Outrun Change – We need to learn quickly to keep up with the massive change around us so we don't get run over. We need to outrun change.

You cannot turn an economy off, then turn it back on. Here are the results when hubris makes you think you found the magic switch. Part 2.

Modern Cargo container ship giving an idea of the amount of cargo that can be carried. Each of those containers is one semi-load on the freeway. Image courtesy of Adobe Stock.

Seems like most industries have a tangled supply chain. The entire transportation system is sorely distressed.

The elitists in federal and state governments have a staggering level of hubris. They think waving their hands, clicking on their laptops, issuing press releases will make the entire economy bend to their will. What they accomplish is willfully causing disruption in your life and in my life.

Here are merely a few of the recent articles describing the tangled impact of Covid dictats and sundry government policies:

Lots of cargo ships are waiting to unload off the California coast.
Large port operator expects disruptions to last into 2023.
Workers in transportation sector warn of possible system collapse.
Chip shortage for carmakers will last into late 2022.

Looks like it might take another 15 or 18 months to untangle the worldwide supply chain.

Wall Street Journal – 8/17/21 – Cargo Ships Are Again Idling Off Jammed Southern California Ports – Back in the middle of August the tally of cargo ships sitting off to coast of California was 37.

A tweet I saw this morning (10/9/21) from someone flying out of Long Beach indicated the individual counted 50 ships waiting to unload.

At around 10,000 containers per ship that is somewhere around 370,000 containers waiting to be unloaded back in the middle of August and is now currently somewhere in the range of half a million containers sitting off the coast.

Article says a few months ago it was only nine. Normally it is zero.

You cannot turn an economy off, then turn it back on. Here are the results when hubris makes you think you found the magic switch. Part 1.

Random stock outages are still common. Image courtesy of Adobe Stock.

The supply chain in most industries is tangled up somehow somewhere.

The people in federal and state governments with the staggering level of hubris to think they can wave their hands and make the entire economy do their bidding are willfully causing disruption in your life and in my life.

What is going on around us?

I am struggling to figure out what’s going on around us in the economy. These are confusing times.

That is why I blog. Digging into news reports and statistics deep enough to write something coherent (hopefully) pushes me towards understanding. At least that’s the concept.

The next several posts I have lined up will explore some economics aspects of this confusing world.

Price of oil and value of crude oil produced in North Dakota – May 2021.

Previous post showed a graph of average daily production in North Dakota. After a record high of 1.52M barrels of oil per day (bopd) in 11/19, production dropped to a seven year low of 862K bopd in 5/20. Production recovered to1.32M bopd in 10/20 before dropping to 1.08M bopd in 2/21 and sitting at 1.12M bopd in 4/21 and 5/21.

The good news for the state is oil prices have been recovering.

Prices for North Dakota light sweet had been in the $40s to low $50s for 2019 and most of 2020 before dropping and hitting a rocket disrupted price of $9.16 in 4/20 and $7.92 and 5/20.

Prices recovered to $32.35 in 6/20 and then slowly increased to $63.62 in 6/21 and are at average of $50.50 in 7/21.

All those prices are from the North Dakota Director’s Report.

Graph at the top of this post shows the4 North Dakota Light Sweet, West Texas Intermediate, and an estimate for the average price realized in North Dakota.

What does the dramatic swing in prices combined with the dramatic swing in production look like in terms of the amount of revenue realized by producers?

North Dakota oil production in May 2021 slowly recovering from economic shutdown.

Graph above shows wild swings in oil production in North Dakota during the government shutdown of the economy due to the pandemic.

Imagine…results from communism. Every time it has been tried.

Above video is parody of the song “Imagine”, showing the actual results from communism every time it has been ever been tried: empty store shelves, hunger, poverty, repression, political prisons, and death.

I could go into depth on the consequences from adopting communism. In fact, have a very short discussion: Why is it necessary to have a nuclear defense?

To cut the discussion short, just watch the video.

2021 estimate of nuclear weapons held by all nuclear powers.

The missile trailer located in the compound of the Oscar -01 launch control facility at Whiteman Air Force Base, Mo. (Photo courtesy of U.S. Air Force). No date or further attribution attached to photo. (Note – if the access door is open and missile transport is getting ready, that is actually a launch facility, not and LCF.)

The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute publishes a huge yearbook every yeare. I just learned about this. Yeah, yeah, I’m slow to catch on. I know. That’s why I’m writing this blog – to slowly catch on.

