Weekend WTF

I was browsing the Weekend thread at Militaryphotos.net and saw many cool and unusual things.

First is the unusual: it seems that some in the Lebanese Army Special Forces are going well out of the way to earn that "Special" title -- one guy demonstrates why jumping through burning hoops is a bad idea, and who knows what the hell to think from that last picture. Why the Lebanese government doesn't provide mannequins to bayonet instead of soldiers like the rest of the world is anyone's guess. Most of their "maneuvers" seem ridiculous, and remind me of the famous Spetznaz soldier doing a blindfolded backflip while throwing a hatchet at a target.

Either way: if you can't be a good example, than be a horrible warning; it seems that the Belarussians have picked up on the dog-and-pony show idea of demonstrating profoundly dangerous and stupid things for soldiers to do to impress the masses. Because you never know when your special force will be in the danger zone somewhere and have no other recourse than to break some concrete off the face of a fellow soldier with a sledge hammer, have an asbestos board broken over their naked chest, repel upside down and unarmed from a helo, or sic an attack dog on a burning, fleeing man.

Americans do crazy things like fly fighter jets 30' off the water over yachts and park armored vehicles in the streets. The Romanians like to make pirates shave each other, have their sailors balance balls on a spoon with their mouths, play tug-of-war, have sack races, and as a special treat have King Neptune bless their nation's boobies.

Now for the cool: the Brazilians have a new rifle - the Imbel IA2; the Indians are still using Enfields and Sterlings, but have also gone modern with the FN F2000. Coooooooool.

All and all it looks like the world's militaries were way more productive than I was this weekend.