|
AbleArcher posted:Not with a straight face or any consideration for preponderance. Claiming the Channel Dash was as consequential as PQ18, Pedestal or Black May would be laughable. Except nobody has in this current iteration of "Lol the Luftwaffe is terrible at everything" 
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 00:03
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 27, 2024 15:04 |
|
|
Flipswitch posted:Risking a can of worms in this thread but I'm curious, the loathing against Tank Destroyers in this thread, or TD chat, is that more the US doctrine of it or against the things themselves? Thinking that you hear people ragging on the idea of them, but less so individual models. Was curious as I was reading some stuff about the SU-85 and SU-100 and they don't get mentioned when it comes to TDs. It's really more of a historical artifact of the last thread, where there was at least one dude who would not shut up about how tank destroyer doctrine was a good and cost-effective solution in both theory AND practice, and who was willing to argue the point over and over again across multiple pages on multiple occasions until everyone was heartily sick of it.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 00:17
|
|
|
Flipswitch posted:Risking a can of worms in this thread but I'm curious, the loathing against Tank Destroyers in this thread, or TD chat, is that more the US doctrine of it or against the things themselves? Thinking that you hear people ragging on the idea of them, but less so individual models. Was curious as I was reading some stuff about the SU-85 and SU-100 and they don't get mentioned when it comes to TDs. It's not about the equipment, it's about the terminology of 'tank destroyer' being an extremely misleading term for assault guns, made worse by world of tanks. The short version is, 'tank destroyers' aren't just for destroying tanks. It gets more complicated because the US actually did have things called tank destroyers, and they're weren't necessarily assault guns (they had turrets). Add a fairly regular stream of WoT players asking stuff about it itt, combine this threads TRUE HISTORIAN problem of arguing tiny, salient points made in other people's arguments, and it's a derail that goes for pages and happened too often. This drives the non WW2 historians itt insane. We haven't actually had the discussion for awhile though so maybe it's time (someone will probably correct me on this post, which is based on vague memories of the last time it came up and probably wrong in places)
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 00:17
|
|
|
Cyrano4747 posted:My point wasn't that stukas are the solution, but that it doesn't take armor piercing bombs and naval torpedoes to kill merchantmen. Condors sank less than 100 British ships between 1940-43, a very small amount in the grand scheme of things and even when compared to other aircraft (mainly Ju 88 and He 111 which did get naval strike versions). It almost never operated against convoys. It's distinction and reputation are from its ability to find and attack lone ships in what should have been safe waters. However lack of radar in the beginning and increased air cover later seriously hurt its effectiveness. A much bigger problem was that aforementioned Ju 88 and He 111 units often fell well short in terms of hit rates compared to what the USN, IJN and RN achieved in similar circumstances.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 00:18
|
|
|
Hey musket era posters, I've been doing some stuff at work with black powder and I've noticed that the residue left after it's burnt really stinks (sulfur). Do your soldiers complain about this or is it so far down on the list of smelly awful experiences in their lives that they don't care?
