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Beardless posted:Edit 2: Cyrano, in your professional opinion how is John Keegan's work? Keegan's excellent. He's got a couple of books which really redefined the way non-military historians looked at military history (Face of Battle in particular) and all of his stuff is just generally a great mix of accessibility while actually having a scholarly argument. Basically he's who Ambrose wanted to be.
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Jan 26, 2014 22:18
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Cyrano4747 posted:Keegan's excellent. He's got a couple of books which really redefined the way non-military historians looked at military history (Face of Battle in particular) and all of his stuff is just generally a great mix of accessibility while actually having a scholarly argument. Keegan's A History of Warfare is silly, at best. He literally claims the Samurai doomed their country because they followed Clausewitz. He wants western armies to engage in ritualized warfare again. He calls the Maya Empire primitive.
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Jan 26, 2014 22:27
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ArchangeI posted:Keegan's A History of Warfare is silly, at best. He literally claims the Samurai doomed their country because they followed Clausewitz. He wants western armies to engage in ritualized warfare again. He calls the Maya Empire primitive. Like Cyrano said, he's who Ambrose wanted to be.
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Jan 26, 2014 22:41
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ArchangeI posted:Keegan's A History of Warfare is silly, at best. He literally claims the Samurai doomed their country because they followed Clausewitz. He wants western armies to engage in ritualized warfare again. He calls the Maya Empire primitive. A History of Warfare is an odd book and one of his easier ones to criticize. Then again, it's also by far the work with the largest scope - he tries to come up with what amounts to a universal theory of warfare and attempts to draw conclusions and categorize conflicts based on the entire history of armed conflict. Any project like that, and especially one of the length that he tried, is probably doomed to failure on some level. He's got a bunch of more narrow works that are a lot better focused and that advance much more specific arguments much more compellingly. Judging him by that single kind of bizarre work would be like talking about Michael Jordan and only looking at his years with the Wizards. I'm not saying Keegan is the best military historian ever, but he's excellent for your average, educated layman with an interest in military history - i.e. most of TFR. He combines readability with actually advancing a scholarly argument in a way that's not insulting to the reader, and it doesn't hurt that he also did a poo poo ton to destigmatize military history within the historical establishment of the 70s-80s.
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Jan 26, 2014 23:06
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Cyrano4747 posted:destigmatize military history within the historical establishment of the 70s-80s 
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Jan 26, 2014 23:08
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The tl;dr on a bunch of boring historiography is that around the early 70s history, like a lot of the social sciences, made the 'cultural turn' and started concentrating on culture, society, and other issues that were previously seen as peripheral concerns at best. The consequent de-emphasis on traditional political narratives (of which old school military histories were a significant component) led a lot of people to dismiss military history as a niche concern at best, amateurish dilettantism more typically, and military fetishism at worst. Remember, a lot of the people leading this charge are the same ones who were grad students in the 60s, so the politics of it and general attitudes regarding anything military or militaristic shouldn't be too shocking. Keegan's Face of Battle was pretty ground breaking when it came out in '76 because he showed that you could not only use a lot of those approaches in the context of military history, but in doing so you could draw conclusions that held value both for the more traditional consumers of military histories (academies, military establishment, etc) but also for the broader profession. It was pretty significant at the time and has held up remarkably well over the last 40 years.
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Jan 26, 2014 23:22
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If anyone isn't aware of its existence the military history thread is this way.
