The US Army’s Nuclear Cannon: Atomic Annie (VIDEO)

Remember as a kid when you’d play ‘rock, paper, scissors’ and then some Smart aleck would end the game by throwing a ‘nuclear bomb!’? Well that’s kinda what the US Army did in the 1950s when they first rolled out the M65 artillery piece—better known as Atomic Annie.

Why

Even if you didn’t make A’s in your junior high history class, you likely still know that World War 2’s final chapter came after the United States dropped an atomic bomb on Japan, twice. But even after this devastating display of military might brought an end to the most immediate hostilities, the US found soon herself headed towards a forty year long Cold War. This new icy conflict pitted the enormous military machine of the Soviet Union and her allies against US-led NATO powers. The US and her allies were outnumbered on the ground–guarding the border between these two bruisers were up to 50,000 Soviet tanks, the living embodiment of the Iron Curtain.

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What was needed, as had been needed not but a decade before, was a secret weapon to even the odds.

Enter the M65

The concept of a nuclear artillery shell enraptured the Army brass in the late 1940s. The thing was, atomic weapons were large beasts, so large in fact that the only guns that could lob one looked like something you find acrobats using at the circus.

First Double Tap Defense Reviews Trickling In (VIDEO)

Skip to the ten minute mark to watch grown men struggle to hold back tears from the pain shooting the Double Tap causes.

It’s an interesting pistol for sure, and while they’re not direct comparisons, soon we’re going to see a lot of reviews that compare this to other, more shootable pocket guns like the LCR, the Nano, and the Colt Mustang.

The Double Tap Derringer really looks like it gives a Scandium .357 J-Frame a run for its money in terms of “kills on the one end, maims on the other.”

But damn is it small. For more head over to the Modern Pawn and the EJ20Legacy YouTube Channels.

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New Study: Combat stress, exposure not related to rise in Military suicides (VIDEO)

It may seem counterintuitive but according to a recent study published by the Journal of American Medicine the increase in military suicides is not tied to deployment stress or combat exposure.

Instead, the study, which cross-referenced data from the National Death Index with the Department of Defense Medical Mortality Registry, suggests that mental health disorders, including depression, bi-polar disorder and alcohol abuse play a prominent role in military suicides, just as they do in civilian suicides.

Researchers examined 83 suicides that occurred between 2001 and 2008 and found that 58 percent percent had never been deployed to a war zone or theater of combat.

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“The findings from this study are not consistent with the assumption that specific deployment-related characteristics, such as length of deployment, number of deployments, or combat experiences, are directly associated with increased suicide risk,” the authors, based at the Naval Health Research Center in San Diego, wrote.

“Instead, the risk factors associated with suicide in this military population are consistent with civilian populations, including male sex and mental disorders,” they continued.  Male service members are twice as likely to commit suicide when compared to their female peers.

Some medical experts believe that there is a silver lining in these findings in that there are ways to screen for and treat individuals who struggle with depression and substance abuse, whereas if suicide was strictly combat-related, it would be difficult to address the problem because soldiers are ultimately needed on the battlefield.

“The major modifiable mental health antecedents of military suicides — mood disorders and alcohol misuse — are mental disorders for which effective treatments exist,” wrote Dr. Charles Engel of the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda., Md., in an editorial.

Meanwhile, critics of the study suggest that important information was omitted, such as data beyond 2008  that examines the long term effects of traumatic brain injuries and the fact that the databases used do not capture all suicides because on occasion family members will not publish the real cause of death.

“Why would the authors repeatedly insist that there is no association between combat and suicide?” asked Dr. Stephen N. Xenakis, a psychiatrist and a retired Army Brigadier General, who spoke to the New York Times. “The careful analysis of bad data generates poor evidence.”

However, head researcher of the study Cynthia Leard Mann told the NY Times that her team plans to update the study through 2012 when the data becomes available, but in the meantime expressed confidence that the new data will only reaffirm what they’ve already discovered.

“The current study includes information from when we saw a sharp increase in suicides, between 2005 and 2008,” Leard Mann said. “So it’s demonstrating that even in that period, we don’t see association with deployment.”

One theory to explain why suicide rates started to increase in 2005 is that the Army relaxed its recruitment and retention standards in 2004, allowing more at-risk soldiers to enlist.  As noted in a Stars and Stripes article, a 2010 Army report said that more than half of 80,403 waivers granted were to people with a history of drug or alcohol abuse, or crimes, and offenses that once had meant discharge were overlooked.