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 00:22
|
|
|
Flipswitch posted:Risking a can of worms in this thread but I'm curious, the loathing against Tank Destroyers in this thread, or TD chat, is that more the US doctrine of it or against the things themselves? Thinking that you hear people ragging on the idea of them, but less so individual models. Was curious as I was reading some stuff about the SU-85 and SU-100 and they don't get mentioned when it comes to TDs. I kinda mentioned it obliquely in my questioning about cold war tank design, but the Hellcat at least had a very respectable performance on the battlefield despite the whole tank destroyer doctrine thing never quite working out. I think it was something like a 4:1 K/D in the Bulge? K/D isn't everything, but the M18 seemed to do a fairly good job of killing german tanks at least, which is nominally what it was designed for.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 00:27
|
|
|
AbleArcher posted:A much bigger problem was that aforementioned Ju 88 and He 111 units often fell well short in terms of hit rates compared to what the USN, IJN and RN achieved in similar circumstances. Source? I'm genuinely curious about this.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 00:28
|
|
Splode posted:Hey musket era posters, I've been doing some stuff at work with black powder and I've noticed that the residue left after it's burnt really stinks (sulfur). Do your soldiers complain about this or is it so far down on the list of smelly awful experiences in their lives that they don't care? I imagine they were used to it, if you are drilled enough doing anything becomes a accepted habit. Gun powder itsdelf during the loading process dried your mouth out like a bitch and soldiers tended to get really thirsty due to this. It was a pain in the rear end during a battle though as that stuff built up in the barrel and eventually made muskets even more innaccurate. Remember in the middle of a battle your going to smell a lot of poo poo, piss, vomit and blood so something like sulfur might also be a distracting sort of perfume to dull those wonderful body fluid smells. Some soldiers when desperate enough used gun powder to season their meagre rations when things were tight. SeanBeansShako fucked around with this message at 00:42 on May 25, 2016 |
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 00:39
|
|
|
The really scary part about the U-boat threat was how effective they were, compared to the number of boats at sea. Force numbers were HILARIOUSLY low well into 1941 when allied convoy and ASW efforts really started to become effective. If gay black Doenitz could have put 100 combat effective boats to sea at the beginning of the war, instead of 20 (or fewer,) the war might have been significantly different. A better gauge of the effectivity of a submarine blockade can be seen through the efforts of the US Navy submarine force against Japan in 1944 and 1945.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 00:46
|
|
|
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1wwUTEkRano country too poor or obnoxious to obtain anything better? don't worry, raytheon will fix you up with the GOODS
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 00:47
|
|
|
Splode posted:Hey musket era posters, I've been doing some stuff at work with black powder and I've noticed that the residue left after it's burnt really stinks (sulfur). Do your soldiers complain about this or is it so far down on the list of smelly awful experiences in their lives that they don't care? I've been involved with blackpowder all my life as a hobbyist/son of hobbyist (my parents were big into the mountain-man chic revival in the '70s, and competed in amateur shooting matches and such, I was pulling the trigger on a Kentucky rifle before I could walk). I kinda like the smell of gunsmoke. Sort of like how hot-rodders love the smell of exhaust, or machinists love the smell of a machine shop, or this guy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jts9suWIDlU&t=111s So I'd imagine they (at least the professional soldiers like Hey Gal's mercs, maybe not so much your average ACW conscript) probably actually enjoyed it.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 00:47
|
|
Bad Angus! Bad!
|
For what it's worth, if I recall the tank destroyer doctrine arguments correctly (not a historian, I expect and welcome corrections), the issue was essentially that the US saw the German blitzkrieg early in the war and decided they needed something to counter that. What they came up with was the tank destroyer doctrine - a strategic reserve of specialized mobile anti-tank units intended to counter a massed Panzer thrust by rushing to the endangered area and beating the hell out of the attacking tanks. The problem is that blitzkrieg is something you do when you're on the offensive and when you're on the defensive, as the Germans were when facing the Americans, you don't really use massed Panzer attacks that often. As a result the tank destroyers often either