Archive for May, 2008
Why You Won’t See the Iranian Weapons We’ve Captured in Iraq
Your only response should be wondering what they are trying to sell you, and why.
News Blackouts
There could be no more bigger news story in the past 5 years, then the revelation that Iraqis and their US and coalition allies have soundly defeated Al Qaeda, neutralized Sunni resistance to the government, and severely constrained the violence and influence of sectarian militias, both Sunni and Shia.
Federal court rules against military’s gay policy
Is the end of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” near?
Volkswagen predicts U.S. diesel share could hit 30% by 2018
My second car was a 1980 diesel VW Rabbit. It was quite economical, though I don’t know quite how it would have compared to the gasoline Rabbit.
Russians admit spaceship suffered a snag
I hadn’t realized things were quite so serious.
New Blockbuster Prototype Stores
Coffee, comfy chairs, and such.
Our “fascist” space program
Chair Force Engineer on the state of things today.
What did Nash see?
Nash was onto something, I’m sure of it. And the photos seem to prove that there was an unexpected attack on one of the military installations outside of Piedmont.
The Andromeda Strain
Watched this 1971 movie recently with my son. I hadn’t seen it in years, and enjoyed it thoroughly. So did my son. Haven’t read the book.
McCain’s Vice Presidential Barbecue?
McCain invited several potential running mates to his ranch this weekend. Could one of them be his choice?
Universal Day of the Jedi
May 25th. May the Force be with you.
The Top 10 Self Defense Myths
I’ve never heard of the “Gross-Out Defense,” but I’m positive it’s worthless.
Plains, Trains, and Plantains: The Story of Oedipus
If this is legit, someone should be beat with a club, and it’s not the writer. It’s the teacher who gave him (and I’m pretty sure it must have been a him) a passing grade. (Still, a good read. – Ed.)
Alien Bar
Designed by Hans Ruedi Giger.
Chestburster Tattoo
Girls dig that sort of thing.
New Red Spot Appears On Jupiter
I thought this sort of thing wasn’t supposed to happen until 2010.
Zombies, sure…but what about dinosaurs?
How to defend yourself against a tyrannosaur.
Why, this could explain the THOUSANDS of Craters on the Moon’s surface
Lunar explosions. Who knew?
Carnival of Homeschooling No. 125
A great weekly resource for lots of cool stuff.
I didn’t know the Canadians had a DD(X)…
Got this email in response to a post last week which noted that funding for the Army’s Future Combat Systems (FCS) had been cut:
The biggest issue I have with these big ticket programs such as FCS and LandWarrior is that they are predicated on the assumption that we know the type of war and adversary we will fight decades down the line, without taking into account the revolutionary nature of warfare.
I wish I could remember the name of the book, which had a bunch of essays concerning the future of war. One essay in particular struck a nerve, about a combat unit of the future that has come to totally rely on its netcentric and computer systems, to include a novel “simulation” program that basically would crunch the numbers of all the relevant data and spit out the course of action that should be taken and its probability of success.
The story ends, of course, with the destruction of that unit by an adversary who took advantage of their reliance on that system and was able to corrupt its results. In the end, though, the actual action that ends with the annihilation of said unit was carried out with comparatively primitive weaponry.
We have to stay focused on the future, certainly, but we have a ‘here and now’ war going on that is going to require a refitting of our forces in the near future, especially the Guard. That was one of the biggest complaints about the Whiz Kids who ran the war in Vietnam . Most of the braintrust in the Pentagon was more concerned with the strategic aspects of the Cold War and our nuclear capabilities and gave very short shrift to the actual combat that was going on in the field at that time.
We have to train and equip to fight the war we’re in while also remaining capable of fighting the next ones. The danger of “over-correction” is very real.
Regarding “refitting the Guard,” I’d like to state again my suggestion that perhaps the National Guard could be designated to provide mostly “major war” capabilities with mostly heavy combat brigades trained for mech anized warfare. This would simplify the training of part-time troops yet provide bulk for the heavy hitting if needed. The active duty Army, of course, would retain much of its big war capability, but full-time troops are more easily retrained for new missions as needed.
