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Sam, Welcome to another edition of Old School Guns. This is episode number 223. 223. So anyway, it's been a little bit of a while. Like everybody else, I've got all kinds of appointments and other things that just rule my life right now. And so I was just waiting for some news to kind of gather up. And it, and it has, and if you have any questions or comments, you can email them to me at KB M A K E L A O l dot com KB M A K E L O l dot com or you can put them in the comments section on podbean. So interesting stuff happening. Another bungled, foiled, just comic opera assassination attempt against Donald Trump. You know, and I'm a huge, well, I'm a Trump supporter. I voted for him three times. I, you know, and everybody who listens to this probably has figured that out. You know, I'm, these guys are being radicalized. Whether it's crooks, whether it's that other nut they just put in prison for life or, or this guy that was just, just killed. Somebody's radicalizing them. And I'll get more into that a little bit later. But you know, this, and, and they refuse the Democratic Party of the United States, which is on the verge of becoming a terrorist organization. Um, the only reason they're not is because they think they're going to win big in the midterms and God help us if they do. But they're radicalizing these people and they're not even, they're not even bringing down the tenor, okay, Nazi, racist, genocide, all these things that they continually just call out are, that's very inflammatory language. People don't use it against them. Even though I would say that they're the most racist party in the, that's. They're the most racist that any party has been in our history, I'll put it that way. You know, it's, it's terrible. This is really terrible. You know when somebody sneaks onto Mira Lago with a short barreled 12 gauge shotgun. And a, by short barrel, I mean just minimal hunting, I guess, 18, 20 inches and a can of gasoline, obviously going to start a fire and then mow down whoever he's going to mow down when they come out of the building. It's a ridiculous plan. And just like crooks and probably this other guy, Ruth, and now this guy there. What, what are you doing? You know, same thing with the, the, the whole Charlie Kirk thing. It's like where, where do you think this leads you're not just gonna get away with it, go back to normal life, and 30 years from now say, yeah, I did it, and give interviews and sell a book. No, it doesn't work that way. They will get you, they will find you, they will track you down by meaning they. The apparatus of government. But the real hypocrisy, first of all, it's the waste of life is just terrible. The hypocrisy of the Democratic Party, where they radicalize and encourage people essentially to do these things. Then when it happens, they step back and say, hey, it's not us. We didn't have anything to do with it. You know, this guy came from a family of Trump supporters. You know, it's like, no, you people are radicalizing. They know it. They're doing it in the schools, they're doing it in the media. And I don't know that mass media will die off fast enough to make a difference. But I hope it, I hope it goes soon. It's just terrible what they're creating. And I am not a doctor. I am not trained in any of this. These are just layman observations is they're creating some sort of mass psychosis or mass hysteria. You don't see people like, you know, just look at the, look at the film clips of the ICE rioters, the anti ice rioters in Minneapolis, and you see how triggered these people are. And it's hundreds of them, you know, triggered to the point where the mother of two uses her vehicle to try to stop and trap ice. Try to prevent them from doing their job that they are supposed to do. And so this is ridiculous. You know, if you're. I just. It comes from something. It's like you're a parent. You have two children that depend on you. You have two children that depend on your car. So going out and using it to block ICE people and, and do these kind of things is terrible. It's terrible. It's what irresponsible, responsible kind of a person is that. And then if you, you listen to the mouth on her partner, who is, she's, she's another real, real gem. I mean, the foul, disgusting things these people are doing that the, the second dirt bag who, who got, who got blown away, the, the four, you know, again, they pretend you would think this guy is the angel of mercy, you know, oh, he's a VA nurse and he's such a good person. He was trying to help a woman that had been shoved to the ground. All that's a lie, and they knew it when they finally Couldn't even tell that lie anymore. When the film of him earlier in the week came out of where he's spitting on an ICE agent and kicks the taillight off an ice car. And then of course, he shows up to a, to a, one of these riots, basically illegally carrying. And don't, don't say, well, he had a permit. Well, he didn't have it on him. He didn't have ID on him. So therefore he was illegally carrying. He was supposed to have those two things on him if he's carrying in that state. So he was