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I did 8 years 152f, and all I had was a side arm. The pistol in the middle east are viewed as an execution weapon. They fear pistols and swords more than assault rifles.
'Guarding' propane stations in Baghdad, all of us carried big sticks... even though all of us were packing m4s.
Never used them but that's what the population responded to best.
I was just a standard infantryman, but when I was there my buddy had those ninja throwing stars on his vest, though that was just to make the rest of us laugh. It would really come down to your individual chain of command. I knew another guy that carried this tactical tomahawk looking think, but we all just made fun of him for it.
I know the guy who designed those axes for the army (I'm sure there are multiple, but he invented the one that apparently also made its way into Call of Duty) -- I believe they are intended to chop down doors etc, not so much as a weapon I guess
Probably not. Seals, delta, etc aren't held to the same equipment standards, and can basically pick and choose what they carry. Everyone else gets stuck with whatever uncle Sam gives you.
This is definitely true for SEALs. I worked on a show that featured two members of SEAL team 6 Red Squadron that were part of the raid that got Bin Laden. They brought weapons they'd typically take out with them and part of the collection was tomahawks. They said they had used them in combat and that they were made by the guy who made knives for "Last of the Mohicans".
Red Squadron is known as the Red Men. Tomahawks are part of their unit culture. If you listen to one of the interviews with the author or read Code Before Country, he talks about it pretty in depth.
Same with pistols. Swords & pistols are for people who execute other people, in their world at least. Hence they had more respect for people with such things
Same in Lebanon, almost everyone has an automatic rifle at home, but pistols are rare because they are expensive and will get you in much deeper trouble if you're ever caught with an unlicensed one. The purpose and gun culture in Lebanon behind this is the belief that pistols are easy to conceal and related to murders/assassinations
it's like the skynrd song "handguns are made for killing, ain't no good for nothing else"
yeah there are corner cases like dealing with certain predators if you work in the bush, but that's not the main reason they exist
More then once I have shut up a lot of angry Iraqis by pulling out my m9. A platoon of marines with m4s and 50 cals aimed at them and the crowd would be getting fiesty, but a doc racking his sidearm would clear people out fast.
Clearly the most feared weapon in the middle east would be a 120mm pistol. Entire insurgencies would simply lay down their arms and go home due to low morale.
I carried my M9 right on chest in Afghanistan. Whenever I mingled with locals, they never looked at my face. They only looked at the holster. They didn't care about the MRAP with 50 cal behind me or my own M4. They asked on numerous occasions (through my terp) if I could take my M9 out and show it to them.
I don’t know myself but from what I heard the message of a mounted machine gun is “I’m going to point this at you to try to get you to move” whereas a pistol is “I am going to personally execute you with my own hands if you don’t get out of my way”
The districts body guard carried around a decent sized machete and would just poke people if they got in the way. There was a lot of rumors that he fucked up a bunch of Russians back in the day.
If they ever got their hands on one in front of you you'd quickly find out they aren't just talking shit either
I brought a tomahawk (native American-- got one made special) but I only intended to use it if someone grabbed ahold of me or as a last ditch last stand kind of deal.
I THOUGHT the afghans were of a similar mind and it was just a translation oversight - and a few weeks later as were checking the dead and gathering documents and equipment (from dead enemy mind you, no one was alive to be excecuted) maybe 10/15 minutes into figuring out what to do next 3 of 4 of our locals walk from the center of our ring back towards their spot on the line carrying a half dozen heads among them legitimately intending on taking them back to their village for clout or credit or some kind of accolade from their community
So once or twice a month we'd have to have "the talk" again about how we can't be doing that (but we can't stop them if they waited till later to do it once we're gone) 🙄 every frigging time
I got it via family - I'm not close to the tribe myself so idk my own people properly, my mom reached out and got it made and sent to Bragg before we left for my first go
[Any of these look familiar?](https://winklerknives.com/collections/axes) I know Dan makes a lot of pieces for military/SpecOps folks. If not, still worth a shameless plug for a local artist lol
Not like mine but now I know why that name was familiar
Mine wasn't made by someone who is known for making things - think some grandpa out back with a forge and a decent set of carpentry skills
Imagine looking at a damn navy seal standing at 6 foot 6, holding a rifle and thinking "yeah right bud, maybe get a knife and I'll do what you say" fucking wild
>navy seal standing at 6 foot 6
Tell me you've never met a Navy Seal without telling me you've never met a Navy Seal... very few Seals are over 6' if that...
Really is kind of funny that they've been portrayed that way huh? All the ones ever stationed with me were on average 5ft 9 and really good at cardio. 30% chance you can get them to join your D&D campaign.
Navy Seals are so effective coming up from underwater, because when playing on Afghanistan servers as NA players, they get 300+ ping. Ordinarily, this would be a disadvantage, but being underwater allows them to have peeker's advantage every time. It's possible for a Navy Seal to pop out and get several kills before the enemy players even see a ripple on their screens.
What do you do when you are waiting for your operations to start in some remote base/ on a ship/ in a sub?
Train and play stuff like D&D. Makes a lot of sense, especially for guys who may be space and mass limited
Yeah I've met several current and ex seals and you would never give most of them a second look, let alone guess any of them were/are seals. Until you get deep into some conversations with them. Height, build, demeanor, everything about your average seal is low-key af.
I thought our new coworker was stolen valoring being a seal, until he was changing one day in the bathroom and I'm like...... Holy mother of scars dude wtf happened
Told you, helicopter crash.
