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P-Mack posted:Could have sworn I read a thing comparing the 30YW to the Congolese wars and the way they kept drawing in neighboring nations. Every way is the 30YW when you find the quasi-religious factors and the people on the outside supporting a side.
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Jan 17, 2016 13:30
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P-Mack posted:Could have sworn I read a thing comparing the 30YW to the Congolese wars and the way they kept drawing in neighboring nations.
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Jan 17, 2016 13:36
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Hazzard posted:The BBC is doing it as well, I feel ashamed. Not at all, I was just trying to make a similarly bad analogy... and failed. Out of Middle Eastern rulers and generals in all of history, who'd be the closest equivalent to Napoleon? Horemheb? He started as an officer and became the god king of Egypt and reformed the kingdom (even if his reforms weren't progressive in nature). e: mind you, even poor analogies can serve some limited purpose, but trying to apply them beyond that purpose can be harmful for understanding things. Eg. if you need to explain electrons to a school kid it can help to visualize atoms as tiny solar systems, but it's a highly inaccurate simplification and shouldn't be used beyond that. Nenonen fucked around with this message at 14:47 on Jan 17, 2016 |
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Jan 17, 2016 14:31
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They're similar in the sense that they're both horribly bloody civil wars, I guess. And, um, that's where the similarities end.P-Mack posted:Could have sworn I read a thing comparing the 30YW to the Congolese wars and the way they kept drawing in neighboring nations. You should write one and post it here 
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Jan 17, 2016 14:42
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Everyone knows irony is the superior metahistorical trope 
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Jan 17, 2016 17:58
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_a46WJ1viA 100 Years Ago I'll take "Things that are extremely relevant to modern geopolitics", please. Yes, it's time for Sykes and Picot to put their heads together and do some line-drawing that will set the bar for all other short-sighted piss artists to clear. Meanwhile, there's a valiant rearguard at Hasankale that holds the Siberian Cossacks up for a day, Robert Palmer continues watching the Engineers fail to build a bridge over the Tigris, Bernard Adams goes home on leave, and Flora Sandes gets a bollocking from her company commander.
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Jan 17, 2016 18:42
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my dad posted:They're similar in the sense that they're both horribly bloody civil wars, I guess. And, um, that's where the similarities end. You can do a little better than that: both involve outside powers fueling the fighting, and factions people think split along religious lines but don't when you look closely. But when you try to figure things like who the Early Modern versions of Assad and Isis are, the analogy quickly falls apart.
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Jan 17, 2016 19:16
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Waterloo, The Aftermath by Paul O'Keefe is a fantastic read. In reguards to the first few hours after the battle of Waterloo, where the survivors of the Anglo-Dutch-Nassau-Brunswick forces were bedding down for the night letting the Prussians pursue the fleeing wreckage of what was the Armee du Nord the head if G-Troop of the Royal Artillery Captain Mercer (this Adam ant looking dude) was in a bit of a pickle. His uniform was dirty. No like 'faded in campaign, I pissed myself and couldn't find a replacement pair of breeches dirty'. No, SOAKED WITH GORE dirty. During the battle itself he had the luck of just missing a brutal near hit with a roundshot mounted next to a fellow member of the battery moving to idly rest his elbow on the horses head chatting with the man. That poor horse however was incredibly unlucky and well his head was exploded. Mercer of course was soaked by blood and horsey brain matter. At the time and after the battle this was really no big deal, but in proceeding few days due to the chaos in that general region of Belgium apparently there wasn't enough time for him to take a bath or change his clothing. No bigge mate, just a little dirty that is all. Except well, over time the blood and brain matter congealed in his breeches and made the materiel hard and very very crusty. Painfully crusty. So crusty in fact, it cut. He suffered a serious rubbing cut across the taint to the anus which got a minor infection. He was lucky to recover more or less, but the pain from the wound prevented him riding properly for the rest of his life unless in an emergency. Not as bad as dying during the battle or being haunted enough you can never go near a open door or window to go again but yeah. A Waterloo veteran with a taint injury. Always pack some spare trousers. Get the book, seriously good stuff. SeanBeansShako fucked around with this message at 19:32 on Jan 17, 2016 |
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Jan 17, 2016 19:26
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Does somebody want to spurg about the air war on the Eastern Front? It never seems to come up in general accounts, but I've heard a claim that it was secretly decisive.
