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MLB WORLD FACES Soto lifts Nationals Officials: Renewed T-Pain enjoying new to wild-card win Baghdad protests success on heels of over Brewers turn deadly ‘Masked Singer’ win Back page Page 15 Page 18 Air Force graduates a record 745 officers at training school » Page 3 stripes.com Volume 78, No. 121 ©SS 2019 THURSDAY, OCTOBER 3, 2019 50¢/Free to Deployed Areas Packing a PUNCH USS Gabrielle Giffords fires ‘sea-skimming’ Naval Strike Missile in Indo-Pacific BY CAITLIN DOORNBOS find and destroy enemy ships at shows the launch from three an- Party’s rule. Dongfeng means “east The littoral Stars and Stripes distances up to 100 nautical miles gles as a sailor barks orders in the wind” in Chinese. combat ship USS away,” the statement said. It zips background. At 9,400 miles, the Dongfeng 41’s Gabrielle Giffords Sailors launched a Naval Strike over the ocean “at sea-skimming The launch came the same day range is potentially the longest of launches a Naval Missile from the deck of the littoral altitude, has terrain-following capa- China unveiled its supersonic any weapon in the world, the Center Strike Missile combat ship USS Gabrielle Giffords during exercise bility and uses an advanced seeker Dongfeng-41 intercontinental bal- for Strategic and International Stud- on Tuesday, the first time such a Pacific Griffin in for precise targeting in challenging listic missiles capable of carrying ies think tank in Washington, D.C. weapon has been fired in the Indo- conditions.” 10 nuclear warheads. The missiles the Philippine Sea told the Associated Press in a Sun- Pacific region, according to a Navy In footage of the launch released appeared in a military parade in on Tuesday. day report. statement. Wednesday, the missile ignites Beijing celebrating the 70th anni- KENNETH RODRIGUEZ The precision strike weapon “can and flies from the ship. The video versary of the Chinese Communist SEE MISSILE ON PAGE 6 SANTIAGO/U.S. Navy North Korea launches ballistic missile after announcing plans for new nuke talks BY KIM GAMEL AND YOO KYONG CHANG The missile flew about 280 miles from The National Security Council in Seoul not a threat to diplomacy. Stars and Stripes the waters off its eastern coast near the held an emergency meeting and said it Experts say the communist state is like- town of Wonsan and reached an altitude “placed weight” on the likelihood that the ly trying to project strength ahead of new SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea of 565 miles, South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of North had “tested an SLBM” though South negotiations to wring concessions from fired a ballistic missile that appeared to Staff said. Korean and U.S. intelligence officials were Washington. have been launched from a submarine on That would make it the highest apogee still analyzing precise details. The weapons tests also show that the Wednesday, South Korean officials said, for a missile tested since the North fired The latest launch marked an escalation North has continued to develop its weapons hours after the communist state announced an intercontinental ballistic missile toward from the recent short-range, land-based programs as talks have stalled. it has agreed to resume nuclear talks with Japan in November 2017 amid rising ten- missile tests that President Donald Trump the United States this weekend. sions over its nuclear weapons program. has dismissed as small-scale and therefore SEE LAUNCH ON PAGE 6 PAGE 2 F3HIJKLM •STARS AND STRIPES• Thursday, October 3, 2019 MILITARY Marines looking into new types of grenades Stackable modules bring larger explosions with less fragmentation BY MARTIN EGNASH Stars and Stripes Several new types of grenades, including one that can be stacked to create a larger explosion, have garnered interest from the TEAGAN FREDERICKS/U.S. Marine Corps Department of the Navy. A U.S. Marine with 11th Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division, throws an M67 hand The Crane, Ind.-based Naval Surface ANGIE DEPUYDT/U.S. Army grenade at the grenade range during a command-sponsored corporals course at Warfare Center issued a request for in- The Scalable Offensive Hand Grenade Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton, Calif., in June . The Marines are looking into a formation about the modular grenades allows users to configure blast effects by new modular “offensive grenade” that lets you stack grenades. last month, along with several other early- connecting up to three modules . stage procurement notices about several scalable shock effect and variety of use,” orient or daze, rather than kill or wound. flash-bang grenade variants. The Marine tico, Va., which oversees the development the website says. “Each module can have The requests all state that no funding Corps has also expressed interest in the its own fuse, and grenades can be used ei- has been approved for procurement, and stacking grenades. of flash-bang devices and other weapons designed to stun, incapacitate or confuse, ther separately or by