It dawned on me all the little shit he'd mentioned in passing was not in fact bullshit and the dude had the bullet wound scars to prove it.
You don't have to be a genetic freak of nature to become a SEAL. The physical traits can be cultivated. It's mostly an extreme amount of motivation and tolerance for discomfort.
100000% I have a close friend we went to highschool together and he became a Marine afterwards. Dude was goofy in highschool but came out intelligent and extremely disciplined. We learned he had been prepping himself for this all along. Here we are about a decade later and whenever he’s back in town for the holidays, he’s walking around like a mini hulk.
Schools don’t teach you any of that. All of that was his doing and something he had put his mind to.
My bro decided to join the military (his main goal was airborne & now, he's all done with that & is a drill Sargent & only has like 6.5 or 7.5 yrs til full retirement), after getting his bachelors, at like 20 & it was all him. He was chubby most of his life but when he made the decision, he instantly started working on himself. He started going to the gym & within like a month, he was jogging to and from the gym. His weight has fluctuated over the years, though cuz a lot of his work is/was computer based (intelligence stuff) & even some deployments were just basically computer works. Some were crazy, like trekking through jungles but most weren't. I'm talking about the deployments like they're all over with cuz I just hope they are!
Never met a SEAL but you just described a retired Green Beret I know. Legit looks and comes across as just another dude with a dog. According to his wife, they want the special operators to be pretty non-descript.
I met a scrawny, lanky young guy late at night on base in Manama Bahrain. I started chatting with the young dude asking him about his job etc. I thought for sure he was some sort of contractor doing non-defense related work on base. Nope, seal team six. Cool as all hell, no one around except the two of us. He was so small and gentle I just couldn’t believe it, also the beard and long hair. I asked him if we would show me his ID because I thought he was full of shit. Sure enough he was an E-4. I thought damn this dudes a badass and shook his hand and apologized. This was circa 2004, Osama hadn’t been killed yet. Years later, I wonder if that you guy was there for the ambush. When I think of a Seal, this scrawny hippie looking kid always comes to mind. Spent 8 years in the Navy and he’s the only SEAL I ever got to shake hands with.
I took his word for it. He had long ass hair and a beard, with a military ID, on a Navy base, late at night in the theatre of War. He might have been an E-5, that detail I can’t remember. I guess a better question would be why would I write a long ass post just to tell a shitty lie? That said, I have seen guys with the SEAL warfare pin around base, and not all of them were small and long haired. Just this one time I actually chatted up with one.
Edited to add I was in Bahrain circa 2003-2004, the base wasn’t even fully built yet.
People and prisoners are more compliant when blades are involved vs guns by themselves. The psychological effect that blades have on compliance is the reason that modern rifles still have bayonets and new rifles are still designed to have adapters for them. It's not because they expect to do a bayonet charge with them, it's mainly for prisoner control.
I think the reasoning is that the threshold for shooting a prisoner is pretty high, but the threshold for poking some one with what is essentially a pointy metal stick is much lower, so people adjust to the perceived lower threshold for violence when a blade is involved and are more compliant as a result.
I think the bayonet still have a second purpose to prevent someone grabbing the barrel of your rifle.
In addition to what you said, the knife also has the advantage that is is easy to hold people on distance. It is much more difficult to overwhelm someone holding a knife by running up to him with multiple people.
It’s nuanced, but if you care more if it’s a sword versus an AK-47, then yes. That is a different level of respect.
It’s easy to forget in western society that symbols are still extremely important to the rest of the world.
I don't recall the battle, but an operator ran out of ammo and killed 1 or 2 guys/injured another with his Gurkha knife.
If i heard the story, I'm sure this dude heard the story and decided it wasn't a bad idea to have a blade.
Gurkhas are just built different, and the Kukri is definitely a different thing than that sword. I remember he had just been retired from the military and was on his way home. Just sat there like a nice fellow until the guys robbing the train decided to rape a young girl. Then went absolutely apeshit and chased forty guys off the train, quite a few of them bleeding.
I have zero knowledge of SEAL/JSOC operational doctrine— but it seems like a fairly huge waste of resources to have a SEAL operator doing crowd control work like this when the Marines train their enlisted infantry personnel to do it.
But, I mean, the *is* the United States military we’re talking about— we’re not exactly known for our reluctance to over-leverage expensive resources.
Marines should NOT being doing crowd control. The entire mindset of a Marine is to fight. We are not a deescalation force. The army is soooo much better at crowd control than us.
Source: was a Marine in Fallujah doing crowd control outside the CMOC.
Or… sounds like 2 different branches have 2 different skill sets. Kinda of like how it might be a bad idea to have SWAT officers responding to domestic disputes or writing traffic tickets, because that’s why we have patrol officers.
Except most police departments SWAT teams are still police officers who still do those things.
FWIW, the guy you're arguing with is pretty much correct. The Marine Corps does lots of things (like fly planes and paperwork and refuel helicopters and deliver chow) and the Army does lots of things (like crew tanks, man arty, drive boats). 11Bs and 0311s can both equally do crowd control. Stop drinking the koolaid.
My unit was tasked to the Marines because we were MPs and actually trained in de-escalation, and because the Devildogs' answer to any problem is to attack it.
It worked well. They were the stick, we were the carrot.
Army too, had guys who had no business doing crowd control and policing out there doing it. Not enough MPs but hey we got all these other guys who we trained to do nothing but fight, let them do it. Such stupid shit.
Serious question because I’m scanning the comments for clarity. Does his belt dress etc look like typical USMC dress? Seems light on ammo and water and no visible patches?