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Jan 17, 2016 19:52
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So, here's the texts I promised:Proclamation to the Inhabitants of the Former Grand Duchy of Lithuania posted:Your land has, for the past more than a hundred years, not known liberty, oppressed by hostile brutal power, be it Russian, German, Bolshevik - brutal power that, without asking the populace, forced upon it foreign models of behaviour, binding its will, often life-breaking. Kapsukas on the fall of Vilnius (fragments) posted:We had to exert all our strength; we mobilised the Communists and sent agitators to the front. However, our frontline units were utterly exhausted after four months of life on the march and three on the front in the worst conditions. With a lack of rail communication in Lithuania and shortfalls of food and horse trains in some townships (in Vilnius guberniya) as well as inadequacies of supply organs in others (in Kaunas guberniya), the situation in some regions of the front became unbearable.
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Jan 17, 2016 21:31
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Kapsukas is a piece of poo poo. It's actually a moniker based on a region/ethnic grouping/alt naming, to make him look closer to the "people". Even had a city named after him later on. rear end in a top hat. Tevery, if you want, I can see if the Lithuanian version matches up to your translated one.
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Jan 17, 2016 21:45
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BurningStone posted:Does somebody want to spurg about the air war on the Eastern Front? It never seems to come up in general accounts, but I've heard a claim that it was secretly decisive. It mostly played out similarly to the ground war. The Soviet Air Force got the absolute poo poo kicked out of it during the opening invasion, and continued to suffer due to a lack of modern planes and trained pilots. Eventually planes like the IL-2 and the Yak-9 managed to start making it to the front lines, the experience gap between German and Soviet pilots narrowed, and by the end of the War the Germans basically ran out of planes and pilots. For a more in-depth answer, the "War in the Air" episode of Soviet Storm has a good overview of the difficulties faced by the Soviet Air Force and what kinds of engagements were common on the Eastern Front. It's a good episode of a good documentary series, and the whole thing is worth a watch if you've got the time.
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Jan 18, 2016 00:19
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Picked up Tank Men by Robert Kershaw of It Never Snows in September fame, and when reading through the "dramatis personae" (or list of dudes he quotes as sources   ) I find the following in the British and Commonwealth section:quote:Bernard Montgomery. Gen later Field Marshal. Commander of the Eight Army after August 1942 and architect of the decisive Desert victory at El Alamein in November 1942. His complacent belief that the Sherman 75 'would suffice' after their introduction condemned British tank men to confronting superior panzers in Normandy and NW Europe with inferior tanks. But I'm sure he'll have lots of American and Soviet sources included that'll talk about the benefits and flaws of the other designs and versions of the Sherman to put it all in context right? Oh, no. Just four people. One of them is Belton Cooper 
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Jan 18, 2016 00:37
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Acebuckeye13 posted:It mostly played out similarly to the ground war. The Soviet Air Force got the absolute poo poo kicked out of it during the opening invasion, and continued to suffer due to a lack of modern planes and trained pilots. Eventually planes like the IL-2 and the Yak-9 managed to start making it to the front lines, the experience gap between German and Soviet pilots narrowed, and by the end of the War the Germans basically ran out of planes and pilots. What's interesting is apparently the Navy had it's poo poo together and avoided anything disastrous happening to them.
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Jan 18, 2016 00:42
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Arquinsiel posted:Picked up Tank Men by Robert Kershaw of It Never Snows in September fame, and when reading through the "dramatis personae" (or list of dudes he quotes as sources This seems bizarre to me, given brits notably did have fireflies in NW europe and the usual argument goes "Why didn't America make the firefly?".
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Jan 18, 2016 00:44
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HEY GAL posted:Yeah, my ex thought that, specifically the part where they both involved a big area with weak central control Did they become your ex when they implied that your dudes were basically the ISIS of the 17th century?
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Jan 18, 2016 00:45
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spectralent posted:This seems bizarre to me, given brits notably did have fireflies in NW europe and the usual argument goes "Why didn't America make the firefly?". What is the firefly? I never heard of a British tank with that name.
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Jan 18, 2016 00:48
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Libluini posted:What is the firefly? I never heard of a British tank with that name. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sherman_Firefly It's a British upgrade of the M4 where they crammed a 17 pounder in the turret. It was pretty good at killing heavy tanks.
