Survivors

33 thoughts on “Survivors”

1. DHS funding expansion under the big beautiful bill; With motherly oversight can they coordinate operations between ICE and DATF and Explosives? As long as these sweeps are focused on illegal alien criminals, Muslim sleeper cells, and not WTP wanting short barrels for self defense purposes, why not? It makes sense to let the Frank Hammer’s operate with discretion. Franks m.o. is not to be confused with the “full auto” styles of the KGB and Gestapo’s in full operation currently in Nicaragua.
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   VDH clip; Nice plug for an introduction, turning out sane grads from the “School Of Public Policy” @ Pepperdine. Exposing the ” unhinged and nihilistic” face of the demo party once again he goes down the list of the well known, trying to reason their causes could be easily solved if they’d just return where they came from, i.e. Sudan ect…
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   Identifying the lesser known new voices vying for recognition like Crockett and Alex Padilla, desperate for the spotlight, and learning to lie out of both sides of their mouths. ” I’m not against deporting illegals” the latter screams as he crashes an assembly. Whilst the voting tracks of this CA senator reveal promotions for ” Sanctuary Cities”. “Known by their Fruits” IMHO is a proper viewpoint for these goat circus” entertainers” who want anonymity as well as funding from a “single provider ” as Peter Shiff offers from his warped socialist ( totalitarian control) perspective of …
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   ” freedom of expression.”
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   Great graphics on the Iranian dismantle project, L.L. Keep’m coming. Deep long intellectual dissertations are welcomed by this reader as well. Catch up comment from a couple days ago.

   1. BATFE went after Randy Weaver for a shotgun that was allegedly shorter than allowed by statute. I don’t think that he and I would have been friends. I think that Weaver had a screw loose – but I think that most of the US Congress have loose screws.
      .
      In 1989, Weaver met Kenneth Fadeley at an Aryan Nations meeting. Aryan Nations is again, one of those groups of people I have nothing in common with and (U/C Special Agent) Fadeley was investigating crimes committed by the group. I’ve been U/C in the Hessians Motorcycle Gang (many years ago) and I understand the situation as far as that goes. Weaver agreed to sell Fadeley two sawed-off shotguns, and was recorded on tape saying he could supply Fadelay with four or five illegal shotguns a week. Weaver (a man not known for exotic skill sets) figured out that buying shotguns for X and hacksawing the barrels could triple his money – it’s not rocket science. By so doing he committed a federal felony and set things in motion.
      .
      During the initial encounter with Fadeley, the Weaver family relocated from a rental house to a cabin near Ruby Ridge, Idaho, in the Selkirk Mountains. The Marshal’s service attempted to serve a warrant, a stand off ensued, and it was very messy with FBI Special Agent (sniper) Ron Haramuchi killing Weaver’s unarmed wife. Marshals shot Weaver’s 14 year old son in the back and a Marshal was killed.
      .
      Then the FBI, true to form, covered up the bad shooting by lying. There were FBI investigations that white washed things and then Congress turned to the US Postal Inspection Service and a friend of mine handled the last investigation which disclosed what we now know.
      .
      My point is not that the Weavers were good neighbors and model citizens. They were not. But all this happened because the ATF was paying top dollar for Weaver to cut down a shotgun barrel (Weaver’s only source of income).

      1. Yep, the ‘behind the scenes’ information. And Harouchi should never have fired… sigh…

2. Wait a minute, really? Steve, it 9 a.m. EST and no aircraft i.d.’s? You and Surly, RCC all out on the same op together? At least NFO or WSF can i.d. a couple of them?

3. Identify the Aircraft:
   1. TBD after coffee
   2. SIPA S.1100
   3. Convair GRB-36
   4. Republic YRF-84F Thunderstreak
   5. SNCAC NC.1701

   1. #1 think Russia

      1. 1. Kazan Aviation Institute KAI-3 trainer. I did think Soviet at one point but nothing came up in the usual sources. Finally found the photo on a Facebook post!

         1. X2

   2. AI requires coffee?

      1. If it greases the gears of the Navy, one can expect that even a terminator machine requires lube.

4. *facepalm* Yep, that’s definitely non-staged panic alright. And like all panic, the brain shuts off, and keeps repeating the last known thing it was supposed to do instead of the thing that will actually help. When I was learning to fly, I had a nearly schizoid experience: the university wanted me to master the radio and all the avionics before proceeding to the actual flying part, while the crusty old guys I was paying cash on the barrelhead to teach me in taildraggers were adamant that I learn stick skills first, then pick up electronics when able. Old school thought was “You will revert to the first thing you know under panic. So the first thing you know better be power idle, rudder opposite, ailerons level, stick forward…. not get on the radio and call mayday.” (Old school was right.)
   .
   The man’s really lucky the controller knew basic recovery. Most aren’t pilots. Good on that controller!
   …
   As for United’s recruiting, I am limited in what I can say. I can safely say that the stats aren’t as bad as they look at first glance, because the stats for *all entrants* are being conflated with the stats for *flight students accepted into the program.* Also, the programs know what they’re getting, and do not assume that the students know how to do *anything* until it’s been taught. I have not had an issue with the students in those programs that I have come in contact with… they’re motivated and humble, and willing to work hard. Compare that to students who come from top flight schools who are convinced that they are the next Maverick on Top Gun, and when I gently point out that they called *me* for help, are as likely to reply that no, they called me so I can tell the FAA that they’re right and I and the FAA are wrong… (That never ends well.)