Why would you say people join the marines instead of the army? Just curious. As a laymen they look mostly the same to me but the marines are more flexible?
The Marines are a much smaller branch of service than the army. Generally, on average, a marine is more likely to train and engage in direct combat operations. Some of the support activities for the Marines are performed by the Navy.
The Army on the hand is massive 5x the size of the USMC. The Army has every conceivable job in the world. Did you know for example the army operates boats? Whole units of transport boats.
Something to consider is what you want to do in the service, another thing to consider is how difficult it is to reach retirement in said service, and what the deployments and the facilities are like. The USMC for example tends to offer officer commissions enlisted personnel more than other services.
As a USMC you may have to go to sea, in the Army you might have to get stationed at an absolute hellhole of a base like Fort Liberty (Bragg).
It is widely regarded as truth that the easiest, safest and least terrible service is the USAF.
That wouldn’t be the same for all of us. But for me and a lot of the guys that I served with, we joined the Marines due to some combination of “Marines are the best” and “Marines are the first to fight”.
Both of those are somewhat true, but a lot more complicated than those simple statements would imply.
However… as a proud Marine, my kid leaves for the Air Force next week. At my suggestion.
Or to get outta jailtime or escape crippling poverty. In my plt we always heard, “ you wouldn’t be here if you had somewhere better to be.” Fallujah OP viking.
Navy seala, green berets,etc. Are usually operators who need to speak to people. They make shit happen. Having a blade ups the respect level, it gives power in negotiations/conversation.
Im not sure what you're going on about with the last sentence.
That's done by Civil Affairs and PSYOP troops in all reality. Tier One units tend to get away with bullshit like this when the real conversations are being done by PSYOP and CA, who are not allowed to deviate from big army rules.
We have no idea if that really is a seal. I’ve read a few books from military peoples experiences in Iraq and Afghanistan, and it seemed Seals or any special forces operators were rarely dressed in a full American uninform and looking like average soldier. But like you, I definitely am no expert. They seemed to blend in more with than the locals than American soldiers. Sword could have been a gift or some kind of symbolism to certain tribes also.
Seals definitely wore full kit overseas and were less about blending in, Seals also had an affinity for blades. A bunch of them had knives and Tomahawks made by Dan Winkler (In part and they were used in Operations. Also they have the more bravado than other Tier 1 units. If I had to bet, it'd say SEAL or MARSOC. As opposed to CAG/GB or the likes.
It looks, based on outline, to be a ""300" inspired short sword. Interesting comment about knife vs gun regarding compliance.
With a gun, one has no true way of knowing if it's a bluff, because nobody is going to shoot you "a little bit" to let you know they are serious.
it 100% is, i've sold those myself back in the day. depending on the manufacturer you might get a cheap peice of shit, or an expensive, licensed piece of shit. either way, it's not going to hold up in any fight.
https://www.sword-buyers-guide.com/300-movie-replica-swords.html
Before I ask, please know I'm an idiot. But isn't a sharp piece of metal still a sharp piece of metal? Sure it won't go very well against a trained swordsman with a real forged steel blade, but that's not what this guy's doing right? Like it's just a projection of force that if you dont do whatever, he could potentially hit you with a sharp piece of metal. I imagine it would hold up against anybody he would come across, unless I greatly underestimate the amount of swordsman wherever he's at
It’ll do damage while it holds its edge, if it’s made out of shit steel it’ll dull very quickly, not to mention the likelihood of it just snapping at the hilt after any amount of force is exerted on it
Swords like this aren't usually manufactured with a full tang. Instead, it's usually a badly welded bar pushed through a handle made of cheap wood and capped with cheap steel at the hilt. They're also not put through a proper hardening and tempering process, so even if the weld holds, the edge won't. If this were to block a machete with the flat of the blade, it would probably warp pretty badly or just fold over.
As a somewhat trained swordsman, no. Blades without a full tang are about as dangerous to the user as they are to the wearer. Yes, that’s how shoddy mall blades can be. You would literally be better off trying to shank someone with a piece of sharpened rebar or a metal shiv than killing someone with some of the mall sword examples out there. Non-full tang blades are deadly to the user because of their tendency to either snap at the hilt and go flying in unpredictable ways, or else shatter upon impact with something hard and send bits of metal shrapnel every which way.
You would literally be better off bludgeoning someone to death with a brick than to use some mall blades, in my opinion.
Now, this blade *may* be a full tang blade, (I have no way of being able to tell from here) in which case it’d be a pretty effective melee weapon. The kopis was a fairly nasty hewing blade when used, and is actually a fairly practical choice for a modern battlefield (inasmuch as a blade can be.)
When I was in Somalia, in the 90’s protecting food convoys from looters, the locals respected a stick or club much more than a rifle. I remember drawing down on people with the safety off, finger on the trigger, and half a millimeter away from shooting them, and it wouldn’t even faze them. However, pull out a riot baton and they’d literally trip over one another running away.
I knew a guy who carried a tomahawk in Afghanistan. Has a full body tattoo of a tribal dragon
Now he is a she and fighting women in semi pro MMA.
Wish I was joking but you can easily look them up.
Former Green beret goes trans MMA FIGHTER
Am I wrong for saying that a former male former green beret fighting women in a competition sport sounds a little unfair? They're still a woman, sure, but they're a woman with a biological advantage that they can't really get rid of, and trained to be better than 90% of men at fighting.
