Baltimore – Conspiracy House…?

Michael Cessna March 29, 2024

In the early morning hours of March 26, 2024, the container ship MV Dali lost all power and steering as it attempted to depart the Port of Baltimore, heading to Colombo, Sri Lanka. Drifting with the current of the Patapsco River, and influenced by inertia, the massive ship rammed the southern support tower holding up the Francis Scott Key Bridge (also known as the “Key Bridge”). The impact resulted in the more or less instantaneous collapse of the bridge’s main span onto the ship’s bow, and causing several highway maintenance workers (working the night shift to repair potholes on the bridge) to fall into the frigid waters; tragically, although two of the workers were rescued, another six are missing and presumed dead, as of this writing (March 29). There is conjecture as to whether anyone else went into the water, as there may be other vehicles under the wreckage.

Given that less than ninety-six hours, as of this writing, have elapsed since the incident, very little hard information is available concerning the details of what actually happened. From all appearances, however, it appears that the crew and the harbor pilots aboard were caught completely by surprise. Given that, they appear to have done everything they could to try and mitigate the disaster; the ‘Mayday’ call issued by one of the harbor pilots almost certainly saved dozens of lives, by getting Maryland law enforcement and transit authorities to lock the US Highway I-695 toll booths prior to the impact.

The MV Dali is a container ship of middle size, as international cargo carriers go, being rated for just under ten thousand Twenty-foot Equivalent Units (TEU); in practical terms for the layman, this equates to carrying the equivalent of about 5,000 semi-truck trailers as cargo; in contrast, the EVER GIVEN, which grounded and blocked both directions of the Suez Canal almost exactly three years ago, on March 23, 2021, is one of the largest container ships in the world, clocking in at over 20,000 TEU’s. The Dali is homeported in Singapore, but is currently under lease to the MAERSK line, one of the leading shippers in the world, and was operating with a crew of 22 from India. Despite very ugly comments from certain sectors, nothing appears to have been wrong with the crew’s performance. Similarly, the ship was in good repair, having been inspected at previous ports of call, as well as in the Port of Baltimore itself. Singapore is very careful about keeping vessels it has granted a flag to, to maintaining a high standard of operations and repair.

Perhaps inevitably, the sun had barely risen over the accident scene before speculation began to run wild online, with breathlessly frenetic claims ranging from insurance scams to cyber hacking, to an attack by “Insert Foreign Entity Here”, to a “Black Swan”/“false flag” event sparked by “Insert Portion of the US Government Here”. While many, if not most, such ideas border on the demented, given the events of the preceding two or three decades – depending on where the counting begins – they do need to be looked into, at some realistic level.

That is what we will now proceed to.

Conspiracy – or Accident?

The first thing to understand is that maritime accidents happen all the time. The Dali itself had a docking accident in 2016, and there is the EVER GIVEN incident referenced above. There was actually a ship grounding in 2022 in Baltimore…things happen all the time and sometimes, they happen in the worst possible places.

This incident is almost certainly just as it appears: a devastating and tragic accident, occurring at precisely the worst place and time…

However…People jumping to a conspiratorial view of this incident are not necessarily kooks and weirdoes – although there are, of course the obligatory “occult” explanations that are…”inventively creative” is probably the best term.

There seems to have been nothing wrong as the Dali was towed away from the dock by Port of Baltimore tugboats. The ship was escorted by tugs to make a tight U-Turn as it left dockside, and began to build up speed; this is a completely normal procedure for most large vessels when leaving port. Neither was its acceleration to c.8 knots (9 mph/15 kph) unusual for its position in the Patapsco River’s channel. Likewise, the tugboats disconnecting as the Dali completed its U-Turn unusual; again, this is completely normal procedure for leaving port.

The problems begin as the ship neared the bridge. Videos of the ship approaching the bridge clearly show its lights shutting off, followed it beginning to drift. The Dali displaces nearly 149,000 tons, is nearly 1,000 feet in length, and stands nearly 100 feet from the surface to its highest point. Losing power to engines, steering or both, renders ships of this size completely at the mercy of both wind and current, as is shows by the ship immediately beginning to drift in the current. The crew apparently tried an emergency restart on the ship’s generators, producing the cloud of smoke seen in the video, and a momentary restoration of power…By then, however, it was too late, as the power failure occurred as the ship was less than a mile from the bridge – ships this large cannot stop on a dime, and by the time power was restored, it was far too late to correct the drift.

One underhanded and disingenuous tactic used by various “conspiracy theorists” (as opposed to “conspiracy analysts”) is to make assessments based on sped-up versions of the video. This kind of gaslighting warps the perspective of the unwary and/or inexperienced viewer; it is very much the kind of behavior that gives “independent researchers” a bad name.

But…the timing of the power loss is frankly suspicious, as it occurred at precisely the worst possible moment, where the crew and pilots would have essentially no way of diverting – much less stopping – the vessel, preventing an impact with the bridge.

Likewise, there is nothing unusual about the ship being able to knock the bridge down. The Francis Scott Key Bridge began construction in 1972, and opened in 1977. Commercial ships were far smaller in those days, but even so, a large vessel ramming the bridge supports head-on – deliberate or not – would almost certainly cause a catastrophic collapse; this would be the case with most bridges in the world, then as now. If there was a serious fault in the bridge’s design, it was in the near-total lack of protective “dolphin” barriers to protect the bridge supports, which certainly allowed the Dali to strike the support tower directly.

Comments have questioned what appears to be a “dynamite charge” exploding at the moment of impact, directly above the bow of the ship. In reality, this was a power cable running along the top of the bridge girders snapping, throwing off a shower of sparks as it separated…It was not an explosive, nor was it a thermite [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermite] charge – that is not how those things work…

…Still, the timing remains highly questionable. Based on the notion that this was a deliberate act of sabotage, we will now look at potential “Who’s” and “Why’s”.

Who?

Assuming that this was a deliberate act, one in which the ship’s control systems were hacked or sabotaged in some other way, the first question to ask is “Who” would carry out such an attack?

The number of groups around the world with the capacity to hack a commercial vessel at precisely the right time and place to cause significant damage is almost too large to calculate. At the same time, such a “hostile foreign entity” would have to have very precise and highly detailed intelligence on the vessel and the Port of Baltimore in order to carry out their attack effectively. While certainly difficult, such a potentially hostile foreign entity could well have such a capability.

The next potential culprit, unfortunately, consists of any number of factions within the power structures of the United States Government, itself. This is, sadly, a significant possibility, given the relentless exposure of the openly hostile and highly illegal actions carried out by various groups within the US Government over the course of the last seventy-odd years, if not more, actions that range from COINTELPRO, to Project Megiddo, to the Library Awareness Program, to any number of operations carried out in the aftermath of the 9-11 Attacks.

Why?

The next question to answer – or at least try to puzzle out – would be “Why?”

For a hostile foreign actor – whether a state like Communist China, North Korea, Russia, etc., or some flavor of terror group – shutting down a major US oceanic port for one or two months (the initial estimate of the time needed to clear the channel of debris to allow the Port of Baltimore to reopen), especially given the presence of a four-ship squadron of the Department of Transportation’s “Ready Reserve Fleet” (RRF) which supports the US Navy around the world, is definitely attractive. At the same time, while certainly a serious situation for strategic operations, this is actually not that critical of a problem, as there is redundancy built into the RRF for such situations.

*MARAD Ready Reserve Fleet ship locations, 2021. USDoT. Public Domain.*

What is much more serious, is the effective closure – even if temporary – of one of the busiest commercial ports in the world. Currently, projected losses are estimated at some $15 billion dollars per day, as well as closing access to the largest port importing cars into the United States. Added to this is the potential impact on the jobs of some 8,000 people in Baltimore, if not more. Overall, this is not a blow that Baltimore can easily deal with, as the port has been the only economic engine keeping the city financially above water.

Clearly, these results are highly desirable for any foreign actor.

Conversely, there is the notion of a deliberate act engineered by factions within the US government. While this possibility cannot be reasonably dismissed out of hand, it is difficult to see what they gain would be.

A simple insurance scam is rather pointless, as is the idea that delaying the ship’s cargo delivery to Sri Lanka is of such importance that it would require crippling a large vessel and blocking a major port. Similarly, staging such an incident to divert attention away from any number of ongoing political, legal, military or social issues currently plaguing the United States is hard to grasp, as even the “alternative media” is still talking about many issues besides this disaster…

Follow-throughs…?

…In both circumstances – a foreign enemy or an internal one – the telling question is the lack of “follow-on” attack[s]. When the Imperial Japanese Navy completed its raid on the US military bases at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on December 7, 1941, it did not stop there. The Japanese military capitalized on its devastating strike, and launched a series of massive offensive operations throughout China and the Western Pacific region simultaneous to their attack. This is common throughout history – one does not commit to a major attack on a location without an immediate follow-up attack, singly or in quantity. The expenditure of assets – financial and military – simply is not worth the effort is there is no follow-on operation to capitalize on a successful strike.

Conclusion

This last point is really the best argument in favor of this entire affair being a simple, tragic accident, one that is having an impact far outside its mechanical circumstances.

There are conspiracies aplenty in the modern world. It is important to carefully examine sudden events to see if ulterior motives are factors, and spell out such motives if they are identified…at the same time, it is equally important to not assume that a conspiracy exists where it does not. That requires careful and sober examination of the incident in question.

