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The dark past of SeaWorld? Oh yes, there is certainly a dark past to this industry that, surprisingly... and very conveniently for SeaWorld... doesn't seem to be in the public eye. Is this past surprising? It shouldn't be, After all, SeaWorld is a corporation. It's Big Business. It's about the almighty $. Yet, somehow, their bad behavior and discretion has been buried. In the days of industries like Big Tobacco, having to pay the price (you may have seen their "confession" recently, which was mandated by the government... admitting to secretly and deliberately designing cigarettes to maximize addiction), SeaWorld appears to have gotten a pass, with no apologies and no confessions. Well, I say it's time to shed a bit of light on this subject. The public is ready for it. Movies such as Free Willy have certainly helped get the ball rolling (although Hollywood doesn't get a pass on this either, as I will explain in a few minutes), and then we had "Blackfish", which really pulled back the curtain, for us to see. Yes, SeaWorld has done the right thing now. No more breeding of orcas in captivity. They want us to say "Great job! Thank you, SeaWorld!". And yes, we should say that. However... let's be clear that $ was the reason... not a sense of decency. Nevertheless... they have made the move to slowly eliminate the torture of innocent, highly intelligent and social orcas through lifetime imprisonment. They've finally done the right thing, their reasons, notwithstanding. We move forward to better times for our beautiful black and white giants of the sea.But... I'm not giving them a pass by continuing to leave their dubious past in darkness. We need to know more about this, so that future legislation and sneakiness does not cause a backslide. Allow me to shed this light with a little history of the incarcerations of cetaceans. I won't go back to ancient history, as it's somewhat irrelevant right now. We are all aware of man's penchant for capturing wild animals for our enjoyment. We've always done it, and will probably continue to do it. It's man's nature. So let's focus on the relatively recent times, beginning in the 19th century.Boston Aquarial Gardens in 1859 and pairs of Beluga Whales in Barnum's American Museum in New York City museum—dolphins were first kept for paid entertainment in the Marine Studios dolphinarium founded in 1938 in St. Augustine, Florida. It was here that it was discovered that dolphins could be trained to perform tricks. So, okay... that was the 1800's. Ignorance about dolphins and whales abounded. Curiosity was the reason we captured these bright animals. We learned a tremendous amount about them, despite the fact that this was the beginning of worse things to come for our seaborne friends. But... now we know better, so we must do better, right? That wasn't to be for quite a while yet. In the 1800's there were a few places that profited off these dolphinariums. It was a curiosity and people flocked to see them. This continued as a novelty for about a hundred years, on a fairly small scale. But then... and here it comes... Hollywood played their card and changed everything. As a matter of fact, it happened the year I was born. 1963. Out came a very popular movie titled Flipper! And because of the popularity of this movie, it wasn't long before dolphin dollars grew bright in the movie executive's eyes, and out came the TV series named Flipper. I grew up on Flipper! It was awesome! Flipper the dolphin was the star. Flipper was the aquatic equivalent of Lassie and Mr. Ed. Oh, how we delighted, laughed and clapped, watching Flipper the dolphin go through his weekly adventures, always helping his human friends, and doing his famous tail-walk across the water. There was even a very popular song that some of you may remember, to start the weekly program.They call him Flipper, Flipper, faster than lightning,No-one you see, is smarter than he,And we know Flipper, lives in a world full of wonder,Flying there-under, under the sea!Everyone loves the king of the sea,Ever so kind and gentle is he,Tricks he will do when children appear,And how they laugh when he's near!They call him Flipper, Flipper, faster than lightning,No-one you see, is smarter than he,And we know Flipper, lives in a world full of wonder,Flying there-under, under the sea!Yes, the Flipper theme song. We sang along. We marveled at how this fascinating fish... what? It's not a fish? Okay, whatever... We marveled at how the fish... err... animal... wait--what exactly is it, if it isn't a fish? Okay whatever... We marveled at how this fish was always smiling and laughing. Gosh, it would be great to work with this animal! So, there began the world's love of dolphins. Boy, that was one happy fish! Suddenly... dolphin dollars again lit up in the eyes of entrepreneurs across the country, and this is when the era of Dolphinariums... no, let's stick with Aquariums... began to take off! But to cash in on this craze, we need dolphins! Now the boat captains couldn't cast their nets quick enough, to capture dolphins for all the aquariums sprouting up all over the place. They couldn't shoot adult dolphins quick enough to capture the baby dolphins quick enough (those adults... they were really against being captured! We'll take em if we can get em, but if not... a rifle-shot will do, and then we can scoop up the young ones). A whole bunch of dolphins were taken by hook and by crook to fill the demand. Because... you know... Flipper! People would shell out the cash to see these remarkable animals in swimming pools. Kidnapped out of the deep blue sea, so we could watch them play volleyball with the trainers and splash us all that were brave enough to sit in the front row. Show time was fun time! What happened behind the scenes wasn't really known.But... it wasn't long before a few of us actually DID wonder how they got these animals to do all these tricks. And where did they come from? What kind of life did these animals live... in the ocean... and in the pools? Slowly, it started to become a social issue. Not a big one, but activists did begin to chip away at the social conscience. The inhumane way that these animals were captured… the murdering of entire pods and families in order to get one good one... yeah, some began to notice. In fact, these early activists did a pretty good job, under the circumstances. They did make a difference. Meanwhile, the giant among the public aquariums... SeaWorld, began to get nervous and angry. This was their main meal ticket! So they fought back. This went on for a while, and the activists made some progress, but eventually they hit the wall of corporate profits, and all the lawyers, and finally a compromise was reached. It wasn't completely satisfying for the animals rights people, but... it was something. They scored a major victory with the passing of the 1972 Marine Mammal Protection Act in the United States. This was big news! People... people who were ignorant to the real story, began to understand, and these aquarium acts began to suffer due to public opinion. Marine Mammal Protection Act had repercussions around the world as people's eyes were opened to the intelligence of these perpetually smiling creatures, as they learned that those weren't smiles of happiness. Dolphinariums and aquariums began to close all over the world. From many hundreds, we went to many dozens. But then it stopped. The many captured dolphins were released or killed, or the shows continued with less profits. This was the best that the activists could do, it seemed. People still loved to see them, but at least the worst of the collection methods were now made illegal. This made things very tough for places like Seaworld. They still needed dolphins, and... orcas! Orcas could be trained too! Namu taught us that, after being the first orca to be captured and sold