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It's. Welcome to another edition of Old School Guns, the podcast that tells you exactly like it is. And this is episode number 220. 27. 227. And got a lot of things to cover today. But if you have any questions or comments you can email them to me at kb m a k e l aol.com k b m a k e l.com or you can leave them in the questions section on podbean, which is where we originate from. So anyway, we got some bad, bad news to share and that news is probably one of the last great firearms journalists. A Mr. Mike Bellevue, who's on YouTube as Duelist 1954, the former Black powder editor for Guns of the Old west magazine, a firearms journalist for 30, probably 35 years, has announced that he has a terminal cancer diagnosis which is just terrible news because he's putting out a YouTube video a week that were very interesting, mostly black powder oriented, but if you, but occasionally going into some more modern things. But he, he really contributed to the, to the mass of information that we can just get at a click. And his information was very, very sound. He's a very good researcher, a very good practical mind when it comes to these, especially the reproduction black powder revolvers. He, he had some gunsmith training so he could correct some of the minor flaws that may come out of the factory. He's enough of a researcher and a historian to know how these were used, what types of bullets were used and all these other things that we see as very important and are really helpful to try to get, to try to maximize the potential, potential that these, these guns have. He also looks at some of the more modern aspects of them like the different powders, the different, the different cartridge conversion cylinders and you know, just a, an incredible body of, of, of work which even extends down into medieval swords and you know, flintlock firearms and, and all kinds of things like that. And it's a real shame. For the record, I do not know Mr. Bellevue. I have exchanged emails with him when I had questions and I can tell you he was a very much a gentleman. You know, it's like dealing with a gentleman. His, although he doesn't have the, you know, the steely eyed background of law enforcement or military that you know that Jeff Cooper and Charles Askins and Skeeter Skelton and some of these guys had, his knowledge is, you know, on par or superior. He, he knows a lot more and he's able to communicate it very, very well. So it's a very sad note that we have to acknowledge his current status and, and what the, you know, future of that is, is going to be. So, you know, I would say get on, get on YouTube and watch some of those. And he also has a Patreon account, and you can, you can go there and for minimal charge, have access to even more. So wish him the best in his, in his journey, because that's, that's a very difficult road to be on. Well, then we have to come back to earth and, you know, there have been two assassination attempts against Donald Trump at the White House correspondence dinner where they actually captured this little scoundrel alive. And then just, I call it an attempt that no one else will, but it's, it is what it is. They just had a guy show up to the White House and try to shoot his way in. And fortunately, he was killed by the Secret Service before he had any success. But, you know, you see this and you go, why in the world is this happening? And then you have to look at the leaders of the Democratic Party. You have to look at the media. They're just there, unbreaking and unstopping criticisms, outright lies in many occasions. Anything, you know, when you have, I, I bet Trump's negative, his negative coverage in the, the media, I call it, you, the, the liberal tarred media. It's got to be well over 98% negative. I mean, there's not a positive thing anybody says about them. So it's probably 100%, but it's always hard to prove 100%. So the media and the Democratic Party hierarchy of, well, they're activists, whether it's trans activists, homosexual activists, aggrieved, whatever, plug in whatever ethnicity or race you want, activists. These people don't build anything. They're all about just tearing down. And they're not about making anything better. They're about hurting other people to get what they want. You know, we're just going to raise taxes, take from you and pay for the medical care and all the other care of these indigent, lousy people who are, who are just not doing anything. You know, it's about take from you and give to others so they can secure votes. That's all it is. That's all it's ever been with them. And they're not even trying to disguise it now. You know, used to be you actually had conservative Democrats who were, you know, they were a much better group. You could actually deal with them. You could actually get consensus with them and do things. Then the party was just exterminated them like the way Hitler exterminated the Jews. The Democratic Party went after the conservative, or what they would call Blue Dog Democrats, and they exterminated them. And then they went aft. Then they, you know, just kind of lied and said, well, we haven't changed. We