breaking the law. It's just like I had, I've had, of course, permits, one of the places I lived, what one thing you could not do was carry concealed in an establishment that primarily sold alcohol, meaning a bar, and realize that there's a lot of kind of restaurantee bars that are, they're kind of, kind of close. But you can't carry, you know, if there's, when in doubt, you, you can't carry and you're not. Even though you have a permit and you might have it on you, an ID on you. If you go into an establishment like that and you are detained and apprehended by law enforcement, you are not legally carrying. Because one of the stipulations is you can't go into those places if you're carrying. And it's the same case here. So none of their lies make any sense. Throwing the fireworks at people, throwing the water bottles, all that stuff that's. Yet you see giant crowds doing it down here where I live, the gutter scum. School teachers convinced hundreds, maybe even thousands, I don't know, of kids to walk out of their class to protest ice. Now most of these, most of these kids are being kids and it's like, hey, if I can get out of class, you know, you're not going to go sit in English class when everybody else is out trotting around. You get to get to go out, get into the fresh air, you know, and then come back and the, you know, the goofballs will have their signs and all that. Most, most of the kids probably just went along with it because it got them out of school for a couple hours. But obviously some shitbag teachers, other, other pieces of garbage who somehow have gotten control of schools or gotten influence over children, set this all up and made it happen. It's absolutely outrageous. Part of a mass psychosis. Yeah, this is really bad. This is really, really bad. I don't know how people, you know, this is, you know, we always Thought it would be another pandemic or some other type of thing that would bring on a collapse or this kind of upheaval. But now we're talking. It's really kind of a mass psychosis. People just can't understand, won't understand, and at the slightest opportunity, act triggered. This is really bad and it's happening and it's, it seems to be spreading. It's even getting into red states that is, that is bad, very bad. And another example is there is. He's, as you know, he's dead now. This Jeffrey Epstein, a pig of a human being, absolute dirt bag. A dirty old man. A dirty old man and his friends. And one of them is apparently the former Prince Andrew, that you know, buffoon from the royal family. And a whole lot of big, A lot of big businessmen. I mean, names that have been kicked around. You know, I don't know, I don't even want to recite them. But all these guys were going down to his island ostensibly to do investments and talk about investments because this guy was apparently a pretty high rolling financier and investment guru. But it appears that they also may have been dazzling with these. Or dazzling is probably the wrong word, but engaging with these young women that this guy had groomed to become like a little harem down there or something. It's all tawdry, it's all nasty, it's all filthy. But people are psychotic about it. I mean, they're psychotic. I mean, Marjorie Taylor Greene threw away her career over it. Release these piles. And it's like, you know, I being kind of a, you know, a person who's. There's things you can do, things you can't do. There's things that maybe a libertarian wouldn't do. Trying to regulate the world's oldest profession and the people who are in and around it probably is a very difficult thing to do. And now that they got Maxwell in jail, the girl, the, the, the nasty girlfriend, Epstein's dead. The, the poor girl who commit, who, who was apparently connected to Prince Andrew through all this. She got a, you know, $15 million settlement. She later committed suicide. I mean, troubled person, obviously. She, she got all kinds of money. They've taken Epstein's money and I think they've divided that up amongst the, the girls that were involved in this. I mean, at a certain point, I, I don't know what other kind of. With statute of limitations being what they are. I don't know that there's any, there's any further point in going after this. I mean, it it's been a dead story now for. He died in 2019. He Certainly, you know, he was in prison. So, you know, five years is a statute of limitations. And I think. I don't know that there's any other. I don't know that there's anything else you can do but try to make. Divide up the money, try to make people whole again and do your best. But it's just Matt. And not everybody just kind of says that people are just frothing. And like I said, people are losing their careers over it because they're going psycho. They're going psycho over it. Ah, it also brings us to Greenland. Make no mistake, Greenland is a strategic problem for the United States and a strategic potential, strategic opportunity for Russia and China. And it boils down to this. Denmark, which is a nice country with really nice people. I mean, it's really nice. Now, I don't know about their latest waves of illegal immigration or legal immigration