Tactical Submarines | Launching Missiles and Torpedoes from Subs | 30 Year Navy Vet | Rob Peters - Combat Story

Episode Transcript
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(00:01):
So if I'm going to use torpedo,for example, as my method to kill.
Then, I need to be within launchparameters of the weapon, the
weapon, the submarine and the fuel.
Right?
And then once that happens, youknow, am I placed in the right place?
Do I shoot?
Then what comes next?
Well then, the enemy gets a vote.
At some point, he may comeback and want, you know, he may

(00:23):
want to do something to you.
So how do you position yourselfto get out alive, right?
Welcome to Combat Story.
I'm Ryan Fugit and I serve WarzoneTours as an Army Attack Helicopter Pilot
and CIA Officer over a 15 year career.
I'm fascinated by the experiencesof the elite in combat.
On this show, I interview some ofthe best to understand what combat
felt like on their front lines.

(00:43):
This is Combat Story.
Today, we have a combat story first, as wehear firsthand from Rob Peters, who spent
almost 30 years in the Navy on submarinesin the mid 1990s to just this year.
Rob served on five differentsubs and commanded twice.
In this episode, we cover some ofthe different types of subs, the
training, the mission sets, to includespecial operations force support

(01:04):
and delivery, attack parameters,missile launches, and more.
We found Rob thanks to a formerguest and forever friend of the show,
Todd Opalski, the Marine sniper andrecon operator invited to Delta.
He and Rob met in an unusual way.
And Todd, a decorated combat leaderhimself at truly the highest level,
suggested strongly that I interview Robnot just for some unique and humorous

(01:26):
insights from a life underwater, butalso for the leadership experiences
and learnings Rob shared with Todd.
To me, that is high praisecoming from Popowski.
With that, please enjoy thisdeep dive into the deep ocean
of submarines with Rob Peters.
Rob, thanks so much for taking thetime to share your story with us today.
Yeah, thanks a lot, Ryan.

(01:46):
Thanks for having me on.
So it's a pleasure.
So we got connected in a very unusual way.
Uh, many people who listened to thispodcast, know the name Todd Opalski,
uh, very decorated and accomplishedMarine enlisted officer, sniper force
recon, and then invited over to Delta.
Um, he's done it all andpeople loved hearing his story.

(02:07):
So for people listening, uh, Toddconnected me with Rob and Rob,
I'd love to hear how you two met.
And what those conditions were.
Yeah.
Right.
Uh, so who would ever think that a,uh, you know, crane on eat, eat and
marine would meet, you know, a watchedup sailor in the middle of nowhere.
So, uh, the scene wasO'Reilly Lake, Oregon.
Um, I'm through hiking thePacific crest trail, North bound.

(02:29):
And so as Todd and I was alreadythere, um, I stopped for resupply.
I was going to camp there for the night.
And, uh, and I just happenedto run into Todd, this guy's,
you know, in tank top and.
I can see his tattoos and like,Oh, clearly he's a veteran.
It's just, I think veterans, whenthey see other veterans, it's an
instant, you know, connections like,Oh, you got a different vibe from the
people who normally hike the trail.

(02:50):
And we got to talk in and, you know,hit it off pretty, pretty quickly.
And then he said, he's on his way.
He just stopped in for supplies.
And he's going up the trail.
I'm like, cool, you know, hopefully runinto you, you know, and that was it So
the next morning I usually get up atodark 30 and i'm out of i'm out of camp
by zero five and and i'm heading up Andand todd just happened to be stopped

(03:11):
somewhere a couple miles north of whereI camped for the night and um, and we
started talking again next thing, youknow, we're hiking together and for the
next 600 miles We hiked and finished thepacific crest trail northbound together.
So we spent you know, we joked about it.
We called ourselves team blue greenAnd uh, you know, there's a there's a
picture of us, uh at the canadian borderholding an american flag It was great.

(03:34):
And uh, you know, todd's a greatamerican, uh, fantastic career just
an all around great person and uh Youknow, I, my, my career dwarfs his and
uh, and what he's done for this country.
Uh, but it's a pleasure to be mentionedin the it's an honor to be mentioned
in the same name as him We're we'rein two completely different leagues
He he holds you in the same regardbecause that's what he was saying He

(03:56):
hasn't he has never referred somebodyto this show and he's like ryan You
have to interview rob and so 600 miles.
How how many days is that?
You know, hiking number of days,probably, you know, 20 days, you know,
we're averaging 25 to 30 miles a day.
Uh, that was what we were doing atthat point on the trail and, you
know, yeah, it's, you know, for aguy who was, uh, Who basically spent

(04:19):
most of his time on submarines, youknow, hiking that many miles a day,
uh, it takes takes a little work.
You get used to it though.
Yeah, was he justsprinting this whole time?
I mean, I imagine hedoes this pretty fast.
Yeah, he's a he's a pro.
Um, you know, and I can, Ican keep up for the most part.
Um, there were some days he, he got aheadand, uh, you know, but at the end of the
day, we know where we're going to rally.

(04:39):
So, you know, generallywe had a rally point.
We've just set up where we'dstop and, you know, have water,
have food and stuff like that.
But, um, generally, youknow, we would just leapfrog.
And by the time you're there,you're over 2000 miles height.
So you're, you become prettymuch a professional walker.
And, uh, you know, you get good at, youknow, walking with a rock on your back.
I still remember himwhen I interviewed him.
He said, uh, he's like, Ijust loved ranger school.

(05:01):
Oh, you're just outsidethe whole time rucking.
It's great.
And I was like, nobody says that.
So, yeah, yeah.
So, um, you know, it's funnybecause, uh, my wife and I, we,
we've joked about it over the years.
Like, Hey, you know, when you getout of the Navy, you ought to, you
ought to, we ought to go on a cruise.
I'm like, no.
I'm not paying money to go to see,you know, I spent a chunk of my adult
life getting paid to go to see andI'm like, I'm not ready for that.

(05:24):
So for someone who, you know, lived, youknow, lived in outdoors doing their job
and then wanting to do it afterwards,that's a different level, you know, Yeah.
What was the inspiration foryou to actually do that trail?
Yeah.
Um, I fell in love firstwith the Appalachian trail.
Uh back in 2008, in fact, I didn't evenknow it existed And I was stationed
in dc and took my family to shenandoahnational park And we discovered

(05:49):
the appellation trail and it's likewow, this thing goes from georgia to
mayhem Like wow, this is pretty cool.
And I started hiking it because atthe time I was like I wasn't really
happy that the Navy sent me to DC.
I just kind of, you know, you acceptorders, Roger that, and you go do it.
But I made it a point everywhereI've lived, I make it a point to,
you know, embrace the assignment,embrace the area that I live in.

(06:10):
So what better way to seeVirginia than hike it?
Yeah.
And, you know, over a quarter ofthe trail, the Appalachian Trail,
is in Virginia, and so I startedhiking it, and I started enjoying it.
And I, and I backpacked andcamped as a kid, and as a young
adult, so I, I enjoyed doing it.
It was just rediscovering it.
And, um, you know, fast forward,as I'm getting ready to leave the
military, I'm, at this point, I'vebeen hiking the Appalachian Trail.

(06:30):
I've hiked over a thousand miles of it.
I'm like, alright.
I got to hike another trail, you know,I already set up my mind that I'm not
going straight into the job market.
I'm going to, you know, I need tomentally reset for my career and trigger
out what my priorities in life are.
So that was the impetus behindit to answer your question.
So what I ended up doing was, um, afterI retired in March of this year, um, in

(06:51):
the fall of 2023, I decided I'm goingto through hike Pacific crest trail.
And, um, yeah, so I retiredon the 1st of March this year.
And 21 days later, I havea backpack on my back.
I'm at the Mexican border.
It's warm out.
It's campo, california I'm walkingnorth i'm pinching myself going.
Uh, what am I doing?
You know, it was surreal that firstday and then you know 159 days later.

(07:14):
I'm at the canadian border goodon you Did you find your, your
meaning at the end of that trail?
Uh, yeah, I think I did.
I, the one thing I did discover is themost important thing in my life is time.
Um, yeah, that's the thingthat I didn't realize.
You know, I think part of it waswhen I left the military, I didn't
understand my priorities in life.
And, you know, to me, Time was,you know, I think you put in

(07:36):
hierarchies, you know, God, family,country, always, always, always.
But in terms of just personal, while I'mhere, my time's worth more than anything.
So it's, it's affected the way I view,you know, my decisions from that point on.
And I think living out of, uh, youknow, basically everything I own in my
life is worn on my back and every dayit was food, water, distance, shelter.

(07:58):
Um, when that becomesyour priority every day.
You know, it just made me re rethink mypriorities in life and time became the
thing that that was the most valuable.
Okay.
So, as I mentioned, uh, as we werekicking off, you are our first Submariner.
Is that how I should say it?
Uh, Submariner.
Although I think, uh, I thinksome other people say Submariner.

(08:18):
I've been called worse names in my life.
So, you know.
Got it.
So, we've got a lot of ground to cover,but I am interested kind of growing up.
What piqued your interest maybein just in the navy in general or
was it always subs from the start?
Oh, gosh, it wasn't itwasn't subs at the start.
Um, my dad was a world war ii in koreavet and uh, No, and then after yeah, he

(08:42):
was he was a cb in world war ii So hedropped out of high school at the age of
17 enlisted in the navy with his dad'spermission Uh went to boot camp and you
know, his dad was in the navy Uh earlierbefore world war ii and said hey you
should go on ships And so he's like, okay,you know, you'll see action on ships And
so he did then he joined this organizationcalled the seabees So the navy just sent

(09:03):
him to this thing called seabees and hefound out they get dropped off They get
shot at while they're building airstripsin the pacific So that's what he ended up
doing in world war ii and then after worldwar ii he went back to illinois And uh
finished up high school and then he joinedthe air force and then in the air force
He was a comms guy enlisted comms guy Andhe was in the Korean war and then, uh, he

(09:25):
retired, um, in 1964, you know, growingup, I heard stories of military and
service and it kind of ran in my family.
So I always, you know, from an earlyage, I always wanted to serve my country.
I just had no idea of, youknow, what vehicle or how that,
that was going to go down.
And, and, um, and also I'm the first onein my family to make it past high school.
So there was a big pushfrom my mom and dad.

(09:47):
To say, hey, you know, youought to go to college.
I was kind of on the fence inhigh school I was like I should
I want to join the marine corps.
I had some friends, uh who'd enlistedin the marine corps I'm like, yeah,
that sounds like fun, you know carryaround guns and go do cool shit
and break stuff and um, You knowas a 16 17 year old knucklehead.
That's uh, you know, that'sperfectly in my line of And, um,

(10:07):
you know, I got talked into goingto college, given a year or try.
And so I did that and, um,I ended up going to college.
Uh, I was interested in serving,so I checked out the ROTC program.
I was encouraged to apply forROTC scholarship and I earned one.
Uh because my grades and uh, so Idecided to sign on the dotted line in
1991 and the rest is history Um, I thinkduring you know as in ROTC you get these

(10:33):
summer cruises where you get exposed todifferent Occupations and I did one of
my cruises was on a submarine and I waslike, this is pretty interesting And
we ended up shooting two test missiles.
It was wild.
It was pretty cool cruise Like, these aremy people, this is my tribe, you know,
they're competent, I can trust my lifeto them, they know what they're doing,
they kind of have a twisted sense ofhumor, um, you know, but they're just,

(10:54):
they seem squared away as compared toother types of organizations I saw in
the Navy, and so, uh, my senior yearof college, I volunteered for, uh, The
nuclear power program, which you haveto go through an interview if you're an
officer candidate And you have to go backto washington dc to this naval reactors
headquarters, and I got interviewed Um forthe program and for reasons to this day.

(11:18):
I still don't know I got acceptedand uh, so when I graduated college
in 1994, I reported to nuclear powerschool in orlando, florida and You
know in the only way, you know, Ididn't have an engineering background.
So I had a math degree You Andso I didn't know much about
engineering or any of that.
And I was told along the way, theNavy will teach him and they did.
But, uh, you know, really mygoal was to get on submarines.

(11:40):
That was the coolest thing.
The whole nuclear power thing, atleast when I was 22 years old was
this was just a means to an end.
And, um, yeah, that's, so that'show I ended up in the Navy.
And in the submarines, uh, just I hada great experience So the nuclear power
track didn't guarantee you were going togo to subs Well, you can volunteer when
you get accepted to the naval nuclearpropulsion program as an officer You both

(12:02):
either volunteer for submarine duty oryou choose to go to the carrier navy at
the time And that was the, the choice.
You either go to carriersor service fleet, or you go
to the Navy, to submarine.
I volunteered for submarine dutybecause I was like, this is cool.
As long as you're physicallyqualified, you know, the
nuclear training is the same.
So the initial, there's classroom trainingfor six months, and then you go to a

(12:25):
land based, um, we call it prototype, orbasically a reactor plant, and you have to
qualify to op, you know, to operate on it.
Before you're sent to your firstship and um, and that's for enlisted
and officers So the schooling issimilar between enlisted and officer.
Uh, there are some differences Um inthe academics, but overall the the scope

(12:45):
of the training is about the same Theenlisted train to qualify on a specific
watch on board the power plant whereasthe officers qualify to be the They call
it engineering officer of the watch.
You're the officer in charge of Thepropulsion plant and the watch team.
And so you're trained, you know,more to a supervisory role.
Yeah.

(13:05):
So the training is about ayear and, uh, yeah, it was,
it was pretty tough training.
I, you know, I think my lack oftime management skills and, you
know, just general immaturity madethe experience rougher for me.
Um, I am not, I am by no means, I'ma stellar graduate of this program.
Um, you know, I.

(13:25):
I uh, I scrapped I scrapped throughit nothing to be proud of on
that Um, it damn near wasted me.
So, uh, you know justdespite my own faults.
I made it through i'm curious A couplethings there number one Is it, are there a
bunch of people who volunteer to go subs?
Are you having to compete for those slots?
And what are you doing dayto day in that training?

(13:47):
Like I'm sure it's, it's just secondnature to you, but for, for somebody
on the outside, like if I say I went toflight school and you know, I learned to
fly, people can, but I can't, I can't wrapmy hands around exactly what you're doing.
So I'm curious about that as well.
Yeah.
Good question.
So I don't know if it's, I thinkit's competitive, but I also know,
Um, there's, you know, there'schallenges, it goes in cycles, right?

(14:09):
Some years, uh, people, people,we meet recruiting goals.
It's not a program thatpeople typically flock to.
It's, uh, you know, it's technicallydemanding, it's notoriously tough.
Um, and I would argue people who aregraduates of the program and serve
honorably and go on, they go on to.
You know a wide range of occupations inleadership and society You know, we have

(14:30):
people just go out and just do basicthings all the way to being the president
of the united states You know, jimmycarter was a nuclear trained operator.
He was the first nuclear trained operatorto be president of the united states
So, you know, i'm looking at it from astandpoint of you know, the naval nuclear
propulsion program graduates of it Arecapable of doing virtually anything.
We can pick up concepts very quickly.