This would also cut down on the lengthy deployments of Guard troops to campaigns such as the current ones in Iraq and Afghanistan. This would be a good thing.
A problem with this plan would be that some of the new-fangled equipment for big wars might not be so financially successful if the active Army buys less of it.
Worse things could happen, I guess.
It just occurred to me that in the confusion surrounding the technical issues earlier this week, I never posted the links to all the great gun bloggers I met down in Louisville last week.
I think this is close to complete:
- A Keyboard and a .45
- Bitter
- Bloggo, the dog boy
- Call Me Ahab
- Chicago Handgun Rights
- Dave Kopel
- Days of our Trailers
- Glenn Reynolds
- Joe Huffman
- Michael Bane
- Ol’ Broad
- Rustmeister’s Alehouse
- Sailor Curt
- SayUncle
- Sharp as a Marble
- Smallest Minority
- Snowflakes in Hell
- Squeaky Wheel
- The Ten Ring
- The Unforgiving Minute
- US Citizen
- XRLQ
No doubt, I left someone out. If so, just kick me. And send me a note so I can apologize and correct my list.
Besides this star-studded crew, I also had the pleasure of meeting and chatting with the following non-blogger stars:
- Gordon Hutchinson, author of The Great New Orleans Gun Grab
- Todd Jarret, shooter extraordinare
- David E. Young, 2nd Amendment researcher and author of The Founders’ View of the Right to Bear Arms
- Robert Brown, editor of Soldier of Fortune magazine
- Ronnie Barrett of Barrett Firearms
- and a lot more.
A nifty interactive map of homicides in Baltimore allows you to break down by crime, age, race, etc. The breakdown won’t surprise many people, though I was shocked at the gap.
Aircrews perform a preflight check on an MQ-9 Reaper before it takes off for a mission in Afghanistan. The Reaper is larger and more heavily-armed than the MQ-1 Predator and in addition to its traditional ISR capabilities, is designed to attack time-sensitive targets with persistence and precision.
A lot of folks are surprised at the size of the Predator and Reaper. I know that I was. I think people think it’s small because it’s unmanned. This is a good photo to give a sense of how large the Predator-B Reaper is.
The original MQ-1 Predator had a length of 27 feet and a wingspan of 48 feet. The Reaper is 36 feet long with a wingspan of 66 feet.
Here’s an artist’s rendering of a fully loaded Reaper. Here’s a kinder, friendlier version.
UPDATE: Reader comment:
You know what just occurred to me? The MQ1 Predator was almost as long as a WW2 fighter with slightly greater wingspan. The MQ9 is longer than a P51 with something like twice the wingspan. And much much more firepower. And no one in the cockpit. Not that there is a cockpit.
That hadn’t occurred to Murdoc. Sure helps put it in perspective.
A crane operator lowers a REMUS 600 autonomous undersea vehicle (AUV), configured with a laser scalar gradiometer, into the water from aboard TWR 841 May 19, 2008, during AUVfest 2008 at the Naval Undersea Warfare Center’s Narragansett Bay Shallow Water Test Facility in Newport, R.I. During AUVfest 2008, participants demonstrate and test the applications of AUVs for both mine countermeasures and archaeological research. DoD photo by John F. Williams, U.S. Navy.
The ten foot, 530 pound AUV can operate in as much as 600m of water. REMUS stands for Remote Environmental Measuring UnitS. See the Hydroid page for more.
What has been caught on camera in Chicago. As Say Uncle would say, it appears to be an unpossible situation.
Go check it out and comment at Uncle’s. His comments are still working.
What a mess. I’ll try to have them up again soon.
I’ll be amazed if this posts correctly.
UPDATE: Well, it only took 2 tries. Vast improvement.
UPDATE 2: Things are still wobbly.
UPDATE 3: What a mess.
UPDATE 4: I’m going to turn back on the CAPTCHA thing for comments.