While the debate will continue over the factors influencing military suicide, one thing everyone can agree on is that it’s a huge problem that only appears to be getting worse.  In 2012, military suicides hit a record high with 349, up from 301 in 2011.

To help solve this crisis there are certain things we know work to save lives, as John Draper, the director of the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline, noted a recent NY Times op-ed:

We know that high-quality mental health care and crisis intervention through hot lines like the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline and the Veterans Crisis Line reduce emotional distress and suicidal thinking.

We also know that suicide rates correlate with poverty and unemployment, so those employers across the country who are hiring veterans are also doing their part to bring down the suicide rate.

We may not know why the veteran suicide rate is so high, but if our community comes together to meet the challenge, we can bring it down.

Police Departments Upgrade M&Ps, Increasingly Switch to 9mm

Smith & Wesson is upgrading police-issued M&P pistols in Colorado Springs, Colo., supplying officers with improved M&Ps in exchange for their used guns. The new handguns lack a magazine safety which affects the guns’ trigger pulls.

Magazine safeties, also known as magazine disconnects, prevent a firearm from firing if there’s no magazine inserted, but they often put tension on trigger components, making them heavier or stagy. They’re also newer-model M&Ps which have better factory triggers than models from previous generations.

“It was an even trade. Isn’t that wonderful?” said police spokeswoman Barbara Miller to the Gazette.

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The new guns are falling into the department’s replacement cycle, as the Springs’ police are issued every five to eight years and the M&P pistols they are replacing are now six years old. The guns will be surplussed for resale on the consumer market.

Smith & Wesson developed new trigger components for their M&P Shield subcompact concealed-carry pistol, and has since been rolling out the new triggers across the board for all their M&P pistols.

“The new 9mm M&P without the magazine disconnect safety allows us to achieve a smoother trigger pull,”said Lt. Mike Velasquez, police training director. The officers will get some range time with the guns before they’re issued.

The upgrade is part of a growing movement to supply officers with easier-to-use handguns, including a trend towards 9mm handguns over larger, harsher-recoiling calibers like .40 S&W.

Officers in Sioux Falls, S.D. are an example of yet another department making that exact switch. While they carry Glocks, not M&P pistols, they’re trading in their .40 caliber handguns for 9mm pistols, citing lighter recoil and greater capacity as the reasons for the change.

The Sioux Falls police will also be getting their guns at no cost to their department, thanks in part to a federal grant for new equipment. They will be selling their 17-year-old pistols back to Glock and buying new ones for just $409.

Part of this is because of improved bullet technology; a modern 9mm bullet is often as effective as other larger calibers, particularly when taking faster follow-up shots into account.

“When it comes to determining what kind of guns we carry, accuracy is by far the most important factor,” said Police Chief Doug Barthel to the Rapid City Journal. “We’d much rather have them put more rounds on target than have something with a little bigger caliber but not necessarily hit on time. It’s safer for the public in an unlikely shooting event.”

“It seems .40 S&W continues to fall out of favor with more people coming to the realization the 9mm offers higher capacity, lower recoil, lower training costs and solid terminal ballistics when compared to the .40 S&W,” explains the Bang Switch.

Police departments starting switching to .40 S&W pistols in the ’90s; it was simply a harder-hitting chambering. Today the effectiveness of the two cartridges is similar, and subsequently many departments across the country are beginning to favor 9mm.

Another contributing factor in the wide-spread adoption of .40 S&W pistols is thought by many to be political. Following the passage of the Assault Weapons Ban in 1994, many police departments were offered incentives by gun manufacturers to switch to the newer cartridge, as long as they sold or traded their old 9mms back to the manufacturer.

Manufacturers were then able to re-sell the recently-banned magazines on the open market, as they were considered “pre-ban” magazines.

“The AWB allowed gun manufacturers to buy back previously issued law enforcement magazines and resell them on the commercial market,” explains Todd G. over at Pistol-Training.com. That made all those used, abused, high capacity magazines worth their weight in gold. So manufacturers went to agencies and offered to trade them, at no cost, new & improved big-caliber guns for their wimpy little 9mms. The agency got a new gun that fit in its current holsters, replacing old and sometimes completely worn out guns.”