However, just because a conspiracy is not immediately evident, that does not prevent such a situation from being exploited by the unscrupulous…as has happened before.

Forewarned is forearmed.

*The Freedomist — Keeping Watch, So You Don’t Have To*

The ‘Combat Shotgun’ – The Ancient Weapon Still Punching Above Its Weight

Michael Cessna March 22, 2024

Shotguns are ancient technology, as firearms go. It is no stretch to say that the first handheld firearms that we would recognize as such were, in fact, “shotguns” as they usually fired multiple projectiles at ranges within one hundred yards…assuming, of course, that the weapon did not explode in your face. Saint Barbara was devoutly venerated for a reason.

Over the centuries, as metallurgy and chemistry made firearms increasingly reliable (and safer), the shotgun remained the main personal firearm, through the use of ‘buck and ball’ rounds. These combined a large musket ball with a few smaller pellets, essentially a middle ground between the ‘bird load’ used in hunting, the modern “double-aught” general purpose round, and the modern hunting slug.

As rifled weapons developed and matured throughout the 1700’s and into the 1800’s, shotgun-type loads began to fade out in military use. With the development of the ‘Minié ball’ in 1846, shotguns virtually disappeared from world armies as anything more than ‘foraging guns’.

This did not make the shotgun obsolete, however – far from it. Civilian hunting shotguns kept pace with military innovation, albeit for different purposes, and law enforcement still used shotguns for everything from countering rioters to concealed firepower for discrete protection of political figures.

With the United States’ entry into World War 1, however, the shotgun returned to the battlefield, with a vengeance.

In the confused, dirty and brutal world of trench warfare, the common handguns and bolt-action military rifles of the day simply did not function very well, resulting in all manner of impressively ingenious – and extremely vicious – improvised weapons. The German solution to this problem was the invention of the submachine gun, in the form of the MP-18. The Americans, however, brought in shotguns.

*Winchester Model 1897 “Trench Gun” with bayonet, 1921. Public Domain.*

Largely consisting of Winchester Model 1897’s, American units were very familiar with the use of shotguns in recent combat, having used them during the Philippine-American War in 1899, and in the 1916 expedition into northern Mexico, to chase the bandit Pancho Villa. These rapid-firing, pump action shotguns quickly made their presence felt, to such an extent that the Imperial German General Staff – who had initiated modern gas warfare – issued a formal protest over the use of shotguns. When the United States reminded them of the shotgun’s history, and pointed out that the shotgun caused no more unusual damage than their own chemical weapons, the Germans threatened to execute any US soldier captured with a shotgun, or shotgun ammunition. In response, the United States threatened to execute any German soldier captured wielding flamethrowers or serrated bayonets. The Germans not only are never known to have executed any US shotgun troops, but apparently issued some captured 1897’s to their own ‘stormtroopers’ alongside the MP-18.

The Model 1987 Trench Gun, as it came to be called, continued in US military service until at least the 1950’s. As the Vietnam War heated up, however, US troops began to arrive with more modern weapons, such as the equally legendary Remington 870. With better ammunition technology – the old waxed paper or fully metal cased shells, having been replaced with the brass-plastic case ammunition – the modern combat shotgun was born.

*A member of the Marine detachment from the nuclear-powered aircraft carrier USS THEODORE ROOSEVELT (CVN-71) takes aim with an M-870 12-gauge shotgun during boarding team training in 1991.*

With the ability to deliver devastating close-range firepower, the combat shotgun is an intimidating weapon in the extreme. Most combat shotguns run with eight rounds in their tube magazine, with another round “up the spout” in the chamber. If loaded with double-00 buckshot, that means a combat shotgun can fire about seventy to eighty.32 projectiles at high speed. Few, if any, other weapons can equal this level of fire. Additionally, unlike both pistol-caliber submachine guns and military select-fire rifles, most shotgun loads do not “over penetrate”, or pass through all manner of wall and roof materials, endangering civilians on the other side of those barriers.

*Mossberg M590 breacher shotgun, 2021. Netherlands Ministry of Defence. Public Domain.*

In addition, shotgun shells have evolved over time to fire all kinds of strange loads, from flares to rubber bullets, “bean bag”, tear gas, and door breaching rounds. This flexibility, coupled to ease of use and a generally less alarming appearance to the public, have guaranteed the combat shotgun’s continued use by police, but has also made it a favorite for the military when units have to operate at close quarters.

Despite repeated flirtations with “assault shotguns”, there has never been much real interest in the idea, as no design submitted does any one task in an overly superior way to the combat shotguns currently in service, and any advances in ammunition design can usually be accommodated with minimal changes to the weapon itself.

*The M26 Modular Accessory Shotgun System. 2018. DVIDS photo. Public Domain.*

The shotgun has been used in combat for centuries – and it isn’t going anywhere, anytime soon. Good design works.

Militarizing Police Forces – Success or Liability?

Michael Cessna March 15, 2024

The controversy over the militarization of law enforcement has been a continuing question in the United States since the inception of the SWAT (Special Weapons And Tactics) concept of the late-1960’s. While some parties cover their own political biases on the subject by ranting about the US Federal Government providing “military equipment” to local law enforcement departments, primarily through Washington’s “LESO” program, such pandering to “fear-porn” is simply the willful refusal to acknowledge the reality that any “militaristic” expression of law enforcement is precisely what those hysterical parties demanded for years…and then were faced with results that they refused to believe were possible.

While rather clichéd, the popular idea of the “good police” was formed in the 1950’s by television shows such as Dragnet and the later Adam-12. As the years rolled by, however, it became increasingly apparent that the “good cop” – even if a real thing – was not capable of dealing with the new realities of criminal violence at the end of the 1960’s.

Increasingly, local police and county-level sheriff’s departments were faced with criminal gangs operating drug labs in remote rural areas, that offered criminals the ability to utilize military-style tactics to defeat police efforts at arrest. Similarly, worsening political violence in urban areas displayed a significantly different character than the violence of previous decades. In this context, armed groups – primarily Communist groups inspired by the likes of Vladimir Lenin, Mao Tse Deng, and Ernesto “Che” Guevara – attempted to initiate urban revolutionary warfare against the United States establishment and its citizens.

The passage of time, as well as the shifting motivations of the popular media, has downplayed the levels violence involved, to the point where the resurfacing of old training videos sponsored by state-level police departments are seen as almost fiction, when in fact, the reality was that violent attacks and kidnappings were frequent occurrences. What would now be openly called organized terrorist campaigns were waged by groups as diverse as the Weathermen, the Black Liberation Army, the Ku Klux Klan (KKK), and the Symbionese Liberation Army.

For these reasons, long-time observers were in no way surprised at the recent uptick in “ambush attacks” against police officers around the nation; indeed, the wonder was that the surge in such attacks had not happened earlier.

In response to the increasingly complex violence of the 1960’s, first the Philadelphia Police Department – quickly followed by the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) – established large teams of officer designated and trained to respond to various situation that were outside the realm of normal police duties. To a great degree, the SWAT concept was limited to dealing with bank robberies and hostage situations. This situation changed decisively after LAPD SWAT fought its landmark gun battle with the Symbionese Liberation Army on May 17, 1974. Police departments around the nation took note of a law enforcement unit being suddenly thrust into an openly military type of operation, and began to act accordingly.

*LAPD SWAT officers, 2015. Photo Credit: Marc Cooper. Public Domain.*

Beginning with larger departments, SWAT-type units were formed within departments, and began training and equipping those teams accordingly, frequently seeking training advice from prior-military service veterans of the recently concluded Vietnam War, as those soldiers usually possessed skills not previously taught to police officers. The Federal Government took notice, with the FBI laying out the basis for its Hostage Rescue Team (HRT) in the late-1970’s, leading to its actual founding in 1983.

Civil police departments, however, quickly realized that they needed more extensive assistance to maximize a unit like a SWAT team. With the US military establishment being both legally restricted from directly aiding civilian law enforcement by the Posse Comitatus Act, and not wanting bad press in the aftermath of Vietnam, police departments struggled to properly equip their teams. However, as there was a concurrent decrease in strictly political violence as the 1970’s drew to a close, local departments used their SWAT units for both “high-risk warrant service” and hostage rescue situations. Both type of operations, of course, straddle the line between strictly police enforcement and military operations.

*FBI HRT during the 2011 the Aztec Fury exercise. USMC Photo. Public Domain.*

Beginning in 1990, with the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Years 1990-1991, the Federal Government opened up the direct sale of military surplus equipment – including weapons and certain armored vehicles – to civilian law enforcement agencies, under what was then called the “1208 Program”, after where is appears in the enabling legislation. In 1996, various wording was changed and the law was expanded, going into effect in 1997, becoming the current “1033 Program”.

The vast bulk of the weapons and equipment available to civilian law enforcement agencies is gear that is either excess to the military’s needs, or is older equipment that the military has completely replaced in its Active, Reserve and National Guard units. Because of the heavily discounted amounts (down to “free for the taking”) offered to civilian law enforcement, this has been a great boon to expanding the capabilities of local police departments and their various special teams. Since 1997, though, while high-risk warrants and hostage rescues by police have certainly happened, but SWAT units in most departments are usually used to raid drug labs and dealers, which actions are specifically encouraged in the 1997 legislation.

