggressive posture. All challenging and interesting stuff.

Next, we had a 3 day stop in Kota Kinabalu, a small city in Malaysia, on the island of Borneo. The main purpose of this stop was to work with the Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency, a 4 year old organization the Malaysians have put together modeled after the U.S. Coast Guard. We held boarding team and boat crew training with them, conducted some mock boardings, and gave some tours of the ship. We also played a game of soccer against them and worked side by side with them ashore doing some trail and walkway maintenance at a regional wetlands park.

Leaving there, our most recent stop was in Singapore for 2 days. This stop was primarily for crew rest, but Singapore is also a logistics hub so we were able to get some good support, received some more parts and got several crewmembers back on board who had been stateside.
When we left Singapore, we did another strait transit, this time through the Strait of Malacca, one of the busiest international straits in the world. The sheer number of large vessels transiting the strait or anchored in Singapore anchorages is absolutely mind-boggling. It was a very long day transiting out, filled with more close encounters with other ships than most cutters experience in a year. To give you an idea, my standing orders to the OOD require that I get called whenever another ship is going to come within 2 miles of us. Usually, I get those calls when the ship is 6 to 10 miles away, sometimes farther. The OOD and I discuss the situation, he or she tells me how they want to deal with it, and we proceed. I will usually go up to the bridge myself if the ship is going to be closer than a mile away. During the Strait of Malacca transit, we were routinely 500 yards or closer to other vessels, often within 500 yards of a vessel on either side of us, making 15 to 20 knots to avoid getting run over. Again, a long day but pretty exciting and professionally rewarding.

Those are the highlights of the trip so far, from my perspective. There's also been a lot of drills, training, gunnery exercises, flight ops, underway replenishments, and normal ship's work. Plus a few morale events to round things out. We've been busy, and we are gaining a great deal of experience and expertise that is going to be very useful not only during this deployment, but in future ops as well. Keeping busy also helps keep the crews mind off the down side of the deployment, separation from family and friends back home. It doesn't work, completely, but it helps. With Valentine's Day tomorrow, I know there will be a lot of homesickness aboard. Know that our thoughts are never too far from all of you, no matter how busy we get.

Until next time,
CAPT Kevin J. Cavanaugh
Commanding Officer
USCGC BOUTWELL (WHEC 719)

Facebook

For those of you who are on Facebook, I invite you to follow along with our sanitized adventures by joining the group "Friends of the USCGC BOUTWELL". That's where our trusty PA3 (public affairs specialist) is posting pictures and more from our epic journey.

You can also swap stories, recipes, and sea stories with all the other folks there. Happy surfing.