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 Grandson Lucas has been asking me about military vehicles I was familiar with, so I thought it would be a good time to put together some links that he could review when he had questions. My military service spanned from 1973-1998, post-Vietnam and Cold War with one very exhilarating time during Desert Storm.  So, lets talk about some of the vehicles we used.  My list will be those that I am intimately familiar with.

Transport.

M151, Truck, Utility, 1/4 Ton. - This was the "Jeep" of my era. Ubiquitous to the Army, this little vehicle went everywhere. Fun to drive, rugged, dangerous.  The driver sat on the gasoline tank and the vehicle was known for rolling over in a turn.  Produced until 1988, it was supplanted by the HMMWV.

M998, HMMWV.  The Hummer.  Both beloved and despised by my generation, it serves the Army today. I was issued one in 1996 and kept it until I retired in 98.  Mine would run down the road at 55 mph and was as nimble as a mountain goat.   We never stuck it, although we took it into some sketchy places.  Mine was the soft-top with no armor.  Canvas doors and a radio. It got me where I needed to go, and always brought me home.

M39 series, 5 ton, 6x6 truck.  Also known as the M54, this beast was the prime mover for the Army the entire time I was in service. This thing hauled troops, food, medicine, ammo, and fuel. It was the primary hauler between the logistics base and the troops in the field.

Armored Vehicles

M113 Armored Personnel Carrier. If you were in the Army during Vietnam or the Cold War, you knew what these were. It carried a squad of infantry. They were everywhere. I spent many a miserable hour in these damned things. The suspension was terrible. The seats were uncomfortable and the back ramp would fall on you and kill you. 'Nuff said.  It beat walking.

M60 series tank.  My first tank was an M60A1.  I got it in 1975 when I was assigned to Charlie Company, 4th Battalion, 37th Armor at Fort Knox, KY. According to the log boo, that tank was built by the Chrysler Corporation in 1963. It had a 105mm rifled tube, no stabilization and a coincidence range finder. Everything on it was purely mechanical.  The night-vision was the old style infare that required a light source. I kept that tank for fourteen months when I moved from platoon leader to an XO slot in the 4th Brigade.

The last tank I took downrange was an M60A3.  This was a much-improved version, with better suspension, a laser range finder, GPS system, improved optics and true thermal night sights. The M60A3 was a great tank, one that I truly favored.

M577 Command Post Carrier.  This thing was a variant of the M113, designed to accommodate a tactical command post. Generally, you would find four of these in a battalion, one or each of the staff functions.  (Personnel, Intelligence, Operations and Logistics).  They would park together and form a command post.

M551 Armored Reconnaissance Vehicle.  The "Sheridan".  This thing was not a tank, but OhMyGod, it was a lot of fun. Nimble, fast, lightweight, it was just a joy to drive and command. It was designed around the Shillelagh missile system, which frankly never worked and was a bad idea from start to finish, but the vehicle was just a lot of fun to operate. The missiles never worked, but the gun would fire a HEP charge that was effective against bunkers and vehicles.  Of course, it had two machine guns, the 7.62 coax and the big 50 atop the turret. The vehicle was supposed to be "air-droppable" and sure enough, it was.  But only once. After it hit the ground, it became a machine gun emplacement.

We won't talk about the M1 Abrams, simply because I know little about it.  My last unit, 1/156 was an M1 unit, but I was a staff-rat and never took one downrange.  It's a great tank, but not one that I have any experience with.

The post GRAM 61: Sweden’s Prototype Domestic Competitor to the FAL and G3 first appeared on Forgotten Weapons.

Detectives with the Major Case Unit met with each party separately and obtained statements about what had transpired. Through investigation, it was determined that the driver of the white SUV, Stephan M. Clark (4/18/1961), was upset about the red pickup truck intentionally blowing thick black smoke while in front of him. This resulted in an angry exchange and hand gestures. Clark then re-engaged the driver of the red pickup truck after the initial incident and pulled a gun from the holster in his waistband, prompting the other driver to pull his own firearm out of fear. The other driver fired at the front tire of Clark’s vehicle in an attempt to disable it so he could get away and call law enforcement. The driver specifically aimed in that area to avoid hitting Clark.

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Just after 3:30 a.m., the Walton County Sheriff’s Office responded to a burglary-in-progress call on Quail Hollow Court in Inlet Beach.

When deputies arrived, the homeowner had Tyler Mack Maroney, also known as Tyler Mack Morris, 25, of Panama City, held at gunpoint.

Deputies quickly took Morris into custody and found a handgun in his waistband.

Morris was transported and booked into the Walton County Jail on several charges, including possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, burglary, wearing a mask while committing a felony, grand theft, and obstruction. Additional charges are expected as two more weapons were found in his possession.

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The resident grabbed their AR-15 rifle and went to the door to look through the peephole. He did not recognize the man and only opened the door after checking if he noticed any weapons.

Officials said the girlfriend came out the bedroom and also confirmed she also did not recognize the person at the door, dressed in what appeared to be a Halloween costume.

Lt. Willkens stated the man attempted to force his way inside and kept repeating, "This is my apartment."  The resident physically pushed back to keep him out, but the intruder continued to rush through the door. The resident fired a single shot, hitting the man in the upper body.

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If you gotta go to the hospital, this is pretty sweet to have on your playlist.

And props to Hugh Laurie for performing a great old classic that everyone - and I mean everyone, like Satchmo and Cab Calloway - has covered.  And crushing it. 

So I had surgery.  The doc injected something called a SpaceOar (yeah, stupid name).  Basically it's to provide some separation of the cancerous and non-cancerous tissue for the radiation will focus on the former and not the latter.

The doc also said he put in three gold bits that will help aim the beam better.  I thanked him for bedazzling my ass ...