Tactically speaking, these operations are far from military-level actions. The reasons are simple: such raids will have, at most, one to four hostiles that the police are planning on arresting, and even if the police teams meet resistance, it is certain to be short, disorganized and ineffectual. Most importantly, the criminals the SWAT teams are trying to arrest rarely have any desire to “fight it out to the bitter end”; actions like that certainly happen, but it is very rare. Criminals, by and large, are more likely to surrender than to fight to the death.

Two incidents, however, revealed the weakness of the widespread reliance on SWAT teams.

On February 28, 1997, serial bank robbers Larry Phillips Jr. and Emil Mătăsăreanu attempted to rob a Bank of America branch in the Los Angeles suburb of North Hollywood, sparking one of the largest gun battles in US police history. While the details – and video footage – of the shootout are widely available, the takeaway is that responding police officers were categorically incapable of dealing with a single pair of largely untrained criminals, operating under significant amounts of illegals drugs, who had no intention of surrendering. The pair of gunmen were finally taken down because their own incompetence, Phillips dying by his own hand, and an already-wounded Mătăsăreanu being mortally wounded by a hail of point-blank fire from three SWAT officers after a bungled attempt to flee.

Worse, however, were “after-action” interviews with the SWAT officers. While all of the responding police officers – and certainly the SWAT officers – displayed outstanding levels of bravery that should be justifiably recognized and hailed, their attempts at conveying accurate technical information was terrifyingly abysmal.

This is not a case of pedantic criticism. One of the chief tenants of military ability is being both “technically and tactically proficient”, in this case, being able to correctly identify both the types and capabilities of equipment, but also in making realistic assessments of hostile force’s capabilities. This was very definitely not in evidence in the aftermath of the shootout, even years later.

The other case was exposed serious issues in police response to determined, non-criminal violence was the 2008 terrorist attacks on the city of Mumbai, India. A 10-man team of terrorists from the Pakistan-based Lakshar-e-Taiba conducted a highly complex infiltration and attack operation against the city – a metropolis of over 12 million – lasting four days, with a frightening level of competence.

Local police were essentially helpless, as the attackers were not there to commit simple crimes like robbery or kidnapping. The terrorists were there to kill as many Indian civilians as they could; only one terrorist would ultimately survive to lay out the details of the operation for Indian police and military operators.

A 2013 Naval Postgraduate Study examined the question of potential United States civilian police response to a hypothetical Mumbai-style attack. The results are far from encouraging, especially given the events of the subsequent decade.

While very large police departments – such as the LAPD, among others – have written detailed plans for dealing with multiple “active shooter” incidents, and while acknowledging that improvised bombing attacks can generate larger number of casualties than infantry/commando style shooting attacks, both the study and those department’s own manuals also acknowledge that such dedicated types of attacks would generate widespread fear and terror (hence, the designation of “terrorist attack”) throughout not simply the urban area affected, but also throughout the wider region, as well as the nation as a whole.

Lurking under these stolid studies is a fundamental issue: Police officers – hysterical screaming to the contrary – are not mentally or psychologically prepared for a confrontation with a group such as Lakshar-e-Taiba. Taking down drug dealers, child traffickers and the occasional unstable individual are one thing; dueling with an organized, focused and dedicated team of shooters who are not operating for any of the conventional criminal reasons is an animal of an entirely different stripe.

As incidents from the North Hollywood shootout, to the Columbine and Uvalde school shootings demonstrate, many police departments around the country – regardless of the level of material support they may have received from the 1033 Program – are not psychologically prepared to deal with a single shooter who is willing to fight to the end, much less a pair of shooters, even when the shooters are completely untrained; the response of Nashville, Tennessee police officer to the recent school shooting there is the exception that demonstrates the rule.

In light of the foregoing, the continued hysterical demonization of American citizens to not simply defend themselves firearms in the absence of police, and equally strident calls to limit not only the ability of American citizens to own firearms, but to restrict their ability to obtain competent and useful training with weapons they already own, is highly worrying, given the demonstrated willingness of left-leaning city administrations to not only actively restrict their police departments from dealing with organized, large-scale violence, but also giving criminals literal “get out of jail free cards” for “petty crimes”.

This demonstrates, more than anything else, that the “average American citizen” is very much on their own when it comes to crime in their nearby areas.

If you are reading this inside the United States of 2024 – take note.

Technically & Tactically Proficient – Can Military Leadership Be Self-Taught …?

Michael Cessna March 9, 2024

We’ve previously discussed the “democratization of military training”, way back in 2022, looking at the idea of individuals, with no previous military training or experience, teaching at least one of those skills to themselves. Since that article, the ability to acquire those skills – what Great Britain used to call “small tactics” – has only expanded throughout the internet; indeed, all that is necessary is knowing what information to ask for.

Of course, certain things are required to teach oneself these kinds of skills, primarily access to at least basic small arms, such as rifles, handguns and/or shotguns. Of course, for the longest time, access to such weapons could be problematic; in many places in the world – and increasingly, within the United States, itself – that requirement can still present issues. Recently, however, that impediment has been reduced through the use of highly realistic “toys”, primarily “Airsoft” weapons, which mimic actual military-type weapons in current use. While Airsoft toys have significant issues in trying to impart realistic levels of firearms training, they can be effectively utilized to cover many of the basics, drastically reducing the need for “live fire” training and experience. Likewise, while keeping in mind that using Airsoft for military-like training has serious handicaps, it can help teach the basics of small-unit maneuver, at least up to the squad to platoon levels.

This ability to train realistically – even if not precisely up to the level of “actual” military levels – is already making its impacts felt in places such as Burma, where insurgents fighting a brutal military junta’s forces have been able to couple effective training with 3-D printed firearms to “bootstrap” themselves into effective guerilla infantry formations.

So terrified has the “power elite” within the United States Government become, they are resorting to desperate actions to ban even a hint of such training options for civilians – in effect, creating an underclass dividing civilians from prior-service military personnel…The fact that such actions are specifically counter to Congress’ own foundational requirements does not seem to even be a consideration to a group desperate to retain their own power and authority.

*The Minute Man, sculpture by Artist Daniel Chester French (1850–1931), 1875, Concord, Massachusetts. National Park Service. Public Domain.*

That said, there is another aspect to the training issue: that of “leadership”.

Military leadership – contrary to the views of many in the military, political and corporate sectors – is very different from “leadership” in either the corporate or political sectors. Leadership in a law enforcement agency does bear some resemblance to military leadership, but there are fundamental differences even there.

At its core, military leadership is much more difficult to define, let alone execute in the field. While there is a legal expectation of obedience inherent in military leadership, as there is in the political and law enforcement spheres, this almost never true in the corporate sector. Likewise, while law enforcement officers are expected to voluntarily face danger, there is seldom – if ever – a legal requirement to risk their own lives, as the verdict in the trial of the armed officer in the Parkland high school mass shooting demonstrated…This is very much not a verdict that would be laid in a military court martial for a similar offence.

In a very real sense, military leadership is centered on the fundamental principal that the commissioned or non-commissioned officer holds both the legal responsibility and moral authority to order their subordinates into situations that have a high chance – and potentially a guarantee – of resulting in said subordinates death or severe wounding. Such a responsibility is something that few politicians will ever face, in the course of their political careers; in the United States, the only political leaders who hold such authority are the President of the United States (in relation to the Federal Armed Forces), and the various governors of the Several States (in relation to their State National Guard commands).

The prescient question for this article, however, does not necessarily revolve around “legitimate authority”; in fact, the nature of his article more or less assumes that the notion of “legitimacy” does not come from a “vertical hierarchy”, but from a “lateral agreement”.

In the real “old days”, military leadership came from the strongest, meanest and most capable warrior, who used their fighting prowess to gain a band of followers who followed them because of their demonstrated skill and wisdom. In time, this evolved into various forms of social hierarchy, primarily in the form of “kingship” and an associated aristocracy, based on military ability and personal loyalty. Aside from the occasional aberration, such as the Roman Centurion system, this remained the case in Western Europe until the 17^th Century.

*The First Muster, 1637. Artist: Don Troiani. Public Domain.*

Beginning around that time, the idea of the old “feudal levy” began to evolve into that of citizen militias. These types of formations were frequently self-organizing, in the literal sense of the term, where a group of local people – usually at the village or town level – would assemble on their own, pronounce the formation of some level of militia unit, the members of which would then volunteer to “place themselves under military discipline” (a very ‘loaded’ term, and one which the modern military struggles with to this day). And then, they would frequently do something so unheard of today, it is nearly impossible to find references to it: the self-mustered militia soldiers would elect officers from among their ranks as leaders.

In the British colonies of North America, the various colonial governors preferred to appoint officers to military ranks, such as George Washington’s direct appointment to the rank of Major by the Lieutenant Governor of Virginia, but the reality was that colonial governors could not afford to be too picky with a group of militia self-organized in time of need.

