America’s tall ship, the U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Eagle (WIX 327), broke out canvas to depart Fort Trumbull in New London, on Saturday to begin the training vessel’s annual three-month summer cruise. Some 88 years young, she is carrying her fifth, recently installed, figurehead on her bow, in addition to a working cargo of mids.
For those not already aware, Eagle, a trophy ship from WWII, is a majestic 295-foot, three-masted barque used as a training vessel for future officers of the USCG and NOAA and is simultaneously the largest tall ship flying the Stars and Stripes and the only active square-rigger in U.S. government service.
Eagle’s 2024 full summer schedule includes port visits to:
May 25 – May 28: Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic
June 4 – June 7: Cartagena, Colombia
June 14 – June 17: San Juan, Puerto Rico
June 24 – June 27: Bridgetown, Barbados
July 7 – July 10: Hamiliton, Bermuda
July 18 – July 21: Halifax, Nova Scotia
July 26 – July 29: Portsmouth, New Hampshire
Aug. 2 – August 5: Rockland, Maine
Aug. 9 – August 12: Boston, Massachusetts
Eagle is scheduled to return to New London on Aug. 16.
A more detailed look at her sked:
If you have a chance to visit her, you will not be disappointed.
The circa 1918 Mark VIII Heavy “Liberty” Tank was a rarity.
At some 37 tons, they were massive, designed to carry a pair of 57mm QF 6 pounders and up to five M1917 Browning water-cooled 30.06 machine guns, all clad in 16mm of steel armor plate, this hulking land battleship was powered by a modified V-12 Liberty aero engine (hence its moniker) that could make it crawl at a blistering 5 mph across broken terrain on its tracks.
Only 125 were produced of a planned 1,500 before the Great War ended, with 100 of those made in America at the Rock Island Arsenal in Illinois from kits supplied by the British. Sent to armor training camps at Camp Meade, Maryland, and Camp Colt, Pennsylvania, they served through the 1920s in a series of test units and, placed in storage in 1932, were scrapped in 1940 to recycle their steel for more useful purposes.
U.S. Army M1917 Tank on a Mark VIII Liberty Tank No. 67981 at Camp Meade, 1921
Just two remain in the U.S.: a hull at the U.S. Army Armor & Cavalry Collection at Fort Benning (now Fort Moore) and a second, which has spent most of its life at Aberdeen Proving Ground before it was shifted to Benning in 2014. That last example, which has undergone a much-needed three-year preservation cycle after being exposed to the elements its entire life, has finally returned “home” and was installed as a macro exhibit at the RIA museum late last month.
Dubbed simply, “Mark” it is now on (covered) display at the corner of Rodman and Gillespie Avenue, overlooking the Museum.
When the Walther PPK was introduced in 1931, billed as a smaller version of the company’s PP series meant for use by plain-clothed detectives (the PPK stands for Polizei Pistole Kriminal), it was in chambered in 7.65x17mm Browning Short, which we know over here on this side of the Atlantic as John Browning’s .32 ACP.
This was soon augmented with variants offered in .380 ACP and, by 2013, Walther discontinued the .32 version of both the PPK and PPK/S.
Some 31 years after the PPK was introduced, MI6 armorer Major Boothroyd, or Q, would famously issue CDR James Bond, RN, one in lieu of his .25 ACP Beretta, describing it as: “Walther PPK. 7.65mm with a delivery like a brick through a plate-glass window.”
Now, with improvements in bullet and propellant design leading to the resurgence of 9mm over .40 caliber, and .380 seen as the new 9mm, and .32 seen as the new .380, the stubby little round is much more popular these days.
And so, it should be no surprise that Walther is bringing the “old” caliber back for both the PPK and the PPK/S, in both stainless and black variants. All models have the classic Walther styling coupled with a hammer drop decocking safety, fixed sights, and a wave cut atop the slide to reduce glare.
The standard PPK, which is shorter at a pocketable 3.8 inches high, has a 7+1 shot capacity while the taller (4.3 inches high) PPK/S has an 8+1 capacity. All models share the same 3.3-inch barrel length and 6.1-inch overall length.
Here we see a group of hardy USAAF men clustered in front of B-24J-1-CO Liberator Come Closer (S/N 42-72973) of the 38th Bombardment Squadron (Heavy), 30th Bomb Group, 7th Air Force, sending Mother’s Day wishes, likely in 1944, where it was stationed from March to August of that year.
For an, um, closer look at the Sad Sack nose art of Come Closer III check out this image of an ordnance crew prepping a bomb load on Kwajalein on 9 April 1944.
