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Koesj posted:My German ex always told me she had a right poo poo time with the dutch language at first. People from the border areas though...
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Nov 12, 2014 01:21
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Hey Gal, maybe you've mentioned this, but how many guys in one of these regiments? I mean the practical fighting number you'd expect to have, not paper strength or those with non-combat jobs.
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Nov 12, 2014 01:30
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BurningStone posted:Hey Gal, maybe you've mentioned this, but how many guys in one of these regiments? I mean the practical fighting number you'd expect to have, not paper strength or those with non-combat jobs. Big regiments can form two battalions/brigades when they fight but small ones have to glom onto someone else's. HEY GUNS fucked around with this message at 03:10 on Nov 12, 2014 |
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Nov 12, 2014 01:37
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Bacarruda posted:The US Army also issued phrasebooks in French, Dutch, and of all things, Portuguese (presumably to help GIs working with these guys). Those Portuguese phrasebooks were probably also handed out to airmen operating in or passing through Lajes in the Azores. Although they were technically neutral the British managed to get the Portuguese to let them use the Azores as a ferry/ASW base in part thanks to a treaty signed in the fourteenth century (although mostly it was promises of military aid to the Salazar government). Vincent Van Goatse fucked around with this message at 03:13 on Nov 12, 2014 |
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Nov 12, 2014 03:09
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HEY GAL posted:It varies a lot, since "a regiment" is just "the administrative unit headed by an Oberst and with more than one company in it." Big ones can have two thousand or so people in them, small ones a few hundred. I think I saw a regiment once that had thirteen companies in it, which depending on the size of the companies (300 people at the start of the century, less than a hundred by the 1680s) could have been up to 3,900 people not counting the officers. And I suppose the percentage who carried each type of weapon varied as well. It sounds like it must have been a headache to organize and command, but was anything about the 30 Years War easy?
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Nov 12, 2014 04:26
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BurningStone posted:And I suppose the percentage who carried each type of weapon varied as well. It sounds like it must have been a headache to organize and command, but was anything about the 30 Years War easy?
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Nov 12, 2014 04:33
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HEY GAL posted:Naaah, that's straight up 1:2 pike:musket or 80:20:200 pike:halberd:musket, it's pretty standard. People actually used halberds in large numbers? I always assumed they were too impractical to use compared to a pike. Mostly because my little research into medieval/renaissance weapons is that the cooler it looks, the less likely it is to have actually been used.
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Nov 12, 2014 04:42
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Who was that guy, I think a British air force commander who was just totally loving nuts and had dreams about fallen soldiers riding beams of light from mountains to rescue an imperiled Britain? I think he might have believed in fairies too.
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Nov 12, 2014 04:46
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Frostwerks posted:Who was that guy, I think a British air force commander who was just totally loving nuts and had dreams about fallen soldiers riding beams of light from mountains to rescue an imperiled Britain? I think he might have believed in fairies too. That would be Lord Dowding http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugh_Dowding,_1st_Baron_Dowding
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Nov 12, 2014 04:49
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Don Gato posted:People actually used halberds in large numbers? I always assumed they were too impractical to use compared to a pike. Mostly because my little research into medieval/renaissance weapons is that the cooler it looks, the less likely it is to have actually been used. Edit: it is really really easy to ruin a pikeman's day just by stepping slightly to the side and walking forward a few steps with your short-rear end weapon. This is also one reason why the halfpike is a thing.
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Nov 12, 2014 04:52
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Fangz posted:What was the linguistics situation during WWII? As I recall the combined US Navy - British - Dutch force at the Battle of Java Sea was significantly hampered by the Dutch Admiral, Karel Doorman, having to have his orders translated to English before being broadcast to the rest of the task force, to say nothing of the incompatibility of their various communications systems and procedures.
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Nov 12, 2014 04:56
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HEY GAL posted:Edit: it is really really easy to ruin a pikeman's day just by stepping slightly to the side and walking forward a few steps with your short-rear end weapon. This is also one reason why the halfpike is a thing. Was any attention paid to fighting as an individual with a pike, or was it all about working in groups? Would pikemen and musketeers carry a sword or something in case they wound up in a fight separated from their company?
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Nov 12, 2014 05:01
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I suspect in those days, the fae folk were less benevolent spirits that bestow blessings, and more capricious spirits that must be appeased via ritual. He's probably sent so many men to their deaths that he'd believe anything to keep them alive.
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Nov 12, 2014 05:06
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Chamale posted:Was any attention paid to fighting as an individual with a pike, or was it all about working in groups? Would pikemen and musketeers carry a sword or something in case they wound up in a fight separated from their company?
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Nov 12, 2014 05:06
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It must suck to be thwacked in the balls by the butt end of a pike because the joker in front of you decided it wasn't an eighteen foot day.