(14:50):
We're agile.
We can, you know, we can think throughproblems critically, quickly, efficiently.
And, you know, I, I, we attribute itto, you know, Hyman Rickover and the
standards he set for the program.
Um, you know, the standards areare unrelenting and they're not
negotiable and um, you know Andgetting used to that mindset was tough.
So to answer your question, you know, sowhat was it like a nuclear power school?

(15:14):
um think of doing like equivalent of twoyears of graduate school in six months
in a myriad of Engineering topics sothings I never dealt with in my life.
The only two things I dealt with in mylife Prior to that were physics and math.
And those are the minimum requirements, bythe way, uh, for officer standard program,
you had a year, have a year of calculusand a year of calculus based physics.

(15:36):
So check and check.
I had that, but I had no idea aboutelectrical circuits or material
science or electrical engineeringor mechanical engineering.
I knew no, I couldn't evenbarely spell engineering.
And there's probably guys inthe class with, with like.
Degrees in these like electricalengineering mechanical.
I imagine.
Yeah, a hundred percent.
In fact, most people who who enteras officers have engineering degrees.

(15:59):
So most people I, you know, went toclass with had mechanical engineering,
electrical engineering, chemicalengineering, nuclear engineering.
Do they look down on you?
They're like, Oh, you gota physics degree math.
Um, no, no, no.
I mean, we're all, you know,we're all in it together.
Um, you know, I wasn't the mostacademically, uh, we'll just say I
was below average academically in a,in a sea of exceptional people and,

(16:23):
um, you know, the, the difference, Idon't even think there's a difference.
You know, the grade point averageis probably the difference.
All of us worked hard, youknow, I can't speak for them.
Um, you know, what kept me afloat in thewhole thing was I just refused to quit.
Okay.
I refuse to, you know, I thinkanything in life is worth it.
You know, you have to be willingto put in the work to do it.
And I, and I'll be damned if I quit orfailed, it just wasn't going to happen.

(16:47):
So, you know, whatever it took.
And one of the things that'sfunny is you had to maintain
a certain grade point average.
So one of the things that they didto encourage academic performance
was if you weren't meeting.
You know, in the eyes of the staff,certain academic performance based on
your demonstrated, you know, potential,you were put on mandatory study hours.
So you were in class from 8in the morning to 1600 or 4 p.

(17:09):
m.
every day, Monday through Friday.
But, you know, the baseline numberof mandatory hours on top of, you
know, the 40 hour week or whateverthe math was there, um, you had to
do 30 additional hours of study.
So we called it Mando 30.
And, uh, people who were directedto be on mandatory 30 were
typically called Mando Commandos.
And, um, you know, I was so, Iwas so challenged academically.

(17:33):
And I don't know if they tookpity on me, but I was never
forced into mandatory 30 hours.
I would just put in 40 to 50to 60 hours a week on my own.
Nobody had to tell me to do it.
I just suck so bad that, you know,I just had to, because I think for
me, it was a combination of bad timemanagement and the method in which

(17:54):
that subject was taught just wasincompatible with the way I learned.
I think I had succeeded in college.
College was easy.
High school is easy.
It's because I was in an environmentwhere I had more control of my time and
the way the information was coming in.
So I could actually.
I'm more of a visual learner and, youknow, and this is back in 1994, you
know, we're basically stenographersin class, but the instructor would

(18:17):
be lecturing on a chalkboard and we'dbe writing up stuff, we'd be, we'd be
scribbling notes and, you know, and,and so to me, it was just so much
information for me at the time to take in.
It wasn't, the conceptsweren't super hard.
It was just a lot of information andall our exams were not multiple choice.
They're all essay questions and youhad to answer them a certain way.
So it almost became a point where.

(18:39):
You know, you either understood them soyou can, you can write down the answers
and get it correct or you had to memorizethem and I was so far behind, you know,
I spent, I ended up, you know, spending alot of my time just memorizing it, which,
you know, in hindsight isn't helpful,but if you beat in enough information
over time, the concepts come in.
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And then, um, you know, so that was thefirst school, the second school, you
know, you had to qualify on a plant.
So you had to get checkouts, youknow, so you're given a, we call

(20:30):
it a call standard, but basically.
A booklet of basically knowledge andpractical factors you had to get certified
on And you had to complete this entirebook which ended you had written exams
You had oral exams and at the end you hada final board You had to demonstrate on
a on watch on an actual plant Normal andcasualty operations and pass the board
and then you had to pass this final boardso that you know and that was uh That

(20:54):
was challenging, too, because, you know,taking all this knowledge you learned in
the school and then now applying it to anactual power plant, which was different
from the one you're taught in school.
And, um, you know, so I, I wentthrough that and I think, you
know, what additionally, whatmade that more challenging was
halfway through my dad passed away.
And so I had to interrupt school for aweek and I still stayed within my class.

(21:16):
They never pulled me back andthat weighed on me a little bit.
And um, you know, in gettingthrough that with, you know, I
attribute that to my classmates,my classmates are super supportive.
Um, you know, I wouldn't say atthe time the staff was supportive.
Um, that was one of the reasons,you know, I fought long and that was
one of the first leadership lessonsin the Navy, you know, um, the, the

(21:37):
people at the staff We're good people.
They're hardworking people, but Ithink they pop through so many students
that, you know, they didn't reallyview students as human beings per se.
And again, this is the mid 90s.
Things are a little bit different justbecause the times are different doesn't
make it, you know, right or wrong.
But it did plant a seed in my headthat, you know, if put in a position

(21:58):
of responsibility, people do matter.
And, um, that was the first seed as ayoung butter bar, you know, Anson that
was planted in my head about, you know,if I ever have people under my charge
that are having problems, I'm going todo my best to try to treat them as human
beings, because I like to be treatedthe way, you know, it's the golden rule.
And so that was, that was thefirst data point in my head.

(22:20):
And, um, Yeah, and thattraining was tough.
Um, you know, I learned I didn'tlearn the lessons completely I as
fast forward I go to my first summaryand I the lessons that I should have
learned in the in that school Payoff always get to first summary.
Um at the time I was wondering whythey trained us the way they did
And it made a whole lot of sense.

(22:41):
Once I actually got to a submarinein a real ocean, doing real things.
So they, they don't do any trainingon the sub in that year pipeline.
It sounds like, so you you've completedthat and then you go to the sub.
You go to a, well, for submarine officersat the time, and now it's different.
It's varied over the years,but the general sequence
was, you know, think of it.

(23:02):
I'll use an aviation algae.
You go to a ground school first.
So the first six monthsis like ground school.
And then you actually go to like, whichyou would consider primary training.
And, um, so basically you're at an, aland based, you know, reactor plant.
So basically I was at a campus.
I'll use the civilian term, a campusin upstate New York, where there were
a couple of reactor plants there that,that the DOE and the Navy managed.

(23:24):
And basically students.
Yeah.
Um, the prototype served two purposes.
It's to test, um, existingreactor technology.
So we actually operate power plants andtest them and do evaluations on them and
test, test out procedures, et cetera.
And at the same time, we alsohave a mission to train students.
Uh, we have a requirement in placethat before you go to your first,
um, actual nuclear powered ship, youhave completed this training program.

(23:47):
So think of it as, you know,on the outside in commercial
nuclear power, you have to get.
A national level certification.
So a reactor operator nurse license.
Um, so, you know, like in themilitary, you were licensed to fly.
I don't know if you necessarily had an FAApilot's license, but you could get one.
When the military had a certain,yeah, you had something along with it.
So.
So the Navy has its own regulatory, youknow, mechanism in lieu of, you know,

(24:13):
the nuclear regulatory commission.
So that's, that's inessence what you're doing.
You're getting qualified.
And then during your first tour Oh,so after your year of school, then I
went to this two to three months schoolwar in Connecticut Where I learned,
hey, you're going to a submarine.
Here's some basics, you know, here's somethings you're going to need to know before
you're a division officer on a submarine.
What do they have to do, if anything, toget you prepared for, I guess, from the

(24:37):
outside, the claustrophobia, the ideaof being in the ocean, the way you guys
are away, like, is there any acclimationthat they give to get you ready?
Um, Well, I think the nuclear program,you know, does a, does a good job of
preparing you for that because you'realready, you know, what I didn't realize
was that culture was slowly being putinto you during the nuclear training.

(24:58):
And then when you get to submarineschool, you go through trainers
and now you're interacting withpeople who are not nuclear trained.
Um, some are nuclear trained, but mostof the, now you start dealing with more.
Um, you're now as an officer, youalso have enlisted instructors.
You have to go to a damagecontrol, wet trainer, for example.
So they put you in the same trainer thatthey put the enlisted sailors in, you

(25:18):
know, basically simulating an injury room.
That's flooding.
You've got to go in and workas a team to repair flooding.
And as the water level from the rivergoing up and it's cold, it's fun.
Um, you learn submarine escape.
You'll learn, you know, basic.
At the time you learn basic watchstanding, like what are some of the
first watches you're going to standas an officer on board the submarine.
Um, and so you get introducedto simulators, trainers,

(25:40):
there's academic topics.
It's, it's pretty easy comparedto the nuclear training.
And I think for the nuclear trainedofficers, you know, it was a welcome
break Um after a year of having a lotof information, you know shoved at
you at an alarming speed And I usethe term alarming for me not for the
people who got four o's and were okayWe're super smart nuclear people.
Um, you know, I had to learn byosmosis I was strapping books to my

(26:03):
head, you know, hoping that it wouldpermeate into my skull Um, but yeah,
so the submarine school was great.
I actually really enjoyed The submarineschool and took great interest in it.
Cause that's the stuff I signed up to do.
And I realized I'm like.
This is what I want to go do.
I want to go drive the submarine.
This is, you know, then yougo to your first submarine.
So I reported my first submarine and, um,right, right after the new year in 1996.

(26:27):
And until the middle of 1999,I was on the same submarine.
And, uh, yeah, that was a, that was an eyeopener and that was a pretty interesting
time, good, good time to grow up.
So we gotta, there arelike a few things here.
So help me with the sequencing.
Um, I want people to understandthe basics of submarines.
But also I don't want to lose this thread.

(26:47):
Maybe just how, how is a new officerbrought into a sub like your brand new?
It's always different indifferent military units.
I'm curious in thatcommunity, but they do.
So, you know, when I go to answerthat question, so it's multi part,
I'm going to answer it in order.
Um, when I get to that part, I'mgoing to preface it with, this was
the early 1990s, early to mid 1990s.

(27:09):
So the way I'm telling the storyis through the lens of the mid
nineties, all male submarine course.
Um, you know, and in the things wedid, then we don't necessarily do now.
Okay.
I'll just caveat it with that.
I understand.
So a submarine basically is a shipthat deliberately sinks and it can
also come back up, you know, the numberone rule of submarine and keep the

(27:31):
ratio of surfaces dives one to one.
Probably similar to aircraft, you know,landings to takeoffs one, the one, right?
And so basically a submarine isdesigned to be on the surface normally.
And so it's positively buoyant and tosubmerge it, you need to become negatively
buoyant where the buoyant force isbasically less than the force of gravity.

(27:52):
So then you sink.
It's just like, you know, imaginebeing a swimming pool, you have your
lungs full of air and you can probablyfloat on the surface of the water.
As soon as you exhale, Youprobably start sinking.
Well, it's because you're losing yourreserve buoyancy and you're actually
becoming negatively buoyant So the theprinciple is similar and on submarines
what we have is we have two sets ofballast Um, we have variable ballast and

(28:17):
we have fixed ballast and so on when thesubmarine's on the surface We engineer the
submarine and load it in such a way thatit stays safe and and on the surface so
positively buoyant and So we have ballasttanks in the forward and aft parts of
the submarine, which keep air in them.
So we have vents at the top that are shutand then we have grates at the bottom.
So just imagine putting acup upside down in the water.

(28:39):
There's, there's always a pocket of air.
If you punched a hole in the topof the cup, the water would fill up
because the air is being displaced out.
Right.
So that's basically howa submarine submerges.
We just open the vents.
On the main ballast tanks bringing inall this water and the submarine just
becomes overall negatively buoyantin theory and should sink and go

(28:59):
down and You know, get underwater.
Now, what makes it interesting ofcourse, is a submarine, basically
think of it like an aircraft,except it flies through the water.
So it's a watercraft.
And so all the forces that are presentin aircraft flying through the air
are flying, you know, it's similar toa submarine flying through the water.
So you have X, Y, and Z.
You have yaw, you have pitch, youalso have roll, but you also have

(29:22):
the attitude and you also have speed.
So, and, and unlike an aircraft,you can just sink static.
Right.
Well, that doesn't really giveyou a degree of control and rate.
So you want to be going through the waterbecause the hull itself, the submarine,
depending on its attitude has a certainlift or, or, or non lift force, you know,
and then you also have control surfaces.
So you have control surfaces likerudders, which control yaw basically

(29:46):
X direction, you know, left and right.
Then you have, um, we call sternplanes in the back, which typically,
you know, control the pitch orthe attitude of the submarine.
And then, um, we have normallycontrol surfaces up front.
Uh, either on the bow called bow planesor fairwater planes which are located
up in the sail So the bumpy part of asubmarine you look on the surface has
this little notch at the top where peopleare up there when they're a surface

(30:08):
that's called the sail and Sometimesolder submarine designs some submarine
designs have control surfaces on thesail and then some have It blow the
water line and they're called bow planes.
Anyways that controls depth normallyanyways, that's that's basic submarine
construction And basically youuse you know Once you're submerged
you're flying through the water usea combination of planes Angle of the

(30:30):
submarine and the speed of the submarineto control your trim condition.
So in general, that's how you keepa submarine neutrally buoyant,
whereas in a fixed wing aircraft, youknow, you have those factors also.
You have your attitude, you have yourcontrol surfaces, and then you have
trim for aileron, elevator, rudder.
Um, some submarines have trimfor it, uh, but the submarines I
served on didn't typically havetrim specifically for the surfaces.

(30:53):
So the old fashioned way of maintaininga submarine neutrally buoyant in the
water, was a combination of planes angleand speed and your ballast loading.
So your ballast tanks are full ofwater when you're submerged and
then you move variable ballasts.
You have tanks inside thesubmarine to change the moments
to trim up your submarine.
So if your hand's off, you shouldmaintain a certain, we call a neutral
angle, just going through the water.

(31:13):
And that's if you're pretty, you know,you're, you're, you're perfectly trend.
I'll just use that as plain terminology.
So that's how submarine goes to the water.
And if you want to go deeper, you justadjust your control surfaces to go down.
Just like flying aircraft, right?
I've been told flyingaircraft is pretty simple.
You push forward, the trees get bigger.
You pull back, the trees get smaller.
Then we go faster and slower.
That's what I've been told.
That's right.
I mean, that's what I like tosay to, uh, uh, fixed wing guys.

(31:36):
The rotary wing is even harder.
That's what I like to messwith them a little bit.
Okay.
So this is submarine.
Okay.
The front end is called the bow.
The stern is, is, theend is called the stern.
So these are the control surfaces, right?
So you have the rudder,which is up and down.
That controls yaw.
You have the stern planes,which go up and down.
Think of them like elevators,except they control attitude.

