This is the second part of the three-part series describing ranks of Indian Army, Navy and Airforce.

Navy Ranks

The picture above lists the ranks in decreasing order (from L to R)

Since when was the idiotic complaint of a terrorist more important than supporting the men and women who put themselves in harm’s way so that we sleep peacefully at night?

From Fox News:

Awwww. The poor little Islamic jihadi who beheads non-Mohammedans and kills women and children got his feelings hurt because someone punched him!

Whoever is running this investigation and pushing these chages needs to be thoroughly investigated and when wrong-doing is discovered (i.e. prosecutorial misconduct) they should be hand-cuffed and frog-marched off to prison!

You can access the complete story on-line here:

Navy SEALs Face Assault Charges for Capturing Most-Wanted Terrorist
Rowan Scarborough
FoxNews.com
November 25, 2009

This post is actually a rather long reply to a question about flash photography in a heritage forum Midland Heritage, so it may read a little strangely.

Blimey now this is a big can of worms. Firstly I would really recommend the strobist blog as an excellent resource lighting 101 this will take you straight to the first page of their (rather long) lighting tutorial which will give you all the info you could possibly want.

One way to use these flashes  is  to fill shadows   when you are lighting a dark dingy room, I would suggest that a set of triggers is a good first purchase for this and will help immensely, especially if you havent got any of the shiny flashes that will trigger wirelessly.

I always find it easier to work from an example and I quite like this one as it is not immediately apparent that I have used a lot of flash.

I have just used the one unit which has been placed just behind the door on the left and bounced off a silver reflector (though the wall would also work).

The reason I needed to light this was that the difference between the sunlight streaming down the stairs and the door which was deep in shadow and rather gloomy, so I metered for the stairs and used a process of trial and error to find the correct fill.

With this shot there is some evidence that I may have used a flash, first the colour of the light is different, cool the side where I have used the flash and warm on the other where the sunlight is coming down the stairs. Secondly the light is concentrated at the bottom of the door which is a giveaway that a small light source has been used (firing two or more flashes through a diffuser or large bedsheet may have helped lessen this but it is not really the most practical or portable of solutions).

I will often use a flash to highlight a section of detail aswell, this shot is the usual long exposure on a tripod which people are used to 1.3 seconds at iso 100 and an aperture of f13. the flash here is lighting the foreground and bringing detail to the “thing” at the front.

In this shot the flash would have been firing at quite a high power despite the long exposure, this is due to the aperture being so small and the way that flash lights a picture.

Put simply the flash only cares about aperture as the burst of light is emitted for roughly 1/10000 sec, only one burst is emitted during a normal exposure so it doesnt matter what the shutter speed is to the flash.

Having said this the ambient light obviously cares about both so in a long exposure the flash may not appear as evident but this is only due to the natural light taking over as the dominant light source and stifling the light from the flash.

Going back to the picture the flash is very evident here because the area it is lighting is in shadow allowing the flash to be the dominant source of light, it needed the high power to allow enough light to hit the sensor through a small hole in a very short space of time.

This was the part of flash photography I always struggled with but the best way is really to experiment.

Another way I will often use flash like this is to kill all the ambient light in a room and allow the flash to light the scene on its own.

The geek info for this image is: 1/250 sec at f10.

It would make sense for me to increase the shutter speed further to something like 1/1000 as this would allow me to reduce the aperture and put less strain on the flash units, however the flash will not sync at this speed 1/250 being the maximum on my camera. So I am stuck with f10 which isnt so bad as it allows me to keep everything nice and sharp.

Without the flash the frame is black, the little detail you can see on the background is due to spill from the lights

To light the picture I used two lights, one on a stand right in front of where the model was jumping at around chest hight on the model. This flash was zoomed in towards the model as I wanted to concentrate the beam of light on her (this also reduces the power needed as more light goes where you want it) doing this makes the beam harder and narrower and is a great way to bring attention to a specific point in an image.