Assigned to the crew of John A Runge, this Liberator flew numerous missions to the Japanese bases at Truk and later several missions softening up Iwo Jima prior to the Marines’ amphibious landing.
As noted by a page on Fold3, which lists Come Closer as completing 100 missions successfully:
The new “J” Models first appeared on the line at San Diego in August 1943. They would be equipped with a nose turret as well as other improvements on the D Models which are discontinued—Of the 51 aircraft in this 1st block of J Models, 35 of them were assigned to the newly forming 30th Bombardment Group, the 27th, 38th and 392nd Bomb Squadrons. Another 14 were sent to replace losses in the 11th B.G. which had already been deployed in Central & South Pacific areas. Those squadrons were the 26th, 42nd, 98th and 431st.
According to Joe Baugher, Come Closer III survived the war, is currently owned by Paul Peters, and is under restoration to fly in Chino, California.
Some 55 years ago, from 4-to-11 May 1969, the first “City-Centre to City-Centre” transoceanic jet flight in history was completed by an RAF Hawker Siddeley Harrier GR1, XV741, from No.1(F) Squadron, conducting VTOL take-offs and landings from the water-soaked platforms in London and New York, with Squadron Leader Tom Lecky-Thompson at the controls.
It recorded the fastest time from [a disused coal yard near St Pancras Station in] London to the top of [a pier on the Hudson River near] the Empire State Building in Manhattan: 6 hours 11 minutes and 57.15 seconds. Refueled by a Victor tanker aircraft, this was completed for the Daily Mail-sponsored London – New York transatlantic air race.
The nonplussed Thompson, a Suez veteran who joined the RAF at 17, carried a sack lunch consisting of “a chicken leg and a bottled drink, possibly ginger beer, which I consumed halfway across.”
I recently had the honor of visiting CZ’s historic European factory and found its roots ran back almost 90 years and its first product was for the Czech Air Force.
Located in Uhersky Brod, in today’s Czechia, the Czech Republic, CZ’s current factory opened on June 27, 1936. Constructed some 200 miles east of Strakonice, where Ceska Zbrojovka then had its main operations, the move came as part of an initiative to shift firearms production farther away from the tense border with Hitler’s Germany.
Uhersky Brod, which today is just a few minutes’ drive from the foothills of the Carpathians and the border of Slovakia, in 1936 was well into the interior of Czechoslovakia. It was an old fortress town, a walled city, that dates to at least 1275. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
And it remains a beautiful town today. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
Although one that has seen war, occupation, and resistance. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
The new facility’s dispersed original layout, built near the town’s railway station, was even intentionally made to mimic residential and light industry buildings (i.e. garages and carpentry shops) from the air, arranged in line with city streets, complete with trees and greenspaces that you would expect in a small mountain town.
You can still get a feel for the old “Mainstreet CZK” layout of the factory when visiting CZ today
Part of the modern factory’s layout these days is a protected gun vault, which holds both CZ’s current production wares and some of their historic guns. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
Sharp-eyed gun nerds will immediately spot the Sa vz. 58– the Czech Kalash that isn’t a Kalash– as well as the Sa 26 (vz. 48b/52) sub gun without which the UZI may never have been born, along with the Sa vz. 61 Skorpion machine pistol and the chromed out public duties vz. 52 rifle, but how about the machine gun at the top?
Oh yes. Meet the Letecky kulomet vzor 30, or “Aircraft machine gun Model 30,” chambered in 7.92x57mm (8mm Mauser).
This was the first gun CZ was set up to produce in Uhersky Brod, and it went on to arm just about everything in the 1930s Czech Air Force that had wings in at least three different variants.
And, ironically, the Germans ended up with it in the end, with the Luftwaffe using them in both secondary ground defense and a light AAA role.
How about this great shot of a stubby U.S. Naval Air Reserve North American FJ-1 Fury fighter, BuNo 120368 F-101 of the Naval Air Reserve Training Unit (NARTU) from Naval Air Station Oakland, May 1951. Note the large “Weekend Warrior” nose art.
U.S. Navy National Museum of Naval Aviation photo No. 1996.253.7237.023
The same jet– along with others assigned to Oakland with the same nose art– appeared in several images taken around the same time over the Bay Area, possibly taken for use in recruiting drives.
Ordered along with the similarly jet-powered carrier-borne fighters– Vought XF6U-1 Pirate, McDonnell XFD-1 Phantom, and the McDonnell XF2D-1 Banshee– late in WWII for Operation Olympic/Coronet, the planned invasion of Japan set for May of 1946, the FJ-1 Fury utilized the anemic Allison J35-A-2 turbojet, good for 4,000 pounds of thrust, to lift its 15,000-pound frame.
