Wilder: Why We Can't Do War Anymore

John Wilder's latest article, "Why We Can’t Do War Anymore," delves into why we were able to defeat the Nazis and Japanese in WWII, at the same time, but can't defeat Iran. Primarily it has to do with costs: Western weapon systems are expensive; Iranian drones are (relatively speaking) cheap. For instance, as Wilder observes, our aircraft carriers are so expensive and so limited in number that we cannot afford to lose any--and so we have to keep them well away from where they might be struck by an enemy missile or drone.  Read the whole thing.

Super Girl Bombs At Box Office

So I watched Citizen Vigilante this past weekend. I was mildly disappointed, probably because I was expecting something more like Nobody, The Punisher, or Death Wish, or perhaps something more focused on migrant crime. The film spent as much time on three delinquents that refused to pay for bus tickets and, later, were beating up a teenage boy in a park, as it did on the Muslim "youths" which gang raped a girl (probably based on this incident from Germany, but could have been describing dozens of other such incidents across Europe and the UK, and which still continue to happen). The film also suffered from a disjointed time line. And for goodness sake, the main character acted like he wanted to be caught: no gloves, no attempt to disguise his features, and constantly carrying an operating cell phone. 

    But my point is not to review Citizen Vigilante but to point out that the film--which purportedly only had a budget of between $5 million and $9 million had grossed more than $67 million some 5 days ago and has topped Amazon's charts for purchased movies since its release on Amazon Prime--is performing better than Supergirl of which the Daily Mail reports: "Supergirl bombs at the box office: Milly Alcock's 'surly' superhero fails to entice viewers with a flop opening weekend after lacklustre reviews." That article indicates that Supergirl's production costs were $170 million or more (and that does not include advertising costs) and opened with $38 million in U.S. and Canadian theaters. It added $30 million in overseas markets. It is pretty obvious which movie will provide its investors a greater return on investment (ROI). Using the high end budget of $9 million and only considering the $67 million that it had raked in as of a week ago, Citizen Vigilante had a ROI of 7.44. In order for Supergirl to provide the same ROI--just using the production budget and ignoring marketing costs--it would need to gross $1.27 billion. 

    I don't know why Supergirl did so poorly as I haven't seen it. But I would guess that it failed like so many other big budget superhero films of late: it was written and/or directed by people with essentially no experience writing or directing (and absolutely no experience in the genre) who were picked because of DEI or some other reason having nothing to do with merit; and who provided a crappy story with unlikable characters rather than heroes. 

    Whatever you might think of Sanders in Citizen Vigilante, he was a type of hero. On the other hand, Supergirl, based on what I've read and heard, was just another self-obsessed, immature girl boss. 

Gun & Prepping News #87

 Some links that may be of interest:

• "The Mount"--The Tactical Wire.  An excerpt:

    In wing shooting, a critical aspect is the mount – bringing the comb of the stock to the cheek under the dominant eye, bringing the gun to your eye line, not ducking your head to see the bead.

    In riflery, when crossing a plain in search of small varmints for example, the technique is largely the same -- as it is in combat. Bring the rifle to your eye, don’t duck down to the rifle.

    When shooting a handgun, according to an aged document from the American Pistol Institute (now known as Gunsite Academy), the plan for the 250 – Defensive Pistol included students beginning range experience with the mount.

    As there are less points of contact with the handgun than long guns, you could argue the mount is more critical. It’s certainly critical when learning the gun. 

    Some will decry this beginning as “range world,” alleging that one can never do this operationally. Is there something to this? It seems a bit like using the sights. Walt Rauch once told me that the sights on a handgun are like the training wheels on a child’s first bicycle; once you learn the mount through extensive practice, the sights confirm your hold.  