for public display.So, before we go on, let's go back a bit and find out more about the introduction of orcas onto the stage and into the limelight. In fact, allow me to give you chronological history of capture events, for both orcas (Killer Whales) and dolphins, that occurred during this heyday of public aquariums, and what SeaWorld's and the other aquarium's involvement was all about:[1]1961, November ~ Marineland of the Pacific, south of Los Angeles, discovers a single orca feeding alone in nearby Newport Harbor. They corral the female Killer Whale, finally hoisting it onto a flatbed. When the orca is introduced into the tank, she smashes head-on into the wall. Frank Brocato, Marineland's head animal collector at the time, recalls: "We'd suspected the animal was in trouble because of its erratic behavior in the harbor...But the next day, she went crazy. She started swimming at high speed around the tank, striking her body repeatedly. Finally, she convulsed and died." The autopsy reveals she suffered from acute gastroenteritis and pneumonia.1962, September ~ Frank Brocato, Marineland's head animal collector, and his assistant, Boots Calandrino, bring their 40-foot collecting boat, the Geronimo, to Puget Sound, Washington, to search for another killer whale for the aquarium. After a month of searching, they found a mature male and female orca in Haro Strait, off San Juan Island. "The female, who seemed to be chasing something, headed straight for the boat. At that moment, Brocato saw a harbor porpoise cross the bow and skirt the ship...The porpoise was followed by the female orca, in hot pursuit." The two animals circled the boat, the little porpoise apparently using the boat as a shield. "'I reeled there was a good chance to use the lasso,' said Brocato, remembering he incident. 'So I put my partner out on the bowsprit and told him to watch for that porpoise... because the orca might be right behind it. And it was. He slipped on the lasso. We had her. But then everything started to go wrong.' The cow cut sharply and dived under the boat,...its last few turns caught the heavy nylon line and wound it around the propeller shaft, immobilizing the boat. ...The female ran the end of her 250-foot-long tether and surfaced at the edge of the mist. Then Brocato heard screaming high-pitched piercing cries coming from the female. ...the big male appeared out of the mist a few minutes later, and together, the two animals started swimming at great speed toward the boat. They charged several times, turning away only at the last instant but thumping the boat with a sound thwack of the flukes as they passed. ...Brocato grabbed his 375-magnum rifle and started shooting. He put one bullet into the male, who then disappeared. But it took 10 shots to kill the female. ... That night, Brocato towed the carcass to nearby Bellingham to have the animal weighed and measured. ...Brocato took the teeth as souvenirs, and the animal was rendered for dog food.1964 ~ Moby Doll, the first live orca exhibited in captivity. Harpooned as a sculptor's model, he survived for three months in a makeshift pen in Vancouver harbor. Vancouver Aquarium collectors had harpooned him off the coast of British Columbia.1965 ~ Namu is accidentally snared in a fisherman's gill net near Namu, British Columbia, Canada. Ted Griffin, the young owner of the Seattle Public Aquarium buys Namu for $8,000 cash. The bull killer whale is the first captive orca to perform for the public. Namu dies in July 1966 - 11 months later- due to an infection from polluted water in his pen.1966-early 1970s ~ Don Goldsberry and Ted Griffin develop a netting technique for capturing orcas in Puget Sound, selling the animals mostly to Sea World. By the early 1970s, Goldsberry has captured more than 200 orcas. About 30 were sent to various aquaria. The rest went to SeaWorld.1970 ~ Penn Cove, Washington, killer whale capture. 80 killer whales are corralled by the Seattle Public Aquarium's collectors. Several orcas die during the capture. Their bellies are slit and they are weighed down with steel chains. A few of these orcas wash ashore and cause public outcry against killer whale captures in Washington's waters.1970, August 8 ~ A four year-old killer whale named Tokitae was brutally taken from her mother in the Puget Sound and brought to the Miami Seaquarium where she was placed in a 35 foot wide tank and renamed 'Lolita." In the waters of the Puget Sound of Washington State, a pod of killer whales were attacked and rounded up by a group of killer whale herders, led by Ted Griffiths and Don Goldsberry. Using speedboats, an airplane and releasing explosives in the water, they forced the orcas into Penn Cove. The juvenile orcas were separated from their mothers, as the infants were prime candidates to be sold to aquariums, while the adult orcas were released and free to leave. However, the adult pod would not leave their offspring and refused to swim free, vocalizing human-like cries, until the last baby was pulled out of the water, never to return again. One adult and four infant orcas were killed during this capture. The industry, in an attempt to keep the orca deaths from the public, instructed the herders to slit open the bellies of the dead animals, fill them with rocks, and sink the creatures with anchors, hoping they would never be discovered. It is because of the large number of violent orcas captures by the marine park industry in Washington State waters, that an entire generation of orcas was eliminated, and as a result, this orca population is now considered an endangered species.One of the orca infants captured was a 4 year old named Tokitae, who was sold to the Miami Seaquarium. She arrived at the marine park on September 24, 1970, where she was renamed ‘Lolita’ and has lived there ever since. She performs tricks during her scheduled shows, and has done so for the past forty-six years. She lives in a small swimming pool.1976 ~ Washington State waters are closed to killer whale captures, in the aftermath of the notorious Budd Inlet killer whale capture of the same year. The whale roundup and capture was witnessed by Ralph Munro, an assistant to Washington State Governor Dan Evans. Munro happened to be sailing in Puget Sound at the time. He reports that SeaWorld's captors were using aircraft and explosives to herd and net the killer whales; a clear violation of the terms of their collection permit. When Washington State Governor Dan Evans learned of this, he sued SeaWorld. All of the killer whales were eventually released, and a Seattle district court ordered SeaWorld to give up its permit-granted right to collect killer whales off Washington. Washington State waters became an unofficial sanctuary for killer whales, and so far, no organization has ever again applied to capture killer whales from these waters.1976 ~ With Washington state waters off limits, SeaWorld turned to Iceland for its killer whale captures. After Puget Sound, SeaWorld did not want to be officially involved, but Don Goldsberry agreed to unofficially assist W.H. Dudok van Heel, zoological director of Holland's Dolfinarium Harderwijk, and Jon Kr. Gunnarsson, director of Saedyrasafnid, an aquarium near Reykjavik. During the fall herring season, they netted two young orcas, and airlifted them to Holland. One of these was forwarded to SeaWorld in San Diego after six months. The following October, the same consortium captured six orcas. In October 1978, Goldsberry and Gunnarson caught another five. In just two short years, SeaWorld had nine new killer whales, and at this point, reportedly dropped out of the picture.1976-1979 ~ According to Gunnarson, 21 Icelandic killer whales, mostly young ones, were sent to aquariums from 1976-79. Besides SeaWorld's nine, two each went to Dolfinarium Harderwijk, Marineland of France, Canada's Marineland, and Kamogawa SeaWorld in Japan. Single