Good for about 475 knots, it carried a six-pack of .50 cal Brownings clustered in its nose– the last U.S. Navy jet with a .50 caliber armament– with 1,500 rounds carried, and no weight allocation for underwing hardpoints.
Notably, the first operational Navy jet fighter squadron, VF-5A (renamed VF-51 in August 1948), was equipped with FJ-1s and made history in March 1948 with a series of workups on the straight-decked Essex-class carrier USS Boxer (CV-21).
FJ-1 Fury of VF 5A flown by CDR Pete Aurand traps on the flight deck of the carrier Boxer (CV 21) in the first underway test on 17 March 1948.
USS Boxer CV-21 March 1948 off San Diego, First operational jet fighter squadron VF-5A’s FJ-1 Fury. LIFE Kodachrome.
USS Boxer CV-21 March 1948 off San Diego, First operational jet fighter squadron VF-5A’s FJ-1 Fury. LIFE Kodachrome.
USS Boxer CV-21 March 1948 off San Diego, First operational jet fighter squadron VF-5A’s FJ-1 Fury. LIFE Kodachrome.
VF-5A also made a bit of history by winning the Bendix Trophy in 1948, beating out Air Force F-80 Shooting Stars in the cross-country race.
CDR Pete Aurand’s FJ-1 Fury aircraft of Fighter Squadron (VF) 51 lined up for the Bendix Trophy Race at Long Beach, California, in 1948.
With its first flight in November 1946, and, with the new and much better performing F9F-2 Panther introduced by 1949, the Fury’s career was limited and, with just 30 production models delivered to the Navy, they transitioned to the USNR as a transition trainer for pilots moving from Hellcats and Corsairs into jets, before the type was retired in 1953, having just served seven years.
In that short period, at least nine of the 30 operational FJ-1s were written off after crackups, lost in accidents, or ditched at sea, taking at least five aviators with them. Not an enviable safety record.
Of course, the Fury would make a much more successful return to service in its swept-wing FJ-2/-3/-4 format, which was the tailhook-carrying hot rod brother of the famed F-86 Sabre, but that is another story.
U.S. Marines assigned to Alpha Company, BLT 1/5, 15th MEU, recently made history by launching the new Amphibious Combat Vehicles from the USS Harpers Ferry (LSD 49) to conduct a live-fire, waterborne gunnery range during Exercise Balikatan 24 at Oyster Bay, Philippines, on 4 May. A promised upgrade from the troublesome (and often extremely dangerous) AAVP-7A1, which was first entered service in 1972.
U.S. Marine Corps photos by Sgt. Patrick Katz, Cpl. Aidan Hekker, and Lance Cpl. Peyton Kahle:
A U.S. Marine Corps amphibious combat vehicle attached to Alpha Company, Battalion Landing Team 1/5, 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit, splashes off the amphibious dock landing ship USS Harpers Ferry (LSD 49) during Exercise Balikatan 24 in Naval Detachment Oyster Bay, Palawan, Philippines, May 4, 2024. BK 24 is an annual exercise between the Armed Forces of the Philippines and the U.S. military designed to strengthen bilateral interoperability, capabilities, trust, and cooperation built over decades of shared
Amphibious combat vehicles attached to Alpha Company, Battalion Landing Team 1/5, 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit, drive in formation back to the amphibious landing dock USS Harpers Ferry (LSD 49) following a waterborne gunnery live-fire training during Exercise Balikatan 24 in Oyster Bay, Philippines, May 4, 2024.
U.S. Marine Corps amphibious combat vehicles attached to Alpha Company, Battalion Landing Team 1/5, 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit, conduct an open water transit to return to the amphibious dock landing ship USS Harpers Ferry (LSD 49) during Exercise Balikatan 24 in Naval Detachment Oyster Bay, Palawan, Philippines, May 4, 2024.
The waterborne operations and live-fire training marked the first employment of the ACV platform in the region, underscoring the United States Marine Corps’ commitment to modernizing the force in support of a free and open Indo-Pacific.
I recently had the honor of visiting CZ’s historic flagship factory in Uhersky Brod, in Czechia, the Czech Republic, and got to take the first CZ 75 out of its resting place.
Designed starting in 1969 by the brothers Koucky (Josef and Frantisek) for CZ as a 9mm parabellum chambered pistol made for commercial export, the handgun known as the CZ 75 was finished by early 1975 (hence the designation) with five pre-production samples (serial numbers 00001 through 00005) carefully assembled for testing and evaluation. Some of these T&E samples chalked up over 11,000 rounds in testing with no breaks or serious issues, and the gun soon went into full-scale production with a few minor, mostly cosmetic revisions.
