KA-BAR LDK

This is the KA-BAR TDI LDK, my newest acquisition. TDI is the Tactical Defense Institute and LDK stands for last ditch knife. It is intended as a backup weapon, for self defense when you can't access any other weapon. It is very small, but seems like it is pretty good quality, which one would expect when buying any knife with KA-BAR written on the side. The knife is made from a single thin piece of steel. It has a flat ground blade and an extremely acute point. It will go right through just about anything softer than the knife itself. It weighs next to nothing and has been riding in my pocket for a week and I can't even feel it in there. the blade is listed as 1.58 inches long and is pretty sharp right out of the box.



One of the scenarios that helped to inspire this type of weapon is the classic "gun retention" situation where someone is attempting to take a pistol away from you, usually when it is in a holster. One idea is that you hold onto the weapon as tight as possible, draw the knife with your weak hand and apply it generously to your assailant until they cease attempting to take your weapon, or until you can back off and draw said weapon. That scenario is mostly for law enforcement types, but as some application to anyone who might be attacked in the street.

The sheath is black glass filled nylon and feels pretty sturdy. It is about the size of a credit card and can be laced into your shoes or boots, or behind a policeman's badge for example. It came with some 550 type cord to wear around the neck, but I considered that a no-go, because you can be strangled on purpose or on accident with strong cord around the neck. I outfitted it with a ball chain, but I didn't care for wearing it around my neck that way either.


I've seen others use different grips, but the the pic below shows what feels more comfortable to me. Middle finger through the hole in the grip, index finger in the "trigger area" and thumb laying across the left face of the knife and onto the serrations along the spine. If you have big sausage fingers, this will not work for you. In fact, if you have real big hands I would recommend that you skip this neat little knife altogether. One thing I like about this type of grip is that it would be very difficult to take it away from me. There is nowhere to grab the weapon that isn't sharp and if you tried a martial arts-style wrist grab you very well could end up with a set of very nasty, deep cuts as the small blade is very easy to move around compared to a big knife.


A pretty neat little knife if you ask me, and one that will likely be in my pocket for well, ever. The LDK usually goes for about $20 US, but I got mine for a song at $11.99, from Midway USA, which is an awesome company. (Hey Larry, how about some free swag for the free advertising?)

This Day in History - June 21

1919 - The Scuttling of the Imperial German High Seas Fleet at Scapa Flow

SMS Bayern

World War I ended on November 11, 1918, but as things tend to do, not everything was quite tidied up yet. Under the terms of the Armistice, the German U-boat fleet was surrendered and no one was under any illusions that the Germans would be allowed to wreak havoc on international shipping with their U-boats again. The High Seas Fleet was another matter however. Under Article XXXI of the Armistice the Germans were not permitted to destroy their ships. Germany of course, wanted them back, the opinions of the British Royal Navy seemed to lean towards breaking the ships up for scrap, so that they could never again threaten them. The French and Italians contingents wanted a quarter of the ships each for themselves. They could at no cost, greatly increase their Naval power and at the same time, decrease their neighbors and punish Germany. (Which was of course, the point of the Treaty of Versailles, which may have helped to cause WWII, but that is another matter)


Admiral von Reuter, commanding the crew of the interred Navy, waited until most of the Royal Navy ships in the vicinity went out for a training exercise and gave the order to scuttle all vessels at 10:00am. By 12:00, when the began to list, the crews hoisted the Imperial German Ensign to their mainmasts (which they had been expressly forbidden from doing) and began to abandon ship. The Royal Navy picked up 1,774 Germans by the evening and transported them to Invergodon by battleships of the First Battle Squadron. Vice-Admiral Fremantle had sent out a general order declaring that the Germans were to be treated as prisoners-of-war for having broken the armistice and they were destined for the prisoner-of-war camps at Nigg Island.

Ultimately, 52 of the 74 ships sank including 15 of the 16 capital ships, 5 of the 8 cruisers, and 32 of the 50 destroyers. The rest were towed to shore by the British Guard boats that attempted to stop the scuttling. Nine German soldiers were shot and killed by the guards during those actions. In the inter war period, some were raised and scrapped or sunk as targets, but some remain today, many at considerable depth, and can be visited by divers.

SMS Hinderberg

217 BC - Battle of Lake Trasimene

The battle of Lake Trasimene has been recorded not only as one of the most important battles of the First Punic War, but also one of the most successful ambushes in the history of war.