they've allowed from other places, but the ethnic Danish who I've known, and it's been on military operations and things, are very decent, nice people, but there's only like 8 or 9 million of them. They cannot defend Greenland, even with NATO's help. It's. It's kind of a bridge too far. The other thing is they can't keep China and Russia out. They just can't. There's just not enough resources. They can't do it. And de facto, we have basically been defending Greenland for 85 years. Maybe 86 years. I guess it's 85 years. No, it's 86 years from about, you know, 1940. You know, we wanted to keep the Nazis out, so we defended it. And so we've been paying the bill for their defense for 85 years. That's why Donald Trump wants the island, is. So if we can defend it, keep them out of the northern part of this hemisphere, and we can, you know, if there's. If there's any kind of strategic minerals or oils or any kind of that stuff, we have the money to develop it, whereas Denmark does not. We can. We can make it happen. They can't. It should be ours. I'm not sure we're going about it the right way. I think I just would have landed people and then made a midnight phone call to. To Denmark saying, you need to go along with this, or else we won't like you very much. And, you know, you can. You can cry about it all you want, but the strategic interests. NATO's northern flank has to be more secure and the dog sled teams from Denmark ain't do armed with model 1917 rifles which we, which we gave them at the end of World War II. Those aren't going to make it. Those aren't cutting it. Okay. We need a serious commitment and a serious presence on Greenland. That's just the way it is. Interesting. The Winter Olympics, which I'm not a huge fan of. I'm not a huge fan of the Olympics anymore. You know, when I was, when I brought up, it was kind of, you know, basically a way the Cold War kind of played out. You know, it's us against them, you know, the communist bloc against the free nations. I've always, and of course I was rooting for us. But the, the, the deal as I've gotten older and as the Cold War ended, I really think that some of the nationalism in the, in the Olympics is really ridiculous. I mean, does it really matter that Norway gets, has won most of the medals? I don't think so. I think the flags and all that other stuff, I think it's just childish. So I don't really, I don't really go for it. And I don't like the political statements that some of the athletes make. I don't, I've never liked that. I always thought that was pretty bad. So I'm really happy that both the hockey teams won. But what I will tell people, before you rub it into Canada's face, is that the great John C. Garand, or Garand if you want to pronounce it, French way designer of the M1 rifle. He, he came from Canada, came down here. So, you know, it's, it's kind of a two way street that we have a lot to be grateful with Canada for. I just wish they treated their people better. They're trying to take their guns away and everything else. And I wish Alberta would become either independent or become a state, become part of the United States. That'd be awesome. Okay, now we can get into some questions and answers. And actually we're, we're cooking along with this. What do you think of Daewoo rifles? They've been showing them at the Shot Show. Promising importations. What is your opinion of them? I have touched them. I've actually never fired one. I've never fired one because the first time when they actually imported them, I think in the 80s or whatever, they were still pretty rare. They didn't bring that many of them in. They look very cool. I like the styling, you know, but here's the bottom line. It's an interesting Fun rifle. And it has the one great attribute of a, of a 5.56 rifle. And that is it takes stanag standardized NATO magazines, the same kind we use in AR15s and M16s. So that's, that's the brilliant part of that. The rest of it is it's, it's really no more sophisticated than an M16A1. It's got good sights, it's got the same kind of pencil barrel. It's, you know, it's a, a nice rifle, but it's nothing that, you know, when you look at the dollar value, you can get into a basic AR style rifle for a lot less, I think than what these Daewoos will cost. So that's what I think for collector value. It's an interest. It's fine for as a real useful working rifle. It probably is. Probably is not. And that's essentially the second part of that question. It was actually two questions. What do I think about the HK93? The HK93 has got a heavier trigger pull than I like. It does not take stain aggression magazines. And the last time I checked, the HK93 magazines were horrifically expensive. I think they might have been 80 to $100 a piece. Maybe there's some. Because it was never adopted by that many militaries. It was adopted by a couple, I think, but not really very many. It just, it never quite caught on the, the AR really kind of. I remember it way back in the day. It was kind of nip and tuck there for a while. A lot of people liked H&K. HK was a great innovator. Some of their designs worked out well, some of them not so well. But H and K, the one thing