The second light was low down right below the camera and bounced off a silver reflector, this light was as wide as I could make it and lower power than the first as I wanted a soft light just to fill the shadows left by the main beam (it is also this light that caused the spill).

The only problem with lighting this way is you are forced to blend the light, filling any unexpected shadows and keeping the light from becoming a distraction.

You are not restricted to darkness for these techniques either and they can be a viable and interesting alternative to a HDR image. This shot was exposed for the sky on a bright day with the sun at my 5 o’clock. This caused the top of the Helicopter to be exposed, but left the detail at the bottom dark and in the shadow. To counter this I used two lights one either side of the helicopter (my 10 o’clock and 2 o’clock), these lights were used to give the bottom of the helicopter a little more exposure than the light hitting the top, bringing your focus to the front of the helicopter and giving the picture more impact than a normal exposre could allow.

I hope this has been somewhat useful to some people, and sorry about the length, this is a technique I use in most of my images at work and while it may take some getting used to, once you have an idea about what the light will do it becomes a very powerful tool that can be set up quickly and easily

A note on my kit: All the above were taken with a Fuji S5 Pro, a Nikon 17-35mm f2.8 lens and one or two nikon speedlights. I use an old Sb26 connected to a trigger and an sb800 which fires wirelessly when it detects the light from the first flash (or any other flash for that matter) my bag also contains a silver/gold reflector and a cheepo Jessops tripod which I use as a stand. All fairly cheap and most importantly very portable

I regularly put images using this technique on my Flickr page and include a brief description of the lighting used.

So, today’s, like, Black Friday. Everyone is, like, so crazy about all the sales and stuff. I kind of wanted to, like, go to Old Navy ’cause if you, like, buy at least, like, twenty dollars worth of stuff you can get, like, Lego Rock Band. I wanted the game but, like, the store opened at, like, 3 AM and by, like, 4 there wouldn’t be anymore games and I’m not, like, waking up earlier than 9 on a day that I don’t have any, like, school. I was like searching the web for, like, inexpensive handbags and I, like, saw this site where this girl made handbags out of, like, duct tape. It was pretty cool and stuff. She had really pretty colors. I might get one but I’m not sure if she’d ship it. If anybody wants to, like, check this out it’s http://www.creativeclutches.kk5.org/. I really don’t think this helps this girl ’cause nobody really, like, reads my blog but whatever. The bags are, like, $0.50 or $1.00 so I could, like, afford it in less than a week’s allowance and stuff. Oh Emfrea Kingjee!

Yeah there are always lots of events where a top commander helps chop up a turkey. This visit to the USS Nimitz by General Petraeus puts all those other visits to the troops during the holidays (by anyone) to shame.

This is a great and most sincere visit to thank his joint brothers and sisters in arms.

–Shortly before midday, he took his first-ever ride in an F/A-18 fighter jet. Someone had written a message for him on the plane’s left-side window: “Gen. Petraeus, Things to Do Before Lunch – run 12 miles, do 500 push-ups, win a war or two.”–

.

Sometimes it isn’t what you say, it’s the way you say it! International maritime signal flags make a great home or party decoration. Give a personalized signal flag banner as a gift, or say something special in an unusual way.

We offer Horizontal, Vertical and Valances personalized by you.  Also our BZ Award banner which means “Well Done” for that special someone. Our banners are especially great for that someone that is hard to buy for. A gift that will be sure to please.  Check out our website for more details.

IB Designs, USA

BY DAVID PUGLIESE

Ottawa Citizen

A design contract for the Nanisivik Naval Facility in Nunavut has been awarded to a civilian firm from British Columbia but the date when construction work on the facility is to begin could fall behind schedule, Defence Watch has been told.

On Thursday the Defence Department announced that the initial design phase contract has now been awarded to a British Columbia firm. Construction work at the naval facility could “possibly begin in 2011” and is forecasted to be operational by 2014, according to the department.

Sources tell Defence Watch that it is fully expected that the program could slip slightly behind schedule, mainly because construction and environmental issues expected with building projects in the North.

