Each succeeding "Mermaid" release presents another new challenge. That challenge is usually in the form of a tactical answer to the question of how you justify carting pretty girls, halfway around the world, to tropic locales without making the same banal excuse that they're on "vacation."

Mermaids At War offers yet another opportunity/solution to the above puzzle, and with it, possibly an award for concept-stretching. Two girlfriends, Lori and Kelli, decide to chuck it all and head for an island in the Pacific, Palau, to be more precise. Why? Kelly, it seems, besides being a concert harpist who has fantasizes about performing in the nude (!), is a modern history major. Palau was a battle site in the war in the Pacific, and many relics from that fight can still be found entangled in the jungle bush.

It's, perhaps, better not to ask how all this has anything to do with a T&A video, but the job gets done, reasonably well, and the girls pose semi-naked along beaches and other scenery of Palau. Semi-naked and briefly are the operative words here. The video projects earnest commitment in making a statement about history and patriotism, but the viewer must make a choice between a salute and a hard-on. Given the overwhelming balance towards World War II history in this production, I'd say it was time for 21 -guns.