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Jan 26, 2014 23:24
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AlexanderCA posted:So, how DOES one unfuck military production/procurement? There is a lot of fat that could be cut along the process, Cost+ contracts being a big one but then the big defense contractors wouldn't want to take the risk on new technology...etc (at least in theory) but they would find and have other ways to cut costs if that happened and do regularly. The entire system is pretty messed up. We just had to do a DMS for a part and the lifetime buy came out to about 100k (Dy4 Single Board Computers) which is really nothing in terms of buying poo poo but the paperwork/government approvals/buyers/business people getting involved took the total cost somewhere around 200k+ and we only got it to the supplier on the last day possible so almost missed the DMS order window. We've known about the DMS for about a year... Now, take that and scale it to everything that gets bought and you can see why poo poo costs so much that how you get the '$1000 wrench' and poo poo like that. Whenever you need to buy something that's in any way deliverable you have lots and lots of people touching it along the way, these people are all making 60-200k a year so their time is expensive. On the other hand having all of these checks (most of the time) gets a better product delivered. It's a balancing act that we really have moved towards the 'don't gently caress up spend more money to make sure' side as contractors. Basically spending too much and getting a slap on the wrist is preferable to loving up in some way that could be fixed with more oversight/money/engineers/support people so everyone is really conservative in pricing/procurement and this goes down to the lowest level suppliers. You also have that whole issue that if you don't spend the money every year you lose it next year. So I'm using a $50k sig gen basically as a 10 MHz reference generator because 'hey, we need to spend $300k in a month do any of you guys need new toys?' If a non-defense/government contractor company did this they would go out of business. There is also a lot of using older technology being used because it's known to work and will do what we need it to. This becomes more expensive because if you've written software for a board that came out 15 years ago the supplier can charge you out the rear end to keep making it instead of DMSing. The software is also terrible and expensive as poo poo to make because if you're at all competent with software you'll want to kill yourself quickly working for a contractor. Agile/Scrum/Lean...etc nope we don't do that. Largest jobs program ever devised by the US government. Here's a handy chart: 
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Jan 27, 2014 00:12
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Snowdens Secret posted:The other really common mythbusting of the German blitzkrieg involves how much stuff they had to pull into Poland behind horses because they still didn't have enough trucks. I don't know how much of that was really resolved by the time of the French invasion. Picture being worth a thousand words...  Yes, I know, POWs, end of the war, apples to oranges, yadda yadda. It still makes the point. Plinkey posted:There is also a lot of using older technology being used because it's known to work and will do what we need it to. This becomes more expensive because if you've written software for a board that came out 15 years ago the supplier can charge you out the rear end to keep making it instead of DMSing. The software is also terrible and expensive as poo poo to make because if you're at all competent with software you'll want to kill yourself quickly working for a contractor. Agile/Scrum/Lean...etc nope we don't do that. Addendum to this, when programs drag on for a decade+ from initial conception to IOC (looking at you Raptor/F-35), software, computing power, and anything associated with the IT side of things in general is just a complete clusterfuck because of how quickly that tech moves and how impossible it is to modify a lot of that stuff once a program has progressed past a certain point. This is how you wind up with the USAF's top of the line stealth fighter in the year of our lord 2014 using a software language from 1970.
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Jan 27, 2014 00:42
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iyaayas01 posted:Addendum to this, when programs drag on for a decade+ from initial conception to IOC (looking at you Raptor/F-35), software, computing power, and anything associated with the IT side of things in general is just a complete clusterfuck because of how quickly that tech moves and how impossible it is to modify a lot of that stuff once a program has progressed past a certain point. This is how you wind up with the USAF's top of the line stealth fighter in the year of our lord 2014 using a software language from 1970. F22 using ADA wouldn't surprise me at all. But yeah, that's the general gist of the point I was trying to make. There are a lot of things done 'because that's how we've always done it' and if you come in and try to change things to make them work better you get a lot of push back.
