Colt 1911 Aztec Jaguar .38 Super Serial #29 of 300 This one sold for $3,424.99 through CDNN.
This full-sized stainless Government Model 1911A1 is chambered in .38 Super and features a beautifully intricate Aztec theme based upon the jaguar.
“The Aztecs regarded the jaguar as the bravest of beasts, and the proud ‘ruler of the animal world.’ The Jaguar was a favorite symbol in Aztec representations of war. In Aztec mythology and astrology, the jaguar also played an important role. Aztec kings, like their Classic Maya predecessors, used the jaguar to enhance their social status. As the jaguar was lord of animals, so an Aztec emperor was the ruler of men. Aztec emperors wore jaguar clothing into battle and sat in judgment on a throne. Jaguar Warriors were members of the elite Aztec military special forces.”
Sold through Talo, these limited edition Colt are a full sized 80-series stainless government in .38 Super caliber. The slide is first polished and then deeply embellished with Aztec themes of the jaguar, rulers, and high priests. The left rear slide panel features a gold rampant Colt.
The gray pearlite grips pick up the Aztec theme along with a gold rampant Colt medallion. The Jaguar pistols have special factory issued serial numbers AJW001-AJW300.
As an aside, .38 Super is the highest caliber handgun round availible (legally) to civilians in Mexico.
Part of the five-man crew of a MkI Staghound armored car “Frascati” of 1st King’s Dragoon Guards shelter from the sun and take a brew-up beneath a parasol fitted to the turret of their vehicle, somewhere in Italy, 13 July 1944.
Note the camo netting and packs tied to the hull. Via IWM
Chevrolet made 3,844 4×4 T17s between 1942-44 and, capable of making 55mph on good roads, they were fast and had decent range (longer than most tanks, anyway).
Most– some 2,844– were sent to the UK (designated Mk I) armed with a 37 mm M6 gun good enough for poking holes in anything that wasn’t a tank, a coaxial .30 cal Browning M1919A4 machine gun, and a British-pattern 2-inch smoke mortar in a rotating turret, another M1919A4 in the hull, and an option to add a third M1919 or similar up top on the turret.
As for the KDG’s, they traced their lineage back to 1685, fought in both World Wars and were amalgamated with the 2nd Dragoon Guards (Queen’s Bays) in 1959 to form the seniormost (line) cavalry regiment in the British Army: 1st The Queen’s Dragoon Guards (QDGs, “The Welsh Cavalry”) which endure today riding Jackal armored vehicles which are very much like the old Staghound.
As for Englishmen and umbrellas, that is a whole other thing.
But since you have come this far, how about some more umbrellas on tanks, IFVs, and APCs:
Officers of the 11th Hussars rest under the shade of a beach umbrella with their Morris CS6 during a patrol of the Egyptian/Libyan frontier, 26 July 1940
Trooper John Weire of Mentone, Vic, uses an umbrella to shelter from the shower of rain, during Operation Ballarat which began 4 August 1967 and ended 16 August 1967, while the remainder of the crew, Sergeant John Murphy of Cressy, Vic (left), and Craftsman Terry Parker of Launceston, Tas, keep a sharp lookout for Viet Cong (VC) from their armoured personnel carrier (APC) from A Squadron, 3rd Cavalry Regiment. South Vietnam. AWM Photo EKT 67 0063A VN
A US M48A1 tank crew in Vietnam, March 1971. Note the track links used as extra armor, the non-standard twin .50 caliber machine guns mounted at the commander’s hatch, and the beach umbrella
Bovington Tank Museum’s visiting Leopard C2, complete with Jolly Roger and umbrella
1 ARMD, the 1st Armoured Regiment of the Royal Australian Army, last week celebrated their 69th anniversary, founded on July 4th (funny, right) 1949 but tracing its lineage to the Light Horse units of the Boer War and Great War, and various armored units of WWII. Part of the celebration and regimental parade included these two fine examples of Oz armor, an M1A1 Abrams AIM in a new Kryptek-like camo overlay, and a “shaggy dog” ASLAV-25.
1800×773 Click to big up
1800×783 Photo via 1 ARMD
Of note, the Australians have also been using some Saab Barracuda camo on their M1s lately.
Israeli spy Eli Cohen, whose Omar Sherif good looks and smooth attitude allowed him to penetrate the Syrian defense ministry and highest levels of politics like the stuff of a Bond film under the cover identity of Kamal Amin Taabet, was caught in mid-transmission by the Syrians in 1964 after a KGB HF/DF team tracked his radio down.
His life ended in a public execution in Damascus and his body was reportedly buried three different times over the years to keep the Israelis from finding it.
