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Armyman25 posted:I was reading through the Alexander Stephens speech to the Georgia legislature regarding his doubts about secession and found this towards the end: It actually wasn't as ridiculous at the time as it seems to be today. Pennsylvania wasn't going anywhere, but Ohio and New York (particularly NYC) had massive Democrat/Copperhead political populations and had a lot of support for both peaceful secession and for the southern cause in general. This probably reached a peak when the mayor of NYC proposed that the city secede from both the state and the union. Pretty much anywhere that Democrats had a serious political base, you saw a lot of pro-southern sympathy. In general I get the feeling that modern histories seriously overstate the popularity of abolitionism before and during the war, particularly the hardline abolitionists who were opposed to anything gradual or with compensation. it was a pretty radical political position to take and it really only had widespread support in a handful of areas (ie, Boston, rural Pennsylvania, etc).
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Mar 2, 2016 17:24
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In a "the Union falls apart" scenario I've always thought NYC would have some sort of Paris Commune thing happen to it.
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Mar 2, 2016 17:39
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golden bubble posted:Watching it again, extra credits actually claims that Panther had an above average K/D ratio at Kursk. So it is vague enough to be accurate. I'm just kinda urked that they focus on the technical aspects of German tanks over their training and leadership advantages. Though I shouldn't have expected anything less from an episode sponsored by World of Tanks. K/D ratios are a completely bullshit metric anyway, and are only good for video game epeen stroking.
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Mar 2, 2016 18:13
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Polikarpov posted:K/D ratios are a completely bullshit metric anyway, and are only good for video game epeen stroking. If the Russian tanks are constantly having to make their way back from spawn points, or waiting out rez timers, it makes it difficult for them to contest objectives or defend their flags. Especially if the Germans were camping objectives.
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Mar 2, 2016 21:17
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Truck Chat Continued After World War I, trucks had become commonplace in militaries, aside from the Central Powers who were forced to hand over their vehicles to the Allies for destruction. The abundance of trucks was problematic, as it conflicted with the war economies turned peaceful that no longer had a market to sell vehicles in. In the US, for instance, this was due to the massive amounts of trucks being resold to civilians as surplus. They had so many trucks that, by 1929, they only purchased 800 new vehicles and most of them weren't trucks. The 1930s brought about an agreement on three seperate truck classes: Light, Medium, and Heavy. It also saw the introduction and experimentation of features such as four-wheel steering, locking differentials and independent front suspension. Heavy recovery vehicles and tank transporters were still rare at this time, and half-tracks were starting to gain ground in terms of popularity, especially in Germany. Another important aspect of military motor pools that some nations tried to improve on was standardization of the various trucks in service. While standardization may have been the intent for some nations, it was easier said then done. For example, the German military had developed a set of specifications in the mid-20s for several series of vehicles for personnel and load carriers in the light, medium, and heavy classes. Years later, they would require a new plan because their vehicle appropriation led to a plethora of cars and trucks of varying makes and models was becoming a logistical nightmare. Their answer to this problem was a new set of specifications, but this achieved very little as the manufacturers were free to interpret the requirements as they saw fit. In the lead up to World War 2, specialized trucks were still in relative infancy. Tank transporters, heavy artillery tractors and tank transporters did not keep up with the increasing weight of newer tank designs and steps weren't taken to rectify this issue until it was too late. Aircraft refuelling trucks, bridging vehicles, signals and communication trucks, and workshop trucks would all come to fruition as the need arose. Next time: I might actually talk about World War 2 vehicles!
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Mar 3, 2016 05:03
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Sharing this for your amusement, perhaps you already know about Hitler's drug habits. Among other delicious substances, Pervitin, or also known as Crystal Meth. The substance found it's way back into Germany's political elite.  If you understand german, I'd recommend you read the wiki article, there's some gold there. Tasty words like "Reichsopiumgesetz". Speaking of which, what kind of substances are currently in use in the military "in case of emergencies"?
