1000 Words (retrospective)
Operational – It’s the lawn of the Tropicana hotel, Las Vegas, 1991. We used a metal detector to find the barrel of a .45 Govt. that the shooter used to execute a man. The barrel had been buried in the lawn. The shooter (center), a hit man, is handcuffed. L to R – D. A. Inv. Mike Rhodes (deceased); D. A. Inv. LL; Special Agent H. M. Brown, FBI, my partner; Suspect, Supv. D. A. Inv. J. Hodges; and D. A. Inv. D. Miller.
Crusading
As of November 2024, the British Army had 18,398 medically qualified personnel for deployment. There are roughly three times as many soldiers at Fort Bragg alone. If the British want to stop the Russians, they should send them all. They could leave a company to march around Buckingham Palace and impress the tourists. Putin has 1.5 million men under arms. I wouldn’t expect to see any of those British troops again this side of Valhalla.
The French Army is larger than the British but nowhere near capable of posing any serious threat to the Russians. During the 30 years between 1991 and 2021, the number of French main battle tanks dropped from 1,349 to 222. To sustain a deployment of 5000 troops to Africa to fight Islamic extremists, Paris had to use almost eighty percent of its actual military equipment.
When Putin rants about missile strikes on Russian territory being effectively American strikes on his country, he has a point. The missiles are American. The training in how to use them came from America. The warheads are filled with explosives made in the U.S. The targeting data fed into the missile systems to allow them to strike targets hundreds of miles away with precision came from us. The only thing Ukrainian about such an attack has been the finger on the guy pressing the launch button.
Bullet Points:
** Ah, the good old days when you’d arrive in the US, go to the Kit/Kat Club, do a few lines with Hunter and go home with suitcases full of cash. (right) Elections have consequences.
** State of the Union Speech – Pres. Trump’s speech laid everything out. I have nothing to add.
** Border Deployment – Breitbart – Under orders from the Trump administration, the Pentagon is deploying 3,000 more troops and armored Stryker vehicles to the U.S. border with Mexico. The orders expand current operations and to “seal the border and protect the territorial integrity of the United States,” officials said. The additional troops will bring the current troops level at the border to more than 9,000 service members to work with previously deployed federal and state law enforcement agencies. The move was ordered by U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, who posted on social media, “We are dead serious about 100% OPERATIONAL CONTROL of the southern border.”
** I changed my party affiliation formally from Independent to Republican.
** Due to the rising medical test costs, all you need to do is pee under a tree and wait. If ants gather, you have diabetes. If the grass dries up and dies, it’s high in salts. If it smells like BBQ, your cholesterol is high. If you forgot to unzip your pants, you have Alzheimer’s.
** In remarks before his first Cabinet meeting last week, President Trump said, “We have to go back to paper ballots. … It’s a very safe form of voting.”
** People overlook that Pres. Trump’s original job at his family’s business was collecting rent. He never forgot how to evict someone.
** “U.K.’s Keir Starmer pledges $2 billion to help Ukraine buy missiles.” $2 billion? Don’t we spend more on transgender operas in Ireland and tranny comic books in Peru? Circumcizing African males?
** Nobody likes a loser. If many years of following sports taught me anything, there are no such things as loveable losers. There are only winners and losers. Winning is fun. Little Z-skyy ain’t fun. The “war leader track suit” isn’t cute anymore.
** Today is Ash Wednesday. I’m not a Catholic, so that doesn’t mean that much. Happy Ash Wednesday to those who do.
** “I’m interested in that thing that happens where there’s a breaking point for some people and not for others. You go through such hardship, things that are almost impossibly difficult, and there’s no sign that it will get any better, and that’s the point when people quit. But some don’t.” – Redford
** Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA) was told to watch a video of “President Trump’s accomplishments” as she was denied an immediate meeting with HUD Sec. Scott Turner, while her fellow anti-DOGE protesters yelled outside the department’s headquarters.
The Budapest Memorandum(s)
Under the agreement, the Russian Federation provided security assurances to Ukraine by promising neither to attack nor to threaten to attack them in exchange for surrendering their nuclear arsenal. The other signatories (the United States, United Kingdom and France) pledged non-military support to Ukraine in exchange for its adherence to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons. The memorandum bundled together a set of assurances that Ukraine had already held from the Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe (CSCE) Final Act, the United Nations Charter, and the Non-Proliferation Treaty. Still, the Ukrainian government found having these assurances in a Ukraine-specific document valuable.