However, in what was described by the BBC as a secret operation by the Mossad, his wristwatch has been recovered.
Amos Ben Gershom/Laam
The watch, which was with Cohen until his death, surfaced in Syria several months and was put up for sale by whoever stumbled across it. In a twist of fate, Russian assets reportedly help locate it.
Cohen operated behind enemy lines – establishing close ties with the top Syrian political and military leadership – from 1962 until he was hanged almost exactly 43 years ago on May 18, 1965. Cohen, who was known in intelligence circles by the number 566, wrote in encrypted French and sent his messages via a tiny radio transmitter. Cohen’s transmissions were instrumental in helping the IDF prepare for the 1967 war with Syria. He provided information about the Syrian Air Force and military positions on the Golan.
Born Eliyahu Ben-Shaul Cohen in Egypt, Cohen worked for Israeli military intelligence throughout the 1950s then, working for the Mossad and after muddying his tracks in Argentina, relocated to Syria– while he had a wife and three kids back in Israel.
It went far beyond that. His apartment was the crossroads for the Who’s Who of Damascus, which he encouraged, and then dutifully took note. This evolved into field trips to highly secure locations throughout the country, blessed by the Syrian brass. Cohen somehow managed to make it back home three times from Syria, on each occasion bringing photographs and sketches of Syrian positions– strategic gold.
A national hero in Israel, Sacha Baron Cohen of all people is set to play Cohen in new Netflix movie.
That moment when watching Blake’s 7 that you spot a sweet Colt SP-1, the “OG” of AR-15s.
Also, if you have no idea what 1978-ish space opera goodness B7 was, all four seasons are for free on the Tube. Ep 1, Season 1, below.
Written by Terry Nation, who also created the Daleks for Doctor Who, it is something of a George Lucas meets George Orwell on a low-fi budget and appeared on BBC1. I first caught it on PBS in the late 80s, but it is still great today.
Warship Wednesday, July 11, 2018: a Big gun in a little boat
From the collections of the Danish National Museum #92-1993
Here we see the Danish kanonbaadene (gunboat) Møen of the Royal Danish Navy, a prime example of the late 19th Century “flat-iron,” or Rendel-type gunboat popular in Europe for coast defense for a generation. Just 112-feet overall, she mounted a very stout Armstrong 10-inch, 18-ton muzzle-loading rifle as her main armament.
Seriously:
Click to big up 2000×1321. Note the two covered 83mm guns on the bridge wings, the accordion player, and bugler. Oh, and the big ass 10-incher in the center. And yes, that is the whole crew.
Named after the lonely but beautiful island of Møn, the hardy vessel was ordered from Orlogsværftet, Copenhagen in 1875 and commissioned 24 August 1876. Based on the British Ant-class (254-tons, 85-ft overall, 1x RML 10-inch 18-ton gun) the 410-ton Møen was the *largest* of a five-ship lot consisting of three 240-ton Oresund-class vessels and her near-sister, the 383-ton Falster, all completed by 1876 and mounting the same giant 10-incher.
British Ant-class. In all, between the 1870s and 80s, some 100 or so Rendel-type gunboats like these were built and used by a dozen navies to include those of Argentina, the Chinese, and Japanese. By the 1900s these were largely replaced as an idea that had quickly expired.
Danish gunboats Lille Bælt (center), Grønsund (119 ft., 2 x 12 cm guns) and ironclad Gorm (233 ft., 2x10inch guns), 1895. Lille Bælt is an Øresund-class boat, all 85-feet of her. The gun is a 254mm/18cal muzzleloader. Oof
Meanwhile, just to the south of Denmark, the German Kaiserliche Marine had ordered 11 similar Wespe-class gunboats mounting an impressive 12-incher forward. It should be remembered that at the time Denmark and Germany were only a decade removed from a sharp war that went kind of bad for Copenhagen.
German Wespe class Rendel gunboats– the opposite of Moen and Falster
Powered by a 500hp steam engine, the proud Møen could make a stately 9-knots on her iron-hull when wide open but could float in just nine feet of water, enabling her to hide in the shallows around Denmark’s coastline and burp out a 400-pound shell to 6,000 yards. In tests, the Danes found that the 10-inch main battery of these five gunboats could penetrate 270mm of wrought iron at 628 meters, which was pretty good for the day.
Joining the fleet by late 1876, the plucky gunboat joined in regular Eskadren (squadron) maneuvers each summer from June to the end of September in the Baltic, assisting with cadet cruises as needed and practicing her gunnery while the Øresund-class ships were gradually removed from service, found to be just too small of the task.