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Mar 3, 2016 10:01
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JaucheCharly posted:Sharing this for your amusement, perhaps you already know about Hitler's drug habits. Among other delicious substances, Pervitin, or also known as Crystal Meth. RIPPED FUEL
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Mar 3, 2016 11:08
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I love the univeral lovely look of all tabloid papers.
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Mar 3, 2016 15:16
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ArchangeI posted:I'm curious: who decided which soldier went where when a maneuver was ordered during the age of the battle line? Was every soldier expected to know exactly how many steps to take when the unit was ordered to turn 90 degrees or form a square? And how was it decided who went into the first rank/second rank/third rank? I would assume that the first rank was really unpopular due to having no chance whatsoever to escape the bullets (unlike the rear ranks who had nice and big meatshields in front of them). Short answer: Yes, every soldier was expected to know exactly where he was supposed to go and how fast for all maneuvers. This is why the life of a Coalition wars era soldier was continuous, repetitive drill. As for the who is in the first rank - I think people really underestimate the combination of extremely harsh discipline and a feeling of camaraderie with soldiers in the unit. You might bitch about getting the short end of the stick, but when it comes down to it and you're in a battle, your training will take over and you will not want to let down your friends around you. Plus, there were sergeants and corporals to make sure the ranks stayed dressed, push guys in to position and such. Here is a drill manual from the British Army circa 1816 This includes substantial lessons absorbed during the Coalition wars. http://www.uppercanadianheritage.com/norfolk/drillmanual.pdf
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Mar 3, 2016 16:13
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a good post from pyf:Samovar posted:Do you know that there has been a recorded instance of a navy losing to a cavalry charge? Well, now you do.
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Mar 3, 2016 16:33
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Hogge Wild posted:a good post from pyf:  wikipdia posted:the French suffered no casualties. 
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Mar 3, 2016 16:35
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Hogge Wild posted:a good post from pyf: But has a spearman ever beat a tank?
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Mar 3, 2016 16:36
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Jobbo_Fett posted:Another important aspect of military motor pools that some nations tried to improve on was standardization of the various trucks in service. Were the WWII trucks generally designed to specifications or were they just civilian trucks that the militaries bought?
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Mar 3, 2016 16:39
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Ainsley McTree posted:But has a spearman ever beat a tank? 
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Mar 3, 2016 16:39
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bewbies posted:Were the WWII trucks generally designed to specifications or were they just civilian trucks that the militaries bought? In general, armies had specifications/requirements for the various types of trucks they required, although this would be overridden based on necessity. I should be able to delve into the various nations one-by-one but, in my reading so far, we already have the German example of designing specs that nobody follows. Interestingly, the USA had what they called the "Standard Fleet" which was supposed to be, you guessed it, the standard series of trucks in a variety of weight classes. You can read about it here. The story goes that they built 60 trucks/prototypes and they did it considerably cheaper than regular manufacturers, so much so that they lobbied against the program and killed it in its infancy. Another mention, in the book, that I haven't talked about yet was, what it claims, as the most effective form of standardization to come from World War 2 - the CMP or Canadian Military Pattern. The series is important because the many sizes were built with as many similar parts as possible, allowing for much easier production and simplifying the logistics chain.
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Mar 3, 2016 17:13
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Jobbo_Fett posted:While standardization may have been the intent for some nations, it was easier said then done. For example, the German military Say no more.
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Mar 3, 2016 17:18
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100 Years Ago "Noria" is a buzzword you may have heard in relation to Verdun; here's what it is, how it works, and what the implications are for the rest of the Western Front. The Russians capture Bitlis and are planning to sail on Rize, Grigoris Balakian's mates make pointed comments about how it's a good thing he talked them out of killing themselves; Edward Mousley comes down with rheumatism; and Lieutenant Bernard Adams tells an epic three-act funny story involving batmen, hammocks, and coal.
