For the next month, we are at war.
Composite Training Unit Exercise (COMPTUEX) fully integrates Carrier Strike Group (CSG) 12 as a cohesive, multi-mission fighting force to test the strike group’s ability to carry out sustained combat operations. Knowing where we might go on deployment and what we’d be likely to find there, this is our last chance to practice before we play for keeps.
But how did we get here? COMPTUEX preparation started the very day we returned from our 2023 deployment. Since then, the clock was counting down until the time Gerald R. Ford Carrier Strike Group (GRFCSG) was back in the fight.
The first step: get the equipment back in working order after a long mission, ASAP.
“We learned a lot on our last...
U.S. Coast Guard tactical team members, Sailors, and Marines exit an MH-60S Sea Hawk helicopter, attached to Helicopter Sea Combat Squadron 9, on the flight deck of the world’s largest aircraft carrier, Ford-class aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN 78), after a right of visit boarding operation while underway in the Atlantic Ocean, Jan. 7, 2026. U.S. military forces are deployed to the U.S. Southern Command area of operations in support of the U.S. Southern Command mission, Department of War-directed operations, and the president’s priorities to disrupt illicit drug trafficking and protect the homeland. (U.S. Navy photo)
B-Roll package of USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN 78) cyclic flight operations during dusk to nighttime hours while the ship operates in the Caribbean Sea, Nov. 19, 2025. U.S. military forces are deployed to the Caribbean in support of Operation Southern Spear, the U.S. Southern Command mission, Department of War-directed operations, and the president’s priorities to disrupt illicit drug trafficking and protect the homeland. (U.S. Navy Video)
CAPT Rick Burgess, a native of Bellevue, WA, graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1996 with a Bachelor of Science in Political Science and was designated a Naval Flight Officer in 1998.
Operational assignments include tours with Fighter Squadron (VF) 31, USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN 72); Strike Fighter Squadron (VFA) 102, USS Kitty Hawk (CV 63); and two tours with VFA-103, USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN 69) and USS George Washington (CVN 73).
Shore assignments include service as Action Officer in the House Liaison Office, Office of Legislative Affairs (OLA); TOPGUN Instructor with Navy Fighter Weapons School; Strike Fighter Placement Officer (PERS-433B) with Navy Personnel Command (NPC); Branch Chief, Global Missile Defense...
Gerald R. Ford, the 38th President of the United States, was born July 14, 1913, in Omaha, NE. The future President grew up in a close-knit family, excelled scholastically and athletically at South High School in Grand Rapids, and achieved the rank of Eagle Scout in November 1927.
Ford attended the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, where he majored in economics and political science. An extremely gifted athlete, FORD was voted the Wolverine’s most valuable player in 1934, with opportunities to play professional football.
Ford chose the legal profession over a professional football career, graduating with a law degree from Yale in 1941. After the United States entered the war during World War II, Ford received a commission...