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Nov 12, 2014 05:44
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Phobophilia posted:I suspect in those days, the fae folk were less benevolent spirits that bestow blessings, and more capricious spirits that must be appeased via ritual. Are you talking about Dowding? I dunno, I'm pretty sure by the time of the Second World War the Fae had long completed their pop-cultural transformation from capricious to more benevolent creatures.
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Nov 12, 2014 05:54
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Seeing Fury recently brought this to mind: tank hatches can lock from the inside, right? Seems like a pretty obvious defense against some guy tossing a few grenades into the hull.
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Nov 12, 2014 07:04
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Yes, but that's only dictated by doctrine when you're passing through bad neighborhoods.
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Nov 12, 2014 07:18
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Germany, 1945: A Bad Neighborhood.
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Nov 12, 2014 07:36
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Yes, it's like a lava lamp.
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brozozo posted:Seeing Fury recently brought this to mind: tank hatches can lock from the inside, right? Seems like a pretty obvious defense against some guy tossing a few grenades into the hull. Yeah they can. There's a Russian memoir where the guy panics a German tank commander though, who forgets or fumbles to lock his hatch, and ends poorly. I'm sure it's been done a few times.
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Nov 12, 2014 07:59
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PittTheElder posted:Germany, 1945: A Bad Neighborhood. And the worst ghettos you've ever seen.
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Nov 12, 2014 09:21
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Don Gato posted:People actually used halberds in large numbers? I always assumed they were too impractical to use compared to a pike. Mostly because my little research into medieval/renaissance weapons is that the cooler it looks, the less likely it is to have actually been used. The halberd lived on into the Napoleonic era. A lot of British battalions had their color guard carry halberds. They were used in combat.
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Nov 12, 2014 12:53
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Frostwerks posted:And the worst ghettos you've ever seen. Their ghetto blasters were ideal for breaking.
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Nov 12, 2014 15:07
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The HOA are incredible assholes.
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Nov 12, 2014 16:00
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Can anyone recommend a good introductory book to the Iraq-Iran War? I found a lot of stuff in my library that was published before the war even ended in 88, is this worth checking out? I would also be interested in fiction from either country related to the war.
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Nov 12, 2014 16:14
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brozozo posted:Seeing Fury recently brought this to mind: tank hatches can lock from the inside, right? Seems like a pretty obvious defense against some guy tossing a few grenades into the hull. When your tank is on fire, you don't have time to unlock your hatch before bailing out. But yes, doctrine dictates that hatches should be locked when there's a danger of infantry climbing all over you.
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Nov 12, 2014 16:18
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The German phrasebook for American soldiers is pretty fascinating reading. Some of the pronunciation stuff is really wonky. "Möchten" is pronounced "mershten"? I guess that explains Webster's (who was supposed to be decent at German) hosed up German in Band of Brothers.
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Nov 12, 2014 17:08
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KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:The halberd lived on into the Napoleonic era. A lot of British battalions had their color guard carry halberds. They were used in combat. Didn't the French Officer of the party guarding the Eagle carry a blinged out Napoleonic mace too? Or was that the commanding officer of the regimental band?
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Nov 12, 2014 18:08
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100 Years Ago The men around Ypres have now reached the stage of exhaustion seen earlier before the Indian Corps arrived at Armentieres. Even as shells fall around them, the men are falling asleep where they stand; but the Germans are no longer inclined to try to take advantage of it. I'm also taking a look at why the Eastern Front managed to deadlock itself despite never degenerating into sustained trench warfare; as, having finished retreating from Warsaw, the Germans begin the Battle of Lodz. The Daily Telegraph also tells a number of amusing trench-stories for the first time, including the first reported example I've seen of men on both sides holding up a paper target on a stick so they can have a friendly shooting competition, something that happened surprisingly regularly in quiet sections of the line all through the period of static warfare.
