The HZ6 is a new tactical model from CRKT Knives. Designed by James Williams of Vass, North Carolina, it is inspired by a classical Japanese straight sword, the hira-zukuri.
It features full tang construction with a 6.5″ powder coated blade from SK-5 carbon steel and G10 handles. The HZ6 comes with a Boltaron sheath.
Winkler Knives has updated the Defense Dagger by adding low profile scales rather than the skeletonized handle on the original version.
American Service Knife is a new multi-tool brand created by Marine Veteran and renowned knife maker Greg Medford.
This model is the Jefferson. It features Orange scales, Drop Point Blade, Chisel, and Bottle Opener. However, the knives are modular and the components as well as scales can be swapped out.
Like the name says, these are American made. Their steels are powdered stainless alloys from Niagara Specialty Metal in upstate New York, the Titanium they use is mined in Ohio and their plastic injection molded scales are made in Scottsdale, Arizona from American made plastic material suppliers.
Dynamis Alliance honcho and former SEAL Dom Raso showed me his Neptune Blade, a dedicated dive knife during my brief visit to the Blade Show in Atlanta.
He’s been working in perfecting the design over the past several years and it’s great to see this American made knife finally out and hitting the market.
The blade which features double edge serrations is made from CPMS110V with a NEPT-X proprietary coating to resist salt water.
It also integrates a line cutting notch as well as a grip lanyard making it easy to ensure you won’t lose your knife. That same lanyard also secures your knife within the sheath.
Finally, the Neptune has multiple mounting options:
• MOLLE Vertical Mount
• Horizontal MOLLE Mount
• Horizontal Belt Mount
• Dive/Duty Belt Mount
• Includes Dynamis IWB Sheath
Expect the first run to be out by the end of 2022.
crusheverything.com/product/neptune-dive-blade
Supreme Allied Commander Europe, General Eisenhower issued this message to those embarking on the greatest undertaking in modern history, the invasion of Western Europe at Normandy, France.
Thanks to all of you who were there, from all of us, for liberating Europe from under the boot of oppression and protecting not only our great nation but our Allies as well.
This young guitarist has good taste.
The Texas origin story couldn’t be told without mentioning Davy Crockett and his Tennessee Volunteers at the Alamo so I couldn’t think of something more fitting at the NRAAM expo in Houston than this one-of-a-kind dipped magazine from Mission First Tactical.
This flipped image is from artist Robert Jenkins Onderdonk’s painting called “The Fall of the Alamo” or “Crockett’s Last Stand”.
Everyone who saw it wanted one but they made it just to show what they can do.
When you look at WWII, historians, and military people will say, this is what won the war, or that is the reason. Some people say it was the M2 .50 cal machine gun or the Jeep or the M1 Grand rifle. I think there is an excellent argument for all of those things and more. But there were also some fantastic feats of engineering. There were a couple of reasons that the Germans didn’t think that the Allies would land at Normandy. Some of it had to do with the deception plan the Allies used, like having Patton be in charge of a fake Army in the north of England. The other reasons was the fact that there was not a deep-water harbor close enough to make it worthwhile. But the Allies had a secret plan to build their own harbor. The Mulberry harbors were temporary mobile harbor developed during World War II for unloading troops and supplies during the Allied invasion of Normandy.
The British developed them from lessons learned during the ill-fated Dieppe raid two years prior. The Brits discovered that quickly capturing a well-defended port was impossible. They were formed in secret and sunk all over England so they wouldn’t be seen.
After the successful landing and the establishment of beachheads on D-Day, two Mulberry harbors’, previously constructed in secret at various sites across the UK, were taken in parts across the English Channel and reassembled off Omaha Beach and Gold Beach. Within 12 days of the invasion, the harbors were up and running. The Mulberry Harbor was broken down into three different areas, the Breakwater, the Pierheads, and the Roadways.
The Breakwaters were made from a combination of sinking 70 older merchant ships, steel, and concrete caissons, and concrete type crosses used to help keep it all in place. The breakwater was about 9.5 kilometers long(about 6 miles). In from that was the Pierhead that the ships could tie off to, the last part was the roadways that lead into the shore and was used for the offloading of the personal and supplies to the beach.
Along with the components of the mulberries, the harbors were protected from swell and waves by blockships deliberately sunk adjacent to the harbor. You can still see parts of the huge concrete blocks sitting on the sand, and more can be seen further out at sea. I have significantly simplified how they were made and what went into them. I am not an engineer and a hell of a lot more when into making the then I talked about.
The Mulberry harbors were intended to be used until a French port could be captured. It was not until six months after D-Day that the port of Antwerp in Belgium was captured. The Mulberry harbor at Omaha Beach was abandoned after it was damaged in a storm on the 19th of June 1944, but the harbor at Gold Beach continued at nearly full capacity for ten months after the invasion. The British Mulberry supported the Allied armies for ten months. Two and a half million men, a half-million vehicles, and four million tons of supplies landed in Europe through the artificial harbors at Arromanches.
