I served my time, but I was never privileged to see a Bob Hope show. (We generally got Philippine Rock Bands, and we were glad to see them ... except for the Female Impersonators, but that's another story).
Thanks to Gary the G-man, we have the link to this short video.
Nobody who has ever been in this situation will ever deny that Bob Hope was A Great Man.
(Ten Minutes of Nostalgia. Worth the watch, if only for the chicks. And thank you again, Gary.)
"Titusville, FL - Professional shooterJessie Abbate won the Women's Open and Limited titles at the Steel Nationals held in Titusville, Florida this past weekend. Abbate also won the Steel Master title - a title awarded to the aggregate champion. With this victory, Abbate defended her 2010 Steel Master title. This marks Abbate's first major title of the 2011 shooting season." [Emphasis added by editor]
"Professional Shooter".
I think this is the first time I have seen the title "Professional Shooter" applied to Speed Steel (or USPSA) in a public release of match results, although of course we all know that they exist in those competitive sports.
They also exist in IPSC. But we don't really know for sure what that nomenclature means.
AMATEUR VS PROFESSIONAL: Most IPSC shooters are amateurs. That means, we provide most of the match fees for any match. We volunteer to work the match: administration (Match Director, Range Master, Statisticians, stage construction, Range Officers, etc. The only "professionals" who do any of this ... the functionaries who make USPSA matches works, are those few individuals who are hired by Match Directors to help with setup and tear-down. And they work for pennies, considering that they are doing manual labor at a very low hourly rate of pay.
IPSC Professionals pay to shoot the match, and they go home with most of the wins. To them the glory, the honor, and another bullet-point in their professional resumes. They do not typically "work" the match; they're not playing, as we are. They're working, and must necessarily not be distracted by extraneous activities. [Note: GMs and Professional Shooters almost always do their fair share during matches by taping and resetting targets; they are not ignorant of their obligation to do their share, nor are they usually reluctant to contribute.]
And we, the amateurs, facilitate their careers. Also, we compete against them. (Don't be fooled by "you only compete against people in your own division and class". Remember, their classifier scores are the yardstick against which your performance is measured. More on this later.)
Is that fair? You decide. If you choose not to read the whole article skip to the bottom to see the THESIS.
BACKGROUND:
In USPSA, we are accustomed to competitors who regularly benefit financially from "prize tables" and other rewards. And we have recognized them as "Sponsored Shooters". At one time, it was recognized that their sponsors either helped the shooter with the expenses attendant upon competition: practice, travel, equipment, etc.
In fact, "sponsored" shooters are now regularly members of Shooting Teams: Army Marksmanship Unit, Team S&W, Team Glock, etc. This arrangement makes it possible for the better shooters to compete at little or no personal expense, and it enables Firearms Manufacturers to advertise their wins (suggesting, not too subtly, that it is the superiority of their firearm which provided the 'edge' for that competitor ... an excellent and time-tested marketing ploy).
Sponsorship aids winning; winning allows the competitor to not only enter more matches, but to practice more with less or no personal expense. And the cycle is self-reinforcing, providing even more of a competitive advantage as time goes by.
These competitors are those who not only have the drive to win, but also have the talent. All they need is to be able to afford all of those expenses ... material, travel and match expenses, etc ... and still be able to make a living to support themselves and their families.
Over the years, the sport of Practical Shooting has grown and benefited by the performance of "Sponsored" competitors. We see a Jerry Barnhart or Todd Jarrett, et al, and we connect with them. We see what the very best shooters can do, and it encourages us to strive to emulate them as best we can. And of course, through the USPSA Classification System, it allows us to be classified against "The Best, of The Best, of The Best" (see: Men In Black).
Obviously, it takes someone especially talented to compete in such august company. A paltry few of us can enter the ranks of Grand Masters; for the rest of us, B-class is "The Graveyard of Mediochre Shooters". (Full Disclosure: yes, I'm a B-class shooter in some of the few Divisions in which I am classified; C-class in the rest, the ones in which I don't often compete. After 25+ years, it's obvious that I'm "not that good". I shoot for fun and the company, and I don't expect to win very often ... if at all.)
Still, it doesn't seem to matter; no matter in which division I compete, the top scores will have been matched against the "Professional Shooters". Grossly defined, these are people who not only have competition-related expenses, but also living expenses, provided by "someone else".
The "Professional Shooter" is someone who does so for a living. That is, they are not dependent upon paying for their day-to-day, normal cost-of-living expenses being paid for by a "real job". (A job which is not dependent upon their competitive ability.)
Many of these excellent competitors earn extra money teaching elements of competitive shooters; in company with a dozen or two other would-be competitors, I once paid Travis Tomasie $130 for a one-day course on the fine points of IPSC competition. I felt at the time (and I still feel) that I got my money's worth. He was 30 years younger than me, and he knew more about pistol competition than I had every figured out by my own experience. And I have bought tapes (Ron Avery) and books (Brian Enos) from other winning shooters, learning from them all.
Rob Leatham, "The Great One", has 'always' been described as a "driver for a livery company" (United Parcel Services?) As such, even though he is the perrenial winner in almost every match in which he competes, by this definition he should not be classified as a "Professional Shooter": but at his website he is named as "Rob Leatham Professional Shooter, 24-time USPSA National Champion, 5-time IPSC World Champion, action pistol shooter and practical shooting website".
I'm guessing that his day-to-day livelihood is not dependent upon delivering parcels to your doorstep anymore.
TALKING POINT:
Even the most talented (eg: "naturally gifted") shooter has small hopes of competing successfully against a Professional Shooter. The best they can hope for ... and this has been the traditional career route ... is that someone will decide that they appear to have a sufficient talent that it's worth the financial obligation to sponsor them at least as far as providing ammunition for practice; the next step is match fees and travel fees; the third step is providing an 'honorarium' for linking their name to the product name.
That doesn't always provide enough money for the shooter to quit his or her "day job", but it may provide sufficient money for them to make their living expenses by offering Training Classes to wanna-be shooters.
At this point, I don't hold much hope of competing successfully against the person who trained me for a day, a weekend, or for a week. I can improve my own capabilities, but I have not the advantages in practice time and expenses to me competitive.
THESIS: USPSA should make an effort to identify "Professional Shooters", and remove their Classifier scores from those against which the non-professional shooter must be measured. It should become a part of USPSA's functions to require professionals to self-identify, and put them in a special ... Category? Class? Division? for the purpose of Classifier Scores.
Amateurs should compete against other Amateurs; they should not compete against the Professional Shooters. This should be true also in Major Matches, which suggests that there should be a separate Category, at least, identifying which Professional Shooters actually WIN a match, a stage or a division.