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Jan 27, 2014 00:52
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ProfessorCurly posted:
My grandfather grew up in occupied Holland and remembers very clearly walking down a road with a friend while a German convoy passed, mostly carrying looted goods. All along the side of the road were remains of other convoys that had been strafed over the preceding few days, including earlier that morning. Sure enough, as they were shuffling along they heard the drone of aircraft engines and all hell broke loose as everyone dove for the ditches or ran like hell. Opa and his friend dove into a ditch and wound up landing in what had presumably been a couple of German soldiers until something powerful had more or less turned them to pulp. He would have been about 13 at the time. My great uncle was about the same age when he snuck off to watch the Canadians assault a German radar emplacement not far from where he grew up. He watched a rather odd looking tank towing a trailer roll up to the trench works occupied by the Germans and saw a massive gout of flame shoot from its front. It was a flamethrower, and he has told me that after hearing a couple of dozen Germans burn to death that he cannot bring himself to hate them. He and his family suffered during the war, but so did those men and as far as he is concerned hate is what helped bring about that whole mess in the first place. On the subject of myths of the Second World War, this video came up earlier in the thread and is excellent: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Clz27nghIg What shocked me is the notion that at the start of Barbarossa a massive tank battle took place that far eclipsed Kursk in terms of raw numbers, and yet not a thing has been written of it. Fearless fucked around with this message at 01:09 on Jan 27, 2014 |
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Jan 27, 2014 01:01
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Sperglord Actual posted:The way I remember reading it (and I could totally be wrong on this) was that the Poles had a somewhat successful tactic of using cavalry with anti-tank rifles to make hit-and-runs on German vehicles, which the Germans spun into face-saving propaganda about fighting untermensch bumpkins. Requesting name change. Mods?
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Jan 27, 2014 03:24
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Cyrano4747 posted:If you think that's bad, look into WW2 military history. The supposed hyper-competence of the German military from 1939-1941 is one of the biggest myths there is. It's a goddamned miracle that they had the successes they did. A lot of that reputation for invulnerability was encouraged by post-war governments who were all to eager to cover up and ignore just how criminally unprepared, poorly organized, and incompetently lead they were during the inter-war and early war periods. Cyrano4747 posted:There is absolutely no earthly reason why the Germans should have done as well as they did, other than inter-war institutional rot and sheer incompetence in some very senior positions. It wasn't so much about the Germans being amazing martial geniuses as them being the only ones who weren't criminally incompetent. I'm going to pick on the bolded geniuses parts here for a moment. I won't argue with you that the German martial superiority during WW2 was over-stated but I think you go somewhat too far in your posts here in denigrating their performances. To attempt an analogy: Was Albert Einstein a genius or were all other scientists of his era idiots? Maybe Bobby Fisher was actually poo poo at chess but everyone he played was more poo poo? Genius is a relative term. What was it about the German military and/or political structure that allowed them to succeed instead of stagnate, to grow while the rest of Europe was rotting? Why was everyone else criminally incompetent while the Germans were not? Maybe they just got lucky. edit: To actually have an argument, my point is that the German General Staff system created a system that resulted in long-term consistent excellence in military leadership. Other western nations embroiled in WW2 did not, and thus started off woefully behind. I have certainly not read as much as you on the matter, and where the thrust of my argument is going is based on, "A Genius For War" by Trevor N. Dupuy. A book I would recommend reading to anyone here (unless others, like Cyrano, can tell me how it is actually poo poo and instead I should read X book, in which case I will expand my reading list). tangy yet delightful fucked around with this message at 06:44 on Jan 27, 2014 |
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Jan 27, 2014 06:34
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Jan 27, 2014 06:37
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Is the pretty easy point from the earlier discussion that it's functionally impossible for the Russians to go from halfass prototype -> full fledged production aircraft with a feature set beyond the F-22 in a year? How is that not a credible idea?
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Jan 27, 2014 07:03
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AlternateAccount posted:Is the pretty easy point from the earlier discussion that it's functionally impossible for the Russians to go from halfass prototype -> full fledged production aircraft with a feature set beyond the F-22 in a year? How is that not a credible idea? Yes that'd be a very credible idea, but that was not the point I was trying to discuss.
