That's what the Japanese thought.

True enough. You might as well know, in case you haven't figured this out about me, that whenever I read a novel, I always think in terms of adapting it for film or seeing how it might really play out. But she got this much right: Ragnar would be smart enough to stay ahead of any particular captain who might come against him. So he need not worry about the admirals.

You do know it is fiction right? And AR was not exactly an expert on military things. Or even aeronautics.

He wouldn't try to steer his ship up the river. Instead he would go up the river in a low-lying fast boat. Any ship, of any size, would carry at least one "gig" (motor whaleboat, etc.) and possibly more than one.

Well, remember how great a load that aircraft has to carry. Maybe part of the reason Miss Rand didn't specify how many Troy pounds of gold he carried was that she hadn't quite made up her mind about the capabilities of the aircraft. The text says "from Mid-Atlantic to Colorado." I admit I'm not "up" on islands on or near the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. But I can't imagine he would dare try to launch from the present Portuguese Azores. (The People's State thing, don't you know.) In any event, he would need an island having a central plain large enough to accommodate something at least as large as the old C-130 Hercules.

BTW, how are you going to sneak the USS Enterprise up the Delaware River to meet with Rearden?

He doesn't have to take off from his ship in a cargo plane. He could take off from his ship in a helicopter and then take a plane from a land-based hangar

But it wouldn't actually be difficult. Smaller ships launched airplanes from catapult. Besides, that's a strange criteria to insist upon without also considering other criteria that rule out an aircraft carrier - like the long range guns capable of bombarding a factory. It's 2016 - take a helicopter instead of an airplane. Presumably one powered by Galt's engine and not needing to refuel. Or a VTOL aircraft like the Osprey. Or launch a seaplane by catapult and when it returns to the ship - pick it up by crane. They've been doing that for about 100 years.

Could you conceive of such a ship able to launch aircraft? Remember: Ragnar takes off in a cargo plane to airlift gold to the Gulch.

The ostensible reason why the US Navy continues to build carriers is that nobody has a carrier fleet with the capabilities of the US Navy. Any carrier put into operation against the US Navy would be quickly found and destroyed. Furthermore, a carrier is virtually useless by itself. It needs a fleet of destroyers and other ships to protect it from air and undersea attacks.

IMNSHO, a much better choice for RD's pirate ship would be a ship following the traditions of the Q-ships of WW2. These were merchant ships remodeled as war ships and used to lure German U-boats to their doom. I believe that the Germans had a similar version used to raid commercial shipping (which is exactly what RD is doing). Basically a secret warship disguised as a merchant vessel and capable of being modified to have slightly differing profiles. The older and more decrepit it looks on the surface, the better. It could carry a secret arsenal of hidden naval guns, AA guns and missiles, cruise missiles and surface to surface missiles, and torpedoes. It could also have engines capable of speeds that a regular merchant ship could not do. Furthermore, it would have the right profile to get near a "real" merchant ship and allow for boarding as well as the ability to carry a helicopter for boarding and sea-to-land operations (hidden when not in use of course). By changing the false funnel(s), the paint job, and flagging, it could use several different disguises.

The other advantage such a ship would have is that it would not need a large crew. Even the "fast sealift ships" owned by the US have complements of 40-60. Large container ships have even fewer people I believe.

One ship in modern literature that fits the bill is the Oregon. In Clive Cussler's series of novels called the Oregon Files.

Nice touch, "The effectiveness of any team is the same as the effectiveness of the leader of that team." This is true in every situation. Consider the NFL team the Patriots. Is it because of Tom Bradey that they win so much, or because of their leadership and managment? Does Payton Manning win Superbowls every year--he is most effective as an individual when he has proper leadership to allow his talents to shine.

Leadership is not a team activity.