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Mar 3, 2016 22:42
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Is there a good book/paper that documents how the US Navy intended to use its aircraft carriers during the Interwar era and just before WW2? More specifically, how would the US Navy employ its aircraft carriers with its battleship inventory if it was not for Pearl Harbor sending a lot of battleships into the drink?
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Mar 3, 2016 23:31
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Danann posted:Is there a good book/paper that documents how the US Navy intended to use its aircraft carriers during the Interwar era and just before WW2? More specifically, how would the US Navy employ its aircraft carriers with its battleship inventory if it was not for Pearl Harbor sending a lot of battleships into the drink? I can't give you a good source but the tl;dr as I understand it (navy historians correct me if I"m wrong) is that the USN was very committed to battleships after WW1, something that got kind of hosed up by the various tonnage limitation treaties. As a result they started emphasizing aggressive action of lighter ships in a kind of combined-arms approach. Aircraft carriers had a recognized role in spotting the enemy fleet and as spotters for naval gunfire and as the capabilities of the aircraft improved across the 20s and 30s they increasingly became part of the strike force. The big thing that they learned through all their wargaming in that era was that the side that struck well first was generally the one that won. The carriers were to not only spot the enemy, but also get some early blows in that would hopefully weaken them enough that the main battle line would be guaranteed a victory. You can see this emphasis in the nomenclature attached to a lot of the units and airplanes developed in this period. The SBD was the "Scout Bomber Douglas" and some of the SBDs flown off Enterprise's decks as attack craft at Midway were in "Scouting Six", VS-6 At this time the doctrine was basically a step behind the tech, which was advancing pretty rapidly, but not so far behind that the potential of aircraft was ignored. People still had misgivings as to whether an aircraft squadron could sink a battleship wihout incurring prohibitive losses from AAA. Happily for the US the debacle at Pearl Harbor didn't gut their battle plan so much as it forced them to rely more on naval aviation for the knock out blow, something which it turned out wasn't as big an issue as people feared in the late 20s and early 30s.
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Mar 3, 2016 23:59
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Danann posted:Is there a good book/paper that documents how the US Navy intended to use its aircraft carriers during the Interwar era and just before WW2? More specifically, how would the US Navy employ its aircraft carriers with its battleship inventory if it was not for Pearl Harbor sending a lot of battleships into the drink? I think that a very solid half of what you're looking for will be in The First Team. It is unfortunately about what happened rather than what might have happened. War Plan Orange is a good overview of the strategic side of things, I think (I didn't do a good job of reading it unfortunately). There's definitely some discussion in Shattered Sword which everyone ever should read, although a majority of that is as point of comparison for the Japanese. Unfortunately I got into Pacific Theater stuff when all the cool exciting stuff was about the Japanese end of things, which means my bibliography is weak on the US side. If you can somehow finagle a copy of Norman Friedman's books on the subject (and any other really), they're great although they're focused mainly on tangential topics to your interest (ship design and the Cold War).
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Mar 4, 2016 01:43
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We're talking about weird shoot downs over the in the AIRPOWER thread, and this story immediately reminded me of Hegel's guys:quote:During World War II, the BAR saw extensive service, both official and unofficial, with many branches of service. One of the BAR's most unusual uses was as a defensive aircraft weapon. In 1944, Captain Wally A. Gayda, of the USAAF Air Transport Command, reportedly used a BAR to return fire against a Japanese Army Nakajima fighter that had attacked his C-46 cargo plane over the Hump in Burma. Gayda shoved the rifle out his forward cabin window, emptying the magazine and apparently killing the Japanese pilot.
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Mar 4, 2016 02:23
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Yes, it's like a lava lamp.
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PittTheElder posted:We're talking about weird shoot downs over the in the AIRPOWER thread, and this story immediately reminded me of Hegel's guys: L-6 Grasshopper (co)pilot using his 1911 shooting down a Fi-156 Storch is just about all you need.
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Mar 4, 2016 02:28
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PittTheElder posted:We're talking about weird shoot downs over the in the AIRPOWER thread, and this story immediately reminded me of Hegel's guys: I saw a photo of 8 C-96es mounted in a rear airplane turret. That must have been better for morale than actually shooting planes.