The Budapest Memorandum was negotiated at the political level, but it is unclear whether the instrument lacks legal provisions. It refers to assurances, but unlike guarantees, it does not impose a legal obligation of military assistance on its parties. According to Stephen MacFarlane, a professor of international relations, “It gives signatories justification if they take action, but it does not force anyone to act in Ukraine.”
In the US, neither the George H. W. Bush administration nor the Clinton administration was prepared to give a military commitment to Ukraine, and they did not believe the US Senate would ratify an international treaty, so the memorandum was adopted in more limited terms. The memorandum requires consultation among the parties “if a situation arises that raises a question concerning the … commitments” set out in the memorandum. Whether or not the memorandum sets out legal obligations, the difficulties that Ukraine has encountered since early 2014 may doubt the credibility of future security assurances offered in exchange for nonproliferation commitments. The United States publicly maintains that “the Memorandum is not legally binding, ” calling it a “political commitment.”
Ukrainian international law scholars such as Olexander Zadorozhny maintain that the Memorandum is an international treaty because it satisfies the criteria for one, as fixed by the 1969 Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties (VCLT) and is “an international agreement concluded between States in written form and governed by international law.”
China and France gave security assurances for Ukraine in separate documents. China’s governmental statement of 4 December 1994 did not call for mandatory consultations if questions arose but only for “fair consultations”. France’s declaration of 5 December 1994 did not mention consultations.
For 20 years, until the 2014 Russian military occupation of regions of Ukraine, the Ukrainian nuclear disarmament was an exemplary case of nuclear non-proliferation. Since the invasions of Ukraine by Russia, the wisdom of Ukraine relinquishing its nuclear weapons has been questioned, even by former president Bill Clinton, one of its signatories.
Former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Steven Pifer wrote in 2024 that Ukraine choosing to keep the nuclear weapons that were on its territory in the early 1990s was an unrealistic option, given that all of the infrastructure needed to maintain the operational life of the warheads was located in Russia and that Ukraine itself was facing an economic crisis that prevented it from building such infrastructure in its own country. Pifer also noted that the Ukrainian government concluded at the time that doing so would have been unaffordable. He added that in retrospect, American and Ukrainian officials did not foresee the Russo-Ukrainian War and because of that Ukraine was willing to accept security “assurances” from the U.S. and Britain, which unlike “guarantees,” do not require the use of military force if the agreement was violated. Pifer also wrote that it would have been unlikely that the U.S. Senate would have ratified such guarantees.
Historical Retrospective – The Xi’an Incident
After a yearlong retreat from pursuing Nationalist troops, Mao’s communists settled in remote Shaanxi province and again enjoyed a brief reprieve in the marginally warlord-controlled countryside. A new headquarters was founded in the loess caves of Yan’an. However, Chiang Kai-shek negotiated with the local warlord to allow his armies to enter Shaanxi and was soon preparing for another annihilation campaign.
By late 1936, Chiang was poised to encircle and attack the communists again, but his plans were thwarted by the duplicity of one of his generals, Zhang Xueliang.
You may recall from an earlier article that Zhang Xueliang was the son of the powerful Manchurian warlord Zhang Zuolin. Zuolin was dubbed “The Old Marshal” and Xueliang “The Young Marshal.”
The Japanese assassinated the elder Zhang in 1928 with plans to install his son as puppet warlord. At the time the young Zhang was an opium addict, which the Japanese believed would render him malleable and easier to control than his now-dead father. However, Zhang shook off his drug habit, found a new resolve, and proved a more formidable adversary than the Japanese anticipated.
They responded by launching an all-out military invasion of Manchuria in 1931. Zhang’s warlord army put up some resistance but was soon defeated and Zhang fled to mainland China. After several ineffective attempts to retake Manchuria, Zhang joined Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalist government as an army general.
Which brings us back to 1936.
Since joining the Nationalists, Zhang had urged Chiang Kai-shek to focus on countering Japanese aggression in Manchuria. Still, Chiang insisted on eliminating the communist rebels first so that a united China could better resist the outside invaders later. His famous adage was “The Japanese are a disease of the skin. The communists are a disease of the heart.” (the Chinese seem to treasure these sorts of political slogans)
Chiang’s policy of “First internal pacification, then external resistance” didn’t go over well with Zhang, and it was also growing deeply unpopular with the Chinese public. So in late 1936 Zhang took matters into his own hands.