• "Overrated & Unneeded: Back-Up Iron Sights"--Recoil Magazine. Despite the click bait title, the author notes that if your handgun's red dot sight becomes occluded for some reason, your front iron sight will not be visible either. He discusses three alternative methods of sighting:

•  Guillotine/Shoulder Squaring

First popularized with the Trijicon RMR due to the convex top glass, the guillotine is simply placing the top edge of your MRDS at the base of the target’s neck, like you’re chopping the head off a French noble. Similarly, you can align the edges of the optical body with the shoulders and press.

• Owl Horns/Crowning

This method simply lines up the top of the optical window with the top of the target’s head. With an RMR this may look like horns on the head, and with a rounded window you’ll give them some new headgear — right before you turn their face inside out.

• Meat-In-Window

Sealed sights work exceptionally well with this method because they have both front and rear windows to line up (sound familiar?). Look for misalignment between your pistol and target by observing shadows in the window itself. The longer the optical body, the more accurate this method will be.

He has other advice, so read the whole thing. 

• "Behind the Bullet: The .500-416 Nitro Express"--American Hunter. 

    Unlike the American system of naming a cartridge derived from an earlier design—the .25-06 Remington, 7mm-08 Remington and .338-06 A-Square come quickly to mind—where the new bullet diameter comes before the parent cartridge, the British method uses the parent cartridge name before the new bullet diameter. The .450/400 NE is the .450 Nitro Express necked down to hold .400-inch (actually .411-inch) diameter bullets; the .500/465 NE used by Teddy Roosevelt is the .500 Nitro Express cartridge necked down to hold .465-inch-diameter bullets; and so on and so forth. Kreighoff mated the case of the .500 Nitro Express with the abundant bullets of the .416 Rigby, resulting in the .500/416 Nitro Express, a well-balanced cartridge which makes a sound choice for dangerous game. 

     Looking at the ballistics of the .500/416 NE, you might recognize the formula: a 400-grain .416-inch-diameter bullet at a muzzle velocity of 2,300 to 2,350 fps, generating 4,700 to 4,900 ft.-lbs. of energy at the muzzle. These figures are common to the .416 Rigby, .416 Remington Magnum and .416 Ruger, and are certainly more than adequate for any and all game species on earth. A 400-grain bullet of this nominal diameter possesses a Sectional Density figure of .330; anything above .300 is considered perfectly acceptable to deliver the penetration needed for taking thick-skinned dangerous game, and modern premium bullets are even more effective in the field. In fact, for the visiting sportsman using the services of a Professional Hunter, this formula is just about as perfect as you could ask for, and just might represent the quintessential balance of striking power and ease of shooting, especially in a double rifle which has a little more weight to it.

• "WSM Legionary 22: Lightweight .22 LR Can Under $200"--The Firearm Blog.  An excerpt:

    The suppressor weighs 3.5 ounces with a 1-inch diameter, keeping it from upsetting the balance of lightweight rimfire rifles and pistols. The body is 6061-T6 aluminum with a Type III hardcoat anodized black finish. Thread pitch is 1/2x28, which covers the vast majority of threaded .22 LR barrels on the market. I have a few .22LRs, and they’re all threaded in this pitch.

    On the performance side, WSM claims the Legionary 22 reduces sound levels to 114.10 dB on .22 LR, which works out to roughly 27 dB of noise reduction compared to unsuppressed fire. That should put it in a competitive territory for aluminum rimfire suppressors in this price range. 22s are one of the few rounds I dare to shoot suppressed without hearing protection, apart from the odd sub-9mm here and now.

MSRP is $189.99. 

• "Hunting with Air: Getting Started"--American Hunter. The author notes:

Here in Idaho, you can use PCP air rifles to hunt upland game, small game, big game and furbearers. Different caliber restrictions apply depending on the animal you’re pursuing. For example, projectiles must be at least .35 caliber for deer, pronghorn, wolf and black bear, and at least .45 caliber for elk, moose and sheep. The bottom line, whether it’s varmints, game animals or furbearers, it’s legal to pursue with an air rifle here in Idaho.

