Wow what a fascinating thing to share with the world! That's really cool that you could take your grandfather's experience and turn it into something like this for the rest of us to read and enjoy. Also very cool that you are following in his footsteps as a writer.
Was the ballistic missile submarine your grandfather commanded as an executive officer retrofitted for a nuclear payload?
I wonder if your grandpa has any insights into liquid flouride thorium reactors. I listened to a podcast a little while back that extolled their potential virtues.
I may not understand the one about whether a fleet ballistic missile (FBM) submarine can be retrofitted for a nuclear payload. But there are two nuclear aspects to a U.S. fleet ballistic missile submarine - the nuclear power plant used to provide the energy needed to propel and provide electricity for the ship - and the ballistic missiles that can accurately deliver nuclear bombs onto targets thousands of miles away. Some of the FBM submarines that were in service when I was on active duty were later converted to non-FBM service, and no doubt could have been converted back. I cannot speak authoritatively on that, but think that would have been highly impractical as well as inconsistent with our country's arms reduction commitments.
There is a very impressive Wikipedia article on liquid fluoride thorium reactor technology. (You may want to recommend it to the questioner.) The potential advantages are enormous, but so are the challenges. The only "insight" that I can offer is:
Light water reactor power plants turn nuclear-generated heat into usable electrical and mechanical power using the steam cycle, an about 200-year old technology that advanced to replacing steam engines with steam turbines about a hundred years ago. The as-described liquid fluoride thorium reactor technology doesn't utilize so well-proven, well-developed a technology. (I tend to think of the liquid fluoride thorium reactor technology as somewhat akin to the automotive technology that preceded Henry Ford's first cars.) That doesn't at all mean that modern engineering cannot make liquid fluoride thorium reactors practical and economic, but advocates of implementing new technologies typically underestimate the technical barriers that must be surmounted, the cost of doing that can be incredible, and surmounting technology barriers can involve very time-consuming development of new technologies. A huge number of promising ventures fail because of unforeseen and insurmountable (at the time) obstacles, and whether or not any individual one will prove to be suitable is highly speculative. Moreover, "nuclear" is a button-pushing word that escalates opposition to everything it's associated with.
I may not understand the one about whether a fleet ballistic missile (FBM) submarine can be retrofitted for a nuclear payload.
It sounds like your grandfather was operating submarines that could launch nuclear bombs! Wow, that is a hefty responsibility. I am sure they favor only the highly skilled for this position.
Interesting to hear his take on LFTRs and how the technology is still in its infancy. I hope the general distaste of the word "nuclear" does not cause the potential of this energy source to be overlooked.
I have but now found this discussion, and belatedly comment despite it's age due to what I believe is the continuing relevance of the matter. I wholeheartedly commend your grandfather, and such men, as strive to be excellent in every way providing service to humanity.
However, I must lament the institutions and predatory psychopaths that have intercepted such noble and dedicated service that should inure to society and the free people that comprise it. It is also unfortunate that instead of correctly characterizing the public fear of the existential nature of the potential of nuclear accidents reactors of legacy designs necessarily featured, your grandfather described that fear as merely 'the unknown'. The fact is that though a million reactors not fail, and produce power safely for a thousand years, when one slips through the cracks of probability to catastrophically fail - which he properly points out the Three Mile Island accident was not of catastrophic result - all of that felicity and benefit will be utterly destroyed and rendered moot in the absolute destruction of the ability of life to survive in the radioactive wasteland actual catastrophic failure will produce for tens of thousands of years.
This is not a fear of the unknown, but a fear of utter destruction and death that is an actual possibility of the specific technology legacy reactors feature. Molten salt reactors are inherently proof from this existential catastrophic danger, since failure produces cessation of reaction as the salt freezes. Fear of that newer technology might be factually characterized as fear of the unknown, but not the fear of the radioactive hellstorm legacy reactors featured. That's instead the fear of genocide and absolute destruction, not merely unknown possibilities.
The susceptibility of institutions, even those staffed and effected by men as dedicated and competent as your grandfather, to covert domination and control by psychopaths, is an inevitable consequence of the inhumanity of 'legal persons', and that feature shared by psychopaths that creates that susceptibility. Throughout history, we see that institutions such as government, the Mafia, and multinational corporations have been surreptitiously controlled by psychopaths to the detriment of society in fundamental and disatrous ways.
It is now a matter of public record that Roosevelt knew beforehand of the impending attack of the Japanese on Pearl Harbor, yet deliberately allowed it to effect it's full and deadly harm on Americans under his command. This is not the fault of the Navy, or the highly honorable and dedicated men who died under his command. It is a feature of inhumane institutions and their susceptibility to psychopathic control sought by such predators to aggrandize themselves, and caring not at all what costs others might pay for their aggrandizement. While an almost unending litany of identical predatory crimes against humanity can be provided here, I do not believe that is necessary for students of history, nor potentially of benefit in the event of disagreement. No fact or truth could convince one unwilling to change their mind regarding the inhumanity of institutions in the face of that one proof already provided.
I hope that the men and women of good character that today serve the professional military of our free people will come to grasp this particular fact that is critical to their ability to serve their families, communities, and nation: since 1973 testosterone of Western men has been reduced by more than 60%. The corrupt institutions controlled by rapine psychopaths that today deploy our professional military to effect their predation across the world have targeted the very professionals they depend on to secure the assets of the world for chemical castration. Our soldiers are just as medically harmed as civilians in this sinister and diabolical plot to create a fertile royalty of the psychopathic class of banksters that controls our institutions, the Mafia, extranational corporations, and the USG itself, and those soldiers are critical assets in the scheme to castrate themselves.