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Jan 27, 2014 07:23
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I think part of the argument is that if you look past the obvious Russian bullshit about a fighter better then the F-22, it's still an evolutionary step in the Su-27 family of fighters. It doesn't have to be an F-22 killer if it actually comes in at a semi-reasonable price and the Russians are willing to export it. Modern variants of the Su-30 already give a lot of F-15s a run for their money, so when you consider the current state of western air purchases and how the F-35 is shaping up you can still see how the PAK-FA is a credible concern. Until we know just how much of a poo poo heap it is (or isnt), it's a problem western planners have to consider. I don't think anyone with a brain actually thinks it's going to be an F-22 killer, but if it turns out to be a solid aircraft with decent RCS reductions, a reasonable payload and good kinematic performance, then it's still a pretty loving big deal. Especially for all our friends who might have to go up against it without the leverage of an F-22, or for Boeing/LM who have to compete with it on the export market to countries like India, Brazil, etc. To boil down what I'm saying; it doesn't need to be this giant gold plated monster to be a credible threat. Hell, IMO it's actually more concerning if it isn't because that probably means they end up in a lot more hands then the 10-15 the Russians would actually buy. Mazz fucked around with this message at 07:47 on Jan 27, 2014 |
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Jan 27, 2014 07:39
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Plinkey posted:There is a lot of fat that could be cut along the process, Cost+ contracts being a big one but then the big defense contractors wouldn't want to take the risk on new technology...etc (at least in theory) but they would find and have other ways to cut costs if that happened and do regularly. Now you mention it, a Dutch navy officer recently reminded me that they (at least partially) design their own ships and also act as a subcontractor of sorts to the private shipyard, while assuming risk responsibility? Their programs seem to run relatively smooth. Though that might be nationalist bias.
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Jan 27, 2014 09:38
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AlexanderCA posted:Now you mention it, a Dutch navy officer recently reminded me that they (at least partially) design their own ships and also act as a subcontractor of sorts to the private shipyard, while assuming risk responsibility? Their programs seem to run relatively smooth. Though that might be nationalist bias. The USN does the same thing and I imagine so does every other Navy. The Dutch like to enjoy a little superiority complex which I enjoy needling some posters on, but they also run some over-budget big project mess pretty much nonstop, I haven't kept up but when I was there it was the Betuwelijn (which looks to have finally opened.) They've also caught their klompen in the F-35 debacle so they're certainly not immune.
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Jan 27, 2014 10:40
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Koesj, could you restate your argument if I misinterpreted what you were trying to say? If you were merely trying to state that Russia is capable of placing the T-50 PAK-FA into production and calling it a 5th gen fighter (even if it's not), I agree with you.Mazz posted:I don't think anyone with a brain actually thinks it's going to be an F-22 killer, but if it turns out to be a solid aircraft with decent RCS reductions, a reasonable payload and good kinematic performance, then it's still a pretty loving big deal. Especially for all our friends who might have to go up against it without the leverage of an F-22, or for Boeing/LM who have to compete with it on the export market to countries like India, Brazil, etc. grover fucked around with this message at 11:55 on Jan 27, 2014 |
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Jan 27, 2014 11:53
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Beardless posted:From what I've read about the invasion of Poland, the whole Polish strategy was to hold the Germans off until the French in particular could get things going on another front. And the whole "cavalry charging tanks" happened after a Polish cavalry unit made a successful charge against infantry, and then ran into some tanks or armored cars that came up in support. Actually, I'm pretty sure we've got Andrzej Wajda's Lotna to thank for the "Poles with sabers charging tanks" stereotype: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jd9hLbvGrWI (relevant bit starts at 3:10) Was meant to be symbolic, but people took it at face value and it just kinda stuck. Also I just wanna say I fuckin' love Cyrano's historyposts.
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Jan 27, 2014 12:49
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Question: I read a rumour that US have destroyed all of their defunct F-14s and all spare parts were also destroyed, and not kept in your Also, for those interested in the Swedish Airforce, there is a museum at the old air plane base for F10 in Ängelholm (south part of Sweden), which is roughly one hour north from Copenhagen/Malmö. I was there this weekend and they have a small collection of planes including a J-22 (WW2 propeller plane by SAAB), F-29 Flying Barrel, J-35 Draken, SF-37 Viggen, JAS-39 Gripen as well as SK50 and SK-60. It is interesting to compare how large the Viggen is compared to Gripen.