Of those five, CZ 75 expert David Pazdera notes in his book that number 00004 disappeared into history, while 00002, 00003, and 00005 were sold on the commercial market in the early 1980s, leaving just 00001 as the sole remaining sample gun left in CZ’s inventory. They keep it locked inside a display case deep inside a secure vault.
Even with a 50-year-old design, you can easily spot the hallmark geometrical “Golden ratio/Golden section” in length and height used in the CZ 75 to produce an aesthetically pleasing firearm offering a natural point of aim.
CZ 75 Serial Number 00001. Note the slab-sided milled slide, duraluminum grips, and large hammer spur. Also note the very deep scallop to the front of the slide, something that would carry on to the First Model CZ 75s. Other than that, it is easily recognizable to any fan of the 75. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
Compare the above to this second-generation 1986-vintage CZ 75 “Pre-B” with all matching serial numbers and zero import marks. (Photo: Chris Eger)
Some 70 years ago this week, the pivotal 1954 Battle of Diên Biên Phu ended after a 57-day siege, an event that set the stage for the French withdrawal from Indochina and the American entrance into the region for two decades, for better or worse.
While the siege was supported on the French side by over 10,000 sorties– most of which (6,700) were by a host of C-47 transports including 678 sorties from C-119s flown operated by Civil Air Transport (which became Air America)– just four haggard French Navy (Aeronnautique Naval) squadrons accounted for a whopping 1,019 sorties during this period. Compare this to the Armee de l’Air’s 2,650 sorties from two squadrons of F8F Bearcats (2/22 Languedoc and 1/22 Saintonge), two of B-26 Invaders (1/19 Gascogne and 1/25 Tunisie), three observation/recon squadrons, and two helicopter squadrons.
Arromanches
Built as HMS Colossus, the light carrier Arromanches (R95)— so named to honor the memory of the Allied landing on the Normandy coast– was leased to the French in 1946 and finally sold outright in 1951. During the Dien Bien Phu siege, her SB2C-5 Helldivers of Flottille 3F and F6F-5 Hellcats of Flottille 11F lost two aircraft from the former and three from the latter to Viet flak between 15 March and 26 April 1954.
Bois Belleau
Built as the Independence-class light aircraft carrier USS Belleau Wood (CVL-24)— a ship that earned a Presidential Unit Citation as well as a full dozen battle stars in the Pacific in WWII– Bois Belleau (R97) was loaned to the French Navy in late 1953 and rushed to Indochina where her F4U-7/AU-1 Corsairs of Flottille 14F got into the fight in close air support.
French Carrier Bois Belleau, formerly USS Belleau Wood (CVL-24), at Saigon. Note the Corsairs on her deck
César
One of the French Navy units that was there until the end was the unlikely Flottille 28F, which flew land-based Consolidated PB4Y Privateer maritime patrol bombers from Tan-Son-Nhut. Formed in July 1944 at Norfolk to fly lumbering PBY Catalinas in the Med from bases in North Africa, “The Wolves” of 28F had moved to Indochina in October 1945 and transitioned to the bruising Privateer in 1951.
However, spare parts and general unavailability of maintenance and replacement aviators had, by the time of Dien Bien Phu, trimmed the squadron to just 6 operational crews and 7 to 8 aircraft.
Note the Wolf insignia. These bombers dropped not only 500, 1000, and 2000-pound bombs, but often got low enough to Viet positions to open up with their .50 cals as well
Nonetheless, lemons into lemonade, the high-mileage 28F Privateers would make regular nighttime interdiction missions followed up by daytime bombing runs against Viet Mihn artillery and AAA assets, directed by Major Jacques Guerin’s Dien Bien Phu Airfield Control Post (call sign Torri Rouge), with the patrol bombers call sign being César.
Yup, basically flying day and night, with many crews typically running 2-3 sorties per day so long as they had a bird to do it in. One pilot, the famed Éric Tabarly, logged over 1,000 hours in his 11 months with the squadron– an average of three hours every single day, with most of that weight being during the siege.
On the last morning that Dien Bien Phu stood, Torri Rouge made contact with an inbound 28F Privateer, radioing:
“A 17 heures 30 nous faisons tout sauter. les Viets sont à côté. Au revoir à nos familles … …. Adieu César….” (“At 5:30 p.m. we blow up everything. The Viets are nearby. Goodbye to our families… …. Farewell Caesar…. “)
The Mechanix of Auto, Aviation, Military...pert near anything I feel relates to mechanical things, places, events or whatever I happen to like. Even non-mechanical artsy-fartsy stuff.
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