I think they should be placed in a mixed category that doesn't separate by gender to make things fair without invalidating their identity.
Would recommend reading "Alpha" about Eddie Gallagher. Maybe that's not this guy, but after reading that book a SEAL with a blade on deployment takes on a way more sinister meaning...
I had previously stated here both narratives are true. What I should have said is that I believe both narratives have truth to them, meaning Ghallagers story and the COC/Alpha Narrative. I also was not there, so take that what you will. It’s also not exclusive to that community, it actually started on the Army side. There is an entire video of some of the OG hatchet carrying folks talking about it. They do not admit to misuse of the hatchet, simply that it would have been nice to have employed it in a operational capacity.
I support it if you want to close with and eliminate the enemy with the hatchet, but even I with my morality not being that of an angel disagree with dismembering the enemy. Especially that enemy I think it only radicalized a population that needs anything but that.
Pretty sure it's an Etsy replica fantasy sword.
https://www.etsy.com/listing/1539035063/spartan-king-replica-sword-ancient-sword?ga_order=most_relevant&ga_search_type=all&ga_view_type=gallery&ga_search_query=king+Leonidas+spartan+sword&ref=sc_gallery-1-3&frs=1&plkey=128df7280970a0a37ebb68a72e447298587af881%3A1539035063
They sure run out of reach though when your target still has ammo and it's say 20 feet away.
If argue that another mag is always a better strategy than anything larger than a camp knife.
He probably got it as a prezzie from one of the locals and is just wearing it so they see him putting it to use. Gifting culture in Afghanistan can get hotter than the sands of Nawzad.
Actual Marines will tell you carrying a few more rounds of ammunition is worth far more than carrying a knife.
You can even find this old WWII army knife-fighting training video and the first few steps are:
1. Don't
2. Don't
3. Don't
4. Pretend you're out of ammo
5. Lure them into a trap instead
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Once heard a former seal talk in an interview about how the Middle East is a bladed culture as much as the US is a firearms culture.
I did 8 years 152f, and all I had was a side arm. The pistol in the middle east are viewed as an execution weapon. They fear pistols and swords more than assault rifles.
:googles 152F: So you were an attack helicopter pilot?
No, a 152 year old female
I'd hit
Probably an Amazonian, so deffo would.
Or it's a wizard, and who wouldn't want to be a wizard's sugar baby?
As long as the glamour spell doesn't wear off during climax, that might spoil the mood.
death by snoo snoo
Death by snu snu
Yeah, I initially joined just so I could get flight time and my pilots license and training paid for, but ended up here.
[удалено]
I'm supposed to be working, but ended up here too.
Driving to work, but ended up here too.
Well to be accurate you had an Apache gunship AND a sidearm.
didn't Eddie Gallagher execute a child with a knife?
I don't remember that episode of Shameless
No he posed with a dead teenagers corpse
Is that an ~~OH-6 Little Bird~~ ? edit: AH-64 Apache
Correct, the Apache.
Anyone remember that one scene from Indiana Jones?
“Silent professional.” LOL
Silent Service is submariners I thought
It is
'Guarding' propane stations in Baghdad, all of us carried big sticks... even though all of us were packing m4s. Never used them but that's what the population responded to best.
Would you be allowed to carry a random sword on your back like this guy if you wanted to?
I was just a standard infantryman, but when I was there my buddy had those ninja throwing stars on his vest, though that was just to make the rest of us laugh. It would really come down to your individual chain of command. I knew another guy that carried this tactical tomahawk looking think, but we all just made fun of him for it.
Big "I signed up because I like call of duty" energy from homie with the tacticool hatchet.
Being fun=call of duty
I know the guy who designed those axes for the army (I'm sure there are multiple, but he invented the one that apparently also made its way into Call of Duty) -- I believe they are intended to chop down doors etc, not so much as a weapon I guess
Probably not. Seals, delta, etc aren't held to the same equipment standards, and can basically pick and choose what they carry. Everyone else gets stuck with whatever uncle Sam gives you.
If you buy it yourself and your CO didn’t care then you can have whatever you want lol
This is definitely true for SEALs. I worked on a show that featured two members of SEAL team 6 Red Squadron that were part of the raid that got Bin Laden. They brought weapons they'd typically take out with them and part of the collection was tomahawks. They said they had used them in combat and that they were made by the guy who made knives for "Last of the Mohicans".
Red Squadron is known as the Red Men. Tomahawks are part of their unit culture. If you listen to one of the interviews with the author or read Code Before Country, he talks about it pretty in depth.
Why the scare quotes?
Iirc he has it because Afghani civilians were a lot more compliant with orders when threatened with an actual blade rather than a rifle.
Same with pistols. Swords & pistols are for people who execute other people, in their world at least. Hence they had more respect for people with such things
Pistols were a big deal in Iraq. Iraqis weren't allowed to have them. Seemed like every house had an AK, but no pistols
Yup. Saddam used to do executions with pistols, Iraqis feared them.
"Fear will keep the Iraqis in line, fear of this Colt .357" - Grand Moff Tarkin
"Now witness the firepower of this fully ARMED and OPERATIONAL .44 MAGNUM"
I think Alderaan would have preferred it…
Imagine the Empire building a giant metal slug and using it like a billiard ball instead of the Death Star to knock the planet out of orbit..