(31:57):
And then you have the fair water planes.
Some ships have bow planes up herethat controls depth typically, because
they have, you can see they're smallerthan the stern planes, so they have
less, you know, so these have wayless of a moment in the center.
You know, the, the pivot points righthere, the center of gravity is right here.
So that moment is way smallerthan that moment, right?
And when you surface, youcome back up using speed.

(32:21):
Typically there's exceptions sometimes.
Um, but typically you use speedto come up, keep yourself up near
the surface, and then you forceyourself up and slowly blow out all
the water out of your ballast tank.
So your vents are shut and you just forceair into the ballast tanks, which expels
the water underneath the grates out.
And then your ballast tank slowlystart filling up with air and you

(32:42):
just become overly positively buoyantand then you're on the surface.
And then you, you know, you to preventinadvertent submerging and you,
you lock certain things and preventcertain things from being operated.
And, uh, in essence, that is asubmarine, you know, one on one.
Yeah.
So it's a ship that deliberatelysinks and deliberately comes back up.
We used to say, or my dad,my dad flew Hueys in Vietnam.

(33:03):
So we, He would tell me the same,what I think it was, um, takeoffs or,
or optional landings are mandatory.
Just this idea that you'recoming down one way or another.
So the one to one ratio,I really liked that.
Yeah.
Yeah.
It's important.
It's important to get to the surface.
Oh, uh, how deep, I guess the unclassversion, how deep would you go and how

(33:24):
fast are you moving through the water?
Yeah.
So we can go deeperthan, you know, 400 feet.
Okay.
And, um, and we can go faster than 20knots or 20 nautical miles an hour.
We can go faster than that.
Um, and that's about it.
That's as much as all I'll say, butbasically imagine, you know, so our
largest submarines in Ohio classsubmarine, it typically is anywhere
from 16, 000 to 18, 000 tons.

(33:46):
And, um, so imagine something of an objectthat size, and you can see, you know,
you can Google pictures of an Ohio classsubmarine, And dry dock, you know, from
the bottom of the submarine, we'd callit the keel of the ship to the tallest
antenna is almost a hundred feet, just togive you a perspective from the keel to
the highest antenna when raised on thisclass of submarines, you know, a hundred

(34:07):
feet, that's a pretty big submarine.
So this is, you know, an Ohio classsubmarine, this displaces, you know,
18, 000 tons with missiles on board.
And, um, you know, it'sas big as a space needle.
So if you took the Seattle space needleand laid it, you know, from bow to
stern, that's how tall it is, just togive you an idea how big this thing is.
And it's, you know, 42 feet wide.
And, you know, so it's a largedraft vessel and, and, and that's,

(34:29):
that's not in the tax summary.
This is our largest submarine.
Yeah.
So tax submarines about from here tohere, it's about 360 feet long and
displays it only like six to 7, 000 times.
So, um, And they carry a smaller cargo,but yeah, you know, um other things the
last submarine commanded was not nuclearweapons It carried a dry dock shelter for
special operating forces The cargo thatthe ohio class submarine holds a trident

(34:52):
d5 missile is like a four story missile.
It's a three stage solidpropellant missile Oh, yeah, yeah.
And so it was the Navy designedthe submarine back in the 1970s
to carry 24 of these things.
And so imagine 24, youknow, four story missiles.
Now, originally, the original Ohio'scarried a smaller missile called the

(35:14):
C4, um, which is smaller than that.
So it's about three, three stories andchange But the submarine was designed to
accommodate a larger missile that cameinto play in the late 80s called the d5
And that's the missile that's carried onboard submarine nuclear powered ballistic
missile submarines today is the trident2d5 missile So that's the big big missile
and then uh, the the smaller one waswhat I started with the first submarine

(35:35):
I was on We carried C4 missiles and,um, but regardless, they're, they're
all solid, solid fuel, um, you know,three stage missiles, basically they
carried a payload at the top and, um,and basically we carried them around.
So you need a submarine big enough tohouse them and run around the ocean.
So it's pretty crazy.
Okay.
So, so with the caveat that this isthe mid nineties and things Yeah.

(35:59):
Things have probably changed a little bit.
Yeah.
What, what's it like being a new officer?
Getting to, do you call it a shipor a sub when you're talking Su a
submarine, we know to a submarine ship.
Okay.
For, for submarine.
Okay.
Um, you know, I think part of itand what I, one of the things I
like about submarine culture, um.
Is that if you're not qualified so everyperson that shows up to a summary for the
first time is not qualified in summaryAnd so officers and enlisted have to earn

(36:24):
we call the dolphins your your warfareinsignia kind of like, you know People who
are in their ranger tabs or jump wings orwhatever certification you have or your
wings And so there's a process in whichofficers and enlisted have to earn their
qualifications and if you're not qualifiedOn submarine back then, you know,
you're typically it's rank independent.
That was one of the things I loved aboutsubmarine culture Was nobody gave two

(36:47):
shits about your rank, you know, it reallycame down to your your level of knowledge
your skill your integrity You know, andthose things were matter more to crew
members because it's a small small crew,you know We have a crew anywhere from 120
to 160 people, you know, everybody andyou know Everybody has multiple jobs on
board and you know, the two worst enemieson a submarine at any time are fire and

(37:11):
flooding And, and all crew members fromthe captain to the lowest sailor have
to be able to be a part of the effortto save the ship, you know, so the
culture on board a submarine is tighterand, you know, every person counts.
And so, you know, when you showup to submarine, you're a new guy,
you're, you know, back then wecall them dubs, non useful bodies.
And, um, you know, so every, every one ofus that showed up that weren't qualified,

(37:34):
you know, you have to go through allyour qualifications for officers.
It's typically about a year.
Year and a half, uh to qualify to earnyour dolphins and then for enlisted
it's up to about a year Um, and thequalifications are different For the
officers we have to qualify all ourwatches first before we're considered for
our dolphins Whereas if you're enlistedyou have to qualify one important one
at sea watch Before and then completeyour qualification Um before you go

(37:58):
for a board and and qualify so thequalifications are different But you're
still not qualified if you're notqualified You're not qualified and you
know, one of the most useless thingsin the world is not to be qualified
anything on board So you can't do it.
You're not qualified to operateanything So that's that's
like the worst worst level ofcitizenship on board of submarine.
So You know regardless if you're ano1 I start off as an o1 butter bar Um,

(38:20):
you know, so i'm i'm the useless ofthe useless, you know at the beginning
And um, you know in addition, you know,you're trying to do your qualifications
and start earning your keep on board Youknow, so you have to you have to work on
your qualifications get qualified watchstation stand watch under instruction
So you're doing You know, watch isunder instruction on a rotating basis
while you're qualifying, going totraining and doing all this other stuff.

(38:43):
And you're also, you know, I was adivision officer for a group of, my
first division was electricians and,um, yeah, shout out to Scott Brady.
My first, uh, my first chief, uh, that manmade more of an impact in my career than,
than almost anybody in my 30 year career.
And I was proud to be at hisretirement and he showed up to mine.
And that guy's an amazing human being.

(39:04):
And uh, you know, it's kind of likeyour senior nco equivalent, you know,
he's the guy that that taught me Howto lead he provided the first example.
It was a good example, you know, he wasfair He was hard on himself, but he was
hard on his people, but he was consistentAnd um, you know, he treated people with
dignity and respect and he held up highpersonal standard And that was a good
thing for a 23 year old person like meTo to you know to emulate so he was kind

(39:29):
of my first imprinting, you know in thenavy of of of Who a leader is and um,
you know, I I owe I owe the world to thatman and uh, you know And those lessons
as you grow older, you know, they comeback, you know, like oh, that's what
he meant because you don't always It'slike, you know being a parent, you know
You you discover, you know flashes ofyour own parents when you're when you're

(39:50):
a parent It's you know, I learned thosethings as I as I progressed through the
navy and grew older Let me let me askyou real quick rob before so When you're
standing watch that is effectively YouSomething's happening in a particular part
of the the sub and how do you respond anddictate what happens next and resolve it?
Yeah, so on the submarine onthe submarine the entire vessel.

(40:12):
It's manned manned vehicle My firstsubmarine had 160 people on it and
there are watch standards throughoutthe ship performing different functions
So mainly there's enlisted watchstandards in key spaces doing key things
operating key pieces of equipment Andum, and then you have some you have
certain you have two officers typicallyon watch You Uh, officer deck is
the captain's direct representative.
He or she is responsible for basicallyexecuting the plan of the day Executing

(40:36):
the ship's operations and getting theship from point a to point b and and
driving the ship around He or she's onwatch to allow the captain to sleep And
so basically they're on watch and thenyou know at the time I joined the navy
we were on six on and basically Um,you know, we're in what we call three
section watch rotation or sometimes four.
So 24 hour day, you're on six hour watch.

(40:57):
So basically, you know, theship's routine was broken up.
Battle rhythm was broken upinto four blocks per day.
0600 to noon, noon to 1800, 18 to 24,and then, you know, midnight to six.
So you can imagine how theday goes through that way.
And you stand a six hour watch.
So for officers, you know,underway, I'm not talking import.

(41:17):
When you're at sea, officersmanned basically one of.
You know one of two watches, uh,typically and this was in the mid 90s
So, you know when you're starting offas a young officer, you have to qualify
back in the engineering So I had toqualify engineering officer of the watch
first, which is what I qualified atthe at that prototype school I talked
about except now it's on the it'son a ship It goes through the water.

(41:38):
It's a completely differentreactor plant than the one I
studied completely different.
And, you know, I'm alreadyacademically handicapped.
So, you know, I got that, I gotthat awesome thing working for me.
So, you know, so I, I, I nugged throughmy quals and I start standing watch.
And, uh, so basically you're on awatch rotation and then as you're
qualified that watch, you're also.
Taking on your time off.

(41:59):
You're going up to startqualifying other watches.
Um, I had the, you know, I had to qualifydiving officer of the watch, and then
I had to qualify officer of the deck.
And then, and then officer deck iseither there's two qualifications.
You're either surfaced or submerged.
They're they're different watch stationsbecause driving a ship underwater.
Is different from driving aship on the surface surface.
You have to follow certain rules Umthe same rules that other ships have to

(42:21):
follow around the world Um, you know,so there's an international standard
in avoiding collision, for example thatyou have to be familiar with But when
you're underwater those rules don't applySo it's different set of rules and so
there's a whole process in which you gotto learn and in submarine qualification
It's not only just standing watch and youknow driving the ship in the submarine

(42:41):
force unlike other communities You Youalso have to have working knowledge of
all the systems on board the submarine.
So just as simple as youknow How do we make water?
Well, you got to be able to discusshow we make potable drinking water You
know, how do we generate electricity?
How do we you know, howare things constructed?
You know, what's the reason why we chosecertain materials for their construction?

(43:02):
How do you know, do you have to know orknow normal operating procedures normal
casualty procedures your immediate action?
So let's think of similar, you knowsimilar your occupation You have to
learn emergency procedures for yourYou know, and then, and then you get
evaluated similar to a check ride atthe end, then you have an oral board.
Yeah.
And so the qualificationprocess is, is, is very similar.
And that process took me about, oh, alittle over a year, um, between a year,

(43:25):
year and a half, something like that,just the way our operational schedule was.
And, um, but yeah, so I gotqualified and, uh, you know,
Standing watch around the ship.
Um, but yeah, that's that's basicallythe process and then enlisted are similar
They qualify watch station import at sea.
They have to also Understand ship systems.
So regardless what your job is,you know, so in the army, I think

(43:45):
it's called mos air force afsc Andthen in the navy, it's called NEC
and navy enlisted classification.
So whatever your MOS is i'll just usethat terminology It doesn't matter if
you're a cook, uh, you turn wrenches oryou fix nuclear things It doesn't matter
you every crew member has to have baselineknowledge of how we do things How the
ship operates, how it's constructed, howit's designed, and be also be able to

(44:09):
fight fires, control, you know, know whereall the flood control levers are, know
where all the emergency things are, thebasic, you know, general things, if you're
in any compartment at any given time,you're able to respond and be useful.
So that's, and then for officers,it's similar, you know, and to be in
charge, you know, take charge and beable to do, be able to give directions.
And then, and then the officers getthe additional bit of, you know,

(44:31):
Understanding, you know, how todrive the submarine to position for
shooting a weapon and engaging atarget and also evading and surviving.
So, um, that's a completely separate art.
So everything I've talked to up to thispoint is just learning how to operate
it in normal emergency conditions.
And I think as an officer'scareer progresses, you, you get
more, much more education in.

(44:51):
Using the warship as a weapon systemto track down engage targets and
also evade, you know And and that'sthat's a completely different art
form, but the building blocks for thatstart in the training So you got to
first learn how to avoid collision.
You've got to first with only hearingthings in the water You know be able
to manage contacts just from noisecoming from different directions and

(45:13):
how to develop a tactical picture inyour head You know, and there's an art
there's there's a science and art todoing that and and it's not something
that you know You learn overnight.
I happen to be better at it thanoperating a nuclear power plant
And that's where I found my joyin the job was, was the people and
also being able to drive the ship.
So what, uh, when you, when you getthere, do they mess with you somehow?

(45:36):
Oh yeah.
Oh yeah.
Is there something that they doto newbies coming into the nubs?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Um, you know, uh, one fun one was,you know, stapling your, you, we were
coveralls underway and they kind oflook like prison, Mechanic suits or you
know prison suits and um, you know onefun trick that i've had done to me was
somebody stapled my pant My pant legs.

(45:58):
So when I get out of my rack and goput it on I can't put my legs through,
you know Um, oh gosh, they'll you know,they'll freeze your pillow You know,
i've also heard people getting youknow You adjust the temperature in the
ventilation zone where you're sleeping.
So it's really hot.
You can tweak the temperatureat best with people.
Oh, there's, there's tons ofthings you can do to people.
Yeah.
I'll just leave it at that.

(46:19):
Basically it would beclassified as hazing today.
Yeah.
That's what I was wondering when yousaid caveating, it was the nineties.
I assume there was something there.
Yeah.
And you know, eighties and before, youknow, I mean, you know, yeah, people,
people did stuff that was, uh, intoday's world would be just alarm bells
going off, you know, but, um, yeah.
And there was just a way of handlingthings back then that were was a little

(46:42):
more personal than okay today Got it.
We'll just we'll just say that and Yeah,you know and I I mean think back to your
own childhood How how was you know, howwas accountability meted out in your
childhood versus now as a parent, right?
And so Um, you know, I think it'sit's good for young men to grow up
Um, you know, it's just because wedid it then doesn't make it right.

(47:03):
I'm not here to condone it It's just thethe system we're in But you know, we,
we played jokes on each other and eventoday we still play jokes on each other.
I have, I have stories of, you know,when appropriate, please throw them out.
So let's just say, so you're, you'reat your first ship, you know, you're
going through your progressions.
Um, you mentioned before youkind of alluded to, or not

(47:23):
alluded to you mentioned in your,in the summer cruise cruise.
Yeah.
So when you're doing the cruisethat they, they fired missiles.
Right.
So they, they actually, yeah,we, we shot test missiles.
Can you des like, whatis that like on a ship?
I know exactly how it feels topull the trigger on an Apache and
see something, leave the rail.
Like obviously you mentionedthe tactical picture, just.
Walk us through what that is like.