you could say about them is they had innovative firearms and they were really about the only, you know, roller lock rifles out there. And very, very good. But they never quite caught on here. They caught on a little bit but then went away. You know, the, the AR was just too much of a marketing juggernaut. So again, it's a great, a great rifle for collectors, but not so great for, for shooters. And I saw one, it was actually a clone. It wasn't Century Arms. It was something else. And the last one I saw that, I think they wanted three $700 for this clone, which was laughable, absolutely laughable. So in spite of everything else, I think it's probably overpriced. Okay, let's look at the next is Delta 4. Switching from the HK416 to the SIG MCS spear. I've Seen. I've seen a news report that says that. But, you know, you. You have to be very careful with those unit. Those units, first of all, they don't advertise a whole lot of the stuff they do. And the other thing is they. When Delta Force started. When Delta Force started, it was a shoestring operation where they had to, you know, they didn't have any weapons. They had to. They had to go get a bunch of M3 grease guns, you know, out of storage because they need. For some reason, they didn't want to use M16A1s, I don't know, but. But I think they had silenced grease guns which they actually liked and thought very highly of, and they replaced them with MP5. So they. They were around for a while, but they. They have obviously a huge budget. And you just saw from the Maduro thing, I mean, these guys train hard. They. They are all business. And if there's a piece of kit they want, they'll go out and buy it. And even if they put it on the shelf, it may not be something they use every day, but they may foresee a situation or they may be confronted with a set of circumstances that would mean that the HK416 is not optimal and the spear is. Now, what that is, I don't know. I couldn't tell you. The people who I have known who've been in that unit are people who, you know, they were in the unit, and then after a while, they left the unit to go do other things. So I don't have any kind of. Obviously any kind of contacts currently in the unit. So I wouldn't know what their thinking is on this, but I'm sure it's rational thinking. I'm sure it's just like anything else. They see there's a mission set that we have where we need a rifle that does xx, X, Y and Z. And the spear fits it better that the spear fits those parameters better than the HK416. Okay, here's another question. Have you seen the used Sig P320s on the market? And what do you think? Well, that's a quagmire. There are. There seems to be, I don't want to say a glut, but I'll say a glut of police trade in three 20s. Whether that's been triggered by, you know, the negative press and the talk of uncommanded discharges, whether it's been done by all that, whether it's been that. I think the state of Washington has deauthorized the use of the P320. Whether it's any or all of that, I don't know, but it seems like there's a glut of them on the market. And you know, I mean, the only one that is remotely interesting to me is there were some.45 ACP, I think both a compact a the full length one. That's kind of interesting to me because it's 45 ACP, which I think is a inherently better caliber. The 9 millimeter ones, it's like, yeah, you know, whatever. You can get nine millimeter handguns anywhere. And you know, I've made, I've told you what I think of polymer plastic institutional, you know, handguns, you know, it's kind of like institutional wear in a, in a, in a company cafeteria. You know, will it, will it do what it's supposed to do? Yes, probably. But it's nothing that you'd want to set the table with your next, your next fancy dinner party. You know, I've said it. It's. They're, they're designed to be purchased and appreciated by bureaucrats and not necessarily shooters. So. But if you need a nine millimeter that fits, fits those things, I suppose it'd be okay. I can't see any reason why you wouldn't buy it if you, if you were on an extremely tight budget. Because I don't think the new ones really cost that much more and they might cost twice as much maybe the ones I've seen have been 350 and between 300 and 350. So I think the newer ones are about 6. So whatever. If you're on an extremely tight budget and you are saying I need a 9 millimeter handgun, that's what I can afford, then you know, you might want to check it out. So that's what I think of those. You know, if you have a need and it fits, you know, that's, that's what it is. All right, here's the next one. You've talked a lot about your liking of carry handle AR15s. What don't you like about carry handle AR15s? Let's see. The first thing I don't like about them is I really care for the, that rounded front sight. I think that the A2's squared front sight is actually a lot better just, just from the light, you know, just, just of light reflection. I think that's better. Not that it makes. Now I will also tell you that it doesn't make that big of a difference, but, but it could. So I could sit there and say, well, you could notice it. So I suppose that's