This is a look at how Mosin-Nagant rifles, the USSR’s main longarm of WWII, came commercially into the United States at the height of anti-communist sentiment.
(Soviet soldiers with Mosin-Nagant rifles during WWII.)
(A “sign of the times”; a typical 1950s disclaimer for Mosin-Nagants being sold commercially in the United States)
On 1 October 2025 the Royal Thai Navy decommissioned HTMS Pin Klao, the former USS Hemminger (DE-746). It was the last Cannon class in service, the final WWII DE (destroyer-escort) of any type still in service, and one of a small number of WWII warships of any type or nation still in use during the 2020s.
(USS Hemminger (DE-746) during WWII.)
(The final crew of HTMS Pin Klao, the ex-USS Hemminger, during 2025.)
The Admirable class was one of the US Navy’s two main fleet minesweeper classes during WWII. Some were Lend-Leased to the USSR during the war and ten of those would end up converted into a quite unexpected civilian role.
(USS Measure (AM-263) during WWII.)
(The Soviet whaler Buran, the former USS Measure, during the 1950s.)
The USA’s M4 Sherman tank of WWII had a long career after that war, seeing service with numerous armies in several conflicts around the world after WWII. The last active user was the South American nation of Paraguay.
(Sherman Repotenciado of Paraguay’s Regimiento Escolta Presidencial; by 2018 the final active-duty unit anywhere on Earth still using WWII Shermans.)
I wish to thank all readers over the past ten years. This is a mixture of topics I have had in my head probably not big enough for study on their own.
To start, I have never explained the image I used as the cover photo for wwiiafterwwii.
The cover photo and the color photo above were taken at Elizabeth City, NC on 17 February 1960. It shows the last PB-1G (USCG nomenclature for the B-17 Flying Fortress) still in US Coast Guard service; also the very last Flying Fortress of any version left in any of the five armed forces; alongside the USCG’s first SC-130B Hercules.
This particular Flying Fortress, serial #77254, had been a stock B-17 during WWII. It was one of eighteen bombers transferred to the US Coast Guard from the US Army after WWII for conversion into unarmed lifeboat-droppers. After two years in that role, this particular plane was modified again for a Coast & Geodetic Survey project, with a panoramic high-detail camera.
(The camera cost $1.5 million ($19.99 million in 2025 dollars) and was for aerial mapping. It was worth more than the Flying Fortress itself.) (official US Coast Guard photo)
This plane had all WWII guns deleted, and was fitted with a radar and LORAN receiver. The WWII Norden bombsight in the nose was retained as it was helpful to line up camera runs.
Besides the mapping project this PB-1G also did International Ice Patrol flights. It ceased active use in October 1959 and was discarded in 1960, on the same day as the photo.
As a loose theme, these are somehow unique WWII warships which served in the Cold War-era Turkish navy. That in itself is not particularly odd, as there was a stretch during the 1970s when practically the entire Turkish fleet was surplus WWII warships. However I selected these as I feel there is some unique trait: either what they were; or; how Turkey (neutral during WWII) ended up getting them.
(The netlayer TCG Kaldiray started WWII as Sansin, a warship of the French navy. It was part of the Vichy Levantine squadron’s interned flotilla along with TCG Akar described below. It served Turkey until 1975.)
France’s WWII MAS-36 rifle served in a number of francophone African nations after WWII. This is a look at one of the more obscure, Burkina Faso.
(French soldier with MAS-36 rifle during WWII.)
(Upper Volta army soldiers with MAS-36 rifles during 1976.)
I would like to wish American readers a happy 4th Of July, our nation’s 249th year.
A few years ago I was in NYC and visited Ft. Hamilton, the last active military base in the city. On the base is this sign, of Revolutionary War coastal artillery.
(As of 2025 there are thirty US Army units with direct traceable lineage to the Revolutionary War. One, the 1st Battalion 5th Field Artillery Regiment, is the descendant of Gen. Knox’s force in Brooklyn. This battle was fought the same day as the Declaration Of Independence was signed in Philadelphia, PA.)
Fifty years ago this May, ships of the South Vietnamese navy fled to the Philippines as Saigon was overrun.
Recently media outlets have covered this story, often as “…how America stole a whole navy in 1975!” which is not correct. Meanwhile many naval observers worldwide are aware that the Philippines later received these WWII-era warships, but not really aware of the steps to make that happen.
This will be less technical data and more a look at the behind-the-scenes hoops that the USA jumped through to transplant a fallen ally’s WWII-era warships into another ally’s fleet.
(The escape: Overloaded with refugees, HQVN Lam Giang arrives at Côn Son as Saigon falls in 1975. It had been LSM-226 during WWII.)
(The wait: former South Vietnamese warships rust away at Subic Bay during the summer of 1975, awaiting politicians to determine their fate.)
(The payoff: BRP Miguel Malvar, formerly South Vietnam’s HQVN Ngoc Hoi and the WWII US Navy’s USS Brattleboro, serving the Philippines in the 21st century.)
I don’t know how many readers have an interest in military bureaucracy. Probably not many.
This is a look at how WWII-legacy weapons were cataloged in the Foreign Materiel Catalog, the FOMCAT, a now-forgotten US Army publication of the Cold War era.
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