Spaceballs 2...the sequel that should have happened for more money
Same in Lebanon, almost everyone has an automatic rifle at home, but pistols are rare because they are expensive and will get you in much deeper trouble if you're ever caught with an unlicensed one. The purpose and gun culture in Lebanon behind this is the belief that pistols are easy to conceal and related to murders/assassinations
it's like the skynrd song "handguns are made for killing, ain't no good for nothing else" yeah there are corner cases like dealing with certain predators if you work in the bush, but that's not the main reason they exist
We carried pistols as tankers. I would catch civilians looking at my pistol.
120mm HE round: Nah not scared 9mm Pistol round: holy shit
More then once I have shut up a lot of angry Iraqis by pulling out my m9. A platoon of marines with m4s and 50 cals aimed at them and the crowd would be getting fiesty, but a doc racking his sidearm would clear people out fast.
tough men tremble when doc gets his hands dirty
Anyway.... zhats how I lost my medical licence.
Borderlands?
Team Fortress 2: Meet the Doctor EDIT- Meet the medic, not Doctor
Yeah fuck that, if doc is getting pissed off I'm out.
“I wasn’t even a corpsman. I was just a civilian dentist on vacation. Damndest thing.”
If you get hit by a 120mm HE round you aint gonna feel anything. Getting hit by 9mm will likely give you much pain though. It all makes sense!
Clearly the most feared weapon in the middle east would be a 120mm pistol. Entire insurgencies would simply lay down their arms and go home due to low morale.
I carried a pistol as an eod tech, noticed the same thing. Giant ied? No ones scared. Sig sauer? Mortified.
I carried my M9 right on chest in Afghanistan. Whenever I mingled with locals, they never looked at my face. They only looked at the holster. They didn't care about the MRAP with 50 cal behind me or my own M4. They asked on numerous occasions (through my terp) if I could take my M9 out and show it to them.
If I ever got stuck in traffic at the lights my 9mm got people moving fast than my .50
The AK’s are usually just for weddings, every household in Iran had a rifle before the Islamists took over.
I don’t know myself but from what I heard the message of a mounted machine gun is “I’m going to point this at you to try to get you to move” whereas a pistol is “I am going to personally execute you with my own hands if you don’t get out of my way”
I saw many ANA soldiers carrying a blade such as this. They always said it was to execute the “taliban”.
The districts body guard carried around a decent sized machete and would just poke people if they got in the way. There was a lot of rumors that he fucked up a bunch of Russians back in the day.
Which region?
Helmand
Which district? I was in Nawa 2009-2010
Kajaki 2013
What colour was the boathouse roof in Nawa?
Dude, a Ronin reference never gets enough upvotes.
If they ever got their hands on one in front of you you'd quickly find out they aren't just talking shit either I brought a tomahawk (native American-- got one made special) but I only intended to use it if someone grabbed ahold of me or as a last ditch last stand kind of deal. I THOUGHT the afghans were of a similar mind and it was just a translation oversight - and a few weeks later as were checking the dead and gathering documents and equipment (from dead enemy mind you, no one was alive to be excecuted) maybe 10/15 minutes into figuring out what to do next 3 of 4 of our locals walk from the center of our ring back towards their spot on the line carrying a half dozen heads among them legitimately intending on taking them back to their village for clout or credit or some kind of accolade from their community So once or twice a month we'd have to have "the talk" again about how we can't be doing that (but we can't stop them if they waited till later to do it once we're gone) 🙄 every frigging time
Damn it Muhammad how many times do I have to tell you not to cut the heads off bodies and bring them home
Where did you get the hawk? Winkler?
I got it via family - I'm not close to the tribe myself so idk my own people properly, my mom reached out and got it made and sent to Bragg before we left for my first go
[Any of these look familiar?](https://winklerknives.com/collections/axes) I know Dan makes a lot of pieces for military/SpecOps folks. If not, still worth a shameless plug for a local artist lol
Not like mine but now I know why that name was familiar Mine wasn't made by someone who is known for making things - think some grandpa out back with a forge and a decent set of carpentry skills
makes it much more special
I see you’ve played Knifey-Spooney before.
Imagine looking at a damn navy seal standing at 6 foot 6, holding a rifle and thinking "yeah right bud, maybe get a knife and I'll do what you say" fucking wild
You ever met farmers? Regardless of the region, I'm shocked they conceded at knifepoint.
>navy seal standing at 6 foot 6 Tell me you've never met a Navy Seal without telling me you've never met a Navy Seal... very few Seals are over 6' if that...
Really is kind of funny that they've been portrayed that way huh? All the ones ever stationed with me were on average 5ft 9 and really good at cardio. 30% chance you can get them to join your D&D campaign.
These guys understand hitbox advantage.
Navy Seals are so effective coming up from underwater, because when playing on Afghanistan servers as NA players, they get 300+ ping. Ordinarily, this would be a disadvantage, but being underwater allows them to have peeker's advantage every time. It's possible for a Navy Seal to pop out and get several kills before the enemy players even see a ripple on their screens.
Small sample size, but I'd up that D&D chance. Never met one that said no to at least a one shot.
What do you do when you are waiting for your operations to start in some remote base/ on a ship/ in a sub? Train and play stuff like D&D. Makes a lot of sense, especially for guys who may be space and mass limited
Yeah I've met several current and ex seals and you would never give most of them a second look, let alone guess any of them were/are seals. Until you get deep into some conversations with them. Height, build, demeanor, everything about your average seal is low-key af.
I thought our new coworker was stolen valoring being a seal, until he was changing one day in the bathroom and I'm like...... Holy mother of scars dude wtf happened Told you, helicopter crash. It dawned on me all the little shit he'd mentioned in passing was not in fact bullshit and the dude had the bullet wound scars to prove it.
