Blown main gun M4 tank at Patton Armor Museum at Fort Knox
Monthly Archives: January 2013
What IS an Assault Weapon?
With all this talk about assault weapons, let’s look at what they are talking about. Just what makes something an ‘assault weapon’ and how does this term compare to the concept of what lawmakers are looking to regulate.
The first true assault rifle was born in 1943 Germany. Invented by firearms engineer Hugo Schmeisser, it was a select-fire (either full auto or semi-auto at the flick of a switch) rifle that fired an intermediate caliber round (larger than a pistol but shorter than a rifle round), and had a large detachable magazine that could be changed quickly. This gun was dubbed the StG44 or ‘storm rifle model 44’ and was a crucial addition to the German arsenal in the end of World War Two.
This rifle was very popular and the Soviets soon had a modified version they adopted a few years later as the AK-47. The current assault rifle of the US military is the M4A1 carbine, which has a select-fire trigger, 14.5-inch barrel, and can fire at 750-rounds per minute until its ammunition is exhausted. For a private citizen to own one of these types of weapons, it has to be made before 1986 as the Hughes Amendment banned production of select-fire weapons for private sales that year. Even if a ‘pre-86’ gun is available, they run upwards of $10K and take 3-6 months to transfer from a Class III dealer after an extensive ATF approval process that includes a $200 tax stamp.
AKS-74U ‘Krinkov’ of the Russian Army. It is 19-inches long with a 8.3-inch barrel and fires 30 rounds of 5.45x39mm at about 700 rounds per minute. Its a true assault rifle…..now lets talk about the mythical creature that is an ‘assault weapon’…..
Read the rest in my column at Firearms Talk.com
Guns for the Ladies
In my job as a firearms instructor, both NRA and State certified, I am often asked what firearms are the best choices for females. This comes both from females as well as for males looking for a handgun for that special woman in their life.
Here is what I tell them
Read the rest in my coulumn at Firearms Talk
Homeland Security Under Scrutiny in Congress
Senator Coburn is at it again. This time he is going after the Department of Homeland Security is his 55-page report entitled “Safety At Any Price: Assessing the Impact of Homeland security Spending in US Cities”
“If in the days after 9/11 lawmakers were able to cast their gaze forward ten years, I imagine they would be surprised to see how a counter-terrorism initiative aimed at protecting our largest cities has transformed into another parochial grant program. We would have been frustrated to learn that limited federal resources were now subsidizing the purchase of low-priority items like an armored vehicles to protect festivals in rural New Hampshire, procure an underwater robot in Ohio and to pay for first responder attendance at a five-day spa junket that featured a display of tactical prowess in the face of a “zombie apocalypse.”
DHS has since spent an estimated $35 billion on its grant programs over the past decade, including $7.144 billion for UASI Urban areas. Los Angeles alone got some $500 million in grants while smaller cities like Milwaukee got $44-million to buy gee-whiz stuff. Even tiny towns such as Keene, NH got $90k to buy an armored BearCat vehicle just in case. An incident involving the purchase of 13 sno-cone machines with $6,200 in homeland security grants illustrates the weakness of FEMA’s oversight of its grant programs. This is the focus of the report, basically throwing rocks at how local law enforcement agencies spend the Feds money on junk they probably don’t need, but hey, it’s the Fed’s offering them the money, soooooo….
NeoStead 2000: South African Scattergun
South Africa has had a long history of armed conflict and, as such, has an equally long history of innovative local weapons design—so innovative in fact, they’re solution based designs have been copied by manufacturers internationally. With limited budgets South African arms makers have a reputation of doing ‘more with less’ and a good example of this (and one we can see elements of Kel-tec’s latest combat shotgun, the KSG) is the NeoStead 2000.
Read more in my column at GUNS.com
Warship Wednesday, January 2, 2013 (Happy NEW Year)
Here at LSOZI, we are going to take out every Wednesday for a look at the old steam/diesel navies of the 1859-1946 time period and will profile a different ship each week.
– Christopher Eger
Warship Wednesday, January 2, 2013 (Happy NEW Year)
Here we see the HMS Temeraire tugged to her last berth to be broken up in 1838.
While normally we cover steel ships, powered by coal, oil, diesel, or some other fossil fuel, the Temeraire deserves a special mention. Ordered in 1790, she spent 8-years in the stocks being constructed at the Chatham Dockyard before entering service during the Napoleonic Wars in 1799. Built as a Neptune-class ship of the line, she was a huge 2120-ton 185-foot long battleship of the sail era and as such carried an amazing 98 cannon arrayed on four decks. With each of these guns requiring a 5-7 man crew, the ship when fully manned carried over 700 sailors, officers, and marines.