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Mar 4, 2016 02:38
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Ensign Expendable posted:I saw a photo of 8 C-96es mounted in a rear airplane turret. That must have been better for morale than actually shooting planes. This machine kills fascists https://www.warhistoryonline.com/featured/innovative-flawed-fire-hedgehog.html  
hogmartin fucked around with this message at 02:57 on Mar 4, 2016 |
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Mar 4, 2016 02:53
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This talk about planes shooting each other down in cool ways reminds me, a Tucano T-27 armed with machine guns shot down a drug smuggler's plane a few years ago and it was caught on thermal camera. The whole thing plays out like a dramatic film climax ("2 miles to the border!") before the plane goes down hard. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gHDZqUa0m1s
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Mar 4, 2016 03:01
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Truck chat continued A small aside, the Germans weren't the only ones with problems before the war even started. It took the British far too long to realise war would return to Europe, and at a time where they lacked sufficient motor vehicles. Like other nations, this was due to WW1 leaving them without the need to buy many replacements and technological developments were slow. When war finally did rear its ugly head and the BEF made its way to the mainland, it was with 85k to 100k vehicles of varying age and quality - civilian and military. Germany I already mentioned how much of a problem standardization was for them, but here's some numbers to put it in perspective. Maj. General Adolph von Schell, who was the Director of Automotive Affairs, tried to wake the German Army from the logistical nightmare it was experiencing by reducing the number of different trucks and vehicles in service. Fahrzeugministerium records indicate that they successfully reduced the number of truck types from 131 to 23. The number of car-type designs dropped from 55 to 29. However, these numbers would again be on the rise depending on a number of factors, mostly centering around captured production facilities or using foreign military and civilian vehicles, such as the French Citroen and Renault trucks. By 1941 [approx.], only the Kubelwagen would remain in production, to be the only car in German military service. At the same time, truck production would also be simplified into 4 categories: 1.5 ton, 3, 4.5, and 6.5 ton trucks. These would include both normal and all-wheel drive versions. This doesn't mean that they stopped using the other or older designs, it just means they were no longer built. By the end of 1943, only 9 seperate types of trucks were being produced. As an aside, the various manufacturers by weight class were: Light Trucks - Steyr and Phanomen Medium Trucks - Opel, Daimler-Benz, Ford, and Borgward. Heavy Trucks - Daimler-Benz, Bussing-NAG, and Tatra. Even with the simplification of production, the German war machine would soon experience other problems thanks to the continued bombing of production facilities by the Allies. In all, Germany produced less than 500,000 transport vehicles during the entire war. Britain would go on to produce around 680,000; Canada built more than 810,000; and the USA churned out some 3 million soft-skinned motor vehicles. Edit: Derp on words tonight. Jobbo_Fett fucked around with this message at 03:17 on Mar 4, 2016 |
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Mar 4, 2016 03:14
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How many cars did the Soviets produce, and how many did they get from the West?
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Mar 4, 2016 04:02
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Hogge Wild posted:How many cars did the Soviets produce, and how many did they get from the West? Lend-Lease: 400,000+ in trucks, transporters, tanks, prime movers, etc. Wikipedia states that the 400,000+ number was for trucks and cars alone. Tanks are counted seperately. Domestic: The only numbers given in my book, without going through all the individual entries, states "During the second Five Year Plan, Soviet factories produced some 200,000 vehicles." The only concrete numbers I can find in the individual entries, put together, top off at 100,862 vehicles (cars and trucks). This isn't strictly WW2 only numbers, as at least one entry mentions that the number is from 1953. GAZ-64/67/67B: 63,489 (Produced from 1941 to 1953) GAZ-AA, GAZ-AAA: 37,373 (Produced from 1932 to 1943) Edit Deuce: Wikipedia numbers: GAZ-64/67/67B: 93,489 GAZ-AA/GAZ-AAA: 985,000+ ZIS-5: 1+ million Lol, there's no entry for the most important Russian truck of the war... the ZiS-5 truck. Jobbo_Fett fucked around with this message at 04:38 on Mar 4, 2016 |
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Mar 4, 2016 04:25
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Seriously, there's an entire page about a one-off Soviet 6x6 vehicle built in the 60s and not ONE mention of the ZiS-5? The hell?!