• "Myth Of M1 Carbine Penetration Failures in Korea"--Scattered Shots.  There had been persistent reports from some troops in the Korean War that the M1 Carbine was unable to penetrate the heavy winter clothing worn by Chinese troops. This assertion always seemed strange to me because nothing comparable was reported in WWII of which I'm aware. The author of this piece decided to test the story. He writes:

    Being August, I could not manage sub freezing temps, but I did set up a cardboard target behind a very thick pad that I added extra clothing by stuffing it inside to make it even thicker.  I set up from 200 yards away and fired.

    The military FMJ round had no problem punching through the thick clothing and padding just as I knew it would.

    Even from 200 yards the carbine and its ammo said by “experts” to be puny. not only went through the padding with ease, it zipped through the wood and damaged it more than I expected.  But it was not done yet.

    It traveled another 10 yards and tore into the dry hard packed dirt and rocks behind   several inches deep with little deformation to the short stubby 110 ball rounds.      

Others have debunked this as well:

• "Debunking M1 Carbine Myths: What the Record Actually Shows"--Keep Shooting. 
• "The Box O' Truth #36 - Frozen Clothing And The Box O' Truth"--The Box Of Truth. 
• VIDEO: "Testing The M1 Carbine Myth That Won't Go Away: Can it Penetrate Winter Clothing at 100 Yards?"--Battlefield Curator.  

• "Review: Jim Green African Ranger barefoot boots"--Survival Common Sense.  

Barefoot boots have become a “thing.” The concept is that barefoot shoes/boots allow the foot to react to the ground as it would if the walker was walking barefoot. This strengthens muscles in the feet, bare foot proponents claim, which may have become weakened because of years of  wearing shoes. Going barefoot allows the legs and spine to align naturally, proponents further claim, reducing or eliminating back aches, joint issues and other posture-related problems.

• "SELCO: There’s History and There’s What Really Happened (and Why)"--Organic Prepper. An excerpt:

    Some events or reasons for those events, or actions alone that led to events, do not exist for official history.

    There are ways that you can access those “nuggets”, or real historical events that never happened based on approved history.

    Sometimes they are told to you by the witnesses or people that took part in the events. In that way, you can get bits and pieces of history, how it looked on the ground, and usually, you’ll be shocked how “real history on the ground” is completely different from the official one, no matter what event or timeline we are talking about.

    Sometimes you can find it, again in bits and pieces, in places that share alternate views about historical events. Those places are usually being ridiculed by the official side as conspiracy theories, a bunch of weirdos, etc.

    Sometimes they are nothing more then conspiracy theories and weird content produced only for money-making. But sometimes there is more there, so the authors are more than ridiculed, they are getting silenced, in one way or another.

    Real history is always much more interesting than the official one. And by saying that it is always much more “interesting” than the official version, I mean it is more ugly, dirty, and treacherous. 

• "How to Choose a Ferro Rod That Won’t Let You Down"--Survival Common Sense. The author recommends:

    A lot of people focus on rod length first, but diameter is often the more important detail.

    A thin ferro rod may still work, especially for occasional use, but thinner rods usually have less surface area and can wear down faster. They can also feel less forgiving when your technique is off. If your angle is not perfect, or if your scraper is not ideal, a small rod can make the whole process feel more difficult than it needs to be.

    A thicker rod generally gives a little more margin for error. It often feels easier to control, easier to scrape, and better suited for repeated use. That does not mean bigger is always better, but it does mean that ultra-small rods are often best treated as compact backup tools rather than primary fire starters.

    If you are building a main fire kit, choose a rod size that gives you confidence, not just portability.

• "Free Survival eBooks: Downloadable Straight from Amazon"--More Than Just Surviving. This isn't a list of specific titles--these change constantly--but instead includes searches for different categories of books by price (lowest to highest). 
• "Mother Nature’s Best Home Remedies"--Homesteading.  Some medicinal plants and how to use them. 
• "Older buildings and substandard construction left Venezuela vulnerable to earthquakes"--Associated Press. From the lede: "Older buildings, substandard construction and geography left many neighborhoods in Venezuela vulnerable to strong earthquakes like the ones that struck the country this week." Also:

    David Cocke, a structural engineer in California and former president of the Earthquake Engineering Research Institute, said that a combination of soft soils, tall towers and older concrete structures contributed to the widespread damage, particularly when buildings pancaked, or collapsed floor-by-floor.