While the election of officers from within the ranks could certainly be problematic and prone to corruption, incompetence, and discipline problems, it actually tended to work out more often than not. George Washington’s frequent criticism of the various Colonial militias was aimed primarily at their officers being more concerned about keeping their positions by not enforcing too strict a regimen of discipline on their men, and likewise not training their men too strenuously, since those men could easily vote them out of their positions at any time. This was not true, however, in all of the hodge-podge of militia units Washington had to work with, but it did have a negative impact. While this negative impact led to the creation of a “regular” army, that army remained tiny for the entirety of the War of Independence, relying on local militias to fill its gaps for the entire course of the war.

As time went on, of course, the idea of local militias began to fade out of the public mind, especially as states struggled to retain sole control over their state military forces. Now, the same parties within the US government trying to outlaw military training for civilians outside of the armed forces, with the aid of their allies in the “popular press” have demonized the term “militia” to the point where most American equate the word to “terrorist”…

…But that is a whole other discussion.

To return to the point: Can a civilian – with no formal training or military experience – “self-teach” themselves to become an effective military leader? A leader capable of not simply leading a military formation, but of creating a basic training regimen for whatever troops they can “attract to their banner” (to borrow a phrase)?

The answer, as can be surmised, is…it’s complicated.

Reading various works on military leadership, both from the “old days” and newer works, is always a good start; a basic reading list will be presented at the end of this article. However, there is always a break point, where theory and reading must be put into practice.

And that’s the difficult part: a military officer – whether appointed from a higher authority or self-taught – is very much a chief in need of ‘spear carriers’: without troops to lead and teach, the self-taught “officer” will never know whether they have effectively learned the lessons their readings have taught them.

The majority of readers of this article will almost certainly never have to actually face this issue in “real life”…and you shouldn’t want to, by any means. But – the situations and threats of the world of the early-21^st Century may require those skills.

It’s your decision whether or not to pursue the idea of teaching yourself how to lead troops. While I certainly cannot make that decision for you, you should be very concerned about government flunkies who don’t want you to do so.

Military Leadership Resources:

FM 22-100 (1961) Military Leadership [archive.org]

Small Unit Leadership: A Commonsense Approach; Dandridge M. Malone [Amazon]

FM 16-100 – Character Guidance Manual (1961) [archive.org]

Platoon Leader; James McDonough [Amazon]

Company Commander; Charles MacDonald [Amazon]

The Passion of Command; McCoy [Amazon]

Company Command – The Bottom Line; Meyer [Amazon]

The Submachine Gun – Relic Or Revival?

Michael Cessna March 2, 2024

When, in the middle of 19^th Century, metallic cased cartridges began to revolutionize the utility of firearms, inventors around the world focused on systems that could improve the utility of firearms in general. The bulk of this development, however, was rather surprisingly applied to the civilian sector, and not the military side.

Military forces are highly conservative by nature. If a thing or a tactic worked in the last war, chances are good that it will work in the next one. Certainly, buying new weapons to replace the old and worn out ones is just a good policy, overall, but “new anything” used to be held as highly questionable: “new stuff” and new tactics are suspect until they have been proven under fire. There is also the concern of confusion and congestion in the supply system should war break out while you are in the middle of transitioning to a new system; this was one of the key arguments of US Army Brigadier General James Ripley – long the whipping boy of those who though that the Henry Rifle (the predecessor to the Winchester lever action rifles) should have been adopted – had about metal-cased cartridge weapons in general: the army procurement system was simply not set up to handle a massive change-over in the middle of a war.

*1860 Civil War Henry Rifle No. 4771, 2009. Photo credit: Hmaag. CCA/3.0*

Money played its part, too, because “new” equals “expensive”. The Vickers Machine Gun – the British version of the Maxim Gun – cost roughly $10,000 in today’s money. In 1914, that was an eye-wateringly large amount of money for a weapon that only fired rifle-caliber ammunition. The prior experience of European militaries using automatic weapons in colonial wars – where the opposition carried flintlock muskets, at best – was not seen as relevant to a “major power” war.

These concerns are not fits of childish whining. Getting this kind of thing wrong results in your own troops ending up dead when they didn’t have to be, and frequently catastrophic failures on the battlefield, as the US Navy discovered in World War 2, when it found that its new torpedoes didn’t work…at all.

When World War 1 began in August of 1914, most of the nations involved committed the arrogant cardinal sin of assuming that the war would be over – in their favor, of course – by December. Needless to say, it wasn’t. World War 1 saw European armies bash their heads against the wall, literally, using every tactic and weapon they could come up with to try and break the deadlock of trench warfare, which was itself straight out of the book, when mobile operations could no longer make progress, and you didn’t want to surrender your gains. And this is no different today, as Russian and Ukrainian troops quickly discovered in 2022.

A German trench occupied by British Soldiers near the Albert-Bapaume road at Ovillers-la-Boisselle, July 1916 during the Battle of the Somme. The men are from A Company, 11th Battalion, The Cheshire Regiment. John Warwick Brooke. Public Domain.

What to do?

Conventional infantry tactics of the time for assaulting a trench system were what we would now term “human wave attacks”, largely unsupported by weapons we now consider essential tools of warfare. Rifles were universally, manually operated bolt-action weapons…and that was it. Machine Guns like the Maxim and the Vickers were not easily moved under fire, and mortars were scarce. The best forces could do for support were massive – sometimes days-long – artillery barrages, that were frequently ineffective. While there were aircraft, their impact in supporting infantry attacks was more or less non-existent. What assault troops needed was a lightweight automatic weapon that could be carried and operated by a single soldier on the move, a weapon small enough to be maneuvered in tight quarters, and that could be fired more rapidly than any rifle, but which was not a handgun.

The result was the submachine gun.

The submachine gun fires a pistol caliber bullet from a detachable box magazine. While it can fire shots in the semi-automatic mode, they could also fire in the fully automatic mode; this is the definition of selective fire.

Imperial Germany and Italy were the only powers to actually develop and deploy submachine guns (quickly abbreviated to “subguns” or “SMG’s”) during the First World War. While rather awkward (the Italian Villar-Perosa), or rifle-like (the German MP-18), the new weapons quickly showed their promise, quite literally “in the trenches”.

The heyday of the SMG, however, was the Second World War. In that war, industry caught up to technology, and changed the game. Low-cost machining equipment allowed the rapid production of simple designs. Where designs at the start of the war, like the Thompson and the Lanchester were essentially elegant and finely made weapons, they were at least as heavy as a conventional rifle, and were expensive, time consuming and extremely expensive to make.

*Dutch soldier deployed to Indonesia with Lanchester SMG, 1947. CC0/1.0.*

The SMG’s of the “interwar period” (the time between the first and second world wars) quickly gave way to weapons optimized for rapid production. The British STEN Gun, the American “Grease Gun”, and the Soviet PPS were extremely low-cost, to the point of being downright crude in the case of the PPS. In a very real sense, the bulk of World War 2 SMG’s were the polar opposites of the World War 1 and Interwar designs…too much so.

Post war, SMG development sought to find a middle ground, even as the selective-fire “assault rifle” began to make its presence felt. The Israeli “Uzi” and the “Carl Gustav m/45” from Sweden still used inexpensive manufacturing methods, but the weapons were produced to a much higher standard of quality than wartime necessity and developing design had allowed.

*Israeli soldier on the road to Ismailiya, 1973. Photo credit: Naor Amr. CCA/2.5*

As the 1960’s dawned, however, two rival designs appeared that would become the defining designs of the submachine gun class: the MP-5 and the MAC-10.

The MAC-10, designed by Gordon Ingram in 1964, was extremely compact, and was manufactured in a variety of calibers. Not much larger than a handgun, the MAC-10 series were quickly “bootlegged” by criminals, because the design was easy and cheap to build…The MAC design, however, had a number of flaws. The worst of these was its extremely high rate of fire, which could range from 900 to well over 1,100 rounds per minute, making the weapons extremely hard to control in any situation. This also affected their reliability, resulting in frequent jams. The MAC design still limps along today, with various small companies striving to fix the design to make viable as more than a curiosity.

*Mac-10 submachine gun used to kill Colombian minister and lawyer Rodrigo Lara. Photo credit: Yukof. CCA/4.0*

The other design is the near-legendary MP-5. Made by the German firm Heckler & Koch, the MP-5 became the touchstone to measure other SMG’s against.

*U.S. Navy SEALs coming in from the water. US Navy photo, c.2003.*

Appearing only in 9x19mm, the MP-5 had a solid and reliable action, excellent sights, and came with a wide variety of barrel lengths and buttstock options, enabling it to be tailored to any situation users could think of. The weapon first really entered the public eye during the 1980 Operation Nimrod, where British SAS commandos retook the Iranian embassy in London from hostage-takers in a daring daylight assault. The images of black-clad SAS troopers carrying MP-5’s quickly saw Hollywood desperately acquiring any version of the weapon they could, resulting in the weapon being shown in literally hundreds of movies, television shows and video games. The MP-5, however, is no shirker – it very much lives up to its media reputation.

Military forces around the world loved the MP-5, praising its reliability and accuracy. But, for those military’s that had purchased other weapons from Heckler & Koch such as the G3 rifle, among others, the MP-5 quickly became the go-to for military police and special forces.

*North Penn Tactical Response Team of Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, practicing Cellular Team Tactics, 2008. Photo credit: Tim McAteer. CCA/3.0*

As the 1970’s drew to a close, however, the assault rifle rose to dominance. Many militaries decided – mostly for financial reasons – that if they could eliminate an entire class of weapons that required a separate supply chain, weapons that could be replaced by the assault weapons their front line troops were carrying anyway, limiting those few remaining weapons to highly specialized units only, that would be a net win for their budgets…and for a time, events seemed to bear this out. It turns out that now, however – some 40+ years later – there are problems with this idea.