sat around idle or were pressed into much-needed infantry support roles, which they weren't designed for and weren't particularly good at. On the few occasions they saw service the way they were more or less intended to do (Battle of the Bulge basically), they performed well, but this was a pretty small fraction of the time they actually spent in the field. The big thread arguments basically centered around whether or not they were worth the time and effort it took to get them to the field considering how little they were used in their intended roles, or if the US Army would have been better served just building and shipping more Shermans or whatnot. Hashing that stuff out over and over and over again was the reason why there's a warning about tank destroyer doctrine in the OP.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 00:53
|
|
|
 best tank vietnam '65-'69
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 00:55
|
|
|
Flipswitch posted:Risking a can of worms in this thread but I'm curious, the loathing against Tank Destroyers in this thread, or TD chat, is that more the US doctrine of it or against the things themselves? Thinking that you hear people ragging on the idea of them, but less so individual models. Was curious as I was reading some stuff about the SU-85 and SU-100 and they don't get mentioned when it comes to TDs. Tomn posted:It's really more of a historical artifact of the last thread, where there was at least one dude who would not shut up about how tank destroyer doctrine was a good and cost-effective solution in both theory AND practice, and who was willing to argue the point over and over again across multiple pages on multiple occasions until everyone was heartily sick of it. The tank destroyer guy was me and I do think I had a point, though I've certainly accepted that it's not a worthwhile argument to make anymore in the thread and I haven't posted about it in years. I think there's less disagreement about the issue than people joke about, for what it's worth. Pretty much everyone agrees that US tank destroyers WERE effective when they were in their doctrinal role of stopping German armored attacks. With the lone exception of Kasserine Pass (where the TDs were halftracks with 75mm guns instead of actual M10s or M18s), every time that German tanks attacked a sector with US TDs in the area, the TDs were a key part of the defense and effectively hunted and killed German armor. Pretty much everyone (including me) also agrees that there weren't all that many German armored attacks against US forces. For the vast majority of 1944/45, the US was attacking German forces, not the other way around, which meant that TDs weren't really in a position to fulfill their designed role and they were acting instead of mobile artillery or taking the place of actual tanks - jobs which they did not do as well as actual SP artillery or actual tanks. So the question really comes down to, was it a smart decision for the US to invest in the tank/TD split strategy, given what they knew at the time and the level of armored vehicle technology available. I personally argue yes - in the early 1940s, German armored attacks were rightly feared and it makes sense to me to go above and beyond to prepare your force to defend and repel panzer attacks. Additionally, I don't believe that the US could have produced 76mm Shermans or Pershings significantly faster than IRL if they had foregone the tank destroyer strategy and instead focused on producing tanks that could act as MBTs as soon as possible. But I don't think those arguments can be said to be factually correct one way or the other - it's a judgement call, and I personally think the decision to invest in the TD units made sense at the time AND that a reasonable person could disagree with that, though I believe that most who disagree do so unfairly with the benefit of hindsight, knowing what the US experience fighting in Europe would be. Thank god that the US never had to fight anything like the battle of Kursk, but if they did TDs would be invaluable. And that's why you don't hear the same sniping at the anti-tank self-propelled assault guns that the Germans and the Soviets used. I do recommend that people read Tank Killers: A History of America's Tank Destroyer Force by Harry Yeide, and I have an open offer to paypal anyone the price of the book if they buy it, read it, and don't think it's worth it. I think that a lot of people who diss TDs don't know as much about TDs and their record of performance as they think they do. I'm happy to post about this subject if people are actually interested in a conversation, but I know most folks aren't so I'll expect to continue to leave it dropped. gohuskies fucked around with this message at 01:13 on May 25, 2016 |
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 01:01
|
|
|
How different is TD doctrine from the interbellum infantry/Cavalry tank split?
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 01:09
|
|
|
Nenonen posted:
What those uniforms say to me is "I am extremely poisonous."
