The United States Navy (USN) is the naval warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. It is larger than the next 13 largest navies combined in terms of battle fleet tonnage, according to one estimate.[5][6] The U.S. Navy also has the world's largest carrier fleet, with 10 in service, one under construction (two planned), and two in reserve. The service has 317,054 personnel on active duty and 109,671 in the Navy Reserve. It operates 283 ships in active service and more than 3,700 aircraft.[3] HSV-2 Swift is a non-commissioned, hybrid catamaran originally leased by the United States Navy as a mine countermeasures and sea basing test platform. She is now privately owned and operated by Sealift Inc. and chartered to the United States Navy Military Sealift Command. She is primarily used for fleet support and humanitarian partnership missions. The HSV stands for "High Speed Vessel", and its home port is Naval Amphibious Base Little Creek in Norfolk, Virginia. The vessel has two CONMAR crews that typically rotate every three months to keep the ship deployed eleven months per year. The minimum crew size is 35; 18 are military with the balance civilian, provided through American Maritime Officers and Seafarers International Union. On rare occasion that she is in a United States port, it is usually Naval Station Mayport, Florida, supporting the Fourth Fleet or Charleston, South Carolina, for major maintenance. Rota, Spain, is considered by the crew to be the "Mediterranean home away from home".[1] The ship was constructed by the Australian shipbuilder Incat in Hobart, Tasmania, and was leased to the U.S. Navy through Bollinger/Incat of Lockport, Louisiana. She was the second catamaran the Navy leased to test new technologies and concepts associated with the Chief of Naval Operations's "Seapower 21" plan. The contract value for the first year was $21.7 million. Swift is the fourth Incat-built high-speed wave piercing catamaran to enter military service, following behind HMAS Jervis Bay, U.S. Army Vessel (USAV) Theater Support Vessel Spearhead (TSV-X1) and HSV-X1 Joint Venture. It is a wave-piercing, aluminum-hulled, commercial catamaran with military enhancements, such as a helicopter flight deck, strengthened vehicle deck, small boat and unmanned vehicle launch and recovery capability, and an enhanced communications suite. It features a new, modular design, which will allow the ship to be refitted to support any mission without requiring long shipyard periods. While from the front the vessels appear to look like a trimaran, the centre hull does not rest in the water and is not used for buoyancy. As a logistics vessel, it does not have water-tight compartments or weapons systems. Its propulsion is provided by directional water jets, so it doesn't have propellers or a rudder for steering and can maneuver in twelve feet of water.[1] The Pentagon is the headquarters of the United States Department of Defense, located in Arlington County, Virginia. As a symbol of the U.S. military, "the Pentagon" is often used metonymically to refer to the U.S. Department of Defense rather than the building itself. Designed by American architect George Bergstrom (1876--1955), and built by general contractor John McShain of Philadelphia, the building was dedicated on January 15, 1943, after ground was broken for construction on September 11, 1941. General Brehon Somervell provided the major motive power behind the project;[4] Colonel Leslie Groves was responsible for overseeing the project for the U.S. Army. The Pentagon is a large office building, with about 6,500,000 sq ft (600,000 m2), of which 3,700,000 sq ft (340,000 m2) are used as offices.[5][6] Approximately 28,000 military and civilian employees[6] and about 3,000 non-defense support personnel work in the Pentagon. It has five sides, five floors above ground, two basement levels, and five ring corridors per floor with a total of 17.5 mi (28.2 km)[6] of corridors. The Pentagon includes a five-acre (20,000 m2) central plaza, which is shaped like a pentagon and informally known as "ground zero," a nickname originating during the Cold War and based on the presumption that the Soviet Union would target one or more nuclear missiles at this central location in the outbreak of a nuclear war.[7] The United States of America (USA), commonly referred to as the United States (U.S.), America, or simply the States, is a federal republic[10][11] consisting of 50 states, 16 territories, and a federal district. The 48 contiguous states and the federal district of Washington, D.C., are in central North America between Canada and Mexico. The state of Alaska is the northwestern part of North America and the state of Hawaii is an archipelago in the mid-Pacific.

• published: 28 Nov 2013
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