   1. I worry about the race to the bottom in the effort to be more woke. If pilots are good pilots, then they are even if they’re the the bottom 2% in the academic standings. And I don’t write that tongue in cheek. Quality is as quality does.

      1. The school of nursing I attended required a 3.0 to graduate. What do you say to the guy who graduated at the absolute bottom of his class?
         Congrats nurse, you made it!
         Thirty years in ER came next, then 18 more doing sedation and procedures, so I guess it all worked out ok. Great grades do not necessarily correlate with the ability to do what needs to be done.

      2. I worry about the last two generations of instructors raising pilots to be Children of the Magenta Line. I worry about the softening standards – the drive to never have the kids do a full stall any time until commercial training, only “stall awareness”, and recovery at incipient stalls, is going to kill the kids when they get into their first real, inadvertent stall, and it’s nothing they’ve ever experienced before while they’re task saturated and having an emergency. I worry about the training them to run the avionics at the expense of building basic stick and rudder skills…
         .
         And I *really* worry that the EEOC checkbox kids are being given *so much help* that they’re getting passes without the skills they need, and *being trained into having an attitude problem that prevents them from getting better.* I swear, when I first started flying, I wasn’t “breaking barriers” or “fighting discrimination”. The gents were just delighted that someone female loved the thing they loved. There was no “the man’s keeping me down” – the weather is actively trying to kill you, and if you don’t respect the plane, she will too, but neither of them care what plumbing is between your legs.
         .
         Now? I swear most of my female students have this shrill attitude and ego about “I’m better than the men, and they can’t keep me down!”… I’ve had other instructors hand Little Miss Attitude to me, because they’re flat done with trying to teach a closed mind. I disenrolled one student recently and blackballed them from the industry, after I explained that I don’t care what sex or gender or sexual attraction you are, if you’re going to act like the north end of a southbound mule, we’re not going to put up with it. They threatened to sue, and to tell everyone I’m every -ist and -ism in the liberal playbook… like that would change my mind? Like I’d let them get in a position to put passenger’s lives at risk, because they’ll throw a tantrum if I don’t?
         .
         That said, some of my best students are terrible at academics – some I’ve actually had to stop and teach box breathing to control their anxiety about taking tests and checkrides – and yet they’ve got *better* situational awareness and aircraft control than I did at their total time. As you say, Quality will tell.

   2. The N-number traces to a flying club in Kenosha WI. Probably an extremely low time pilot.

5. Mayday – hopefully you lose your pilot’s license for having a panic attack meltdown
   and forgetting how to fly a Cessna?
   *
   I disagree with Cdr. Sal this time. That sloop of war is a near-useless target.
   IMO you need credible air defenses and preferably some sort of area SAM
   to be worth floating as a Navy combatant these days. This thing isn’t really
   good enough to be a Coastie cutter. I agree that the Navy needs to be bigger,
   but buying 10,000 Boston Whalers with a .50 cal each won’t improve anything.
   *
   NATO Summit – I’m glad to hear that NATO has pledged to spend 5% GDP on
   military affairs by 2035, because it means that at least a few European countries
   might actually get to the former 2% spending goal by 2050 or so. As for Spain
   getting a freebie – it isn’t as though anyone expects Spain to actually be willing
   to fight, anyway. Fuckers wouldn’t even contribute to the anti-Houthi escort
   patrols, and have been counting solar farms as military spending.
   – Kle.

   1. CDRSAL forgets what a dismal disaster the Littoral Combat Ship program has been when he extols the virtue of sloops-of-war. That being said, the rest of his rant is on point.

6. WW3- Over…for now anyway.
   Listened to SecDef Hegseth this morning, started by dressing down the media for not promoting the difficulty of the mission because they [have to] hate PDJT. He explained the amazing pilots et al who accomplished this unbelievable plan…flawlessly…and wanted them to see how incredible our people are in executing a well-defined plan. He went on to explain the success – with receipts. The Media bums…true to form…unbudging from their idiocy in complete tone deafness, managed to maintain their marching orders from The Dem Swamp Elite and proceeded to question everything Hegseth said….twice. Tapper said “we are required to be skeptical, it’s our job”, all the while running around hawking an apology book that states the exact opposite regarding the prior Dementia Patient in Chief.
   These people are complete psychopaths, minds fully taken over by their paychecks, and possibly Satan. Disgusting behavior, but the upside is WTP see it for what we knew…the curtain has been drawn, only the willfully ignorant will ignore the fact anything coming from the MSM is an agenda-driven lie.

