Didn't we all know what the outcome would be and just thanked God it
didn't seem likely to happen?

The CW from the mid-80s was that we would *eventually* win the sea battles,
after the Soviets melted a few of our HVUs down to slag.

From the SSN standpoint alone, a squadron
of six ASW helos (of which 1-2 were always being worked on in the hangar
deck) was not going to be enough to counter a Soviet SSN tour de force
against Mother. I think we both know how useless the VS assets always
seemed to be at real inner-zone ASW, but even if you throw in a bone for
them, we all pretty much agreed we wouldn't have a place to land if the
real **** happened.

My VS duty was with VS-31 on Ike - we re-made our squadron patch in 1981 to
reflect the fact that we had gone one entire year without submarine contact.
It was one of the real reasons that I went into helicopters; the other main
reason was that the VS AWs were just plain snobs - something I have never heard
anyone say about us "knuckledragging SAR swimmer" AWHs. Its hard to be full of
yourself when you are ****ing in your wetsuit to keep from freezing.

Of course, I'm sure you'll agree we knew us AW's
would make damn sure a lot of VMF (Voyenno Morskoj Flot) sailors went to
ocean floor in the process.

Like I said, it would have been glorious -- at least for a little while )

Later, Mike.

v/r
Gordon
====(A+C====
USN SAR

Its always better to lose -an- engine, not -the- engine.