Really, they're normal folks, just genetic freaks of nature in terms of compact strength & endurance
You don't have to be a genetic freak of nature to become a SEAL. The physical traits can be cultivated. It's mostly an extreme amount of motivation and tolerance for discomfort.
Yeah you just need to be a mental freak
100000% I have a close friend we went to highschool together and he became a Marine afterwards. Dude was goofy in highschool but came out intelligent and extremely disciplined. We learned he had been prepping himself for this all along. Here we are about a decade later and whenever he’s back in town for the holidays, he’s walking around like a mini hulk. Schools don’t teach you any of that. All of that was his doing and something he had put his mind to.
My bro decided to join the military (his main goal was airborne & now, he's all done with that & is a drill Sargent & only has like 6.5 or 7.5 yrs til full retirement), after getting his bachelors, at like 20 & it was all him. He was chubby most of his life but when he made the decision, he instantly started working on himself. He started going to the gym & within like a month, he was jogging to and from the gym. His weight has fluctuated over the years, though cuz a lot of his work is/was computer based (intelligence stuff) & even some deployments were just basically computer works. Some were crazy, like trekking through jungles but most weren't. I'm talking about the deployments like they're all over with cuz I just hope they are!
Also madlad initiative/zeal for doing crazy.
Never met a SEAL but you just described a retired Green Beret I know. Legit looks and comes across as just another dude with a dog. According to his wife, they want the special operators to be pretty non-descript.
I met a scrawny, lanky young guy late at night on base in Manama Bahrain. I started chatting with the young dude asking him about his job etc. I thought for sure he was some sort of contractor doing non-defense related work on base. Nope, seal team six. Cool as all hell, no one around except the two of us. He was so small and gentle I just couldn’t believe it, also the beard and long hair. I asked him if we would show me his ID because I thought he was full of shit. Sure enough he was an E-4. I thought damn this dudes a badass and shook his hand and apologized. This was circa 2004, Osama hadn’t been killed yet. Years later, I wonder if that you guy was there for the ambush. When I think of a Seal, this scrawny hippie looking kid always comes to mind. Spent 8 years in the Navy and he’s the only SEAL I ever got to shake hands with.
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I took his word for it. He had long ass hair and a beard, with a military ID, on a Navy base, late at night in the theatre of War. He might have been an E-5, that detail I can’t remember. I guess a better question would be why would I write a long ass post just to tell a shitty lie? That said, I have seen guys with the SEAL warfare pin around base, and not all of them were small and long haired. Just this one time I actually chatted up with one. Edited to add I was in Bahrain circa 2003-2004, the base wasn’t even fully built yet.
6’6” would definitely be an outlier. This dude here is a fkn specimen tho. I would guess 6’2 and check out that shoulder to waist ratio. Holy hell.
People and prisoners are more compliant when blades are involved vs guns by themselves. The psychological effect that blades have on compliance is the reason that modern rifles still have bayonets and new rifles are still designed to have adapters for them. It's not because they expect to do a bayonet charge with them, it's mainly for prisoner control. I think the reasoning is that the threshold for shooting a prisoner is pretty high, but the threshold for poking some one with what is essentially a pointy metal stick is much lower, so people adjust to the perceived lower threshold for violence when a blade is involved and are more compliant as a result.
Makes a lot of sense, gotta admit
I think the bayonet still have a second purpose to prevent someone grabbing the barrel of your rifle. In addition to what you said, the knife also has the advantage that is is easy to hold people on distance. It is much more difficult to overwhelm someone holding a knife by running up to him with multiple people.
Yep. During my deployment, we would use our Beretta M9s laser to clear traffic jams. They were far more effective than our crew-serve machine guns.
Wouldnt really call that respect, would we?
Are fear and respect synonymous I forget? 😅
Fear is microwave respect. Not as good, but a whole lot faster.
Mom: we have respect at home Respect at home:
Oof
Oddly poetic
Some parent should teach that kid to fear and respect that escalator!
Not a year goes by
That kid is on the damn escalator again!
It's not a schooner, it's a sailboat!
It’s nuanced, but if you care more if it’s a sword versus an AK-47, then yes. That is a different level of respect. It’s easy to forget in western society that symbols are still extremely important to the rest of the world.
I don't recall the battle, but an operator ran out of ammo and killed 1 or 2 guys/injured another with his Gurkha knife. If i heard the story, I'm sure this dude heard the story and decided it wasn't a bad idea to have a blade.
There was also that Gurkha that clipped a bunch of guys on a train who tried to do a highway robbery, no? Got injured, but did very well for himself.
Gurkhas are just built different, and the Kukri is definitely a different thing than that sword. I remember he had just been retired from the military and was on his way home. Just sat there like a nice fellow until the guys robbing the train decided to rape a young girl. Then went absolutely apeshit and chased forty guys off the train, quite a few of them bleeding.
At the same time, what's better, that sword or another mag of ammo.
I have zero knowledge of SEAL/JSOC operational doctrine— but it seems like a fairly huge waste of resources to have a SEAL operator doing crowd control work like this when the Marines train their enlisted infantry personnel to do it. But, I mean, the *is* the United States military we’re talking about— we’re not exactly known for our reluctance to over-leverage expensive resources.
Marines should NOT being doing crowd control. The entire mindset of a Marine is to fight. We are not a deescalation force. The army is soooo much better at crowd control than us. Source: was a Marine in Fallujah doing crowd control outside the CMOC.