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Mar 4, 2016 04:44
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Uh.... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ZIS-5_%28truck%29
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Mar 4, 2016 04:53
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See edits
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Mar 4, 2016 04:57
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hogmartin posted:This machine kills fascists "Ask a Russian engineer to design you a shoe, and he'll give you something that looks like the box the shoe came in. Ask him to design something that will slaughter Germans, and he turns into Thomas loving Edison."
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Mar 4, 2016 05:41
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Hunterhr posted:"Ask a Russian engineer to design you a shoe, and he'll give you something that looks like the box the shoe came in. Ask him to design something that will slaughter Germans, and he turns into Thomas loving Edison." God I hate that quote.
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Mar 4, 2016 06:23
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Cyrano4747 posted:God I hate that quote. Americans say the dumbest poo poo about Russian engineering.
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Mar 4, 2016 06:47
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chitoryu12 posted:...a Tucano T-27 armed with machine guns shot down a drug smuggler's plane a few years ago...  I bet pretty soon someone will reinvent the Panzer II for counterinsurgency operations.
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Mar 4, 2016 10:07
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Siivola posted:Can I just say that unironically arming turboprop planes is the most adorable thing ever? Considering all the weird poo poo that the Syrian rebels have welded together over the course of the war, they probably did by accident.
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Mar 4, 2016 10:15
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Jobbo_Fett posted:As an aside, the various manufacturers by weight class were: Do you know what the deal was with Opel and Ford-Werke both being subsidiaries of American firms at this stage? Did the Nazis nationalise them during rearmament or seize them at the outbreak of the war? Actually, the same question goes for Vauxhall/Bedford in the UK, which was actively developing and building tanks and trucks for the war before the USA joined the fray, although I guess that sort of thing came under the 'we'll give you all the support we can get away with without actually being drawn into a European war' pre-1941 phase. I know that GM's European arms were much more independent from Detroit (and each other) than they were post-war but your post made me think. PittTheElder posted:We're talking about weird shoot downs over the in the AIRPOWER thread, and this story immediately reminded me of Hegel's guys: Has the semi-mythical time the minature armoured train on a tourist railway in Kent shot down a Bf109 come up? Lots of local legends about that - the most common is that the German pilot didn't realise he was strafing a one-third scale train, misjudged his altitude and crashed. Unfortunately the only official record is that the train crew claimed a half-kill for a Bf109 in tandem with a Hurricane pilot. The legend probably gets confused with the verified time an unarmoured (and un-armed) train downed an Fw190 in Kent later in the war- the plane straffed a local freight service on its way to Lydd and shot off the steam dome, releasing a huge cloud of steam without blowing up the boiler. The pilot, blinded by flying through the cloud at the bottom of his pass, was disorientated at the crucial moment, crash-landed in a nearby field, survived and was taken prisoner. Apparently the loco carried an Iron Cross kill-marker on the side of the cab for the rest of its service.
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Mar 4, 2016 13:33
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Siivola posted:Can I just say that unironically arming turboprop planes is the most adorable thing ever? Turboprops (and specifically Tucanos) have always been a thing for COIN, though. They can fly slower than jets which is handy when trying to shoot up guerrillas in jungles or whatever.
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Mar 4, 2016 13:38
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Siivola posted:Can I just say that unironically arming turboprop planes is the most adorable thing ever? Pictured: An armed turboprop plane 
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Mar 4, 2016 13:54
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MikeCrotch posted:Pictured: An armed turboprop plane Is that some kind of Warthog or a C-130 gun platform??
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