Nords: Russian sub claims North Pole floor

[FinallyRetired]

Nords:
Just curious, did you happen to drop any flags anywhere on the ocean floor? If so, I have a business idea

"Two deep-diving Russian mini-submarines descended more than 2 1/2 miles under North Pole ice to stake a flag on the ocean floor Thursday, part of a quest to bolster Russian claims to much of the Arctic's oil-and-mineral wealth."

FOXNews.com - Russia Places Flag on Seabed at North Pole - International News | News of the World | Middle East News | Europe News

 

[Nords]

Nords: Just curious, did you happen to drop any flags anywhere on the ocean floor?

I pumped out a lot of trash in my day, but no flags. That kinda would have been a big giveaway to the AGIs that trawled around for intel.

When it came to objects deposited on sea floors, the U.S. submarine force tended to focus more on recovery than on distribution. In fact a lot of that tradition centered around picking up objects put on the seafloor by the USSR submarine force.

It's a kinder gentler post-Cold-War era, but if this had happened 20 years ago I bet there would have been furious cursing in the hallways of two U.S. submarine type commanders, followed by a Norfolk-Pearl Harbor race to be the first to send a U.S. unit up there on a recovery mission. The flag (so carefully and expensively planted on the bottom) would have been dried, respectfully folded & wrapped, and delivered by the State Dept to the USSR ambassador.

Or else in a separate private ceremony the U.S. Navy CNO would have presented his Soviet Navy counterpart with the U.S. Navy's reconstructed track of the USSR units involved in the flag-planting, along with all of the MK48 torpedo firing solutions generated during the surveillance. But I'm just guessing.

I wonder how many other flags have been planted just outside the 12-mile limit...