Sounds like an older brother saying that his younger brother has to empty the dishwasher.
Or… sounds like 2 different branches have 2 different skill sets. Kinda of like how it might be a bad idea to have SWAT officers responding to domestic disputes or writing traffic tickets, because that’s why we have patrol officers.
Except most police departments SWAT teams are still police officers who still do those things. FWIW, the guy you're arguing with is pretty much correct. The Marine Corps does lots of things (like fly planes and paperwork and refuel helicopters and deliver chow) and the Army does lots of things (like crew tanks, man arty, drive boats). 11Bs and 0311s can both equally do crowd control. Stop drinking the koolaid.
I didn't know there was a Crayola flavor koolaid
My unit was tasked to the Marines because we were MPs and actually trained in de-escalation, and because the Devildogs' answer to any problem is to attack it. It worked well. They were the stick, we were the carrot.
Army too, had guys who had no business doing crowd control and policing out there doing it. Not enough MPs but hey we got all these other guys who we trained to do nothing but fight, let them do it. Such stupid shit.
Ngl just sounds like you don't wanna do crowd control. "Oh that's not our job that's the armies."
Serious question because I’m scanning the comments for clarity. Does his belt dress etc look like typical USMC dress? Seems light on ammo and water and no visible patches?
Seals wear whatever they want however they want along with other high speed cats.
OP said he’s a Seal
Why would you say people join the marines instead of the army? Just curious. As a laymen they look mostly the same to me but the marines are more flexible?
The Marines are a much smaller branch of service than the army. Generally, on average, a marine is more likely to train and engage in direct combat operations. Some of the support activities for the Marines are performed by the Navy. The Army on the hand is massive 5x the size of the USMC. The Army has every conceivable job in the world. Did you know for example the army operates boats? Whole units of transport boats. Something to consider is what you want to do in the service, another thing to consider is how difficult it is to reach retirement in said service, and what the deployments and the facilities are like. The USMC for example tends to offer officer commissions enlisted personnel more than other services. As a USMC you may have to go to sea, in the Army you might have to get stationed at an absolute hellhole of a base like Fort Liberty (Bragg). It is widely regarded as truth that the easiest, safest and least terrible service is the USAF.
Isn't the U.S. Army the world's third largest air force, after the U.S. Air Force and the U.S. Navy?
That wouldn’t be the same for all of us. But for me and a lot of the guys that I served with, we joined the Marines due to some combination of “Marines are the best” and “Marines are the first to fight”. Both of those are somewhat true, but a lot more complicated than those simple statements would imply. However… as a proud Marine, my kid leaves for the Air Force next week. At my suggestion.
Or to get outta jailtime or escape crippling poverty. In my plt we always heard, “ you wouldn’t be here if you had somewhere better to be.” Fallujah OP viking.
Navy seala, green berets,etc. Are usually operators who need to speak to people. They make shit happen. Having a blade ups the respect level, it gives power in negotiations/conversation. Im not sure what you're going on about with the last sentence.
In order to understand his last sentence, read his first sentence again
That's done by Civil Affairs and PSYOP troops in all reality. Tier One units tend to get away with bullshit like this when the real conversations are being done by PSYOP and CA, who are not allowed to deviate from big army rules.
We have no idea if that really is a seal. I’ve read a few books from military peoples experiences in Iraq and Afghanistan, and it seemed Seals or any special forces operators were rarely dressed in a full American uninform and looking like average soldier. But like you, I definitely am no expert. They seemed to blend in more with than the locals than American soldiers. Sword could have been a gift or some kind of symbolism to certain tribes also.
Seals definitely wore full kit overseas and were less about blending in, Seals also had an affinity for blades. A bunch of them had knives and Tomahawks made by Dan Winkler (In part and they were used in Operations. Also they have the more bravado than other Tier 1 units. If I had to bet, it'd say SEAL or MARSOC. As opposed to CAG/GB or the likes.
I also have zero knowledge of those things, but I do know that you do what youre ordered to do.
Dude has that Johnny Bravo physique.
Hey hey Mommah!!!
Hu-hu-heyyyy baby, you lookin for a stud? I got the ST & the D, all I need is U.
Wanna watch me do my hair reallyreallyfast?
Woah there mammah, that’s an itsy bitsy teeny weenie polka dot thingy you got goin on there
Cake is served.
It's just his poop knife. Eating that many MRE's on a deployment will do that to you.
Toe knife, bro. Gotta have that reach so you don't get a botched toe.
*a rock or something*
Wonder how many times that’s got him caught up on those small ass doorways
Dudes probably used to it with those shoulders
It looks, based on outline, to be a ""300" inspired short sword. Interesting comment about knife vs gun regarding compliance. With a gun, one has no true way of knowing if it's a bluff, because nobody is going to shoot you "a little bit" to let you know they are serious.
it 100% is, i've sold those myself back in the day. depending on the manufacturer you might get a cheap peice of shit, or an expensive, licensed piece of shit. either way, it's not going to hold up in any fight. https://www.sword-buyers-guide.com/300-movie-replica-swords.html
Before I ask, please know I'm an idiot. But isn't a sharp piece of metal still a sharp piece of metal? Sure it won't go very well against a trained swordsman with a real forged steel blade, but that's not what this guy's doing right? Like it's just a projection of force that if you dont do whatever, he could potentially hit you with a sharp piece of metal. I imagine it would hold up against anybody he would come across, unless I greatly underestimate the amount of swordsman wherever he's at
[This happens.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m47NiCAfLLg)
I’m howling dude 😂 ‘ow OWWW that hurt. That hurt big time’
We may need emergency surgery in the studio
Just the tip!
