Monday, April 23, 2012

KIT CARSON SCOUT




I have completed painting seven US Marines and am waiting on another 3-5 more to come in the mail to complete my Marine squad, in the meantime I painted up a Kit Carson Scout, Kit Carson What?? I hear you ask, well during the Vietnam War the US Marines came up with the clever idea of recruiting, communist defectors as intelligence scouts for American infantry units, it is believed that the Chieu Hoi (open arms) program was responsible for the removal of over 100,000 enemy combatants from the battlefield.



In the Early years Kit Carson Scouts were responsible for identifying Viet Cong guerrillas and cadre from among the civilian population, in addition to this the Kit Carson scout proved to be good at identifying booby traps, caves and tunnels and caches of enemy weapons, later on the Kit Carson Scouts were used directly as recruiters themselves.



Since there are no available Kit Carson Scouts in 28mm, I was forced to do a head swap and create one, I took the body of a Baker Company mini and the head of a West Wind mini and there you have it, bad guy turned good guy, dressed in faded green fatigues, boonie hat, Sunglasses, blue neck scarf and a M16 assault rifle.

Next up, its either going to be the rest of the marines (assuming  they turn up sooner rather than later) or an ARVN fire team (half a squad), any preferences fellas? 

12 comments:

colinmnash said...

Looking good Extraordinarii! Was there someone named Kit Carson though? wondered about that for a while ...

My preference would be the ARVN fellas, but don't really mind tbh!

Adam said...

Looking good.

As for what to show next, I'll be fine with either, I just loving seeing painted minis.

Simon Quinton said...

Very nicely done sir. Anything you put up here will be gratefully received

The Angry Lurker said...

He's a nice one, good job and I'd go for ARVN!

lrqan said...

Good loooking model, well done.

Shelldrake said...

Assuming you have the ARVN and the Marines haven't arrived I would paint up the ARVN :-P

If Ebob Miniatures started selling his Vietnam war range then we could all get a Kit Carson.

I really do wonder why nothing is happening there.

The Extraordinarii said...

@Cmnash - Yes there was such a person, he was a mountain man, trapper and of course a scout for US army in the old wild west.
Go Here for more info:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kit_Carson

@Adam - Thanks man.
@Brummie - Cheers mate.
@Lurker - might have to be ARVN.
@Irqan - Thanks mate.

@Shelldrake - Ebob yes... very dissapointing, I would say that he has shelved that project, I wouldn't be expecting anything anytime soon.

Luckyjoe said...

Very nice job. That's a cool characterful mini with a good backstory.

Rodger said...

Very nice, looks great!

The Extraordinarii said...

Thanks Joe and Rodger your comments are appreciated.

Adam said...

Looks cool

The Extraordinarii said...

Thanks Adam, Welcome to the 'Nam.