I don’t get it, are they the military or are they not? Aren’t the ships privately owned? Can you not be a ship captain without going to the Merchant Marine Academy?
In: Other
Just to add on – they’re not military, but the USN does have the Military Sealift Command (MSC), mostly support, research, and supply ships, that are crewed by civilian mariners. The CIVMARS are US government employees but are not in the military (though a lot of them are former Navy). The Navy also has a cadre of officers who are licensed merchant mariners, called Strategic Sealift Officers.
The US merchant fleet – ships that are actually registered in the US – is astonishingly small. US regulations require a lot of safety and inspection rules to be followed that other countries don’t, and by law the majority of the crew (I forget the percentage but it’s basically all) have to be US citizens. Other countries don’t care so much, so the countries with the biggest merchant fleets, at least on paper, are places like Liberia, Panama, and the Bahamas.
Latest Answers