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Jan 27, 2014 13:26
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Cardiac posted:Question: True. To prevent Iran from getting parts for theirs.
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Jan 27, 2014 13:52
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grover posted:and the half-assed attempt at stealth adds weight which hurts performance, payload and range. So just like the F-35 then. All jokes aside, unless you can actually pull some sources for this argument (Suhkoi patents indicate a significant amount of RCS changes over previous designs but with performance still being a primary factor), and also these manuverability and weight issues, I'm going to disagree that we should find it so easy to dismiss. I don't look at this the same way as the J-20, this is Sukhoi, they've built good airframes for a considerly long time, and a Russian government that has a lot more money to throw around then they did 10-15 years ago. Mazz fucked around with this message at 14:47 on Jan 27, 2014 |
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Jan 27, 2014 14:17
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MrYenko posted:True. To prevent Iran from getting parts for theirs. Are there any of them that have been saved for museum exhibitions? I've seen pictures of that in this thread.
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Jan 27, 2014 14:21
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Cardiac posted:Are there any of them that have been saved for museum exhibitions? Yes, they were offered pretty freely to museums, and quite a few ended up that way. My favorite is the one at the Museum of Naval Aviation in Pensacola. She flew in off the carrier after her last deployment, shut down the engines, and they towed her inside. Still has dirt and fluids in all the right places. Contrasting against the restorations of older aircraft they have there, which are some of the finest restorations I've seen ANYWHERE, (seriously, it's an amazing museum,) it's pretty cool to see things as-used.
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Jan 27, 2014 14:56
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Cardiac posted:Are there any of them that have been saved for museum exhibitions? The old location of the Grumman plant on Long Island has one on static display. Hard to get pictures- the location is now some sort of LockMartGrumNorth office and security won't let you park near the plane.
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Jan 27, 2014 15:00
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Mazz posted:So just like the F-35 then. Look at pictures. It has very, very, non-stealthy features. Grover's actually done a decent job of listing a few. Look at the goddamned engines, to start. You can look right up the intakes, and the contours of the fuselage over the engine cavities are decidedly un-stealthy. It doesn't even have it's own engines, and what sticks out the back is the same as what you'll see (with eyes or radar) on a Flanker.
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Jan 27, 2014 15:24
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Okay, I should clarify that I'm not arguing about how stealthy the design actually is, just that it does have a lot of specific RCS improvements over legacy fighters while being as worried about flight performance as it is RCS in a lot of its design. I'm not arguing it's ever going to be as stealthy as the F-35, let alone the F-22, I'm just arguing that what grover is doing is seemingly dismissing the entire aircraft because of what he sees in pictures, without actually reading into Sukhoi design philosophy. And that really boils down to them opting for performance in as many places as stealth, and freely admit the compromises they've had to make. I personally think this is a pretty logical argument when you consider the advances in sensors (especially IRST) and how the engagements of previous air wars have often played out once poo poo actually hit the fan. If they can keep costs semi-reasonable and make even some of the avionics/engine improvements they've stated, there's really no way that's not something worth considering a credible threat, both in in the sky and on the export market. http://www.janes.com/article/32190/pak-fa-stealth-features-patent-published http://m.indrus.in/blogs/2014/01/16/patent_analysis_shows_how_pak-fa_differs_from_f-22_in_air_combat_philos_32309.html EDIT: VVVV And an argument like that has a ton of merit, I'm just not comfortable with dismissing it so quickly, especially in comparison to the F-35, not the 22. And I think that's an apt comparison given the future of aircraft procurement options. Mazz fucked around with this message at 16:26 on Jan 27, 2014 |
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Jan 27, 2014 15:39
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Avionics vs performance and the appropriate balance has been debated since 'avionics' became a word. That being said, there's a certain level of sophistication you expect from a properly '5th-gen' avionics package, and in PAK-FA/FGFA/PMF/whatever, development of that avionics package seems to be entirely funded by the Indians, and they are apparently unhappy with that development even as their monetary commitment grows. If they walk, either that development stretches on considerably longer, or more likely the Russians are stuck building at least an initial block of the plane with current-gen electronics. Supercruise-capable engines may also fall under this.