Classifier Scores should also be maintained in a Separate classification matrix, so that Amateur Shooters are not classified in comparison to Professional Shooters.
When I was living with SWMBO, I was getting up at 6am so I could get to work early ... and therefore get back early enough to relieve her relatives who were "sister-sitting" her while I was at work.
Even after taking a shower and shaving, I wasn't really all that wide awake. So SHE and I developed a "Status Check" to make sure I had everything I really needed.
Most of my stuff was in my briefcase, which I carry with me everywhere. I didn't need to worry about incidentals like my check book. But I did need to keep track of the things I carried on my person.
I only needed to make sure I had five things:
Eye glasses
Phone
Watch
Car Keys
Money Clip (including identification, like Driver's License)
It amazed me that I so often discovered I had forgotten to have one or more of those essential items.
(To be sure, I didn't really need the watch. I don't like wrist watches, and besides I had a watch on my cell phone, my key chain, and my money-clip. But SWMBO had given me the watch for Christmas and I was always conspicuously wearing it. The day she died, I put my wrist watch on the shelf and have not worn it since; I never wanted her to know that her gift was something that I didn't appreciate.)
Now my list is down to only four items, and it's a lot easier to keep track of. The funny thing is, my phone never rings and a few months ago I LOST my eyeglasses ... had to buy a new pair. But I hadn't forgotten to put it on when I left home, I just don't know what happened to it. Fortunately, I bought three pairs of cheap "drug-store" eyeglasses which only magnify, which is all I need for reading. I'm far-sighted, so I can drive just fine without glasses.
And I keep an extra set of keys in the car, which is double-locked with a keypad, so even if I forget my keys I can drive my car and get back in my house. There's $20 in cash hidden there, too, so I can buy lunch or some gasoline even though I may have forgot to bring my money-clip (although, of course, I cannot legally drive.)
I think it's a good idea to duplicate some "resources" so that even if I run out of the house naked (not my usual practice, but think "your house is on fire and all you need to do is to escape alive"), I'm not at the mercy of the elements nor dependent upon the charity of strangers. And yes, I also have a bag packed with spare clothes there, too. They have been stored in my car after the 2003 USPSA match at Tri-County Gun Club when it rained so hard that even my rain-gear didn't keep me from getting uncomfortably soaked. It would have been good to have dry clothes to change into then; now that I have a change of clothes available, I've never shot a match under such inclement conditions. But if I find myself in that situation again, I can expect to ride home warm and dry and comfortable. It's worth the investment of two square feet of space in the back of the car.
I also keep several bottles of water, some munchies (usually granola bars), boots, a blanket, extra batteries and extra ammunition for my carry pistol back there. Also, a few other handy items (hand warmers, blanket, batteries, matches, knife, a CB Radio, etc.) in the car. It all fits into the plastic bin .. another 4 square feet of the cargo area which usually serves no usual purpose.
The briefcase also carries munchies, a small amount of water, address book, pens and paper, etc.
In my pockets I also carry a flashlight, cigarette lighter, money, phone, ID and credit cards.
That gives me three levels of Emergency preparedness:
Immediate: in my pocket. Short term: in my briefcase. Longer term: in my car.
No, these few items don't constitute a SHTF preparedness. If I need more than this, I'm probably going to be SOL.
But for the next day or so, I'm able to be dry, warm, fed, watered and comfortable.
Of course, in the long run and in any civil emergency, I'm no more of a "survivor" than 99% of other people. That's why I have emergency stuff (stove, fuel, water, food, lanterns & fuel, etc.) in my pantry and garage. But still ... if it all goes in the pot ... I'm just one more person who doesn't believe in making my day-to-day life a fearful experience. I expect the world to continue turning as it always has. And if it doesn't? What the heck, I probably don't want to live in that world, anyway.
Want to know whether you're "Normal" weight, "Overweight", or "Obese"?
You can load your height and weight here (http://www.nhlbisupport.com/bmi/) and find out.
Quick self-test is also an alternative: If you're not sure, you're probably overweight. If you're really worried ... you're probably obese.
This is very unforgiving, folks, so don't go there if you don't really want to know.
I only know this because I was curious, having developed a Budda Belly. Yes, I am overweight.
Which is curious, because when I was in the army I weighted 141 pounds when I was drafted, and weighed 126 pounds when I came home.
According to the BMI calculator, I was "normal" at 141 pounds, and "underweight" at 126 pounds.
Funny, because everyone always considered me to be "skinny", even when I was drafted. When I came home at 126 pounds, I looked like a non-survivor at a Nazi Concentration Camp. But I felt fine, and was in the best physical shape of my life. In fact, I looked almost the same at 141 pounds. (Except at 141 pounds, when I got in fights, I sometimes won; the only way I could win fights at 126 pounds was by shooting people who were shooting at me, and hitting them first. This is not recommended for civilians, BTW, unless someone really is shooting at you.)
I was over 30 before I gained enough weight that I could no longer see my pelvis bones; now I can't even see my toes!
Five years after I got out of the army, I weighed 170 pounds. That's suppose to be "normal", but I remember popping a button off my shirt. Seems my weight all went to my belly.
Bummer.
I guess it's time for me to start thinking about less fried foods, and more vegetables and grains. Rye Whiskey is made from Grain, and that's suppose to be a healthy food group, isn't it? How can I go wrong?
But I have more faith in the American people than that. Most gun-control advocates know that most gun owners are responsible citizens. Most gun owners know that the word "commonsense" isn't a code word for "confiscation." And none of us should be willing to remain passive in the face of violence or resigned to watching helplessly as another rampage unfolds on television.
This sounds good .. VERY good.
Except that OUR experience is that the concept he emphasizes (see italicized sentence) just hasn't worked out all that well for us.
In our actual experience, "REGISTRATION" is EXACTLY EQUIVALENT to "CONFISCATION".
See Tanya Metaska's article on "First Registration, Then Confiscation" on Front Sight Magazine, which provides only the very simplest exposition of the sequence of events which occurred in California in 1998 - 2001.
---
The story from California is convoluted, but believable according to Front Sight Magazine. and Gun Owners of America. California Attorney General Dan Lundgren essentially required that owners of "assaultweapons" (including the SKS rifle, which was not capable of "full-automatic" fire), register their firearms. The understanding was that this was only a cautionary act.
When Democrat Bill Lockyear, an avowed (Democratic) gun prohibitionist, became Attorney General in 1999, he decided unilaterally ... with perhaps some no small encouragement from Handguns, Incorporated (HCI) [see BRADY, relating to OBAMA] ... that this kind of firearm might be considered an "assault weapon" similar to that which was used in the Stockton School-yard Massacre. The SKS was immediately defined as such by Lockyear, and this new AG decided that all SKS rifles should be confiscated.