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Nov 12, 2014 18:09
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Arminius' War Chapter 01: Riding on High Emotions since 9 AD 1933 a nice little novel was published in Germany. “Die Geschwister Oppermann” (The Brothers and Sisters Oppermann) by Lion Feuchtwanger, a famous German author. You may have heard of him. In this book, the right-winger Dr. Vogelsang, teacher of young Berthold Oppermann, gives out some homework. Berthold is supposed to write a report about the significance of Arminius the Cherusker (or “Hermann der Cherusker”, as he is known at the time and in the novel) for the German people. Berthold Oppermann does his best and writes a dialectic report. The second half of his report will be about why Arminius the Cherusker was indeed really important for the German people. The first half serves up a lot of arguments why he actually wasn't, to be dealt with in the second half. He then starts presenting his report in school and his teacher Vogelsang completely flips out, raining metaphorical death and ruin on the poor child. Berthold never gets to present the second half of his report on Arminius the Cherusker. Vogelsang never forgives the young Jewish pupil in his class the tarnishing of proud Arminius, the Germanic super-hero who saved Germany single-handedly from the Romans. His unrelenting hate finally drives Berthold to commit suicide. Feuchtwanger's book only replays thoughts and hysterics playing out in the Germany of his time. But how did some weird Germanic warlord from the ancient times got to be so important for Germany in those peoples' eyes in the first place? Just to cut you off, no the Nazis didn't have anything to do with this, they just added some strange philosophical fuckery which translates best into English as Like Racism, But Somehow Even Worse. Of course we Germans can't do things by half, we only deal in extremes. So after WWII was over, history swung back to the other side like a missile and exploded into fancy tales of Arminius, Mega-Traitor and Killer of Innocent Romans. It took almost until today before crazy myths and fabrications started to break down a bit for some more actual, objective work on Arminius the Cherusker. And his famous battle, where he gloriously defeated the Roman army of Varus. I mean, where he heinously ambushed poor, innocent Varus, his personal friend, to slaughter unarmed Romans in cold blood. What really happened, and why emotions are always at an all-time high in Germany when this is discussed, follows in my next post. (Hopefully today or tomorrow morning at the latest.) As promised, I'm starting my series on Arminius' war against Rome, starting with some groundwork today. Also as demanded, crossposted between this thread and the ancient history thread.
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Nov 12, 2014 18:51
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Raskolnikov38 posted:That would be Lord Dowding Dowding was actually a pretty incredible leader. RAF did him dirty 
bewbies fucked around with this message at 19:23 on Nov 12, 2014 |
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Nov 12, 2014 19:20
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Dowding was pretty awesome.
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Nov 12, 2014 19:26
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Really strange that I don't remember hearing about him.
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Nov 12, 2014 21:09
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HEY GAL posted:Groups. Think about it, you have eighteen feet of reach, which means that anyone can get inside your reach whether or not they really try. One pikeman is really kind of pathetic and embarrassing, but in groups of hundreds or more they're fantastic. You can half-hand it if you want to (we never do in reenactment because that's an excellent way to hit the guy behind you by accident), but everyone carries swords anyway. What's the maneuverability like on one of those big blocks of pike dudes?
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Nov 12, 2014 21:17
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Bacarruda posted:Soldiers on both sides were also issued with phrasebooks. You can see an example of a US Army English-German book here. There's some helpful stuff for surviving in the German jungle in there: He has been bitten by a poisonous snake = ayr is fawn ai-ner GIFT-shlahng-a G'BISS-en vawr-den I want a mosquito net = ish MERSH-ta ain maw-SKEE-to-nets HA-ben Can you write with English-style letters? = KERN-en zee la-TAI-nish SHRAI-ben? That might be helpful for goons stuck in German archives 
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Nov 12, 2014 22:48
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They're really going for the Bavarian pronunciation in those translations.
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Nov 12, 2014 23:04
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Remember that German is still very much a living language in the US at that time; it was the 1-2 combo of the world wars that really destroyed it as something that people spoke around their neighborhoods or taught their kids in the home. It could be someone with a yiddish or bavarian background writing how he'd pronounce the sentence, or it could be some regional American pronunciation from middle Kentucky or Pennsylvania or the upper Midwest or any of the other big sploches of pre-1910 German settlement. If you speak German and you've ever run into someone who speaks Pennsylvania Dutch (which isn't really Dutch as in 'from the Netherlands' - it's just a corruption of "Pensylvanisch-Deutsch") think that. They're one of the few groups who never really gave up on the language even with the wars. That's an extreme case as they've been relatively linguistically isolated from modern hochdetusch for ~250ish years, but it works as an example. The vowel sounds in particular slide around a bit.
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Nov 12, 2014 23:39
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gipskrampf posted:There's some helpful stuff for surviving in the German jungle in there: Unless it says "Which way to the whorehouse" I don't see it as being that useful to a soldier.
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Nov 12, 2014 23:48
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gipskrampf posted:There's some helpful stuff for surviving in the German jungle in there: My favourite is "The US Government will pay you". I can just imagine a GI yelling that after running over someone's fence with their jeep. Rhymenoserous posted:Unless it says "Which way to the whorehouse" I don't see it as being that useful to a soldier. There's "bathhouse" and I think winking and nudging suggestively transcends language barriers. Ensign Expendable fucked around with this message at 23:54 on Nov 12, 2014 |
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Nov 12, 2014 23:51
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Ensign Expendable posted:My favourite is "The US Government will pay you". I can just imagine a GI yelling that after running over someone's fence with their jeep. IIRC a big NATO exercise (I want to say Atlantic Lion in '84) had civilian contact admins driving around with 2 million or so total in cash D-Marks 
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