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Jan 18, 2016 00:49
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Libluini posted:What is the firefly? I never heard of a British tank with that name. Assuming that's not  : A sherman with a 17pdr crammed into the turret.e;fb In an effort to be more useful: It was a spectralent fucked around with this message at 02:25 on Jan 18, 2016 |
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Jan 18, 2016 00:50
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Cyrano4747 posted:Did they become your ex when they implied that your dudes were basically the ISIS of the 17th century? my dudes appear not to give a gently caress about religion. i have seen one (1) reference to a religious argument in the Mansfeld Regiment legal documents and I'm still not sure whether the guy who mentioned it made it up and my ex compared the 30yw to the congo war, not to this thing in syria, since we broke up before this thing became a thing
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Jan 18, 2016 00:50
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Raenir Salazar posted:What's interesting is apparently the Navy had it's poo poo together and avoided anything disastrous happening to them. TBF its not like they had the capability to do much of anything that could go wrong.
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Jan 18, 2016 00:51
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it was also like the sierra leone war in that, as one dude put it, the lines between magic and modernity were blurred. the secret is they were barely there to begin with
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Jan 18, 2016 00:53
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HEY GAL posted:it was also like the sierra leone war in that, as one dude put it, the lines between magic and modernity were blurred. the secret is they were barely there to begin with Is anyone actually ascribing that to the wars in those instances? From what little I've read about medieval and early modern peasant cultures magic was a pretty big loving part of them to begin with, and from what I've gathered from you it was pretty prevalent in the upper echelons of society as well. I just kind of lump the magical wards against pistol bullets in with the various traditions to fend off disease or ward off the evil eye.
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Jan 18, 2016 00:55
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Cyrano4747 posted:Is anyone actually ascribing that to the wars in those instances? From what little I've read about medieval and early modern peasant cultures magic was a pretty big loving part of them to begin with, and from what I've gathered from you it was pretty prevalent in the upper echelons of society as well. I just kind of lump the magical wards against pistol bullets in with the various traditions to fend off disease or ward off the evil eye. edit: the first article in gustavus adolphus's articles of war for 1621 prohibits witchcraft and the magical enchantment of weapons edit 2: the guys who killed wallenstein did so with a partisan that had been washed in holy water, since he was obviously immune to both edged weapons and being shot HEY GUNS fucked around with this message at 01:07 on Jan 18, 2016 |
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Jan 18, 2016 00:59
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This is sounding disturbingly like 2E D&D. How do you calculate a pike block's THAC0?
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Jan 18, 2016 01:10
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HEY GAL posted:no, that's hard core calvinists, or the fanatical fringe of catholics like that dude who assassinated William the Silent with a wheellock pistol firing square bullets OK, now you've piqued my interest. Square bullets?
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Jan 18, 2016 01:18
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LeadSled posted:OK, now you've piqued my interest. Square bullets? bullets that have either been cut or hammered into cubes are an assassin's weapon because they do terrible things to the inside of a human body. the guy who killed william the silent loaded his pistol with three of them at once and shot him at point blank range. the reason he did this is that the king of spain had put a bounty on william's head when people tell you that the past was a more innocent time and the world is only getting worse, they are wrong; the only difference between him and us is we would have streamed it to youtube, maybe the assassin would have had some friends add snazzy details in postproduction once he had received his martyr's death HEY GUNS fucked around with this message at 01:35 on Jan 18, 2016 |
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Jan 18, 2016 01:23
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Bonus fact: Both the US and UK had both a plane and armoured vehicle which shared a name; the UK's firefly and firefly, and the US's hellcat and hellcat. Kind of pointless fact I guess. Also checking, the firefly was literally equipped to Monty's 21st specifically for Normandy, so god knows what the book meant.
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Jan 18, 2016 01:24
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Cyrano4747 posted:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sherman_Firefly spectralent posted:Assuming that's not Interesting, a British counter to the German Tiger tank. I'm thinking I never noticed them because whenever I read something about the war in the West, they got thrown in with all the other Shermans by the authors. 
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Jan 18, 2016 01:25
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The Puckle gun was designed to be capable of firing either round or square bullets, the latter was recommended to only be used against non-Christian opponents.
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Jan 18, 2016 01:26
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P-Mack posted:The Puckle gun was designed to be capable of firing either round or square bullets, the latter was recommended to only be used against non-Christian opponents.