Fortunately (for Lockyear and HCI), the Great State of California already had a list of SKS rifles, which you may recall had be registered as required by the former Attorney General.
Thus all SKS rifles in California were perforce confiscated. Again, easy to do: they had already been registered, by legitimate law-abiding citizens who believed the original assurance by then-AG Lundgren that "Registration Does Not Equate To Confiscation".
The lesson here is that any drive for "no-fault Registration" will not survive a change in administration. There are no 'administrative' rulings (such as "Registration does not equal Confiscation") which are guaranteed ... nay promised [you know what a Politician's promise is worth; take that amount, and divide it by any number you wish] to survive longer than it takes to print up a set of governmental rules.
Let me say this again, in more clear language: The legislation must pass laws to change the status of ... anything. It can do that, but there are some delays built in, and the changes must pass a vote of elected officials.
The bureaucracy, on the other hand, does not live by laws; it lives by "codes". They are not necessarily elected officials, nor are they necessarily bound by laws, except by strict interpretation.
If they can re-interpret laws to suit their own personal prejudices, the bureaucracy can require ANYTHING ... including the translation from "registration" to "confiscation". ____________________
So the next time we are reassured by Legislators that whatever law they pass in reference to collection and maintenance of firearms ownership (and especially if they specifically say "Registration doesn't mean Confiscation") ... we shouldn't necissarily accept this on face value.
Instead, we should instantly reject this.
You can tell when bureaucrats are lying; if their lips are moving, they're lying.
I've been hearing about the "Top Shot" competitions on the History Channel for the past year and a half, and I've been really curious about it. Unfortunately, I don't have a Cable hookup, so I haven't seen ANY of it. (I've been waiting for it to come out on DVD from RedBox.)
As Iian Harrison might say: "No Worries".
(Well, he's English not Australian, so he probably wouldn't say that exactly, but he might.)
I found this link (same as the link at the top, BTW) to the Top Shot competition, which provides both "full episode" and a couple of other views ... summaries, if you will.
I watched the "Anatomy Of A Shot" series, and it gave me a much better appreciation of how difficult this competition really is.
My understanding was that there was a series of competitions between teams, using weapons with which the team members had absolutely no experience. After watching just a few videos (especially the Archery and the Tomahawk-throwing series) I decided that they must have had at least some basic instruction ... well, call it familiarization. They knew the basics about how to use the equipment, but not necessarily any real opportunity to acquire skill sets for each weapon.
I am, of course, impressed with the competitors. But I'm at least as impressed by the design of the competition elements (stages?) which the History Channel provided.
It's not easy to design a stage. But to design a stage for a "different" weapon, make it look like a "game" that anyone can intuitively understand after watching it for a few minutes, and then gear it toward a "team exercise" ... now, that's hard to do!
I've been competing in IPSC/USPSA for a long time, and I know it's really boring to watch, if you're just an observer. These courses of fire are far from boring. In fact, they look like something that would be really exciting to do at a club level.
Oh, not all of them, of course. But some of them lend themselves fairly well to a design which could be presented at a club level.
_________________ Off Topic Thought ____________________
I seem to recall a "shoot-off" presented at the 1994 Oregon Section match at Tri-County Gun Club. It was an optional stage, and it was essentially a "Man Of Steel" shoot-off with US Poppers and Pepper Poppers, where there was one mandatory reload and the winner of each "challenge" was determined by overlapping 'finish' poppers. (You know how that works, if you've ever been to a Major Match in the 1990's when they were very popular ... and even into the 21st Century in USPSA.)
This team shoot-off required one Grand Master, one Master, one A, B, C and D-class shooter on each team. I'm not sure that there were six shooters per team, there may have been only five: they may have allowed either a conceivably GM or M shooter ... it wasn't that big of a match, so there weren't that many GM's competing.
At the time, there were only two divisions: Open and Limited (Previously "Stock"); it was a long time ago, so I'm not sure that each team must have match-competed in the same division. But whatever the arrangements were --- they seemed equitable to me.
I did get involved in that shoot-off, as a D-shooter using a S&W 659 (9mm) shooting Limited/Stock.
Each class of shooter on each team competed directly against the same class of shooter on the opposing team.
The nice part of this competition, for me, is that there was as much interest in signing up a decent D-class shooter as there was signing up a GM/M shooter. So I got to play.
As I recall, my team didn't win. but it was such a rush for a relatively unskilled shooter to find himself on the same team with some of the best shooters in the state (and outlying states) that it encouraged me to playing ... if only for the Glory.
______________________________________________
The competition has changed in USPSA since then, and there are usually no more "team" events available, whether or not it counts on the final match scores.
I think the Top Shooter competition concept might conceivably make matches more interesting to shooters at all skill levels. We have lost the opportunity to consider ourselves part of a team, but perhaps we are ready to go full-circle and bring back the "optional shoot-off" options.
My paternal grandmother, Willametta Dildine, was Irish through and through.
As she was not born a male, she was not an Irish Drunk .. but then, I repeat myself.
She married Virgil Ezra Burnett, a man of German/English descent, and made of his life a living hell.
They had eight children: five boys, three girls. My father, Vernon, was the fourth of the five boys. His younger sister, also named Willametta, was a vision of her mother: she made a comparable Living Hell for her family in all directions. Yet his youngest sister, Ruby, was a vision of loveliness in all ways. She was beautiful, charming, personable, made the best Peanut Butter Cookies in the world, and married a drunk.
Well, she was Irish, don't you know?
Marriage is the only way that the Irish can conquer the English and the Scots, and I guess gramma was preordained to continue the ages-old fight. She had no regard for her grandchildren, that I can tell you. I never received a kind word from her; never sat on her lap, never was given a treat. My most powerful memory was one Thanksgiving day in her home when I found her hidden box of crackers. The dinner had taken far too long to prepare, for a small child's will to forbear. When she saw me happily munching on (very small) handfuls, she screeched for my mother to "take that young hooligan out of my pantry, and don't let him eat all of my crackers!"
And even less regard for the spouses of her children. My mother was of English/Scots descent, and so my grandmother hated her in the way in which only the Irish could hate. She never accepted my mother, attempting even to dissuade my father from marrying her.
My father, as had all of his brothers, left their home as soon as he could to make his own way in the world. He was 15 years of age when he left to take up employment in the fields of Eastern Oregon. He taught himself to be a mechanic, and for the next 55 years earned a good living for his family. He married a woman named "Wilhelmina". Pure coincidence, I think, although I dated another woman named "Wilhelmina" for a while when I was in college ... in the town where my grandparents lived. I could have done worse than to marry her, but I did not.