animals were sent to new aquariums in Hong Kong and Switzerland.1980 ~ Hardy Jones captures on film Japan's dolphin drive fishery. It is broadcast worldwide and international outrage brings an end to these drives for a few years.Mid-1980′s ~ The drive fisheries start up again, but with a new twist. The fishermen drive in false killer whales and dolphins as before, but now they set aside the most beautiful ones for sale to aquariums and to the U.S. Navy and then slaughter the rest.1989 ~ The last capture of killer whales in Iceland's waters (four orcas caught).1993 ~ Marine World Africa USA of California is challenged by animal protection groups over the park's import permit for false killer whales from Japan. They cite the Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972, which requires documentation that the marine mammal captures were humanely conducted. The National Marine Fisheries Service denies Marine World's import permit for Japanese-caught false killer whales because, in essence, the park violates the terms of its own import application, and had no observers present to document that the capture was humane. (Letter from NMFS Acting Administrator of Fisheries, Nancy Foster, to Michael D. Demetrios, President of Marine World Africa USA, dated May 7, 1993):"Your application described a seine-net capture method to collect animals swimming past the coastal bays and inlets of the Taiji area. ...The actual location of the capture (Iki Island) and the actual capture method (drive fishery) are not those described in your application. ...You ...also stated that no one associated with Marine World Africa USA was present during the capture of these animals" and thus don't "have the firsthand knowledge necessary to conclude that the capture operation was `humane' and conducted in a manner consistent with that described in your application."Many public aquaria and marine theme parks as well as the U.S. Navy had already acquired dolphins and false killer whales from Japan's drive fishery.July 16, 1993 ~ The movie "Free Willy" is released. Public awareness begins its most recent groundswell regarding the inhumanity of captive performing cetaceans.1996, October 17 ~ Futo, Japan"During October 1996 fishermen and others chased into Futo Fishing Port, on Shizuoka Prefecture's Izu Peninsula, over 200 bottlenose dolphins, a number over three times the allotted quota, and about 50 false killer whales, for which there was no quota at all, and began selling them to aquariums, in addition to slaughtering and butchering [them] for sale as meat. ...Ten aquariums in Shizuoka Prefecture and nearby prefectures were involved in this capture, but only six of those facilities actually received dolphins; ... The order in which aquariums chose dolphins on this occasion was apparently decided by drawing lots, ...the surrounded dolphins were of course in a state of panic, and gradually sustain more injuries in their quest for an escape route because they crash themselves into boat hulls and the wall, become entangled in nets, and scrape their underbellies on the rocky bottom in shallows. Dolphins also collide forcefully with one another as they flee about. ...Because many aquariums were involved, and because they all wanted uninjured females from 1.5 to 2 meters in length, those appearing to be the best were chased around the harbor many times. Owing to this repeated chasing and surrounding with nets, as well as the panic it caused, many dolphins were exhausted and sank to the harbor bottom." Because they had caught more than their permitted quota, the fishermen were required to release 100 of the bottlenose dolphins they had captured. On October 22 and 23, the Futo Branch of the Ito City Fishing Cooperative sold 26 bottlenose dolphins and six false killer whales to aquariums. The aquariums were forced to release these six false killer whales, as there had been no permit to capture them." (The above is from "A Report on the 1996 Dolphin-Catch- Quote Violation at Futo Fishing Harbor," by Sakae Hemmi,Elsa Nature Conservancy, Institute for Environmental Science and Culture.")February 7, 1997 ~ Taiji, JapanJapanese fishermen capture a pod of killer whales. In all, ten killer whales are rounded up and driven into the shallow water bays of Taiji. Five whales are taken to Japanese marine parks. To date, two of these killer whales have died, a female and her calf. Japanese and international animal groups continue to press for the release of the remaining three killer whales.July 16, 1997 ~ SeaWorld Inc. is issued public display import permit for one adult beluga whale from Vancouver Aquarium.August 14, 1997 ~ Dallas World Aquarium, Inc., has applied to import four Amazon River Dolphins from Venezuela, according to the Federal Register. However, it states: "The International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN) has included the species in the 1996 IUCN Red List of Threatened Animals under the category `vulnerable,' i.e., taxa believed likely to move into the endangered category in the near future if causal factors continue operating. population data concerning Inia geoffrensis in Venezuela is limited and the application states that no census has been taken of the subject wild population/stock. Therefore, NMFS has concerns about the status and conservation of the dolphins in the Orinoco river system and the potential impacts of the permanent removal of four sub-adults from this population/stock. Additionally, NMFS is concerned that holding this species in captivity may involved a significant risk to the health and welfare of the animals held. Historically, study results conclude that due to a number of factors this species has fared poorly in captivity in the United States, with an average longevity of 32.6 months for the 35 animals for which data was available." (Source: U.S. Federal Register, August 14, 1997)2013 ~ The movie "Blackfish" is released, enraging a new generation, regarding orca captivity.2013 ~ Some scientists suggest that the "unusually high" intelligence of dolphins means that they should be recognized as "non-human persons". In 2013, the Indian Ministry of Environment and Forests prohibited the captivity of dolphins on these grounds, finding it "morally unacceptable to keep them captive for entertainment purpose".2015 ~ The House of Commons of Canada passed Bill S-203, Ending the Captivity of Whales and Dolphins Act, and sent it to the Senate of Canada. Two facilities would be affected, Marineland of Canada and the Vancouver Aquarium. In 2018, Progressive Conservatives in the Senate were accused of using procedural obstruction to keep the bill from moving to a vote. In June 2018, such senators added amendments intended to exclude Marineland and the Vancouver Aquarium from being covered by the bill. After three years, the eventual outcome is not yet known in October 2018.That brings us up to the present, and the fight continues. SeaWorld has gotten on board, as public pressure was too intense and they were losing money. Ending the captive breeding of orcas will also be a tremendous blow to their profits, but it was the lesser of two evils, as far as potential profits were concerned.Meanwhile:[2]Lolita’s tank is the size of a hotel swimming pool. Lolita is the oldest living killer whale in captivity, in the smallest orca tank in the country.