That being said, .40 S&W is still favored by much of the law enforcement community, at all levels of government. The debate over which caliber is better is slated to rage on for the foreseeable future.

Woman exchanges gunfire with armed robbers at Houston Denny’s, saves hubby (VIDEO)

It’s unclear who needed more range time: The robbers or the woman shooting at them. 

A woman came to the aid of her husband when she found that he was being robbed inside a southeast Houston Denny’s early Thursday morning.

The couple was having breakfast with the man’s brother around 4 a.m. The woman got up from the table to go to the restroom and when she returned her husband was face down on the floor with six armed men attempting to rob him.

So the woman, who has a valid concealed carry permit, pulled out her own gun and opened fire on the group of suspects. After an exchange of gunfire the suspects took off with some jewelry they had taken before she had interrupted them.

“She said she came out of the restroom and saw my brother on the floor. That’s when she started doing what she gotta do. She got a license and she’ll do anything to protect her kids and my brother,” the woman’s brother-in-law, who did not wish to be identified, said.

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Although nobody was hit, the exchange resulted in bullets being sprayed across the parking lot, hitting windows of the restaurant and several cars parked outside.

Police confirmed that there was a shootout, but did not say how many shots were fired or how many of the suspects were armed.

It appears that the motive was robbery, but the woman’s brother-in-law isn’t so sure. “I don’t know if it was random, or he was followed, or someone set him up. Cause he got his own record label,” he said.

The couple, who is still shook up over the ordeal, is thankful that nobody was injured during the incident. The woman’s brother-in-law is grateful that she was armed and told reporters that he believes she saved his brother’s life.

The investigation is still ongoing and no charges have been filed against the woman, who shot in self-defense of her husband.

6 lessons learned from the ammo shortage (VIDEO)

 The end of 2012 and beginning of 2013 was hard but instructional for the shooting community. Fear, political handwringing and dedication to the shooting sports collided into a bizarre sociological train wreck that spawned a run on ammo purchasing not seen since — ever.

No doubt this was a trying time for shooters. If you could find an ammo source, sales were often limited to a box per customer. If it was on the secondary market, prices were incredibly inflated but people were still paying up (inexplicably, a brick of .22 LR became more valuable than a unicorn). Some new shooters bought guns without ammunition to put through them, some bought ammo without a matching firearm. Established shooters cautiously dipped into reserved stashes and cutting back on their range time.

Fortunately, signs the ammo drought is ending are starting to show. I don’t think anybody’s going to argue the experience was awesome or fun, but it should definitely serve as a learning opportunity for shooters. Experience is the best or worst teacher, depending on who you ask. I’d like to share with you the six biggest lessons I learned from the last few months, and invite others to share their lessons as well.

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1. The joy of dry-fire

My friend bought a Smith & Wesson M&P 9 at the onset of the shortage. Unfortunately, he was left with a very cool paperweight. What ammo he did scrounge up from occasional trips to the gun store and generous donations of other shooters needed to be carefully metered in use.

With little ammunition, we both resolved to make the best use of those precious cartridges when range time came up. Dry fire practice jumped to the forefront as a way to enjoy the new purchase on some level, but proved to be great for improving our shooting and diagnosing problems in our technique.

Today, I have plenty of ammunition lying around and get to the range once a week, but I’m still only shooting a bit more than I did when the shortage seemed unending. Why? Because I spend more time dry-firing now than actually shooting. When I do go to the range, my groups are tighter, my confidence is higher, and I’m shooting out to longer distances than before.

The benefits of a good dry-fire practice regimen are well-documented. The shortage just made me appreciate it. It saves money, makes us better shooters and gives us a chance to handle our arms without a trip to the range. It took a shortage of live ammo to make me realize dry fire practice’s obvious value, but I’m glad I know now.

2. “Common calibers”

“I only own guns in common calibers because they’re available everywhere,” said anonymous patron.