    “They just don’t have the more modern reinforcing steel connections that we put in those kinds of buildings today,” said Cocke.

    Since the 1970s, engineers have known that concrete buildings are particularly susceptible to earthquakes and seek to reinforce new construction with steel. While many rich nations have forced property owners to retrofit or tear down dangerous buildings, many poorer or middle income countries have lagged in enforcing upgrades as they battled more immediate woes.

• "Astronomers: We might be experiencing a shower of comets from the distant Oort cloud due to a close pass of another star 2.5 million years ago"--Behind The Black. 

HD 7977 is a still nearby Sun-like star in the constellation Cassiopeia whose close passage was discovered by the Gaia mission. Approximately 2.5 million years ago, the orbits of the Sun and HD 7977 brought the two stars close together, but exactly how close is still an open question. Gaia data suggest they passed within 4000-25000 astronomical units of one another. Now, Kaib and Raymond have shown that the orbits of long-period comets suggest HD 7977 came within 6000-10000 AU of our Sun, setting off a major shower of new comets into the inner solar system.

RPG Saturday: Space: 1889

 

Space: 1889 was a Victorian Era era role playing game released by Game Designers Workshop (GDW) in 1989. It did not see the commercial success that GDW wanted and was quickly cancelled by GDW in 1990. This is somewhat amazing to me, as interest in the game has held on with subsequent versions (same setting but different game mechanics) being published by several companies over the intervening years. 

    The game is an amalgam of the science fiction of Jules Verne, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, H.G. Wells, and Edger Rice Burroughs, combining the fantastic elements of their stories with the scientific theories of that day and age, giving an early steam punk vibe. It reflects an alternate history of the Victorian Era where Mars and Venus are habitable and interplanetary travel is possible. The result is the colonial revelry of the Great Powers extending to include the inner planets of our solar system. 

    The basic background of the game is informed by certain theories of the period: that Mars was a world slowly dying from lack of water, crisscrossed by canals; that Venus was a hothouse world covered with thick jungles, swamps, and oceans much like a primordial Earth, hidden under a permanent haze of clouds; and that space was filled with the Ether--the medium which transmitted light waves and gravity. 

     The alternate history used by the game begins with Thomas Edison inventing an Ether propeller that can move a craft through space. However, the propeller will not work until a craft is lifted to altitude of 24,000 feet on Earth. Once a working device was developed, Edison and a Scottish adventurer named Jack Armstrong set off for Mars in 1870. The initial lift was provided by a hydrogen balloon after which the Ether propeller took them to Mars where they made first contact with the Martian inhabitants. With their return to Earth, the race to colonize Mars and the other inner planets took off. Because the power for the Ether propeller comes from solar boilers, Ether ships are limited to the inner solar system, so the outer planets remain unexplored.

    While Zeppelins and dirigibles are used for airships, one of the most valuable exports from Mars is liftwood--a naturally occurring tree wood that when correctly harvested and shaped has antigravity powers. By a system of louvers made of lift wood, a ship can control its lift and maneuver above a planetary surface. So the best airships use lift wood. 

    There is other "mad scientist" type technology that you can incorporate into your game--lightening cannons, freeze rays, and mechanical men, for instance--but other than the Ether propeller and other technology necessary for space travel, most of the other technology in the game is either technology that existed or extensions of the same that could have been possible if the right inventor (and investors) had come along. 

One of the three main types of Martians

     The game system was actually quite simple. Characters were primarily defined by six attributes: Strength, Endurance, Agility, Intellect, Charisma, and Social Level, with scores ranging between 1 and 6. Unlike some other games that incorporate some version of social level as an attribute, it makes a real difference in this game as it limits which careers are open to a character and also is used to determine their wealth--basically the amount of money and other resources available to the character. 