Yet we always spent most of our weekends in the small towns where his brothers and sisters ... sometimes where my mother's brothers and sisters ... lived. He was a devout family man, and I see it now in my children and most especially in my own son who so loves children that when there were people his own age and children in the room, he always spends most of his time with the children.
The Irish can be an unhappy people. God knows they have reason to be, they have been inflicted with famine and disfavor. When they began to immigrate to America because of the Great Potato Famine, they were poorly treated by the people who had immigrated before them.
And yet they love their God, they love their church, they love their people. The Leprechauns are a fitting symbol. Tricksters, hoarding their pots of gold and sporting their national colors, they play tricks on those who would steal their fortunes.
Clannish, yes they are. The Irish are not the only people who will lie and steal and deceive to protect their people against those who are NOT their people.
But they are so open to each other, one wonders how an Irishman could deceive anyone.
My daughter married an Irishman. He's what they call "Black Irish" ... supposedly a descendant of the Spanish survivors when the Spanish Armada was beaten by the English under Lord Howell and Sir Francis Drake. When bad weather overwhelmed the storm- and battle-damaged Spanish ships, some of the crews made it to the shores of Ireland and were eventually accepted as members of the community, thus leavening the Irish stock with Spanish blood. (Current thought is that this is all balderdash, as the Spanish sailors and soldiers were slaughtered to a man by the Irish. I prefer to accept the romantic concept that the black-haired Irish carry the blood of Spanish Conquistadors .. and the temperament!)
I also tend to think that the image of the Irish as a fun-loving, cheerful people must be reconciled with the alter image of a dark, melancholy, aggressive people who love a good fight as much as they love a glass of beer or a dram of whiskey.
Why else should the most famous proverb concerning the Irish be: "God invented Whiskey, so that the Irish should not rule the world".
When the Aliens assault Earth, it will be Irish who lead the defense ... and the subsequent inevitable slaughter of Aliens.
And then they'll retire to the pub, to laugh and sing "O Danny Boy" (perhaps this is a more real depiction of the attitude I recall ... or not) and lift a glass for Absent Friends.
Although I've long since moved "KISP" to the "websites that I'm now kinda luke warm about" level on my sidebar, that doesn't mean that I NEVER avail myself her keen insights to the culture and her high good humor when reporting our never-ending failures.
I just don't go there every day. There's so MUCH content, I just couldn't possibly read HER stuff and crank out the occasional article about MY stuff.
If you are like me in appreciating her blogsite, then you deserve to be informed that she is moving her blog to a different URL. (This will be reflected on the link on my sidebar.)
A (very!) young Mexican woman volunteered to take over the office of Chief of Police in her home town, and got the job because every rational person in the country was too frightened by the likelihood of being slaughtered ... as her predecessor was.
That was six months ago.
Six DAYS ago, she took a "temporary leave of absence" and, unannounced, showed up in the United States of America, where " ... she has initiated a formal asylum petition" on the basis of reported death threats and, possibly an attempted kidnapping in the town which she had eagerly sworn to protect the citizens.
Apparently, she has since discovered that she can't even protect herself. Big surprise.
"EL PASO, Texas — A young woman who received death threats after recently becoming police chief of a violence-plagued Mexican town is in the U.S and seeking asylum, Mexican and U.S. officials said Tuesday.
Marisol Valles Garcia, who was 20 when she was hired last October, made international headlines when she accepted the top law enforcement job in Praxedis G. Guerrero, a township near the Texas border overrun by drug violence. Her predecessor was shot to death in July 2009.
Garcia is now in the U.S. and will be allowed to present her case to an immigration judge, according to a statement from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The town is in the Mexican state of Chihuahua, where ombudsman Gustavo de la Rosa confirmed that Garcia was in the U.S. and said she has initiated a formal asylum petition."
So what's with this? I mean, she volunteered for a LEO command position in a notoriously rough town. Didn't she have a ... a ... I'm trying to think of the word, what is it?
Didn't she have a PLAN?
Did she think she could take a job where her predecessor had been murdered, in a lawless place, without having a viable plan (one which she was equipped to implement it successfully, given her well-demonstrated attributes and strength and will)?
Or perhaps her plan wasn't for the betterment of her community, but for the betterment of herself?
I'm guessing that she will be granted asylum (U.S. immigration officials are notoriously prone to accept any petition where the would-be immigrant can make a case for persecution if asylum is not granted), and I'm wondering if this was not her goal -- her "plan" -- all the time.
Color me biased. Go ahead, I don't mind. Perhaps it takes a Bad Person to suspect the motivation of a woman ... no, a girl ... who deliberately puts herself in such an obviously untenable position.
Wow! What a gutsy move. Tens of thousands of Mexicans illegally cross the border every year, from Mexico to the United States, for the purpose of "seeking a higher standard of living" and/or "trying to improve the pitiful plight of their families".
(And a significant number of Mexicans ALSO apply for legal immigration ... and are often turned down because there are so many "illegal aliens" from Mexico are already flooding the "unskilled labor" pools of this country.)
So now this girl has found an entirely new scam, for the same purpose, and you just know that she is going to get away with it.
To tell the truth, I really don't blame her. In fact, in some ways I admire her inventiveness. It's kind of the way that I admire the characters played by Paul Newman and Robert Redford in "The Sting". Sure, they're all crooked as a dog's hind leg, but they're such charming rogues and so terribly inventive.
While on the one hand I would really like to see this charming, inventive, lovely young woman succeed ... on the other hand, I very much would like to see her application turned down.
The basis for the rejection would be something along the lines of "you made your bed, now you may sleep in it". Well, badly stated; that's true. And you know that this administration would NEVER be anything but compassionate. That is to say: as long as she makes a sufficient case to be categorized as "The Underdog", she may reasonably expect that her application for asylum will be approved, and she will never want for anything for the rest of her natural life. Never mind that she brings no marketable skills, and will probably end up on the public dole. (Unless Hollywood, that hotbed of liberalism, chooses to make a film of her otherwise humdrum existence ... although it would make a MUCH better film if they started it out from the point where her application was denied, and followed her subsequent attempts to actually fulfill the expectations which she had engendered in her constituents when she applied for the job in the first place. Kind of like Walking Tall, without the stick.)
Ultimately, we can only say that we deplore the situation which is developing (or has fully developed, and can only get worse?) in Mexico.
We don't like drugs. We disapprove of corruption. and we absolutely cannot understand that third-world-country government mindset which allows drug-gangs to terrorize their innocent civilians, but which at the same time refuses to allow those same innocent civilians to arm themselves.