I’m mostly a revolver shooter in the handgun arena and lover of old cartridges like the 6.5x55mm Mauser. I was able to see the upsides of being into at least a few oddball cartridges when the 9mm and .223 shelves became miniature dust bowls only irrigated by the tears of 3-gun competitors. While .38 and 6.5x55mm aren’t even exotic, they just aren’t the ‘common calibers’ most people refer to that are used for everything gun related. Sport shooters, law enforcement, casual plinkers and the military gravitate to a few calibers in a feedback loop that lead to 10 cartridges eclipsing most other fine options on the market.Remember hearing that all the time eight months ago? It was a mantra for many types of gun owners, from the prepper community to sport shooters. Well, we’ve seen a test run of how well this little gem worked out when the ammo supply chain was hit by an external hiccup. Short of the “Red Dawn” cosplayers in bunkers and those dastardly scalpers, it seems the average guy won’t be able to find their “common” caliber when a shock hits the market.

I consider this a wakeup call to the conventional wisdom being, well, if not wrong, pretty suspect. Maybe the time to pick up that .257 Roberts or 7.62×25 CZ-52 is here. I don’t think everyone should run out and buy a corner-case caliber firearm just for kicks, but for your next purchase, consider picking up a less common caliber version. Either do that, or stockpile your ammunition truly deep. Speaking of which…

3. When times are good, buy

Jeff Quinn, the face of GunBlast and owner of an impossibly epic beard, dropped a true jewel in a YouTube video.

While sometimes this sort of sound-bite wisdom ends up being awfully obtuse in practice, I just don’t see any compelling argument against what Quinn is saying here. When times are good, even very casual plinkers who shoot a hundred rounds a year should keep a small supply on hand. Unless you decide to use it to decorate an aquarium with cartridges or something, it’s not going to go bad. And really, what are you NOT going to shoot eventually? When is the price of ammunition going to go down?

While we’re on the topic of spending money…

4. Start reloading

What kind of gun owner who does even moderate volumes of shooting hasn’t considered reloading at some point? Maybe you even watched some YouTube videos on it or idly flipped through a Hornady catalog. But then something came up and trampled the interest.

Next time, stay strong and commit to reloading. Changing priorities around a bit can quickly lead to a well-stocked setup. Maybe instead of buying another AR, pick up a good starter kit by Lee or RCBS and some components. If you don’t reload, start saving your brass now and by the time you start, you’ll have plenty to reload. If you’re really lucky, you might even have a friend who will let you use his or her press as long as you supply the consumables and dies.

Why weren’t you there? Smug berms everywhere were practically laughing at us. Unfortunately, many shooters just didn’t have the ammo to provide those backstops with the regular lead smackdown they need to remind them who’s boss.Yes, handloading can be time consuming, but if that’s holding you back, remember the darkest days of the ammo shortage. Recall the gunmetal skies creased with lightning, hot ash-choked air and the empty lanes of your shooting range — well, at least one of those was probably accurate.

From that viewpoint, is it worth it to skip a range session to manufacture some ammunition to feed your next trip? If you’re missing shooting sessions now because you have no ammo on hand, then you can probably answer this one yourself.

I know that when the ammo shortage started, so did one of reloading supplies. This isn’t surprising, since the two are clearly related, but in my experience, reloading goes hand-in-hand with stockpiling. It just makes sense when you consider the savings from bulk purchasing. Some reloading components can ONLY be purchased in bulk quantities for sane prices. I don’t know any reloaders who were at any point completely bone-dry on ammunition. Done smartly, handloading will really help you weather shocks in the ammo market.

5. Support good vendors

I’m not going to slander the shops that raised prices in accordance with the laws of supply and demand. Instead, I’m going to encourage people to remember which vendors helped them out and kept an even keel on prices even when it seemed Ouroboros emerged and swallowed the ammo industry. I’m lucky enough to have multiple great gun vendors locally who all maintained consistent pricing, even if it meant their stock was selling out. Hopefully, you were in the same situation and managed to buy some ammo for reasonable prices.

I’m not saying to round up a posse and burn down the places that raised prices — that’s fair game in a free economy. But there’s a flipside to that coin, and it’s your customer loyalty. Remember who carried you through the shortage and kept your guns fed when times are good again.These vendors were the thin line between shooters like myself desperate for a hit, and scalpers exploiting my addiction — not to mention my fears that maybe the ammo shortage wasn’t going to get better. When I was starting to think $70 for a brick of .22 LR was the new vision of a good price, my local gun shops were there to bring me back to sanity.

6. The supply chain is weak

Finally, I don’t think anybody can make the argument that the supply chain that provides ammunition to consumers is resilient. When you need ammunition during a real crisis, what do you think the odds are that store shelves will be stocked?