   1. There’s always another war, PaulM. People will go to war, or they’ll steal your wallet, if they think that they can get away with it.

      1. Isn’t that the truth..otherwise why would we need God? In the meantime much of that is off the radar for a few days, river float with flyrods, a bunch of brookies and rainbows caught…that stuff is a million miles away (well, until I check into the fray, albeit intermittently).

         1. Funny… they didn’t seem skeptical of the Covid Clampdown or “mostly peaceful protests”,
            or Joe Biden, etc…

            – Kle.

7. We had three large shipyards locally when I was young. They ramped up during WW2 and continued in the sixties, and seventies, building drilling rigs for the offshore industry. Two closed, and the last one is not nearly the shipyard it once was. All the old timers are gone, and their skills are buried with them. They’re a testament of the folly of not keeping our shipbuilding industry healthy.

   1. As I understand the situation (in part with the Big Beautiful Bill) there will be an increased focus on building back shipyards. I believe that’s a vital interest of the nation. From what President Trump has said, he feels the same way. So maybe times will change. As you correctly point out, the skills necessary are almost generational, and once gone, they require a lot of time and effort to be brought back, if at all. At the risk of sounding over the top, look at the Pyramids in Mexico or Egypt. We have no idea how they were built thousands of years ago, and would be hard pressed to do it today. Even the Panama Canal – we know how they built it. Approximately 27,500 workers died during the construction of the Panama Canal, spanning both the French and American efforts. The French effort in the 1880s alone resulted in the deaths of over 22,000 workers. During the American construction period from 1904 to 1914, an additional 5,600 workers died. Would any country (outside of someplace like North Korea, Russia or China) be able to do something like that in terms of human cost?

8. NATO
   They promise 5%. They won’t actually do it. They will wait until Trump is out of office and go back to their old ways. In the interim, accountants lie like a rug. Give Spain grudging credit for saying “no”. They likely didn’t count on the tariff club. Don’t try to short a NYC landlord his rent.
   ——–
   Spins in a Cessna? Release the controls. You need to force them to spin to begin with. My first instructor stressed always fly the airplane first. Useless things included altitude above you, runway behind you, and gas on the ground. Use the radio last.
   ——–
   The Navy
   I leave this to you salts; you know whereof you speak. I will point out the old saying, quantity has a quality all it’s own. At the start of WWII the Japanese Navy was arguable superior to our own. Did we simply defeat them, or did we overwhelm them? Looking from the outside, it appears the Navy has a serious management problem. Is it baked into the Navy DNA? Consider the torpedo problems in the early days of WWII as an example.

   1. To some extent, the 5% demand was aspirational because the goal is ten years away, and many of the people who signed off on it will be in their dotage by then. At the same time, without a goal, they’d spend .5% clinging to the hope that America will save them. Spain is a declining nation. They haven’t been the same since they raped Mexico and Latin America. What will they do without a place to pillage?
      .
      At the beginning of World War II, Japan enjoyed a quantitative and qualitative advantage in its fleet. Much of their army was engaged (and to some extent was bogged down) in China. The capacity for the USA to turn to a war footing almost completely amazed the world. The Japanese gave us the time to do that, and the loss of their four fleet aircraft carriers at Midway was a setback of Biblical proportions. Book recommendation: Shattered Sword: The Untold Story of the Battle of Midway, by Jonathan Parshall, Anthony Tully, et al. Nov 30, 2005, tells the story from the Japanese perspective.
      .
      The US had a serious rivalry in the Pacific between the Army (led by MacArthur) and the Navy (led by Nimitz), but the Japanese Army and Navy suffered from similar dysfunction within their ranks. They manifest in different ways.
      .
      The battle between patriots and The Swamp in America is not unlike what we’ve always had to contend with. Human nature, rivalry, egos, etc.

9. Sigh… I’m NOT surprised Spain is dragging their feet. I don’t think they are even spending 2% now. They DO NOT like the military over there, but LOVE the dollars they get for the bases. While at the same time, treating the military folks like s**t off base. You know it’s bad when they take a Roma’s word over a dependent and her daughter…

   1. The Spanish bases are strategic. It would be bad to lose them.

      1. True, but remember, we pulled all the ships out of Rota in the early 80s, partially because of the way our dependents and sailors were treated. And we moved VQ-2 out of Rota in the 90s.

         1. I heard that we’ve returned.

10. Great Britain used to have a Navy. Useful if you’re an island or any other country with a coast. Or a lake. Or a river.

    Of course I’m thinking about setting up a redundant LCS on Lake Whitney as a kind of naval wing to the DLC. Just moor it there in the center of the shallow lake and take control.

    1. Remember to drill the crew to repel boarders.

       1. You shouldn’t just moor it – think of the wake you could kick up
          in a lake with one of those things!
          – Kle.

11. Here’s a story of a Navy vet still doing good…a WWII Navy vet:
    https://blanknews.com/the-last-chair-in-burlington-at-98-years-young-ernie-barnes-still-cuts-hair-as-the-relic-of-an-almost-forgotten-knoxville-neighborhood/

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