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GO gently caress YOURSELF posted:Hey guys, I'm sorry if someone already asked this (but I expect not). It's nearly Christmas and people were asking for gift ideas for me and I'd really love if someone had a good, English-language book that talks in depth about Louis, Le Grand Conde. I'm hoping Hegel might have a recommendation... Ed: Could I interest you in some biographies of Philip II? Books about the French Army of Louis XIV in general? Monographs on mercenaries? HEY GUNS fucked around with this message at 21:37 on Dec 10, 2013 |
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Dec 10, 2013 21:33
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a travelling HEGEL posted:Ed: Could I interest you in some biographies of Philip II? Why are you recommending biographies of the greatest king Macedon ever had (that's right, I said it) if he wants early modern stuff? 
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Dec 10, 2013 21:55
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a travelling HEGEL posted:Unfortunately, I don't, which is too bad because that man ruled. If anyone finds one, I'd like the recommendation as well. Possibly. I'm mainly interested in Le Grand Conde because of an earlier discussion in the thread that sent me sifting through Wikipedia. The snippets of what he got up to are really tantalizing and, as someone who appreciates a good story, I really wanted to hear more. His estranged wife supported him tirelessly through his imprisonment for sedition? What?! He was one of the King's chief advisers, got ousted, was imprisoned, then rose to become a major political force again? Double what?! I mean, I need more!
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Dec 10, 2013 21:56
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Ghost of Mussolini posted:On French WW1 uniforms; This is pretty mind-boggling. I thought the benefits of standardised camouflage had already been proven before WW1? Or at least, everyone else AFAIK had already moved to relatively drab uniforms.
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Dec 10, 2013 21:56
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GO gently caress YOURSELF posted:Possibly. The French Army from 1610 to 1715 and why it owned Mercenaries The best book ever written on German mercenaries, good luck finding it though
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Dec 10, 2013 22:05
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Ghost of Mussolini posted:Bonus pic I had for some reason: Because I was really amused by the caption, here's a (very) loose translation: Six days of leave! Lucky, Hairy cock! We're gonna chug some. Just missing a MILF to be able to take it easy. Nine of Eight fucked around with this message at 23:42 on Dec 10, 2013 |
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Dec 10, 2013 23:39
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Slavvy posted:This is pretty mind-boggling. I'll say. There's no way that kid is old enough to be smoking.
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Dec 11, 2013 03:56
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Everyone knows that the French lowered the conscription age to 5 years after the 1917 mutinies duh. Learn your history.
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Dec 11, 2013 06:05
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Shimrra Jamaane posted:Everyone knows that the French lowered the conscription age to 5 years after the 1917 mutinies duh. Learn your history. And it worked brilliantly - everything from rifles to uniforms had to be miniaturized, which meant you used fewer resources to equip them. Also shallower trenches would suffice.
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Dec 11, 2013 06:36
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gradenko_2000 posted:Oil would come from Romania and agricultural products and other raw materials I expect were extracted from France and Poland and the other occupied territories, and I do know there was starvation going on in Germany and its occupied territories by 1944 onwards (just not as harped on for some reason), but it's not like there's a lot of rubber to be had even if you controlled continental Europe, but the Germans just kept producing trucks and tanks and planes right up to the end. Towards the end the Germans were seriously running out of just about everything. I want to quote Albert Speer at Nuremberg: Prosecutor: "Is it true that slave workers were beaten with steel batons?" Speer: "Yes." Prosecutor: "Why was that?" Speer: "Because we did not have rubber to make ordinary batons."
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Dec 11, 2013 08:53
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Nenonen posted:And it worked brilliantly - everything from rifles to uniforms had to be miniaturized, which meant you used fewer resources to equip them. Also shallower trenches would suffice. Same amount of wine though apparently.
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Dec 11, 2013 09:39
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Rodrigo Diaz posted:
If you look at the quarrels that have hit the ground, all the flights are strewn at odd angles lying apart from the shafts. Could it be illustrating some type of crossbow deployed calthrop (sp?)? The shafts stuck in the ground look like spikes as well. The odd shapes in front of the crossbowmen look like they may be a more traditional form of calthrop.
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Dec 11, 2013 09:42
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Rodrigo Diaz posted:Changing gears for a minute I found the picture of crossbowmen firing at a high angle I'd been looking for: Outside Dawg posted:If you look at the quarrels that have hit the ground, all the flights are strewn at odd angles lying apart from the shafts. Could it be illustrating some type of crossbow deployed calthrop (sp?)? The shafts stuck in the ground look like spikes as well. They're also firing on unbarded horses. I read a quite interesting thing recently about how close the Genoese Crossbowmen came to the longbowmen at the Battle of Crecy. Apparently so close that the English guns were able to effectively fire on them, causing "much loss".