Gun stores America-wide had dry supplies because of the PROSPECT of legislation, just a potential a shift in political climate. We’re not talking about supply lines being interfered with, commerce and transit being hit with new layers of red tape (like whatever the U.N. is cooking in their moral cesspool at any time), international trade being disturbed, or even damage to the infrastructure. We’re talking about speculation and fear creating a serious shortage. Don’t take the cartridges on the shelves for granted.

The next time

While it’d be lovely to think we won’t see a similar scenario to this shortage play out again in the future, it’d also be profoundly stupid. You could make the case that as bad as this round of anti-gun hysteria was, things could be made a lot worse very quickly. All it takes is some unfortunate circumstances and opportunistic politicians to plunge us back into panic spending mode. Let’s take this shortage as a sort of practice crisis and learn everything we can to prepare for the next time, which may be the real deal.

Colt Select Fire AR (VIDEO)

Colt.  At the center of this venerable company is a desire to serve.  From their iconic cartridge revolvers to their timeless single action .45s, Colt has armed our service men and women.  And the Peacemakers and 1911s are easy enough to find as they were issued.  But not so with the rifles.  Unless it has three stops on the selector switch, there’s something missing from an AR-15.

Let’s go back a bit.  The term pre-ban may be confusing, especially those who weren’t paying attention to gun culture for the ten year span of the assault weapons ban of 1994.  Modern sporting rifles were harder to come by then, and guns made before the ban went into effect often drew high prices.

But there’s a prologue to that chapter.  The regulation of “machine guns” goes back as far as 1934.  But in the 80s, seers and other parts came under increased scrutiny.  In 1986, select fire machine gun manufacture and sales were more heavily restricted.  

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Guns made before that time can still be bought and sold by civilians, but they are still regulated by the NFA of 1934.  That means paperwork.

It can all be very confusing.  What is less confusing is the price tag on these guns.  A pre-1986 select fire lower, at bargain basement prices, can fetch $10,000.  That’s a conservative price.  Very conservative.  Then you have to top it, dress it up, register it, feed it….

On with the review!

The Colt lower here was made before 1986.  It is properly documented, registered, stamped, etc.  It’s bona fide, as we say in the south.  And it kicks ass.

I’ve shot some fun guns.  Some of which were full-auto.  Thumping through a drum mag on a Thompson is one of those rare things that makes me smile like a child.  But the old trench broom doesn’t feel like a useful tool.  I imagine it did at one point, but it is like driving my pop’s 32 Ford.  Maybe it would if I spent more time in actual trenches.

The Colt, when fired in single shot mode, shoots like any other AR.  In fact, this rifle has been customized like every other privately owned AR I’ve shot.  So no big deal there.  Throw on a Magpul stock, grip, and forend grip, and it feel fairly familiar.  It accepts magazines like an AR.  This is simply the chassis.  Until you flip the switch.

The upper comes from Troy.  It is an M7.  The 7.5″ barrel makes this an SBR.  But this is where the rifle begins to establish a real identity.  It is very maneuverable.  The M7 takes the overall length of the AR down to bull-pup size, all for $1,525.

(As a side-note, and just to throw a hypothetical wrench in the system, I have to ask… would you want a short barreled AR, with all of the paperwork hassle and increased expense, when you could have a full sized Tavor?)

The short barrel knocks off a bit of the 5.56′s punch, and decreases the potential long range accuracy.  But that’s purely academic.  The short barreled AR is a close quarters weapon.  With the folding stock adapter from Law Tactical, the package gets even smaller.  What was already compact becomes easily concealed.  A bag like the 5.11 Triab offers fast access to incredible firepower.

 Speaking of firepower

This isn’t the type of rifle that you open up.  No mag dumps.  It can take the heat.  But why?  The adolescent fantasy we too often entertain when playing with full-auto weapons gives way to a reverential respect.  Burst fire with this rifle is reasonably accurate and controllable.  There is a significant muzzle rise, but the vertical grip helps to keep it level.

The first time I fired it, I felt a bit inadequate.  I had a hard time balancing the bursts.  Too little downward pressure, and the gun would rise up.  Too much, and I’d watch the dirt pop in front of the target.  I’m so conditioned to single shots, that I fire and relax a bit, even if it only for a fraction of a second.