After all, it's not like they're getting any protection from their government ... which, in case I haven't mentioned it before, is notoriously CORRUPT! Both their police, and their army; and their president is well spoken, but flagrantly and demonstrably incompetent as is his administration.
(Makes you glad to be an American, doesn't it? Oh, wait a minute. Never mind.)
Why is that, do you think? Is it because the national government thinks that if their citizens were armed, there would be more murders, and torture, and decapitations and raids and gunfights in the streets and 72 bodies found in a demolished building in the countryside?
"A National Public Radio executive was captured on hidden camera calling the tea party movement racist and xenophobic and said NPR would be better off without federal funding, in an embarrassment likely to fuel the latest round of conservative attacks on public broadcasting."
I've been disposed to discuss the disgusting Liberal Bias of NPR over the past couple of years, sometimes even questioning whether I could earmark my income taxes to NOT go to their disgustingly liberally biased reporting.
We have all known for years that their self-vaunted 'objectivity' was mere verisimilitude, and a charge which they have never answered except in denial.
Now we here it straight from the mouth of one of the premier executives:
National Public Radio said in a statement that it was "appalled" by the comments from Ron Schiller, the president of NPR's fundraising arm and a senior vice president for development.
Well, yes, they are appalled; but it seems to be common that they are much more happy about being "appalled" by the actions of someone with whom they have already disassociated themselves. Witness their immediate FIRING of commentator Juan Williams, who said (in his capacity as a private citizen, NOT as an employee of NPR) something which was decidedly not "touchy-feely":
Attacks by conservatives on NPR gained momentum last year when analyst Juan Williams was fired for saying on Fox News that he feels uncomfortable when he sees people in "Muslim garb" on airplanes. Schiller defends the Williams firing in the video.
The interview was secretly filmed on Feb. 22, 2011, in an exchange with two men who (falsely) represented themselves as Muslims who were offering a donation of five million dollars, from a source which repeatedly described their organization which was "originally founded by "... the fundamentalist Muslim Brotherhood".
It was a sting operation, and that sting hurt the image of NPR and its leadership. During the interview, Schiller accused Republicans (especially the Tea Party) as being "not intellectual" and "Racist, racist". He also accused Jews of "running the newspapers".
Curiously, Schiller also made the statement that NPR didn't need Federal support, and in fact he would personally embrace any decision which resulted in discontinuing governmental funding because it would allow NPR to be more "independent".
One wonders how much more "independent" NPR could be, or how much more flagrantly they could espouse recorded opinions which allows the leadership to "like" the appellation of "National Palestinian Radio".
The article includes a link to NPR PRESS (which, at this time, makes no reference to the interview), and also to the organization --- Project Veritas -- which made the film ... and includes damning excerpts in their plea for funding.
Yes, it's always about money. And politics.
Frankly, I'm not impressed by either NPR or the muck-rakers who exposed them.
On the other hand, the muck-rakers aren't getting $90,000,000 of my taxes every year to support their politics ... and if they do, it's not because I have no say in how my tax dollars are spent.
Perhaps I should also write an article complaining about how my union (SEIU) is taking nearly a thousand dollars a year from my paycheck for "Fair Share" to support their liberal politics.
But then, I'm retiring in another six weeks, so I can probably afford to speak up then without the thread of bone-breakers hunting me down like the running-dog Capitalist that I am.
Six days after my marriage, I reported to the Selective Service Induction Center in Portland, Oregon. I was assigned to the U.S. Army, and reported to Fort Lewis, Washington for Basic Training.
I spent three months in Basic, and another three months in Advanced Infantry School, all at Fort Lewis.
Then I was selected for Non Commissioned Officer School (NCOC) at Fort Benning, Georgia. This program, also known as "Instant NCO School", and "Shake 'n Bake", because it replaced years of experience normally required to achieve NCO status with a six-month program of intensive training and challenge, supposedly with the goal of providing needed SKILLS (note: not experience) required of a NCO.
I graduated in April of 1969 as an Honor Graduate (Staff Sergeant: grade E6) and immediately transferred to Fort Anniston, Alabama for On The Job (OJT) training. The duties there were to become a member of the training cadre at a Basic Training Company.
Having successfully completed the OJT portion of my NCO training, I was granted 3 months leave, which my wife and I used visiting friends and family between Alabama and Oregon.
In September, 1969, I reported to a Replacement and Transfer unit in Oakland, California, from which I was shipped (by air ... almost as Air Freight) to Vietnam. I was an 11B40 ... Infantry NCO.
Before I shipped out, my sister threw a "Going Away" party for me at her house in Eugene, Oregon. This was typified by heavy drinking and dancing, and my insistance upon constantly replaying "Vietnam Blues" (also known as "Feelin' Like I'm Fixin' to Die" by Country Joe and the Fish. )
Well, that was the feeling in the country when I was scheduled to report for duty in Viet Nam.
But my sister, bless her heart, would do everything she could think of to help me get through the war. Realistically, there wasn't much that she COULD do, but she reached deep into her faith and gave me the only shield available to her: a Saint Christopher Medal.
The Patron Saint of Travellers was as much as she could do at the time, so she gave me the medal on a silver chain and I was touched by her thoughtfulness.
I reported to the First Infantry Division, centerd at the Division Base in Dian, in III Corps, a few miles from Saigon.
After a week of "in country training", reviewing all of the tactics I had learned in Advanced Infantry and NCO school, I was assigned to 3rd Platoon, Lima Company, 1/16, 1ID. They needed a Platoon Sgt., and I was the closest to a "Platoon Sgt." available at the time. (This slot is usually assigned to an E7, but those "upper ranking" NCO's were usually assigned to positions such as Supply Sgt., Company First Sgt., and other essential positions.)
Knowing nothing about war except for what I had been told, I was choppered into my company Area of Responsibility near Thunder Road (Hiway 13) north and east of Saigon.
When I arrived at my Company Area "In the Rear", it was late in the afternoon, so I was given the rest of the day to get my gear squared away, draw ammunition, a weapon (M16A2), field gear (Alice Pack), rations and water. I was briefed on Division Policy ... which essentially was that they told me 1ID and 1/16 policy was that we worked as a company in the field, and existed on a light pack with 2-3 days rations and water with 'frequent' resupply by helicopters.
At 7am the next day, I was waiting at the chopper pad when a 3-bird "resupply flight" of Hueys landed to pick up ammo, water, C-rations and incidental "stuff". In fact, it wasn't until the end of the 30-minute flight that I learned I was to be inserted into a "Hot LZ" (Landing Zone), and the company was under fire from "unknown enemy forces". (That is, they didn't know if the North Vietnamese Army ... NVA ... or Viet Cong ... VC ... were shooting at them. Typically, they hadn't seen the enemy; they only knew that somebody was shooting at them.
