SHIP LOCATIONS:

• Ship & Group Locations Checked / Updated

SHIP LOGS:

April 13

• USS GHW Bush (USS-77): @ Norfolk, All Hands Call meeting, CNO visits ship, Plan to continue cert training in April – May, then begin maintenance period this Summer
• USS Simpson (FFG-56): in Atlantic off Africa, Damage Control Training (...currently deployed to APS)

April 15

• USS independence (LCS-2): Transitting Panama Canal, transferring to San Diego, CA

April 16

• HMS Westminster (FFG): Major drug bust in Indian Ocean
• USS Mitscher (DDG-57): in Atlantic, Heading to New Orleans with FS Germinal (FFG) for Fleet Week
• USS Nimitz (CVN-68): in Pacific, heading to San Diego to begin training (...if it's deploying, then estimate October Deployment)

GROUND UNITS:

• US Army / US Marine Unit KIAs updated by DOD Reports up to (4/16/2012)
• RUSSIA / BELARUS AIR ASSAULT DRILLS added to grid (April 17 - 19)
• RUSSIA STRATEGIC BOMBING EXERCISE added to grid (April 16 - 20), involves aerial bombing and cruise missile firings at the Litova test range by 40-bombers, near Japan's maritime border.
• US 75^th Ranger Regiment verifed in Logar Province, Afghanistan

NOTEWORTHY NEWS:
April 16

• AFGHANISTAN: Taliban insurgents begin spring offensive (...NATO / Afghan offensive began April 14^th).
• RUSSIA: Russia's Caspian Sea Fleet acquires new stealth gunboat able to engage enemy vessels or clear beachheads for amphibious landings (equiped with 1-A-190 artillery system; 2-AK-306 30mm miniguns; 1-Grad-M 40-tube 122mm MLRS)

April 17

• IRAN: Defense Minister announed progress in development and production of indigenous version of Russia's S-300 ADA system
• RUSSIA: Moscow says they won't cave in to western or domestic pressure to quit it's peacekeeping mission in Transdnestr, Moldova (180^th Motor Rifle Division). Russia might also be deploying a Voronezh missile defense radar in Transdnestr to counter the west's missile defense system. (...I wonder if they'll deploy an S-400 system there too, like they're deploying to Kaliningrad and possibly to their Crimean bases?)
• SUDAN: Sudan says it's willing to risk a full blown war with S. Sudan in order to recapture the Heglig oil fields. S. Sudan militia seen massing on border.