It took me three magazines before I could keep it level enough to use the gun’s iron sights with anything approaching accuracy.  And then, I was putting bursts into a twelve inch group.  The first shot would thread the needle.  The next three or four would widen out substantially.

After a good solid burst (once I learned to control it), target acquisition happens the same way it does with any AR.  The iron sights work fine.  Non-magnified optics work even better.  No amount of stability would allow me to keep the irons aligned during burst fire.  But a single red dot, or a holographic circle makes things much more reliable.

But you have to be prepared to feed it.  Before the Great (ammo) Depression of 2012, we would load up the Surefire 60 round magazine regularly.  We emptied magazine after magazine.  But not now.  It is too expensive.

Conclusion

These should be more accessible than they are.  A select-fire AR is a tool that requires some discretion.  But there’s very little that can compare.  With the short barrel and the folding stock, this combination comes in much closer to sub machine gun standards.  I’ve yet to see an AK pattern rifle that can match the size, and I doubt I’ll ever see one this small that can match the accuracy that the Troy barrel delivers.

Is it worth it?  All of the extra expense?  The time required to find and buy a select-fire lower.  The registration of the lower?  Yes.  Of course it is.

Is it worth the price?  No.  This isn’t a dig at anyone who is selling a full auto gun.  Not at all.  It is a dig at the system that creates an artificially inflated value system based only on scarcity.  The gun doesn’t cost any more to make.

But that’s not the world we live in.  We live in a weird world where tools like this are only available to a select few.

Trijicon files lawsuit against Obamacare morning-after-pill mandate (VIDEO)

Trijicon, the popular optics manufacturer and military contractor, is joining the fight against an Obamacare mandate that requires businesses to provide emergency contraception, aka “Plan B,” to employees.

Earlier this month, the Michigan-based company filed a lawsuit arguing that the Affordable Care Act mandate “illegally and unconstitutionally” requires Trijicon to violate its and its owners’ religious beliefs by forcing the company to cover items that induce early abortions by preventing the implantation of an embryo after its conception.

Specifically, those items include: “Plan B” (the so-called “morning after pill”), Ella (the so-called “week after pill”), and intauterine devices (“IUDs”).

“My father began this business with the intent of treating our employees and customers in a way that represented his strong Christian faith,” Trijicon President and CEO Stephen Bindon, told Live Action News. “By filing this lawsuit, we are simply trying to retain the culture and values we’ve always promoted here at Trijicon.”

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(Hobby Lobby, an arts and crafts company, also filed a lawsuit challenging the Plan-B mandate, see video below)

While Trijicon provides health insurance to employees, that coverage does not include abortion or abortion-related services.

Trijicon believes that it has a right to choose which services to offer employees and that the mandate coerces the family-owned business to “engage in acts that they consider sinful and immoral,” as the lawsuit states.

“All Americans, including job creators, should be free to honor God and live according to their consciences wherever they are,” Senior Legal Counsel Matt Bowman told Live Action News.

“As the vast majority of courts have found so far, the abortion pill mandate is an excessive burden on the religious freedom that the Constitution recognizes and guarantees to all Americans,” he continued.

According to the Affordable Care Act, those companies that fail to provide emergency contraception coverage to employees will face heavy fines. The Trijicon lawsuit, which joined a list of about 30 lawsuits filed by similarly religious-oriented businesses, is seeking an injunction against the mandate.

In response to the Trijicon lawsuit, the U.S. Department of Justice said that it will not oppose the request for an injunction, but will allow the lawsuit to proceed to court.

There’s little doubt that this will be a hotly-debated topic in the weeks and months to come. As each lawsuit makes its way through the lower courts, it’s likely that at some point the U.S. Supreme Court will have to decide whether it’s constitutional for the government to levy fines against a business that refuses to provide emergency contraception coverage to its employees because it infringes upon that business’s religious beliefs.

It should also be noted that this isn’t the first time Trijicon has made headlines for its strong Christian values.

Trijicon has, in the past, inscribed biblical references on the scopes of standard-issue rifles carried by U.S. soldiers on combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. The firearms with the Trijicon scopes were nicknamed “Jesus Rifles.” For obvious reasons, this caused a big kerfuffle.

Trijicon agreed to stop printing gospel references on sights for service rifles in 2010 and provided the Department of Defense with modification kits for the removal of the code on existing rifles. Yet, for one reason or another, it appears that the U.S. Military did not make it a priority to erase the code and biblical verses continue to pop up from time to time.