one coming back. I have no real problem with the flash suppressor, but I think that the way they filled in the bottom slots on the flash suppressor, the A2, is probably a good idea, but I've never really had a problem with it otherwise, so I can't really say that that's. That's any kind of a real consideration. I would say that the other issue I have is there's no hash marks on the sight or the carry handle base like there is on the A2 where you can mechanically zero for windage. The. The rear sight. Yeah. Using those hash marks, you actually have to click it all the way over and then click it back 17 clicks. So that's how you mechanically zero an A1, whereas A2, you just line up the hash marks and you're. You're there. And why is that important? Well, it's important because way back in the day when I was issued an M16A1, one of the big things was you would mechanically zero the rifle. And then when you went to the zero range, you would keep track of your adjustments. You would write them on one of these sticky labels and you would put it in the pistol grip of your rifle so that if you got your rifle at some point and the sights had been changed or some. Some other deal, you could just look at that thing that you stuck inside the pistol grip and say, oh, I need to go two up and four left, and I'll be zero. From a mechanical zero and I'll be zeroed. It's logical. It made sense, except for the fact when I pointed it out to my chain of command that, well, nobody ever messes with these sites, especially on an A1. It's not like anybody really would adjust those sites. You would clean it, turn it into the arms room, and it would just sit there. And, you know, occasionally you had to go in and clean it. But unless you change the sights, the sights on the A1, one of the beauty is beauties of it is that they, they stay where they're at. So I said the only the time when this would be most handy would be if my rifle gets turned in for maintenance. Because occasionally they would check them for, you know, if the barrels were bending, which they never really found. But, you know, your rifle could get turned in for some sort of maintenance if they discovered something with it. So I said, if my rifle's gone, well, my adjustments are in my. Are in my pistol grip and they're Gone too. In which case I was told, well, you should have those written down. And. And of course, I showed. I showed my boss the. My little smart book that I had, and I said, I do have them written down, but does every soldier in this company, this rifle company, have. Have them written down too? And the answer was no, of course not. They just did the minimum. They wrote it, stuck it in there. So if Private Snuffy goes to. If he gets transferred to another platoon, the company, he might keep his weapon, he might keep the same weapon, or he might not. If he goes to another. Another organization and they hand him a rifle, if he's got those changes, he can mechanically zero the rifle, put his corrections on it, and be exceptionally close to zero if not zeroed. So, you know, if we didn't institutionally put them down somewhere else besides the. The pistol grip of the rifle, then we were in danger of losing that data. But the inspectors who inspect your arms room and military arms rooms get inspected all the time for. By a whole host of people. They wanted to see that little label stuck in there with the corrections on it. And if. If every one of your rifles that was assigned had. Had that, you were good to go. If you didn't have that, well, then, you know, you were in trouble. So, yeah, the. Basically being able to mechanically zero and then put your corrections on a. On sites is very important. And I like. I like the A2 the way it. Way it happens on that a little bit better. I think the A1. I'm always torn with this. I'm always torn whether the A1 system, where you actually have to take some action, whether it's the point of a pen or some other pointy object or a, you know, cartridge, and make those changes, whether that's a better system on the rear sight or is the knob, which is on the A2, is that a better system? I kind of go back and forth. For me, they're both. The knob is more convenient, but they're both equally serviceable. So the one thing I really like about it, though, here's what. Here's. Here's what I like about the A1 sights. And I'm supposed to be talking about what I don't like, but what, what I do like. I guess what I'm talking about is I don't like. What I don't like on the A2 sites is that somebody can come up and click, click, turn your. Turn your windage dial. You know, they can turn your windage knob. They cannot do that on an A1. So I guess, I guess for me personally as a shooter, I like having the knob there because I'm the only one who touches it. But you know when people say, hey, do you have an AR when you show it to somebody? You know, you know, unless you're watching them like a hawk, somebody could, you know, turn that knob and throw you off. Whereas they cannot do that with an A1. So what I like and what I don't like, carry handle, ars, the A2s have something I kind of don't like and the a and the A1s have something I do