The sources noted that construction at the Nanisivik site was originally expected to commence in the summer of 2010. It is estimated the project will cost around $100 million.

In May, Defence Department officials told a Senate committee that the facility was going to be operational as early as 2012.

“The Nanisivik berthing and refuelling facility has had initial site studies done,” explained William Pentney, Associate Deputy Minister of National Defence. “Construction work will begin in 2011.  We expect it to be operational initially in 2012 and fully operational by 2015, appreciating that Arctic seasons are short and there is a fair bit of work to be done to ensure we are meeting the environmental and planning standards as well as developing something that will be effective.”

Pentney noted that the U.S. could also use the facility. “Canada cooperates with the United States to a great degree in search and rescue and Coast Guard activities in the North and I am sure we would be happy to welcome the American military, and perhaps other militaries, to our base in our internal waters to refuel and undertake training,” he added.

Located more than 1,000 nautical miles by sea north of Iqaluit, the facility will serve as a staging area for naval vessels on station in the high Arctic, enabling them to re-supply, refuel, embark equipment and supplies, and transfer personnel. This will extend the range of Canadian ships in the Arctic during the navigable season (approximately June to October), according to the Canadian government.

Military and government officials have noted that the site is strategically located inside the eastern entrance to the North West Passage, at Nanisivik in Nunavut. As a deep-water berthing facility already exists at this site, start-up costs will be significantly reduced. With its sheltered harbour, nearby jet-capable airstrip, and proximity to the North West Passage, Nanisivik offers an ideal location for the docking and refuelling facility, according to background information provided by the Defence Department.

The initial design contact announced Thursday was awarded to WorleyParsons Westmar Ltd., from North Vancouver, B.C.

In a statement Thursday, Defence Minister Peter MacKay said the contract award “demonstrates” the Conservative government’s commitment to ensuring Canada’s security and exercising sovereignty in the North.

This contract, worth just under $900,000, is for the first of four design phases of the project, according to Defence Department officials.

This initial design phase will establish the various requirements for construction, as well as preliminary design work that will lay the foundation for the remaining design phases. The other three design phases will involve conceiving detailed plans and designs, developing drawings, and preparing construction estimates for the facility.

The NNF will function as a logistics hub to support the Canadian Navy, and other Canadian government vessels in the Arctic during the navigable season.

For more Canadian Forces and Defence Department news or articles by David Pugliese of the Ottawa Citizen go to David Pugliese’s Defence Watch at:

http://communities.canada.com/ottawacitizen/blogs/defencewatch/

Navy SEALs have secretly captured one of the most wanted terrorists in Iraq — the alleged mastermind of the murder and mutilation of four Blackwater USA security guards in Fallujah in 2004. And three of the SEALs who captured him are now facing criminal charges,

The three, all members of the Navy’s elite commando unit, have refused non-judicial punishment — called a captain’s mast — and have requested a trial by court-martial.

Ahmed Hashim Abed, whom the military code-named “Objective Amber,” told investigators he was punched by his captors — and he had the bloody lip to prove it.

Is this what we have come too? That a most wanted terrorist gets man handled and we put the people who risked their lives to capture him on trial? HOW PATHETIC.

Peter Davis

THIS is how you knock down a door…

And if this is what we are up against, I shouldn’t worry…

In far away countries, many of our soldiers celebrate thanksgiving today in the absence of their loved ones. From small combat outposts to large forward operating bases, our hope today is that America’s bravest are able to relax and recuperate, as we are so thankful for their sacrifice. They are doing the hard, dirty and dangerous warfighting work now so that our children and grandchildren will not have to.

Today, we should be most thankful for the hope of a safer world as a result of their tireless efforts.

Det är länge sedan jag hade tid att skriva men nu har jag några minuter över….

Först av allt så tänker jag återkomma med nya inlägg om vad som händer och har hänt i Laos den senaste tiden. Med tanke på att Laos snart ska stå som värd för ett av de största idrottsevenemang i Sydostasien så finns det en del underliga saker att berätta.