[2]It is now known that killer whales are incredibly intelligent, sentient and social creatures. Resident killer whales from the Pacific Northwest, which Lolita is classified as, stay with their mothers their entire lives. Lolita's mother, known as L25, is still alive today at approxinaltey 90 years old, and is photographed regularty by scientists and conservation organizations. Lolita currently lives alone with no other killer whale companions. When not performing in her show, Lolita floats listlessly in her tank. In the wild, killer whales swim hundreds of miles a day, diving as deep as 500 feet. In her tank, she swims in circles inside the 35 foot wide area and can only go as deep as 20 feet, in a small area in the center of the tank.For information on Lolita, her proposed release plan and how to get involved, please contact the Orca Network at:[email protected] Lolita | Raising Awareness for Lolita the OrcaIf you’re interested, there is a bit more information here: Stefan Pociask's answer to What animal would you ban from zoos?If nothing else, this all is proof that activism does work. Don’t be disheartened by slow progress. If nobody cared enough to join with the small voices, we would never hear them turn into big voices, and wonderful creatures like orcas, whales and dolphins would be in a far darker place with no hope for their future. Don’t be afraid to spread the word and get involved. It works.If you’d like to know how the movie star Flipper the dolphin died (her real name was Suzy), it’s right here. It would be hard to believe if it wasn’t coming right from the actual, and regretful, trainer who worked with her all those years: Dying to make us happy: The bloody truth behind the dolphinariumPLEASE RESHARE AND ASK OTHERS TO, AS WELL. VISIT THE LINKS. YOU REALLY CAN HELP.CITATIONS:[1] PBS Frontline Other Captive Orcas - Historical Chronology[2] Save Lolita | Raising Awareness for Lolita the Orca*** Feel free to contact SaveLolita.org to see how you can help.

Sure! Done right, it's an amazing experienc, but done wrong it will have a negative and all-encompassing effect on your life. I've had both.The very first time I heard the word ‘surrogate’ was when I was told that I'd need one. I’d had a horrible pregnancy, ending in a heartbreaking loss that necessitated a lot of interventions, including several D&C’s and antibiotics etc. After it was all over, I was diagnosed with Asherman’s Syndrome (intrauterine scarring) and told that I might face fertility issues. I requested to be panelled, which meant that a group of consulting specialists would get together and collectively review a patient’s file and decide on a course of action or a diagnosis and treatment, if there was any. I remember meeting 7 doctors that all told me, one by one, that pregnancy would be impossible; one doctor actually had the gall to compare me trying to get pregnant to nailing a picture in a crumbling wall full of holes. Through tears, I asked those “specialists” what my options were, because I'd always wanted children, and one doctor replied that adoption was always an option, or later, I could find a surrogate. I asked what a surrogate was and he replied that it was a woman that has a baby for you. I cringed, picturing the Hollywood version of the destitute, but fertile, young woman that moves into my house for however long and into my marital bed for 3–5 nights so that she and my future husband could make a baby and pass it off as mine. Um, no!I became a fertility consultant so that I could help people experience that miracle, and I could enjoy pregnancy and birth by proxy. It helped ease the sting a bit but nothing truly ever took the pain away. I cried sometimes, especially on the first day of my period, and always found a suitable reason (excuse) to miss any baby showers or Christenings or naming ceremonies. One of my friends had a baby girl and I was obligated to visit her in hospital, but didn't stay long enough to even take off my coat and stumbled out in a weepy, emotional mess because although I wanted it so much, I'd never have those experiences.Fast forward a few years and a relocation to Ontario, and I found myself at the doctor’s office again, complaining about irregular periods and cramps on my left side. He explained that I probably had a cyst on my ovary, which is common in Ashermans women; their bodies can't understand why they aren't getting pregnant so the body ramps up the fertility hormones, but to be sure he sent me for an ultrasound. I went next door to the ultrasound clinic and 10 minutes later I was in an ambulance en route to the hospital for treatment of an ectopic pregnancy. I woke up feeling worse than before, because I realized that I had fertilized however many embryos that never had a chance to grow, and I felt like I’d had dozens of abortions. I spoke to the doctor and told him to tie my tubes, do a hysterectomy, whatever, just to make sure that I could not ever fertilize another egg. He agreed, but told me that I should have one spontaneous menstrual cycle and then come back to him to discuss options and make plans. I came back a few months later and told him that he had done something wrong, that at least I used to bleed, but hadn’t since the ectopic issue. In hindsight, I was very abusive to him. He asked if there was anything else going on, were my breasts sore (yes, they were always sore when my period was due!) was I nauseous at all (yes, I had a stomach flu!) was I tired (yes, I’d been working a lot!) and on it went. He asked me for some urine and then I understood what he was getting at and started to cry, begging him not to do that to me. He replied that pregnancy had to be ruled out before any other tests were done, and I relented. He did the test in front of me and the stick went in white and came out vivid blue. Glowing, Microsoft blue. He told me I was pregnant and I told him he was an asshole, then left angry and went about my life, missing every obstetrical ultrasound that he dared to schedule for me. I wasn't an obstetric patient, therefore I had no need for an obstetric ultrasound, right? Eventually this doctor called me at work and invited me to prove him wrong, so to do exactly that, I left work and went to the clinic for my ultrasound, fully expecting to see the same empty and barren mess that I had always seen on a sonography screen. The tech did the usual, measuring this and recording that and then invited me to look at the screen. I saw what looked like an unshelled peanut, the combination of a fetal head and abdomen, and in that abdomen was a beating heart. That transducer was on my belly, and that was my name on the screen and those were my baby's measurements the upper corner and that was my due date beside it, with a date that was 5 months distant and in that split-second, my life was entirely different. No words can explain or describe what that felt like, intense euphoria followed by intense regret. I hadn't believed that it was possible, so I hadn't been behaving like a pregnant woman should. I threw my cigarettes in the garbage before I even got dressed and ate a large, nutritious meal on the way home, which promptly got rejected, and I set about making the changes necessary for Motherhood and waited for my baby. My baby!I went overdue and finally birthed a healthy fat gorgeous baby boy, very quickly. Having spent a long time learning and teaching about fertility, I knew that women are never more fertile than right after a pregnancy, so I started thinking that maybe I could get lightning to strike twice. Well, lightning struck, and I carried and birthed my 2nd son, 13 months after his big brother. I was ecstatic! My doctor warned against pushing the envelope, so I went on birth control pills. When my older son was 2, I dropped a birth control pill down the drain, and that was son #3. Son #4 followed, and so did his siblings, until I had 7 sons and 3 daughters.Following the birth of my youngest baby, I started to give serious consideration to the miracle that I had been given. Yes, the doctors were wrong about me but they wouldn't and couldn't be wrong about everyone, and somewhere in the world there was a good and deserving woman that, through no fault of her own, still cried the same tears that I had cried and I wanted, needed to help her and take that pain away.I got in touch with a surrogacy agency in Canada and filled out the ream of paperwork, applying to their program as a