like. I also think as I'm moving back, the pistol grips are okay for me. I don't have a problem with those. I actually like them. I actually like them. I get along with them fine. I can see where some people would like to have a more full grip, a thicker grip to help position their, their shooting finger a little bit. I understand that. I will also say though, the reason the way they are. The way they are is because when the AR10 and the AR15 kind of came out, they were also trying to sell these to foreign governments. And in a lot of different places around the world, people aren't as big as us, meaning tall and with large hands. So with smaller hands you could see where they kind of. The, the one size fits all is rather than one size is too big for some. You can see where there's appeal to that. So I, I think they could improve that a little bit. I've never been that crazy about the charging handle and the way you pull it back, it just, you know, that was kind of an add on. The original one was the trigger that. The trigger type charging handle, which was in what we call the carry handle. I like that, I really like that system. I've used it. I like that system. That's a lot. That's, that's very cool. The other one, it always seems like you have to push your rifle forward and bring it back. I. Not really crazy about it, but it's, it's not a big enough of a deal to worry about. And yeah, that's the other thing I've never cared for. And this is. I corrected it on my A2. I put a good sling on it. But the, the A1 slings, the black slings are just a carrying strap. It's not good for any kind of sling or stabilizing the rifle very well. Same thing. Even if you use the older green canvas ones, I just don't think that they're very good slings. That's all. So a better sling. Now I realize there's all kinds of stuff on the market now, but you know, kind of looking back with the traditional gear that's been used with A1s and A2s, yeah, I think the sling was, was definitely, definitely lacking. And we don't do any kind of marksmanship training that involves a sling. It's, it's, like I said, it's become a carrying strap. So that's the, that's the important part about that. All right. Ooh. Is there a difference between commercial 55 grain 223 and military M193 ball? And what did I say? That they both have 55 grain full metal jacket bullets. They're essentially interchangeable cartridge cases. They are, you know, same dimensions the 223 has got. It could be loaded with some different propellants, but I don't think they really do. I, I'll be honest with you. The only difference I can see is when I buy 22355 grain, usually the brass case is polished a little nicer and you don't see the annealing mark on the case, shoulder and neck. So that's about the only thing I have never found a point of impact difference. Now I say that, that I have also never chronographed and gone through that whole thing. I really don't shoot very often. I don't shoot groups with, with kind of those combat style rifles because I find it's like shooting a group with, it's like shooting group after group after group with your hunting rifle. It's not really meant for that. It's meant to put them in, in a locale and not necessarily in a locale on the target. Not necessarily in the, you know, tightest group possible. And with variations in lighting, whether it's morning, afternoon, cloudy, sunny, you know, all that affects iron sights. And some of it can affect scopes, but not very, not very much scopes, meaning everything from, you know, reflex sites to, you know, aim point electronic sites and holographic sites and, and the LPVOs that, that people seem to want now. So I don't, I don't do that. Also, chronographs are kind of the same way. A lot of exterior factors, temperature, that's temperature, sunlight, you know, altitude, a lot of things can affect a chronograph. So I, I just, I'm not really a huge fan of that. I'm more of a can I hit my target? To me, that's always the bottom line anyway. Everything that you're doing up to, to validate whether you can hit your target. Is. Is it. And out of curiosity you could, you could put a dot on your target and aim at that and see if there's any appreciable difference. But I don't think you'll find any with a 55 grain bullet. You just won't. That's, that's been my experience. So I don't think there's much difference at all. Okay. Is it true the Marines have said no on adopting the SIG M7 rifle that the army adopted? I understand that's the case. They're with the M27. They like it, it's theirs. They, it fits their requirements. So I think it's a. Probably a smart choice. But yes, the Marines have said no. And that, that's surprising to me. It's very surprising to me because you always think of the Marines as kind of being the M14 guys, you know, that even Springfield Armories logo for years and years was a guy wearing it, you know, is in a Marine Corps uniform, fatigue uniform with the, you know, the blocked hat, you know, you know, shooting the M14, you know, calling it the ultimate the M1A, you know, that was. So anyway, getting back to reality. Yeah, it looks like they are not. And it's surprising