Men nu måste jag berätta vad som just nu pågår vid bordet bredvid mig på ett hotell i Jakarta, Indonesien där jag är just nu.

Tre herrar, två asiater och en västerlänning, troligen Holländare eller tysk sitter och talar om hur de ska kunna slutföra en affär om en eller två svensktillverkade U-båtar, Kokums har nämts flera gånger liksom Swedish Navy, som just nu finns i en hamn i Singapore. Inte helt klart till vilket land dessa U-båtar ska skeppas, men mycket tyder på att det är ett land som vapenexportkommittén skulle vara intresserade av. Mina öron har nu växt till ”Dumbo storlek” men jag lyckas inte exakt uppfatta vad dom säger mer än att det handlar om penningtransaktioner via olika banker i Europa via Schweiz och en bank i Sverige som jag uppfattade som SEB….
Är jag något stort på spåret eller är det bara en ”Groda”?

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Happy Thanksgiving, everyone! I hope you all enjoy a hearty meal at home with your family and give thanks for the meaningful things in life. I should probably lay off the hearty meals. As of today, I am 74.75 inches tall and 213.2 pounds. That’s 2.2 pounds over the Navy weight limit for my height. Now, it’s not an emergency or anything, and the day after Thanksgiving is the day I start taking care of business in terms of physical fitness. Still, five pounds gained in the two months since I took my MEPS physical is not the direction I want to travel. I want to be less than 200 by the time boot camp rolls around. Again, lots of time to get there, but time flies. I’ve got 181 days left before the longest and hardest 50 days of my life.

So…Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars. I’m sure you all want to know what I thought of this one, right? Well, the full review comes after I finish the game, but I’ll lay out some of my quick takes on the game as of yet. I’ve logged five hours so far and I have 11% completion according to the game’s completion meter.

• Allow me to say this: of all the DS games I have played, this is the one that makes the best use of the unique features that separate the DS from a handheld like the Playstation Portable and Game Boy Advance. The touch screen is used liberally and in ways that supplement the traditional gameplay without feeling like a distraction. You use the stylus and touch screen to jack cars, defuse car bombs, deal drugs, even create Molotov cocktails. This is what I look for when I play a DS or Wii game: features that take advantage of the system’s unique quirks.
• Your character is a sarcastic, streetwise thug from Hong Kong named Huang Lee. Upon his arrival into Liberty City, he’s thrust into the midst of a power struggle between his own uncle and a couple other mid-level crime bosses for prestige within their Triad. You do missions for all of them, and the missions are pretty standard GTA fare, just on a smaller screen.
• Despite the game’s name, very little of the action actually takes place within Chinatown. They might as well have called it Grand Theft Auto: Triad Wars. You’ll be going all across Liberty City, and it feels a lot like GTA IV, which is not a bad thing by any means.
• The most disappointing thing in this game is that one of the more interesting and less repugnant characters you run into gets killed graphically about half an hour in. It happens very suddenly, and immediately sets the tone. I didn’t like losing poor Ling, but it’s a plot point that works in this story.
• The dialogue in this game takes place entirely in text with stylized photographs of the characters illustrating the conversations. It’s alright, and I knew that my hopes for Liberty City Stories-esque cutscenes were a bit much. Still, the lines are very bare-bones and don’t seem particularly fleshed out. Without credible voice acting to give these lines some punch, the conversations seem somewhat hollow and over-exaggerated. The GTA series is well-known for some humorous interaction during pre-mission scenes, but the humor in this one just feels soulless without voices.
• Dealing drugs is a new way to make money, and while racking up huge profits lets you bankroll goodies early on, it really feels dirty when you sift through your stash box of illegal controlled substances, trying to find the right ones to max out your profits. The game brings the term “cruising for drugs” to a very real meaning, because you have to find the dealers to buy and sell from yourself most of the time. Maybe it’s just my moral compass, but the DS touch screen removes a barrier of vicariousness. It feels like uncomfortably more than just pixels sometimes.