Two Bronx boys face charges for beating teen to death with rock after he shot at them

Edenwald Houses is the largest New York City Housing Authority development in the Bronx, with 40 buildings, 2,036 apartments and about 5,300 people, but no swimming pools, allegedly! 

Two young men from the Bronx are facing charges after a teen boy died presumably from the injuries he received when the two bashed in his head with a large rock after the teen shot at them.

Seventeen-year-old Antonio Lyles was pronounced dead while in police custody at a local hospital just after 4 o’clock Tuesday morning. An autopsy is scheduled for today to determine the exact cause of his death.

According to police, they were called to the Edenwald Houses, the largest housing project in the Bronx, around 3 o’clock Monday afternoon. Lyles had allegedly walked up to a group standing outside and opened fire on them with a .32 caliber semi-automatic pistol, which was later found at the scene by officers.

No one was struck by the gunfire, but 20-year-old Ezequiel Pena and 18-year-old Stanley Hampton then chased Lyles down and proceeded to beat him with a large rock.

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When police arrived they found Lyles with severe head trauma and he was immediately transported to a local hospital. There he remained under police custody awaiting charges for assault and criminal possession of a weapon. But about 13 hours after the incident, Lyles died from what is believed to be injuries sustained from the beating.

Pena and Hampton were arrested early Tuesday morning before the teen had died. They were charged with assault and gang assault and were awaiting arraignment scheduled for yesterday morning. It is unknown at this time if the boys will face additional charges following the death of the teen.

The investigation is ongoing.

The case has brought about some discussions about whether or not the two men charged were justified in beating the teen since he first fired shots at them. What’s your opinion? Were the two justified in the beating or should they be charged for his death?

‘Bring Enough Gun?’: Safari rifles for the ‘Fatal Five’ (VIDEO)

“Bring enough gun…” It’s a common expression at both ranges and hunting cabins, but can be applied whenever a buddy buys some huge caliber rifle or shotgun and shows it off for the first time. Nevertheless, we decided to point out some of the finer points of those titanic gatts of the safari.

Why

When European and American adventurers came to Africa in the 1800s, they found the continent teeming with exotic wildlife. While there was many of the same types of hunting scenarios as there were back home, (e.g. upland birds, small game, deer etc.), there were also some incredibly dangerous big game animals. The five most fatal of these, called the Big Five, or the Fatal Five, were the African elephant, rhinoceros, leopard, Cape buffalo, and lion.

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These animals were difficult to hunt, especially on foot and when cornered, they were incredibly dangerous as all could mount attacks rapidly. Immense 13,000-pound elephants could charge, almost totally concealed from tall grass and trample a hunter flat before he could get a shot off. A 2000-pound black rhino’s skin is thick enough to deflect small and even medium caliber rounds. The 200-pound leopard was a master of the stalk, only appearing at night to ambush its prey. The Cape buffalo, stubborn even when wounded, could ambush pursuers and turn the tables in the blink of an eye, earning these unlikely bovines the dubious reputation as one of the most successful killers of humans on the continent. Finally, we all know the lion as “the king of the jungle”. A pair of these creatures, known as the Tsavo Man-Eaters, killed no less than 35 workers along the Kenya-Uganda railway project in 1898. This epic lion v. man battle was depicted in the 1996 film The Ghost and the Darkness.

With animals like these, your regular off the shelf rounds just did not cut it.

Shotgun origins

When the first European hunters came to the continent, they did so with huge muzzle loading blackpowder shotguns. The most popular of these were up to 4-gauge (yes, that’s a single digit) monsters that fired quarter pound solid slugs propelled by 500-grains of black powder. When you remember that the Colt Walker, the most powerful handgun until the advent of the .357 Magnum, only held a powder charge of 60-grains of BP, you can get a feel for how big these guns were. While these scatterguns did the trick at extremely close ranges, by the 1900s, things got more advanced.