Nationalist soldiers in Shaanxi, who had served under Zhang in Manchuria, were awaiting their chance to move northeast and attack the Japanese army. Instead they received orders from the capital to annihilate the nearby communists. Zhang complained that his troops were refusing to fight fellow Chinese and requested Chiang Kai-shek fly to the ancient capital of Xi’an to galvanize them. In fact, Zhang and another general, Yang Hucheng—whose wife had come under communist influence—were secretly plotting with the Communists. If Chiang would not attack the Japanese voluntarily, he must be coerced. If he still would not attack the Japanese under coercion, he must be removed.
Chiang flew to Xi’an unaware of the trap that awaited him. Mao Zedong (Mousey Tongue), who reviewed and approved the subversive plan beforehand, described it as pure genius.
Throughout several days of meetings, Chiang argued with Zhang and his staff about the wisdom of prioritizing attacks on Chinese communists over the Japanese, but Chiang overrode them all and ordered the offensive to proceed. Then he retired to his temporary headquarters at the Huaqing Hot Springs.
Early the following day Zhang’s troops broke into the resort, killing or arresting Chiang’s aides. They entered his bedroom to find it empty. Chiang had escaped through the window but injured himself and was quickly captured in the hillside forest.
Brought before Zhang, Chiang’s subordinate pleaded (paraphrasing) “I am still your loyal officer. I will release you if you agree to unite with the Communists and fight the Japanese.” Chiang replied: “If you are still my loyal subordinate, you will obey and release me immediately,” but to no avail. For Zhang there was no turning back. He was fully committed to his mutiny, and Chiang refused to speak further. He was now held hostage by one of his generals, his fate uncertain.
This crisis, “The Xi’an Incident,” effectively saved the Communists.
Fearing for her husband’s life, Chiang’s wife Soong Mei-ling flew to Xi’an to mediate a resolution. She had good reason to worry. The CCP was thrilled at the news of Chiang’s arrest and Mao Zedong was openly calling for his show trial and execution. Zhang Xueliang didn’t want Chiang dead; he only wanted to change policy. Furthermore, Zhang believed Chiang was the only man strong enough to lead a united China against the Japanese, so killing him would be counterproductive.
Far more frustrating to Mao’s plans was Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, who interceded on Chiang’s behalf. This was one of many times that Stalin would side with Chiang over the ostensibly preferable fellow communist Mao Zedong. Why? Stalin’s first concern was the Soviet eastern border’s vulnerability to Japan, a rising empire that defeated Russia and snatched away Manchurian territory in 1905. Stalin believed Chiang and a united Nationalist-Communist front would be far more effective at resisting Japanese aggression than Mao and his ragtag force of a few thousand soldiers.
Stalin chose the USSR’s security over ideology and cooperated regularly with Chiang Kai-shek for many years, usually to Mao Zedong’s chagrin. Deferring to Stalin’s position of strength, Mao acquiesced and sent his diplomatically inclined deputy, Zhou Enlai, to partake in a two-week negotiation with Chiang, Zhang, Soong Mei-ling, Nationalist officials, and Australian arbitrator William Henry Donald.
In the end, Chiang was forced to accept the new United Front, end his attacks on the Communists, and allow the Communists to keep and independently operate their own army, all in the name of the new anti-Japanese alliance. He was released on Christmas Day 1936 and resumed his duties as president of China.
One small boost Chiang received from the ordeal was that his kidnapping instantly gained him sympathy from the Chinese public and the world. The nation sat on edge as negotiations were conducted, and when Chiang was released, he became a national hero—in part because he finally agreed to confront the Japanese and in part because Zhang’s actions were viewed as disloyal and treasonous.
For now, Chiang had the full support of the Chinese people, but his communist foes were still alive and worse yet also enjoying a public relations boost. The Communists had magnanimously refused to execute their mortal enemy Chiang, all for the greater good of saving China from the Japanese invaders. And the Communists were now free to operate their armies, shielded from Nationalist onslaughts.
After the Xi’an Incident, Chiang Kai-shek, Soong Meiling, and Zhang Xueliang flew to the capital, Nanjing, where Zhang was promptly arrested along with his co-conspirator, General Yang Hucheng.
Zhang Xueliang wrote apologetic letters to Chiang Kai-shek from his jail cell, explaining that he had reluctantly acted to preserve China. Chiang eventually reduced his sentence to indefinite house arrest.