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Jan 18, 2016 01:30
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spectralent posted:Bonus fact: Both the US and UK had both a plane and armoured vehicle which shared a name; the UK's firefly and firefly, and the US's hellcat and hellcat.
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Jan 18, 2016 01:32
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Libluini posted:Interesting, a British counter to the German Tiger tank. I'm thinking I never noticed them because whenever I read something about the war in the West, they got thrown in with all the other Shermans by the authors. It's one of those things that, if you know more about WW2 than "Blitzkrieg, France Falls/Dunkirk, Battle of Britain, wait a bit, Normandy, Germany Beaten, War Over!" in the UK, you've probably heard of. Interesting it's not as well known elsewhere, though, I suppose.
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Jan 18, 2016 01:32
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spectralent posted:It's one of those things that, if you know more about WW2 than "Blitzkrieg, France Falls/Dunkirk, Battle of Britain, wait a bit, Normandy, Germany Beaten, War Over!" in the UK, you've probably heard of. Interesting it's not as well known elsewhere, though, I suppose. I have two books over WWII, one compares recruitment, training and other factors of the US and the German army, while the other is Ivan's War. None of the other books I've read in the past bother much with tanks either. The only comprehensive book about tanks I've ever read was My Tank is Fight!, which tells you something about my interests, I guess.
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Jan 18, 2016 01:43
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Libluini posted:I have two books over WWII, one compares recruitment, training and other factors of the US and the German army, while the other is Ivan's War. None of the other books I've read in the past bother much with tanks either. Fun fact, My Tank Is Fight! is the book that introduced me to this very website, way back when. I wonder if elpintogrande got commission off my 
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Jan 18, 2016 01:53
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Acebuckeye13 posted:It mostly played out similarly to the ground war. The Soviet Air Force got the absolute poo poo kicked out of it during the opening invasion, and continued to suffer due to a lack of modern planes and trained pilots. Eventually planes like the IL-2 and the Yak-9 managed to start making it to the front lines, the experience gap between German and Soviet pilots narrowed, and by the end of the War the Germans basically ran out of planes and pilots. I second the soviet storm, it probably might be a little pop history, and doesn't go extremely in depth, but it doesn't seem to have outright myths in it and its an enjoyable watch.
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Jan 18, 2016 01:55
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Why did the beret become a popular military hat? It doesn't keep you warm, it doesn't keep the sun out of your eyes, you can't wear it under a helmet. All it does is look sharp and fit inside a pocket.
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Jan 18, 2016 01:57
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Gargamel Gibson posted:Why did the beret become a popular military hat? It doesn't keep you warm, it doesn't keep the sun out of your eyes, you can't wear it under a helmet. All it does is look sharp and fit inside a pocket. Keeps your hair under check.
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Jan 18, 2016 02:00
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Mine always falls out of my combat jacket so you can take that one off. Just tuck the loving thing into my belt.
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Jan 18, 2016 02:00
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Libluini posted:Interesting, a British counter to the German Tiger tank. I'm thinking I never noticed them because whenever I read something about the war in the West, they got thrown in with all the other Shermans by the authors. If you've played videogames involving the Brits in Normandy you'd know them and love them. Mainly they seem to be the only Allied tanks devs think can match up against the invulnerable hordes of German Panthers and Tigers. spectralent posted:Assuming that's not There's a number of inaccuracies here. Firstly while the Firefly was a couple of tons heavier than the 75mm it was adapted from, it's fairly comparable to the late war 76mm version of the Sherman. It's certainly not comparable to the Sherman Jumbos the US produced. Secondly mostly Fireflies fired standard APCBC ammo, not sabotted ammo. The standard ammo was already able to penetrate a Tiger frontally at 1000 yards. The APDS didn't factor into it. The US did not 'already' have the 76mm. The Firefly was being worked on in 1943, whereas the first variants of the 76mm Sherman was being worked on in March 1944, and didn't get deployed until August 1944. The Firefly saw very effective use mixed in 25%/75% units together with 75mm Shermans. Why didn't the US build it? Because hindsight is 20/20, and in the event the Allies were fortunate in that the majority of the heavy tanks were in fact faced by the British. 'Blaming' the 75mm Sherman on Montgomery is really weird, though. Fangz fucked around with this message at 02:12 on Jan 18, 2016 |
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