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  "description": "Service says designation reflects ‘longstanding traditions’ in the fleet",
  "path": "/navy-stakes-claim-to-contested-gays-of-hormuz/",
  "publishedAt": "2026-04-03T12:00:44.000Z",
  "site": "https://www.duffelblog.com",
  "tags": [
    "Adm. Daryl L. Caudle",
    "Director of Naval History and Heritage Command",
    "Shores of Tripoli",
    "the Village People",
    "Learn more",
    "Marine Corps.",
    "crossing the line",
    "climbing a large, slippery",
    "shellback ceremony.",
    "Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth",
    "submarine community",
    "Foxhole Briefs",
    "@SECDEF_Nice"
  ],
  "textContent": "WASHINGTON — After Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Gen. John Daniel “Raizin” Caine warned recently that the “Straits of Whore Moose” [sic] had become a contested waterway, the U.S. Navy moved quickly to designate the area a protected maritime cultural zone known as the Gays of Hormuz, sources confirmed today.\n\n“This is now a safe haven,” said Adm. Daryl L. Caudle, Chief of Naval Operations. “A deeply nautical, deeply life-affirming safe haven where we can finally be ourselves.\"\n\nAccording to retired Rear Adm. Samuel J. Cox, Director of Naval History and Heritage Command, the service has long felt a special connection to these “particular” straits.\n\n“The name itself finally allows us to stop being subtle,” Cox said. “For decades, sailors have been navigating Hormuz with a level of… interpretive enthusiasm.”\n\nCox noted that as far back as 1949, the Navy’s Middle East Force helped establish what he described as “a proud tradition of extended deployments, questionable decision-making, and everyone agreeing not to ask too many questions.”\n\n“The Marines have the Shores of Tripoli,” Cox added. “Now we have the Gays of Hormuz. This will live forever in Navy heritage.”\n\nThe Navy emphasized that its relationship with gay culture did not begin this week, citing its enduring affection for the Village People and a little-known internal effort in the late 1970s to replace “Anchors Aweigh” with “In the Navy.”\n\n“People thought that was a joke,” Cox said. “It was not.”\n\nService guarantees citizenship. Participation may vary.\n\n\n                            Learn more\n                        \n\nThe move has also intensified the Navy’s long-running rivalry with the Marine Corps.\n\n“The Marines keep acting like they’re more masculine,” said Cmdr. Jason Baker, captain of the USS _Dewey_. “We keep acting like we’re not enjoying any of this. It’s been going on for about a hundred years.”\n\n\"The Navy has a long tradition of being extremely weird about its own traditions,\" said a Marine Corps spokesman, pointing to the service's crossing the line ceremonies and students at the Naval Academy climbing a large, slippery phallic statue every year. \"We fully support them continuing their traditions somewhere far away from us.”\n\nUnder the new designation, any Navy vessel entering the waterway will be required to conduct what officials are calling the “Fraternal Order of the Strait-Chaser Ceremony,” a ritual inspired by the Navy’s historic shellback ceremony.\n\n“Everyone remembers their first time crossing the line,” one official said. “This is similar, just… less subtle.”\n\nDefense Secretary Pete Hegseth was reportedly less enthusiastic about the announcement.\n\n“I told them to knock it off,” one aide said Hegseth remarked. “Some things are traditions, and some things are just getting out of hand.”\n\nAt press time, a spokesperson for the submarine community said, “We have no comment, and we would prefer to keep it that way.”\n\n🖊️\n\n _****SECDEF_Nice****_ __served in Army Civil Affairs and specialized in failing to influence populations and occasionally his own chain-of-command. Favorite quote by Plato: “The best satire for the soul is the truth.” Follow him on X at @SECDEF_Nice or at__ Foxhole Briefs__.__",
  "title": "Navy stakes claim to contested Gays of Hormuz",
  "updatedAt": "2026-04-03T12:00:44.183Z"
}