Reel In Awe At My Mastery Of The English!
Yes, there I was, making tea and toast in the kitchen and wondering what this Intro could possibly be about, and I remembered "Military History Not Visualised" and his vlog about Sinister/Ruffian logistics, because SIT BACK DOWN! logistics is interesting. Take our recent blog entitled "Can The Can In Cannes" about the four-gallon flimsy and the far superior Teuton jerrican. At least 14 people read that. Art!
No, there's nothing at all to do with that series in this blog, I just wanted to use a picture more - shall we say 'enticing'? - than a box of rockets. So, let us begin with a picture cropped from MHNV. Art!
That's the thing about MHNV, he always provides sources and in their original Teuton, him being Austrian.
What does the above quote mean? Well, that Grad has 40 tubes that each hold a rocket. They are normally fired in a 'ripple' sequence or you risk destroying the entire truck. When they have all be sent on their way, why, all those tubes need to be reloaded. Individually. By hand. Art!
This is how the rockets are stored and transported, in wooden boxes. It's a good thing Ruffia has a lot of timber because these are one-use items that often suffer damage in transit, as seen above. Also - Art!
Those handles are not decorative, and yes, it requires four or more sweating Ruffian mobiks to carry each box from the truck it was transported in. Then they have to break them open, and only then can they begin to reload the Grad. The time given to reload is ten minutes, which MHNV's source from Ukraine states is horse-puckey and thirty or forty minutes is the real time. Art!
This is Happy Harry HIMARS. All six rossiles (because I can't decide if they're rockets or missiles) come supplied in one large 'cassette' which takes all of four minutes to reload, because the vehicle itself has the crane needed for such work built on.
MHNV - I can't find his name mentioned, but think it's 'Paul' so we'll go with that <Googles> O! actually it's Bernhard, so we'll totally rock it with Bernie - also mentioned more modern Ruffian rocket systems like the 'Smersh' (Ruffian for 'Death'). These use the exact same single rocket loading by hand as the elderly Grad. Art!
Someone has been watching too much 'Thunderbirds'
Bernie then moves onto smaller-scale logistics issues, such as the boxing of small arms ammunition and other items of similar size. Art!
Explosive detonators to port and 30 mm cannon rounds to starboard. Please note that these steel cans are completely sealed and cannot simply be opened by pulling off a lid or anything sensible, because Ruffian. No, you need a special cutting tool, an axe and a hammer to get into these things. Art!
First, you use the tin-opener to rip open the tin on two edges, then you insert the axe blade and use the hammer to basically (not a word Conrad is fond of) hammer the tin open. This is the reason those tins of 30 millimetres look so battered - it's because they are. Conrad is not sure he'd enjoy hacking and bashing a 'soup-tin' full of high explosives. It's not a choice Ruffian mobiks have. Art!
One of the identifying features of MHNV is the use of graphics at the end to sum up Ol' Bernie's content up to that point. This one is no exception. So, what are the downsides of the Sinister/Ruffian methoding? Let us take them one at a time. Art!
A mixed blessing, because all those wooden boxes can be used to burn as firewood or as construction material in the hovels that mobiks call dug-outs.
It does indeed, because Ruffian mobiks typically don't bother about state-owned property, and Conrad is not certain that the arch-symbol of Western technology, the forklift truck, ever reached the barbarous realms of Muscovy.
That last is why Ukraine acquires lots of Ruffian ammo whenever they retreat, because it would take days to put all that stuff back into boxes and then hump them onto trucks and by then the front line has moved on ten miles.
Then there is the quality of ammunition as supplied by the Norks .....
I Have Blatantly Stolen This
Conrad read about this on Twitter*, as the kind of Tweet he comes across there are not very flattering about DJ Tango. In this one, the poster claimed that Donald Trump's inner Smeagol was coming out. Art!
Donald thinks he won something!
I know, I know, we'll be covering that $91 million bond later in the week as we need more information about what's going on, which won't come out until Monday at the earliest as E Jean Carroll's lawyers pester for more data. Conrad strongly suspects the name "Sauron" will be in there somewhere.
Cinema Sins: "Mackenna's Gold"
Conrad, for no good reason, decided to rewatch "Mackenna's Gold", shortly after watching "Cinema Sins", which is a channel that dissects films and points out all their inconsistencies. The narration is at frantic speed, such that I wondered if it was on 2x, but no, CS just speaks that fast. He did a number on a disaster film I've not seen, "Greenland".
ANYWAY Conrad brought this mindset to his perusal of MG. The film begins with about 6 minutes of geography porn and then zooms in on a lone rider.
Except - Art!
Notice how, out in the middle of a deserted nowhere, there are two other sets of hoofprints. No, this is not a much-travelled thoroughfare. IT IS THE MIDDLE OF NOWHERE! Art?
That tiny white and black dot in the very centre is Prairie Dog. See? Shot on location in Utah and Arizona, two South Canadian states that define "Big And Empty".
Don't worry, we will definitely be coming back to this film, because Your Modest Scribe was making notes.
"City In The Sky"
Ace is acting on behalf of the Doctor aboard Arcology One, because the alien squatters in the Australian outback have not taken the hint and left.
‘Wotcha,’ she greeted them,
to looks of puzzlement. ‘Hello.’
‘Hmm,’ frowned Christos. He still felt dire after having contracted
Barclay’s Bug and didn’t feel well enough to bother with chit-chat.
‘The Doctor said we need to
try and locate the Lithoi’s base in
‘Thank you, Miss. That is exactly what I have spent eight hours
trying to do.’
Ace made a small tutting
sound that might have been commiseration or criticism.
‘Not going too well, then?’
Christos made a tutting noise of his own.
‘Miss, we don’t even know for certain that an alien base exists. All we have to go on is your companion’s
assurance and an empty robotic shell.’
‘Hey, if the Prof – the Doctor – says that there’s an alien base you can
bank on it!’ retorted Ace, hotly.
Christos looked amused at her insistence.
‘Mizz - ’
‘Ace. Call me “Ace”.’
‘Very well. Ace, I
exaggerated. I used simple trigonometry
to narrow down the area these aliens might be hiding in.’
He showed her several pages of calculations on his Tab, working
backwards.
‘I knew the approximate data for the inbound Chinese missiles. Plugging the numbers in – ah, cutting out the
mathematics, I found the intercepting beams to come from a region fifty
kilometres square. Istvan, bring it up
on the screens.’
Well, two thousand five hundred square kilometres is better than forty thousand, so bravo! Christos.
Finally -
Darling Daughter is visiting for Mother's Day, which is why this blog is a bit later than usual. What, you were waiting for this?
* None of that "X" stuff here
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