The Punic Wars were a series of conflicts between the north African empire of Carthage and the Republic of Rome. Due to the daring, intelligence and and burning hatred of Carthage's general Hannibal, the Romans had been having a rough time. They elected Gaius Flaminius and Gnaeus Servilus Geminus to the position of Consul and gave them control of two armies and orders to destroy Hannibal's invading army which had been pillaging and burning its way through southern Europe.

Hannibal was an expert tactician and showed a clear understanding of the need to fight on ground that is favorable to your forces. After failing to goad the army under Flaminius to a fight, Hannibal started to move towards Rome. Hearing that the Roman army had finally broken camp and was following them, Hannibal chose his ground and arrayed his forces.


He chose a heavily forested hill region on the shores of the lake. Below the camp, on a small hill, he set up his heavy infantry forces, made up of Iberians, Celts and Africans. They would be position to attack downhill toward the Roman column's left flank when it appeared. His light infantry from Gaul was concealed in the wooded hills along with the the cavalry. They were to stay hidden until the attack began and then quickly block the Romans' line of retreat. His lightest armed troops were kept along the hills in hiding, ready to hit the Roman column in the flanks after the attack began. Hannibal had also ordered his men to light campfires on the Tuoro, to convince the Romans that they were further away than they thought. Having set up his men, Hannibal then merely had to wait for Flaminius to come blundering along into the trap. Flaminius could have waited to be reinforced by Servilius, and in fact was urged to do so. But he is remembered as a being impetuous and lacking self-control. He would live just long enough to regret those traits.

The next morning, Flaminius led his troops eastward along the road along the edge of the lake. A thick morning fog was present. Hannibal dispatched a small force of skirmishers to draw out the Roman vanguard. This had the effect of splitting the Roman force into two groups. As soon as the main body of the legions entered the kill zone, the trumpets were sounded, giving the signal for the attack.

The attack went exactly as planned and the Carthaginian cavalry blocked off the retreat route of the Romans. The Romans were taken by surprise and were being attacked on three sides, with water on the fourth. The Romans did not have time to form up their standard ranks and had to fight in a way they did not prefer. Romans armies usually did not march in their armor although this may not have been the case in this battle. The Romans were divided into three groups and the vanguard seeing the slaughter behind them, broke through the skirmishers and escaped through the forest. The rear of the column, furthest to the west was hit by a cavalry charge and forced into the lake, where many drowned. The center, with the most of the forces, fought for more than three hours with Hannibal's elite Gaulish heavy infantry before being wiped out. Flaminius was killed by the Gaul Ducarius. The Romans suffered about 15,000 dead and 5,000 captured, a total and complete defeat. The Carthaginians lost 2,500 killed and reports state that many later died of their wounds.

Also...

• Livy states that so terrible was the massacre at Lake Trasimene, that neither army was aware of the occurrence of an earthquake, which at the very moment of the battle "overthrew large portions of many of the cities of Italy, turned rivers, and levelled mountains with an awful crash."
• An ancient tradition says that because of the blood, which for over three days filled the water, that the name of a small stream feeding the lake was renamed Sanguineto, the "Blood River".
• In the surroundings of Lake Trasimene, there are further areas which retain a particular meaning, including Ossaia ("Charnel House, Place of Bones"), Sepoltaglia ("Place of Burial"), Caporosso ("Cape red"), Piegaro ("Subdued Place), Preggio (from "Peggio", "Worse"), Pugnano ("Place of battles"), and Pian di Marte ("Field of Mars").

Smithsonian's History Jokes

I thought these were pretty hilarious and I like how they point out that history is just FULL of craziness.

Living Insignia

I found these pics a couple of days ago and thought that they were kinda neat. They all date from the early WWII period and were taken at various military training sites. The last one is the entire 1st Division. I guess they took them from a tower or perhaps an aircraft. Not something you see everyday.

More Eye Pro saves

Eye Protection is awesome

It is not uncommon to here stories about soldiers whose lives were saved by their helmets or body armor. But no less important is eye protection.

Here are two photos I found today from combat operations in Afghanistan. This soldier, identified as Corporal Renaud M. of the French Alpine Hunters, took a Taliban round straight into his goggles. even though they are on his helmet in the pic, I imagine they were on his face during the incident, given the wound on his cheek. He would have certainly sustained a serious wound without his eyepro and very well might have even been killed. This is just another instance of modern protective equipment doing the great job we want it to. I often hear people complain about the amount of money the military uses up, but when I see one of our boys' life saved by that money I feel good.

Good work and all my best wishes, Corporal Renaud. And good work, nameless person who made those goggles. Taliban gunner--fuck you.

