Wednesday Wisdom: 11 March 2026

Medal of Honor: Joseph Timothy O'Callahan

While serving as chaplain on board the U.S.S. Franklin when that vessel was fiercely attacked by enemy Japanese aircraft during offensive operations near Kobe, Japan, on 19 March 1945. A valiant and forceful leader, calmly braving the perilous barriers of flame and twisted metal to aid his men and his ship, Lt. Comdr. O'Callahan groped his way through smoke-filled corridors to the open flight deck and into the midst of violently exploding bombs, shells, rockets, and other armament. With the ship rocked by incessant explosions, with debris and fragments raining down and fires raging in ever-increasing fury, he ministered to the wounded and dying, comforting and encouraging men of all faiths. In addition to this, O’Callahan helped organize efforts to combat the flames and smoke that were paralyzing the ship and the men aboard.

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Who now speaks with authority on pistol technique? 

This question is almost impossible to answer. No one thought much about it up until the conclusion of World War II, and since that time the subject has been complicated by divergence and objectives between the public and private sectors.

 When we opened the Pandora-box of practical pistol shooting in California back in the late 50s, we did not realize that a definite split would develop between those who shot a pistol in search of excellence and those who shot a pistol simply because they had to. The feeling, which we sometimes hear from the mouths of idiots, that "only the police and the military should have weapons," ignores the fact that the police and/or the military are not likely to achieve any generalized level of excellence (though they indeed may turn out champions of highly specialized efforts). In any exercise in sporting competition only a limited number of champions will develop. It is possible that the techniques they use are not applicable to mass audiences.

We sympathize with the law enforcement people who are faced with the need to train increasing numbers of increasingly incompetent recruits forced upon them by politico-sociological conditions. For example, the late Bruce Nelson was once criticized when demonstrating the modern technique to some cop groups in California on the grounds that he "practiced a lot." I did not realize then, and neither did he, that people who practice a lot with their weapons may be excoriated as "politically incorrect."  Jeff Cooper's Commentaries Vol. 3, No. 3

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Diamondback Firearms Introduces the SDR-A; Lightweight, Hammerless Aluminum Revolver

Diamondback Firearms announces the launch of the SDR-A, an aluminum-frame, hammerless .38 Special +P revolver engineered specifically for modern everyday carry. The SDR-A expands Diamondback’s Small Defensive Revolver lineup with a lightweight, snag-free option designed for personal protection, concealability, and reliability.

Built on a forged 7075-T6 aluminum frame and weighing just 15.6 ounces, the SDR-A is Diamondback’s lightest revolver to date. Chambered in .38 Special +P SDR-A is purpose-built for defensive carry without sacrificing performance or durability.

The hammerless design eliminates snag points during draw while maintaining a smooth, non-stacking double-action trigger pull rated between 9.0 and 11.5 pounds, optimized for safe, consistent EDC use. A fixed orange fiber-optic front sight paired with a low-profile green fiber-optic rear sight enhances rapid target acquisition in defensive scenarios.

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It's Hypocrisy; We know it, and you know it.

One of the more illuminating things about the Iranian situation is the sheer amount of Western Liberal Hypocrisy they are inadvertently putting on display. Those liberal women cosplaying as Handmaid’s Tale Ketchup Bottles? Getting all hot and bothered over the prospect of losing their rights?

Mahsa Amini was an Iranian girl who wore her hijab in a fashion that the Iranian morality police didn’t approve of … so they beat her to death.

Zahra Bani Yaghoub was a Doctor of Medicine. The mullahs told her father — and I quote: "Iran does not need such medical doctors." The Basij (a paramilitary volunteer militia) saw her sitting on a park bench in public with her fiancé. The Basij snitched her out to the morality police. She and her fiancé were arrested, and she was raped and beaten to death in custody.

An IRGC officer repeatedly raped Atefeh Sahaaleh over a three-year period. She was finally put on trial for “immorality” and sentenced to death. When it was pointed out that she was only 16 years old (in Iranian “law” too young for the death penalty), the judge said she looked like she was 22, and that was good enough. She was hung from a crane and died by slow strangulation for the crime of being raped.

Iranian women have lived — suffered — under an oppressive regime that suburban white liberal women in the United States can only fantasize about, and the Iranian women would like it to end.

Silence from Affluent White Urban Liberals.

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A Very Brief Introduction to Hostile Surveillance

Though the term surveillance can be generally applied to various types of activities and electronic measures, this article is dedicated to the HUMINT type of physical surveillance, which can be defined as: The covert observation of a target for the purpose of collecting information.

This short sentence is loaded with the three key ingredients of surveillance. The first two ingredients are covertness and physical observation – take one of these factors out, and you no longer have what we consider surveillance. If physical observation is done overtly, willingly allowing the target (or anyone else) to see it, then this would simply be physical observation rather than surveillance. Conversely, if an operative is conducting him/herself in such a covert manner that he/she cannot really observe the target, then this would simply be hiding undercover rather than conducting surveillance. The fact that physical surveillance necessarily combines observation and covertness is one of the main reasons why surveillance is such a challenging undertaking.

