By Richard H. Dick James Before departing camp, I was warned that the terrain surrounding Cai Cai was honeycombed with VC mines, and to be on the alert. No amount of training will give a soldier true battle experience. The only way to get that experience, and learn if you can handle it, is toContinue reading “My First Combat Patrol”
Category Archives: Armed Conflicts Worldwide
The Korean War Week 86: Koje-do: A Simmering Cauldron – February 10, 1952
An astonishing accusation about chemical weapons by Soviet diplomat Yakov Malik dominates headlines this week, as the POW issue continues to plague ceasefire negotiations. But those are far from the only developments this week. Elsewhere, overcrowding, poor conditions, and lack of firm control escalate tensions at the UN’s Koje-do POW camp, perhaps beginning to precipitateContinue reading “The Korean War Week 86: Koje-do: A Simmering Cauldron – February 10, 1952”
The Korean War Week 85: Futilely Pounding North Korea? – February 3, 1952
The UN forces are by now having trouble just keeping their planes in the skies, thanks to shortages of spare parts, so for long can they maintain aerial supremacy over Korea? And though the aerial campaign to destroy North Korean infrastructure has been stepped up, so too has the enemy’s ability to quickly rebuild. AndContinue reading “The Korean War Week 85: Futilely Pounding North Korea? – February 3, 1952”
SOG During Operation Dewey Canyon
Ken Bird gives his first-hand account of a SOG operation
The Korean War Week 84: Inside Truman’s Diary – January 27, 1952
Things heat up in the Panmunjom Peace Talks, which each side arguing that the other side’s proposals violate the Geneva Convention, but by the end of the week they talks are in recess. Naval aircraft pound the North Korean infrastructure all week long, though, and US President Harry Truman has a few things to sayContinue reading “The Korean War Week 84: Inside Truman’s Diary – January 27, 1952”
WW 2 Rat Bombs
During World War II, Britain’s Special Operations Executive came up with one of the strangest sabotage ideas of the war: the “explosive rat.” Dead rats were stuffed with plastic explosive and sewn back up so they looked like ordinary carcasses. The plan was to smuggle them near German boiler rooms and coal piles, hoping workersContinue reading “WW 2 Rat Bombs”
The Vietnam Liberator Pistol
What most people don’t know is there was a version cooked up for use in Vietnam.
General Edward Porter Alexander
A Bio of the CSA’s Best Artillery officer.
The Korean War Week 83: The Medics’ War! – January 20, 1952
There’s discussion- and disagreement- in UN Command and Washington about whether or not to poll all the POWs the UN side holds to see where they would like to go should they be released. There are arguments for and against this, and it brings up a couple different interpretations of the Geneva Convention. This weekContinue reading “The Korean War Week 83: The Medics’ War! – January 20, 1952”
The Korean War Week 82: Operation Strangle Isn’t Strangling! – January 13, 1952
Operation Strangle, to destroy enemy logistical capability with air power, has been in progress for months now, and yet the enemy is still able to bring up men and supplies, and even slowly stockpile them for possible future offensives. The UN position now is that should there be an armistice, and should the other sideContinue reading “The Korean War Week 82: Operation Strangle Isn’t Strangling! – January 13, 1952”
Scattered Shots 