From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
J E F F C O O P E R ' S C O M M E N T A R I E S
Vol. 9, No. 2 Page February, 2001
Previously Gunsite Gossip
INAUGURATION!
By a startling piece of miscalculation, the SHOT Show and the Safari Club
Show were held this year on the same
weekend. It would seem that a great many people would be interested in both
activities. We went to SHOT because it is
our business to do so, but this forced us to miss seeing various good friends
who were at Safari. We did discover, how-
ever, that the mutual interest here is not as strong as we might have
supposed. The SHOT Show is a trade show and it is
put on primarily by and for tradesmen. The Safari Club Show is for trophy
hunters who often have little or no interest in
firearms. For my part I go to the SHOT Show to look at guns, and the
gun-looking was not particularly good this year.
Those of us who shoot a good deal are well aware that the most important
single attribute of either rifle or pistol is trigger-
action. A good trigger release is what makes either rifle or pistol easy to
hit with, and hitting is the purpose of the exer-
cise. I examined four new handguns this year, and each had a worse
trigger-action than the one before. Perhaps the
idea is that since nobody can hit anything with a pistol anyway, what
difference does "hitability" make? With rifles it is not
much better. Steyr Mannlicher will not put a "Jeff Cooper trigger" on a
Scout unless it is personally ordered. So that
leaves us with the Blaser 93, whose marvelous and radical trigger-action is
its strongest point, but a point which both ad-
vertisers and salesmen seem to miss.
All together the floor at SHOT was covered with thousands of salesmen,
but hardly a shooter from one end of the hall
to the other.
????
Some unpleasant commentator in the travel business is now pushing
Botswana as the in place to go. Certainly the
Okavango Delta is one of the wonders of the world, but what it does not need
is a flock of non-hunting photographers in
Hawaiian shirts. There are plenty of wonderful places to go in Africa to
watch the game animals without shooting. Non-
hunters should go there and stay out of the game country. Besides which it
is a pretty good general rule that what is in is
out, and what is out is in. Travelers take note.
????
We hear from a friend of John Gannaway's who just returned from the roof
of the world that while the Marco Polo
sheep is indeed the world's grandest trophy, his pursuit is not a good idea
at this time. The operators, naturally, want your
money, and they want you to get in and get out as quickly as possible. This
is not a good idea when your base camp is
located at 13,000 feet. As is common knowledge, high altitude takes a little
time to which to adjust, and a two-week hunt
simply does not offer enough time. This hunt was in Tadjikistan where the
Tadjiks cannot speak Russian and the Rus-
sians cannot speak Tadjik. The object of the exercise, from the local
standpoint, is money—your money. You must oper-
ate with a sheaf of one hundred dollar bills in each shirt pocket. The
countryside is grand, but not beautiful, mainly high,
gentle rock slopes with no visible vegetation in any direction. Our friend
anticipated a great deal of long-range shooting,
but, as one might suppose, when he got his shot he took it at 200 paces.
Well, he got his ram, and it will look very grand
on his wall, but he has no desire to try that episode again.
????
I have just now discovered the purpose of that full-length stock on the
1903 Mannlicher—often referred to as the
"Mannlicher" stock. It is to facilitate use of the carbine as a walking
stick. The emperor and his sons were great hunters
of the high country, and they liked to hold the rifle by the barrel and use
the butt as a support. Certainly that full-length
stock does nothing for the accuracy factor of the weapon. If anything, it
decreases it. But it does make a nice handle for
a walking stick. Funny nobody ever mentioned that before.
????
We just now learn about the "Eye of Sakai." As you know, the great
Japanese flyer, Saburo Sakai, was hit in the face
by 30-caliber fire from an SBD. His right eye was given up for lost, and
though he was permitted to fly again toward the
end of the war, he was reconciled to being blind in one eye for more than 50
years. As it happened it was discovered
quite recently that he had been living with a metal fragment in his eyeball
all this time. They went in and took the piece
out and completely restored the sight of his wounded eye—just before he died
of natural causes. I find this astonishing.
He apparently suffered no continuing pain, nor any infection. He just could
not see out of that eye for a whole lifetime.
????
Everybody's productivity seems to have been severely retarded by EE2, but
that is behind us now, and let us hope we
will not be bothered with it again, ever. That election was such a squeaker
that we can by no means be smug, but there is
hope that those of us on our side will now realize how forcibly we must
pursue the truth at all levels during the next four
years and win the next one by a landslide.
????