(47:44):
Yeah.
So basically, um, imagine theengineering challenge, right?
You've got a four story, solid rocketmotor missile, and in order for it
to light, you don't want it to be,you know, saturated with seawater.
So how do you get a submarine that'sunderwater to shoot a missile out of the
water, and then once it's dry to igniteand take off and go towards its target.
Right.

(48:04):
So that in itself is pretty cool.
Basically, you know, you, you basicallylaunch the missile out of the water.
in a, in an air bubble.
So how do you do that?
Well, basically you have a tank of waterwhich has a rocket motor strapped to it.
You ignite the rocket motor, it flashesthe water to steam, and then the hatch is
open and you have this, you know, plasticor this basic something that's keeping

(48:27):
the missile from, from flooding out.
It breaks at the same time that thewater ignites the steam and basically the
missiles just ejected out of the tube.
And then it gets out, it rides basicallyin a blanket of bubbles until it
reaches the surface, it broaches thewater, and then once you meet certain
parameters, the rocket motor starts,and then it takes off and goes.
That's a lot of weight leavinga ship that's underwater.

(48:49):
So if you remember, if you've evergone, you know, been underwater, or
have you ever done a scuba diving?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So if you imagine if you'reunderwater scuba diving and you're
in a wetsuit, which is possiblybuoyant normally And let's say you
just jettison your your lead belt.
You just let go of it.
You're gonna start coming up and Imagineletting go of a lot of weight and you know

(49:10):
The ejection force of a big four storyobject leaving the submarine come out.
It's really loud, by the wayIt's just Freaking amazing.
So it's this really loud noise.
The entire ship goes down in the waterand comes back up and it levels because
we also have a compensation system.
So the the missile itself is a certainweight or a certain mass When it leaves

(49:30):
you have to make up for it if youwant to stay neutral at the end So you
have this down up transient, right?
If you want to keep it level at the endYou need to compensate for it because it
turns out the missile that we launchedweighs more You Then if you just fill
the tube entirely with water, so you'regoing to have to bring water in to keep
neutrally buoyant If that makes sense.
Yeah, and so it's just this really loudnoise I mean and the whole ship just

(49:54):
goes down up it kind of stables outAnd then the hatch comes shut the next
hatch comes open We launched the secondmissile and these are test missiles and
um, it was amazing, you know And thesemissiles can go, you know, a gps You know,
they can hit targets thousands of milesaway, you know, very, very accurately.

(50:15):
And, and that's, it turns out at thetime, you know, in 1993, I had no
appreciation in how much those missilesconstitute our strategic deterrent.
There are, there arenational insurance policy.
That's one of the reasons why theRussians, the Chinese, and other
adversaries don't mess with us is because24 7, There's these submarines running

(50:36):
around the ocean ready to go waitingfor a presidential order at the time
I didn't fully appreciate that but wealso test these missiles to make sure
they still work and um, you know yearslater I was part of a program that was
was the group that helped train andcertify the weapon system And also,
um did operational evaluation test andevaluation of of those missiles Um in

(50:58):
a different job later in my career, butyeah, that was pretty cool And so as
a young, you know You 21 year old kid.
I'm just like, this is freaking cool.
Awesome.
Yeah.
It's like, I'm, I'm on a shipthat just shoots giant missiles.
I'm like, this is, you know, and um,you know, so I was all in at that point.
I was like, okay, you know, my tribe,these people know what they're doing.
I can trust my life tothem and they do cool shit.

(51:18):
So put that all together.
It's like I'm sold.
Yeah.
How about torpedoes?
Same feel.
Yeah, the torpedoes are way smaller.
They're a 21 inches diameter.
Um, and when they shoot out, you don'teven feel it leave the ship because
you're talking like an 18, 000 tonvessel and torpedoes, maybe a ton, ton
and change a couple, you know, it's,it's such a small object and what you

(51:42):
hear is the impulse leaving the ship.
So we use air, um, in someclasses of ships to, to.
to basically propel turna turbine to force water.
So we use water, we jet out thetorpedoes with water, but we
use air to initiate the process.
And really what you hear in the shipis, you know, like the submarines
I served on were pretty loud.
The, the launch transient, you wouldhear air, or there was a ram, you

(52:06):
know, in another class of submarine, weused a high, you know, we used a ram.
Um, that basically actuated and it,and it just pours both of them for
use water to force the torpedoes out.
So all you hear is the, is thesound of that ejection system.
And then if it used air, you'dfeel, you'd feel the air change, the
pressure change in the submarine.
You know, you get to the pointnow where modern submarines,

(52:26):
they're, they're a lot quieter.
And, you know, our newest submarines,if you want a torpedo, if you're in the
right place in the ship, you can hearit launch, but other parts of the ship,
you just feel a pressure transient.
Like, did we just launch a torpedo?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Torpedoes way smaller thanthe missiles that we launch.
And yeah.
How, how long are you out at sea again,if this is a class topic, obviously

(52:52):
we typically go out to sea, you know,I mean, the, the limitations food.
You know, really, it comes down to food.
Um, the longest I've been outto sea without coming back
to port is 100 days straight.
Um, that was the longest I'vebeen, and that was when I was in
command of my first submarine.
We, we spent 100 days at sea.
Um, but you know, I've had it short.
It's just a couple nights.
Really.

(53:12):
It comes down to the food.
We make our own oxygen.
We make our own water, you know, and weload up supplies and really the limited
sense of demand vehicle is the food.
The most food I've ever put onboard a ship was my last deployment.
When I was in command ofanother ship, we put about 140
to 150 days of food on board.
Wow.
Yeah.
And he had the packet and, you know,freezers and, you know, And refrigerator

(53:35):
actually we didn't use we converted oneof our refrigerators into a freezer So
we had two big freezers and then we hada bunch of dry stores and you just find
places to put put stuff in Okay, so i'mgoing to ask a couple other questions, but
I would ask you to steer me Um, to, youknow, these five different ships and your
experiences on these different cruises.

(53:57):
I think, I think there's something, maybethe Intel side of me, less the aviation
side, although there's similarities, butthe Intel side, I do wonder, it feels
similar in that like, We might not havebeen in a war zone when we were always
deployed or, you know, operating, butit was always a real world mission.
I feel like you guys are alwayson a real world mission, whereas

(54:17):
like maybe some, you know, in themilitary, if we were in garrison,
that was total, that was training.
But yeah, the agency, every timewe're out, that is real world and
you have to operate like that.
So I would imagine you guys arealways out there and it's always
hunter versus hunted at any time.
Yeah.
Yeah.
You know, that's the, you know,one of the things I mentioned to
you, um, you know, before this was.

(54:38):
You know, you're not going to getany glamorous stories of kicking down
doors or doing anything like that.
The submarine, every time it leavesthe pier, we're in the environment,
you know, there is, we may be training,but you know, you can still hit things.
You can run aground, you can havea fire, you can have flooding.
Um, you know, so the enemy is, youknow, mainly it's the ocean, you

(54:58):
know, the submarine pressure hall issubjected to sea pressure all the time.
And so we rely on, you know, qualitymaintenance practices, you know,
unnegotiable standards on that, um,proper operating procedures, alert crew
members who question their indications.
Um, you know, and training and then,you know, fires, uh, fires are very

(55:20):
bad, especially in a very close space.
So you gotta, you gotta put themout very quickly and flooding is
bad too, because, you know, youcan, you can die pretty quickly.
So, um, you know, the hazard is alwaysthere with the submarine, you know,
like all ships, the entire organ,the entire unit goes with the ship.
So we're all out there in the environment,you know, 24, seven underwater.
And so, um.

(55:40):
You know, that adds an element to it.
I think, you know, to the uninitiated,or if you've never been, you know, you've
had troubles before you don't realizeit until, you know, you don't, you
know, when I was young, I didn't realizemy own mortality or the chances of it
until I was on my first sub right now.
Oh, gosh, it was near the end of my tour.
Um, so we're on the surface and Webrought an inspection team on board

(56:05):
and the inspection team wanted us torun our diesel generator So on the
submarine, we have a diesel generator.
It's a backup power source So iffor whatever reason we have to we
have to shut down the reactor atsea we need to maintain electrical
power We have a battery on board.
We also have a diesel generator.
So diesel generator has a bunch offuel And we can still keep the lights
on and keep the battery charged up.

(56:26):
So it's an emergency battery source, butthe inspection team wanted us to run the
diesel and do certain, certain things withit to evaluate the operator's ability to
operate the diesel proficiently at sea.
So we had, we, in order to do itin the situation we were in, we
were forced to be on the surface.
So on submarines.
You know, we just don't dive theship we have to be given permission

(56:48):
to operate submerged in that area Sothink of it like transition to class
c airspace, for example or permissionto take off Right, so you're given
you're given permission to do that.
It's it's comparable but differentanyways We didn't own the water.
So we had to be on the surface and we'reheading out and this is in the Pacific
Northwest in the Strait of Juan de Fuca.
So this is, um, if you look atthe map of Washington and Canada,

(57:11):
Vancouver Islands to the north,Washington states to the south.
There's a strait that separatesPuget Sound from the Pacific Ocean.
So we're heading outthere, we're heading west.
And it's like in April or May.
It's in the late 90s, and I rememberit was getting stormier and stormier.
I'm the officer deck.
I'm up on the bridge with a lookout.
So I got this kid up there withme, um, and, uh, we're both kids.

(57:33):
But I'm the officer.
I'm on watch.
I'm the guy driving the ship around,giving commands and navigating the ship.
And as we're getting out, the seasare getting rougher and rougher.
So the period of the waves from, fromwavetop to wavetop are changing and
the amplitudes getting bigger andbigger in such a way that, you know,
as the submarines riding on the surfaceand the waves come, we're starting
to drop in the troughs and the shipis starting to partially submerge.

(57:55):
So the bow, when you see videosof ships and rough seas, they hit
and a bunch of water comes over,we're starting to experience that.
Are you sticking out of the top here?
Are you looking outside?
I'm in that tower.
Yeah, I'm on, yeah, I'm on, yeah,I'm in the tower and I'm, you
know, and so me and this guy, thelookout, we're, we're in harnesses.
So we're in body harnesses andwe're clipped into the submarine.
And so that's, that's first fact.

(58:16):
So we're, we're clipped in thesubmarine, we're on watch, we're
actually up there doing stuff.
Maintaining a proper lookout,looking for other ships.
We don't want to hit ships.
And, um, I'm also lookingaround, don't hit other ships.
We have a radar and we got someother things up there so I can
write with them and stuff like that.
And we also have these radar reflectors,these little, at the time we had
these aluminum things that help.

(58:36):
So when other ships have their radarson a submarine, it's really hard to spot
because we have a low radar cross sectionbecause we're just low to the water.
We're kind of hard to spot.
So to make ourselves more visible atthe time, the thought process is let's
hang more shit off the submarine.
Metal to get a better radar return.
That was the theory back then.
And so these radar reflectors made alonethem and they're tethered to the ship.
They're clipped on And we have a bunchof stuff up in the bridge that we have to

(58:59):
pack up and bring down below And there's along tube called the bridge access hatch.
It's got two hatches got an upper hatchand a lower hatch And that connects
down the lower hatch connects downto the pressure hall when you know
the people tank where the people arein And so basically when you're on
the surface They're both open so aperson can go from the sail all the
way down into the pressure hall thesubmarine It's about 25 feet 20 25 feet.

(59:21):
Anyways waves are coming over thesubmarine now And the seas are getting
rough and i'm like, okay, this sucks,you know, it's it's it's cold The pacific
ocean is not a warm ocean in that part Andyou know, we're we're still running, you
know, we're still running and we're gonnado this test and uh Yeah, start calling
down below i'm talking to the navigatorlike hey, man, you know, I think it's
starting to get rough You know, we maywant to consider uh turning around if we

(59:44):
want to keep doing this test Because Idon't know how long I can safely maintain
a watch up here at the time is stillmanageable There's some waves going over.
It's all good But it wasdefinitely getting worse.
And we're starting to parse the, thewave, the way the wave period was in the
amplitude was getting worse and worse.
And we were starting to pound, youknow, every couple of minutes, the
bow would go into the waves more andwe would start getting more seawater.

(01:00:05):
The other interesting thing ison the summary now is on the
sale is in a free flood area.
So you have the pressure hall, but thenyou have a superstructure built over it.
And the reason that superstructure exists.
And so when the missile tubes comeopen, it's a hydrodynamic fairing.
If that makes sense, you didn't, ifyou didn't have that superstructure,
it was just the pressure hall, butthe hatch would just come open, just

(01:00:26):
be a curved hall and it wouldn't behydrodynamic going through the water.
Okay.
So you, you basically, so think ofa fairing, like on your sports car,
except you just wrap the fairingaround the top of the submarine.
Well, that fairing is a free flood area.
So you have the pressure hall hereand the fairing and water can come in.
So as the waves come in the shipsubmerges water comes in that free
flood area Well, the sail is connectedto the fairing and that's a free flood

(01:00:49):
area too up to that second hatch Iwas telling you about the two hatches.
They're both open Well, that tube iswaterproof when it's all shut, but
right now they're both open so watercould come in from the ocean if the
waves are high enough into The pressurehole and flood inside the submarine.
We've actually had that happenbefore in the submarine force.
Well, anyways, that was a risk aswe started partially submerging.

(01:01:11):
Well, what happens to all theair in the superstructure?
When the waves come in, well, all thatair has to go out somewhere where it goes
out the sail and we call that phenomenasail breathing and so what was happening
was Every time the ship partiallysubmerged like a massive gust of wind
would come and objects would just getjettisoned out of the cockpit Because
the forces like gale force winds and i'mliterally holding on on some of these

(01:01:33):
waves as we're partially submerged I'mliterally holding on from being ejected.
It was getting that bad.
And, and so I'm like, holy crap,this is, this is pretty legit.
You know, I'm holding on and, and,um, and I'm starting to realize
if we keep going out, this is,this is not going to be favorable.
You know at some point my my mindstarts realizing this is probably a

(01:01:55):
bad idea I probably should get downbelow with my lookout get him below
get me below Let's shift the watchdown below and start driving the ship
from where it's safer So I start havingthat dialogue, uh with the people below
especially with the ship's navigator.
I'm like, hey, man I may need you torelieve me It's starting to get really
unsafe up here and and i'll neverforget like one of the waves The first

(01:02:17):
was one of those radar reflectors Iwas talking when it went flying and
it hit my lookout in the face and hegot this gash and he was bleeding And
so I ended up giving him a relief.
I got him down.
He got treated He just got a cut onhis head just bleed, you know from
cutting your head Another kid cameup to be the lookout and I remember,
you know At some point we had wehad hit so far down into the wave.
I looked over the side YouAnd I couldn't see below me.

(01:02:40):
Like there was a lot of water prettyclose up to where I was for, for one wave.
I remember, and I'mlike, okay, this is it.
You know, this is, this is freaking nutsand I don't want to risk flooding the
ship with me and the lookout trapped uphere while they're taking water below.
And they, they may be floodingand I don't even know.
So, so, you know, I checkedcommunications with blow.