believe the same things. But of course, behind the scenes, they were the most radical. They had the most radical agenda going and now they don't even try to hide it. You know, you listen to what they say, they don't even try to hide it. And when you see the Mandamis and all these, you know, Democratic socialists, you know, all this, you see all this garbage and you see what they say against. It's not just, it's not just Trump. It's people like you and me who, who are actually paying the bills making all this happen. I mean, don't, don't forget that Eric Sewage, well, the pervert traitor duped by communist intel agents, cheater on his, on his wife and family, serial molester of women. I mean, don't, don't forget that this guy threatened to use nuclear weapons on gun owners. I mean, you know, I mean, how crazy is that? And these people who tried to assassinate Trump are just as crazy. And they're inspired by these people. When all you hear is this kind of rhetoric, anybody who's on the fringe of sanity could easily go over. Look at, look at these assassins. You have that guy, crooks, who is the one at Butler, Pennsylvania. Now, if that guy wasn't the most maladjusted kook, you can just tell by his pictures, okay, then you have that Ryan Ruth who just looks batshit crazy. He just looks terrible. You know, you look at him and, you know, you wouldn't want to be around him or near him. He just has that crazy, crazy ass look on his face. This other guy who came and, and did the correspondence dinner, again, you know, absolutely acting in an absolutely crazy manner, like you're really going to shoot your way in there. And you know what? He got farther than he should have. He got a lot farther than he should have. And then you have this one guy, the latest one, who he just goes up and, and he's, you know, tries to shoot his way into the checkpoint. It's like, you know, that's, that's obviously a plan that is not going to have very high chance of success. So you, you look at how crazy these people are and you have to say something, something has motivated these fringe, crazy people to attempt to assassinate the President of the United States. And it's the rhetoric, it's the behavior, it's. You know, I'm not saying that everybody has to roll over and be yes men, but they need to take a step back because this stuff can boomerang. I mean, and you see it, it's not only been Trump. You took a look at that poor guy who is the CEO of United Health Care. I mean, I shouldn't say this, but I. A family member worked for United Health Care, and they are a shitty company to work for. I mean, UnitedHealthcare is not a fun company to work for. At least. At least in the experience that was related to me. So it's. It's not like. It's not like it's, it's, it's all wonderful, but the CEO doesn't deserve to be gunned down walking the street, Walking across the street doesn't deserve that. Doesn't deserve to be targeted and gunned down by that, by some punk, this Luigi Mangioni, you know, who they're trying to make a folk hero out of. It's just. It's just horrible. Same thing with the Charlie Kirk thing. Here he is assassinated in front of thousands of people. At least hundreds of people, maybe not thousands. I don't know. I don't know how many people were there by some. All this guy invested totally into this weird trans thing where they dress like animals, like big furry animals and diddle each other, I guess. I mean, it's just really. It's really pretty torrid, man. Now, we live in a free country, and if you're an adult and you want to dress like a big free animal and you know, and do all that, that's. That's fine, but you can't take grandpa's deer rifle out and shoot people you disagree with. You know, it's. It's just un. Freaking believable. And there have been other things, too. I mean, for every one of these that we know about, there have been attempts. You know, I mean, face it, Schumer was out there screaming when, When Roe v. Wade was overturned, screaming about reaping the whirlwind. A couple weeks later, somebody tries to kill one of the Supreme Court justices. Gee, those aren't connected. I mean, of course they are. And, you know, it's. They are. Demonizing is something that they can do. And they're attempting to demonize us. I mean, they attempt. You know, when they say mega, they're talking about if you voted for Trump, all 80 million of us, or. Or whatever it was 75 million of us. They're talking about us. And they're talking about coming after us, they're talking about how evil we are. I mean, we just have to stand up and not tolerate this. This. They don't need to be on television and they don't need to be listened to. You know, I mean, it's just, it's just unfricking believable. It's the same people who tell us mass migration is a good thing. It's the same people who, who tell us that all of this other stuff that goes on is a good thing. And it's not. It's not. Iran having a nuclear weapon is not a good thing. And finally someone, they're close enough so that someone had to step up and do the dirty work that's been getting pushed, put off by both parties for 40 years. You know, everybody knows you can't let those people