On this last excursion to New Orleans, we were privileged to chat again
with Joe Foss, who is one of the Mighty Warri-
ors. It is an interesting experience to talk with a Mighty Warrior, and I
have been able to do so before. I have talked with
Joe Foss a good many times since we have both been involved with the National
Rifle Association. I spent half a day with
Rudel, who just may be the Mightiest Warrior of all. I spent a week in a
hospital bed adjoining that of Lou Walt, and I have
shared drinks at the bar with Herman Hanneken. Politicians are not
impressive as a group, nor are entertainers, nor
CEOs, but Mighty Warriors are something else again. They are the hot sparks
from the grinding wheel of history, and
their immediate presence is inspiring. I never met Lancelot, nor El Cid, nor
Richard of the Lion Heart, but I did once
communicate in spirit with David the King in his Basilica in Jerusalem. The
rabbi wrote my name on a paper and wrapped
it around a candle which he then placed center on the tomb.
Such goings on!
????
Our Danish friend, Jean Wenckens-Madsen, opines that our electoral system
here in this country is "outdated." Per-
haps so, but we would not have it any other way. Chastity, and courage, and
truthfulness, and dignity are also outdated.
Being "up to date," on the other hand, may be nothing to boast about. The
men who drafted our constitution over two
hundred years ago were much better educated and more politically
sophisticated than any politicians we see hanging
about today. We thank God that they left us the benefit of their wisdom!
????
We picked up a good sea story at SHOT. One of our old time students in
San Salvador just last year was beset by no
less than eight punks with SMG's bent upon assassination. Edwardo killed
four and claims he only let the other four get
away out of kindness. "They were so young," he said. Well, kids can kill
you pretty well, too, though they usually do not
do it expertly.
????
Amongst the new offerings in major caliber service pistols we notice a
fascination with grip safeties. The grip safety
was a poor idea when Browning first dreamed it up, and as you know he dropped
it in 1935. It is not only useless, but
somewhat dangerous, but it does satisfy a sort of nervous craving for
mechanical safeties which seems to be the mood of
the times. Consider the "safety" on the trigger, as in the Glock and the
Vektor . This is called a safety, but if you press the
trigger the gun fires. This suggests stamping the combination on the safe
door. It is obvious to anyone who thinks about
it that in handling a firearm, safety rides between the ears, rather than
between the hands. You cannot make a gun safe.
You can, however, make a shooter safe, but in the Age of Technological
Irresponsibility, we seek to make up for human
shortcomings by means of gadgetry, which, of course, is fallible.
The gun industry, like other industries, is distressingly enslaved to
faddism. The lemming principle prevails.
????
Official Gunsite historian Barrett Tillman comments upon a Medal of Honor
citation from Germany in World War II in
which the hero fired 171 rounds of a 30-caliber carbine ammunition to achieve
eight (8) disabling hits. This lad's activities
were truly heroic, but one must assume that German tactical efficiency in
this action was simply abysmal. He was under
short-range direct fire from smallarms and machineguns throughout the episode
and he sustained only one bullet wound.
I saw something vaguely like that up in the Aleutians in which our man
just walked into the Japanese position, shooting
as he came and being shot at and missed. It may be that when you get up and
charge like that, the people on the other
side get all flustered and forget about their trigger control.
????
We hope you all had a good New Year's eve. I have long held that the
only two proper places in which to enjoy a New
Year's eve celebration are a grand ball (with live orchestra) and a snug
mountain cabin under three feet of snow. We
were not able to arrange either of these this year, but let us know if you
did.
????
Danie van Graan reports an episode of following up a wounded lion in dim
light. His client had shot the lion with one of
these ultra-high-tech, big-bottle 30s without immediate affect. Danie went
in on hands and knees with his trusty "Co-pilot"
in hand, the ideal tool for the task. No further action, however, since the
lion was dead when they found him.
Velocity hysteria—the child of Roy Weatherby—is still with us despite
all evidence to the contrary. If you need more
killing power, you do not need more feet per second, you need more bullet
weight and more impact area. I thought eve-
rybody knew that, but a great many people are not paying attention.
????
On the way home from New Orleans, daughter Lindy stopped in at Indianhead
Ranch in Texas and slew a bison. She
used the Dragoon, from prone with bipod, at a range of 250 yards—much longer
than expected. The 270-grain Swift bul-
lets slid clear through, with no evidence of expansion, and the bull ran some
little distance before succumbing.
Family member Bethany Robinson came along and did herself another bull
with Clint Smith's 45-70 Sharps. This fad
for bison shooting is automatically limited by the expense involved,
otherwise we might be charged with reducing the
herds again. The meat is of the best, but at eight dollars a bite one is
unlikely to overdo it.
????
We understand that school children are frequently punished today by being
"suspended." I never ran into anything like
that as a child, but it certainly seems to me that a day off from school
would have been a reward, rather than a punish-
ment. As I recall it, school was simply something that got in my way and
interfered with a lot of more important things I felt
I had to do. But no such luck. I went to school because I had to, not
because I wanted to, and most of what I learned I
learned at home. Of course, that was back in the 20th century.