This was typical of my entire tour of duty. We Deal in GHOSTS, Friend!
The chopper was loaded with a pilot and copilot, a Crew Chief and a Door Gunner, and a stack of C-ration cases four feet high and wide. The Door Gunner was chatty, and told me that his favorite sport was to machine-gun Water Buffalo in Rice paddies. (Was I on the wrong side here?)
As I was landed in a small clearing, it wan't until I jumped out of the door of the grounder chopper that I realized that I was hanging onto my M16 with one hand, and my St. Christopher Medal with the other.
It must have worked. As soon as we were re-supplied, we grabbed our still-boxed supplies and loaded onto another flight ... an eagle Flight this time (five choppers plus gunships for protection) and lifted out to another area ... the Heart Shaped woods.
I and the small group I was attached to were on the last of 3 flights to lift off. (It was a Company Size Operation .. one of the few where the entire company was involved in a single battle, during my entire tour of duty. At the time, I had no idea how unique and important this operation was.) Just before our choppers landed, one of the 5 men I was attached to declared that he thought the incoming fire was coming from a woodline across an open field from us. He was carring an M72 LAW (Light Anti-Tank Weapon ... a rocket in a disposable tube) and he was going to fire the LAW at the woodline just before the last chopppers landed. He was forbidden to fire the LAW without permission from a 'superior'. Having no desire to have our lift-off chopper be downed by enemy fire, I readily gave him permission! The rocket, having been fired, hit the base of the trees in the opposing woodline. I didn't understand how well-placed the shot was, until I much later tried to hit a woodline as commander of a tank.
We lifted off successfully, and in 20 minutes joined the rest of the company at our "cold" LZ in the Heart Shaped Woods ... another area where the VC was usually in command. We were lucky this time, not having taken fire upon landing. There I met the Company Commander and learned that his chopper (the one which had left our old position immediately before mine) had received fire upon extraction. He reported that several rounds impacted upon the floor of the cargo compartment, but had passed through without significant damage to the machinery and NO injuries to crew or cargo. The cargo, of course, was the CO and the HQ cadre.
The St. Christopher Mojo was apparently working for all of us.
When we landed and disembarked at our new LZ (cold), we first grabbed our resupply, then waded through a hip-deep swamp for about 50 yards. The 2nd Squad RTO (Radio Telephone Operator, or "Kilo") lost his SOI during the crossing. The SOI is Strategic Operational Information .. or the codebook to all of our radio callsigns, one-time codebook, and other highly secret information. We spent 10 minutes searching for the swamp and finaly the Company Commander (Captain Determan) made the call: if we couldnt' find it with a company of men searching for it, knowing that it was somewhere inside the 2-acre swamp, Charly was unlikely to happen upon it by accident.
Besides, if Charley was in the area he knew where we had landed, and an extended search would only draw his attention. That is, if we were obviously searching for 'something', then that 'something' would obviously be important to us. Charley would not quit searching until he found it. The codebook was "administratively" declared "irretreviably lost" and the search was abandoned.
We took our ration cased and 2-gallon water jugs to the opposite shore, and broke them down. That is, we uncrated the C-rations and distributed them, along with the water and the ammo and the sundaries packs and incidental resupply (some uniform parts and one pair of boots) and radio batteries among the company. Some of it was random and equal distribution; the battery packs went to the RTOs; the uniform replacements and the boots went to those company members who had reported uniform components which were too damaged and/or worn to be sufficient to their purpose. Curiously, this was the only time when I saw boots and uniforms replaced in the field. Apparently, it had been a hard campaign so far. I was grateful that I had missed the worst of it, and once again I realized that I was gripping my St. Christopher Medal.
We dug a fire pit wherein we dumped the unselected C-rations, along with the old radio batteries, and discarded uniform parts (trousers, blouses) and disintegrating Jungle Boots. We added a few quarter-pound segments of C4 explosives to provide initiating fire to the discards, and to provide sufficient heat so that the discarded C-ration tin cans would burst. We also included incidental discards .. jelly and peanut-butter tins, which were extremely flamable under the great head from the C4, and would add to the indendary nature of the fire.
Then we moved out, along the perimeter of the Heart Shaped Woods.
It's worth noting that the Heart Shaped Woods was actually a several-acre area populated by chest-high brush. It was impossible to move through, except for a few animal-created trails. The general consensus was that ALL of the trails were mined and /or booby-trapped, which was the reason why Charley owned the area, and we avoided any attempts to cross it. The 1ID burned the woods occasionally, but that only made the next growth richer, taller and thicker. Recent division policy, I learned, was to avoid passing through or attempting to irradicate the intrinsic cover and concealment afforded to Charley (VC -- Viet Cong or "Victor Charley"). Instead, we would patrol the fringes from time to time, and if Charley chose to engage American Troops. we would call in artillary and/or Air Support and eradicate the woods. And Charley. With no expectation thta we could win and "own" the Heart Shaped Woods.
In the meantime, we were content to patrol the fringes, at irregualr intervals, as the mood struck our commanders.
Observant Charley, of course, was already fully convercent with the basic Tactical Response: "Observe, Evaluate, React". He had decided to mine the fringes, in the hopes of decimating our infrequent patrols.
So it was that, three hours after I had truly entered the "Twilight Zone" of Combat Vietnam, the man immediately behind me in the single-file formation that was Charley Company circumvating the Heart Shaped Woods raised his voice and one finger and said: "Excuse Me, Platoon Sergeant?"
Everyone in the range of his voice stopped, and I turned to see what he had to say.
"Uh, Sarge, I think I got caught up in something. I think it's a booby trap."
I moved back near his position 10 feet behind me, knelt to look at the ground where he was standing. Sure enough, there was a web of thin wire around his boots, a couple of strands tangled up in the laces of his combat boots. There was just enough of the wire (held 3" above the ground level so it would easily be caught by a slow-stepping infantry-man) which was obviously part of a booby-trap.
I carefully remove the wires from the trooper's boots, got him OUT of there, and then called for the Tiger Scout.
The Vietnames Chu Hoi took a look, said "yep, that's a booby trap", and told us to get out of the immediate area.
He set a Claymore Mine over the trap (apparently a three-some of American hand-granades with the trip-wires attached to the pull-pins) and blew it up from a safe distance. No obvious secondary explosions, but we couldn't find grenades later, so we assumed that they had exploded,
And yes, I found myself again clutching my St. Christopher Medal as if it were indeed a direct limk to God ... who knows He had not obviously andswered any of my prayers "directly", but I had indeed been very very fortunate this first day in the field.