in Iran, a bunch of filthy Islamist. I mean, the stuff they do to people and, and we just sit there and go, they just look at it and they don't, they don't register how evil that is. They killed, like, I forget what the date is. And an Iranian American could tell you. I, I actually can't. But there was one day they, they probably killed 20,000 people. The regime killed 20,000 people who were protesting. That's, that's Battle of the Somme type casualties inflicted on an unarmed civilian populace. This is why we will never give up guns. This is why we will never give them up. Thirty years ago, Britain gave up their guns. Now they're going to jail for Facebook post posts. Going to jail. If you are in, if you're a British citizen and you're in the United States and you say something against their DEI or their mass migration or something else, they categorize that as hate speech. And they wait for you to come back into the country and they slap you, arrest you and slap you in the legal system. It has happened and it will continue to happen until their crypto communist government is removed. And I don't know, I'll tell you this right now. Rather than worrying about if the former Prince Andrew diddled a hooker 25 years ago, rather than worrying about all that, perhaps the Royal family should come out and say, look what's happening to our country. And they need to assert they do have some power. They need to assert it because there isn't going to be a Great Britain. A UK is going to be gone in 20 years. I would argue that it may be irretrievably gone now. It's been mass migration, mass illegal migration. It's been cultural destruction and there isn't. The Royal Family is so stupid. They don't even know. They're not going to be there in 20 years. They're not going to be up shooting grouse at Balmoral or having Christmas and Sandringham. They're not going to do that anymore because all that's going to be gone. Those are going to become mosques. It's going to be, you know, Balmoral will become a combination Islamic hotel and mosque. They don't own, they don't get. That's where this is all going. Look where they were 40 years ago and look where they are now. I mean, they couldn't even. And I mean, if you live on the Falkland Islands, better learn how to speak Spanish because. Because they're not going to defend you. They can't even put. They can't even put ships to sea. The Royal Navy is effectively gone. I mean, it's effectively gone. They have, I think, two aircraft carriers but no escort ships. I mean, they're at the point where they, like they were in 1940, where they had to, you know, come to the United States and say, could you give us some of those old destroyers you have and, you know, help us out? But then they were helpable. Now, I don't, I don't know. I suppose we have enough of the old, older Oliver Hazard Perry class frigates. We still got a bunch of those in mothballs. I suppose we could refurb them and sell them to the British as a stopgap, but I don't think they have the will. It's not that they don't have the means, they just don't have the will to do anything. And it's absolutely, it's, it's very disheartening when you think about, within living memory, Winston Churchill. And then you, you flash forward 60 years later and this is the state. This. And this is not just an anomaly. This is not just them. The rest of Europe is following and we're trying to follow. We're trying to follow. There are, there are stories that are out there that are unbelievable. Unbelievable. And when you link it to. Why do you think they want to exterminate this DEI so bad? It was. It was the most horrible nonsense you could ever imagine. And I know because I saw some of it firsthand. Firsthand. And it is really an ugly DEI is vicious, ugly. You wouldn't think it would be. You would think it'd be. Well, they're probably hiring some people who normally wouldn't get hired because they're maybe not the best qualified, but they're qualified enough. You figure that's probably it. No, it is a much more vicious ugly and it's. And it's penetrated into industries that you would think would be immune to that, but they're not. They are certainly not. So anyway, that's enough of a rant. We got some big, big problems coming. One thing I saw is, and I saw this on YouTube and it wasn't that long. The video hadn't been up. So I don't know how long these guys have been around. But there's a company called Super Brawn and if you try to look that up, it brings up the basketball player LeBron James. But it's actually Super Broad Firearms. They're from Poland and they're making a couple of interesting things. The first is a copy of the 1858, what we call the 1858 Remington. The Remington model New Army. It looks pretty good. They had some funky grips and I think they, they actually had it so that you could put a skeletonized stock on it. I couldn't really see too much in the. The video is pretty, pretty low, low quality. It's done by the guy called Cap and ball who's on YouTube. He's, he's Belgian and his, his English is, you know, it's passable. And then he's talking to a Polish guy whose English is passable. And I'm not sure they quite understood