Sister Falster, pre-1903. Note the same big 10-inch forward
On 30 September 1901, while anchored in front of Fort Middelgrund between Copenhagen and Malmö, Møen suffered a catastrophic hull breach while testing new (and apparently finicky) incendiary shells for her Armstrong. While her 35-man crew was safe aboard the nearby coastal defense ship Skjold, Moen‘s rifle was fired electrically via a cable from 400m away and on the third shot a fire started aboard that triggered her magazine just seconds later.
The ship “disappeared” and settled on the bottom of Øresund, gratefully without any casualties. Only her masthead was visible over the surface.
The news was widely reported in naval journals of the time.
The sinking of the Moen from the Journal of the American Society of Naval Engineers, Volume 13
The sinking of the Moen from the Naval Institute Proceedings, Volume 27 1901
Sister Falster, the last Danish Rendel-type gunboat, soon after the accident landed her big gun and she was rearmed with a much safer 57 mm popgun in 1903.
Kanonbaaden Falster sometime between 1903 and 1914, note the much more sedate 57mm L44 M1896 mount forward. Interestingly enough, this model gun remained in maritime service well into the 1990s, only retired by the Icelandic Coast Guard in favor of slightly more up-to-date Bofors 40mm singles.
Retained for another decade, she was listed as having an armament consisting of seven machine guns (likely domestically-produced Madsens) in Janes‘ 1914 edition:
6th down, at the time the oldest armed gunboat in the Danish Navy
During WWI, Falster served as a guard ship between Amager and Saltholm. The highlight of this service was when the British submarine HMS E.13 ran aground near her in 1915, and some of the RN officers were brought aboard until they could be sent ashore to be interned for the duration.
Kanonbåden Falster, stern, as guardship
At the end of hostilities, she was withdrawn, disarmed, and was sold in February 1919. As such, Falster was pretty much the swan song of Rendel-type iron gunboats except for the Greek Amvrakia, which mounted an 11-inch gun on a ridiculous 400-ton hull and remained in (nominal) service until 1931.
Converted to a coastal freighter under the name Holger, Falster was lost in 1930 with seven merchantmen aboard in a winter snowstorm north of Djursland with a load of cement.
As for her sister, the Danish Navy salvaged the guns and most of the more valuable equipment in 1902, but the wreck of kanonbåden Møen, in just 19m of sheltered water, is a popular and easy dive.
The two ships were later commemorated by the Danes in the much larger Falster-class minelæggeren(minelayers) which were active from the 1960s through 2004.
As for Denmark, of course, the Royal Danish Navy was an armed neutral in the sharp crossroads between the Royal Navy’s Grand Fleet and Imperial German Navy’s High Seas Fleet in the Great War, a semi-active combatant against the Germans in WWII, and, since 1949, has been an important contributor to NATO.
Specs:
Displacement 409 t.
Length: 112.5-feet
Width: 28.8 ft.
Draft: 9 ft.
Engine: 500 hp steam engine, one screw
Speed: 9.0 knots, 20-tons of coal
Crew: 30 to 35
Armament:
Single RML 10-inch 18-ton gun (254mm/18cal) M.1875 Armstrong
Two 83mm/13cal M.1872 Krupp rifled breechloaders (later replaced with 6 37 mm rapid-fire guns).
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“Battery Gun” By Richard Jordan Gatling, 1865 Ink and watercolor on paper. 18 3/4″ x 14 1/4″ via National Archives and Records Administration, Records of the Patent and Trademark Office:
“The Gatling gun was the first successful rapid-fire machine gun. Invented by Dr. Richard Jordan Gatling, a physician, the first model had six barrels revolving around a central axis. Gen. Benjamin F. Butler of the Union Army first used the gun at the siege of Petersburg, Virginia, in 1864-65. Shown here are two drawings of the improved 10-barrel, .30-caliber model which fired 400 rounds a minute. The gun was patented on May 9, 1865, and was officially adopted by the U.S. Army on August 21, 1866. It proved superior to other rapid-fire guns of the time and, for more than 40 years, the Gatling gun was used by almost every world power.”
Ruger has been hot and heavy with its 1911 offerings in recent years– to include any number of full-size 5-inch barreled variants in the standard .45ACP and always popular 9mm and 10mm. Now– and it is about time– they have kicked in a a $900~ Officer sized model that reains a steel frame to boot, giving Kimber and Springfield a run for their money.
According to Ruger, “The new SR1911 Officer-Style pistol chambered in .45 Auto features a shorter, 3.60″ barrel and shortened grip frame that makes for an ideal concealment pistol. Compared to the SR1911 Lightweight Officer-Style, the steel frame on this new model retains additional weight for better balance, lower recoil and greater durability.”