I didn't know that ahead of time. That is ironic. : )

And here you are:

the blogger Overmanwarrior, in reviewing the casting of Eric Allen Kramer to portray Ragnar Danneskjöld in the upcoming release Atlas Shrugged, Part 3, offers a different reason. Conventional military and security forces, staffed as they are with largely incompetent drones, suffer institutional paralysis. Thus they cannot cope effectively with a Ragnar Danneskjöld, any more than the People's States of Mexico, Chile, and Argentina could stop Francisco d'Anconia from humiliating them.
“ Over this last weekend a young man asked me why I wasn’t worried about assassination attempts, and political harassment for the things I get involved with. As I tried to explain why I did not worry about such things to him I could only think of Ragnar Danneskjöld. Readers here know that I have been involved in friendships with hit men, I have known members of crime syndications well, I have been a property repossesor, a body guard, a bouncer, and have been in many conflicts. I have known prominent judges representing the highest order of the law who looked like nice family guys who were deeply in bed with crime families doing really bad things so I have some very good experience and the bottom line is this; the NSA, the big banking families, the FBI, CIA, Muslim radicals, communists, socialist, labor unions, crazed lunatics and fanatical collectivists of the world taken together cannot for the life of them find their way out of a paper bag without proper leadership to help them. They are, taken at their collective intelligence, incompetent. As individuals, there are very competent people in those organizations—but as long as they function as a collective unit they are only as strong as the weakest links and are paralyzed with inaction. They can literally do nothing. The experience of Ragnar Danneskjöld in the novel Atlas Shrugged is reality. He was too competent to be captured by collective fools—which is a contrary message shown on cop dramas on television. In real life bullets don’t often fly as straight as people think, nor do they do as much damage upon impact. This is similar to when you punch someone in the face—they do not immediately go down like they do in the movies. If a person is bold, competent, and more intelligent than his rivals—he will win no matter what the odds and no matter what the number and this is something only a handful of people in the entire world understand. [3] ”

In other words: the authorities cannot catch Ragnar Danneskjöld because he, being smarter than any one man looking for him, can easily elude all such men. Good intelligence, operational and otherwise, requires weighing heads, not just counting them. The effectiveness of any team is the same as the effectiveness of the leader of that team. The better leader will win a game of hide-and-seek every time.

Thank you. For that consideration, I'm going to give you a mention and a link.

that's pretty awesome. One highly productive gulcher finds what he needs-only to find out it was conceived by another productive gulcher. I'm not surprised. I love the virtual Gulch!

That was a nice job. It was the best one I could find. There was a lot in there that took some time to look up and flush out. It certainly fit what I was looking for.

Well, I must say I'm flattered.

The article in Conservapedia, being the biographical sketch of Ragnar Danneskjöld and a discussion of just how he could have come to hijack the USS Enterprise and outfit it for modern-day privateering, was mine. That's right: mine. And if you click through to it, you will find links, at the bottom, to plenty more articles: about John Galt, Francisco d'Anconia, Dagny Taggart, Henry Rearden, James Taggart, Wesley Mouch, Kip Chalmers, Dr. Floyd Ferris, Dr. Robert Stadler, the Taggart Bridge, the Taggart Tunnel, Directive 10-289, Project X...you name it, or him, or her, and I have written about it, or him, or her.

I invite you all to review my essay and tell me where I might have gotten anything wrong. I was just figuring out the most plausible back story from what Rand actually wrote aboud him, and had him say about himself. And also what I would do in his place. Of course I would try to hijack the USS Enterprise (CVN-65). She's the longest flattop ever built, and was in a class by herself. Replace her nuclear engines with John Galt's electrostatic dynamos, and you've got yourself a ship that can sail forever.

That aside, if you read further on, you'll find how I handled his meeting and marrying Kay Ludlow, and the likely role he might be called upon to play after the collapse that follows the strike.

http://conservapedia.com/Ragnar_Danneskj...

Good catch. But since the index date for the movies was September 2, 2016, Ragnar had plenty of time to capture that ship in the Before Time.

If you're going to hijack the Big E, you'd better do it quick, she won't be on this side of the razor blade factory much longer... In 2015, she's scheduled to be dragged to Bellingham and scrapped

They are going very fast for a production like this. But these days, without all the red tape in the way, they can. When dailies had to be sent off to be developed just to watch them films took a lot longer. Today, it's like a third of the time or less, because everything is instant. But most commercial filmmakers are still stuck to the old time scale.

It was neat to see a couple brief clips from the movie. As much as I'm looking forward to the release, I want them to not rush it.

Yes it is. When joy and productivity are aligned, it is a happy life indeed!

Ragnar does have the most fun of all of the AS characters, doesn't he? A properly lived life should be joyful and fun in the midst of productive work. It is an easy point to miss amongst all the good points that Ms. Rand makes in AS.