Vice Admiral Douglas Perry

Our speaker, Vice Admiral Douglas Perry, followed in his father’s footsteps, graduating from the Naval Academy and then becoming the commander of a submarine. Nine years of his childhood was in the Ghent neighborhood of Norfolk while his father was a commander of a submarine.

 

Vice Admiral Perry wears two hats: as the commander of the Second Fleet and of the Joint Forces Command.

 

The Second Fleet had a long history protecting the North Atlantic from our enemies after World War II. It maintained peace for over six decades. After the breakup of the Soviet Union (1992), it was believed that Russia would peacefully coexist. In January 2011, the Second Fleet was disestablished. After Russia’s invasion of Crimea and its increasing belligerence, the Second Fleet was reestablished in 2016. Its mission is defend the homeland by maintaining peace of the north Atlantic Ocean from the Caribbean to the Artic Circle. A large part of its responsibility is to maintain readiness.

 

As a subset of his responsibilities, he is the Task Force Commander 20 and is responsible for the final integration of a carrier strike group, like the USS Eisenhower.  

Established in 2019, the Joint Forces Command Norfolk is a joint operational level command as part of the NATO command structure. It helps in the coordination with other NATO partners to insure that all participants have strong military preparedness.

 

Of the 31 countries involved in NATO, eighteen now spend at least two percent of their GDP on the military.

 

Historically Finland and Sweden used to believe that they wouldn’t be attacked by the Soviet Union/Russia. That changed with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine resulting in Finland becoming a NATO member in April 2023. Sweden has been approved for membership and both countries bring strong militaries to the alliance.

 

Of concern is the recent flare-up in the Red Sea by the Houthi rebels. We are prepared to defend against drone attacks but the more difficult issue is the missiles launched from mobile trucks such as recently hit the British registered Rubymar.

 

Our visitors included:

 

 

This week we had three prizes. Sigur Whitaker won four tickets to the Virginia Arts Festival production of her choice. Two tickets to an upcoming ODU basketball game were won by Kay Stine. An additional two tickets to an upcoming ODU basketball game was won by LauraBeth DeHority.