And now the Queen Of The World has another surgery.  This shit is getting old.  I've never had a month that went like this, health-wise.

Foxtrot Mike Lima. 

 I have not been ignoring y'all, I just haven't found anything that piques my interest enough to write about.  This morning, though, I found an email from Jacob at Wideners.  They have done a deep dive on the .300 Blackout.  For those of you unaware, the .300 Blackout is a niche cartridge designed to run through a standard AR platform.  Some folks really like it.

For those interested, the link is here. It looks fairly interesting, and there is a lot of information there.

In other shooting mews, I'm having trouble with the Winchester 94 I mounted the red dot sight on.  Mainly, having trouble scheduling range time.  Life keeps getting in the way of range time.

Fr those of you, who like me, are not particularly interested in watching the clock, I am reminded that once again this weekend, we are going to do the whole "Fall Back" thing on Sunday morning. I don't recall when this foolishness started, but I would not be averse to seeing it end.  Pick one and stick with it, but don't make me change my clock twice a year.

(AmmoLand.com)-An official National Park Video shows  double meaning, irony, and tragedy, in three screenshots. 

 Link to video by NPS Glacier National Park on Youtube, created November 19, 2017  The video is only two minutes and 39 seconds long. 

Link to the original video with text showing at the Glacier National Park site. 

On July 25, 2014, Brian D. Murphy used both bear spray and a .357 magnum revolver to stop a charging grizzly bear. He probably shot the bear in the face. The shot stunned the bear, stopped the charge, but did not kill the bear. Murphy shot the bear after it had charged through the bear spray. Murphy helped keep other hikers safe. He immediately told park rangers about the incident. All the physical evidence was consistent with Murphy's account. The bear had left by the time the rangers arrived, but blood and hair and DNA confirmed it was a grizzly bear. Murphy was not charged by the investigating officers. His firearm was not taken. Two months later, he was charged by officers of the National Park Service. Murphy hired an attorney who took the case before the local federal judge and the local Assistant United States Attorney. The case was dismissed with predjudice on October 9, 2014, meaning Murphy could not be charged again.  

Murphy's case made the local media and was widely known as a case where bear spray failed and a .357 magnum shot to the face worked.

On November 19, 2017, Glacier National Park created an official video titled: Using Bear Spray. The video is 2 minutes and 39 seconds long. According to the description, it is in the public domain. The same two actors are seen in at least one other video where the uniformed actor is identified as "Ranger Simpson" and the non-uniformed actor identified as "Buddy".  They star in a series of videos created in 2017. Sam Simpson identifies himself as a ranger with seven years experience. The video was written and produced by Scott Holmes. Scott Holmes is an independent music composer who also contracts nature films. A year after these videos were created, Scott Holmes Music was created in Scotland, UK.  

It would be difficult to believe the park rangers were not intimately familiar with the Brian Murphy case. It seems likely why they were laughing at the obvious double meaning at the end of the video. It may come from a lack of knowledge by Scott Holmes or it may be intentional. It could easily have been avoided by using the word "spray" to substitute for "shoot".  The text at the end of the video could have been "if you spray a bear in the face." 

In the Brian Murphy experience, bear spray failed to stop the bear.  A shot from a .357 magnum to the face at 7-10 feet worked extremely well. With this context, it is easy to see why the statements are funny in a video on how to use bear spray. 

The irony is palpable. A video showing how to use bear spray, saying it only is effective with a (gun)shot to the face of the bear.  

The screen shots are from Glacier National Park Video. The text in screenshots is in the original video.  In the outtake, the crew laughed at the above statements, as shown in the screenshot from the outtake below: 

The phrases, funny in 2017, when considering the Brian Murphy case, reflect tragedy in 2026.  

In 2026, Anthoni Pollio appears to have been killed by a grizzly bear on May 3, 2026, close to the same spot where Brian Murphy stopped a grizzly bear charge with his .357 magnum in July of 2014.  Both were on the Mount Brown trail. The trail is only 4 miles long. 

Would Pollio have acted differently if the National Park Service were not so intent on promoting the use of bear spray? Would Anthoni Pollio still be alive today? We can never know. 

In North America, as of May, 2026, there have been nine people who were killed by bears after bear spray was used as a defense against the bears. There do not appear to be any people killed by bears when a handgun was present and fired against bears in North America.  One person who fired a .22 caliber handgun in defense against a polar bear in the Svalbard archipelago was killed in 1996. 

In November, 2017, the statistical evidence supporting the use of handguns in defense against bears had only been building for a year. In 2026, the statistical evidence is well developed. 

©2026 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice and link are included.

Gun Watch  

“Two individuals who knew each other had some of type a dispute,” Kochis said. “They engaged with each other at the Taco Bell. One person pulled out a weapon. Another person pulled out their own weapon, which was a firearm, and shot the person in the shoulder. Thankfully it was non-life-threatening injuries. We’re working with the commonwealth attorney now to determine appropriate charges. But on its face, preliminarily, it does look like self-defense.”

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eputies said they were called to Port Royal Road for a domestic-related shooting incident that ended in a death on Sept. 30.

The Anderson County Coroner’s Office identified the victim as 44-year-old Adger Luther Stamey.

(snip) 

An extensive investigation found that the shooting was justified.

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The post Stenzel SAK-21: “American-Made AK” Does Not Do It Justice first appeared on Forgotten Weapons.

Troopers were called to the 700 block of Walnut Hill Road in Georges Township around 1 p.m. for a reported domestic incident and shooting.

They found a man who’d been shot down on the floor of a home. He died on his way to the hospital.

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Later on, during the same night, Tuesday, Oct. 13, 2026, at 3 a.m., Ashe County 911 Center received a call from a female stating a male subject kicked down the door to their Airbnb, and she had shot the suspect when he entered the home.

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