(01:03:00):
Hey, you guys.
Okay.
Yeah.
There's nothing down here.
I'm like, cool.
Cool.
Hey, it's getting rough here.
I I'm ready to be relieved.
I'm going to so we do this processcalled rig for dive Basically, you have
to put the ship systems in a conditionto support submerged operations So
there's certain things that me andthis enlisted lookout have to do, you
know, he'll he'll He'll do the initialpositioning and i'll do the verification.

(01:03:22):
So it's a two man check and weneed to start that procedure So
I first need to get relieved.
So someone below is responsible fordriving the safe navigation ship
So once I turn that over then I cando this this thing with this crew
member called break for dive Anyway,so I finally tell the navigator.
It's like you're relieving me.
You know, this is this is ridiculous.
I can't I can't safely maintain awatch up here because I'm too worried

(01:03:43):
about not getting, you know, knockedover by waves ejected, whatever.
And that was the first time inmy life where I think I realized
I'm probably a mortal and that,you know, I'm an insignificant
thing in this drop of the ocean.
And I probably should start guardingmy safety a little bit more.
And I'll never forget lookingat the lookout, you know, this
kid's about the same age as meand we're looking at each other.

(01:04:06):
And I, no words were spoken,but it was very clear.
The time is now to start taking action.
No words were spoken and, you know,I turned over the watch and we just
started reading things and, youknow, and then I could feel the ship
turning around and we turn around,you know, submarines around hall.
So when you're in waves and you'reperpendicular, the submarine can take
lots of roles and apparently while wewere up there, the ship took a pretty

(01:04:27):
big role and a bunch of things wentflying around the place because it was
setting up for dinner and all this stuff.
And just shit went flyingeverywhere, apparently down below.
And I found that out once I got down.
Uh, but as a ship was turningaround, we hit perpendicular and
we took a big roll, but when you'reup on top, you don't really notice
it because you're just up there.
It's just, it's kind of like, um, you'refloating on an airplane where you don't

(01:04:48):
have any windows like a transport.
And if you're, you know, in flightrefueling and you kind of have this,
Little oscillation and you, or if you'rebumpy on a ride and you have no frame of
reference, you can get sick, you know,where you don't realize where you're at.
It's a very similar sensation, butyeah, that was the first time I
realized like, okay, this is for real.
I believe it.
Yeah.

(01:05:08):
God, especially out in the ocean.
This is a 560 foot submarine.
This is an Ohio class.
And so imagine the waves comingwhere you're in a trough and you hit.
The trough and the water goes over.
Yeah.
So that's what was going on in thesuperstructure right here Actually, you
see this notch in the normal submarine.
That's a free flood area So the watercomes in the sail also is hollow.

(01:05:31):
So the water comes up and pushes theair out So you got a very small hole,
you know, you know pressure is force perunit area your area is a lot less So the
pressure is Freaking through the roof ifyou if you're a math type and so you're
literally having to hold on because allthat air is coming Out you can't hear
yourself think it's like hurricane forcewinds trying to eject you out of the
cockpit That's why you're harnessed inand you're partially submerging every

(01:05:53):
other wave and it's just you know Andand at some point the water got so deep
that it was near where the sail wasSo the fairwater planes were that's
when I said This this shit ain't safe.
I mean, is there a fear that youcould just nose in and and end up a
little bit But you're still positivelybuoyant because your vents so that's
the other thing What you don't see hereis there's three sets of main ballast

(01:06:14):
tanks and you you can google it Andthere's vents on top that open and shut
and the air normally stays in here.
You have free flood grates hereSo when you have air in here
The water can't come up, right?
It's like it put a cup underwater.
As soon as you open it, the air hasa path to escape and the water just
pushes up and displaces the air out.
And that's how the shipsinks and submerges.

(01:06:35):
And then you maintain trim.
Once the ballast tank ventsare open, you shut them.
Once you have no more airescaping, they're full of water.
And now you're transiting in the water.
So to maintain neutral buoyancy, notsink or not come up, you move water
in and out of tanks from CD and movethem around to create the right moment.
The trim.
Neutral.
So you want to be at a certain attitude,just going along, you know, hands off

(01:06:57):
your sticks and be able to do that.
That ship was pretty wild.
We had some pretty, uh, my, my firstunderway, I can't believe I forgot this.
My first underway on that ship, um,we just went out for Bay trials.
So we, we, where I was stationed in theback Northwest, we were able to leave
the pier, go to an instrumented rangeand, and dive the ship in a controlled

(01:07:18):
and operate on a racetrack and asecured range and do a bunch of tests.
Um without going all the way out tothe ocean to do it and then surface
and come back So it basically was a daycruise and I remember my first underway.
We were going out to do these tests andYou know, it was a rainy cold day and we
brought this air force general on boardwith his wife and it was like a Like a

(01:07:40):
stratcom commander or something like that.
I was that's what it was.
And and so we had just um You know,been recognized for, uh, from the
strategic command for the, for thecommand's performance the previous year.
And so we went out and did thisday cruise with the general
and his wife and his staff.
And back then we used to let guestsunder the watchful eye of qualified

(01:08:02):
watch standards, operate things on thewatch, like drive to the submarine, you
know, drive, you know, Ooh, this is cool.
This is driving a submarine.
And there was a qualifiedwatch standard behind.
That was, you know, supervised to makesure they didn't do anything wrong.
So one of the things during that daythat was planned was we were going to
do what we call an emergency service Sobasically it's it's where you come up
and you just put while you're submergedand you're traveling through the water

(01:08:25):
You put high pressure air into theballast tanks quickly to make the ship
possibly point and pop up quickly Andthen what I didn't know was at the time
there was a picket About waiting for usat a certain time to take a picture of
the submarine coming out of the waterAnd we were going to give a picture to
the general like hey, you know, cool.
Yeah.
Well anyways So the general's wifewas at the controls to operate these

(01:08:46):
two high pressure air valves and um,She was given very clear direction.
I was told I wasn't up there for this Iwas down below out of the way because i'm
a lowly, you know butter bar and Basicallytold not to be around any of the vips.
So I I you know, rogerthat i'm low Level nothing.
I'll stay away And, um, so Iknew we were going to do this
because we'd been briefed on it.

(01:09:06):
And so, when we do an emergencyblow, there's three blasts
of an alarm, diving alarm.
If you hear three blasts, thatmeans we're emergency surfacing.
Well, anyways, um, this lady,you know, goes to do it and
she only gets the aft group.
So the aft group of ballast tanksgets there and she forgets the
forward one or couldn't get theforward one to operate in time.
And so, Instead of an up angleforming, which is the normal response.

(01:09:28):
Um, we start getting a down angle and wecan reach like, I don't know, six degrees,
seven degrees, some kind of down angle.
It's like, it's pretty, pretty noticeable.
I'm like, I'm looking at my buddy andwe're in this space and like, this isn't
normal and we're, you know, and we comeout of the water freaking backwards.
So when the picket boat took the picture.
Imagine this, you know, 560 footsubmarine, all you see is the stern, you

(01:09:50):
got mountains in the background, sternof the submarine coming out of the water.
And that's literally what happened.
I'm like, holy cow.
I'm like, so this is what my nextthree years are going to be like, you
know, that was my first impression.
I'm like, so this iswhat, you know, I'm like.
I went from college to doing this suddenlyi'm like that's gonna be a pretty wild
ride man How about um, obviously peoplewho have seen the movies with subs

(01:10:14):
They see these moments where everybodyhas to be very quiet and you're lit.
Somebody's listening.
You don't want to make anynoise Does that still happen?
Is that for real?
Yeah, I think it gets moredisciplined, you know, I think yeah
you in general I mean, it's notas suspenseful as in the movies.
Um, because you know Soundtransmits different ways, right?
You can either, you know, youcan just make noise and air, you

(01:10:37):
know Sound propagates through theair Um, you know, you can also
have contact to contact, right?
So if you take a hammer and hit a nailthat sound is direct metal to metal You
You know, it's conduction of sound rightand then you sound can radiate through
a structure out into the water, right?
So there's different ways that thatnoise can propagate out the water.
Um, you know modern submarinesWe're running fans all the time,

(01:11:00):
you know, we're running pumps.
You have to run certain things to keepoperating So you're always making noise.
The key is you want to dampen that soundas much as possible So I think the movie
is exaggerated, but yeah, you know,we have different quieting conditions.
Absolutely.
Yeah.
But it's not as dramatic asyou know, the movies put it.
Yeah.
I love the movies, how they ramp up, youknow, it's a great opportunity, especially

(01:11:22):
with the nice tense music and the silenceof the faces with sweat running down.
Yeah.
That's pretty cool.
Same thing when we're flying,you know, like in an engagement,
there's no like music playing in thebackground and cool suspense cuts.
It's just like, yeah, themoment it's a lot less.
Cool.
Um, I was wondering as you're outthere, I got to imagine, you know, maybe

(01:11:43):
outside of a training environment, butyou know, you're deployed somewhere.
You probably have to be mindful of.
Other enemy subs that might be looking foryou or ships, maybe not subs or ships, but
you know, that's got to, I assume just apart of, of this lifestyle being out there
and cognizant of who else is out thereand do they want you to know, do you want

(01:12:03):
them to know maybe there's times where youdo and you don't, um, how do you navigate
that as the captain, I guess, for the,for the times when you were in charge?
Yeah, so that's a great question.
Um, you know, one of the things ofcourse, you know, like i'll use just any
military unit If you're going to deployYou know, if you're going to forward
deploy from your normal operating base,you know, to say CENTCOM or, you know,

(01:12:24):
the UCOM or wherever in the world,you know, you're going to, before you
deploy, you're going to get, you know,Intel training, you're going to get,
you know, you're going to get trainedup to operate and certify, you know,
I would assume the army does the samething you do, you know, we do workups.
So you work up to operate in the AO thatyou're going to be tasked and deployed
to go do so, you know, we preparefor what we expect in that theater.

(01:12:48):
Thank you.
Or if we're going through multipletheaters to get somewhere, you know, what
are the things do we expect, you know?
So what are the choke pointswe're going to transit?
What are the You know, what are some ofthe the bottom features that you know,
we're going to have to encounter that areacoustically challenging Um, you know if
there's any adversaries that could be inthe area or have been known to operate

(01:13:08):
Um, you know, what what do they look like,you know, so for example if you operate
in You know near the arabian gulf or inthe arabian gulf, you know, you got to
train to operate with multinational forcesIt's not just you know, just one country.
It's like seven or eight countries Thereare lots of countries that turns out
have economic interest in the middle eastAnd so, you know when you're out there
you see south koreans japanese danishYou know the the uk the iranians, you

(01:13:35):
know the russians the chinese, I meanyou get everyone out there So it's like
a world's playground out there in themiddle east for example, or in europe
You may see nato vessels and you know,it's not just red, you know bad guys
But it's also allied ships things thatyou normally don't see so you gotta You
know your operators and your teams needto be trained on how to recognize them.
What are the capabilities?

(01:13:55):
What threats do they pose, you know,because blue on blue is just as
bad as blue on red, you know It'sthey're they're equally terrible.
You don't want that, right?
So so you got to train and how torecognize it how to deal with it how to
maintain stealth What are our priorities,you know for training we may deliberately
be doing an exercise So for example,if we're doing an exercise with um, you
know anti submarine aircraft You know,typically there'll be a rendezvous,

(01:14:18):
we'll probably go underwater, run somegeometry, and they're going to try to
track us, you know, friendly exercises,but you still need to recognize there's
always a learning component to it.
So there's prep work, briefs,debriefs, you know, ARs, using
army terminology on that.
You know, so it's a, it's a constanttraining cycle of training your crew to

(01:14:38):
what's expected, you know, in theateror where you're going to be operating.
So, uh, you know, it comes down to how doyou classify them visually, acoustically,
you know, et cetera, et cetera.
There's patterns of operation, youknow, just like any military op that,
that you would go out and do, it's justhappens to be in the maritime domain.
And, um, you know, so you canjust imagine, you know, I try

(01:15:02):
to put myself in your shoes.
You know, if you're, if you'redeploying the CENTCOM, you
know, what would you expect?
And what kind of things, you know,what kind of TTP would you practice and
employ, you know, against insurgents?
And, you know, what did we see on the lastdeployment, you know, as you go through?
You know a training cycle, you know, youhave like a jade and ntc or something like
that We have different types of training.

(01:15:22):
So we we have something similar.
We just deploy, you know before we deployWe just spend a bunch of time at sea,
you know off our own coast, you knowdoing training and exercises to prepare
them You know, you mentioned earlier robthis idea of this the way you can kind
of maybe spatially Understand where youare relative to everything else that
you can't see necessarily with the nakedeye and you described it as an art form

(01:15:45):
How How do you how did you develop it?
What is it like once you've I wouldn'tsay mastered it I'm sure you're always
building on it, but the people that yousee who are great at it and then over
time Yeah, i'm sure you're not a captainin a sub because you don't have that like
what is yeah How do you develop that?
What's it like?
Yeah Yeah, so, you know, Istarted off in the early 90s.
And so the technology is nowherewhat it is today So I would say,

(01:16:08):
you know as a young officer in inthe mid 90s Um We're using old,
you know, 1980s 1970s technology.
So, you know, the key in my mind washow do I take information off a screen?
So basically sound, you know underwaterwe take sound from different directions
and you process it in discrete directionSo, you know in bearings in headings

(01:16:30):
You're you're going a certain headingrelative that heading, you know How do
you display acoustic information coming inand then based on that, you know, imagine
as you go through in time You're you'rechecking the bearing could be changing,
you know Imagine merging onto a freewayif you're going faster than a car that's
merging on they're going to be drawingaft from you Their bearings are going to
continue to draw out of you, you know,or if they're faster than you they're

(01:16:54):
going to draw ahead of you It's similar.
You're just you know, the big challengeis how do you develop a god's eye view?
You Of the tactical picture,looking at a linear display.
So that in itself takes some art.
And then, you know, how do you interpret,how do you take that information?
You can demodulate the noise.
Anything man made has, you know, certain,you know, especially rotating machinery

(01:17:14):
screws in particular are imperfect.
So you can count the number of propellers,number of blades and how fast it's going.
And if you assume turns per knot,for example, you can estimate speed.
So now you're trying to take.
Acoustic information bearing informationrate information and trying to form
what each Thing that you think is outthere that you can detect is out there

(01:17:36):
And you're trying to form a tacticalpicture in your head So there's an arc to
doing that quickly and you know Certaincalculations thumb rules you got to be
able to eyeball things quickly and theartist to be able to quickly do that
Build a picture because those are thebuilding blocks for eventually getting
to the point where you shoot torpedoesRight because some of those targets some
of those contacts out there You may gettasked one day to go shoot a torpedo at

(01:17:56):
So you need to be able to position thesubmarine at the same time, understand the
tactical picture, build it, and do it withminimal assistance from electronic device.
And you got to be able to makeinstinctive decisions because it
takes, frankly, you know, a 19, 000 tonsubmarines not going to turn on a dime.
No.
Yeah.
An attack submarine, you know,even a 6, 000 ton submarine is
not going to turn on a dime.