While there is a good deal of overlap between assault rifles and SMG’s, they are very much still apples vs. pumpkins. Even shortened assault rifles still weigh much more than the closest SMG. Additionally, the recoil and muzzle blast from an assault rifle’s cartridge is far larger than that of a handgun. Coupled to this, is that rifle cartridges of all categories move far faster, travel far farther and hit far harder than a 9mm or .45 ACP round. This is a serious problem in close-range urban or hostage-rescue operations, because over-penetration is a serious risk. Among the results of the many problems of “too much” power, is the euphemistic term “collateral damage” – and mangled civilians (especially children) mangled by your troops are definitely not something your government wants on the nightly news.

And all of the above comes before we start talking about the 3-D printed SMG’s currently helping to defeat the military junta of Burma.

Submachine guns have a long history, and they still have significant roles to play. War and other necessary hostile actions are not going away anytime soon, heartfelt desires to the contrary. There need to be reforms in the procurement process because increasingly, civilian politicians – and all too frequently, general officers – are definitely not the people who should be making decisions.

After all – your life might depend on their decisions.

Tools of the Trade: Hip-Pocket Artillery – The Rifle Grenade

Michael Cessna February 23, 2024

Almost a year ago, we briefly discussed the common hand grenades used by infantry and police around the world. These remain among the most common non-rifle weapons carried by soldiers around the world. While we have touched on this particular subject in passing in several articles, this week we are looking at the hand grenade’s ‘next level’: the Rifle Grenade.

*Japanese troops training with rifle grenades, c.2003. Photo Credit: Norseman5614. CCA/3.0*

Since grenades came into widespread use in the mid-17^th century, the weapon’s greatest detraction was its range. Limited to the strength and coordination of the thrower, hand grenades can only be used at very short ranges, typically within 50 yards/45 meters, at the most extreme range. While it is technically possible to throw a hand grenade farther, outside factors – extreme fear, fatigue, enemy fire, etc. – severely limit the throw range.

Coupled to this, in the early days, fuses were generally a piece of rope that had been soaked in a solution of saltpeter (KNO₃) or gunpowder. Obviously, this did not make for a very reliable timing system in the field, where it was openly exposed to rain and mud…and other fluids. As a result, grenades faded from use in 1760’s, their memory kept alive by the units of European armies specially selected for use – the Grenadiers – who, due to their size and strength (the better, it was believed, to throw grenades farther) were converted into assault units, designated to assault an enemy position.

*Private grenadier of the L.Gv. Preobrazhensky Regiment, 1700 to 1732. Painted c.1840. Unknown artist. Public Domain.*

As World War 1 dawned, technology had advanced to the point where reliable timing fuses, protected from the environment, finally made hand grenades reliable enough to use; tactics, however, still had to catch up, as in 1900 the term “rifle company” meant precisely that – 100-120 men, equipped with rifles and bayonets, with only officers carrying pistols. New, and very expensive weapons like machine guns were actually considered to be light artillery (as their size and weight placed them on light carriages based on those for light cannons and howitzers). They and their heavier counterparts had to be assigned to an infantry unit separately. The PBI’s (“Poor, Bloody Infantry”) had to make do, and figure it out, otherwise.

But, as the horrors of full-scale trench warfare closed in along the Western Front, armies needed a way for the infantry to attack an entrenched enemy. Grenades were ideal, but they could only be used at very close range, and while the opposing trenches could occasionally get to within 100 yards of each other, that was still too far for the hand-thrown grenade.

The British, German and Austrian solution to the problem was the “rod” grenade. This worked exactly how it sounds: a steel rod was attached to the bottom of a hand grenade that had been fitted with a longer fuse; the rod was inserted into the rifle’s muzzle and aimed, then the grenade’s safety ring was pulled out, and the grenadier pulled the trigger to fire a blank cartridge with no bullet in the case. The force of the gases from the firing shoved the grenade and its rod out of the rifle, and threw it 150-200 yards or so.

*Mills bomb N°23 Mk I, with launching rod attacked. Photo credit: Jean-Louis Dubois, 2007. CCA/3.0*

I can hear the groans and shrieks of terror and horror from all the shooters reading this from here.

The rod grenade – while it did work – severely damaged rifle barrels, to the point where a rifle would quickly become useless for anything else, as the stress of repeated firings warped the rifle barrels to the point where they could no longer fire accurately…assuming that they did not blow up in the firer’s face on the next launch.

In response, the British swiftly developed the “cup discharger”. This was a steel cup, just large enough to fit a hand grenade inside, that was clamped onto the muzzle of the rifle. A blank cartridge was loaded, and a hand grenade with a “gas check” plate welded to its bottom was slipped into the cup, and fired. While this system still placed heavy stress on the barrel from gas over-pressure, it was nowhere near as bad as the rods had been. Great Britain would continue to use this system through World War 2. Both Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan would use a similar system, although both of those combatants used rifled dischargers to add range and accuracy.

*A member of the Home Guard demonstrates a rifle equipped with a cup discharger to fire an anti-tank grenade, Dorking, 3 August 1942. Imperial War Museum. Public Domain.*

The French tackled the problem in a very…well, ‘French’ manner, with the “VB” grenade, named for its designers, Messer’s Viven and Bessières. This also used a special cup – in this case more like a cylinder, which clamped to the rifle’s muzzle. A specially designed grenade (quite different from a standard hand grenade) was slipped into the cup and aimed. The grenadier did not have to use a special blank round, though – the VB was activated and launched with a conventional bullet: When fired, the bullet exited the muzzle, deftly striking a lever inside the grenade, which activated the percussion cap to ignite the fuse. The action of the lever’s bottom end swing closed trapped the propellant gases coming up behind the bullet, and used them to throw the grenade clear of the discharger cup.

Photographs of a French V-B rifle grenade, a bullet trap type. Top shows views and cutaway of the grenade, bottom shows the grenade and grenade launcher, which is affixed to the rifle. Cross-section shows that the grenade is a pass-through design, allowing the use of live ammunition. Arming tab, activated by the bullet’s passage, can also be seen. US Government, c.1917-1918. Public Domain.

The VB worked very well, and solved the only real problem of the cup discharger, in dispensing with the blank cartridge. When the United States entered the war it, too, adopted the VB design, although it had to manufacture its own weapons, as American and French system and calibers were significantly different. The US would retain the VB design until the early stages of World War 2, using them as late as the 1942 Battle of Guadalcanal. In contrast, while the French military abandoned the VB after World War 2, their Gendarmerie would use the design to launch tear gas grenades into the 1990’s.

*French riot police deploy tear gas, 2007. CCA/2.0*

World War 2 Japan took a very different course, with their Type 100 Grenade Discharger. This device fired standard hand grenades from a cup fitted to the rifle muzzle, and that was launched using a standard rifle bullet. However, unlike the VB system, the Type 100 was offset from the muzzle, and used a gas tap from the firing to launch the grenade out to about 100 yards. This is not surprising, however, if one knows the history of Japan’s infamous “knee mortar”.

The United States led the way after World War 2, by adopting the “spigot” type of rifle grenade. This mounted a grenade on top of a tube with stabilizing fins, which slipped over the muzzle of the rifle, and was fired by a blank cartridge. This eliminated the need for a separate launcher, although still requiring a special cartridge. NATO would eventually standardize on a grenade with a mounting tube with an internal diameter of 22mm. This allows a common system for any standardized rifle to fire both blank cartridge, “shoot-through”/VB-type grenade and “bullet-trap” type grenades.

Advancements in materials technology would lead to the development of the “bullet-trap” design, allowing a rifle to fire a grenade with a regular cartridge; the rifle bullet would be captured by the bullet-trap on the grenade, using both the force of the cartridge’s gas and the physical force of the projectile’s impact to launch the grenade.

In the late 1950’s and early 1960’s, with the rise of the “intermediate cartridge”, the muzzle-launched rifle grenade began to fall out of favor, as the intermediate cartridges available lacked the energy to effectively launch the older grenades to the same ranges. The only solution was to shrink the size of the grenades. This led to rifle grenades being seen to be less effective than lightweight rocket launchers such as the M72 LAW. There was, however, a replacement that stepped in and took over: the 40mm Hi-Low Grenade.

First deployed by the United States in 1961 with the adoption of the M79 grenade launcher and the later M203 system that could be easily mounted under the barrel of most military rifles, this system was so revolutionary, no established state military’s land warfare units lack some system firing a variation of the Hi-Low system.

*MSG Claude L. Yocum, HHC, 2nd Bn., 1st Inf., 196th Lt. Inf. Bde., Vietnam. 1960’s. US Army photo. Public Domain.*

These weapons are able to launch grenades out to 200 to 400 yards (sometimes farther), which have a blast effect similar to a regular hand grenade, but that also fire a wider variety of grenades than the older models of rifle grenades.

Wars are always violent; expecting them to be “clean” or “surgical” is a fantasy. Weapons development is not evil, if the weapons make your forces more capable of ending a war faster, with as little destruction and savagery as possible.