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Jan 27, 2014 15:50
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Snowdens Secret posted:The Dutch like to enjoy a little superiority complex which I enjoy needling some posters on, but they also run some over-budget big project mess pretty much nonstop, I haven't kept up but when I was there it was the Betuwelijn (which looks to have finally opened.) They've also caught their klompen in the F-35 debacle so they're certainly not immune. Oh man that's not even half of it. grover posted:Koesj, could you restate your argument if I misinterpreted what you were trying to say? If you were merely trying to state that Russia is capable of placing the T-50 PAK-FA into production and calling it a 5th gen fighter (even if it's not), I agree with you. Pretty much this except that the 5th gen thing is a particularly bad way to frame the discussion IMO since you're buying into Lockheed Martin Thought (Martism?), and a bit more open ended as Mazz already explained. Godholio posted:Look at the goddamned engines, to start. You can look right up the intakes, How was Boeing solving this particular problem with what was supposed to become F-32, then?  And if Sukhoi already worked with S-ducts on the Su-47, then why not just carry it over to T-50? quote:and the contours of the fuselage over the engine cavities are decidedly un-stealthy. Do you mean between them, or the shaping over the engines themselves? quote:It doesn't even have it's own engines, Yes but they're supposed to get updated ones with the first production run, and entirely new ones around 2020. I don't know whether those are vaporware, or if NPO Saturn can deliver, but F-22/F-35 are developmentally in the same boat with the spiral updates, albeit not with something as major as their engines. quote:and what sticks out the back is the same as what you'll see (with eyes or radar) on a Flanker. What do you mean? Snowdens Secret posted:in PAK-FA/FGFA/PMF/whatever, development of that avionics package seems to be entirely funded by the Indians, and they are apparently unhappy with that development even as their monetary commitment grows. AFAIK the first part is not correct. I was under the impression that they're providing general funding input just to be able to say it's their program as well, plus paying for the integration of the gizmos they want to have on their own version. India's probably getting shafted again, yes, but the unhappiness reported a few days ago supposedly came from their Air Force, which has nothing to do with 'FGFA' as of right now (IIRC it's still only being run as an industrial program from their side, talk about hosed up procurement). They might be playing politics or something, I don't know. quote:If they walk, either that development stretches on considerably longer, or more likely the Russians are stuck building at least an initial block of the plane with current-gen electronics. Supercruise-capable engines may also fall under this. The current engines supposedly already supercruise, but fall short of requirements in thrust-to-weight ratio, fuel economy, and possibly serviceability. Then again we don't know what those requirements are, or how initial or future performance stacks up to other planes. As for the electronics, how good is stuff like this, provided that some dude on the internet got it all right? I haven't got the faintest idea. Large parts of the discussion about PAK-FA/T-50/FGFA/whatever are super tribal, questions of faith, and big fights over contexts and semantics. Most of the stuff I know about the plane comes from forums where there's constant flamewars over it so I'm loath to wade into any discussion without being really open minded about what the Russians might be able to pull off  Sorry for all the quotes!
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Jan 27, 2014 17:41
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M.Ciaster posted:Actually, I'm pretty sure we've got Andrzej Wajda's Lotna to thank for the "Poles with sabers charging tanks" stereotype: No, we've definitely got Nazi propaganda to thank for it. I mean, that movie probably didn't help, but people were talking about this bullshit long before 1959.