    But this is also a skill based game system. Characters can gain skills in three ways: default skills which are associated with certain attributes, with the character receiving one for each of the attributes (plus "throwing"); skills awarded by virtue of the character's career; and skills "purchased" by use of skill points or experience points. 

 

    There are two basic game mechanics in the game. In one method, the player rolls a number of 6-sided dice equal to the score of the attribute or skill being used and compares it against a target number based on the difficulty of whatever the character is doing. For instance, if a character was trying to force open a door and had a Strength of a 4, the player would roll four dice and add up the total. If it was equal to or greater than the target number--say, 12 because the task was "difficult"--then the character would succeed in forcing the door. However, for quicker play for things of a "standard" difficulty, the player would roll a single die, and if the result was equal to or less than the appropriate attribute or skill level, the character would succeed in what they are doing.

    Combat has special rules. In Melee combat, each weapon has a number of hit dice that are rolled to see if the target is struck, which number may go up or down depending on certain modifiers. The person controlling the character being attacked also rolls a number of dice to block or parry blow. Each successful blocking die cancels out a successful attacking die. If the number of successful blocking dice exceeds the number of successful attack dice, not only has the attack been stopped, but the extra die or dice can be used for an immediate attack (e.g., a parry and riposte with sword). This seems complex and slow, but I believe the intent was to try and capture the feeling of two opponents trading blows. 

    Missile attacks (e.g., shooting a rifle, throwing a spear) are resolved similar to the basic game mechanic, but with modifiers to reflect different situations or the distance to a target. 

    And there are special rules for mixing both melee and missile attacks (e.g., Martians armed with spears attacking a British officer armed with a revolver). And the game has fairly detailed rules on fights between airships, fighting animals, using heavy weapons or explosives, and so on.

    If you want a more detailed explanation of the rules, see the video at the bottom of this post. 

    But beyond the rules is the setting of the game. There is a lengthy chapter just describing the Victorian Age, space travel (including rules on creating Ether ships), different types of equipment and weapons, inventing new devices, and, of course, the descriptions of the different bodies that the characters could travel to: the Earth's Moon (including a sample adventure), Venus, and, of course, Mars.

    I have to admit that I haven't really played this game much. It was published during a period when I was living overseas. Sometime after I returned, a friend of mine had bought it and, looking through it, I was intrigued. But I think we only played through one adventure ... and I'm not sure we even finished that adventure. This friend like buying a game, playing one or two adventures and then, seemingly bored, would move on to something else. And that seemed to be the case here. 

    But the setting intrigued me, so when I came across a copy of the game a couple years back, I picked it up. Later I stumbled across a copy of the Referee Screen which I picked up as well. In addition to the actual screen, it also included a booklet with some additional or expanded rules. 

    I still haven't put together an adventure--time and other commitments--but as I look through it again while writing this, I sure want to give it a try. 

    There were a surprising number of supplements and adventures published for Space: 1889 including rules for a miniatures war game. A computer game was even released. The rule book, supplements and adventures are available as PDFs on Drive-Thru RPG.  

    Interestingly, someone even produced a full length fan film based on the game setting (see the video at the very bottom of the post).  

 VIDEO: "Rules Breakdown: Space 1889"
RPGGamer (9 min.)

 

VIDEO: "Space 1189 - The Secret of Phobos Full Movie"
Orkenspalter TV (2 hrs 33 min.)