surrogate. I was accepted and I was sent 3 dossiers of intended parents. The surrogacy consultant had told me about a couple that she had been thinking about and I spent a long time thinking about them before I'd received the 3 files, but I put that couple’s file aside and tried hard to be objective as I read through the other 2 files. The 1st couple had children from prior relationships but she’d had a hysterectomy and they wanted a baby together. The 2nd was similar but he’d been rendered a paraplegic following an accident and she had been his nurse and they’d fallen in love; they wanted a baby together and planned to finance IVF and surrogacy with his settlement. Both of those couples looked like okay people, but didn't feel right. I picked up the 3rd file and started to read. Midway through the 1st page, I had to put it down and take a minute to compose myself. Charles and Marie were a traditional married male-female couple, and Marie had been diagnosed with Rokitansy-Mayer-Küster-Hauser Syndrome and her bravery and courage and commitment leapt at me off of the page. They were young, beautiful and deeply in love and their hope matched their commitment. She had uterine issues just like me, mine was broken and hers was absent and we both had functioning ovaries. Marie even mentioned how frustrating that was. She was the same age that I had been when I had been given that heartbreaking, and fortunately wrong, diagnosis, except hers was correct. She felt the frustration I had felt knowing that ovulation was happening but the embryo had no place to develop and I knew without asking that she had cried the same rivers of tears that I had cried too. ‘Them!’ my internal voice screamed, ‘Them! They're right! It's THEM!’Marie and Charles lived in Europe and sought a surrogate in Canada because our laws made citizenship much easier, plus Canada has a high percentage of French speaking people, which I was, but rusty. I told the agency right away that I wanted to work with them. They were sent my file via fax because Marie demanded it once she was told about me, and Marie called the following Sunday. We spoke a little and cried a lot, and developed a method of translating emails that still makes me laugh. That was August and we were ready to start transferring embryos by November.Pregnancy by IVF isn't easy to achieve though. I was evaluated medically and physically and emotionally and psychologically. I was given strong drugs and a very intense schedule of do’s and don'ts. I was put into chemical menopause and then my endometrium was built up and readied for it’s new occupant with more hormones and steroids and blood thinners and prophylactic antibiotics. The transfer itself happened sooner than expected because Marie had triggered a bit early and the embryos weren't doing very well. Out of 24 eggs, only 11 developed and of those, only 7 were considered even remotely viable. I was given the 3 best embryos on day 3 of their development, and quietly told to not get my hopes up. One nurse even said that they'd see us next month. Marie was holding my hand as her baby seeds were transferred into my uterus and I relaxed and waited the requisite hour with Marie by my side the entire time. We left and went home, and walked in to hear the phone ringing; the clinic called to tell Marie and Charles that the remaining 4 embryos had collapsed, so all they had, all of their hopes and dreams, were in me. My past reared it’s ugly head and I refused to be written off again. I was determined to do all that I could to get pregnant and stay that way and surprised everyone by doing exactly that! Marie and Charles lived with me during the retrieval and fertilization and transfer period and it was a beautiful time in all of our lives. I'm delighted to say that I jumped the gun and got my blood tested early at a walk-in clinic, so that Mom was able to hear those words right from the confused doctor’s mouth, ‘'You're pregnant. Um, well, she’s pregnant. Um, well, she’s, er, you're going to have a baby!’I had an early ultrasound as part of the IVF protocol and I remember looking at that tiny little comma of a baby and thinking ‘Do you know how much you're loved already?’Because there's no safe way to know exact amounts, protocol dictates that a surrogate be given plenty of supplementary hormones using pills and injections and vaginal suppositories, for a minimum of 6 weeks before the embryo transfer and at least 12 weeks after. The hormone injections are an oil so you need a bigger gauge needle and by my 13th week of pregnancy, my ass looked like a Monet masterpiece from all the injections. The high doses of hormones tend to exaggerate the usual pregnancy symptom, so you're not a little bit tired, you're wiped right out. You're not a little bit sick, you're extreme. Your breasts aren't tender, they're on fire and I walked around with my arms crossed in front of me for 2 months to safeguard against any bumps. Aside from the injections and resulting exaggerated morning sickness, it was an easy pregnancy and I put intense effort into making sure that Mom and Dad were kept very involved. I was acutely aware of what it was like to need another woman to carry your baby, so I adopted a strict policy of making absolutely certain that all the firsts weren't mine alone, driving my Midwives crazy in the process. Our Midwives were excellent, even rearranging their staff structure so that the only French speaking Midwife was on my team. It became a routine; I would provide a schedule of my pre-natal appointments to Mom and Dad and I would send a quick email when I was leaving my house and again when I arrived at the Midwives office, then Mom would call and I'd hand the phone to the Midwife, who would then do the entire appointment with the phone tucked between her shoulder and her ear. In this way, Mom and Dad were able to hear the baby’s heartbeat at the same time that I did and they would get information directly as it was determined and have the opportunity to ask questions and be very involved. I had an ultrasound and explained the situation to the technician and asked her to write the baby’s gender down on a piece of paper and seal it in an envelope. I went to a scheduled appointment with my Midwives right after and she opened the envelope on the phone to Mom, announcing that I carried a baby girl.It was around this time that my Midwives strongly advised Mom to secure the very best travel insurance that she could find, and to make sure that it covered hospitalization. They were unable to explain why, but continued to strongly suggest it. Mom agreed and followed their advice.I saw first-hand all that these brave and selfless and amazing people had been through in order to become parents, and I didn't want to make them wait longer than necessary so I’d sought a social induction and Mom arrived on Monday, 2 days before I was scheduled to be induced. Mom and I walked into the hospital together holding hands and she was there for all of it. The Midwife cleared the baby’s head and shoulder and invited Mom to catch her daughter, which she did. The Midwives invited Mom to cut the umbilical cord and when they took baby girl to attend to her, Mom collapsed on me, sticky and wet with birth, hugging me and speaking the only English words she knew, 'Thank you! Thank you! THANK YOU!’ Word spread through the hospital about what was going on and nurses, Midwives, student doctors, health care aides, even a janitor came in to see and congratulate us and wish us their best, and they all started crying and of course my Doula and Marie and I were all crying happy, triumphant tears; there wasn't a dry eye in the ward. Both Marie and I were too busy, me crying and watching this brave and courageous woman become a Mom and Marie in awe of her daughter, to notice that the primary Midwife had disappeared until she returned with paperwork for Mom to sign and bracelets for her wrist; one that matched her daughter and allowed access to the nursery that the baby would never be relinquished to and the other for Marie as a patient. They admitted Marie to hospital for “nonspecific abdominal issues”, but there was nothing wrong with her. They knew that she didn't want to miss a single second of her daughter’s first days, and also because the Midwives, in their unique wisdom, wanted to provide a supportive and watchful environment for the transition of baby going from being in my care to being in her Mom’s. Plus, Marie was a new Mom and could use some support. The next 3 days were amazing; insular and protective, Marie worshipped her daughter and was the fantastic Mother I knew she would be. We laughed together and loved and I'm still so proud of her.I had been a bit concerned about how I would feel, and how it would be for Marie to bond with her daughter because in theory, baby girl had been hearing my voice and my heartbeat and had been rocking in my body to the rhythm of my world and it should have been me that she was used to and took comfort from, so I expected a period of adjustment. Nope! Baby girl was born and came out looking for her Mom and it was Mom that she wanted and Mom that comforted her. On the night of the day she was born, I left to use the bathroom and take care of myself as a newly postpartum woman does and as I was leaving the room, baby girl started to stir in her isolette. I was close by, just in case, but didn't hear a cry and assumed that she had gone back to sleep. I walked back into the room to find the isolette empty and baby girl snuggled in her Mom’s arms. Mom had just gone through a very intense 3 days, with a transatlantic flight and helping her daughter be born and was understandably exhausted! Marie was asleep but baby girl was awake and I looked at them together, a study in beauty. The look on Marie’s beautiful face spoke fulfillment and pride, while baby girl’s face and wise little eyes knew that she was loved and had the world in the palm of her little hand! I understood then that as long and as much as Marie had been waiting for her daughter, so too had her daughter been waiting for Marie. I was just the doorway.Charles arrived a few days later and proved himself to also be an amazing Dad. I took my Mother and children to visit and when baby girl started to fuss in my Mother’s arms, my Mother experienced a moment of uncertainty as to who to pass her to. Her Mom, of course. Dad was flipping a steak and my job was done.Baby girl will be 13 next year. I keep in touch with them still and recently found out that she's studying English in order to better talk with me when we visit them in Europe next spring.You asked about experiences and there were plenty, but one huge thing stands out. Strangers would ask about my pregnancy, how far along are you, is this your first, etc. and when I told them that I was carrying as a surrogate, I always got one of the same two reactions; the person would open a dialogue about their daughter or daughter in law or niece or neighbour or someone else in their world who had experienced infertility and they would tell me what an amazing and generous thing I was doing. Or, the person would be aghast, asking me how I could do that, carry a baby for 9 long months and feel it grow and move and then just give it up? Well, both are wrong. I'm not an amazing and generous person, I’m a woman that was given a miracle and wanted to give a bit of that miracle back because I had red in my ledger and needed to say thanks to the Universe. It wasn't a one-sided act of generosity because I was given plenty of gifts and memories too! Just imagine the trust and confidence that was given to me and I was only one small part of a miracle where the sum total was enormously bigger than its parts. And no, I'm absolutely not carrying and birthing and giving the baby up, I’m giving the baby back!As a really cool footnote, I had a saline ultrasound during the medical evaluation part of things. The Doctor approached me and asked if he could use my images in a professional capacity, to show his infertile patients what a perfect uterus was supposed to look like. I consented and signed off on my permission and release, then smiled a bit, wishing I could package that experience and mail it to each of the 7 “specialists” that had told me that I’d never be pregnant, but since I couldn't do that, I’d have to just enjoy it for myself, that the uterus they all told me was broken and barren was now to be used as the example for the uterus that everyone should be so lucky to have!

You have to understand the nature of the US military-industrial-Congressional complex. It is NOT designed with the goal of optimizing our military capabilities. It is about spending money. Money is power so the real goal is to find an excuse to spend a LOT of money. Buying a very expensive and highly complex weapon system is an ideal candidate for a long term excuse to spend a great deal of money.Such buys of these kinds of spending excuses (and there have been many of them - like the F-35) have several things in common:(1) There is some basis for the motivation to buy in the first place. It might be a real or false new threat from some other military (the “missile gap”). It might be an aging, inefficient or flawed existing system that needs replacement (the B-52). It can also be simply a desire to create jobs and garner votes for an influential senior Congressman. One such example is the multi-billion contracts that have been awarded for the NINE changes in military uniforms by the various services in the past decade. More often than not, the motivation for these kinds of boondoggle contracts is NOT as a result of a carefully planned and designed military necessity.(2) These pork projects must have and often only have the backing of come Congressional senior politicians - usually senior members of one or more critical congressional committees. By support, I mean that the award of the contract of the item must promise to award a significant portion of the labor (translation = jobs, money and votes) within the congressional district of that congress member. There must also be substantial “campaign contributions” to these congressional committee members. Note that this has nothing to do with whether the item being contracted for is needed, well designed, function or effective. It’s just about the money flowing into or controlled by congress.(3) The item must have a lot of bells and whistles, high tech stuff, oh-my-gosh performance or specs and be able to be called a “force multiplier”. Note that this does NOT mean that it REALLY has or can do all this neat stuff or that it has been tested and proven to perform this way - the only requirement is that it must “claim” to be much, much better than whatever is being used now. The reason this is necessary is that the sales pitch is going to the Congress politicians, not to the military. These politicians are easily impressed by the promises of advanced technology, hyper performance and flashy demonstrations. Telling these guys that they can buy one plane for the AF and the Navy seems to be a great idea. A military guy would ask, “how is that possible given all the differences in basic performance requirements?”. It is much easier to get a confirmed supporter from a techno-peasant than it is from an experienced engineer.When the contractor was trying to prove that their ballistic missile defense system worked, they invited Congressmen to witness a demo. The idea was to shoot a high speed missile at an incoming ICBM warhead and hit it in mid-flight upon reentry. Multiple tests had failed prior to this demo so the contractor mounted a powerful beacon transmitter into the fake war head and then built a simple homing signal tracking device into the anti-missile. The successful intercept was witnessed by the Congressmen and funding was extended for several more years…while they worked out the bugs. To date, a radar guided intercept of a real-world ICBM warhead has never been successfully demonstrated but the program that was started in 1983 is still ongoing and still being funded.