each other very well. Which, you know, hey, understanding yourself in another language, it's not your native languages. My hat's off to, My hat is off to. For trying. But anyway, this 1858 Remington had some funky looking target grips on it which I think were a function of the kind of a skeleton steel stock that was on, on it, which you know, would not, would not be period. But if you had the correct grips on the gun, I think it would look, it would look fine and it would be, it'd be good. I. What it costs, I, I do not know. I couldn't really find any for sale. The next thing they made was a Maynard carbine copy, which I'll be blunt, you know. Well, I'll put it this way, nobody else makes one, so if you want a modern recreation of one. This is kind of the ball thing. This is kind of the, the ball game right there. It. It looks very modern and clunky and cheesy. It looks more like an HR handy rifle. Even though it's the Mainer design really doesn't capture the authenticity. It would never fool you. It would Never pass even the 10 yard check. If you saw it 10 yards away, you'd know what it was. And that's not necessarily bad because number one, they can always improve it. They can always, you know, they can always go. And the other, the other thing is if you're buying it just to shoot a Maynard style rifle, you know, Maynard was a Civil war breech loading carbine. If you're trying to, you know, if you want to shoot a gun like that and don't really want to pony up for an original that's maybe worn maybe, you know, if you buy one in really nice condition, they have collector value and you probably don't want to, you know, you don't want to shoot it a lot. And if you buy one that's worn well, then, you know, maybe you're chasing a, you know, kind of chasing a rabbit down the rabbit hole to get it to the point where you can use it. So it's not bad. They also made. And I couldn't figure out what it is. It was a breach loader, a copy of a, I don't know if it was a breech loading conversion of a rifle musket or an early, you know, breech loader is kind of bolt action with an external hammer. I mean, it's one of those funky European designs. It kind of went nowhere, but is very intriguing and it was a very, very high quality replica. It's, it's one that obviously if the, if the wood and everything wasn't brand new, you, you would not be able to tell it from probably one of the originals. That's, that's what a good replicate is. And it looked like, looked like it'd be fun to shoot. I mean you kind of open the bolt like a bolt action, drop a cartridge in, then thumb back the hammer and fire. And you know, I, I don't know what kind of cartridges it takes. I assume it's a linen. Maybe you're inside the, you know, one of the primed bullet ones or something. There, there are all kinds of, you know, very strange conversions and early breach loaders that, that are out there. And then they made a breech loading shotgun which was interesting. I guess it's a European design where it actually would break open like a regular cartridge shotgun. But you would put into linen cartridges of shot and powder and shot and, or paper cartridges of powder and shot, close it, cap it, the hammers and then fire it. So very, a very interesting gun. I, I really liked it. I mean, I really like that. I don't know Why? I mean it's, it's weird but. And then they had some kind of under hammer target pistol which didn't really do anything for me. So. But anyway, it would really be nice if the polls who, you know, they can do craftsmanship. I mean these guns certainly proved that they can do some, some really good craftsmanship. It'd be nice if they got in the game and you know, we weren't really relying on, on just the Italian makers who do a good job but not a perfect job. And it'd really be nice if they could turn out something like a P53 Enfield or 1863 Springfield that really had the correct rifling and everything else, you know, the progressive depth rifling so we can, we can actually shoot them out at distance. So anyway, good to the polls. Super brawn. Super brawn firearms. And next thing I talk about, I will never learn. I will just never learn. I probably look at Facebook more than I need to, just whatever it is, you know. And the, one of the, my favorite one is Firearms News. Used to be the old Shotgun News, I guess that they're now owned by. I don't know if David Fortier is one of the owners of it. I assume that he is because he seems to be heavily involved in it. And I've always liked it. I mean I, I don't have a, I don't have a subscription now, but I always, I had a Shotgun News subscription for years, loved it. And I bought quite a few guns through that, you know, back in the, back in the hoi polloi days of, of the imports, you know. And I bought a Brazilian 1937 revolver made by Smith and Wesson. It's essentially a US model 1917 revolver.45ACP. And I got mine for $167, you know. Now it was not in pristine shape. It was in pretty rough shape. I mean, rough shape insofar as the board was good, the chambers were good, mechanically was really good. But the exterior had shown it. It had been a lot of places and carried around quite a bit. But