Well, that’s all that I’ve got to say for now. Enjoy your turkey, enjoy the football slate, and have fun with your friends and family!

This 26/11 searching for true Indians

“Patriotism is not a short and frenzied outburst of emotion, but the tranquil and steady dedication of a lifetime.” says Kunwar Vijender Shekhar, Pro-Chancellor of Shobhit University on his facebook page.

A lot of homage-paying ceremonies, human chains for unity etc are taking place to mark the first anniversary of Mumbai attacks of 26/11. Most of these are plain gimmicks. I overheard someone retorting in one of the ceremony 26/11 mubarak ho! Big S@#$. These homages are not introspection of any kind, they are just photo-ops.

So began a journey to identify real patriots. Living ones’ who can be Nation’s role model. Not very late I believed Bal Thackeray to be a real patriot, the Nationalist. But the Sena chief’s recent outburst against Sachin Tendulkar makes me believe that political class have misused the emotion of patriotism to serve their interests…real patriots remain unsung!

I think I am confusing Nationalism with Patriotism. Are they different. Wikipedia stresses – Although patriotism is used in certain vernaculars as a synonym for nationalism, nationalism is not necessarily considered an inherent part of patriotism.^[2][3] Among the ancient Greeks, patriotism consisted of notions concerning language, religious traditions, ethics, law, and devotion to the common good, rather than pure identification with a nation-state.^[4][5] Scholar J. Peter Euben writes that for the Greek philosopher Socrates, “patriotism does not require one to agree with everything that his country does and would actually promote analytical questioning in a quest to make the country the best it possibly can be.”^[6]

So who are real patriots. The politicians can never be patriots because the word politics itself is against the notion of patriotism. Some list of public figures who I consider Real patriots are :

• Sachin Tendulkar
• Amitabh Bachchan (after all NRI’s can be patriots)
• Saurav Ganguly
• Rahul Gandhi
• Suniel Gavaskar
• Ratan Tata
• Mukesh Ambani
• Azim Premji
• Yash Raj Chopra
  
• Narayan Murthi

See we can count them on our fingers. But there are numerous personalities, social-entrepreneurs who are PATRIOTS in real sense. Doing their bit to energise the Nation without any shouting and sloganeering. Some personal names I can put forward(whose efforts I have seenpersonally) who I consider doing their best for upliftment of the Nation:

• Kunwar Vijender Shekhar, Pro-Chancellor of Shobhit University Meerut
• Rajesh Bharti, MD, Amatya IAS/PCS Meerut
  
• Dr Alok Pandey, Asst. Development Commissioner SEZ’s in Western UP
• Rot. Yogesh Mohan Gupta, Chairman IIMT Group Meerut/G.Noida
  
• Umesh Gautam, Invertise Group, Bareilly
• Gyanender Aggarwal, GD Promoters, Builder and Social Worker
• Security Personnel -The Army, Navy, Air Force

That’s it.

I was an average high school student. I had to attend summer school between my junior and senior years just to graduate with my class and even then, on graduation night, I wasn’t sure there’d be a diploma waiting for me. I was always more interested in playing ball and chasing girls. I was more successful at the former than the latter.

After graduation I did manage to earn an athletic scholarship to play baseball at a small Florida college but after two years of playing ball, and earning less than one year’s worth of college credit, I realized I was wasting my time as well as the college’s resources and decided I needed to do something else until I figured out what I wanted to do.

So, being the son of a 20-year retired Air Force Tech Sergeant, I joined the military. I spoke to all the branches and in the end it was the Navy that won me over for a six-year enlistment. They enticed me with visions of advanced electronics training, fantastic marketability in the civilian world and a chance to see the world. Remember the old Navy slogan: “It’s not just a job, it’s an adventure.” Oh boy!

From the moment I arrived in Orlando, Florida for my basic training I realized what a joke it was. If you want to know what military basic training is like just watch any episode of Gomer Pyle, it’s exactly like that. Just as ridiculous.