Lots of features:
CNC Machined Slide & Frame w/ Low-Glare Stainless Finish
3.6” Bushing-Less Stainless Steel Bull Barrel w/ Full Length Guide Rod
Positive Barrel lock-up allows for Superior Accuracy Out-of-the-Box
Traditional Design w/ Replaceable Grip Panels & Checkered Backstrap
Lightweight, Aluminum, Skeletonized Trigger provides a Crisp, No Creep, Light Trigger Pull
Adjustable Over-Travel Stop w/ a Quick, Positive Reset
Skeletonized Hammer & Titanium Firing Pin for faster Lock Time
Oversized Beavertail Grip Safety provides Positive Function & Reliability
Extended Thumb Safety & Slide Stop Lever for Improved, Positive Manipulation
Integral Plunger Tube for Slide Stop & Thumb Safety is not Staked & will never come loose
Oversized Ejection Port & Extended Magazine Release enhance Competition Performance
Visual Inspection Port allows for Visual Confirmation of a Loaded or Empty Chamber
Rounded Mainspring Housing for Comfortable Carry
Rear Slide Serrations for a Positive Grip
Drift Adjustable, Novak 3-Dot Sights
Accepts Standard, Aftermarket 1911 Parts & Accessories
Classic, Original 1911 Series 70 Design
Includes: Two 7+1 S/S Magazines
Overall Weight: 31 Ounces
Twist Rate: 1 in 16” Right-Hand
In California, it is pretty tough for one of the 13 million estimated legal gun owners to buy an AR-15 or similar gun deemed by local law since 1989 to be an “assault weapon” without seriously neutering the firearm itself to be compliant. Fast forward nearly 30 years, numbers of (non-compliant) ARs still pop up with regularity in gun crime. Recently, the ATF and LAPD busted a group associated with street gangs that were operating DIY gun mills from Hollywood area weekly-rent hotels that made ARs and Glocks from 80 percent lowers.
Some of the firearms appear to violate National Firearm Act regulations for short-barreled rifles. Go big or go home, I guess. (Photo: LAPD)
So, just regulate “ghost guns” right?
Here’s the funny part: under a bill, signed into law in 2016 by Gov. Jerry Brown, legal builders of homemade firearms have to first obtain a serial number through the state Department of Justice to complete their built and abide by a myriad of California laws.
Here we see what was then dubbed the Mark 11, 20mm Aircraft Gun, in the Mark 1 POD, attached to the centerline bomb rack of a Douglas A4D-2 Skyhawk aircraft, April 14, 1958. The system was known in development by Hughes as the HIPEG.
330-PS-8882 (USN 710123)
330-PS-8882 (USN 710122)
Master Caption:
“The U.S. Navy today unveiled a new pod-mounted weapon, a 20mm aircraft gun capable of firing 4,000 rounds per minute. This gun, called the Mark 11, was shown to Naval Aviators and representatives of the press at the Third Annual Naval Air Weapons Meet, held at the U.S. Naval Auxiliary Air Station, El Centro, California. This new weapon, which will offer a significant contribution to Naval Air Attack Capability, is carried and fired in an external pod which is fitted to the bomb rack of carrier-based aircraft. Its primary application is in an air-to-ground attack, where its controlled variable rate of fire makes it extremely effective. Ease of rearming, replacement of the gun, and maintenance are notable features which add to the practicability of the gun. Rear Admiral Paul D. Stroop, Chief of the Bureau of Ordnance, indicated that with the Mark 11 gun and POD meeting the firepower requirements of future attack aircraft, there will be a gain in aircraft structural simplicity since there would be no need for internal fixed guns. Mr. Frank Markquaret, a Naval Ordnance Engineer in the Bureau of Ordnance, conceived the Mark 11 gun and POD. It was developed for the U.S. Navy by Flier Industrialist, Howard Hughes. The Mark 11 is presently undergoing an evaluation at the Naval Aviation Ordnance Test Station, Chincoteague, Virginia, and is expected to be operational in 1959.”
According to a May 1962 report, 17 test pods cycled 16,000 rounds of 20mm ammo with a total of 29 stoppages or about 550-rounds on average between stoppages.
As reported by Popular Mechanics in 1963, three such pods could be added to a Navy jet to triple its gunfire available to somewhere around 12,000 rounds of 20mm per minute. It should be noted that at the time the A-4 mounted two Colt Mk 12 cannons (U.S.-made Hispano HS 404s), one in each wing root, with 100 rounds per gun.
Adopted as the Mk 4 Mod 0, some 1,200 of these pods were produced and served on Navy and Marine A-4s, F-4, and the OV-10 Bronco, primarily seeing active service in Vietnam for close air support missions.