I love it. I still have it and I carry it around my small piece of property here. It's, it's perfect. I use 45 auto rim mostly, but I do occasionally use the half moon or full moon clips. But anyway, getting back to it on Facebook, they have of course a Facebook site and one of the questions they asked was, you know, should the XM177E1, which was the shortened M16 that had the long flash suppressor on had an 11 and a half inch barrel and about a five or five and a half inch suppressor. So it really is, is a 16 inch, it's like a 16 inch AR carbine, except for the fact that it only has an 11.5-inch barrel. And the question was, should that have been the general issue weapon for everyone in Vietnam or should we have. Or should it have been the M16A1 as it was? And of course I answered, well, the XM177E1 was good for some special mission things, but for general issue the M16A1 was much better. And man, some guy took me to task on that, which I thought it was surprising because about 10 people really liked liked what I said. But this guy took me to task. So anyway, this guy proceeds to tell me that, you know, why in Vietnam would you need a 550 meter rifle, a rifle with the Mac with the effective range of 550 meters, which of course the M16A1 does not have, when you know, it was essentially 10 to 15 yards of, of combat distance. And so why would you want the 20 inch? Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. You know, it was all nonsense. Obviously this guy has never done, been anywhere or done anything or have an understanding of what he's talking about. And I just pointed out that number one, the, the XM 1771, it came after the M16A one. And two, they had real problems figuring out the gas on that. You know, the gas system, they, they had it for the 20 inch barrel, they had, they had it down. But the port diameter, the, all those kind of things, the gas tube diameter, all these sorts of things were variables that they had to work out. And it took them a while to, to kind of get these down. Even the early M4s had these problems. You know, when you deviate from the original design, it takes some development to get it right. And they basically got the, the carbine length one squared away and working, but it took a long time. They would never have been able to produce enough of the other rifles to supplant the M16A1s that they already had and all the rest of it. I probably spent too much time explaining to this simpleton this stuff, but, and I tried not to do it cruelly. It just. These are just wrong. I mean, you know, you're just wrong and you know, all. And there was no reason for him to jump on my post. It's. There were all kinds of others. I don't know why people single me out sometimes, but they do and you know, he, he. Here endeth the lesson. You know, he wants to, he wants to have fat be put down by facts. I could do that. So anyway, I just think that's always. But I always. I should never comment on anything. Even when I think it's a benign environment like you know, firearms news, which is going to have a lot of people that think the way I do. And really I was. This was just last weekend. One of the more interesting things I've done is I've got a steel silhouette. It, it's actually at 300 yards, although I could shoot 300 meters if I needed to. But it's, it's conveniently at 300 yards and you know, just see and it's painted yellow. Just seeing that at that range is it. You can do it. It's, it's not bad with, with iron sight sometimes talking about. But I've actually experimented. If I just go down there and I tie a green trash bag around it and then go back to the firing line and then try to acquire it, even though I know exactly where it is. Trying to acquire it is difficult. If it was moving and green camouflaged it'd be extremely different. It's. It's difficult. And farther out it would be if it were 550 meters away. First of all, I'm not sure that with ball 193ammunition I would have the accuracy to, to make consistent hits. A lot of people will argue that, but I will tell you ball 193ammunition was really designed for 300 meters and in the sights on an M16A1. And you know, kind of later the, the iron sights. Going beyond 300 meters is a challenge. Now I'm not saying it can't be done. And the better trained you are, there are, there are guys who, you know, if you sat down and you trained to do that for six months, you could do that. Your average soldier is not going to be able to do that. As a matter of fact they're going to, they're going to be proficient at the 0 to 300 meter engagements that they shoot in. Qualification. That's why it's a qualification and that's why we, when we shoot we get so many experts, so many marksmen, so many sharpshooters. I mean it's, it's just that way. So we're able to do all that. Yeah. So it's, it's still controversy out there with the M6. The M16A1 will never be recognized for the truly great rifle that it was and is it will never get the recognition and that's actually kind of a shame. But you know and if you think the 20 inch barrel is a big deal. Look at all these guns. I think one of them is called the Dissipator. Yeah, Anderson made it and other people