I first started working in a gun store in the early '90s. Clinton was in his first term, Ruby Ridge and Waco were fresh memories, the Brady Bill and the Assault Weapons Ban passed one after the other, and apocalypse was in the air.
One of the favorite rumors was that tens of thousands (or hundreds of thousands, whichever) of foreign troops were either in the country or right across the border, just waiting for Clinton to order them in to use the railroad cars with shackles and guillotines that lined every secret disused siding in Stump Jump, ID and Two Mules, KS.
At the time, a customer was bringing me his copies of The New American every month, and they had an article debunking some of the more fanciful rumors. Friends, when the Birchers say "Whoa, dude, you're sounding a little paranoid," it's time to pull back and reassess, know what I mean?
In that light: zomg! PLA to take over Hawaii!!eleventy!
Some people's kids, I swear.
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Uhhh.... Why not, like, actually do something humanitarian and help the people of the Philippines instead of pretending??? And by the way, I heard they've offered a measly $100,000 toward the relief effort...
ReplyDeleteI wonder just how many countries have sent in the marines? I am sure we will be helping them as this country has a better heart than that.
ReplyDeleteAll that white guilt has to be expunged somehow.
You were doing so good right up until that big bite of shoe leather at the end...
ReplyDeleteYou know, it wouldn't have been the first time the PLA managed to get "boots on the ground" in Hawaii. Last time, they managed to penetrate a super-secret facility dedicated to monitoring the People's Republic of China.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.strategypage.com/militaryforums/69-29958.aspx#startofcomments
All helicopters are black! Under the paint. Where you can't see.
ReplyDeleteI am conflicted about helping the Philippines. They wanted us GONE so very badly when we had military bases there my first thought is very uncharitable. "Oh, _NOW_ you want aircraft carriers and the Marines here?"
Philippine government thought they could run Subic Bay naval facility and Clark Field and charge the US if the wanted to use them. US respectfully declined.
ReplyDeleteFilipino people by a vast majority still have a great regard for the US and didn't want them gone. That's who we would be helping.
Gerry
I say as long as we can keep Wake and Midway the PLA can have Hawaii!
ReplyDeleteMaybe they would bring some more capitalist spirit to the Hawaiian Islands if they invaded. I doubt the gun laws could be any worse.
China was also invited to RIMPAC2014.
ReplyDeleteI recall Soldier of Fiction tracked down some European Troops Training In The Arizona Desert and it turned out to be Lufthansa flight crew doing desert survival training.
ReplyDeleteAlso, my Canadian friends are fond of pointing out that the Bundeswehr has (had, I suppose) more troops in Canada than in Deutscheland, because they can practice actual, you know, maneuver warfare on the prairies, unlike at home.
Did anyone ever decipher the alleged secret code on the back of street signs, that had directions to the FEMA camps?
You never hear the conspiracy theory that has your name on it.
ReplyDeleteDrang -- Soldier of Fiction also debunked the "MASSIVE UN ARMY COLUMN!!! ZOMG!!!" and "BLACK HELICOPTERS PHOTOS!!! ZOMG!!!" conspiracy stories.
ReplyDeleteIn teh first case, the conspiracy story was running a photo of a train running a bunch of M113 and other miitary vehicles painted white and labelled UN through a prairie region (reputed to be in the US Midwest). SOF pointed out that the mix of vehicles appeared about right for a Canadian brigade group, that the Canadian praire looks pretty much like the US Midwest, and also that Canada regularly transships their stuff through the US to load aboard ships in US ports for their UN peacekeeping assignments -- which have represented pretty much most of their overseas commitments since Korea (the Canadian Army has, IIRC, been on CONTINUOUS deployment for UN missions since 1950. . . )
The second debunked pointed out that the conspiracy book showing ACTUAL PHOTOS OF BLACK HELOS!!! ZOMG!!! was filled with B&W photos of OH-58, UH-1, CH-47, and UH-60 entirely. (Gee, the dark OD green pretty much EVERY US Army helo is painted looks black in B&W photos. . . )
Reminds me of some stupid RussianTV/Pravda crap one of my more ... excitable friends was sharing on Facebook.
ReplyDeleteIt was captioned as "foreign special forces in the US!!!" or somesuch.
A closer inspection revealed it was some Northeast SWAT team that had gotten an up-armored F250 conversion.
It even said "Police" on the side of the damned thing, but who bothers to look at pictures...?
(The real argument against all of that crap, of course, is that no matter how wicked the Government might be, Governments always love control and power.
This is doubly true of the wicked ones.
You don't maintain those by inviting in "UN troops" to run the place.
The only examples of "foreign troops invited in" by a State that I'm aware of are Communist examples where everyone was taking orders from COMINTERN - and also had excellent reason to trust that the Cubans being invited in couldn't really stay and run the place.
No parallel exists today, even in theory.)
Last gun show I went to, probably about September or so, I was browsing the tables of the "magazine" guy to see if he had any 10 round short M&P 15-22 mags. He was busy agreeing with another gentleman regarding the DHS being the "largest purchaser of poison gas in the world".
ReplyDeleteI'm still looking for some short 10 round M*P 15-22 mags.
Rob
The most recent one to make me facepalm is the "vaccines cause autism" one.
ReplyDeleteI had to debunk that one on Facebook last night. Posted to the page of a friend who should know better.
I'm still looking for the FEMA camps in my back yard. Haven't found them yet. MIght be I am in the middle of the FEMA camp and just haven't realized it. We do get a lot of black helicopters, drones and have an areostat overhead, so I guess it is possible...
ReplyDeleteMy parents got their John Birch Society newsletter every month back when I was a wee bairn in the 1960s. I'd read it surreptitiously whenever possible, because they did not want young me to read about such serious stuff.
ReplyDeleteI remember three things I read in it. I learned that fluoridation was an evil, insidious plot against individual rights (and against tooth decay), that sex education looked like something that I'd really enjoy once I got out of parochial elementary school (correct), and that communists were very, very bad people who did many very very bad things (correct).
Two out of three is a better record than many other organizations pushing their viewpoints that I have seen since.
It's because they don't have good shave-ice on the Chi-Continent, or Kings Hawaiian Bread. Or good poke.
ReplyDeleteSo we're going to give the Chicom's a front row seat to how we react/respond to a shutdown of the electrical grid?
ReplyDeleteI fail to see a problem.
[adjusts tinfoil beanie a little tighter. Shiny side out.]
I doubt the seat will be "front row"; they won't learn anything their agents haven't already told them. ;) :(
ReplyDelete