(01:18:17):
It'll turn a lot quicker.
But it still takes time.
And so, you know, there's after you'vebecome proficient, you know, um, If you
do any motorcycle riding a good book YeahI used to ride sport bikes and a great
book that taught me how to safely ridea sport bike was a book by a guy Named
keith code called twist of the wrist andin that book He equates mental bandwidth

(01:18:38):
of a rider to a dollar bill when you'refirst learning to ride a motorcycle You
spend like 90 cents of that dollar, youknow, just learning how to shift You How
to operate it how to keep your balanceand run the motorcycle, but as you get
more proficient You're only using like 20cents on the dollar just to do the basic
things and you have 80 80 cents of yourbandwidth To do other things like finding

(01:18:58):
the right line to approach a curve orwhen to accelerate and decelerate It's
very similar to some reading, or I wouldsay flying as you get more experience,
you know, I would say like flying helo.
I'm sure when you started flyinghelos, you couldn't maintain a three
foot hover without rotating around.
Good Lord.
You know?
Yeah, exactly.
And so as you become proficient, youcan do things like hover, move, move

(01:19:18):
a couple inches, move, you know, thattakes years of reps and sets, and it's
very similar to driving a submarine.
So there's a building block.
You got to first be able totake information that's coming
in from the world, process it.
Build a tactical picture.
And then from that take actionable,you know, make actionable
decisions to position the ship.
Once you can do that, then you graduateto the next level where how do I position

(01:19:39):
the ship to be an optimum firing positionand get within weapons envelope, right?
So if I'm going to use torpedo, forexample, as my method to kill, then
I need to be within parameter launchparameters of the weapon, the weapon,
the submarine, and the fuel, right?
And then once that happens.
You know, am I placed in the right place?
Do I shoot?
Then what comes next?

(01:20:00):
Well, the enemy gets a boat at some pointHe may come back and want you know, he may
want to do something to you So, how do youposition yourself to get out alive, right?
So there's a whole lifetimeof learning and doing that.
Well, anyways, with the antiquated combatsystems of the 1980s, 1970s, and even
into the nineties, you know, you spenta lot of your bandwidth just learning
how to do just building the picture.

(01:20:21):
Today's combat systemsare far more advanced.
And take away a lot of that guesswork.
So you know that $1 bill now, youknow, initially when I was new, I was
spending 90 cents of it just learninghow to interpret plots and data.
You know, the, the young officertoday, he or she only spends
probably 50 cents on the dollar.
You know, just learning thatbecause a lot of it's automated now.

(01:20:43):
Mm-hmm . And, I mean, there's stillan art to it, don't get me wrong, but.
They learn quicker because they're smarterbecause I think we're just dumber and
they're just smarter And the other thingtoo is they have systems to help them so
it speeds up the learning curve And soI can take a young officer who's newly
on board They can get up to speed and Ican start teaching them the things like
getting in weapons envelope earlier duringtheir tour Yeah, whereas, you know when I

(01:21:06):
was a junior officer, I started learningthat later in my tour just because You
know, the way, the way the technologywas and just the reps and sets required
to get to that point, you know, whenyou have more advanced processing and
capability on board, Um, and a lot ofthat bandwidth is now taken doing other
things You you end up having bettertrained operators, which I think is great.

(01:21:28):
You have more lethal You have a morelethal crew, you know so as a junior
officer in the early 1990s to being acaptain in the you know, 2019 time frame,
you know, it's radically different,you know, so Oh, it's so different,
but it was great because, you know,my, the officers are far smarter.
They're far more capable.
Um, they, they can, they just pickup things so quickly because we've

(01:21:51):
made the systems more intuitive.
And, you know, so from a trainingperspective, it's, it's, it's, it's great.
It allowed me as a captain to focus,you know, to devote my energies more
and other things where, you know,I think it was more of a challenge
for my predecessors decades ago.
Just really ignorant questionhere, but I'm just trying to
imagine taking a shot underwater.

(01:22:12):
Maybe a torpedo against another submarine.
I don't know.
Like, are these, do they have some typeof heat signature or you have to get
not just spatially aware, but you haveto get the right depth or altitude.
I don't know what you wouldcall it when you're under the
water at the right altitude.
Like, so you don't under overshoot.
On the target.
Yeah.

(01:22:33):
Yeah.
I mean, in general, youknow, it's a 3D battle space.
Yeah.
I think you characterize it correctly.
I mean, it's similar to probably airto air combat in that sense, right?
Because everybody has an X, Ycoordinate and also the Z coordinate.
Um, you know, I think part of it is,is, you know, to solve that problem, you
need to have a weapon that takes account.
Uncertainty.
So, you know, torpedoes, you know,our torpedoes, enemies, torpedoes have

(01:22:56):
acoustic sensors that are designedto passive passively and actively
use sound to, to basically register,you know, through logic, taking
information, go, is that a valid target?
You know, you basically tellthe torpedo before it shoots.
Hey, this is what Ithink the target's doing.
I'm going to put the shipin a certain direction.

(01:23:16):
You tell me torpedo thatI'm within parameters.
If you're not within parameters, thesystem will give you a big middle finger
and tell you, Hey, you can't shoot.
You're not parameters, right?
Cause it's the weapon smarterthan its operators sometimes.
Um, no offense against those who I'veserved with who are smarter than me.
Um, but you know, once you shoot theweapon, the, the weapon is, has its own
onboard computer and basically dependingon what settings you give it, you give

(01:23:40):
it parameters to go look in the water.
Once it achieves, you know, it'skind of like, um, if you think
like air to air missiles, right?
So a heat seeker, and you use thatanalogy, I would say we're not using heat.
We're using sound.
That's what I was wonderingwhat you would use.
Okay.
Yeah.
You use sound.
I mean, it's not because frankly,that's That's much easier to register

(01:24:00):
because sound is always coming out.
You can, you can get a lineof bearing the sound, right?
So torpedoes are typically acoustic,you know, unlike World War II
torpedoes, which were just, youjust shoot it in a straight line.
Yeah.
Kind of.
Correct.
Like a dumb bomb.
Right.
So you had to actuallydo mental calculations.
Based on the can of the torpedotubes, based on what you're shooting.
It's like, it's like skeet shooting.
You're leading a target, right?

(01:24:22):
Intercept, you know, you're goingthis way and you're trying to, you
know, basically have a collision.
Your torpedoes, you know, ultimately,if you, if you shoot something like
anywhere from skeet shooting to shootinga torpedo, your goal is basically
for your bullet to have a collisionwith the target, that's an essence.
Well, that's all you're really solving,you know, call it the fire control
problem, or basically the skeetshooting problem, it's just underwater.

(01:24:45):
Right.
Now, let me ask you this.
So you, I think before we hitrecord, you had mentioned you,
you'd been on five submarines.
Is that right?
And you're the captain on how many Rob?
I was captain of two ofthose five submarines.
I served.
Wow.
How stressful was it?
The first time you're taking a ship outas the captain, if it wasn't stressful,

(01:25:07):
um, you know, it's interesting.
So first time it was, the yearwas 2012 and I just taken command
and about, I don't know, abouttwo months in the command.
We're getting underway for the first time.
And, you know, I remember prior to beinga captain, I was, if I was officer deck
who happened to be on the bridge whenwe're getting underway from the pier.
I would, you know, when I'm ready to go,I would usually look behind me and tell

(01:25:29):
the captain, you know, uh, you know,captain ship's ready to get underway.
I intend to get the ship underway.
And usually he would say, you know,very well, or get the ship underway or
whatever, he'd give me some order, orhe would just acknowledge my intention.
And I'd always look back.
And so fast forward to 2012, we'regetting ready to get underway.
And the saucer decks in front of me,and he looks back behind me and says,
Hey, captain, I've got the ship.

(01:25:50):
You know ships ready to get underwayand tend to get underway very well and
instinctively I just looked behind meAnd I realized no one's behind me and
it just dawned on me at that moment.
I'm like, oh well crap, you know Um,I guess that's uh, wow, you know,
and it was a it wasn't a stressfulfeeling it was It was like one
of the coolest feelings on earth.
It's like falling in love the first timeIt's just like, you know, it's like wow

(01:26:12):
i'm 39 years old and the government ofthe united states has put me in charge
of you know, this 160 crew submarinemulti billion dollar submarine carrying
missiles And you know i'm given taskingto to go out to sea and you know It's
kind of like you're pinching yourself.
You're just like Youknow, this is so cool.
I don't think, you know, someonemuch smarter than me once told me

(01:26:35):
the problems of commander privilege.
And I didn't understand that statementuntil something bad happened in command.
It was about a month later.
You know, we had a near miss and that wasthe first time that the burden of command
finally hit me when it When I realizedthat i'm probably a handful of people
on board that realize the severity ofa near miss and you know, then Then the

(01:26:59):
world comes, you know, then it all becameclear to me that everyone's looking at
me to come up with a solution And it'sup to me, you know, and when when you're
underway on a ship or a submarine, itdoesn't matter a vessel at sea You You
know the the captain of the ship is it'sabsolute it's absolute accountability
absolute responsibility from stern sternYou look behind and nobody's there.

(01:27:20):
I mean that that lookslike a very powerful.
You are on your ownwith this crew Correct.
And so, you know, it's up to me to toYou know make certain decisions and it's
time for me to freaking lead and you knowThat's the first time in my adult life.
I think I finally Really feltand understood the burden of
command And the privilege of it.

(01:27:42):
And I learned a lot from that.
Um, and it taught me a lotabout accountability, ownership.
Um, I didn't manage it initiallyin the way I should have.
And, um, you know, the best app,just, just the way I reported
it, the way I communicated it.
Off all to my to my leadership.

(01:28:02):
I just didn't do a good job doing it AndI let my emotions cloud the method in
which I communicated it which brought intoquestion my judgment And um, you know and
invited the best ass chewing I ever gotin my entire career It was in a message.
I I received a message from my boss and hesent me this message And it was the best

(01:28:24):
ass chewing I've ever received in my life.
And it was 100%, 110 percent deserved.
I deserved, I earned everysingle word of that message.
You know, the only difference was hewasn't there personally to light me up.
And I, and I needed it.
I, frankly, that document reallywas a turning point in my career.
It really made me realize the burden ofcommand and what I'm actually paid to do.

(01:28:48):
And.
You know if it wasn't for that I don'tthink it would have got me in a place
to realize what I what CorrectionsI need to make as the head of the
organization You know, I think in theship, you know, I was making decisions.
That wasn't that wasn't necessarily theheart of the issue It was my command
level understanding of the issueIt's impacts and how we got there.

(01:29:09):
And more importantly, my roleand how I failed to train my crew
that led me to that near miss.
And that's the part that I,you know, I understood it.
I thought that I truly didn'tappreciate my responsibility in that.
Yeah.
Um, truly, you know, I, I knew I was.
I took the lonely walk and looked inthe mirror and said, what the hell

(01:29:30):
did I do to get us in this situation?
I absolutely did that, but to trulyunderstand my role in my, the, the
onus on me to make the decisions, todo it, the ownership of it, I just
failed to communicate that effectively.
And that, that invited to do quite theass doing it, which I wholly warranted.
Um, and that was great.
What was in that letter?

(01:29:51):
Uh, number one, was that sent just toyou or to other people on the ship?
See it.
It's just to you, because itwas encrypted in a way where I'm
the only one that could see it.
And so I saw it and I read itand I read it and I read it.
Basically it said, Hey Rob, um,hope everything's going great.

(01:30:11):
Um, I read your AR on this thing and.
Um, basically it sucks.
Um, it's clear to me I I question yourassessment of how you got there And
you know the way you wrote it makes itsound like you're you're abdicating your
responsibility And that's pretty terrible.
I'm just paraphrasing.
I'm basically condensing a two pageass chewing into into about 50 words

(01:30:34):
and you know in essence I sucked andI You know, I wrote my communication
describing how we got there and whathappened when I was, you know, in a
state where I was emotional and my pisspoor judgment combined with emotion.
I broke one of my own rules.
I made it.
I made a decision when, you know, Iprobably shouldn't have, and I committed

(01:30:56):
to hitting the send button on an email.
I probably shouldn't have.
And, you know, and, and whenyou're, when you're ultimately
accountable for everything, youspeak for the entire command.
You are the command, you know, yeah.
And so it's nobody else and so, youknow, I didn't appreciate the power of
that until I jacked that up And um, andI you know that that message I got back
I I call it, you know, when you getyour butt shoot, I call that a feedback

(01:31:19):
rich environment So I entered a feedbackrich environment pretty pretty freaking
quickly And that was from you know, thatwas from a couple thousand miles away.
So it's pretty good Andum, you know, it was good.
I I needed that, you know, it was agood calibration and uh, You know,
later I asked for some assistance.
I asked for some external help to help meout and just understanding, you know, some
things on, on board and, oh, I got help.

(01:31:40):
Whenever you ask forhelp, you'll get help.
And, um, you know, I'mworking in the government.
We're here to help.
So anyways, it was all good.
And, um, it really was a turningpoint for me as a person, as a
leader, you know, cause that wasthe first time in my life where I
really had the change to everything.
You know, it was all on me and I neededto, you know, grow up and I learned a
valuable lesson I learned several valuablelessons from that and you know, i'm glad

(01:32:04):
I had a I had a very you know My boss wasoutstanding Um, you know classic leader
through and through just you know One ofthe most patient men on earth, you know
and a great teacher and so, you know, Iowe a lot to him You know, I really do
and he made it he made such a positivedifference in my life and um You know,
and that that helped me later when I gotcommand a second time and I remember those

(01:32:27):
lessons And so, you know in pay it forwardeverything in life you pay it forward, you
know So I really appreciated that and um,you know, that was uh, that was a growing
up period and from that point on You knowthings got a lot better Rob Just out of
curiosity, it wasn't, it wasn't hitting.
We just, we had a, we had a near mishap.

(01:32:48):
We'll just say, Oh, a miss.
Okay.
Gotcha.
And, uh, yeah, just near miss.
I wasn't hitting something.
It just, it was just a near mishapand, but it was, it was bad enough
where it warranted me reporting it.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I probably should let, let management knowthat, you know, we, we had an earmiss.
And, um, you know, so we did that and,you know, that's part of life, you know,
and, uh, you know, you go through lifeand, and, you know, the way we look at

(01:33:10):
it is these are learning experiences.
There are corporate lessons.
From this so, you know, I would saythat one of the things I enjoyed
about my former occupation was weStrive to have a learning culture.
So similar to aviation, you know, Iuse naval aviation as an example We're
similar in that culture where we're opento admitting our problems one Trying to
get to the root of it and understandingwhat are the underlying causes of three?

(01:33:32):
We can make not only our ship better butother ships in the navy better You know,
we want to share lessons because that'sthe only way you're going to learn.
You can't live everyexperience in one unit.
So developing the right corporateculture where we share the lessons
and learn from each other's mistakesand mishaps and whatnot is integral
to running a world class organization.
So, you know, to me.