????
We are informed by family member Keith Neal that M1 rifles, in reasonably
good condition, are now available from
DCM for $500. If you are interested, you may telephone 888-267-0796.
????
We picked up a news headline to the effect that "Bear Attacks Continue To
Mystify Biologists." Not being a biologist, I
do not feel mystified about bears, which are large, strong, dangerous
creatures. Generally they are inoffensive, but cer-
tainly not always. Apparently biologists do not understand that. We
remember a while back that a biologist in the North-
west Territories took the trouble of sending a bear's head all the way down
to Winnipeg for examination because this bear
had chewed up an Indian. It had not occurred to this biologist that bears
frequently chew up Indians. Remember Gunsite
Bear Rule no. 2, which reads, "Bears are not cuddly."
????
Did you catch that exchange recently in which some dim-witted critic
attacked a retired general who had occasion to
run a summer camp, expressing astonishment that the young people were
introduced to marksmanship training. She
asked him if he did not think that teaching young people to shoot was
somewhat "irresponsible." He parried by saying that
he did not think so, but he did not counterattack with the view that not
teaching young people firearms technique is what is
irresponsible.
????
I guess it was pretty obvious that the appropriate assignment for Al Gore
is Ambassador to Chad. Several people
have hit the press with that before we did.
????
A correspondent writes in to ask why I do not make a point of
strip-loading a bolt-action rifle. As I see it, the stripper
clip was a military device enabling the shooter to recharge a conventional
box magazine with one stroke of the hand. This
was usually coupled with a bolt stop which prevented closing the bolt on an
empty chamber. Thus in a hot emergency,
the soldier fired until he could not close the bolt, which told him that it
was time for him to strip in another five rounds. This
was doubtless a good idea in a Rorke's Drift situation in which a rifleman
might be called upon to repel boarders armed
with edged weapons. It is something of a nuisance under more normal
situations in which it is desirable to top off a
magazine which has one or more rounds left in it. The detachable box
magazine is a more useful device under such cir-
cumstances.
????
I continue to object to the expansion of the color code to place "Black"
beyond "Red." In Red you have made the deci-
sion to take the irrevocable step. You have no place further to go than that
and there is no need to clutter up the scene.
????
The following from family member David Kahn from Morrison, Colorado.
"Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups."
????
Family member and master instructor Tom Russell points out to us that we
have been teaching the wrong things here
in the rifle program. It turns out that Kenney Jarrett, of Jarrett Rifles
Incorporated, claims that his rifles are so good that
they breed such confidence that the shooter does not have to know how to
shoot—the rifle takes care of that for him. To
quote: "They don't hesitate pulling the trigger because they know they're
going to hit what they shoot at." Well, doggone!
Forget about sights, forget about trigger control, forget about solid
position, just buy a Jarrett rifle and you will hit whatever
you shoot at, under any conditions. Contrary to what I have always felt and
taught, it is the rifle, not the shooter that hits
the target. (Now sure-as-shootin', somebody is going to believe that I said
that seriously.)
????
"The only people I know who are trusted by their government are the Swiss."
— Derek Heale
????
I have never been much interested in air guns, but I have run across an
air pistol from Germany recently that really
caught my fancy. On this piece the primary tube is the gas chamber, and
around it, like a snake, is wrapped the barrel,
starting top dead center aft and winding up top dead center forward,
describing a 360 degree circle. Now why is this? It
appears that if you start the projectile at the breech and rotate it one full
turn by the time it reaches the muzzle you can
employ a smooth-bore and spin the projectile without rifling. This is a
truly exotic idea, and the pistol itself is a truly bi-
zarre artifact. I am not sure what is gained by this system, since I cannot
read the German that well, but I must certainly
grant these people first prize for ingenuity .
????
Since we now have computers to do our thinking for us, here are few
questions for your machine:
Was American Negro chattel slavery an institution extensible into
the American West?
What should be the qualificatio
--
And for no apparent reason the email ends at his point. I do
agree with him on the issue of pistols. There have been some
truly grim designs introduced in the past few years. They
look cute, but they aren't very good. S&W has introduced a
.357 Magnum revolver made from an aluminium/scandium alloy
with a steel barrel liner. It will probably cost at least
$700 as scandium is so rare. It weighs 10.4 oz. unloaded. Can
you imagine the recoil? Top marks for innovation, low
marks for practicality. Still, at least I get to write lots
of snotty reviews.<G>
Steve.
Cybershooters website: http://www.cybershooters.org
List admin: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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