Vox Day: Citizen Vigilante And Why It's Too Late For A Political Solution

Vox Day discusses Citizen Vigilante and the political class' reaction in his piece "It’s Too Late Now." He notes some comments from some unnamed individual who found the movie disturbing because they "worry that unhinged members of our society might try to copy the main character," and urges that society can vote it's way out of this problem. Day responds:

No, we can’t. That’s the problem. There isn’t a better way any more, there isn’t even a different way, because the very forces that have brought the West to this juncture have relentlessly prevented the people of the West from having any voice in their own invasion and subjugation. Popular approval for this program of legal, government-assisted invasion was never, ever, sought. Every attempt to stop it through political means was thwarted in an illegitimate manner by the system. Mass immigration, political refugees, and migration have ALWAYS been very politically unpopular. No one ever voted for open borders. No one in Minneapolis ever asked to be invaded by Somalis. Every time a European country voted against its own submission to the EU, people were paid off and it was forced to vote again until it voted “the right way”.   

He discusses the morality and necessity, concluding: "Every nation, every people, have the immutable right to cast out the foreigners from their midst if that is their will. And every nation, every people, have a moral duty to do so when the foreigners are preying upon their women and their children."

    There seems to be a certain inevitability to this. It is reminiscent to the build up to World War I. You can go back and read books in the decades leading to World War I and it seemed an accepted fact that there would be a war with Germany. Here, the political class had to know that mass immigration would, over time, encounter greater and greater push back, yet they continued. The question is why did they continue.

    In some respect, I can understand that because the welfare state Ponzi scheme is collapsing along with collapsing birth rates, these countries need to import more warm bodies to pay into the system. But if that was the primary concern, there would have been some mechanism to screen who was coming in to ensure it was someone who would be productive. But the authorities didn't, which makes me believe there is more to it--that it really is the product of a hatred and loathing of their own peoples. 

    If there is nothing else to come out of this film, it will shift the Overton Window. I've noticed people posting memes essentially pointing out that remigration is the moderate position. That may, in fact, become the popular position.  

Meme Of The Day: Did It Though?

 

VIDEO: .22 Punch Out Of A Snub Nosed Revolver

This video compares the Federal Punch in .22 LR against a Federal Personal Defense in .38 Special +P, both out of snub nosed revolvers. Shots were initially taken into clear ballistic gel and then followed up with a heavy clothing barrier and a fiber board insert to simulate ribs. Surprisingly, the .22 Punch penetrated around 14"--just shy of the penetration depth of the .38 Special. This isn't an argument that the .22 will cause as much damage as the .38, but that the .22 Punch has much better penetration than other .22 LR out of a snub nosed revolver, and will reach the recommended FBI penetration depth against those barriers.  

 VIDEO: "Is a .22 LR Snub Nose Revolver Viable for Self Defense? This Ammo is a Game Changer! - Federal Punch" - Gun Sam Revolver Ballistics (17 min.)

VIDEO: Backcountry Splinting

This video goes over wilderness treatment of a suspected fracture, stating with removing of a boot or other clothing that might cause injury as the limb swells, and then demonstrates the shaping and securing of a SAM splint. They used a dark colored splint, but my thought with emergency equipment is to have it in bright colors to make it easier for rescuers to spot you. 

VIDEO: "Splinting in the Wilderness (Survival Doctors & PrepMedic)"
PrepMedic (12 min.)

Insurrection: NY Mayor Defies Supreme Court

The New York Post reports: "Mayor Zohran Mamdani promised to never accept the US Supreme Court’s ruling allowing President Trump’s administration to strip deportation protection for Haitian and Syrian migrants." 

Postal Service Won't Deliver Mailed Ballots In Corrupt States

From Time Magazine: "Postal Service Plans Not to Deliver Mail Ballots to States Unless They Hand Over Voter Data." 

    ... the Postal Service’s proposed rule said that agency employees would verify the eligibility of mail-in ballots by checking them against lists of voters that states would share with the federal government. The proposal, though, said that Postal Service staffers “would not verify whether individuals should or should not be included on a State’s Mail-In and Absentee Participation List,” adding that “states will retain full control over the content of that list.”

    At a Senate committee hearing on Wednesday, Steiner confirmed that the proposal would mean that the Postal Service wouldn’t deliver mail-in ballots if a state didn’t provide this list of voters who have requested absentee or mail-in ballots. 

Democrats are upset even though it was their corrupt practices that necessitated this new rule.