The military always advertises that it wants the best and the brightest, but the first thing they do is try to break you down and then reprogram you. They want to reprogram you into a person that will follow orders without question; something tantamount to a frontal lobotomy that leaves subjects unable to think for themselves. Well then why do they need the best and the brightest if they are not meant to think for themselves? Given the chaos of battle, to strive to have a force that is not expected to think for themselves is not only ridiculous but dangerous as well yet the military, under the guise of the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ), regularly prosecutes soldiers who had the courage, intellect and wisdom to do what needed to be done in the field to preserve lives even though they weren’t told to do it. That’s called “disobeying a direct order” from some arrogant, bonehead hundreds or thousands of miles away.

One is taught that there is a right way and a wrong way to do things and the military will teach you the right way. Anyone not doing things the right way then is to be looked upon with contempt and suspicion. The military teaches you how to micromanage life, as if they know how to do this, to the point that you find yourself counting brush strokes when you brush your teeth. Every move is to have purpose and be approved or else you will be prosecuted by the UCMJ.

The military, see, is a complete subculture within America. All soldiers are considered to be government property, no kidding, and there exist regulations in the UCMJ that can mean loss of pay, confinement, and even jail time if that government property is damaged somehow or if it doesn’t do what it is told to do. Again, even though the government says it wants the best and the brightest, if the sidewalks outside are icy during the winter soldiers are not allowed out for fear of them falling and injuring themselves. As ridiculous and asinine as that sounds it is fact; I lived it. So the broken logic is that we want the best to go fight in foreign lands and kill people and operate multi-million dollar equipment but we don’t trust them to walk down an icy sidewalk without hurting themselves like thousands of civilians do daily in the wintertime.

It’s an abusive subculture that demands abject subjectivity and a complete lack of reason, logic and intellect. The military trains people to be killers; puts those people in a war zone where at any moment, at any second their lives could be over and then prosecutes them if they don’t kill someone in accordance with the “rules of engagement.” That is to say: even though you are in a war zone there are rules to killing people and it doesn’t matter that a month earlier you were teaching 8th-grade history and your national guard unit got called to battle in Iraq. You need to pull that trigger and end another human life but only after that person clearly tries to kill you or else you can be prosecuted under the UCMJ for murder. I’ll let you marinate on that thought for a second.

I’ve never killed anyone but I don’t think you have to in order to imagine what that could do to a rational person’s psyche. I would imagine you would have to put yourself into a mental state that disassociates what you’ve always known to be reality and convince yourself that somehow what you are doing is right; that if you don’t kill that other guy, he will kill you, so you pull the trigger.

Then these poor souls come home and are expected to re-associate their minds with the reality of a civilized society because if they don’t then they will be prosecuted under the UCMJ for insubordination or worse: they might kill someone. The whole thing is a study in mind control conducted by the least-educated people in our society.

It still amazes me how parents brag about their children serving in the military in Afghanistan or Iraq. They talk about how some Arabs dropped planes on their heads on 9/11/01 so they are all for going over there and killing as many of those sons-a-bitches as possible and damn proud that their children are helping make the world a safer place. Who’s going to help the make the world a safer place from America?

(Image Courtesy of Charmed Events Planning)

Though we at Yazzie & Co. would usually kick off the holiday season by writing about holiday weddings, we wanted to switch gears this time around by honoring our troops. With so many of you all fighting for our country, we thought it right to discuss wedding planning – military style. After all, you brave men and women are in love with love as much as we civilians are, so why not share in that by learning how to pull off a magnificent military wedding? It’s not as daunting as you’d think, so stick around and let us show you how to pull it off with panache!