that they're not. That they have not embraced this big bore alter. Big bore, I should say battle rifle style alternative. I'm surprised they haven't and I'm really, really amazed. I would tell people that, you know, you never know. The one thing I would tell people is just because a service says no to something doesn't mean they won't get stuck with it later on. You know, there have been mostly it's with. Well, it could even be something like the Beretta. It could even be something like the, the Beretta M92. It could even be anything that sometimes people say the, the procurers and policymakers and all that say this is what you're going to get. Back in the 70s and 80s the military and I think that was army and Marines were. You're gonna buy. At first it was Chrysler commercial pattern pickups. And then you were gonna buy a. I should say you were going to use a square body Chevy, you know, kind of a blazer and a pickup. You know, it's like. And those are great vehicles by the way. They were great vehicles. They weren't perfect for military use. They certainly weren't a Humvee, but they were basically, they were basically designed for not Frontline service, but for rugged service in support units and other things where you needed to get around. The old M151 Jeep with little tiny four cylinder engines sounded like a lawnmower and ran about like a lawnmower. You know, that wasn't going to cut it. So you, you know, you had these vehicles and basically it also helped bail those companies out. I mean that was part of the Chrysler bailout was we're gonna buy all these army trucks, army style trucks from you so you can get stuck with a piece of equipment. They've always rumored that the Beretta 92, which I actually think is an outstanding sidearm, they always said that that was, you know, well, you know, we want to put cruise missiles in Italy and all the rest of it. I don't think any of that is actually true. I think it was, you know, this, the Sig 226, another outstanding sidearm and the Beretta. Both made, both made the grade. The Beretta just came in cheaper. So the army said, this is what you will have. You will have the Beretta. So that's, that's kind of the way that went. So I'm not surprised the Marines have said no. But it, in the future it could easily get pushed on them. That they are, that they in fact will. It's, you know, they're going to get the old military choice. It can be this way and you can like it or it can be this way and you cannot like it. But you will have the M7. Okay, next question. Is ACU camouflage useless? ACU is kind of that stuff the army had. They, they've, they've been, it's been 10 or 12 years since that those things were around. It was the army camouflage had to kind of that bluish digital tint it was supposed to, I was supposed to take. It was supposed to be a universal pattern that you could use in the Arctic, you could use in the, the jungle, you could use in the desert. And as you can, you could use it in the forest. And as you can imagine, it didn't fit anywhere. Anywhere. It was a poor fit. Now I know this because I was in one of the first groups of people who went into Iraq wearing ACU camouflage, which I quickly ditched for my three pattern camouflage. The problem with it was it didn't fit in anywhere and it was ungodly uncomfortable. I mean it was just a terribly uncomfortable uniform. Didn't like it in the slightest, but it didn't fit in anywhere. I mean they said, well, it'll be better for night. And it really wasn't. It was too light for night, too dark for the day, too blue, it didn't match the desert. It's too blue for the Arctic. It's not enough white or light colors. And in the forest and jungle, it's completely horrible. And in fact, in the jungle warfare training course, they, they actually went back to the old BDU's and issued those to people so they could actually have a chance of fitting in. So there was a lot. And still, you can still find it. There's a lot of cheap equipment out there that's in the ACU camouflage pattern. And you know, I've actually got some of this stuff myself. But what they said you can do, which I will experiment with, is you can get some of this RIT dye and you can basically, you know, you get yourself a big, like a big stock pot and you boil water in it and get it really hot. Get it hot and follow the directions of the dye obviously. But you put the, you put the items, the camouflage items in it, you put the dye in it and then you kind of stir them around and, and you know, in, in about an hour you can take these things out, let them dry and, and the dye you use is either brown or green. And apparently, and there's a couple different shades of green depending on where you are. I guess you can choose the one that fits best. And the stuff kind of comes out as a green digital and it's, it's passable, it's, it's, it's much more useful. It doesn't stand out as a target like this other stuff does. And you can do that with equipment and you can actually do it with the uniforms too. One of the things that's interesting is apparently this stuff will even dye the, you know, the quick release buckles. I don't know how it does that, but it