BTW- these photos were taken by Thomas Goisque, all credit to him, hopefully he won't mind my use of them for educational purposes. You can see the rest of the series here:
http://www.thomasgoisque-photo.com/site.php?page=reportages&spec=def&id=90##

A New Army - for China

Today China formally announced that the Chinese People's Liberation Arny has set up a cyber command called the "Blue Army". Anyone who has been paying attention knows that cyber crime and cyber espionage has been going on for some time and that it is very likely that many viruses and so forth have come out of China. US computer security firm Symantec states that they estimate 30% of all malicious emails come out of China. That is not to say that the Chinese government has been behind them all. It is very plausible that various other nefarious elements such as Russian and Chinese crime syndicates have used the available pool of tech savvy Chinese and lack of oversight to launder money, steal industrial secrets and so forth.

The spokesman for the PLA, Geng Yansheng, stated that the goal of the Blue Army was to improve the country's military security. He also stated that China has been the victim of computer based attacks and that the network security of China was relatively weak. While probably true, that will not likely quiet the storm of people in the West that will use the announcement of the Blue Army's existence to call for more resources to be dedicated to national information and network security. Nor should it. While we should try to be as friendly as possible with the Chinese, both government and people, we do need to realize that they might not feel the same way. Also it is normally assumed that China very dearly wishes to dethrone us as the world superpower.

The Blue Army is reportedly run out of the Guandong Military Command, has existed for at least 2 years and consists of 30 people. I find it hard to believe that a country of 1.5 billion people, with the world's largest military and a fervent desire to modernize would have a computer army of 30 people. I could get 30 nerds together in my buddy's computer repair shop by tomorrow morning. I think it is safe to assume that the real size of the Blue Army is a much bigger than that. That being said, it could be that the Chinese have compartmentalized their network defense and that the intelligence services also maintain a sizable "cyber-police" (for back-tracing). This is even more likely when you think about the steps that the Communist Party has taken in an attempt to prevent their citizens from unfettered Internet access. It is also a good bet that the powers that be in China are at least occasionally interested in checking on the online activities of their flock and perhaps, you know, read an email or two.


So, America's decision makers-- get crackin' on this or we will fall so far behind that we might as well give the country to the Chinese Communist Party (the parts of it they don't already own that is). While cyber security has been talked about a great deal, I like a lot of of other people do not believe that enough has been done to give our country adequate defenses against this new form of warfare and espionage. We need to ensure that we have intelligent, tech savvy, creative, and loyal people working on this for us. And not just as contractors working under multi million dollar contracts. We need an organic National Security cyber team. How about full scholarships and guaranteed jobs for some computer science students for a start? So, come up with some cool name and get to it Department of Defense.

Picture this, just in some ACUs

Now it is time for a funny

I've said it before, but I am going to try and actually post on my blog with some kind of regularity again. And like I have done before I will start off by posting some easy bullshit that takes no work or thought at all from me.

So, how about some funny pics.

The Real Reason the Rebels lost on Hoth:

And while it is not as relevant as it was last week...

History's Oddities

This is Comanche, reputed to be the only survivor of Custer's 7th Cavalry after their fateful battle at Little Big Horn.

The plaque states:
" Comanche, the only survivor of the Custer Massacre, 1876. History of the horse and regimental orders of the 7th Cavalry as to the care of Comanche as long as he shall live 1887."

I would think that some other horses survived and were taken by the various tribes that fought there, but it does make for an interesting picture.

Predator Tactical .500 S&W

For those of you with a lot of money to burn through...
The new Predator Tactical .500 S&W. It is a pump action rifle with a 16.5" barrel and a six round tubular magazine. The basic model comes with a Cerakote® finish in black or tan with Ashely Express sights. It weighs 7 pounds, unloaded. It was developed to maximize the ballistics of the .500 S&W cartridge, developed by Cor-Bon and Smith and Wesson for the X frame revolver. The basic idea is that with a rifle you have a longer barrel, giving the projectile greater velocity. Also, you have less muzzle flash and report because more of the hot gases are used up pushing the bullet out of the longer barrel. You can also have a longer sight radius (the length between rear sight and front sight) this makes it easier to aim, giving better results in most cases. The third benefit is that you can shoulder the weapon and steady it with your weak hand, making it easier to shoot, especially at longer range.