made it and it's basically the rifle length gas system on a shorter barrel, like an 18 inch barrel. Now why people think that's cool I do not know but they do. So you know gotta respect their, their right to choose. There's a reason that people like that rifle length gas system and that's because it's very reliable and it's also very comfortable to shoot. It's not, it doesn't have kind of the. I, I don't want to say the 16 inch barrels and even shorter have punchy recoil but they, they, they move around more. That, that's one of the reasons I laughed at the. What would stoner do that there's two blockheads you know were pushing and I don't even know if you can buy those things anymore. That you know the hokey, the hokey lower receipt polymer lower receiver ST stock thing that they did with the stock. I guess the stock is adjustable if you use spacers, you know, not, not like a regular stock because you couldn't put the regular adjustable stock on it so they could use spacers. Great, great idea. You know. Great, great idea. And you know they used all the lightweight components which the lightweight, using all the lightweight components. A shortened gas system. All those things they were doing to me were just asking for durability issues down the road, you know. But when you make things lighter and lighter and lighter it's, it's normally going to have a cost and that cost is going to be overall if not reliability. It certainly will be durability that just. There is no free lunch. But yeah, a lot of people like the rifle length gas systems and as a matter of fact they use the same one even if you've got a 24 inch barrel AR they, they used to make those DPMs really made a lot of interesting different things and I think the company has been. I think Palmetto State Armory now owns whatever was left of dpms. But, but I thought dpms was awesome. My A2 is dpms and it is, it is freaking awesome. So anyway, that's it for Facebook. The next one is the ACOG obsolete. Well I think it, it all goes back to what your intended purpose is and what your need is. And most people can't define that. They just buy the latest thing. Hey, you know, Joe, cool, the Ex Seal, Delta Force, you know, Ranger, you know, he says use this and that's what they buy regardless of what they actually need. If you need a, a fixed power scope that you don't fool with, that's exceptionally high quality. Good, you know, excellent quality optics. Excellent as far as holding a zero. And the internals are all made very, very. If you need something like that. An ACOG is a great, great scope. I have one. I love it. I mean it's, it's one of those pry from your cold dead hands type of of optics. It's really good. Really, really good. Good. Yeah. I just don't want to, just don't want to give that up now. For other applications, an LPVO might be better for you or a, a unmagnified red dot or holographic site. It just depends what you're doing with the rifle. So the ACOG is not obsolete. It's just one of the choices out there. It's been around for a while. It's been around for, since he, I think early 90s. Yeah, I know that Blackhawk down, they were using ACOGs. Whether they were using them in the Gulf, I can't remember. I don't remember seeing them. So, you know, I don't think, I don't think so. I think it came out right after, either during or right after that. So I'm sure the special mission guys and tier one guys probably had it for sure. But the rest of us grunts, no. So that, that brings me to the case. You know, there, there are people who, you know, they think that these and Brownells makes a, apparently a very nice reproduction of the early Colt 3 power scope that went on the original AR15 SP1. A lot of people think that those were military issue and I'm sure the military had bought some at some point. But they were never wide scale issue. They were never, never around. They were not something that you could accessorize your M16A1 with. They, they just weren't there. So the ACOG was really the first military scope that saw wide use in the US military. Okay, next question. Why was the trapdoor 1873. 1873 Springfield carbine adopted instead of a Winchester lever action for cavalry use? There's, there's good reason for that. Now if you're one of the troops in the field, it's not a very good reason. But if you're a bean counter and a financial guy, there was very good reason for that and the first and foremost reason is they wanted it common with their infantry rifle, which was the 1873 Springfield, which we call the Trapdoor, which was a development of the Allen conversion of Civil War rifled muskets, except it was down to.45 caliber. By this point it had gone through.58 caliber.50 caliber, then down to.45 caliber and 18, 18, 73 because it was just ballistically superior the flatter trajectory of the.45 caliber bullet. So they wanted the same system that rifles and carbines would be the same. So if you could operate one, you could operate the other. With no cross training, you didn't even need to cross train. So that was, that was a one reason. The next reason was because Erskine Allen worked for Springfield Armory. The US Government owned the cop, the patent