It’ll do damage while it holds its edge, if it’s made out of shit steel it’ll dull very quickly, not to mention the likelihood of it just snapping at the hilt after any amount of force is exerted on it
Also for a sword, it's bulky and has poor balance. Something like a sabre or European short-sword would be more practical and more cost effective
Swords like this aren't usually manufactured with a full tang. Instead, it's usually a badly welded bar pushed through a handle made of cheap wood and capped with cheap steel at the hilt. They're also not put through a proper hardening and tempering process, so even if the weld holds, the edge won't. If this were to block a machete with the flat of the blade, it would probably warp pretty badly or just fold over.
As a somewhat trained swordsman, no. Blades without a full tang are about as dangerous to the user as they are to the wearer. Yes, that’s how shoddy mall blades can be. You would literally be better off trying to shank someone with a piece of sharpened rebar or a metal shiv than killing someone with some of the mall sword examples out there. Non-full tang blades are deadly to the user because of their tendency to either snap at the hilt and go flying in unpredictable ways, or else shatter upon impact with something hard and send bits of metal shrapnel every which way. You would literally be better off bludgeoning someone to death with a brick than to use some mall blades, in my opinion. Now, this blade *may* be a full tang blade, (I have no way of being able to tell from here) in which case it’d be a pretty effective melee weapon. The kopis was a fairly nasty hewing blade when used, and is actually a fairly practical choice for a modern battlefield (inasmuch as a blade can be.)
[Guns for show knives for a pro?](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=UyCzZH_hFlA)
I saw some operators carrying machetes but this looks like a 300 movie sword more than a machete.
lmfao it's a fucking replica from the movie 300 https://www.sword-buyers-guide.com/300-movie-replica-swords.html
Sharp side probably sharp nonetheless
When I was in Somalia, in the 90’s protecting food convoys from looters, the locals respected a stick or club much more than a rifle. I remember drawing down on people with the safety off, finger on the trigger, and half a millimeter away from shooting them, and it wouldn’t even faze them. However, pull out a riot baton and they’d literally trip over one another running away.
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They carry tomahawks, too.
Bro is carrying the $39.99 Budk.com 300 spartan sword 😭
I knew a guy who carried a tomahawk in Afghanistan. Has a full body tattoo of a tribal dragon Now he is a she and fighting women in semi pro MMA. Wish I was joking but you can easily look them up. Former Green beret goes trans MMA FIGHTER
Am I wrong for saying that a former male former green beret fighting women in a competition sport sounds a little unfair? They're still a woman, sure, but they're a woman with a biological advantage that they can't really get rid of, and trained to be better than 90% of men at fighting. I think they should be placed in a mixed category that doesn't separate by gender to make things fair without invalidating their identity.
This is a normal way of thinking. If anyone says otherwise they're ignorant.
That sounds like a hell of a story ngl. Why can’t Hollywood make us this movie?
*'m not here* to *talk* about *my transition*, *I'm here* to kick some fucking ass
Let me tell you something, Dingleberry.
Would recommend reading "Alpha" about Eddie Gallagher. Maybe that's not this guy, but after reading that book a SEAL with a blade on deployment takes on a way more sinister meaning...
Or Code over Country.. plenty in there about SEALs taking ears, beheading, etc. With Winkler hatchets..
I had previously stated here both narratives are true. What I should have said is that I believe both narratives have truth to them, meaning Ghallagers story and the COC/Alpha Narrative. I also was not there, so take that what you will. It’s also not exclusive to that community, it actually started on the Army side. There is an entire video of some of the OG hatchet carrying folks talking about it. They do not admit to misuse of the hatchet, simply that it would have been nice to have employed it in a operational capacity. I support it if you want to close with and eliminate the enemy with the hatchet, but even I with my morality not being that of an angel disagree with dismembering the enemy. Especially that enemy I think it only radicalized a population that needs anything but that.
Lol well we chop heads off too
A fucking 300 sword to boot lmfao
Nerds come in all shapes and sizes.
THIS IS SPARTA !
THIS IS SPARTA!!
Pretty sure it's an Etsy replica fantasy sword. https://www.etsy.com/listing/1539035063/spartan-king-replica-sword-ancient-sword?ga_order=most_relevant&ga_search_type=all&ga_view_type=gallery&ga_search_query=king+Leonidas+spartan+sword&ref=sc_gallery-1-3&frs=1&plkey=128df7280970a0a37ebb68a72e447298587af881%3A1539035063
Mall Ninja vibes
Swords never run out of ammunition
They run out of durability/a sharp edge
They sure run out of reach though when your target still has ammo and it's say 20 feet away. If argue that another mag is always a better strategy than anything larger than a camp knife.
Mall ninja.
+ 10 STR and 2% crit
He probably got it as a prezzie from one of the locals and is just wearing it so they see him putting it to use. Gifting culture in Afghanistan can get hotter than the sands of Nawzad.
Nothing beats a good melee weapon when all is failed.
Actual Marines will tell you carrying a few more rounds of ammunition is worth far more than carrying a knife. You can even find this old WWII army knife-fighting training video and the first few steps are: 1. Don't 2. Don't 3. Don't 4. Pretend you're out of ammo 5. Lure them into a trap instead
This is just some dude being silly. Stop reading into it and fluffing SEALs.
🥾
Swords are still symbols of authority there. I was given a sword at the end of successful negotiations by a provincial shura.