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Dec 11, 2013 10:02
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Outside Dawg posted:If you look at the quarrels that have hit the ground, all the flights are strewn at odd angles lying apart from the shafts. Could it be illustrating some type of crossbow deployed calthrop (sp?)? The shafts stuck in the ground look like spikes as well. A thing you need to know: that the bolts are falling among the cavalry; when the crossbowmen began their volley (before or after the horse charged); possibly who was involved (there might be an inscription with the original). A thing you don't need to know: how big an average human being is; what a crossbow bolt looks like.
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Dec 11, 2013 10:24
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bewbies posted:the most heavily defended city on earth To give us a sense for what that means, could you maybe elaborate a little on what city defenses around the world were like at that time and how Washington, DC was superior? Or do you just mean in terms of troop numbers? And speaking of taking cities, I realized I know very little about that. Did battles for cities in the ACW ever back up into the city proper, with fighting among the buildings? Or did defenders always retreat away from the city or surrender before that could happen?
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Dec 11, 2013 11:36
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Thanks for the responses re. German industry in WWII. I didn't even think of synthetic rubber. I added Wages of Destruction to my book wishlist Can someone weigh in on the story behind the hoax over the M113 APC being nicknamed the "Gavin"?
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Dec 11, 2013 13:42
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gradenko_2000 posted:Thanks for the responses re. German industry in WWII. I didn't even think of synthetic rubber. I added Wages of Destruction to my book wishlist I still haven't gotten any further than page 80 or so, and that's at least 15 books ago  The Gavin is one man's (Mike Sparks') crusade against wheeled deathtraps!!! (Strykers), the Marines, and the fluoridation of our precious bodily fluids. All this started something like 10 years ago on tank-net.org Combat Reform!
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Dec 11, 2013 15:06
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a travelling HEGEL posted:Edit: And a bunch of Jews in the South for some reason. Savannah was full of Jews. Relevant: "Shalom, Y'all." http://www.amazon.com/Shalom-YAll-I...rds=shalom+yall
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Dec 11, 2013 15:17
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Koesj posted:I still haven't gotten any further than page 80 or so, and that's at least 15 books ago
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Dec 11, 2013 15:39
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gradenko_2000 posted:Thanks for the responses re. German industry in WWII. I didn't even think of synthetic rubber. I added Wages of Destruction to my book wishlist It's entirely the creation of one guy who thinks that the M113 is the pinnacle of military design. Everything that comes out of him is distilled crazy and horrible youtube videos. The reason why he thinks it should be called the Gavin is because General James M. Gavin was the chief of the U.S. Army's R&D program and thus it should be named after him. Of course no one but egomaniacs name the things they develop after themselves so this didn't happen, but again Sparks is completely crazy. He's well known to create multiple accounts on places so that he would have valiant defenders of his views, including how M113s can be turned into self-propelled airborne assault vehicles which are launched off the back of Iowa class battleships.
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Dec 11, 2013 16:16
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Arquinsiel posted:I really need a goon summary of this drama. The wikipedia talk page for the M113 is mostly this repeated over and over. From what I heard, he wants Gavins for every job. Amphibious Gavins! Gliding Gavins! Gavins with MBT turrets! No finer vehicle exists!
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Dec 11, 2013 16:18
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Taerkar posted:It's entirely the creation of one guy who thinks that the M113 is the pinnacle of military design. Everything that comes out of him is distilled crazy and horrible youtube videos. MiGs Beware: AeroGavins are Armed https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SwHqLtK_TpY This is what somebody really believes.
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Dec 11, 2013 16:22
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I wonder what caused Sparks to be so fanatical about an older APC model. Was he an M113 mechanic? Did he help design or build them?
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Dec 11, 2013 16:25
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That looks like exactly what we need for a hostage rescue scenario, a fleet of metal boxes with Sopwith Camels stapled onto it roaring into Afghanistan 
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Dec 11, 2013 16:27
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Taerkar posted:He's well known to create multiple accounts on places so that he would have valiant defenders of his views, including how M113s can be turned into self-propelled airborne assault vehicles which are launched off the back of Iowa class battleships. Carried by, no poo poo, A-10s. Because nothing says rapid support than an A-10 dropping a single M113 in your lap.
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Dec 11, 2013 16:28
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Trip report: Osprey's Pike and Shot Tactics 1590-1660: OKish I guess but ultimately disappointing. Unless you care about the English Civil War? Which...I don't. Why do I keep reading Osprey books and defending the idea of them in this thread? Because I have a short attention span and am fascinated by bright colors and shiny objects. I bought Spanier auf dem Albuch instead, as per the recommendation in the thread I linked, and if it gets to my current location before I leave this Sunday I'll let you guys know how it is in the next few weeks. DerLeo posted:That looks like exactly what we need for a hostage rescue scenario, a fleet of metal boxes with Sopwith Camels stapled onto it roaring into Afghanistan HEY GUNS fucked around with this message at 16:42 on Dec 11, 2013 |
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Dec 11, 2013 16:28
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Pornographic Memory posted:MiGs Beware: AeroGavins are Armed  The Battlestar Galactica theme just made me lose it. Can't be serious after that.
