Grumpy Editor notes some reporters were drinking on the job while covering Defense Secretary Leon Panetta in China and it was okay with the Pentagon chief, Chinese military and especially with the brewery --- that got a PR boost.
Panetta toured two Chinese war vessels yesterday at the Qingdao naval base.
But the media accompanying the defense secretary were not allowed to follow Panetta on board.
Instead, and to curb grumbling, the Chinese sent reporters to the nearby Tsingtao Brewery for a tour and a sampling of the output.
Some found the brewery more fascinating than following Panetta who was checking out the two-year-old Chinese frigate Yantai, 405 feet long and manned by 175 sailors, and the 228-foot-long, 10-year-old “Great Wall 197” submarine, a conventional-powered vessel, with a crew of 55.
With the brewery tour, reporters learned that the Tsingtao Brewery was founded in 1903 by German settlers and the brand, the top beer in China, debuted in the U.S. in 1972, soon becoming a top seller in the states.
There was no word if the brewery-touring reporters made it back to the naval base on time on a tight schedule that lists New Zealand as the next stop for Panetta.
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