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 01:11
|
|
|
bewbies posted:He had some manner of congestive heart disease and was rheumatic, plus that week in particular he probably had a pretty bad case of the runs and might've even had a heart attack. Don't think for a second there hasn't been academic work on this subject. Didn't want this sweet abstract to get overlooked by airpower-chat: Mainwaring and Tribble posted:We believe that General Robert E. Lee had ischemic heart disease. It is our opinion that he sustained a heart attack in 1863 and that this illness had a major influence on the battle of Gettysburg. Lee experienced relatively good health from 1864 to 1867, but by 1869 he had exertional angina and by the spring of 1870 had intermittent rest angina. Although his symptoms were typical of angina, his physicians consistently diagnosed pericarditis, which we believe was erroneous. This misdiagnosis can be explained by the lack of familiarity of American physicians with angina during the 19th Century. It often was stated that the loss of the war broke the heart of Lee, but in view of our modern day understanding, it probably is more accurate to say that advancing coronary atherosclerosis was the culprit.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 01:13
|
|
|
Cyrano4747 posted:My point wasn't that stukas are the solution, but that it doesn't take armor piercing bombs and naval torpedoes to kill merchantmen. You're right, Germany needed something if it wanted to kill ships, especially mid-atlantic. One of many problems the Luftwaffe had was they only realized the requirement in the summer of 1939. The Fw 200 Condor was a strictly last minute improvisation, supposed to fill this gap until the He 177 took the role. Even then, I'm not sure if a working He 177 would have the legs for mid-Atlantic bombing attacks. Frankly I'm not sure if it'd have the same range as the B-24 ASW patrol planes the Allies would get. Lots of dead horses here; let me just offer up two more for flogging in case anybody wants to read all about the Fw 200; Fw 200 part 1 Fw 200 part 2 You also touch on something else; coordination. The Germans had several different campaigns going against Britain at one time or another, and piss poor coordination between them. Submarines, Condors, briefly surface ships, mining of British harbors, and shorter range air attacks, all happening independent of each other. The peak of the Condor's success happened during a brief time when the Kriegsmarine was directly in charge of the bombing wing operating them. OK, I've taken a pill and are starting to ramble, so let me pass along something weird I learned. Do you know what the most successful Kriegsmarine type was, on a money spent/ damage done basis? Merchant cruisers. By the time the second World War broke out, Germany had converted some merchant ships with a literal year's worth of fuel, hidden guns, and torpedoes. Most of them managed to bag a quite considerable haul of merchant ships, with many sinking more than 100,000 tons. One merchant cruiser even managed to surprise and sink an actual cruisers, causing something of a scandal in Australia. These merchant cruisers were also astonishingly wide ranging; several merchant cruisers got a refit in Japan, and at least one was sinking ships off of New Zealand.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 01:36
|
|
|
chitoryu12 posted:It was also something like 9x slower than an M48 to fire because the gunner had to wait for the gun to automatically settle in and out of the loading position and the air vents to clear the breach so the caseless ammo wouldn't catch a spark on loading. The big things it had going for it were that it could go where the M48s couldn't, and it had very substantial firepower. Its first engagement along Long Binh highway resulted in 125 dead enemies for two shots fired and an unknown number of wounded. Granted, a conventional army wouldn't be walking in such lines, but when that cannon fired, it was devastatingly effective. spectralent posted:One thing I read, and again possibly from this thread, was that one factor that meant the crews liked it was that because it was so weakly armoured and prone exploding, whenever it was defeated it was defeated catastrophically and most of the crew died, so only the people for whom things had gone great returned to talk about it. Conversely, the M48 could take hits, meaning people would come back with some of the crew wounded or dead, and talk about how terrible it went. Which leads to here. Tactically, it was well-liked by the infantry. Much like the M50 Ontos, it could be moved around easily and provide very effective fire support. Strategically, they were liabilities that chewed through unique ammo and trained crews. An RPG or mine could at best send an M48 to the shop and at worst kill crew and write off the vehicle. A Sheridan was pretty likely to be a write-off with dead crew much more often. Flipswitch posted:Risking a can of worms in this thread but I'm curious, the loathing against Tank Destroyers in this thread, or TD chat, is that more the US doctrine of it or against the things themselves? Thinking that you hear people ragging on the idea of them, but less so individual models. Was curious as I was reading some