on the Allen system. So they didn't have to pay anybody anything. So that was a really good, that was a big advantage because after the War between the States, military budgets shrank dramatically and there wasn't a whole lot of extra cash lying around that you could pay, pay royalties for a, maybe a slightly better system that really might not make any difference at all. So, you know, that was, that was the biggest reason. The, the next reason was the Allen system was a very simple system, very few parts. And the parts between the carbine and the action parts, trigger and, and hammer and the breach block and all these things were interchangeable between the rifle and carbine. The only thing that wasn't were the stocks, you know, so, you know, so it was it, logistically it made a lot of sense. And of course it used the same ammunition, even though later on I think they came out with a carbine load because the infantry load ammunition was, was, you know, kind of wicked in the carbine. So they, they kind of loaded it down a little bit. So anyway, though, that was the main reason they kept it. Would the lever action had been, would the lever action had been better for fighting the Plains Indians? And the answer is yes. I mean, you don't know for sure because it never happened. But it's, you know, I don't see how Custer could have done worse if he'd had leverages because he got wiped out anyway. So, you know, the lever action, what are you going to do, get wiped out worse? No, he, he might have been able to gain just enough fire superiority that is command survives partially intact, you know. So, you know, they, they could have, they could have been helpful. But you got to remember in 1865 when the Allen system started and they started all this, you know, there was a, there was a big panic. I mean, the fundamental mission of it was the Union Army. Now it is the United States army, again, is not the pacification of the Plains Indians. That's not their predominant mission. The predominant mission was to fight an external European or European inspired foe. And in 1865, there were three of those that you can think of right off hand. The first one is Great Britain. They helped the Confederacy quite a bit. They, you know, they sold block, they sold Commerce Raiders, they probably sold blockade runners as far as ships goes. They, they shipped a lot of small arms to the south. And, and you know, they, although they did not recognize the Confederate States of America as an independent country, they, they came up just short of that. And we're giving a lot of military aid, at least in sales and things to the Confederacy. So the, the United States was not real happy with Britain at that time. I think we actually, they were actually. The United States actually sued in some sort of primitive international court that they had at the time saying for damages, saying, hey, you gave these guys Commerce Raiders. And they sank so many ships. And they actually got a settlement from Britain over that because Britain in the end really did, didn't want to have soured relations. But Great Britain was a potential foe. And they had forward bases in Bermuda, they had bases in Central America, British Honduras or British Guyana, you know, I mean, you know, they had bases there and Canada of course, which is right on the border. So Great Britain was a big potential foe. Another potential foe was Mexico. Even though the movies portray Mexico as, you know, a rabble of kind of sweaty looking sombrero wearing, you know, compensinos or pans, that Mexico actually had a very well drilled, well trained, a European style army. And they were smarting because in the Mexican American War, even though that army was sly defeated and you know, Mexico had lost two fifths of its. Of its territory and that was really only just 20 years, less than 20 years before. So Mexico would have liked to, would have liked to recover some of that land, but they, they really weren't in a position to go to war with the United States. But you know, the possibility was still there. And in fact, in 1916, Mexican revolutionary Pancho Villa actually attacked Columbus, New Mexico in the United States. So the fear of having a. And was. And he was battled by United States army troops. So the fear of having a Mexican conflict on the border was actually true. It just took it a lot longer to develop. And the third international foe was Spain. And Spain was kind of a Crumbling empire, but it still held things. Cuba, Puerto Rico and other islands in the Caribbean. It still had some holdings, I believe, in South America, certainly some in the Pacific, Philippine Islands in Guam and a few other places. And, you know, they were a presence in this hemisphere. And you know, potentially we could, we could have a conflict with Spain, which happened in 1898. So in 1865, you know, by seeing those three foes, they were not, it was not unrealistic. You know, Britain helped the Confederacy. We'd already fought two wars against Britain. And, and that was within living memory. If you were, you could be born in 1800 and still be alive in 1865 and you would have lived through the War of 1812 and, you know, it