What Folks Might Inaccurately Call 'Lies'
After all, you can be sincere and honestly believe in something, only for it to be complete and utter nonsense, yes Milli Vanilli I'm looking at you. No I shan't explain, go look it up.
We shall get to Jake and Anders in good time, Conrad merely wants to set the record straight as regards various Armoured Fighting Vehicles. Art!
Yes, that appears to be Queenie STAND UP FOR HER MAJESTY! enjoying herself at the rear of a Rolls-Royce armoured car. This was a Rolls-Royce chassis with a turret added, as well as armour plating, to enable it to become the metal steed of cavalry regiments, out to scout. Their mileage was rubbish but you wouldn't get traffic wardens trying to ticket you. Art!
Here we see one in it's natural habitat, the desert, where they served during the First Unpleasantness, the inter-war years and the Second Unpleasantness, too. Different pattern turret this time, with a Vickers machine gun, Boys anti-tank rifle and what might be an Italian light machine gun perched to the rear - the flash-hider looks too long to be a Bren. Notice the sand-channel used for traversing soft sand. Art!
ANYWAY the point Your Humble Scribe wanted to make was that, despite having a turret, this is NOT a tank. Art!
This, gentle reader, is the M113 Armoured Personnel Carrier, aptly described by Colonel Lethbridge-Stewart as a 'sardine tin', except it was made of aluminium not tin. It's purpose was to carry the squishy vulnerable infantry into action, preserving their delicate hides from bullets or shrapnel, and inclement weather. Yes, it has tracks, but it is still NOT a tank. Art!
Say hello to the Paladin M109 Self-Propelled Gun, which has tracks and a turret and yet is still NOT a tank. That mighty cannon, which might have Mister Freud raising his eyebrows a bit, is an artillery piece intended for indirect fire, not for engaging battlefield targets in a direct fire role. Despite looking all 'Alli' and hard as nails, the Paladin, like all SPGs, has thin armour because it's intended to be fighting miles behind the front lines.
There will now be a short hiatus as I go check on the Barm Brack
Looking good!
ANYWAY what I wanted to spotlight here was another sloppy use of imprecise language, which torments me more than toothache or indigestion. Art!
Surprise! Images of him as a serving USAF officer at Minot AFB are kind of hard to find, because OPSEC. Jake has pointedly made the - er - point that ATACAMS and Storm Shadow (and SCALP, sooner or later) are NOT long-range missiles. They are, in fact, short-range missiles. Despite whereabouts in Modern-day Mordor they are falling. Art!
The ATACMS and Stormzy have a maximum range of 300 kilometres, which sounds like a lot to the uninformed, and it would hurt your feet if you had to walk that far, but it's not long-range as missiles are defined. Art!
This is Captain Anders Nielsen of the Royal Danish Navy, whom works in intelligence matters, and probably knows a whole lot more than he's allowed to relate. He, too, has taken up the cudgels of Accuracy in defence of Truth, and took pains to explains that weapons like the Tomahawk or Kalibr have ranges of up to 2,000 kilometres. Those are long-range missiles. The Ruffian Kh-101, when launched from an airborne platform (a long-winded way of saying 'a plane'), has a range of 5,000 kilometres. Art!
"About War And Peace"
Anders is careful to post his vlog out of uniform, or he'd be unemployed.
As he accurately expounds, the ATACMS is seen as a tactical missile system, instead of Ruffian systems like their 'Oreshnik', which come bundled with a strategic image. Art!
Fred and war
Remember, as Nietzsche might have said, as you define language, so language defines you.
On Track With Barm Brack
Conrad's baking renaissance continues. Today I have made 'Barm Brack' from my "1,000 Recipes Cookbook", and the secret for this cake or tea-bread is in the preparation. The night before, you make up 3/4 of a pint of tea, and soak 12 ounces of dried fruit in it, having mixed in 7 ounces of sugars. Art!
That makes a billion recipes. Food for thought.
Then you line a 2-pound loaf tin with a double layer of greased baking paper. The fruit-and-tea mixture is added to flour and a single egg, the whole lot goes in the oven and - Art!
It's a dead simple recipe, unlike the original Barm Brack, which seems to be a yeasted loaf with dried fruit, more akin to Bara Brith than tea-bread. The proof, as ever, will be in the eating, which will commence tomorrow. I will let you know.
Gaining Traction
Unless you have been divorced from contact with the news of late, you cannot but have noticed that things are getting fruity in Syria again, thanks to the amalgam of Syrian opposition groups burying the hatchet and not in each other.
This allows me to focus on the tyrant-wannabe Assad. Art!
The pillock can't even manage a Hitler salute
If I may be cruel and personal, and I may be since WHOSE BLOG IS IT? I have always felt that Bashar looks like "The Stupid Boyfriend" in an Ealing comedy of the Thirties, and a whole lot of people over on Twitter <sneers at Elong Tusk> agree with me. Let me know in the Comments if you think we have a winner here.
More Journey With Bernie
I've done my due diligence and yes, #41 is visible on teh Interwebz, so let us gaze on "Visitor". Art!
Conrad cannot remember a monstrous multi-legged entity appearing in the pages of "Treasure Island" but it was a long time ago when I last read it.
Terminological Exactitude
You may, or may not, be aware of the recent Georgian elections where their pro-Putin party were ridiculously obvious in stealing the vote.
The general population of Georgia, who saw their election being traduced before their very eyes, are most definitely aware. They have been out on the streets protesting, en masse. Art!
Conrad has to admit a certain frisson of support for these people who wield their flag, so closely akin it is to our own St George's flag in This Sceptred Isle.
Look at the number of protesters. Sheer mass presents a problem to the authorities, who cannot simply kill them all, nor arrest them, because they don't have half a million police. Recall, if you will, 2014 and Ukraine, when the pro-Putin political puppet was forced to flee -
Except back then Putinpot had a large, well-armed, well-trained army poised for action. Today he cannot even spare a thought, let alone a rapid intervention force, for Syria, because troubles come in threes. Or fours. Or forty-fours.
Finally -
Get ready for a proper grilling.
No comments:
Post a Comment