(01:33:53):
It's self reporting cool roger that I ownit 110, you know, and it's it's nobody
in my chain of command It's me, you know,and that's that's the price of command
if you don't if you don't want to youknow I use the analogies somebody asked
me one time, you know, what what kind ofmindset do you need to be a captain of?
A ship at sea and I said wellI use a football analogy, you
know, it's fourth quarter Youhave to score a touchdown to win.

(01:34:15):
It's fourth and goal.
You're on the two yard line You have notimeouts left five seconds on the clock
If you want to be the person that hasthe ball every time to try to win the
game I think you're you have the rightmentality to be a captain of a ship
Yeah, you can't be the guy running theblock You got to be the guy that wants
to win the game and punch it through Ithink you got to have that mentality.
Um, I think to be a captain of a shipat sea, you know, and and You know,

(01:34:37):
it's uh, you got to be willing to win itall and lose it all You know, it's, uh,
otherwise don't, don't say the words.
I relieve you don't, don't, don'ttake the job, you know, cause that's
them's, them's the rules, as they say,you know, and, um, I enjoyed that, you
know, and that's the part of commandthat I found to be rewarding is.
You know, I did it my way, you know,and, uh, and that was one of the

(01:34:59):
things that, you know, motivatedme was, you know, I get the, I get
to make decisions and do things.
And, but, you know, as I did command,what I learned the most was I learned
so much more than everybody else.
I had the fortune of learningfrom some exceptional leaders that
work within my chain of command.
You know, I got to watchexceptional men and women make

(01:35:20):
great decisions every day and lead.
And I learned a lot ofleadership from that.
And so, you know, seeing it fromthe perspective where I'm not in
the trenches every day, and I got towatch some exceptional people, you
know, just do some incredible things.
And, and they went on to do a lot ofgood things as their own commanding
officers later in their careers wassuper, you know, and so to me, I

(01:35:40):
think the reward of command was not.
You know, doing it in my own way.
Initially, I think it was like that,but it quickly became, Hey, I get to
watch some extraordinary people comeup with some ingenious solutions to
things, you know, and, um, we had thingsbreak, you know, where I saw some of the
most incredible solutions devised by mysailors, you know, to get things back

(01:36:02):
and running in the middle of the ocean.
Those are the triumphs.
Those are the things whereI, I watched the team excel.
You know, yeah.
And so to me, you know, I just happened tobe, you know, the guy that held the coffee
cup that said, yeah, I just happenedto, I just happened to be the guy that
was, you know, picked to be the figure,you know, the head of the organization.
But at the end of the day, it's thepeople in the trenches that do the work.

(01:36:23):
And my job is to represent them, equipthem, train them and, you know, give,
give the best leadership I can for them.
Because I would hope if the roles werereversed, they would do it for me.
And, um, you know, and, and so to me,it's, it's an honor to do those things.
And it was, it was a, it was aformative, you know, part of my life.
Now it's gone.
Yeah.
But you know, it's fun.
It's, uh, it's got its moments.

(01:36:45):
Uh, you know, I, I'll tell you, youasked me about, you know, mishaps.
This wasn't a mishap.
This is a pretty funny story.
So i'm the captain, uh, we're transitingso we're going from point a to point
b We're traveling like, you know,15 knots or something like that.
So we're moving along and it's asaturday and submerged so Submerged,
so we're transiting submerged.
We're underwater We're just fat dumb andhappy cruising in the middle of the ocean

(01:37:07):
and I have to go to the bathroom So Ihave a stateroom on the ship the executive
officer the number two guy has a stateroomand and I'm like, okay And in this
submarine, there's, there's basically the,the head is between our two staterooms.
So we share a showerand we share a toilet.
So I'm in there, you know, doingnumber two, just trying to get it over
with and get back, get back to work.

(01:37:29):
And suddenly out of nowhere, all thelights and fans go off in the bathroom.
Like just, it goes dark.
And then I can hear an alarm going offabove me and then in the level above me,
which is the control room like oh, That'sinteresting And so the first thing I do
is because I know that in my bathroom Allthe lights and fans are powered off of

(01:37:52):
one side of our electrical distributionsystem I know my stateroom is powered
by the opposite side So the first thingI do is I reach forward and I open my
stateroom door Just to make sure thelights are still on and I open them.
I see the lights are awesome Wedidn't lose all electrical power.
That's that's good because if you lose allelectrical power and you're running around
at 15 knots That's generally not a goodday And then you have to then you have

(01:38:14):
to do a bunch of other shit and it's it'sit's just not You It's a sticky situation.
But the good news is we only, for whateverreason, it turned out it was a fault.
We had a power fault that endedup dumping half our electric
plant that, that morning.
Um, and we recovered from it, butanyways, I was like, good, you
know, so we're, we're reliable.
We're redundant.

(01:38:34):
This is just somehow we losthalf the electric plant.
So I, I secure fromdoing number two and I.
And then on my way up to the controlroom to see what's going on because the
auster decks on the watch I hear thisannouncement over the ship announcing
circuit that that we lost control ofour stern planes So that's that control
surface that controls our pitch and atthis speed it also controls our depth

(01:38:56):
also because The it turns out the theforward control surface is pretty small.
So it's lift force is insignificant Soif you think mathematically these these
stern planes are much larger And so athigher speeds they have way more of a
lift force than the little ones So theybecome the control surface to control both
Altitude and attitude if that makes sense.

(01:39:16):
Yep So it's like elevator on you thefixed wing aircraft analogy It's elevator
on steroids right at a higher speed.
Well, anyways This is our onlycontrol surface that makes us
go up and down at this point.
And I hear this announcement thatwe have a failure and, and there's
direction given to take localcontrol of these stern planes.
I'm like, what?
So this is a big deal to do this.
Oh, yeah.
It's a big deal.
Yeah.

(01:39:39):
I'm gone for like, I'm gonelike for a couple of minutes.
I just want to use thebathroom for God's sakes.
And I hear this announcement,like, what is going on?
You know, I'm like, so I'm upthere and I round the corner and
I look at the ship control panel.
So this panel where.
We have three operators or fouroperators that manage the battle
systems and drive the summaries.
And there's a blown twoblown fuses on this panel.

(01:40:01):
And I'm like, and we have normaland emergency and backup modes of.
Controlling these planes.
So I look at the divingofficer and I ask him.
Hey, did you try the planes in emergency?
I just ask a basic question becauseyou know If you you have a power
transient and I heard And so while Iwas in the head when the lights went
up, I heard a thunk and an alarm andthat typically is associated with

(01:40:21):
Hydraulic shifted so something shiftedin our control To to a different method
and I got you know, I went moment.
I asked that question Hey, didyou test the planes in emergency?
You can see it'll look like oh shit.
I probably should do that And and so youdo that and they have contained we have
control and I look at the officer like heyYou probably ought to announce not taking
local control of the freaking stern planesAnd I'm just like, Oh my gosh, you know?

(01:40:45):
And I'm like, it's like, okay.
And then I see the chief ofthe boat and executive officer.
We're all kind of exchanging,changing stairs at each other.
So we go and huddle and talkand, you know, it's like.
This is a great learning point, you know,we had something happen out of the blue
There's a good learning opportunity rightpeople people acted on An indication
and it's not and this was a situationthat wasn't cleanly written in some

(01:41:07):
kind of backup procedure So you had toactually you actually had to understand
systems and how they interact and lookat the indications to diagnose And this
was a good advanced learning topic.
So, you know just out of the blue aglitch A power glitch, you know, while
I'm in the middle of me taking a dumpcauses an event, which, uh, you know,
it didn't cause the event, but I justhappened to be there, you know, it

(01:41:27):
just caused a great learning moment.
So that was actually a great trainingwith the rest of our ship control chances.
Hey, when you have something like.
You need to look atyour fault indications.
What are your backups beforeyou freak out and do something?
You know, frankly that probablycould have caused more problems.
Oh my god We probably should have control.
You know, we had another one.
We're on the surface.

(01:41:47):
We're doing c trials This is when Iwas in command of my second submarine.
We're out in the middle of nowhere.
There's no contacts There's nothingit's middle of the night And one of the
tests that the civilian test directoron board wants us to do is take our
rudder And go full throw maximum leftmaximum right in normal emergency
and locally And so we haven't locallytaken control of the rudder in like
freaking two years or something.

(01:42:09):
Nobody in the crew's actually donethat And so the order was given to do
it and, you know, just no supervision.
Um, well intentioned kid who's onlydone it once in qualification tries
to do it, screws it up, and we have nocontrol of the rudder on the surface.
And we're going like, you know, 15 knotson the surface in the middle of the night.
And, and I hear thatwe lost rudder control.
I'm like, okay, I look at the contacts.

(01:42:29):
I'm looking at my tactical,so we have nobody out there.
So it's, it's completely safe.
And I called the bridge and go, Hey,officer deck, uh, why aren't you still
going 15 knots with no rudder control?
And you could hear the pin drop, you know,like, oh, I probably should slow down.
It's like, you know, because we hadn'tbeen to sea in like 18 months or something
like 18, 20 months or something like that.
And, and I, you know, I didn't take overthe crew until the ship was more than

(01:42:50):
halfway through the maintenance period.
So no one had been at sea forlike 20 months or something
like that at this point.
Yeah.
Oh, yeah.
And you know, so, you know, we've donea lot of training, but you know, the
training only prepares you for so much.
And I just remember hey, man,uh, why are we still running
around with no rudder control?
Oh, hey, that's a great point That'sawesome You know, so we slow down and

(01:43:12):
you know, those are the times whereyou know, I think you earn your pay
as a captain Yes, you have to be theperson that's detached from it going.
Hey, you know, just ask theleading question Hey, have
you tried emergency control?
Hey, why are you still goingfast, you know, and um, Those
are the parts that I found, youknow, in retrospect to be funny.
Um, they weren't funny at thetime, but, you know, each of

(01:43:33):
those had learning points.
You know, it's like, why did I fail totrain my crew to not recognize that?
And you know, what are we going to doto fix it first own it down the problem,
you know Get after it go figure it outand re educate everyone and update their
update their software, you know And uhand get them going but yeah, it's a team
sport, you know, it's so much fun That'sit's that kind of stuff that You know, I
really enjoyed um, So that story I toldyou we were at 400 feet going to 15 knots

(01:43:59):
and we lost control of this surface Andthe officer deck wanted someone in the
engine room to just take manual controlof it instead of trying a backup method
We could easily go this way or thisway while we're cruising at 15 knots.
I'm like Hey, why don't we makesure we still have positive
control of the submarine beforewe just do something stupid?
So that that's the backstory behindthat Then the other one was, you know,

(01:44:20):
the, the people stand watch up here.
So at the very top of the cockpit.
So when you're on the surface,you have a hatch, you have a
access that goes down into thecontrol room, which is right here.
Rob, what was it like when you mentionedin the nineties, no, no women on board?
Yeah.
So, you know, for over a hundred years,we, you know, a hundred and what, a
hundred and eight years, a hundredand seven years, we didn't have women

(01:44:42):
as regular crew members on submarine.
So it's all men, you know, all male crew.
And then my last two submarines.
Um, so I was one of the first commandingofficers to bring females on board.
So I've commanded asubmarine with all male crew.
Um, the first increment was just bringsome officers on board that are women
and then the second increment which wason my last ship We actually had women
officers and women Um, enlisted sailorsto be fully integrated on my last ship,

(01:45:08):
but all guys, you know, it's just a, youknow, a bunch of guys, it's just, uh, you
know, just imagine you and your brothersand a nice, happy 160 crew family.
Um, you know, you know, happydysfunctional nuclear family and, uh, you
know, doing stuff and, you know, it's,it's the stuff you would expect basically,
uh, you know, in that environment.

(01:45:28):
Um, you know, you bring the ladies onboard, you know, it changes the culture a
little bit But I think you know The womenjust want to be they just they volunteer
to serve their country just like the guys,you know They just want to do their job
and they they don't want to be singled outfor who they are And I don't blame them.
I wouldn't want to either, you know tojoin a group of people as long as you meet
the standard That's all I cared about.

(01:45:49):
Yep, you know, can you turn a wrench?
Can you can you carry a submersible pump?
Can you you know, can you?
You Go through the hatch and do things.
Can you maintain a levelof fitness to carry people?
You know, I think as long as wemaintain those standards, you know,
and I, and I think, you know, there's,there's always room to improve.
I think, you know, my opinion, you know,the Navy's physical fitness test sucks.

(01:46:10):
We should do something like the ACFT.
I think all sailors, regardless oftheir rate should be able to carry
someone their weight in the firefightingensemble with, with kit on, you know,
a hundred yards in a prescribed time.
If you can't do that, in my opinion, Idon't think you should be Physically or
you should be in an operational unit.
Yeah, you know I think the standard isyou need to be able to physically carry

(01:46:31):
somebody through a compartment And,um, if you can't do that, that's the
part I don't, and I don't think thathas anything to do with men and women.
I think the Navy is missing the markon fitness standards in that regard.
Because to me, if, if you can'tpull a shipmate out of a smoke
filled compartment, you're useless.
You know, or if you can't carry a, youknow, 60 or 70 pound object through,

(01:46:51):
through a hatch or, you know, that'sthe problem I have is anybody can,
I can train a monkey to do planks.
Go run a mile and a half and you knowdo whatever that's that that is no
measure in my opinion Of you know, soI think you know The marine corps and
the army got it right to have some kindof combat fitness test where you're
actually using functional fitnessUh as as a benchmark because that's

(01:47:13):
really what you're graded on on thebattlefield For sure nobody cares if
you can run a mile in eight minutes.
You can't know if you can't carry someonedrag someone who just got blown up Yeah,
you know So I would say for sailors, Ithink there should be a comparable test
Um, and I don't know if we're ever goingto get there which you know as a civilian
as a taxpayer now That's that's kind ofone of the things that where do you blow

(01:47:36):
shit at somebody else on this model?
Ah, so So when you're in port, uh, let'ssee, Los Angeles class submarine, it's
the left, it's the, yeah, left side.
So we're moored and we have a lineon the, on the port side, but we're
moored this way and we have a linethat goes over and onto the pier.

(01:47:56):
And the pier, there's a north south pier.
So imagine a pier and there'sanother submarine on this side.
Submarines get ready to get underway.
So one of the things they have to dobefore they get underway is disconnect all
their shore service, including CHT, right?
So basically it's your poop,your, your, your, your poop
line, you know, your sewage line.
So you have to disconnect.

(01:48:16):
Well, there's a valve on thepier that they have to shut.
So when they flush their line,drain it, they have to carry the
hose and they have to shut thevalve on the pier because it's a T.
E header, so there's a valve header ourvalve and then there's a pipe that goes
all the way to a shore collection facilityIf that makes sense, they forgot to shut
their valve We're getting ready to blowour poo tanks And we don't check their

(01:48:39):
valve because it's not an inner procedureto do so We just assume their valve is
shut or if it's open their valve is shut.
It's not going to you know What Imean, so they're getting underway and
they have secured everything but theyforgot to shut their valve as soon as
we pressurize Their tanks and I gavepermission to start blowing Poo goes
path of least resistance across the piershoots onto the bow of their submarine
the spring poo On the front of theirsubmarine and there's a bunch of crew

(01:49:01):
members on top because they're gettingready to cast off lines And I hear this
announcement on the ship's announcing thesecure blowing sands like what the hell?
So I run up the hatchthe captain is behind me.
I go look and i'm like, holy shit There'slike a little geyser of poo like on the
front of their submarine and i'm likewhat i'm like Oh my gosh, they forgot to
shut their valve and the captain goes.