Zhang spent the next half century jailed in his own home. When the Nationalist government retreated to Taiwan, Yang Hucheng was executed along with his family. Zhang was transferred to Taiwan, and his house arrest continued in Taipei. It was only when Chiang’s son, Taiwan president Chiang Ching-kuo, died in 1988 that Zhang was finally freed at age 86.
He moved to Hawaii where he died in 2001 at age 100.
Today, the CCP hails Zhang Xueliang as a “Hero of History” for forcing Chiang Kai-shek to unite with the Communists and resist the Japanese invasion. Their praise is unsurprising, considering Zhang rescued the Communists from a military campaign that may have annihilated them completely.
And Zhang himself was hardly motivated solely by selfless patriotism. Since his eviction at the hands of the Japanese, he had urged Chiang Kai-shek to launch an offensive to retake Manchuria, primarily so that he could resume his status as a warlord over his old domains. It was only after Chiang repeatedly refused that Zhang decided to mutiny and kidnap his commander and president in 1936.
The Xi’an Incident saved the CCP… yet again. The Communists, originally an irrelevant fringe party with only 200 members, had been elevated to contender status in 1923 by outside intervention. That is, when the Lenin USSR insisted Sun Yat-sen accept the CCP into the KMT as a condition for Soviet support.
The CCP was then at risk of annihilation in 1934 and saved at the last minute by intelligence stolen by communist spies working within KMT army headquarters.
The CCP was again saved from destruction by the circumstance of Japanese invasion and Chiang’s kidnapping in the 1936 Xi’an Incident.
Intervention had repeatedly rescued the floundering CCP from either irrelevance or annihilation, and it wouldn’t be the last time.
As conservative China writer Leo Timm summarizes: “Had it not been for Zhang and Yang’s coup at Xi’an, the Communist Party would likely have been wiped out, rewriting modern Chinese history. While Zhang Xueliang and Yang Hucheng, the direct initiators of the coup, can thus be regarded as responsible for the rise of the Communist Party in China.”
Meanwhile, in Tokyo, the Imperial Japanese Army (IJA) had long scheduled a full-scale invasion of mainland China at the end of the decade. Upon hearing the KMT and Communists had formed the United Front to resist Japanese aggression, the IJA immediately accelerated their invasion timetable to begin in 1937, another repercussion of the Xi’an Incident that changed the course of history.
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Global Warming/Cooling and Hurricanes
I don’t see a cause and effect pattern. Then again, I’m not woke.
Identify the Aircraft
1
Two photos – 1,931 built
2
Identify the Armor
3
4
5
Parting Shot
End
1 is Vultee A-31 Vengeance wirh second photo being Royal Australian Airforce
2 is Canadian Lockheed CP-140 Aurora
There is a cyclone just off the Cyclone (hurricane)
There is one off the Queensland coast now and expected to make landfall at Brisbane (state capital) on Friday.
Well south of the usual track by hundreds of miles and the first this far down in over 50 years. Hopefully not too bad but will find out.
Latest update is that it has slowed down so now late morning arrival coinciding with high tide. Lots of people at the canal estates are going to have problems.
We are an hours drive inland so not personally that worried. Last minute panic buying everywhere but as I grew up were they were common we topped up the pantry last week.
RCC, experience is a great teacher. There are two kinds of people, prepared and unprepared. Chowderheaded people assume that the world will be kind to them (unprepared) and they’re shocked when the world slaps them. You see them on the news all the time with an expression not unlike one who just ate spoiled oysters. The prepared are ready for the slap and they absorb it with little damage.
IDA:
1.Vultee A-31 or A-35 Vengeance
2.Canadair CP-107 Argus
IDARMOR:
3. SU-76i was a Soviet SPG
4.Grille aka “cricket”, a German self-propelled artillery vehicle.
5. Grille, specifically the 15 cm sIG 33 auf Panzerkampfwagen 38
Good!
The problem with “who’s the bad guy” in the Russia-Ukraine war is the old problem of “where do you start”? Did Putin just go nuts and invade a sovereign nation for absolutely no reason at all out of Russian paranoia and general evilness? So far as I understand it, in 1990 we (Genschler for Germany and James Baker for the US) met with Gorbachev and publicly assured him that NATO would not expand eastward. But in 1994 official policy became (or maybe secretly always was?) expansion of NATO to Ukraine (plus Turkey, Georgia, etc.) with the long-term goal of isolating Russia both politically and literally, the latter by blocking access to the Mediterranean. In 1999, NATO “assimilated” Hungary and Poland and Czech Republic. So much for what was promised in 1990. In 2004 the Baltic states plus Romania, Bulgaria, Slovakia and Slovenia joined NATO. Double the “so much for what was promised”. Even the most fanatical anti-Russite could see how this might make Russia nervous.