As the legendary Chinese general Sun Tzu said in the opening lines of his military treatise, The Art of War, in c.500BC –

The art of war is of vital importance to the state.

It is a matter of life and death, a road either to safety or to ruin. Hence under no circumstances can it be neglected.

To The Shores Of Tripoli…

Michael Cessna February 16, 2024

The United States Marine Corps has a world-renowned reputation as one of the most capable, and most elite, fighting forces on the planet. Many people are equally familiar with the lyrics of the Marine Corps Hymn. Frequently, however, little thought is given to the meaning behind those lyrics. This week, we’re going to talk about one of those lines, and how it relates to the present day.

After the United States gained its independence from England in 1783, the new nation suddenly found itself on its own in the wider world. While this did not too present much of a problem in most places, it quickly became a very serious problem along the coast of North Africa, past which, American-flagged merchantmen were carrying cargoes into Mediterranean ports, as they had done for decades.

The problem now, though, was that the ships were American – not British. Great Britain in the 18^th Century had, like many of the countries of Western Europe, come to an agreement with the Muslim pirates of the so-called “Tripolitanian Coast” where the Europeans would pay the Barbary Pirates what their leader, Pasha Yusuf Karamanli grandiosely termed “tribute” – the Europeans termed it “bribes” – to not attack those nation’s vessels. Ever since the payments began, American-based ships had been able to sail freely, as they flew the British flag, and carried British papers. After 1783, however, that all changed.

The Barbary Pirates – a group of coastal city-states including Algiers, Tripoli and Tunis – under the nominal control of the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire, had been the naval scourge of the Mediterranean for nearly six hundred years. Their raids to capture Christian European vessels, and enslave their crews, were exceeded only their slave raids along European coasts – ranging as far north as Iceland – raids that were so frequent, a significant portion of the population actually fled coastal areas, moving father inland to get away from the raiders.

European states, embroiled in constant wars with each other, were unable to continuously focus their otherwise-considerable military power against the corsairs. In a time-honored tradition, those countries resorted to simply paying the pirates to leave their ships and coasts alone. In reply, the pirates toned down their raids, only attacking (mostly) when payments were delayed for some reason. When the United States became independent, it had no standing agreement with the Barbary pirates, making its ships and merchants vulnerable.

In response to this sudden turn of events, US President George Washington convinced the US Congress to pass the Naval Act of 1794, authorizing the creation of the US Navy and Marine Corps – both of which had been disestablished at the end the War of Independence – for the specific purpose of cruising against “Algerian corsairs”.

*“An Act to Provide a Naval Armament”, 1794. US Congress. Public Domain.*

Although it took a few years, the new ships of the US Navy were eventually launched, and their crew – including the newly restored US Marines – headed out to deal with the Barbary pirates.

It got off to a rocky start – pun intended.

Although scoring some early victories against the pirates, the frigate USS Philadelphia ran aground outside the harbor of Tripoli on October 31 of 1803, and was captured. Her crew was imprisoned, the ship was re-floated, and towed into the harbor.

As a certain YouTuber has said multiple times, “Don’t touch America’s boats! We do not like that!”

Then-25 year old US Navy Lieutenant Stephen Decatur led a party of 80 volunteers (mostly US Marines) in a covert night raid on the port of Tripoli, approaching on a captured Tripolitanian craft, crewed by Sicilian volunteers who spoke Arabic. Sailing up the hulk of the Philadelphia, Decatur then led the Marines in a surprise boarding action that retook the ship in a wild sword-and-pistol fight in the tight quarters of the ship. Finding that the Philadelphia was too damaged to cruise as a ship again, Decatur and his party set fire to the ship and escaped, leaving the vessel to burn within the view of Pasha Yusuf’s palace.

*Stephen Decatur, by Charles Bird King (1785–1862), 1815-1825. Oil on canvas. Public Domain.*

Determined to put a stop to the Barbary pirates once and for all, US Army Captain and US Consul to Tunis, William Eaton traveled to the ancient city of Alexandria, Egypt late in 1804. Under the orders of Commodore James Barron, Eaton was commissioned as a lieutenant in the US Navy, and went to Alexandria to find Hamet Karamanli – the brother of Yusuf, Pasha of Tripoli, who had ousted Hamet (the rightful heir), to entice him into leading a revolt against his brother.

Encouraging Hamet was not a difficult task, only requiring enough money to purchase weapons and supplies. Hamet had about 500 supporters willing to follow him; Eaton (who Hamet had made a “General”) was able to hire about fifty Greek mercenaries from Alexandria’s waterfront district. The task of maintaining some semblance of order in the fractious little army fell to US Marine Lieutenant Presley O’Bannon, and his seven US Marines.

*Battle of Derna: Route of William Eaton’s army from Alexandria to Derna, 8 March to 25 April 1805. Map created in 1944, as a US Government document. Public Domain.*

The plan was to take Hamet’s force and march them along the coast to the Tripoli-controlled town of Derna. The army would capture it, and send out word for more loyalists to gather to Hamet’s banner. For the United States, the mission was rather different: the idea was to frighten Yusuf into negotiation under threat of being replaced at gunpoint.

If this is starting to sound like a familiar story, pat yourself on the back.

After a terrible march through the North African desert – as the Italians, Germans and British would discover some 130 years later – the force finally reached Derna on April 26th. Although outnumbered by an enemy entrenched behind castle walls, the force attacked suddenly in the afternoon of the 27^th. Hamet and his loyalists quickly captured that part of the town containing the palace and government offices.

The main attack, however, was by O’Bannon, his Marines and the Greek mercenaries. They fired one shot from their field gun (borrowed from USS Argus, that was supporting the attack with naval gunfire) then charged the walls, overrunning the defenses and either killing, capturing or driving off the defenders. O’Bannon raised the US flag over the fort, marking the first time US forces had captured a fortress outside the Western Hemisphere.

The victory was short-lived, however. US State Department diplomat Tobias Lear managed to negotiate an end to the First Barbary War and the release of the crew of the USS Philadelphia and other Americans being held in Tripoli. Figuratively and literally “hung out to dry”, Eaton and O’Bannon had no choice but to withdraw from Derna, taking Hamet Karmanli and the Greek mercenaries with them as they left; Hamet’s Muslim supporters were left on the beach…literally.

Hamet returned to Alexandria, and eventually settled in Sicily. He gifted a Mameluke Sword to O’Bannon for his bravery and leadership; this lives on today as the model for the officer’s sword of the Marine Corps, adopted in 1825.

Presley O’Bannon resigned from the Marine Corps in 1807, and settled in Logan County, Kentucky, where he went on to serve in the Kentucky legislature, dying in 1850. The US Navy would name a few ships for the Marine officer, including the Fletcher-class destroyer USS O’Bannon (DD-450)…which became the most decorated US Navy warship of World War 2, that also captured a Japanese submarine…with potatoes.

William Eaton was left embittered over how the Derna affair ended, and left government service in the aftermath. He became involved in the treason trial of former Vice President Aaron Burr in 1807, presenting evidence that the former Vice president had attempted to recruit him for an attempt to overthrow the US Government. Eaton retired to his hometown of Brimfield, MA, where he passed away in 1811.

…So, while the above historical look is interesting (hopefully), how does it relate today?

As of mid-February of 2024, there is a new pirate menace in the general vicinity of the long-ago conflict outlined above…in fact, there have been a number of “pirate menaces” in the last couple of decades. The specific details might be different, but the ancient rule still holds true: Nihil Novi Sub Sole

There’s nothing new under the Sun.

Incident Command – What You Need To Know

Michael Cessna February 9, 2024

Everyone has seen some form of disaster. Whether that disaster was a war, civil unrest or rioting, an earthquake, volcanic eruption, or some sort of sudden climatic disaster like a flood, almost everyone with an internet connection has experienced a disaster, even if they do so vicariously. But, unless the viewer is physically present in the disaster area, few people have any idea how “the authorities” are able to handle the disaster of the day, at any level of competence.

The answer, since 1968, has been the Incident Command System, or ICS.

Originally developed at a meeting of fire chiefs in Southern California, the ICS idea began as a development of command processes from the United States Navy. It was not, however, a smooth process. The failures in response management during the massive Laguna Fire of 1970 showed that methods of coordination and control were near-completely divorced from reality, and that a great deal of more work was required to develop a coherent and standardized response to emergencies. Beginning in 1973, with the creation of the FIRESCOPE program, what would evolve into the modern form of ICS began with the Tactical Field Control Operations section of FIRESCOPE, ICS quickly matured as Federal, State and local agencies adopted the idea as a standard system.

Seeing the utility of the idea, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) eventually created a 20-hour long standard training course that would allow the creation of emergency management teams in any area that could assemble the requisite personnel and assets. Coupled to a much more basic training program for civilians to act in disaster operations, this combination has significantly helped bring order out of chaos in many real-world disaster situations.

In doing so, it is a shining example of what government can do when it gets something right.

However, lurking in the background was ICS’s genesis as a military-based command structure. In the US military of the 21^st century, this is known as either “Battle Tracking” or “Command Post Operations”.

Because the situation in combat can completely change in a matter of minutes – or less – the idea of having a detailed, yet flexible, set of command protocols has been a very important feature of military operations for decades…And yet, the vast majority of civilians know little or nothing about the process of emergency management.