Big rifles for big characters

The rifles these hunters carried were unlike anything ever seen before. Custom gun makers in England such as Gibbs, Bland and Sons, and Holland and Holland (H&H), as well as the American firm of Griffin and Howe, and the German DW Mauser concern produced extremely well crafted rifles in monstrous calibers.By the 1900s going to Africa or India on safari was the fashionable thing to do. European royalty, authors, and industrialists spent weeks plodding around the wilds of the oldest continent, accompanied by teams of guides, and porters. These guides became the great professional hunters of the 20th century’s golden era of man vs. beast safari action. These men, like Frederick Courteney Selous (thought to be the basis of the mythical extraordinary gentleman Allan Quatermain), Swedish Baron Bror von Blixen-Finecke, and WDM ‘Karamojo’ Bell led talented amateurs like Teddy Roosevelt and Ernest Hemingway into the mouth of the Fatal Five and back out again safely.

These included .416 Rigby, .404 Jeffery, and .505 Gibbs. The .505 was a four-inch long cartridge that fired a 525-grain bullet large enough to be classified today as a ‘Destructive Device’ in the US. The most popular of these guns were single-shot falling block Gibbs-Farquharson rifles, a design that Ruger copied and improved upon for their No.1 rifle in the 1960s. These vintage guns today are highly collectable.

Other old school cartridges from the turn of the century include the 9.3x62mm, a European howitzer popular with gentlemen hunters who wandered the mountains of faraway lands in search of the largest bears and cats they could find (all while wearing fine tweed jackets). In America, bison hunters carried the Winchester Model 1895 in .405 Winchester, and this gun made more than a couple guest appearances in Africa.These British big bores saw service in World War 1, used to snipe at passing German Zeppelins as well as the first Teutonic tanks that clattered across No Man’s Land.

The end of this era of great safari hunters was the death of Peter Capstick in 1996. Capstick walked in the same footsteps as TR, Hemingway, Selous and others and his book on the subject, “Death in the Long Grass,” is one of the best of its kind.

Safari guns of today

The practice of safari hunts today is a dying custom with just a small number of international sportsmen chasing bucket list game and keeping a faint ember of the chase alive. Many of the traditional Fatal Five are off the menu even for the uber-wealthy, such as the endangered black rhino and the protected lion and the African bush elephant. Populations of Cape buffalo and some of the big cats are still open to those with wallets big enough to chase them. As such, animals like wildebeest and eland have been proposed as substitutes and are gaining popularity, although they just don’t have the panache of stalking lions.

The baseline rifle of safari hunters in Africa today starts with the .375 caliber H&H Magnum and moves up from there. In many African countries that still allow hunting of these exotic game animals, this is actually the minimum legal chambering that sportsmen are allowed to bring to the field. The exception to this many places are big cats, which are taken with calibers as small as .300 Win Mag.

Safari guns are still the realm of custom gun makers who turn out extremely high quality single shot and bolt-action rifles in .500 Nitro, .460 Weathersby Magnum, .700 Nitro and the mind boggling .950 JDJ. Commercial firms like Ruger however have always shown some interest in this market, churning out their $1350 No. 1 Tropical in .375 H&H as a more “entry level” priced rifle. European firms like Mauser, CZ, Sako, and Tikka are still keeping the 100-year old 9.3x62mm alive with semi-affordable bolt-action rifles.

Besides the cost and the limitation of game, today is just not the 1900s and budding Fatal Five hunters themselves have become the quarry of environmentalists. When Go Daddy CEO Bob Parsons took down an elephant with the blessing of the local government, PETA and the media had a field day.The rounds for these modern day elephant slayers are almost as expensive as the guns made to fire them. It’s not uncommon for these cigar-sized cartridges to run $10 a pop in the case of the moderately priced .416 Rigsby to well over $100 a round for the hard to find .577 Tyrannosaur. Made in 1993, the four inch-long .577 T-rex generates over 10,000 ft. lbs of energy by pushing a 750-grain monolithic solid round out of its 75mm long case.

Increasingly and ironically, since the veldt of Africa is off limits, Western big game hunters have switched back from the deserts and jungle to the forests and mountains of North America. Here, giant Alaskan brown bear, mountain lions, wolves, and black bear have replaced the legendary safari animals of old. With these creatures, you still have to bring enough gun, but firearms chambered in the lighter .338 and .300 Wby Mag made by domestic companies are better suited than the artillery pieces of yesteryear.

And you don’t have to pay a porter to tote your ammo for you.

The 700 nitro express in a 3 min blooper reel of sorts.  By the way, 700 Nitro is $425 for five shots, making this clip almost as expensive as the “Lone Ranger” but twice as entertaining.