Project White Horse Forum

Boundary Condition #2 (1) November 14, 1910, Eugene Ely makes the first take off from a ship from a wooden platform on the bow of the USS Birmingham; December 23, 1910 LT. T.G. Ellyson reports to the Glenn Curtis Aviation Camp at North Island, as the first naval officer to undergo flight training; 18 January […]

Veterans Day 2010 In high school, Joleta McNelis was never far away from a man she had never met. She carried Lt. John “Jack” Ensch in her heart — and on her wrist.  Aside from his name, the only thing McNelis knew about Ensch was the date his fighter jet was shot down over North Vietnam: […]

Naval Aviation = Night in the barrel (no exceptions)

From Thucydides, to Michael Yon today in Iraq and Afghanistan,  confrontation, conlict, warfare, wars AND War have been recorded for some  2500 years. We are discussing differences in this series.  But Thermopylae to Gettsburg to Midway to Baghdad to mountains of Afghanistan, much remains the same for those who do the  fighting.  This is the carrier […]

 Essential Elements of Information for a Culture of Preparedness Prior to Desert Storm, Gen. Norman Schwartzkopf created a small cell of four majors and a colonel to act as his intimate “brain trust” to plan his campaign. The group became known as the “Jedi Knights.” All were graduates of the School of Advanced Military Studies, […]

Invest in preparedness, not prediction…I will never get to know the unknown since, by definition, it is unknown. However, I can always guess how it might affect me, and I should base my decisions around that.”     The Black Swan, Nassem Nicholas Taleb   In  2001, the Defense Science Board investigated what they termed  “a revolution in […]

Forty years ago, 3 March 1969, the first TOPGUN class  began “graduate level” fighter pilot education and training at Naval Air Station Miramar at the Fighter Weapons School. They were there because eagles screamed. They were there because fighter pilots will not accept failure. In 1966 North Vietnamese fighter pilots (flying MiG 17 Frescos and MiG […]

New York Times, 16 February, 2009—  The homeland security secretary, Janet Napolitano, is re-evaluating the largest federal program for testing the country’s ability to respond to terrorist attacks, one of several Bush administration initiatives she has ordered to come under review. PWH Chapter 1 (Part 1 of 2) The Constant Gardner http://www.projectwhitehorse.com/pdfs/B[1].%20PWH_Chapter1(1of2).pdf (From Page 11) … […]

After more than 37 years of uniform service to the U.S. army and our nation, I will spend the second half of my life committed to a new mission: Creating a “Culture of Preparedness’’ in America. Every effort I take, whether it is this new Web site, public speaking/lectures, fund-raisers, or the books I have […]

Original Post: 22 Feb, 2007, Updated 11 Jan, 2009 After introducing Project White Horse 084640 in October 2006 as an electronic magazine focused on decision making in unconventional-hyper complex-worst case disasters, the next step for this website was the opening of a forum for exchange of ideas. Not intended as a day-day blog, the idea […]