This is not really surprising, because despite their frequency, natural disasters and wars are very rare occurrences in the lives of most people. But, those dangers can present themselves at any time…and knowing at least something of the process – even if the reader never signs up for a course – will prove helpful should you ever find yourself in a disaster situation, by at least helping to understand at some level what is happening.

*FEMA Incident Command organizational chart. 2008. By FEMA. Public Domain.*

The above image depicts the standard notional organization of an Incident Command organization. It is a rather bland, “vanilla” organization, because it is intended to scale to any region, from a small town to the nation as a whole. It outlines the basic departments that would have to function in most emergencies. At the same time, it allows for expansion by adding specialist groups, should the situation call for it. This also allows for “on the spot” recruiting of survivors and volunteers to fill in holes.

A good overview of the process comes from the West Virginia Department of Education, which shows how a specific organization might use the basic ICS format to create its own specialized structure, based on what it deems are its unique needs.

But…How does this apply in any real depth to the individual – in a word, why should you actually care about this process?

To echo the beginning of this article, there are any numbers of dangers, natural and man-made, that can happen suddenly and without warning. There is a greater that 0% chance that you, the Reader, may find yourself in a sudden disaster situation – and help may not be on the immediate horizon. It may come down to you, to start getting things organized.

This is no encouragement to “Walter Mitty” fantasies. The fact that you may have never found yourself in such a desperate situation does not mean that you never will…and with the apparent trajectory of the world, as described by the news every day, the chances that you, personally, may have to either apply the ideas outlined above or step up to take part, is becoming a rapidly increasing possibility.

An article such as this is far too brief to do more than touch on the idea as a general concept. There are videos available that can give you a basic run-down, and the S2 Underground is a great place to start. But, while your author is usually loathe to recommend any government website for any practical purpose, in this case, the Reader should refer to the FEMA links provided above. Most counties in the United States offer some form of emergency management and response classes. Take at least a basic CERT course, to understand the tasks and challenges in responding to disasters – of whatever type – and to become better prepared for whatever might roll in your direction.

The world can be a scary place. But, it becomes significantly less scary if you understand the potential situations, and your options in those situations. You will not be able to learn these skills, nor establish connections with your friends, neighbors and fellow citizens through osmosis – you have to go out and acquire the necessary skills and contacts.

You and your family will appreciate it later.

Tools of the Trade – If I Could Only Have One

Michael Cessna February 2, 2024

As we head into February of 2024, the “wars and rumors of wars” have plateaued, for the moment: Israel’s campaign against the Hamas terror group is still grinding on; the Russian offensives against Ukraine continue to make progress, albeit slowly and painfully; the Chinese Communists are engaging in the time-honored Communist tradition of gutting their military leadership at the most inopportune times; United States and British naval forces continue to sporadically pound Houthi terrorist outposts in Yemen, although their effectiveness is somewhat in question, as the Indian Navy is engaging the occasional Somali pirate boat. Iranian mullahs continue to attempt to foment trouble around the world – no doubt helped by the $6 billion US Dollars sent to them by the Biden administration – even as the US flexes its bomber muscles in the region…And, speaking of that increasingly criminal organization, it seems to have blinked in its standoff with the US State of Texas over its criminal failure to execute the most basic of its duties under the United States Constitution – i.e., securing the US border against a literal invasion – even as it exposed itself, yet again, as holding the United States’ populace hostage to its desire to fund even more openly-criminal groups throughout the world.

In a word – things are on a low roar, at the moment. As a result, we’re going to take a look at something interesting and informative, as Freedomist/MIA doesn’t engage in the “fear-porn” popular in current media. When something develops in the arena of conflicts, we will cover it then, rather than keep terrifying you with spammy updates. That said…

Boomsticks

I usually make a conscious effort to avoid arguing for a “best rifle” (handguns are even more of a no-go in my recommendation department). Usually, I prefer to simply present you, the Reader, with a brief historical overview of a particular firearm that most people may not be familiar with, especially if the Reader might find themselves “going downrange”, in the modern vernacular.

In this case, however, I will make an exception. What follows, is strictly my own opinion – you can, of course, disagree with me…but you’ll still be wrong.

If I were forced to have only one, single “long gun” – either a rifle or a shotgun – what would that be? My answer, which has not changed in over twenty years, is the Simonov SKS rifle, and specifically, the Yugoslavian M59/66, made by Zavasta.

*Yugoslavian M59/66 SKS variant, with folded bayonet and grenade launcher on the muzzle. CCA/4.0*

…..‘Wut’?

The SKS rifle was designed in 1945 by Soviet weapons designer Sergei Gavrilovich Simonov. Chambered in the M43 cartridge designed in 1944, the SKS and its derivatives are semi-automatic rifles, firing from a fixed, ten-round magazine. The M43 cartridge – despite its similar appearance – has no ‘shared history’ with the German 7.92x33mm Kurz cartridge, used in the “first assault rifle”, the Sturmgewehr-44; the M43 is measurably more powerful than the German cartridge, being functionally equal, ballistically speaking, to the venerable .30-30 Winchester cartridge (pronounced “thirty-thirty”), which dates from 1895, and remains one of the most popular hunting cartridges in the world, often in the guise of the Winchester 1894 lever-action rifle. However, the M43 is much more space-efficient, being both shorter, overall, than the .30-30, but also in that it is a rimless cartridge, as opposed to the .30-30’s rimmed case, which makes loading into a vertical magazine not impossible, but it is problematic.

The SKS magazine usually feeds from a 10-round stripper clip, but – unlike the US-designed M1 Garand – stripper clips are not required to load the magazine; loading the magazine with loose rounds is certainly slower than with a strip-clip, but is far better than the M1’s en bloc system, since without an en bloc clip in place, the M1 rifle is simply a single shot rifle.

*8-round en bloc clip for the M1 Garand rifle (left) and an SKS 10-round stripper clip. 2009. Public Domain.*

An obvious question at this juncture would be the SKS’s relationship to the much better known AK-47 rifle. The answer is: not much. Aside from using the same cartridge, the two weapons are very different: the SKS uses a fixed (meaning, “non-detachable”) 10-shot magazine, while the AK uses detachable, 30-round box magazines. The only similarity is that the gas tubes look alike, although they function differently.

As a military weapon, originally, the SKS came with some features not usually found in civilian hunting weapons. In addition to its one-piece cleaning rod slotted under the barrel, the SKS was issued with a cleaning kit stored in its butt-stock. While this was a relatively common feature in military rifles, the SKS also featured an integral bayonet that folded around and under the barrel. While there has been a rash – yet again – of certain quarters declaring the bayonet to be dead (much like the tank), it is not, even though they are rare in the West; they are very likely more common in non-Western nations, but little in the way of technical details come out of those quarters.

*SKS bayonet, folded (top) and unfolded. 2019. CCA/4.0*

Another point in the SKS’s favor is that it has a greater range than the AK-47, with an effective range roughly 100 meters longer than Kalashnikov’s rifle, due to its longer barrel – in ballistics, size really does matter, up to a point.

Finally, the Yugoslavian M59/66 version incorporates a built-in launcher for the world-standard 22mm rifle grenades, which used to be a common feature on many of the world’s military rifles.

The SKS was adopted, in some military capacity, by at least seventy nations, and usually remained in service long after those nations had switched to other weapons, such as the AK47, the M-16 or something else. The SKS, in its many variants, can be found on battlefields around the world, to this day.

So – after the above information, why would this be the rifle I would pick, if I could only have one rifle?

First, it checks the widest number of boxes: it is fully capable as a hunting rifle for virtually any game I would consider hunting; I have neither plans nor desires to go hunting for bears or moose…and were I to run into either – that’s why I have ten rounds.

Next, it is semi-automatic in operation. This is a real point, because as a semi-automatic, it automatically extracts, ejects and chambers a new cartridge on its own, until the magazine is empty. With other weapons, including lever-actions like the Winchester ’94, or bolt-actions like the Mauser, Enfield, Mosin-Nagant, Carcano, etc., manually working the action usually involves breaking the shooter’s grip on the rifle, forcing them to realigned their eyes to the sights. Semi-automatics like the SKS and M1 Garand eliminate this issue.

Next, is its cartridge. While any gaggle of shooters will argue endlessly over the merits of “this cartridge vs that”, no one can dispute the effectiveness of the M43 round, now over 75 years old, in both hunting and combat, and its ammunition is relatively common and “cheap-ish” for civilian buyers in the US to lay hands on (at least at the moment). While its range may not be the longest, 400 meters is perfectly sufficient for most uses. Then, there is its sheer simplicity: there are not that many parts to deal with when you need to take it apart, and none of those are particularly small, or easy to lose.

*SKS rifle field stripped. 2009. Public Domain.*

That pretty much sums up the civilian hunting – and “SHTF” (S*** Hits The Fan) – side of why this would be my go-to.

The other side, obviously, is whether it is still an effective weapon for “military-type” use. True, it is not selective-fire, as modern military rifles are. And, yes, it has “only” a ten-round magazine, versus the 30-round detachable magazines that modern military rifles use. And realistically, do you really need the extra weight of a bayonet, much less a grenade launcher?

So, let’s address the above questions.