I have fired one(1) round from a S&W .500 and I think the pressure wave gave me a mild concussion. It is something else. Although, in felt recoil, it wasn't too much worse than the .454 Casull Raging Bull I fired. Some of you may not be familiar with the world of ballistics, so I have included two pics to help you:



First, the ballistics data. Not very sexy, but it does give one an idea of the type of power we are dealing with here. For comparison, I have a very "hot" (high pressure = high velocity) 9mm cartridge, the Cor-Bon Pow'rball. It fires a 100 grain projectile at about 1400 FPS. Most of the above loadings are that fast, but 3 times heavier.
Next for those who like a more visual representation:
This is the .500 S&W next too what was once the standard for powerful handgun rounds, the .44 Remington Magnum.



Here is a neat video of the PT 500 being shot:


Who drinks Coke Zero? Be a man and drink real Coke or drink water.

Now the truth is that this is going to be an only marginally useful gun. It would be okay for some types of hunting, but the 16.5 inch barrel will limit its range, making it a good gun only for relatively short distances, perhaps 150 yards as a practical limit. For dangerous game, I would rather have a full sized rifle and a 4" barrel .44 Magnum revolver. It is mostly a gun for rich guys to take to the range and impress their friends. Why rich guys? Because it is from a custom gun shop and is listed at $1895.00 US. All that being said, I sure would like an afternoon with this little gun and a stack of paint cans. Of course I would need about $200 for all the ammo. Oh well.


I would like to see it in a "tacticool" version with rails, polymer furniture and pistol grip with a collapsible stock, but that's just me. And if you are a traditionalist, you could go the lever gun route with the Big Horn Armory Model 89 in .500 S&W.



http://www.predatortactical.com/PT-500/PT-500-p36.html

http://www.bighornarmory.com/products/carbine.php

Camouflage Project

So I decided to try my hand at a camouflage finish for a weapon. Being nervous but smart, I came to the conclusion that I did not want to try it on a real gun without some practice. So I painted my paintball gun.

I originally wanted a simple scheme that would make it a little easier to conceal when playing in the woods. I started by disassembling it and taping off any areas like the barrel and trigger where I didn't want any paint to get. Then I gave it a couple of base coats of ultra flat khaki Krylon spray paint. Then having breathed too many fumes I decided that I would attempt to give it a "digitalized" paint scheme. I only had three colors to work with, all from Krylon: khaki, and a fairly dark green and brown. Some more intermediate colors like coyote brown, olive drab or foliage green would have been nice, but you have to work with what you have. After the base coat, I took out the painters tape and began to cut and place pieces of tape to start the design. It ended up like this:



One thing it is hard to keep in mind with this is that the parts you are taping off will be the base color and the parts currently visible will be the next color in the design. It is usually best to base coat with your lightest color, then use the next lightest and the darkest color last. Also, use the darkest color very sparingly.

This is the result of the masking and green paint. It is okay, but I thought that adding the brown would give it a little more depth. So, more hours of cutting and placing little pieces of tape.


This is the main receiver just prior to getting the last coat of paint. Note that there are more places taped off, as I want less brown than green or tan. Also, it is important to make sure that your third color overlaps both earlier colors. I also tried to keep the lines uneven and to leave little islands of each color surrounded by the others to help the shape breaking up effect. This will help to give the design some depth.


This is the final result. I am fairly pleased with it. It isn't as bad as I feared or as good as I might have hoped. I do think it came out a little too "busy" but I think it is not too bad for a first try. If I did another, (which I certainly would not) I would try to make the various colored areas larger and more blob-like and less line-like. That would make it more like the real digital patterns like CADPAT and MARPAT.

In case anyone is curious, the paintball gun is a Spyder EMR-1. If you choose to do something similar, heed my warning: this takes a lot of time. Too much really. You can get just as good an effect with a couple of stencils and instead of spending hours of time, get it done in minutes- minus the drying time. Let me know what you think, I will moderate the comments so that it looks like everyone loves it anyway. :)

Grendel P10 .380ACP

If you had asked gun writers (including me) about the future of the .380 ACP cartridge a few years ago, the average answer would probably be that it was going extinct. The rise of the wundernines made it an underpowered, overpriced antique. Well think again. Advances in bullet design and the rise in states that allow concealed carry has given new life to the old .380. It can now perform at a level not too much below a 9mm NATO and above most .38 Specials. The .380 also makes a great cartridge for small concealable pistols. It is of a class higher in power than .32s, .25s and .22s. And unlike higher powered loads of 9mm and .40, it can be chambered in guns using the blowback method of operation instead of the more expensive, more complex, and less accurate short recoil method of operation. I say less accurate because the barrel of blowback operated pistols is almost always fixed rigidly to the frame, making them "straighter shooting".