(01:49:23):
Did you check our linesbefore you gave permission?
I'm like, yes, sir.
I did And so he walks over and apparentlyhe wasn't friends with this captain
of this other submarine He goes.
Hey, mike looks like you forgotto shut a valve Sucks to be
you Have a great underway.
He comes back and he goes.
Yeah.
Call me if you have any problemsMake sure you shut the valve.
Yes, sir.
Got it.
Holy shit, man They just blew shitall over this other submarine.

(01:49:45):
We've interviewed a couple Manyseals but a couple sdv folks on here
and I remember One of them sayingthat one of the scariest things they
ever did was when they left a sub.
Now, I can't remember if it wasin an SDV or just, you know, their
own person coming out of a sub.
Yeah, lockout.
Yeah, lockout.
Like you, it's just you andthe black ocean, basically.

(01:50:07):
Oh, yeah.
And like, you can't, youdon't know what's below you.
It's, it's a very surreal feeling, uh, theway they And, you know, so funny story.
So when I told you that story, the sealcatching it, so we do all our workups
are basic, so it's basically a crawl runwalk approach when we're working up soft.
And so we basically start withunopposed, daytime conditions,

(01:50:28):
perfect, perfect sea state.
So, we don't, we want to make sure thatthe divers can get the SDV out, the
seals can get the, you know, can safelyuntether, go out, navigate, and come
back, and do everything without fault.
So we basically do unopposed,daytime conditions.
You know making sureeverybody can do it, right?
So we we got to pass that first andthen we start doing recoveries and then

(01:50:50):
our certification standards We have todo it in complete darkness, you know
So the seals the divers have to doeverything in complete darkness do all
the moves to untether and recover thesdv in complete Darkness, that's crazy.
Um And the SEALs have to be able to drivethe STV, navigate, do their task, and come
back in complete darkness, um, unopposedto the baseline certification level

(01:51:13):
for an STV team and a host submarine.
And we have to maintain the submarinewithin parameters, because if we lose
depth control with divers on deck,we can incapacitate them super fast.
You know, you can killall the swimmers quickly.
If you take a deep depth.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
I didn't get the bed.
Okay.
And then yeah, the, the, the, um, what'sit called the dry dock shelter here, the

(01:51:33):
very forward part is a small decompressionchamber, but we can only decompress
like two people at a time in it.
So, you know, if you only haveone hanger that limits the
amount of medical space yet.
So we haven't embarked medical team, theSTP teams in part, you know, we got a
whole bunch of people on board summary.
We're doing soft ops.
And, um, But yeah, you've gotto keep the submarine at perfect
depth in order to recover.
So imagine a submarine inthe dark, deploying an SDV in

(01:51:57):
the dark, no lights, nothing.
Oh, you can see a bunch of glow sticks.
All you see is a bunch ofglow sticks running around.
And this SDV goes off, does its thing.
They have a coordinate to rendezvous.
We have a backup rendezvous point.
We do, we'll just say certaincommunications and, you know, they go
do their thing and we have contingencyplans on how to recover them.

(01:52:17):
If they're disabled, then wehave a way to recover them.
Also, there's a different methodand we have to certify on that.
Um, so it's an integrated team and thenan SSGN with no nuclear weapons, you
know, we can carry up to 155 Tomahawkcruise missiles, you know, so my last
deployment on Georgia, we deployedto the middle East, we had over a
hundred cruise missiles and a dried up.
Excuse me in a dry dock shelter, youknow, and we're a full up isr platform,

(01:52:40):
you know, so, um, you know So we're ableto do, you know, all kinds of stuff.
Um, in fact, I did a podcast with um,david hookstead Um, oh, yeah, if you look
him if you look up david hookstead, I dida podcast with him two months ago Or a
month and a half ago and he asked me aboutgoing through the Strait of Hormuz And
I was tasked to go through the Strait ofHormuz in December of 2020 on the surface

(01:53:02):
So found out after we got to Bahrain wemade world news because apparently the
day before we didn't know this But um thean iranian proxy force had attacked a u.
s.
Base in southern iraq in iraq Andthe next day we just popped up.
We were doing a scheduled show of forcethrough the Strait of Hormuz and the
timing was, wasn't any better, youknow, and basically Iranian proxies

(01:53:25):
attack next day, two cruisers and aballistic guided missile submarine
go through the Strait of Hormuz.
It's a show of force.
I mean, it was freaking, and wecaught him completely off guard.
That was freaking awesome.
And, um, you know, that was oneof the highlights of my career.
It's like, wow, we get the transitstraight over movies on surface, you
know, and give Iran the finger, you know?

(01:53:46):
So, um, yeah, you know, it was a blast.
Um, yeah, I'll bring us to aclose here in just a second, Rob.
I wanted to just get your thoughtswith technology evolving the way it is.
How, like, how do you thinkabout AI in that domain in, in
submarines and the future there?
Yeah, I think the future, um,I think AI, uh, used correctly
can, can take that 1 bandwidth.

(01:54:08):
I talked about, I love that analogy.
If we can apply AI correctly intactical decision making, we can,
we can really free up almost, youknow, in a perfect world, you know,
80 cents of that dollar bandwidth andan average decision maker with AI.
You know, I still think you need to trainand invest in first principles, you know,
I, I still think, you know, frankly,you lose the red dot, you still need to

(01:54:30):
be able to shoot iron site, you know,um, I think that analogy still applies.
I think, you know, maintainingthe fundamentals, I think when you
get more automated, you need toresist the temptation to go all
in on automated and you still needto retain some backup capability.
You know, I think in this world,we rely so much on technology.
We have an entire generationof people who've never, never

(01:54:51):
had to do things manually.
You know most situations they don'thave to but you know, there's an
emp attack or you lose power Howare you going to be able to still
safely navigate and do stuff?
um, I think there still has to be Ithink ai is the future I think if we can
employ ai correctly to Better ascertainand quickly ascertain, you know, probably

(01:55:11):
from a probability standpoint what thelikely Enemy action is you know, I think
you can apply ai in you know, combatarms type application and especially
I think you know In the field on landand also in at sea So I see a bright
future Would you expect to see in thenear future like an autonomous type?
Maybe even controlled.
So maybe not AI, but remotelyoperated like a drone Sub of that

(01:55:35):
size without humans on board.
I suppose.
Yeah, I think I think you know Yousee the war in ukraine and you see
what what's happening in the you knowin the air domain You know, I think
humans are quickly, you know fighterpilots are becoming a thing of the
past I think I think the modern droneis really the future, you know, and I
think you know man flight is going tobecome less and less You know, closer

(01:55:56):
to the enemy, in my opinion, I thinkin the undersea domain, you're seeing
that also, I think you're going tosee the submarines purpose change.
I think as time goes on, it'sgoing to go from being something
that's, that's, you know, up postand personal and something that's
probably more remote, like a sea base.
You know in an ai world where youhave expendable vehicles because

(01:56:18):
really I mean you see it in ukraineI mean drones the kill ratio.
I mean the drones just fly to the humanand blow up You know, and we've gone
from we've gone from it being an abstractconcept in professional magazines to
instantly being employed in the fieldWithin three years and in moore's law,
you know, I saw a graph a week ago Itshowed a logarithmic vertical scale

(01:56:39):
of, you know, computation per some unitand time on the horizontal axis, and
it's basically a linear line, or yeah,linear line on a logarithmic scale.
Moore's Law is well and alivein the computational world.
I would not be surprised that,you know, it's the same with
drones under sea or above land.
Um, you know, so that's the future.

(01:56:59):
That's, that's just me, Joe taxpayer.
Now, I'll just see where things are going.
Yeah, I've seen it evolve.
And, you know, I think there was recentlya news release that talked about a large
undersea vehicle, you know, prototypingand I'm like, Hmm, that's cool.
You know, um, I think the way we usethe submarine as a vehicle, just like
aircraft is, is fundamentally changing inthe century and, you know, I think it'll

(01:57:22):
be for the good and, uh, you know, the.
Submarine force that is of thefuture is not the force I grew up
in And um, you know, it was fun.
I enjoyed it It's uh, I encourage youngmen and women to to join military and
serve their country It's one of the mostnoble things you can do, you know in the
navy when you make better people and uh,You know the most rewarding thing in my

(01:57:42):
career was See young men and women fromfrom all walks of life come together and
achieve something greater than themselvesI think you ask anybody who served in
the military Great You know who served infor a while they see that that's that's
a probably a common thread For sure,you know and you know the leadership
opportunities and life lessons were justincredible, you know And I stayed in for

(01:58:02):
the people I didn't stay in for stayingfor being sleep deprived and breathing
shitty air for for months on end um andbeing away from family for God knows how
long it's spending a bunch of time awayfrom home, you know, in that environment.
So, and just like, you know,anybody in other services who
are deployed from their family.
So, you know, it's a sacrifice and, uh,you know, you pay a price for it, but.

(01:58:24):
You know in the end, you know, or anybodythat's raised the right hand and took the
oath knows knows that sacrifice You knowmy hat's off to them I just I just had
the fortune and honor to be there and youknow, just witnessed a lot of it Yeah,
i'm gonna round out on two questions herequick ones I ask everybody one of them
is uh, is there anything you carried withyou when you were uh, kind of underway

(01:58:45):
out to see Whether in your shit like inyour stateroom or on your person that
had sentimental value good luck charm orsomething You just wanted nearby Yeah.
So my kids got me a, um, they got methis little Lego like Boba Fett and
I carried that thing around on, youknow, I didn't carry it on my person,
but I brought it to see with me.
They bought me this little Legofigure a couple of years back and

(01:59:06):
I kept it while I was on there.
Um, the other one is I kept the book,uh, Marcus Aurelius meditations.
I read that.
Um, I found that book to bereally, really insightful.
You know, when I was having a.
Not so good day or you know, I just neededtime to recognize that you know, it's
not about me It is it's a hundred percentabout the work and the service and um,

(01:59:27):
you know, and and the biggest thing forme was Remind myself periodically that
don't expend any energy over things.
You have no control overIt's just, it's not worth it.
And you know, for me personally,during those times, you know, I
had to fight that temptation a lot.
And it's part of growing up, butit's also recognizing that there's
a different way of thinking.
And, you know, and I continue to read it.
My, uh, my senior in highschool has it buys bedside.

(01:59:51):
So love that book.
Nice.
Nice.
You know, and, and as I've gottenolder, you know, I think the.
The other book that I neglected earlierin my life is the bible, you know
That's the that's the other thing Ineglected and I it's just it blew me
away all these years I didn't reallyread it and appreciate the wisdom.
It has in it god's word and And if thatprobably would have helped me out a lot

(02:00:12):
if I was Back in my 20s and and had myact together, you know, so I I think you
know put those together I think that wouldhave helped me out and yeah We all learn
in life, you know, you got to choose yourown your own paths and then uh Actually,
i'm going to slip one more in here.
Like what do the movies get wrong aboutthe uh submarine lifestyle community
experience Or where do they go?

(02:00:34):
Also?
I hate submarine movies.
Um I think the best submarine movieis dust boat by wolfgang peterson
It's not a happy ending and itfrankly describes submarine culture.
Um, it's you know Youyou go for the target.
Yeah, you take risks you you you boldbut not reckless and um, you know
That's where it gets it, right I thinkwhere it gets it wrong is it tries to

(02:00:57):
glamorize, you know, like your jonesiesand all these people Yeah, sure.
You have some star players, but youknow, it's not as colorful as as
people make it out to be in fact YouYou know, you're doing your job if
it's boring, you know, if it getsexciting and things aren't going well
Um, I think a lot of people, you know,I would say that about flying too.
It's usually if it's exciting It'sprobably not good We would say

(02:01:19):
that at the agency when you're outLike if you if you're really having
a sprint on a surveillance routethings have gone south effectively.
Yeah Yeah.
Yeah.
I mean if you you rehearse you you haveassumptions you plan it if you execute
it to plan You Yeah, you know, itshould work a certain way and when it
doesn't, you know, that's when thingsgo, uh, To get interesting and spicy.

(02:01:40):
Okay All right.
I haven't heard of that one Andthen that's a good good movie world.
Last question here is uh, I think I knowthe answer from the way you described
it, but just looking back on almost 30years in uniform a lot of time Away from
home a lot of close calls a lot of uhlearnings as you look back on that time.
Would you do it again?

(02:02:00):
Oh, absolutely 100% Do it all over again.
Um, you know, it's service is Yeah,I think you and I and everybody
else join the military for a reason.
I think we stay in the organizationFor a different reason, you
know, and it gave me purpose.
It gave me a mission Um, I stayed in itfor the people, you know The best people

(02:02:23):
i've ever met in my life and and workedfor that i'm willing to give up my life
for you know It just I don't think I wouldhave found that working in a cubicle.
Yeah, and um, you know to me, you knowThe sense of purpose and knowing that
despite how much it could suck at timesthat you're bonded by it There's purpose

(02:02:43):
and You know, as a person, I kept engagedand it was rewarding that I'd do it again.
Absolutely.
Rob, thanks for the time.
Really appreciate it.
Yeah, no, it's been a pleasure.
Um, yeah, hope you, uh, hope you hada, you know, got some things out of it.
I'm happy to, you know, If youhave any questions afterwards,
happy to, happy to answer.

(02:03:04):
I hope you enjoyed that combat story.
Definitely our first, uh,submariner to have on, on the show.
Super interesting experience.
I can't even imagine what it's likebeing underwater that long, uh, for
those stretches and tight spaces.
I don't know.
It takes a very special person to do.
Um, just a couple of listenercomments I wanted to share.

(02:03:26):
The first is from at Ty Sobelabout the Rob Sarver interview.
Rob, um, as you recall, was a NavySEAL officer, had seven deployments and
worked on the, uh, warrior to civilianbook and another great interview.
Huge.
Thanks to both of you for sharing thesestories and then another one here.

(02:03:48):
And this is, uh, E5.
S E F U S A R, Sef Uzar.
And this is on the Daryl, uh,uh, second round interview.
Thanks for a great interviewat Combat Story Ryan.
I was an Iraqi interpreter, U.

(02:04:09):
S.
Army soldier, and now a veteranworking in cybersecurity.
Um, so whoever you are,you should reach out to me.
That sounds like aninteresting story right there.
And I will tell you straight up.
I appreciate your service, as I'msure all the people listening do.
Not easy to make that path.
So with that, you can check outour newsletter at CombatStory.
com slash newsletter.

(02:04:30):
I hope wherever you are in theworld, you're having a great rest of
your day, your week, your weekend.
And as always, stay safe.

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Tactical Submarines | Launching Missiles and Torpedoes from Subs | 30 Year Navy Vet | Rob Peters

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Tactical Submarines | Launching Missiles and Torpedoes from Subs | 30 Year Navy Vet | Rob Peters