--
A few m0nths later, I had become much more "comfortable" in the field, and much more confident of my ability to lead. We all looked out for each other, and as my platoon learned that I would look out for them, they assumed the responsibility for looking out for me, too.
After about five months, the silver chain on my St. Christopher Medal finally broke. I suppose it was, in part, because the web-harness for my equipment was sufficiently heavy that eventually the accumulated stress on the light chain overstressed the material. I was fortunate, though, that the medal itself got caught in the folds of my uniform and equipment, so I saved the most important part: the medal itself.
That night, one of my platoon showed me how to braid a boot-lace into a 'chain". I laced the center of the lace through the pierced ring of the medal, and created a 20" chain with the medal at the center. Then I put it around my neck, and one of the platoon members 'melted' the nylon lace with a butayne lighter, so there was no chance that it would fall off.
---
After a few months, I was eventually rotated to "the rear", which means I was reassigned to the administrative position of "Labor NCO" of the Headquarters Company of the 25th Infantry Division. (The 1ID had rotated out, leaving me to be assigned to a new division .. "Tropical Lightening".)
Life became delightfully boring from that point on. We had no attacks on the base on Cu Chi. I had been promised a post of Senior NCOIC at Division HQ, but that fell through. It was a matter of Tripical Low-Expectations for the rest of my tour. Showers every day, assigned to share a hooch with a guy who worked in what was essentally a "Human Resources" department (and if I ever get to hear from Gary Grant again, it would make my day!)
There were no drills, no emergencies, nobody was shooting at me and I even got a second bronze star ... as nearly as I can tell, because I didn't get shot. We had Philipino bands coming by every week to serenade us with their version of "Innagadda de Vida" and the most excitement came from (1) somebody got an aviation Parachute Flare and tried to disassemble it in their barracks, with the resulting spectatular pyrotechnics of the burning of the barracks; (2) There was an investigation of the tendency for Labor NCOs to bring vietnamese hookers on the base for the comfort of the troops; (3) the Division Top Sgt's hooch maid was found to be hooking all over the base, so the Labor NCO of HQ Division (who "took care" of the situation) was give a very good performance review by the HQ Company C.O. (who also had a "personal Hooch Maid"), and (4) there was not a single attach on the base during this period.
The only truly significant even was that, one week before I was scheduled to DEROS (Date Estimated Return from Over Seas), I was taking my daily shower and discovered that the St. Christopher Medal was no longer attached to my home-made Combat-Boot Lace Necklace.
I searched the entire shower area. Asked all of the troops and the Vietnames Laborers to be on the lookout for it. For four days, the business of the Headquarters Company of the 25th Infantry Division was distracted by the imperative to look for my Saint Christopher's Medal.
But to no avail ... I was never able to find, or cause to be found, the good-luck charm given to me by my sister, one year ago.
[Not that my sister had been lax in her attention: during the past year, she had arranged to have my combat platoon 'adopted' by her church youth group. so every man in the platoon received at least one letter per week during their period of service, and many of them received letters even after their DEROS; on Christmas of 1969, the church sent no less than 3 live Christmas Trees to the platoon, along with a 20' wide banner stating "WE LOVE YOU!" in bright red letters; and CARE packages containing food and other treats were regularly sent to my troops.]
Stull, when it came time for me to take that big silver bird back to The World, I no longer had my Saint Christopher Medal to keep me safe.
So I guess God decided I didn't need any "extra help" to get through the Bad Year. Except for one thing:
On the plane flight from Viet Nam to Oakland, California, the civilian staff of the commercial airline (United, if I recall correctly) broke up the monotony of the 9 hour flight between Tan Son Hut and Guam with a lottery. Every man on the plane contributed one dollar, and wrote his name of the bill. The stewardesses put them all in a big plastic bag, and drew the 'winning dollar' to see who got the contributions.
They drew my name.
One dollar invested, $85 returned .. no tax, no problems, it was all gravy. I bought my maximum amouth of duty-free booze at the Guam airport, and still had most of the winnings left to buy a room at Oakland the next night while I waited for my flight to Oregon.
I still had the bootlace necklace around my neck, and I caught myself grabbing for the medal even though it had been left behind in Vietnam.
Perhaps God decided I didn't need it any more. Or maybe it was all just superstition.
All I know is that it was a source of support, in a land where the only tangible support was the troops and support forces who never really knew who I was.
And perhaps it was all in my mind; I needed to believe that some greater power was watching over me.
The fact remains that I made it through a year in Viet Nam; a year which I never expected to survive. I was absolutely astounded when that Great Silver Bird lifted off the runway of Ton Son Hut Airbase without being downed by mortar fire.
So perhaps faith, or "Faith", has some power which I had never before (and never sence) acknowledged, or believed in.
On the other hand, I spent a significant amount if my Tour of Duty reaching for, or clutching the Saint Christopher Medal. I'm not going to say that it made a difference. I'm only going to say that I never had any true faith before, yet I went through firestorms, firefights, incoming shrapnell (both friendly and "otherwise"), misery and agony for 12 months. I saw friends and comrads die or become disabled by bullets, bombs and even a "Step-and-A-Half" viper ... but only one man under my direct command actually died.
The worst injury that I even encurred was Bamboo Poisoning, and the sorese finally cleared up about 8 years later. I can live with that.
I've never replaced that Saint Christopher Medal. In the past 40 years, I've never found myself in a situation where I needed one, as much as I did then.
Thank, Sis. I owe you one. _________________________________________________ Update: March 8, 2011
Has your blog site been taken over by a malovent bug? It keeps flipping over to an advert to some 2d Amendement advertiser. It will do this 3 or 4 times in a row. Very annoying.
My response:
I installed the newest version of Mozilla Firefox last night. I now cannot use Firefox as my browser ... it locks up. Look forward to my re-intalling the old version Real Soon Now.
However, I've also encountered the same problem in IE, which is related to the "RING" network to which I have subscribed for some 3 years. Recently, I've experienced the same problem, even in the old Firefox.
The solution is to use the back-button, which will take you back to the Geek Screen you started on. I've not seen it re-occur after that.
I agree, this is a bug and a particularly obnioxious one, at that.
My plan is to contact the ring-net sponsor and complain. Then to discontinue my membership, "anyway". It was originally intended to provide readers with a simple way to view other 2nd-amendment and shooting-oriented websites even though I had not included the link in my sidebar. It is no longer serving the original purpose because, as you have described, it takes you to a new webpage whether you wish or not.
