The U.S. Navy Is Looking for Submarine Recruits on Reddit

The U.S. Navy is playing games connected Reddit successful an effort to gully successful recruits for submarine crews. At the extremity of September, the U.S. Navy launched its caller “Sub Reddit Hunt” a run connected the societal media site. Throughout the period of September, the Navy volition “hide” 5 submarines connected Reddit and permission clues that imaginable recruits tin usage to way down the submarines.

The crippled is an advertisement meant to drum up recruitment. It’s the brainchild of VML, an advertizing bureau that’s worked with Microsoft, Coca-Cola, and Ford. “This interactive selling run encourages Reddit users to decipher codes and hunt for clues to implicit bid directives—designed to pull the adjacent procreation of submariners,” Marketing bureau VML said successful a station connected Facebook announcing the campaign.

The U.S. Navy, and astir different branches of the U.S. military, are having a hard clip getting radical to enlist. Over the past decade, the Army, Navy, and Air Force person struggled to conscionable their recruitment goals. The Navy is 1 of the worst performers and has failed to enlistee sailors consistently implicit the past fewer years.

The reasons wherefore are complicated. Decades of unpopular overseas wars person tarnished the estimation of the military. A bully system means much jobs, which means that less young radical are pushed into enlisting for a paycheck. Many branches besides won’t fto radical articulation if they’ve ever utilized an illicit substance similar marijuana, person a tattoo, oregon person utilized psychiatric meds. Americans are besides much unhealthy than they’ve been successful generations and can’t conscionable the basal carnal requirements.

All of that adds up to less radical joining the military. All the branches person gotten originative successful the past decennary arsenic they’ve tried to drum up recruits. The U.S. Navy and Army some support progressive esports teams, watercourse connected Twitch and Facebook, and effort to usage video games to thrust recruitment. It hasn’t ever gone well.

The Navy, and different branches, were already advertizing connected Reddit. The augmented world crippled is conscionable an improvement of that tactic. “To guarantee we pull the precise champion and brightest aboriginal sailors, including submariners, the Navy is perpetually seeking innovative ways to interact with prospective candidates connected … societal and integer platforms,” Rear Admiral James P. Waters, commandant of Navy Recruiting Command, told AdAge successful a statement.

The Navy has released 2 of the games and volition merchandise much arsenic the period rolls along. The archetypal is simply a agelong database of redacted statements that users click to wide away. Underneath the bars are clues that could assistance funny recruits way down the archetypal hidden sub.

The 2nd crippled is an audio puzzle. Clicking an animated gif sends users to a Google thrust wherever the Navy has uploaded 8 antithetic audio files that, if deciphered, volition pb them to different sub. Gizmodo ran the audio files by a erstwhile U.S. Navy sonar tech who told them they were a premix of things idiosyncratic mightiness hear.

One contained morse code, different sounded similar span chatter, and different sounded similar a repeated drawstring of Chinese. The erstwhile sailor said the audio was aged fashioned. “We seldom really listened to the noises. We mostly conscionable look astatine the displays of the sounds, you get a waterfall display,” helium said. The sailor didn’t enactment connected a sub, however, and added that “sub-based sonar techs mightiness perceive much than we did. Surely they do.”

The past puzzle is acceptable to spell unrecorded connected October 28. According to a connection from VML, the puzzles “[ask] Redditors to spell deeper than ever earlier to lick a occupation and larn astir the Navy.” It’s unclear if the strategy volition work.

Navy Recruiting Command did not instantly instrumentality Gizmodo’s petition for comment.