San Diego, the military town

For some strange reasons, I always have had a fascination with the military. I guess it could have something to do with my dad being in the United States Air Force from December 1950 to December 1954, me being born at Naval Air Station in Kingsville, Texas, in March 1955, and me graduating in December 1978 from Texas A&M University, a historically military university.

I have lived in the San Diego, California, metropolis since April 1993. According to a Military Impact Study by the San Diego Military Advisory Council, San Diego, a historic military town, is home to the largest concentration of military personnel in the nation, with over 100,000 active duty military and over 240,000 retired military.

San Diego is home to 60% of the ships in the fleet of the U.S. Navy, and one-third of the active duty force of the U.S. Marine Corps. Military spending in the region account for over 25% of the jobs in San Diego.

Most of the active duty personnel are based at these five bases:

  • Marine Corps Air Station Miramar
  • Marine Corps Base and Marine Corps Air Station Camp Pendleton
  • Naval Base Point Loma
  • Naval Base Coronado
  • Naval Base San Diego

Prior to the Covid-19 pandemic, Marine Corps Air Station Miramar claimed to have the largest air show in the United States.

As much as I enjoy air shows, though, I think I like the Navy more because the ships are larger, move more slowly, and often host tours and open houses. It's also very easy to simply go to the harbor in downtown San Diego and watch the military ships leaving on deployment or arriving home.

The picture below shows the USS Carl Vinson (CVN-70), a Nimitz-class, nuclear powered, aircraft carrier. The Nimitz-class carriers often are called supercarriers.

USS Carl Vinson is home-ported at Naval Base Coronado, directly across the harbor from downtown San Diego. I try to go downtown to watch these massive ships leave, and the USS Carl Vinson was leaving on August 2, 2021, for deployment to the western Pacific Ocean. Currently it is heading the Carl Vinson Carrier Strike Group in the South China Sea, an area of competing claims of sovereignty by several countries.

Naval Base San Diego is the largest military base on the West Coast and the home to 54 of the Navy's ships, as well as the principal home port of the Pacific Fleet.

The Navy also includes submarines, and some are based in San Diego at the Point Loma Submarine Base, part of Naval Base Point Loma. If one gets lucky, as I did on January 27, 2012, one can watch a submarine arriving or leaving.



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