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As to Ukraine specifically, the US (or perhaps elements that had wormed their way into State like some sort of parasitic wasp larva, and were wearing the husk of US Foreign Policy as a skin suit) messed with Ukraine resulting in the overthrow of Yanukovych in 2014. By 2016 we were shipping arms to Ukraine and they were shelling the Donbas. So much for Minsk II (autonomy and language rights for ethnic Russians in eastern Ukraine). Apparently in Jan 2022 Blinken told Russian Foreign Affairs Minister Lavrov that the US reserved the right to put missile systems in Ukraine. Needless to say, the Russians freaked out. But also there were talks. By Spring 2022 there was a document outlining an agreement that Ukraine would be neutral, but Boris Johnson went to Kiev and persuaded Zelenskyy to walk away from it. Would Bad Hair BoJo have taken that action on his ownsome as British PM, or did he have the backing of the US in doing so? I don’t know. But it probably wasn’t only Zelenskyy’s decision. (Much as I’d like to hang all the blame on that entitled little shit, there’s a lot of blame to go around.)
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So Putin is not pure and innocent in all this. Duh. But it’s not as if the West didn’t have a large role in provoking this mess either. And it doesn’t matter (to Russia) if what “we” did was the sacred Will of the People or the manipulations of wasp larvae wearing State as a skin suit. It matters hugely to us, but it’s not Russia’s responsibility to separate out elements within the US. They need to be concerned with what the US collectively does toward and to them. For us as USAians, maybe a good principle might be that we try not to get involved in other peoples’ multigenerational civilizational grudges.
I think that the US need to launder money to replace the Afghan laundry with Old Pedo Joe (demented but still aware) and Blinky Blinken as SECSTATE (his Dad was US Ambassador there, you know – before) – gave USGOV an incentive to bait the Bear. Agreed with your analysis.
X2 (you both)
Ps. And Z-skyy was coached by some of our Congress-Critters on how to conduct himself in his meeting with The Big Dog. Gee, wonder why that was.
I was looking at the Italian prime minster talk about not going into Ukraine with troops like France & the UK are talking about. I wondered if France & the UK had already divided up Russia between them?
To the victor belongs the spoils. That may mean that the French and British survivors back home would need to learn to speak Russian.
The Italians have only 50ish tanks, and a pitifully reduced army. And they really need all those troops to back up their police in evicting ‘refugees,’ who, surprisingly, are mostly military-aged males. Hmmm…
Mike, you missed Zelenskyy stating that he was rearming the Ukraine with nukes the day before Putin started the special operation. On top of all the other violated promises, treaties, infringement by NATO and direct poking Russia, it was no surprise to anyone watching the decades long buildup, that Russia moved farther into the Ukraine. Not a single one of our treaties involving the Ukraine required any military assistance, direct military involvement at all but only required diplomatic input. That point is overlooked also.
Additionally, the Ukraine was used as a major trafficking and trading route for centuries.
“rearming the Ukraine with nukes the day before”
I did not know that. Thank you, Dave.
Identify the Aircraft:
1. Vultee A-31 Vengeance
2. Canadair CP-107 Argus
Identify the Armor:
3. SU-76i
4. Grille Ausf. H
5. Grille Ausf. K
Yes, the A-31 and A-35 were similar but I agree with your ID on #1. Well done.
Some further info on the might of the British military – the Royal Navy has more admirals than warships, and the RAF has fewer warplanes than Pakistan .
How the mighty have become insignificant. Paper Lion.
To really talk about global weather you need more data then 44 years (not even a drop in the bucket), then again facts have not been a big part of this “climate change” propaganda campaign.
But it is nice to see a chart like this with actual facts on it..
I like to say these people who buy into anthropogenic climate “change” have managed to convince themselves that “weather” started the day they were born. A 50 year view is useless when compared to a few hundred or thousand years.
For a serious discussion of global weather, we should go back at least 15,000 years. Maybe further. Climate is best measured in geologic timing rather than over the past few years.
