GOP congressman — a retired Navy SEAL — uses foreign warship photo in salute to U.S. Navy

Rep. Ryan Zinke (R-MT), whose political identity is closely associated with his background as a Navy SEAL, recently extended birthday wishes to the U.S. Navy on social media — using what appears to be an image of an Indonesian warship.

In a birthday message on X, formerly known as Twitter, a transparent silhouette of the word “NAVY” was overlaid on the ship.

A Raw Story analysis indicates that the image is a stock photo from the graphic design website Canva.

In the graphic, the numbers “3” and “5” are visible on the ship as is an anti-aircraft radar tower. These and other elements of the photo seem to match a Canva image of a ship with the number “358,” an anti-aircraft radar tower and an Indonesian flag.

The ship is identified as IDN Warship 358 at vesselfinder.com.

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Zinke posted the graphic on Oct. 13 without comment. It remained online as of Tuesday morning.

Lyle Goldstein, who spent 20 years on the faculty of the U.S. Naval War College and currently serves as a visiting professor of international and public affairs at Brown University, concurred with Raw Story’s assessment of the image.

“I think you are correct,” he said. “I'm not aware of any (U.S. Navy) ship class of that type. It looks to be a light frigate or corvette. In that category, we've developed the Littoral Combat Ship (LCS), which looks very different.”

Multiple messages left with Zinke’s office were not returned.

Zinke, who previously served a turbulent two years as secretary of the Interior under President Donald Trump, is the latest member of Congress who have used depictions of foreign military vehicles or symbols in an effort to honor a branch of the U.S. military.

RELATED ARTICLE: GOP Rep. Anna Paulina Luna deletes social media posts featuring Russian fighter jets

Most recently, the office of Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-FL) deleted two of the congresswoman’s social media posts after Raw Story reported that the airplane silhouettes used in her happy birthday message to the U.S. Air Force — she’s an Air Force veteran — were actually Russian fighter jets.

“This post was published without approval from me as the comms director, via a junior staffer,” Edie Heipel, Luna’s communications director, said in an email. “Rep. Luna is a US Air Force veteran who worked in airfield management and her husband is a Bronze Star/Purple Heart Combat Controller. To suggest she doesn’t know the difference between American and Russian fighter jets is asinine.”