would still be within the memory of the parents and grandparents of most of the people who were younger in 1865. So, so anyway, had to have a rifle that could fight with the. And match up against these European and European inspired foes, potential foes. And the trapdoor was it, I mean, and it compared very well to the Snyder. It compared very well to some of these other breach loaders, some of which were really weird. It compared very well to the Remington rolling block. I mean, it was a good system. It wasn't perfect, but it was a good system. And that's why they adopted it. I mean, they would just. Weren't going to try to adopt weapons that would only be useful against the Plains Indians. So that was one of the reasons that the Winchester was there. Plus it would have been just fantastically expensive. We would have just had to. You might have been able to outfit one or two cavalry regiments with Winchesters, but it would have been far too fantastic to, to try to get all the cavalry regiments outfitted with Winchesters and of course, parts. Winchesters are really good guns. They're very durable, very reliable. But they would have been a nightmare for a frontier army to try to keep, maintain and keep operating. So again, if you're, if you're a trooper at a little Bighorn, a Winchester would have been a much more preferable choice. But overall, it was just never going to happen. Okay, here is our last question. Did Soviet cosmonauts carry guns into space? And the answer, surprisingly, is yes. Now you'd say, why would you take a gun into space? And the answer is, well, they weren't afraid of aliens. They weren't afraid to, of bumping into us. They weren't afraid of bumping into anybody else out there. So why would you take a gun into space where guns really don't work because unless you're firing it in an oxygen environment, you know, it's not going to ignite. So, so, you know, it's not like you could be out on a spacewalk with a rifle and fire it at somebody. You can't, they don't work. So why would they take it? And the answer is actually quite simple. The Russian spacecraft, they don't splash down in the ocean. They land in remote places in Siberia and Kazakhstan. And apparently they've had a couple of instances where the calculations may not have been exactly spot on. And the capsules landed a lot farther away than they thought. It would take a day or two to get out to where the astronauts were. And meanwhile there are large bears and wolves and other things that are, that are out there. So the cosmonauts kind of needed an equalizer and they, they got it. And I understand it was, it was a gun that had, I think it was like an over and under, kind of like a savage gun where it would take a, a service round, I guess, either 7, 6, 2 by 39 or 5.5 by 39, and then would also have a shotgun barrel underneath something. I think it was larger than 410, but smaller than probably, you know, 28 gauge. So, you know, probably it could take something, something in there. So, you know, they would, they would land and you would have something. At first they were just equipping them with a Makarov pistol. And when one of these situations happened, the astronaut said, hey, I need something a little better than pistol out here because of the bears and because of the, the wolves. So that's when they developed this weapon. Now there was a story, and I don't know if it's true, but apparently on one of the, before the International Space Station, you know, the Russians had mirror and a few other ones. Apparently one astronaut went kind of, kind of flipped out. One cosmonaut kind of flipped out, and he did, inside a space station, pull the gun on the other one, pull this survival rifle on them. So whether or not that was the impetus to stop using them or, or whatever, but I understand they don't use them anymore. So that kind of leads me to believe that their landing technology is a lot better. So you're not just going to wind up out in the, out in the hood or out in the woods somewhere, and it's going to take them a couple days to get to you, that they're going to get to you right away. So they've, they've refined all that. So that doesn't happen anymore. The other thing they've done is they probably figured, well, you know, in a two man crew, if those guys can't get real disagreement, maybe having a firearm out there is not the best, not the best solution to all that. Maybe that's not the best problem solving, the best problem solving method that, that they could use. So anyway, I don't think they use them anymore. But it'd be very cool collectible to have. It would be very cool. I, you know why they don't make that? Somebody Poland or one of these companies should make that saying, hey, this is the, this is the copy of the, the deal. You know, a lot of collectors would like that. You know, you could, you could make it and kind of charge somebody there. It would be very cool to have. I, I would say that that would be, that would be commercially kind of at least for a limited run, be pretty viable. So that's it for this edition of Old School Guns Podcast that tells you like it is. And until next time, this is Old School Guns Out.