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Jan 27, 2014 18:03
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Totally TWISTED posted:I'm going to pick on the bolded geniuses parts here for a moment. I won't argue with you that the German martial superiority during WW2 was over-stated but I think you go somewhat too far in your posts here in denigrating their performances. To attempt an analogy: Disclaimer: I have not read that book you're talking about and have no real clue what his argument is beyond what you're saying it is. As such the following is worth next to nothing. It's just my lunchtime take on the general issue. I'm also not a military specialist, although I did do military history as a sub-field during my coursework, so I'm kind of half-qualified to talk about the field. First off, the Prussian/German general staff system has been a thing since the post-Napoleonic reforms (so. . . 1814-ish or so) after the Prussian army got spanked in some really embarrassing ways. At the time this was somewhat of a revolutionary way of approaching warfare and the preparation for it. The high degree of professionalization that resulted, especially among the command level officer ranks, is a big part of what gave the Prussian military its fearsome reputation in the 19th Century. It's worth noting that the Prussians borrowed heavily from the organization of Napoleon's personal commands, a system which he largely inherited from Berthier when he took over the French armies in Italy during the revolutionary phase of his career. That said, Prussia is the country that really latched onto it as a systematic way of organizing a military and institutionalized it across their entire armed forces. They certainly deserve most of the credit for really making the modern general staff a thing. This did not go unnoticed or unheeded by the rest of the western world and pretty much every country that's worth talking about emulated it to some degree or another by the outbreak of World War 1. By WW2 it was about as notable as the spitzer tipped bullet. The one major exception to this is the US. We still aren't technically on a general staff system. Yes we have the JCS but if you look at it compared to the staff structures of most European armies there are some big differences in how much of their career officers spend in staff positions. I'm fuzzy on the finer details on that little bit of trivia so anyone who knows more about this feel free to correct or amend as you will. Second, a whole lot of the things that people often point to when discussing the successes of the Prussian military system in any form (and most people consider the Nazi-era Wehrmacht the final form of this, god knows the victorious allies did after the wary - they spent a LOT of ink discussing how to best make sure "Prussian militarism" was dead and stayed dead) were also adopted by various other countries sometime in the 19th/early 20th centuries. Your highlighting of my use of "genius" is fair. To that I would respond that, no, the other countries fighting the Germans really were just that incompetent at it early on. The Germans weren't really doing anything especially new or unique. This ranges from the supposed "Blitzkrieg revolution" to the integration of CAS as an important part of the battlefield. Almost all of that was discussed and developed in the inter-war period by a pretty big swath of young officers from all sorts of different countries discussing what went wrong in WW1 and how to not do all that again. gently caress, Charles de Gaulle was a big part of all that and a massive proponent of concentrated armored thrusts - the difference is that he wasn't listened to at all, whereas Guderian et al ended up in command-level positions. As for the deeper question of why everyone was such a pack of bumbling retards in the early years of the war, I can only offer my own, personal analysis which is, again, highly limited by the depth of my knowledge on this specific subject. The best I can offer is that Germany was actually in a pretty unique position after getting their clocks cleaned in World War 1. Their military was all but dismantled and when it was put back together again in the 30s you didn't have a bunch of old farts lingering around from the previous generation of senior leadership. While officers like de Gaulle stagnated in relatively junior leadership positions due to seniority and political issues, men like Gudarian and Rommel were at least field generals. A good example of this is the career of Franz Halder, the man who was Chief of the german general staff from 38-42. He was a 49 year old major in 1933, and quickly rose to command-grade ranks during the reorganization that followed rearmament. Weygand, on the other hand, the man who famously canceled his predecessor's counter-attack during the Battle of France just to re-issue it almost wholesale a couple of days later for purely political reasons, was already on the French general staff in WW1. Gamelin, the man he replaced, was also a WW1 era staff officer. The other issue I would point to would be political. If nothing else the Nazis unified Germany politically. What's more, the German military was never really divided politically to begin with. The Imperial German officer corps was basically a way to keep the old Prussian nobility (and all the more minor german nobilities to a lessser extent) employed and not destitute following the reorganization of the German economy along industrial rather than agricultural lines in the 19th century and they all fell into the more right-isht/monarchist end of the political spectrum anyways. The inter-war German military was very much a creature of the