(Image Courtesy of MB Weddings)

Should you decide to go all out by getting married in a military chapel or military academy, you’d do well to book well in advance. EHow thinks that a year’s time will suffice in ensuring that you don’t get lost in the military marriage shuffle. Do make sure that you thoroughly investigate who you choose as your chaplain, for you don’t want to be stuck with someone who is unlicensed or unqualified to preside over a military wedding. According to EHow, decoration standards are very particular, so you also want to check with the staff to make sure that what you’ve chosen is in line with what they allow. If you’re not sure how to go about decorating your military venue, we suggest featuring the American flag. Not only does it pay homage to your military background, it also serves as a symbol of unity. Even better, you can take things a step further by featuring flowers that reflect the flag – like red and white roses and blue cornflowers. While military chapels don’t charge to rent for weddings, Tracy Guth from The Knot recommends that you donate to its fund out of courtesy. Think of it as giving back to the milieu that made you the person that will stand tall in front of your new spouse.

(Image Courtesy of the Old Glory Ranch)

Your next priority, soldiers, is to address your guests properly. Not quite as easy as seating your soon-to-be in-laws in the front row, one needs to follow proper military protocol when inviting your wedding guests. For instance, while using regular invitations are fine, you should include yours and/or your soon-to-be spouse’s rank and title on them. Also offer your military loved ones and colleagues the option of attending in full dress, EHow suggests. That way, they will be able to pay tribute to your military bond in uniform. You should also be aware of who you invite and where they will be seated, since this also directly reflects on military tradition. According to Gigi Rena Rogers of Favor Ideas, your commander and high-ranking officers should be seated beside your immediate family while your colleagues should be seated directly behind them. Once you work your seating arrangements out, you’ll be ready to move on to the next step – dressing the part.

(Image Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)

If you’re a soon-to-be bride that’s currently serving, you aren’t bound to wear your uniform. However, you can if you choose to do so. Should you be a soon-to-be groom in the military, it is recommended that you dress in traditional military garb for your big day. Since Winter’s around the corner, EHow recommends that you wear a blue uniform with your medal(s) and pristine white gloves. You’ll be dapper enough in your gleaming shoes to do the Arch of Sabers walk with your new bride. The most defining moment of a military wedding ceremony, this consists of you and your new bride walking through an arch of sabers towards your new life together. Whether you’re using swords as a Naval or Coast Guard officer or sabers as an Army officer or a Marine, EHow strongly suggests that check to see that your chosen base location has them available. Also make sure that there are commissioned officers available to hold up those swords or sabers during that moment on your wedding day, for Tracy Guth mentions that they’re the only ones that are authorized to participate in this part of the ceremony. Once the walk has been walked, your former civilian spouse will now officially be a military spouse – another thing that you’ll be proud to hold your head up high about as a member of the military.

Thanking You from the Bottom of Our Hearts for Your Dedicated Service,

The Yazzie Blogger

Published on PBS FRONTLINE
24 November 2009

In May 1985, federal agents arrested a 47-year-old retired Navy chief warrant officer on charges that he had spent the better part of two decades spying and providing top secret U.S. documents to the Soviet Union. It was a headline story for weeks and one of the last major spy cases of the Cold War era.Details emerged that the man, John Anthony Walker, Jr., had provided codes for more than 200,000 encrypted naval messages to the KGB and organized a spy ring in what was considered by many to be one of the most damaging cases of espionage in the United States.

What caused a 10-year veteran of the U.S. Navy to become a spy? According to the FBI, Walker’s motivations were strictly financial. In 1966, he had taken out a large loan to open a bar in South Carolina, but the bar was a failure. Mounting debt and the financial pressures of having to provide for a wife and four children are what motivated him to drive four hours from his duty station in Norfolk, Va. to the Soviet Embassy in Washington, D.C. For the next 18 years, Walker provided the KGB with classified documents in exchange for a weekly salary ranging from $500 to $1,000.

Twenty-four years later, the case highlights the reason why the Department of Defense continues to fight to protect its military personnel from accumulating unmanageable debt.

Matters of National Security

“When you’re entrusting an individual with classified information, any sort of weakness that can be exploited by our adversaries to try and garner that information, like finances, is a factor that needs to be considered,” Air Force Lt. Col. David Silverman, commander of the 21st Force Support Squadron, told FRONTLINE.