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Dec 11, 2013 16:45
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Did Doppelsöldner use Zweihänders and were they effective?
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Dec 11, 2013 16:48
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Hogge Wild posted:Did Doppelsöldner use Zweihänders and were they effective? Depends on what you mean by Doppelsöldner, and what period you're talking about. In the early 1500s, some of them did, but the term is used in general at that time to describe guys with heavier armor or better weapons, sometimes on the outside of the square--you can see some of them in Dolnstein. By the 1600s, I have heard the term used to describe pikemen, not because they function like the older Doppelsöldner (well, maybe they do, if you tilt your head and squint) but because they were, well, payed more. Zweihänders were used in the early 1500s, wielded by a group of Doppelsöldner in the center of the formation, around the flag/s (this is back when the flag was in the center, not out front). The similarity of the weapon to German execution swords is probably not coincidental: early modern Germans had really weird, almost religious, beliefs about justice/violence/execution; the flag is the soul or identity of the company; and a Landsknecht regiment has the right to administer its own justice, which would have been hugely important on a symbolic level. When Wikipedia says they were anti-halberd weapons, it's wrong. Edit: They're really beautiful; most of the ones I've seen in person are longer than I am tall, and their lines are so graceful. 
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Dec 11, 2013 16:59
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a travelling HEGEL posted:Trip report: Osprey's Pike and Shot Tactics 1590-1660: OKish I guess but ultimately disappointing. Unless you care about the English Civil War? Which...I don't. Why do I keep reading Osprey books and defending the idea of them in this thread? Because I have a short attention span and am fascinated by bright colors and shiny objects. Pff, Osprey books are perfect (for stealing the artwork and putting it in your own work).
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Dec 11, 2013 17:05
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Davincie posted:Pff, Osprey books are perfect (for pictures of your D&D character). 
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Dec 11, 2013 17:09
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What about Flamberge blades? You know the swords what had the wavy bits like the SE Asian Kris knives only they were like 6 feet long? Were those just parade accessories or did people actually fight with 'em? Musta been a challenge to sharpen.
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Dec 11, 2013 17:24
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Taerkar posted:It's entirely the creation of one guy who thinks that the M113 is the pinnacle of military design. Everything that comes out of him is distilled crazy and horrible youtube videos. I mean, there's some legitimate controversy to be had with the DoD's extremely corrupt/nepotistic policies that have heavily favored massively overpriced systems. The M113 is a useful auxiliary vehicle, like the MT-LB, but it's just really odd how someone could look to it as the ultimate answer to everything. The real solution - bring back tankettes.
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Dec 11, 2013 17:53
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The MT-LB is the ultimate platform, it has been used as a heavy tank, medium tank, light tank, AA SPG, and many more! (in movies)
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Dec 11, 2013 18:01
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Panzeh posted:I mean, there's some legitimate controversy to be had with the DoD's extremely corrupt/nepotistic policies that have heavily favored massively overpriced systems. The M113 is a useful auxiliary vehicle, like the MT-LB, but it's just really odd how someone could look to it as the ultimate answer to everything. my guess is that he worked with M113s just as the switch to Bradleys happend. Like most new military equipment, the Bradley was widely considered a piece of crap (too tall, too heavy, doesn't carry as many men). So he wondered out loud why they were replacing Vehicle Of Glorious Design M113, and things spiraled from there.
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Dec 11, 2013 18:02
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Ensign Expendable posted:The MT-LB is the ultimate platform, it has been used as a heavy tank, medium tank, light tank, AA SPG, and many more! (in movies) Come now, they couldn't be more versatile than Spanish M48s.
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Dec 11, 2013 18:08
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Panzeh posted:Come now, they couldn't be more versatile than Spanish M48s.
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Dec 11, 2013 18:17
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Panzeh posted:Come now, they couldn't be more versatile than Spanish M48s. I though those were Chaffees not Pattons. Time to watch Patton again I guess.
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Dec 11, 2013 18:21
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Raskolnikov38 posted:I though those were Chaffees not Pattons. Well, I was referring to Battle of the Bulge, where the Chaffees were Shermans, and the M48s were King Tigers. Arquinsiel posted:I still think nothing beats the M8 in Die Hard for sheer "what?" value. Turretless M8s were actually used because the crews found the lower profile and lighter weight to be more useful than the 37mm gun, a weapon that wasn't good at doing a whole lot. The crews took a bazooka instead. The one in Die Hard looks like it got the top covered.
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Dec 11, 2013 18:28
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So Franco just loaned out his tanks to anyone that showed up in Madrid with a movie camera then?
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Dec 11, 2013 18:29
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