right. Germany went into WW2 with a military where the political intrigues had more to do with intra-party empire building than larger political loyalties. In france, on the other hand, you had a military that was very much split along political lines with top officers that were in bed with most of the major non-radical parties. Going back to the two examples I've already used, Weygand was appointed in 1940 almost entirely because he was a creature of the right and they were ascendent after the initial defeats and Gamelin had secured his job more or less only because he was relatively politically neutral (somewhat of a rarity) and therefore a compromise acceptable to everyone. The reason I lean so heavily on the Germans not being exceptional - but rather strikingly competent - in the early war period is that after the war you do have this narrative of the German army being absolutely amazing in the field from 39-41/42 and their successes in the early stages of the war - ESPECIALLY FRANCE - having an air of inevitability. What Allied mistakes you do see highlighted usually aren't military in nature, but are faults in the civilian leadership of the immediately pre-war era, politicians and parties which generally weren't on the scene any more (at least in the same form) after the war. Again, France is a great example of this. Rather than depicting it as a colossal failure on the part of senior French military leadership - which would have been a bit problematic given de Gaulle's relationship with the French Army in the 50s-60s - it turns into a story about the failures of the French civilian leadership to deal with Hitler early and the incredible skill and superiority of the German army. Rather than being a winnable campaign that was completely pissed down the tubes, France 1940 becomes a doomsday scenario that no one could have won. It's all about dodging responsibility for one of the worst military debacles of the 20th century.
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Jan 27, 2014 19:05
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MrYenko posted:Yes, they were offered pretty freely to museums, and quite a few ended up that way. Having visited that Museum last week for the third time, it is still loving amazing. The newer airplanes in the museum are all pretty much like that Tomcat (flown in to the NAS from their last duty station, towed over to the Museum's side of the ramp, and put inside), while the older ones they generally restore since many of them were are the only left of their type in the world and were found in the jungle or drug out of the ocean, so they're in pretty rough shape when the Museum gets them. In addition to all the one-offs many of the aircraft in the museum saw combat. Oh, and they have an SBD Dauntless that was physically present at both Pearl Harbor on the ground and that conducted strikes against the Combined Fleet at Midway...which would make it the single most historical airframe in Naval Aviation and probably in the top 5 for most historical surviving airframes in U.S. military aviation.
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Jan 27, 2014 19:07
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Time to book tickets to Pensacola.  also this PAK-FA/F-22/F-35 debate is all dumb theorycrafting. What we need here are facts, based on hard evidence. Thankfully, I'm here to provide. As the seminal work on "which airplane is cooler than which" (Ace Combat) clearly proves, a plucky American Hero with an F-22 can shoot down a PAK-FA, but only when he gets really, really close to dropping a WMD on the White House. Otherwise, the PAK-FA is invincible and can poop missiles out its butt that fly right into your face, but only when you are officially dogfighting him otherwise they can't do it for some reason. alternately: you can shoot down a PAK-FA in a hurricane but you have to shoot down a bunch of Su-35s first to prove that you really mean it. QED, plane nerds. Psion fucked around with this message at 21:22 on Jan 27, 2014 |
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Jan 27, 2014 21:19
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You gotta think in Russian!!
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Jan 27, 2014 21:22
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Pffft, you can shoot down a PAK-FA with an F6F if you REALLY feel like it. And that's after you shoot down a trio of Su-47s and weirdo experimental bombers while you're there. (Does Ace Combat Cross Rumble/Assault Horizon Legacy count?)
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Jan 27, 2014 21:37
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Psion posted:QED, plane nerds. You stick to Ace Combat and I'll keep playing (horrible) stuff like HoI3 where you have to handly industry and research 
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Jan 27, 2014 21:41
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I'm ... perfectly okay with that split of responsibilities, actually. gotta stay fly also a goon submitted this paint job in a contest and Namco actually put it in the game so that's pretty rad: 
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Jan 27, 2014 21:45
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Cyrano, how much significance (if any) would you put to the Germans being able to dry-run equipment or tactics, or gain personal combat experience, in the Spanish Civil War? Also don't ever pass up a chance to poo poo on French civilian leadership, they were still clogged with Vichy goons well into the '90s
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Jan 27, 2014 21:48
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