Here we have a somewhat strange example of the .380 concealed carry gun. This is the Grendel P10. Unlike many of the .380s on the market today, the Grendel is an older design, and was only produced from 1988 to 1991. You can see its design uses several features to increase its utility as a serious carry piece. It has a large trigger guard, and has its grip raked back at about a five degree angle to increase its "pointability" and decrease felt recoil. It is very smooth, with little or no projections to snag on holsters or clothing while being drawn. Polymer frame to reduce weight, sized small enough to be able to readily conceal yet big enough to get a grip on for serious shooting.



Why is the Grendel P10 strange? Because it, unlike any modern semiautomatic pistol, does not use a detachable magazine. Instead, it has an internal magazine like a Mauser C96 Broomhandle and is fed with 10 round AR15 stripper clips. While there are disadvantages for using this system, namely losing the possibility of a quick reload. But I have found that most people who carry a pistol don't carry an extra magazine anyway. Despite its faults, it has some interesting positives as well.


One that springs to my mind immediately is that there is no way to accomplish a common negligent discharge (there are NO firearms accidents). Many times a person will eject the magazine out of a semi auto and pronounce the weapon safe and empty, without checking the chamber. Sadly, this lapse of judgement kills several people a year. Since there is no magazine to eject, there is no way to effect this type of error. This fits in line with the idea that the P10 is meant for someone who is not really a "gun person". No need to keep up with magazines, switch them out or down-load them to preserve the springs. Of course, there is a danger that the internal magazines' springs may wear out, but I would buy two extras and not worry too much about it.
The weapon functions double action only, without any external safeties, like most revolvers. This is probably the best method of operation for users that do not wish to spend many hours in training. It is relatively hard to fire without meaning to, but uncomplicated enough so you can fire it when you are scared shitless.

(However, anyone who is thinking of carrying a weapon for self defense should train for it, both in general weapons handling and care, laws and ethics of concealed carry and specific training on how to draw and fire the weapon in high stress situations.)


Here we see it with a threaded muzzle brake, grip extension and mini-mag flashlight mounted on the frame. I would recommend anyone keeping a pistol or any other firearm in their home for defense to mount a light on the weapon. A pretty neat little gun if you ask me, and in some ways it was ahead of its time.

edit: 5/2/12 Saw a Grendel P10 in my local gun shop the other day for $150.
 I thought about it. 

Blackbeard's sword?

In 1996, a team of archaeologists from Intersal, Inc found a ship that they believed to be the Queen Anne's Revenge, off the coast of North Carolina. It was once the flagship of one of the most notorious pirates in history, the famed Blackbeard a.k.a. Edward Teach Recently, a sword was recovered from the site and made the news rounds as Blackbeard's sword. While the fact that it was found on the ship might make it possibly a possession of Blackbeard, it was almost certainly not his sword, at least in terms of a weapon that he carried and used.



We can see that it is of a type we can call a small sword, which were dueling weapons, mostly for the upper class. They tended to be very light and somewhat short,easy to wear all day. They are the basis for modern fencing weapons, epee and foil, (they were not based on the rapier as many people think. The rapier was a very long and heavy sword, which required extensive training and strength to use.) It is possible that it once had a bone hilt and it was obviously made with some care and style. I can't tell if the hilt is brass or if it is gilded, but this was obviously the sword of a man of standing, not the cutlass or hanger that were the most common sword types of the era. So it is most likely that this was part of the pirate treasure (I'd say its booty) rather than a weapon used by the pirates. Still, how cool is that?



Blackbeard was not really active as a pirate for a very long time, perhaps only from 1716 to his death in 1718. He was said to be a tall, spare man with a long black beard, often braided, wound with ribbon or in little ponytails.Period accounts also state that he wore a "a sling over his shoulders, with three brace of pistols, hanging in holsters like bandoliers; and stuck lighted matches under his hat" (Johnson, 1724)

The burning fuse in his beard or behind his ears was rumored to be a ploy to to frighten his enemies. Although considering that his game was combat and robbery on the high seas, he might have just used the fuse as an alternate way to fire his cannon and pistols flintlock weapons are seriously flawed under the best of conditions and fighting at sea was not the best of conditions.
However, it has also been noted that Blackbeard was a effective leader, realizing that the more his victims were afraid of him, the less likely that they would give him and serious resistance.
Blackbeard was killed in battle by a small force of sailors under Lieutenant Robert Maynard on November 22, 1718.




http://www.qaronline.org/
http://www.friendsofqar.org/