She helped blockade both Spain and then France before having her moment of glory at the famous Battle of Trafalgar. It was there, in 1805, that she earned her reputation. Coming to the aide of Nelson in the HMS Victory, the Temeraire fought off the 112-gun Spanish ship Santa Ana, 74-gun French ship redoubtable, and 74-gun French ship Fougueux. This fighting was done at close quarters, usually within a football field and often involved ramming and lashing together. She had more than 125 casualties, all of her sails and masts yards shot or burned away, and her starboard hull and rudder head staved in. The battle ended with both Fougueux and the Redoubtable striking their colors and captured by Temeraire.
Trafalgar: The damaged French Redoubtable caught between the Victory (the large ship in the foreground center) and the Temeraire (seen bow on). The Fougueux, coming up on Temeraire’s starboard side, has just received a broadside. 1836 oil on canvas by Clarkson Frederick Stanfield.
Repaired but never the same again, she continued to serve for another decade of the Napoleonic wars, seeing combat against Danish and French ships. By 1812, no longer needed in the line and with her wood in decay, she was placed in reserve. Her guns were landed, her crews dispersed, and she was pressed into use as a first a prison ship, then a receiving ship, victualing ship, and finally as a guard ship, before her old but still majestic hulk was sold to the breakers in 1838.
“”The flag which braved the battle and the breeze, No longer owns her.”
The famous painting of the proud but stricken vessel being towed to scrap “The Fighting Temeraire tugged to her last berth to be broken up, 1838″ by J. M. W. Turner, has sat at the National Gallery in London since 1851. In 2005, The Fighting Temeraire was voted the greatest painting in a British art gallery and an aging RN Commander James “Shaken, not stirred” Bond admired her in last year’s Skyfall movie. Her name went on to grace a steam-powered warship, a Bellerophon class battleship in World War One, but has not been on the ocean since 1921. Today HMS Temeraire is the name of the shore side Directorate of Naval Physical Training and Sport (DNPTS) in Portsmouth.
Specs:
Tons burthen: 2,12058⁄94 (bm)
Length: 185 ft (56 m) (gundeck)
152 ft 8 in (46.53 m) (keel)
Beam: 51 ft 2 in (15.60 m)
Depth of hold: 21 ft 6 in (6.55 m)
Sail plan: Full-rigged ship
Complement: 738
Armament: 98 guns:
Gundeck: 28 × 32-pounder guns
Middle gundeck: 30 × 18-pounder guns
Upper gundeck: 30 × 18-pounder guns
Quarterdeck: 8 × 12-pounder guns
Forecastle: 2 × 12-pounder guns
If you liked this column, please consider joining the International Naval Research Organization (INRO) They have one of the largest collections of ships photos from avid martial art enthusiasts around the world, many never before seen. Some of the collection online is at http://www.warship.org/ship.htm
The International Naval Research Organization is a non-profit corporation dedicated to the encouragement of the study of naval vessels and their histories, principally in the era of iron and steel warships (about 1860 to date). Its purpose is to provide information and a means of contact for those interested in warships.
Nearing their 50th Anniversary, Warship International, the written tome of the INRO has published hundreds of articles, most of which are unique in their sweep and subject.
I’m a member, so should you be!
Warship Porn
USS America under construction in Pascagoula. The size of a WWII Essex-class CV, she is intended to carry 30-40 F-35’s if they ever get built
Sig Sauer Brings the Classic 550 Rifle to America
Well respected around the world, and the subject of intense collector interest in the United States, the SIG 550 series will finally be produced for sale here.
In the late 1970s, the landlocked country of Switzerland, renowned for chocolates, and cuckoo clocks,
alongside finely crafted watches and firearms, was in need of a new rifle for their military. The SIG Company of Neuhausen, Switzerland submitted a design they classified as the SG 550 for testing. By 1986, the rifle had been adopted and some 600,000 were being produced for the Swiss Army.
Today they are in use with more than a dozen countries and have even been bought by the US government for the FBI and DEA. Before 1989, about 500 semi-auto versions were brought to the United States and sold on the civilian market before the ATF banned further importation of non C&R eligible rifles without a ‘sporting use.’ This made these few gems of the firearms world skyrocket in price to over $10,000 due to the nature of supply and demand.
Now, SIG has gotten around this 20+-year import ban by producing these rifles here in the United States in their Exeter, New Hampshire facility.
Read the rest in my column at Top Gun Review