(4) To amplify the #3 trait, is that a very common trait of these kinds of boondoggle contracts is that it is often sold as a “concurrent engineering” contract, meaning the R&D and even the basic design is not yet resolved but will be some time during the contract. This makes it possible for the company to promise performance that has never existed before or that is based on, as yet, unknown technology that has yet to be developed. Like, “Of course we can make a Navy version of the F35 - just add a tail hook.” Then after the contract is awarded, they can bill for the major redesign of the frame and for the foldable wings and so on. Such contracts often include some interesting clauses - such as - they get paid for doing the basic R&D on a cost+fee basis - meaning that they get a profit on top of whatever it costs - no matter how much it is. Such contracts are known for major cost overruns because there is no incentive at all to cut costs or even to quickly resolve the design.The $11 billion Stryker Army vehicle is a classic example. It was delivered with armor too thin so a new contract was awarded to bolt on additional armor plate. This caused the tires to blow so they had to fix that with a contract to buy all new tires and spares for 311 vehicles. The added armor weight has greatly reduced performance and caused increase wear on the running gear - causing more frequent failures of brakes, transmissions, suspensions and other parts. Then they discovered the $157,000 grenade launcher couldn’t air properly and didn’t work at night so that was a new contract awarded for field retrofit. Then another $9.5 million contract was awarded for additional field support and tools. The combat computer on board the Stryker isn’t sued because it overheats and the displays don’t work. There was even a $111 million contract awarded for “unforeseen manufacturing defects”. Israel, Canada and Lithuania all cancelled orders for Stryker’s after using demonstration vehicles for a short period of time. The price of each vehicle is now up to $5.1 million - the Canadian LAV III, on which the Stryker design is based costs $2.7 million each. Each of these flaws is the subject of additional contracts to fix them and is often done in the field at added costs.(5) It is often said that these contracts “have a life of their own” - meaning that they don’t end or have a defined life for several reasons. First, because of the rush to production in the “concurrent engineering” type contract, the work never ends. In the case of the F35, production models are actually fielded to the military while basic design flaws and performance failures are still being analyzed, studied and redesign is underway with the intent of retrofitting the changes into the deployed aircraft at some time in the future. Sometimes, such failures are not noted until the units are put into actual use. There is also the employment of all those workers (and voters) that are building the F35. If the contract ends normally or as a result of poor design or performance, then all those people lose their jobs. The local Congressman doesn’t want that so even in the face of obvious deficiencies, he will advocate a continuation of the contract - for years and years to come. And then there is the ego problem of anyone associated with the project of ever admitting that it was a bad idea in the first place. No one wants to do that until they are ready to retire. The FB-111 went on for 31 years after it was shown to be unreliable, under performing and inappropriate for the mission.An interesting outcome of all this forcing of purchase of flawed systems is that it will eventually (often after many years) lead to the proposal to retire that old, poor design and troublesome system with an all new hyper-performing, digital, super capable system that will do everything the old system did but much better, faster and cheaper….all congress has to do is “sign the cost+fee contract and we’ll begin production right away and finalize the design within a year or two or five.”You will notice that military necessity, combat effectiveness, field maintenance and logistics and other military considerations often do not enter into the decision to buy and also do not often enter into the decision to stop buying or to cancel the contracts. The Navy F-35 will almost certainly follow the path of the FB-111, the A-12 Avenger II, F3H Demon, F7U Cutless as well as other boondoggle military systems.Allow me just a little more rant to vent on the F-35…..The F-35 is a disaster. It was over sold by the lobbyists, under-priced initially but Lockheed was awarded a “concurrent engineering” contract that allows them to begin production before the design is finalized and tested. The idea that an aircraft built primarily for the Air Force will also work equally well for the Navy and Marines is foolish. We learned that on the FB-111 back in the 1970’s but it took 30 years (1967 to 1998) before they finally admitted it was a bad idea. I suspect the same will be rtrue for the F-35.The F-35, like a number of modern and advanced weapon and support systems did NOT originate in the military but rather in Congress. Perhaps the military indicated that they were looking for a replacement but the choice and design was entirely marketed and sold to Congress before it was decided on by the military.Why do it that way? Because those dopes in Congress don’t know squat about weapons or technology or tactics or logistics or maintenance and will believe whatever the lobbyists tell them. Show them a fancy video, animation or demo and they are interested. Point out that the item will be built in their congressional district and mean hundreds or thousands of jobs and they are sold on the concept. Then dump millions of dollars of bribe money - in the form of “campaign contributions” into the key congressional decision makers and Lockheed gets a contract in which they will make billions of dollars whether or not they can make it work or not.AFTER the sales pitch is bought by Congress, then both Lockheed and the Pentagon start looking at the real problems. I could go into the long list of fundamental design flaws but, with respect to the Navy, there is only one really major issue…carrier landings.An AF aircraft often has a 10,000 ft runway (or longer) to land on. This allows the F35 to gently land and roll out to a stop and then taxi easily to the hangar. It has parking areas measured in acres and can occupy an entire hangar of repair shops and warehouses of replacement parts. No so on a carrier.On a carrier, the landing is a controlled crash. Really. Just before smacking into the deck, the pilot advances the throttle to max, in case his hook misses the wire. When he catches the wire, he is literally snatched out of the air and slammed onto the deck. To make an aircraft be able to do this over and over again, it has to be really strongly built with robust landing gear and a frame that will support all that weight and pounding.When the Navy was asked in a Congressional hearing about the use of the FB-111, the Admiral said that it can easily land on a carrier…..once. Then it has to be lifted off the carrier with a crane and have its landing gear and air frame repaired. Then it can go fly and land on the carrier again….once.In the case of the F35, the thousand pound added weight and the much larger suspension and landing gear needed to land on the carrier comes out of the space and weight needed for fuel, weapons storage, etc.And then there is the storage and maintenance issues…..oh don’t get me started.So, getting back to your question - Congress is driving the purchase. They are funding the buy and making it very difficult for the Navy to refuse or even make it difficult to accept the aircraft. For instance, it would be a career ender for a senior officer to publicly criticize the F35 or its management. Of course there is also the “revolving door” in which the senior most officers associated with these kinds of contracts will retire and then go to work for the contractors at very lucrative salaries.Additional support based on personal experience:In 1986, I was a Program Manager (PM) for buying a new fleet of aircraft for the Navy - working at COMNAVAIRSYSCOM about 1 mile away from the Pentagon. I was the COTR (Contracting Officer’s Technical Representative) for 56 contracts with a $3.2B budget. I got to see the process up close from the inside. I retired in 1988 and worked as a consultant to the contractors for about 10 years. This gave me an indepth look at both sides of the process. It ain’t what most people think it is. Here is one example:While I was a PM on the Navy side, I had to sign paperwork for “progress payments” to the contractor based on their submission of invoices for work done and items purchased. These were often invoices of 300+ pages and it was rare that anyone ever actually read them. I did - which really pissed off the contractors.In incident, I discovered a $1,200 charge for a wire connector. The aircraft being build needed 300 of these and we needed 5,000 spares. That’s over $14 million. I did a little research and found that the contractor was buying this connector for $66. That’s 1,800% profit. Under the contract, they are not allowed to do that. I told them I wouldn’t sign their invoice. They called the Admiral. I got called into see the Admiral but I saw him after I sent to see the CAA - Contractor Auditing Agency. CAA said this was the worst rip off they had seen in years on a per item basis and that they (CAA) could get the contractor blacklisted (unable to take any more government contracts). I had this with me and reported it to the Navy Admiral. He ordered me to bury it and forget about it and sign their invoice. His reasoning was that the Navy wanted to continue to do business with this company and did not want them blacklisted. I did as I was told.As a hired consultant to the government PM that was buying a new $7B health care system for all of DoD, I advised him about what the contractor was doing - sort of a QA/QC checker on the contractor’s performance. In reviewing a routine contract renewal, I noticed that in one prominent part of the contract, they listed a periodic (monthly) status and progress report that went into extreme detail about the contract. As in all such reports, it was given an obscure name - MSL&F Report. This would be a critical document for the proper management of the contract…..but…..elsewhere in the 1,200 page contract, in the fine print in a mundane never-read portion of the text called the CDRL, it listed each “deliverable” and described it. In the listing for the MSL&F Report, it listed it as optional at the contractor’s discretion and that if it was mandated by the government, then the government was effectively initiating a cancellation of the contract which would incur a huge penalty (in the tens of millions of dollars).I pointed this out to the PM and he told the contractor to remove that clause, They refused. Since they were the incumbent and owned the rights to the software and design until the contract is completed, if they walked, several hundred million dollars and two years of time already invested in the program would be lost. The PM was ordered to sign the renewal without the removal of that clause in the contract. The contract ended 5 years later at $3B over budget and three years past the original delivery date. The delivered system was so bad that in less than a year, another contract was released to correct all the flaws.I could go on. The system is rigged, it is driven by money and power and everyone is in on it…out of necessity and lack of alternatives.ONe study done by a university (back in 1987) estimated that if government contracting were run as efficiently as Walmart, the cost of goods and services bought by the Pentagon would drop by 68%.Cynical?….yes. Disgusted?…..yes. Frustrated?…..yes. Wouldn’t you be?Update and mitigation…There is no doubt that the F35 is capable under the right circumstances - long distant engagements, ground attack, infiltration, recon, stealth, etc. but to be fair, that is sort of like buying a high end pickup truck and then using it to carry groceries and declaring it is doing a fine job.We also have some very good pilots flying the F35 that I would put up against any in the world but what we paid for is an aircraft that would assure air superiority against the likes of the Chinese J-20 or the Typhoon. I’m not sure we got that, at least not yet.The F-35 is six years behind schedule and is projected to go “operational” in about 2 years. The nature of these kinds of contracts is that they will live on for years and years and eventually, the weapon system will “mature” and begin to live up to its original (now, decade old) expectation.Ironically, the F-22 seems to be judged to be superior to the F35 in most of the comparable systems and performance. (The F35 has several systems that weren’t available when the F22 was in production.)I can’t vouch for the accuracy of these statements but here is a comment made on a military aviation forum about comparing the F22 to the F35:“Field reports indicate the F-35 can't outmaneuver a F-16D, but has won against F-5's in A2A exercises. A2G exercises are conducted on ranges that lack up-to-date threat simulators according to the FY15 AOT&E report, and a companion AWST report clearly indicates the F-35 has a larger RCS than the F-22 and can be detected earlier than the F-22.Plus the F-22 has a longer range radar, the F-22 can deploy the AIM-9X without compromising stealth signature whereas the F-35 can't, the F-22 carries a larger payload of AIM-120D than the F-35, the Scorpion HMCS will likely be used by the F-22 once testing is completed providing the same HOBS capability as the F-35. And the F-35 has chronic software issues, and significantly lower aerodynamic performance (it can't even super cruise) than the F-22.Lastly, the USAF General cited in this article indicates that two F-22s can do the job of eight F-35s in A2G missions. “I don’t fault the aircraft or the people as much as I fault the system that allows and tolerates contracts to be managed like this. A cost+fixed fee contract, a concurrent engineering contract, a sole source contract and other contract management techniques invite and even encourage waste, fraud and abuse and almost always result in cost and schedule overruns on very large scales.I was a PM for buying a fleet of aircraft for the Navy back in the late 1980’s. My contract was for $3.2 billion to Boeing along with 56 other contractors. I managed 88% of those contracts to be delivered on time or early and at or under budget. The 12% that weren’t were as a result of federal budget decisions that forced expensive delays in those contracts - NOT the fault of the contractor, the contract or the contract management.Part of why that was possible was that the types of contracts issued in those days had punitive clauses in them if the contractor failed to meet the requirements of the contract - including dates, costs and quality standards for all deliverables. The powerful war industry lobbyists got Congress to repeal or replace those contract types, allowing open ended cost and schedule contracts to be issued with vague goals and standards and almost no consequences for failure to meet contract requirements for performance or quality.As long as we allow money to influence these decisions, we will pay more for less and end up with a less capable military.