Just between you and me, I think it's a Liberal conspiracy.
My apologies to readers who have encountered the same problem, and have not reported it. As I said, I have noticed that, but I discounted the phenomena as a Firefox problem, and ignored it. Now that I know it's not something that only I have noted, I can take steps to resolve the problem.
And if YOU see any other problems with the blog, I encourage you to let me know so I can take steps to resolve the issue(s).
In this video, a drunk steals a tank and goes on a "walk-about" through San Diego.
This is what tanks look like, and this is just a minor perspective on what tanks can do.
They're big, they're loud, they're powerful, they're scary (on both sides of the armor plate). They're a rolling pill-box. A man with a gun has NO defense against them.
On the other hand, they're fragile; they're so complicated to operate that one would find their operation is not intuitively obvious.
Segue, Vietnam, September 1969 - September 1970. You are there. Or at least, I am.
I do remember working with a Tank Squadron (3/4 11th ACR ... Armored Calvary Regiment) while I was serving as an infantry Platoon Sgt with the 1st ID. Later, about halfway through my tour, the 1ID returned to the U.S. Since I had only half my tour completed, I was reassigned to the 25th Infantry Division ("Tropical Lightening").
The 25ID didn't know what to do with me. Since I was an E6 (Staff Sgt) they decided to try me in the only open slot available to my rank; tank commander.
I had ridden on tanks and worked with tankers for much of the tour so far, but I had no idea how to use a tank except as support to Infantry operations.
I lasted one day as a tank commander.
On the first day, I was briefed by my tank crew in Tanker Operations. The crew included me as TC, a Gunner, and a Driver. Either of the other two guys knew more than I would ever know about tanks, so they gave me instructions:
"Here is your helmet. It's connected by the radio on squadron frequency, and by intercom. Push forward on the helmet-control to talk on the intercom, push backward to talk on the radio."
Or was it the other way around. I never could remember.
They also gave me one more important set of instructions: "As the Tank Commander, you will ride in the turret. Oh, and this grip-lever in the TC position? It fires the Main Gun. Whatever you do, don't touch it!"
We drove around for a half-day with the rest of the squadron, and then the Squadron Commander decided (I assume) to see how well I functioned as a TC. Either that, or he was just bored and wanted to have some fun.
I received a call to fire on the woodline to the right, which was suspected of harboring VC ... or so he said.
Not being entirely stupid, I had the driver stop, and face right.
Being just stupid enough not to ask the obvious questions (How do you aim the gun from the TC Cupola?), I just ... lowered the gun to what I thought might possibly be the appropriate elevation, ensured by sight that the gun was pointing in the general direction of the woodline, and touched it off.
BOOM!
Oh wow, that is SO awesome!
You have never lived until you have been entirely certain that you have the equivalent of the Biggest Gun in the Hood!
Unfortunately, I was aimed just a little bit high. The target was about 200 yards away. I absolutely devastated the very tops of the trees.
The Squadron Commander said: "Nice job, you killed a bunch of trees. No VC in there".
I replied: "I'm Infantry. Beg to report, no snipers remain in those trees!"
On the other hand, I probably pushed the push-to-talk switch the wrong way, so I'm not sure if the Squadron commander heard my smart-mouth reply, but I'm pretty sure my "crew" did.
Fortunately, later in the day my tank was down-graded for a bad road-wheel. We went back to the camp and we started to replace the road-wheel, which was estimated to take 3-4 days.
I am sure the road wheel was bad. I'm pretty sure the Squadron Commander didn't just decide his squadron was safer without Sgt. Geek commanding one of his tanks.
Since I know nothing about tanks, and I am not mechanically inclined, I made a deal with the crew. They would do the work, and I would stand permanent watch. Which means that I slept in the day (for the next 3 days), and they sleep at night while I stood their watch on the Berm in the Night Defensive Position (NDP).
When the tank was repaired, I was reassigned.
They got a bunch of other infantry guys from 1ID-to-25ID transfer, and they had us assigned as "ride-alongs". When the tanks would Lager Up, my squad of infantry "attached" would go out and set up booby-traps on the likely avenues of approach.
I liked booby traps, but they didn't have sufficient materials (a plastic spoon and a clothes-pin, if it matters) to build the Good Kind of initiators. So I had to use the "two pieces of copper wire with a slip-joint", which was the Not So Good Kind of initiators.
The idea was, when someone walking down the trail hit the tripwire, it pulled the bare-wire loop of one wire (the wires were insulated; the loops were bare) to the bare-wire loop of the other wire. The insulated part of the wires were inserted through the bare-wire loops of each wire, and it was a loose slip-joint which was VERY easy to slide together. When the bare-wire loops came in contact the circuit was complete and the Claymore mines blew the heck up .. big-time!
It's not worth the effort to illustrate, and I know it's not intrinsically obvious. Just assume that the Good Kind was fairly fool-proof and required a POSITIVE pull on the trip-wire; the Not-So-Good Kind was very fragile, and subject to the effects of wind and gravity. Far from my first choice, but one must when the Devil drives.
On the 3rd night I set up a two-claymore mine trap on a major trail, and hid the initiator in the bushes. An hour after I set it up, the wind came up and started blowing the bushes around ... which touched off the initiator.
KaBOOM!
"Sorry, guys. Too dark to set up another booby trap. We'll just go 100% alert for tonite okay? Go ahead and sack out on your usual watch rota, we'll just set up an ambush along the trail. If you hear firing in the night, check in with me before you start shooting main guns along the trail, please."
We got through that night without any problems (eg: no attacks), and the next day they assigned me as Labor NCO to the 25th Infantry Division Headquarters at Cu Chi.
I spent the rest of my tour as "Labor NCO" in the 25ID HQ company hiring Vietmese girls to clean hooches for officers and NCO's in the company, and never went into the field again. Which is a whole other story.
But here's the point of this story: I never knew for sure what model tank we were working with, but for 40 years I've been curious.
I thought they were Sheridans, but that would have made them the M551 Sheridan .. but the gun is too stubby, it's now that I remember.
I thought they were M60's, would have made them the M60 variant of the Patton tank. Looks right, gun is right. But only a few of them were assigned in Vietnam. Yes, some to the 11ACR (Eleventh Armored Regiment, "Blackhorse"), but I gather only in 1/1 11ACR, which was outside our area. We worked with the 3/4 11ACR.
I've decided that these were probably M48 Patton Tanks, with the 105mm main gun, which sounds about right. (Yes, I think I recall that the barrel had a flash-hider attachment.)
Understanding that this all happened over 40 years ago, I'm just wondering if there is a reader who can definitively state what version of tank we may have been using, at that place, at that time.
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