First, selective fire rifles (i.e., rifles that can fire in the fully-automatic mode, similar to an actual machine gun) has long been understood to be virtually useless in individual combat rifles – outside of very narrow circumstances – because rifles are too lightweight to lay a predictable pattern of fire, which is what actual machine guns are designed for…“Fully Automatic Machine Gun Fun” is, well, fun, but that’s usually all it is.

Second, is the magazine. If the Reader were to buy, say, an AR-15 or a civilian-legal AK-47, each of those 30-round detachable magazines will run anywhere from (as of early 2024) $9 – $25, each, depending on what you’re buying…and you’re going to need at least three to five of them, because even just going to the range will get very annoying, very fast, if you only have one or two magazines. In contrast, the SKS’s 10-round stripper clips can be reloaded with commercial ammunition if you save the clips, and you can buy military surplus ammunition that comes in sealed “Spam-Cans”, with all of the rounds factory-loaded onto stripper clips.

There is also the relentless controversy over the dreaded “magazine spring ‘taking a set’” – the notion that leaving magazines stored fully loaded for too long will weaken their internal springs over time. Personally, I’ve never had this happen, but I can see the other side of the argument…all of which is irrelevant with the SKS: if its magazine spring is sticking or is weak – replace it.

Because of this, you can load whatever type of field rig you prefer with SKS stripper clips, and they will sit there happily and patiently, waiting for you to use them, until they are so old, they are corroding their cases.

As to the grenade launcher and bayonet? Well – I certainly hope that I never need to use either of those two features; if that has happened, world civilization has collapsed, and all bets will really be off…But, in the unlikely event that the world has been reduced to that state, I would far prefer to have those feature and not need them, than to need them and have them.

The SKS: You need Simonov’s simple rifle…just, please – don’t “Bubbify” it with Tapco gear.

Trust me, there.

Inevitable Consequences and Alamo Moments

Michael Cessna January 26, 2024

On January 24^th 2024, Texas Governor Greg Abbott issued a statement, concerning the right of the State of Texas to defend itself from invasion, because – quoting from the statement – the Federal Government as a body and specifically, the administration of President Joe Biden, have broken the Compact between the Several States and the Federal Government (the foundational concept that underpins the notion of the “United States of America”) by not simply pointedly and openly declining to defend the nation from a literal “invasion” at the southern border, but in actively taking measures to prevent the State of Texas from defending itself.

Abbott specifically cited the Biden administration failing to fulfill its duties under Article IV § 4 of the Constitution, which has now required Abbott, as Governor, to invoke Article 1 § 10 Clause 3 of the Constitution requiring him to take measures to defend the state.

This statement was issued on the heels of a frankly stunning decision by the United States Supreme Court on January 22^nd, which allowed the US Border Patrol to remove razor wire barricades emplaced by Texas National Guard troops assigned to defend Texas’ border with Mexico along the Rio Grande River. In effect, the Supreme Court sided with the Biden administration in suborning an invasion of the United States.

The massive influx of illegal aliens is a subject we have discussed here previously. The fairest “neutral” assessment of the impact of illegal immigration comes from, of all places, Wikipedia:

“The economic impact of illegal immigrants in the United States is challenging to measure, and politically contentious…”

However, given the reactions of “sanctuary cities” – most of them longtime strongholds of the Democrat Party – to having waves of “migrants” dumped (waves that are not even comparable to the numbers being dumped on Texas) on their doorsteps, not just by Republican-led states such as Texas and Florida, but by the Federal Government itself, it is clear that the staggering numbers are having an immediate, clear and disproportionate impact on the nation (leaving aside said migrants frequently complaining bitterly about the aid and shelter they are given, including appeals to citizens to house illegal aliens in churches and private homes).

In response to Governor Abbott’s January 24^th statement, many politicians have begun to hysterically demand that President Biden federalize the Texas National Guard to halt the Texas program to stem the flow of illegal migrants, and to restrict them to using the legal crossing points, and to follow the established legal processes.

This situation (which has been building for well over a decade as of this writing), and the breathless demands to invoke the Insurrection Act to stop Texas’ actions, has brought the nation perilously close to an actual “civil war”, for the first time since 1860. This is because, as of this writing, some twenty-five state Governors have definitively stated their support of Governor Abbott and the state of Texas.

Actually federalizing a state’s National Guard against the wishes of their state’s governor has been done before, famously in 1957 in Arkansas in regards to the “Little Rock Nine”. A popular misconception is that a state’s National Guard cannot be federalized without that state’s governor consenting to the mobilization. As demonstrated in Arkansas, this is patently untrue.

The National Guard was created by the Militia Act of 1903, known popularly as the “Dick Act” after its sponsor, Ohio Congressman Charles Dick (R), in response to the severe manpower shortage in the US Army in the aftermath of the Spanish-American War (1898) and the subsequent campaigns against Filipino guerrillas in the Philippines Insurrection (1899-1902).

This latter campaign was hampered by American volunteers – who had been enlisted for a period of two years – insisting on being sent home after the conclusion of the war against Spain. As those who had volunteered specifically for the war against Spain were technically still a part of the Militia of the United States, they could not be required to serve longer than the conclusion of the war unless they specifically volunteered to do so.

This manpower issue came from Article 1, § 8, Clause 15 of the “Militia Clauses” (which includes Clause 16 of the same Article and Section) of the Constitution, which strictly limits the call-up and use of the Militia to executing “…the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions…” As a result, the United States quickly found itself significantly hampered in the Philippines by not having enough troops.

The “Dick Act” was written specifically to bypass the restrictions of the “Militia Clauses”, in order to create a new military entity in the form of the National Guard (and later, the Air National Guard). In effect, the “Dick Act” created a type of reserve formation for the US Army (before the creation of the actual “Army Reserve”), which (ultimately) would be equipped and trained by the US Army, but which be paid for by the states, who would also be allowed to use the military formations within the state, at the discretion of its governor. However, if the Federal government decided that they needed to mobilize the National Guard, they could do so at any time…whether a governor agrees with the Federal government or not, as was demonstrated in 1957, in Arkansas.

In the context of the hysterical demands of partisan political hacks, this would mean that President Biden would have to declare the State of Texas to be in rebellion against the United States – something that has only happened once in United States history – in order to force the Texas National Guard to disregard the orders of its state Commander in Chief in the face of an active invasion of their state.

Stop, and consider that implication.

If President Biden were to take such an ill-advised action, that would place the Texas National Guard in the position of obeying either the Federal Government – and allowing a massive invasion of their home state by massive numbers of “military-age males” who certainly did not walk north from homes in Mexico, or Central or South America, because “economic asylum seekers” do not buy airplane tickets from Africa to Mexico, in order to walk north…

…Conversely, the Texas National Guard could refuse orders to federalize. This would constitute “Mutiny”, under Article 94 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ, the legal code of the US armed forces), at the very least. This would place the Federal government in the position of having to arrest up to 19,000 people en masse.

In like manner, there would then be the question of the reactions of the various states and governors who have expressed their solidarity with Governor Abbott’s actions…

This perilous situation is the ultimate outcome of decades of neglect, political pandering and the abject failure of successive Federal governments to execute the most basic of their duties, duties that the Several States voluntarily allowed the Federal Government to maintain authority for, as a condition of their joining the Federal Union in 1789. Leaving aside the obtuse legalities of this situation, the reality is that the American Left – led primarily by the Democrat Party – has driven the nation to a potential breakpoint, where the States may well declare the sitting Federal Government to no longer be a legitimate body. Such an action could go in several directions, none of them good, and all of them highly dangerous.

And while pundits and armchair-warrior-gamers may believe the nearly incoherent ramblings of President Biden, the reality is that the United States military and law enforcement establishments are not able to enforce any nationwide martial law order; in fact, it is questionable if they could enforce such an order over any large metropolitan area, given what happened the last time Federal troops were deployed under “Operation Garden Plot” was engaged.

…In the end, this writer has no solution to this problem, other than telling the Federal government to do its job in securing the borders of the United States, which it has consistently failed to do for over forty years.

The alternatives are not desired by any sane person.

Michael Cessna

Baltimore – Conspiracy House…?

Conspiracy – or Accident?

Who?

Why?

Follow-throughs…?

Conclusion

The ‘Combat Shotgun’ – The Ancient Weapon Still Punching Above Its Weight

Militarizing Police Forces – Success or Liability?

Technically & Tactically Proficient – Can Military Leadership Be Self-Taught …?

Military Leadership Resources:

The Submachine Gun – Relic Or Revival?

Tools of the Trade: Hip-Pocket Artillery – The Rifle Grenade

The art of war is of vital importance to the state.

It is a matter of life and death, a road either to safety or to ruin. Hence under no circumstances can it be neglected.

To The Shores Of Tripoli…

There’s nothing new under the Sun.

Incident Command – What You Need To Know

Tools of the Trade – If I Could Only Have One

Boomsticks

Inevitable Consequences and Alamo Moments

“The economic impact of illegal immigrants in the United States is challenging to measure, and politically contentious…”

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Conclusion

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The art of war is of vital importance to the state.

It is a matter of life and death, a road either to safety or to ruin. Hence under no circumstances can it be neglected.

There’s nothing new under the Sun.

Boomsticks

“The economic impact of illegal immigrants in the United States is challenging to measure, and politically contentious…”

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