Category: Expert Analysis

Recently, you’ve probably heard a lot about Influence Activities or Influence Operations, usually in the context of Russia and the 2016 election. For many Americans, this topic may seem to have come out of nowhere. At SOFREP though, we’ve been talking about it for a long time. See here, here, here, here, here, here, and […]

All too often, we tend to associate anger and aggression with masculinity. It’s an excusable mistake, the same hormone cocktail that made me a big, hairy lug also serves as chemical encouragement any time I feel the need to punch my way out of a situation… but if you ask me, a far more appropriate […]

Most shooters will tell you that proper cheek-weld, in its general universally understood form, is paramount for acceptable marksmanship. While this is for the most part accurate and essential for developing the fundamentals of marksmanship, especially in new shooters and at extended ranges, I’m going to dare to challenge the narrative here at the risk […]

While I’m sure that growing up wealthy comes in handy for inconsequential things like becoming president or keeping your electricity on, growing up poor came with its own bevy of benefits that I wouldn’t trade for all the boiled hot dogs and hand-me-down clothes in the world: it helped sharpen my imagination into a valuable […]

In combat marksmanship, shot placement is incredibly important and more often than not it is the determining factor in lethality. No matter the caliber of bullet or model of firearm, the location on the body where the round strikes determines how much damage is done with the exception of scenario-modifying circumstances. It is the same […]

I follow our small team of writers up an escalator and onto the plaza floor that holds one of the many levels for SHOT Show. It’s a sea of booths filled with the latest in “tactical innovations” that the industry has to offer. Weaving around each other like a massive army of ants, are the […]

Drunken shenanigans notwithstanding, the real reason we come to SHOT Show is to roam around the sprawling convention, eyeballing gear most mortals (like me) can’t afford and reuniting with some of the folks we’ve gotten to know over our years of service, writing, or both. If you haven’t attended SHOT or a similar convention before… […]

Ah, life on the road. By the time this article goes up, I’ll be on an airplane headed to Vegas for SHOT Show and waiving goodbye to my hard-earned gains as I zoom across the sky with a Cinnabon and two nips of vodka in hand. Finding a way to workout while you’re traveling can […]

As I slid my black slacks on in a rush to make it to the SOFREP party at this year’s SHOT Show, I couldn’t help but feel like they didn’t fit. Not the size mind you, my waistline hasn’t changed all that much since my days as an HR manager, but the style, the feel of […]

Thirty-five minutes after I kissed my daughter goodbye for the first time in her short life, a loud bang rang out from the engine bay of my trusty old Kia Optima.  The subsequent clunk beneath my floorboard combined with a complete loss of power made it pretty clear that I was in trouble, and thanks […]

From the earliest days of mankind, one of the few things that separated our particular breed of big-brained monkey from the rest of the competition in the wild was our ability to harness light, in the form of fire. Fire, of course, was paramount to our success as a species for a number of other […]

There are minor spoilers in this article. Netflix has been branching out beyond stories set in the U.S., and has even distributed some excellent foreign shows that have found popularity in America. For example, “3%” is a Brazilian show, but was recommended to me by many of my friends. Netflix has released its first season […]