In 2008, the Navy reported that financial issues accounted for roughly 80 percent of security clearance revocations and denials — approximately 1,500 sailors out of 330,000 active-duty Navy personnel. Cpt. Mark Patton, chief of staff for the Navy Installations Command, told FRONTLINE that security clearance revocations seriously impact a unit’s mission readiness. When one service member is unable to deploy because he or she cannot obtain a security clearance, he explained, the military is often forced to deploy another service member sooner than expected or extend a deployment in order to fill that void. “Any time the nation is at war, any issue that affects your operational readiness and prevents a service member from carrying out his duties and responsibilities is a significant issue,” Patton said.

A 2005 study commissioned by the Department of Defense showed that the U.S. military, excluding the Army, revoked 2,654 clearances that year due to financial problems, up from 284 in 2002, the year before the invasion of Iraq. During that four-year period, more than 6,300 troops from the Navy, Air Force and Marines lost their clearances because of financial troubles. (Figures were not available for the Army, the largest branch of the military.)

Retired Navy commander David Julian, the director of personal finance for the Defense Department, told FRONTLINE that financial problems could affect a service member’s performance during missions. “If we’ve got a service member who’s deployed, potentially in harm’s way, they’ve got to be thinking about the important tasks at hand,” Julian said. “They can’t be thinking about their personal finances at home.”

Money Management Skills

Like most Americans in their late teens or early 20s, new recruits have received little financial education before entering the military. Members of the armed forces earn more money during a deployment — from hazard pay, tax-free income and separation pay — and military financial counselors from bases across the country report that many of these troops return home with little understanding on how to manage it, often finding themselves in financial danger.

Since 1994, the military has mandated financial literacy programs for troops. “Long before the current economic crisis, DoD has valued the financial education of service members and family members, [and] provided them access to resources and programs,” Julian said. “When the current economic crisis hit, we were able to fall back on those controls we already had in place to help our service members be financially ready.”

Betty Geren, who oversees financial education for soldiers and families at Fort Campbell, Ky., home of the 101st Airborne Division, said her department provides mandatory financial education for all first-term soldiers. Staff also provide one-on-one counseling, pull CarFax and credit reports, and assess if a soldier qualifies for a low-interest or no-interest loan. Through a debt liquidation program, the department can also negotiate lower monthly payments and interest rates for a soldier in severe financial trouble. “I think we’re better educating them when they first get here,” said Geren, who has taught financial education for more than 15 years. “And I see more soldiers coming in to be proactive about their finances.”

The Military Lending Act and Other Provisions

Congress has also played a part in protecting the financial security of the nation’s forces. When senior military officials recognized that one of the biggest obstacles to the financial security of its troops was the proliferation of payday lenders — small short-term loan centers that come with extraordinary high interest rates — which popped up near bases in the last decade, Congress took action.

In 2007, lawmakers passed the Military Lending Act, which put an interest rate cap of 36 percent on loans made to service members and their dependents. It requires lenders to disclose the terms of the loan information in writing with a clear description of the payment obligations, the annual percentage rate and fees associated with the loan. The act also prohibits lenders from rolling over debt from one loan to another and from using a personal check or vehicle title as collateral for the loan. Since the act was implemented, it has effectively banned payday lenders from capitalizing on a service member’s debt.

The Military Lending Act is not the only provision in place to assist members of the armed forces, Julian said. Since the Civil War, the government has passed several laws designed to protect the rights and property of service members at war. A 1940 bill included a provision that caps all interest rates on debt accrued prior to active duty service at 6 percent. The bill’s protections were expanded further in 2003, when it was renamed the Servicemember’s Civil Relief Act.

Even with established educational and support programs, Julian said the next step is to expand and improve the financial services for military personnel. “If we can get our service members to understand the right way to do things financially and have the awareness of the programs that are out there,” he said, “then that’ll help solve 90 percent of the problem.”

Watch the accompanying PBS FRONTLINE story that aired on the NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, for which I was the associate producer.