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Operation Greif: German Commandos Sow Chaos Dressed in US Uniforms

When developing his strategy for the Ardennes Counteroffensive, Adolf Hitler knew it was essential to capture at least one intact bridge over the Meuse River. Speed was essential to Hitler’s plan, given its ambitious aims of driving a wedge between the US and British armies, crossing the Meuse, and driving to the coast at Antwerp. If the Germans failed to seize an intact bridge over the Meuse, the resulting delay would give the Allies time to recover from their surprise and enable them to amass forces west of the river before the Germans could cross. To avoid this, Hitler entrusted Obersturmbannführer (Lieutenant Colonel) Otto Skorzeny with a special mission known as Operation Greif.

Hitler called Skorzeny to his headquarters in October 1944 to give him his orders in person. Skorzeny had led secret missions for Hitler before, including the rescue of Benito Mussolini, but this would be his largest and most complex. He was to equip and train a unit of commandos that would advance alongside the 6th Panzer Army—the vanguard of the offensive’s northern thrust. In addition to seizing at least one bridge over the Meuse, the commandos would use espionage and sabotage to sow chaos in the Allied rear.

To do this, Skorzeny would rely on deception, employing English-speaking troops in US Army uniforms and equipment. Hitler told Skorzeny that the Allies had used this same ruse in recent battles. He assured his loyal commando that posing as Americans would only violate the laws of war if the German soldiers engaged in combat while disguised.

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Have They Ever Been Punched in the Mouth?

The average officer coming into law enforcement in 2025 was born in the late 1990s. They are, undeniably, from the generation that was taught anger and aggression were to be avoided. Fighting is “never acceptable.”

They weren’t given toy guns. They couldn’t play cops and robbers on the playground. If they got a B, parents put stickers on minivans applauding the mediocre accomplishments of their special children. They were rarely yelled at and lived under the parental umbrella of safety from all pain and discomfort.

An exaggeration? You decide. But again, inarguably, they lacked independence during their formidable years which is contrary to the entire history of human beings. They were certainly not allowed to disappear on their own, going outside for 8, 10, 12 hours and coming home only when the streetlights came on. They missed out on the all-important interaction lessons necessary for independent growth and maturity.

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Primary Concerns

"While there is some concern of over penetration with a handgun cartridge, your primary concern should be that your defensive round of choice will have sufficient penetration to reach vital organs and cause incapacitating blood loss in an attacker."

On the surface the statement is clearly logical enough, provided we remove one aspect of it.

"... your primary concern should be ...."

Lest you ever find yourself in a lethal use of force encounter...or potential lethal use of force encounter, sufficient penetration of your ammo is far from the primary concern. Your primary concern is to make sure that what you are seeing is in fact accurate, ala use exemplary judgement.

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Lesson from Pistol Competition -- Stress-testing your shooting skills

At the first Bianchi Cup in 1979, Massad Ayoob shot on the same squad as his friend Jim Cirillo, the legendary NYPD Stakeout Squad gunfighter. As they walked between stages, Cirillo blurted, “Jesus Christ, I never felt this much pressure in any of my gunfights!” Mas asked him why and he replied, “There weren’t all these people watching you, and there wasn’t all this time to build up to it!”

Just as there are lessons learned in race car driving that can translate to the street in terms of both more-capable vehicles and more-capable “emergency drivers,” there are things you can learn from the competition arena. These things translate directly to real-world handgun needs, including life-saving situations like those of Cirillo — who said that the best gunfighters on his squad were the ones who shot matches.  

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Well: Sucks to be a Mullah Right Now

1983: proxies for the Iranian mullahs car-bomb the US embassy in Beirut, Lebanon. Seventeen Americans killed. 

1983: proxies for the Iranian mullahs car-bomb the US Marine barracks in Lebanon and killed 241 US servicemen.

1984: proxies for the Iranian mullahs kidnap the CIA station chief in Lebanon, and spend 15 months torturing him -- We know this, because the Iranian proxies sent us video recordings of the torture sessions.

1984: proxies for the Iranian mullahs hi-jacked aircraft, singled out American passengers, and murdered them.

1988: proxies for the Iranian mullahs kidnapped the head of the United Nations Peacekeeping Mission in Lebanon — an American — and tortured him. They sent us a video of his murder via slow strangulation when they got bored with the torture.

1996 to 1998: proxies for the Iranian mullahs car-bombed US Air Force housing in Saudi Arabia, and United States embassies in Tanzania and Kenya, killing Americans.

2003 to 2011: the mullahs set up a factory making Explosively-Formed Penetrators of a Russian design, and trained militiamen in their use for the specific purpose of attacking US service members in Iraq. They succeeded in killing or injuring several hundred US troops with these EFPs.

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