attaching two to three the government has not committed to buy- The notices come as the military looks ing any of the grenades. rather than kill. modules together.” to expand its nonlethal weapons capa- The Marine Corps currently uses “de- The center also notified industry last Developed by Norwegian defense com- bilities for a complex modern battlefield, fensive” M67 fragmentation grenades as month that it plans to issue a request for pany Nammo, which designed the Ma- where troops may encounter more low- their standard. The M67 sends out hot steel proposals for a 5-year contract to produce rine Corps’ M72 LAW single-shot rocket intensity conflict scenarios or situations shrapnel in a 15-yard casualty radius. thousands of 9-bang flash-bang grenades where civilians and enemy combatants are launcher, the stackable grenades have “Fragmentation hand grenades are for up to $16 million. intermixed. been dubbed the Mk 21 Mod 0. meant for defensive use and give an ex- In August, Leimbach wrote in the Marine “Lethality is absolutely critical in the They are designed for offensive use, giv- tensive burst of fragments with a [360- Corps Gazette that while he spent the ma- modern combat environment that we find ing a larger shock effect with less fragmen- degree] distribution,” NAMMO said in a jority of his career “enhancing the lethality ourselves in, but the world’s most lethal, in- tation to protect advancing friendly troops, statement. of the Corps,” he has come to understand credible force must also be able to compete a description on the company’s website That makes them less than ideal for situ- the importance of nonlethal weapons, such in all the other phases of combat,” Marine says. ations like room clearing, where any civil- as flash-bangs, for giving troops space or Col. Wendell B. Leimbach Jr. said earlier “These are specifically designed for use ians present could be inadvertently killed time to determine hostile intent in a com- this year at the National Defense Industrial in closed rooms, such as bunkers, build- or injured instead of just knocked out. plicated combat environment. Association’s Armament Systems Forum ings or semi-closed areas like trenches,” In addition to seeking more information “Wherever Marines are deployed, 21st in Fredericksburg, Va., the association’s the website states. on stackable grenades, the Naval Surface century operational environments will re- magazine reported. The grenades bear a slight resemblance Warfare Center has in the past two weeks quire the use of [nonlethal weapons],” he Leimbach, a tank and acquisition officer, to Legos, and, like the building blocks can also issued notices that it is conducting wrote in August. is director of the Pentagon’s joint nonle- be coupled together. market research on two types of flash-bang [email protected] thal weapons directorate, based in Quan- “Modular offensive hand grenades give grenades, including a variant used to dis- Twitter: @Marty_Stripes T O D A Y IN STRIPES American Roundup ............ 17 Business .......................... 21 Classified ................... 19, 23 Comics ............................. 22 Crossword ........................ 22 Faces ............................... 18 Opinion ............................ 20 Sports .........................25-32 Weather ........................... 21 Thursday, October 3, 2019 •STARS AND STRIPES• F3HIJKLM PAGE 3 MILITARY USAF graduates 745-officer ‘Godzilla class’ BY JAMES BOLINGER “There were so many people from dif- Stars and Stripes ferent backgrounds and different walks of life,” she said. “So much more than a The largest class in the history of the smaller class would bring.” Air Force Officer Training School — 745 Herrera, in a telephone interview Friday, newly commissioned officers — recently said the hardest part of training was being pinned on their rank insignia at graduation away from her daughter, but a highlight ceremonies in Montgomery, Ala. was the traditional “dining in” to celebrate Class No. 19-07 — a group so large that graduation. course instructors and leaders referred to Dining in is a formal dinner that only it as the “Godzilla class” — started with military personnel may attend. Partici- 800 students, twice the usual number, pants wear formal dress uniforms and typ- which required the school to run two train- ically make formal after-dinner toasts. ing squadrons concurrently. The usual at- The event brought together the instruc- trition trimmed the class to 745. tors, the school leadership and all the grad- Of those who graduated on Friday, 116 uating students, Daddona said. attended a shortened five-week course for “It gave me chills,” she said. specialized career fields for qualified, de- Students from each squadron joined gree-holding candidates like physicians, together to sing the national anthem and lawyers and chaplains. shared stories about how each squadron’s Col. Peter Bailey, the school comman- leaders have different styles and ideas, dant, said the class size was increased to Daddona said.

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