Anyway, I will not be buying the new edition because it runs about $100. Recent copies will run $60-$150 on eBay so will not be getting any of those. Copies 10 years or more from the past can be had for under $10. Might get one of those.

On 6/14/21 SIPRI announced release of their hot-off-the-press 2021 edition. Scroll to the very bottom of the linked page and you can see a link to a free copy of chapter 10 on World Nuclear Forces.

Following tables slice and dice information in the press release and chapter 10 for their estimates of world nuclear forces as of January 2021.

In the following tables, “deployed” is estimate of the deployed warheads either placed on missiles or located at bases where there are operational forces, which would allow rapid loading of the weapons.

“Other” means the warheads which are stored, reserves, or retired awaiting disassembly.

A foot note reminds us the British previously had an announced goal of dropping their inventory down to 180 but they announced this year they will increase the ceiling to 260.

The estimates for North Korea are guesses on how many weapons could be built based on the amount of fissible material they have produced.

Our weapons, along with our closest strategic allies:

In case you didn’t have enough to keep you awake at night, our adversaries are expanding their nuclear arsenals.

15U168 TEL 15P158 Topol ICBM by Robert Sullivan is in the public domain (Public Domain Mark 1.0)

Grim news – – China, Russia, and North Korea are expanding their nuclear inventory. From new reports in the last week:

6/16/21 –19fourtyfive – North Korea Might Have Up To 50 Nuclear Weapons: Report – The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, SIPRI, updated their estimate of the nuclear inventory in North Korea.

A year ago they estimated North Korea have between 30 and 40 nuclear weapons.

America is Land of the Free, Because of the Brave. My ‘thank you’ to those who made it so.

Heavy bomber crewman, U.S. Army Air Force, World War 2. Photo from Legacy Flight Museum in Rexford, Idaho by James Ulvog.

Our freedom is under rapidly increasing assault by many politicians who think they are kings and queens appointed by divine right instead of having merely won a few more percentage points of the vote than their opponent in the last election. In the last year public health officials at the federal, state, and county levels who lack self-awareness of how often they beclown themselves have joined in the efforts to shred our liberty.

As a result of these attacks, it is ever more important that on this Memorial Day we remember those who shed all their blood so that we may be free.

A ‘thank you’ from me is so trivial, yet that is all I have.

I will demonstrate my appreciation for freedom purchased by others by exercising freedom.

Yesterday I exercised my freedom of religion. Tomorrow I will exercise my economic freedom, also called pursuit of happiness, by running my business the way I choose.

I have posted variations of the following ideas several times before. I will continue to make these points routinely.

To everyone on active duty today, I often accept a ‘thank you’ on your behalf.

Union Infantry private, U.S. Civil War, 1961-1865. Photo from Legacy Flight Museum in Rexford, Idaho by James Ulvog.

While touring the U.S.S. Midway Museum in San Diego early this month, I wore a “U.S. Air Force” ball cap with various stuff pinned to it, such as the rank I wore, a missile badge (“pocket rocket” for those who know), SAC logo, and a rectangular piece of metal that declares “Combat Crew.”

During the course of walking around, I got lots of glances and several comments of “thank you for your service.”

Also got some joshing comments from the retired Navy guys about them ‘allowing’ me on their ship. Since we were all on the same team back in the day, the kidding was pure fun.

I was on active duty for only four years and that was decades ago. I never got within 3,000 miles of hostile action. (Of course if the flag had gone up, I would have been radioactive dust at 20,000 feet altitude about 40 minutes later.)

As a result, I was uneasy for a long time when someone said “Thanks for your service.”

It took me a few years to get to get comfortable with those comments.

I now graciously and proudly accept those expressions of appreciation from my fellow Americans, but not because of what I did so long ago.

Discussion of nuclear weapons capability of U.S. Navy ships in 1990.

B61 thermonuclear bomb on display at March Air Base Museum, Riverside, California. Photo by James Ulvog.

Nuclear weapons carried on U.S. Navy warships back in 1990 is the focus of the preceeding four posts. Topic caught my interest after a recent tour of the U.S.S. Midway Museum in San Diego, California.

Turns out there were a lot more nukes at sea with the Navy than I realized.

Links to the four posts, totaling just over 3,000 words, are below along with a brief description of each post:

Nuclear weapons at sea with the U.S. Navy in 1990 (and earlier).

Ywb61_1b (B61 “Silver Bullet” thermonuclear bomb, USAF museum) by Greg Goebel is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.