Exactly…I liked that scene sequence in The Time Machine (Guy Pearce version) when he’s seeing the wholesale change in landscape and weather from what was his London laboratory atrium…dramatic. Around here we have a faction of “foresters” who believe certain forests of mixed ponderosa and other tree species are invasive and got DeptAg funding to clear private lands so the “proper 1800’s forest” can return. I reject their asinine college-level term paper concept. It’s stupid, but some believe they can see into the past then want to correct the current environment.
Yet when you point out real facts, like what spurred the Viking Age was warmer temperatures all the way to the Arctic Circle, thus the Scandinavians overpopulated their lands and had to go somewhere, or that Greenland was green when discovered by Norse explorers and the place really only became one giant glacier in the early 1300’s or that the French Revolution was caused by Icelandic volcanoes, well, amazing how when presented with actual historical fact backed by science, they scream at you.
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It’s like pointing out that the Amazon Rainforest at the height of many of the ‘great’ civilizations was mostly grasslands, and that the shift in weather patterns that spelled doom due to lack of rain destroyed said civilizations and the rainforest took over and now said rainforest is a net carbon dioxide, methane and carbon monoxide producer. That if you clearcut a good portion of the forest and went back to farmlands the area would become a net oxygen producer and massive carbon sink.
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Heck, there are people living in Florida, who were born here, that don’t understand that Climate Change in the form of very cold winters are what destroyed the central and northern Florida citrus industry. There are people living in Gainesville who don’t remember that Florida froze during December 23, 1989.
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You can’t make these climate religionists understand anything even when they experience it. Dumb-masses…
Spot on….as my dad would say, “Some people can’t see six inches past their noses.”
POTUS- Watched it in full…epic. The only thing I would add is how loathsome the Democrats were and are…these people hate people, hate America, hate everything not “theirs”, or what they believe to be theirs. Anyone supporting them needs a reality check (as if that would happen…but might gain a few opened eyes). When you can’t stand and clap for a young brain cancer survivor when presented as an honorary Secret Service member there is something inherently callous and demented operating inside. But simply, The Dems are being exposed for the scumbags they truly are (any R who sides with them either needs to resign or get on the Trump Train or it’s leaving without them).
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Z-skyy woke up and smelled the burning coffee shortly before PDJT gave his “reality check to Congress”. Sometimes you have to “leave the room” during a negotiation, make ‘em think a bit, often forcing them to “wake the hell up to reality” (h/t Dad).
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Redford Quote- Yes! Work with those who never give up…the “prepared” tend to be this way whereas the “unprepared” wonder why things are happening to them then go back to bed.
Our Democrats and Republicans in Congress are slackers. They need to step up their game, raise the flag of their true colors and get to work. If you missed the videos, the Serbian Parliament had smoke bombs and such thrown. I must add that their efforts weren’t really effective as they didn’t throw them far and the unguided ones only flew for a short distance. Bottle rockets would have been icing on the cake.
If we are to have a circus, make it a good one.
Roman candles!!
M-80’s…for those of us who recall our more free youth.
Reagan walked away at Reykjavik.
It turned out well.
X2
My Trump “barometer” is Google’s MSN ‘news’ embedded in Windows 11. The more negative stories posted, the better he is doing. I don’t bother reading any of them choosing to remain an ignorant deplorable. Seems his speech was a home run.
It was spot on.
Bull in china shop.
Took out the trash too.
Threw down the gauntlet. Badaboom.
Question, re Tropicana picture: Why is everyone, including the suspect, smiling? Did the cameraman say “cheese”?
We spent half the day digging on alerts from the metal detector (rented there in Vegas) – we finally found the barrel.
What was the lead that kept the focus on that search area?
It looks like an action/cop movie from those halcyon days when you were allowed to have a nondiverse cast. Maybe an 80’s movie kinda thing.
Shooter is a stylish dresser. The double-breasted suit gives faint Frank Nitti vibes. (The character from The Untouchables movie; I don’t know about the actual Nitti.). Is his right arm handcuffed to SA Brown’s left? Because it sure looks like shooter’s left hand is up and visible to us.
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As to the smiling, what else is he (shooter) gonna do? Pouting or showing anger is not gonna help his situation, but it will make him look weak. Might as well go along with the general vibe, though I don’t think he has a happy smile. (Me being the body language expert here. Heh. /selfmockingeyeroll) At least that’s how I see it.
L.L. H/T for posting the Xían incident and all the background, timeline, and characters. Amazing history may have never found out about! Tied into my observations of mission work and ” The Free Burma Rangers” is a similar figure, Aung San Suu Kyi, spending 14 of 20yrs under house arrest.