I cannot believe that the men and women of extraordinary character and dedication to service to their free people would continue to prosecute that ongoing existential threat to their very species, and themselves particularly, did they actually grasp it's reality and ongoing affects. The ruthless and pathological leaders the professional military have undertaken to serve sacrificially for the good of mankind, are instead of providing that good and free society, castrating humanity in order that the banksters might be deified in a world rendered but infertile drones by disrupting the endocrine function of humanity through chemical pollution.
I hope that these facts are apprehended with all possible dispatch by the men on the ground necessary to do the dirty work of psychopaths, who cannot themselves wield the weapons of war to enforce their ascension to the godhood they imagine themselves to be. The good men who serve will not serve to castrate themselves, and the fact of their ongoing castration is provable by examination of the literature not trumpeted by the media for obvious reasons.
Wow what a fascinating thing to share with the world! That's really cool that you could take your grandfather's experience and turn it into something like this for the rest of us to read and enjoy. Also very cool that you are following in his footsteps as a writer.
Great post, you've got a new follower!
Ah wow! I biked there from Philly last April.
Was the ballistic missile submarine your grandfather commanded as an executive officer retrofitted for a nuclear payload?
I wonder if your grandpa has any insights into liquid flouride thorium reactors. I listened to a podcast a little while back that extolled their potential virtues.
I sent him your comment and he emailed this back:
Wow! Thanks a ton.
It sounds like your grandfather was operating submarines that could launch nuclear bombs! Wow, that is a hefty responsibility. I am sure they favor only the highly skilled for this position.
Interesting to hear his take on LFTRs and how the technology is still in its infancy. I hope the general distaste of the word "nuclear" does not cause the potential of this energy source to be overlooked.
thanks for give us the historical news
I have but now found this discussion, and belatedly comment despite it's age due to what I believe is the continuing relevance of the matter. I wholeheartedly commend your grandfather, and such men, as strive to be excellent in every way providing service to humanity.
However, I must lament the institutions and predatory psychopaths that have intercepted such noble and dedicated service that should inure to society and the free people that comprise it. It is also unfortunate that instead of correctly characterizing the public fear of the existential nature of the potential of nuclear accidents reactors of legacy designs necessarily featured, your grandfather described that fear as merely 'the unknown'. The fact is that though a million reactors not fail, and produce power safely for a thousand years, when one slips through the cracks of probability to catastrophically fail - which he properly points out the Three Mile Island accident was not of catastrophic result - all of that felicity and benefit will be utterly destroyed and rendered moot in the absolute destruction of the ability of life to survive in the radioactive wasteland actual catastrophic failure will produce for tens of thousands of years.
This is not a fear of the unknown, but a fear of utter destruction and death that is an actual possibility of the specific technology legacy reactors feature. Molten salt reactors are inherently proof from this existential catastrophic danger, since failure produces cessation of reaction as the salt freezes. Fear of that newer technology might be factually characterized as fear of the unknown, but not the fear of the radioactive hellstorm legacy reactors featured. That's instead the fear of genocide and absolute destruction, not merely unknown possibilities.
The susceptibility of institutions, even those staffed and effected by men as dedicated and competent as your grandfather, to covert domination and control by psychopaths, is an inevitable consequence of the inhumanity of 'legal persons', and that feature shared by psychopaths that creates that susceptibility. Throughout history, we see that institutions such as government, the Mafia, and multinational corporations have been surreptitiously controlled by psychopaths to the detriment of society in fundamental and disatrous ways.
It is now a matter of public record that Roosevelt knew beforehand of the impending attack of the Japanese on Pearl Harbor, yet deliberately allowed it to effect it's full and deadly harm on Americans under his command. This is not the fault of the Navy, or the highly honorable and dedicated men who died under his command. It is a feature of inhumane institutions and their susceptibility to psychopathic control sought by such predators to aggrandize themselves, and caring not at all what costs others might pay for their aggrandizement. While an almost unending litany of identical predatory crimes against humanity can be provided here, I do not believe that is necessary for students of history, nor potentially of benefit in the event of disagreement. No fact or truth could convince one unwilling to change their mind regarding the inhumanity of institutions in the face of that one proof already provided.
I hope that the men and women of good character that today serve the professional military of our free people will come to grasp this particular fact that is critical to their ability to serve their families, communities, and nation: since 1973 testosterone of Western men has been reduced by more than 60%. The corrupt institutions controlled by rapine psychopaths that today deploy our professional military to effect their predation across the world have targeted the very professionals they depend on to secure the assets of the world for chemical castration. Our soldiers are just as medically harmed as civilians in this sinister and diabolical plot to create a fertile royalty of the psychopathic class of banksters that controls our institutions, the Mafia, extranational corporations, and the USG itself, and those soldiers are critical assets in the scheme to castrate themselves.
I cannot believe that the men and women of extraordinary character and dedication to service to their free people would continue to prosecute that ongoing existential threat to their very species, and themselves particularly, did they actually grasp it's reality and ongoing affects. The ruthless and pathological leaders the professional military have undertaken to serve sacrificially for the good of mankind, are instead of providing that good and free society, castrating humanity in order that the banksters might be deified in a world rendered but infertile drones by disrupting the endocrine function of humanity through chemical pollution.
I hope that these facts are apprehended with all possible dispatch by the men on the ground necessary to do the dirty work of psychopaths, who cannot themselves wield the weapons of war to enforce their ascension to the godhood they imagine themselves to be. The good men who serve will not serve to castrate themselves, and the fact of their ongoing castration is provable by examination of the literature not trumpeted by the media for obvious reasons.
Thanks!