Previous articles explained the U.S. Navy had three different nuclear weapons deployed at sea in 1990. That of course got me curious about the capabilities of those weapons.

One of the articles I cited had an intriguing table listing all of the nuclear weapons carried by the Navy over the last several decades. The table provided the data source in a citation, which led me to the following book: U.S. Nuclear Arsenal / A history of weapons and delivery system since 1945, by Norman Polmar and Robert S. Norris. I splurged and got a copy at a very nice price (better than what is available as of today).

It is an astounding resource. A veritable encyclopedia of the US nuclear arsenal. It covers warheads, reentry vehicles, missiles, helicopters, tactical fighters, and strategic bombers. Astounding.

For the moment I will dive into some information on the weapons deployed with U.S. Navy in 1990, which also probably covers their loadouts for a decade or two earlier. Will have lots more to discuss from the book later.

B43

There were about 1,000 B43 bombs produced. They were in the inventory from 1961 through 1999.

Nuclear warfare capability of U.S. Navy in 1990.

B61 nuclear bomb. Ywb61_2b by Greg Goebel is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0

I have been aware of the US defense posture of maintaining a triad for nuclear deterrence since I was in high school. Since way back then I’ve known the Navy had lots of nuclear weapons on SLBMs under the water.

Only recently have I learned there were a massive number of other nukes in the Navy in the tactical size.

Previous two posts have discussed the nuclear warfighting capabilities of U.S. Navy. Did some more poking around and found that there is actually quite a bit of material available online.

Came across one intriguing article, from Greenpeace of all people:

1990 – Greenpeace – Nuclear Warships and Naval Nuclear Weapons 1990: A Complete Inventory.

Article goes into great detail on US capabilities (45 pages), Soviet Union (26 pages), England (11 pages), France (6 pages), and China (2 pages).

Articles written in 1990, which is a useful framework for reference for several reasons.

First, that is about a year before the United States decided (as directed by President Bush) to offload all nonstrategic nuclear weapons from U.S. naval ships. Second, that is a few years after I was on active duty so corresponds relatively close to what was going on my experiences. Third, this corresponds closely to the aircraft on the deck of the U.S.S. Midway Museum, so I have decent pictures to go along as illustrations.

I’ll describe a number of interesting tidbits I found in the article.

Mark 43 thermonuclear bomb, USAF Museum, Ohio, Ywm43_1b by Greg Goebel is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0

By the way, since I’m talking about nukes, please know I’ve long since forgotten anything I ever knew so today I don’t know nothin’ about nothin’ except what I read in non-government or declassified public documents. Just so you know.

Aircraft carriers

“Nuclear Weapons Afloat”, official tally

As mentioned in the previous post, during a recent tour of the USS Midway Museum in San Diego, my curiosity awoke regarding how many nuclear weapons an aircraft carrier had onboard. On of several related questions is how many nukes the Navy had.

Previous discussion described two articles exploring the question.

Immediate answer to my first question is the article asserts a U.S. aircraft carrier typically had 100 nuclear weapons on board during the Cold War.

Deeper answer is the articles pointing to declassified information about the number of nuclear weapons Navy had at sea for the years 1961 through 1991.

Nuclear weapons deployed with the U.S. Navy during Cold War.

Access to ‘special weapons’ area. A Marine guarding nukes? Trust me, you would NOT want to mess with him. Photo aboard U.S.S. Midway Museum by James Ulvog.

On a recent tour of the Midway Museum in San Diego I walked past the door to the “special weapons” area. The “special” means nuclear.

I’ve noticed that area on previous times aboard the U.S.S. Midway, but paused to ponder this visit.

This time I wondered:

How many nukes did a US carrier have on board?
What types?
What airplanes were equipped to carry nukes?

As an amusing coincidence, I asked one of the docents if he is aware of open source documents which describe the nuclear loads on carriers. He did not know, but we had a delightful conversation.

Turns out this docent had a parallel job to what I did when I was in the U.S. Air Force. He was based on SSBN submarines while he was in the Navy, having keys to launch the Polaris SLBM. Like I said, what a fun coincidence.

Well, that triggered my curiosity, got me doing a little research, and I found some good materials for starters.

One specific tidbit in the second article link below is directly responsive to my curiosity – the article asserts U.S. aircraft carriers typically carried 100 nuclear weapons on board during the Cold War.

Update: Just so you know, every word I say in my discussions of nuclear weapons is based on what I have read in a public, open-source document. I don’t know anything else at all about nukes.