does. So it's a pretty good deal. So if you have a bunch of this stuff laying around or you can get it on the cheap, that's something to try. There are a couple of companies and I think it's paint predominantly for paintball. They've actually already done that and it, and it doesn't look bad. So, you know, it's a good way to get into some cheap, pretty well made gear. You know, the gear is well made. It's just that the color is all wrong. So yeah, you can go ahead and do that. If you're like me and you're stuck with some of that stuff and you kind of tired of looking at it. All right, next question. What do you think of drones in frontline combat? Well, my understanding is that in Ukraine that nothing moves during the day because they have these fiber optic drones which are a drone which is up there loitering, but it's got a tether, little tiny, like a little fiber optic cable that's all going all the way down to the controller. And you say, well, that's a stupid idea because you know, obviously it's on a tether, but the thing with it is, is it can't be jammed and it's not susceptible to any of the countermeasures that they have. So these things are up there and you know, with the operators down looking around, anything moving around during the day is getting killed. So these things have brought a lot of, lot of things to a halt. So rather than, you know, we own the night type of deal, it's like, well, nobody owns the day now because everybody can see. And so what they do is they hope for bad weather or they hope for, you know, with kind of the, kind of the stuff where, and they hope at night when these things can't see as well because I guess not all of them are thermal equipped. And then you can move around at night and you can also move around in bad weather when these things can't see. So yeah, it looks like a big change and it's also revitalized and changed the focus of what air defense means. Rather than trying to shoot down enemy, you know, fighters and bombers that are flying over your lines, while that's still something shooting down these drones appears to be at least as important, maybe even more so. So it's a, it's a big deal. They are a big deal. So I would, I would say that that's going to be the changing, changing thing and the, they're already coming out with all kinds of weapons, small arms, different ammo for small arms. So they can, you know, it doesn't take much damage to, to degrade these things, which is fortunate. So we'll see, we'll see if they come up with, you know, some kind of little minigun system that can mow these things out of the sky or, or what the, what the story is. But they, they definitely are, they definitely are a huge influence right now. A huge influence. The ones that are, I guess equipped with anti tank munitions make it very dangerous to be operating a tank in and around that, that environment. So there you go. Well, that is all our questions for this episode of Old School Guns. And again, if you have any questions or comments kbmake l aol.com kb m a k e l.com or put them up on the comment section of Podbean. And anyway, we live in interesting times. So until next time, this is old school. Guns out.
Old School Guns Episode 223 – February 24, 2026
Host: kbmakel
In Episode 223 of Old School Guns, host kbmakel delivers a wide-ranging critique of current gun culture, U.S. politics, the radicalization of individuals, historic and recent high-profile scandals, and a thorough Q&A session covering firearms and military gear. The conversation is unapologetically blunt and brimming with the host’s personal opinions, reflecting on present societal issues, firearm trends, and lessons from military history while engaging directly with listener questions.
[00:45–14:50]
[14:51–21:30]
[21:31–26:00]
[26:01–28:30]
[28:31–01:05:10]
| Topic | Timestamp | |---------------------------------------------|------------| | Introduction and Trump Assassination Attempt| 00:00–06:50| | Discussion on ICE Protests & Radicalization | 06:51–14:50| | Epstein, Maxwell & Societal Fallout | 14:51–21:30| | Greenland and U.S. Strategic Interests | 21:31–26:00| | Olympics and Nationalism | 26:01–28:30| | Listener Q&A Segment | 28:31–01:05:10| | - Daewoo Rifles | 29:35–31:30| | - HK93 | 31:31–33:15| | - Delta 4 Rifle Switching | 33:16–36:00| | - Used SIG P320s | 36:01–39:30| | - Carry Handle AR-15s | 39:31–47:00| | - .223 vs. M193 Ammunition | 47:01–50:00| | - Marines and SIG M7 | 50:01–53:00| | - ACU Camouflage Discussion | 53:01–58:30| | - Drones in Modern Combat | 58:31–01:05:10|
The episode is frank, conversational, and confrontational, consistent with kbmakel’s old-school, no-nonsense persona. It melds deep skepticism regarding political and societal trends with nostalgic comparisons to how things “used to be,” particularly with military gear. The host’s delivery is opinionated with a sense of urgency and concern for the state of the country and the gun culture.
Summary Prepared For:
Listeners who want a comprehensive yet nuanced account of this episode’s commentary and Q&A, as well as those new to Old School Guns interested in its perspective on firearms and broader American cultural issues.