stuff about the SU-85 and SU-100 and they don't get mentioned when it comes to TDs. I missed the chat here, but the debate usually boils down to the same tired argument. People argue that it was a stupid concept to make a bunch of these vehicles and spread them out piecemeal along lines in order to plug gaps. People then determine tank destroyers useless. The doctrine was dumb, but TD crews were still riding in vehicles with cannons and were trained to kill tanks, and they did both. It was just that once you took a whole bunch of dudes and their mobile cannons and didn't scatter them to the winds, they did useful things with their mobile cannons. I'll admit that McNair's obsession with towed AT guns was really stupid and overall detrimental. Plan Z fucked around with this message at 06:25 on May 25, 2016 |
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 01:46
|
|
|
100 Years Ago 19 May 1916: The title for today is "The Cow of Beaumetz". Do the click thing already. Oh, and one of Louis Barthas's mates gets shelled while on the latrine and falls in. Sure, there's some other stuff about Asiago, and Barthas's opinions on "The Last Days of Fort Vaux", and E.S. Thompson's disappearing overcoats, and Maximilian Mugge in the Non-Combatant Corps. But, come on, we've got a funny story about pants making GBS threads and another one about a cow. This is what they want! 20 May: The Austro-Hungarians now begin pushing through the Sugana valley; Vehip Pasha's big mouth might yet work for him in Anatolia, if he can time his attack just right; the Belgians have sent a Commandant de Bugger (I am making that up, but only slightly) to fly some seaplanes in Africa; BEF artilleryman Lt-Col Neil Fraser-Tytler gives us a minute-by-minute of his day, which I am an utter sucker for; Louis Barthas runs away from Hill 304 as fast as he can; and E.S. Thompson is the latest correspondent to suffer an attack of the squitters. 21 May: The Force Publique finishes conquering Ruanda and quickly sets its sights on Urundi, as the Belgian Empire desperately tries to stay relevant and avoid getting rorted at the inevitable peace conference. From the Battle of Verdun, we now have a little German testimony to set against Louis Barthas (spoilers: it's poo poo in his trenches too), who I think would greatly enjoy having his words appear in such a context; General Fayolle is deeply unconvinced that his attack at the Somme will do anything useful, while General Haig is allegedly trying to turn his padres into political commissars; Malcolm White continues freely admitting that he's really, really shite at this "officering" lark; Oskar Teichman arrives at Alexandria; and Maximilian Mugge is not enjoying the NCC, although his friends in the 16th Royal Fusiliers are trying very hard to help him out as best they can.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 01:51
|
|
|
atomicthumbs posted:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1wwUTEkRano Seems like its a direct advertisement for the Canadian army, an older half obsolete piece of equipment that would fit with the rest of the Canadian army's half obsolete equipment.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 02:09
|
|
|
Returning from Gettysburg I have an even lower opinion of Lee than I had even thought possible. How the gently caress are 12k dudes supposed to take the fortified center of the union line when it takes half an hour of walking through the most perfect shooting gallery ever just to reach it.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 02:14
|
|
|
Raskolnikov38 posted:Returning from Gettysburg I have an even lower opinion of Lee than I had even thought possible. How the gently caress are 12k dudes supposed to take the fortified center of the union line when it takes half an hour of walking through the most perfect shooting gallery ever just to reach it. Stonewall Jackson was on the other end of that equation at Fredericksburg, in which good 'ol Ambrose Burnside attacked Jackson's fortified position on the heights...across two pontoon bridges...and Jackson had taught artillery at VMI before the war... That one didn't go well for the US. And then Jackson got killed in a friendly-fire accident and wasn't around to win the one that mattered. Much like Hitler vs. the US and Russia, or the non-nuke plan to topple Tojo, it was a forgegone conclusion that the good guys would win the war of attrition, but Jackson's untimely death probably saved the lives of a few of our great-great-grandpas, much as Patton's death in a car wreck probably saved our grandfathers -- Patton was a bit of a nutjob, and probably would have sided with MacArthur and Tom Powers on whether to glass China by way of Russia. re: Patton: the guy who literally wrote the book on tank tactics* was also the last guy to design a heavy cavalry sword.  Re: great tank battles question some pages back, somebody mentioned 73 Easting, and they're right, but didn't seem to grasp the full scope of it. Actually kinda half-decent History channel doco: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zayVa1r6QZk Pretty sure it's on youtube without the stupid border, but that's the easy-to-find one. 73 Easting was loving ridiculous, one of those massive clusterfucks that somehow rolled natural 20s all the way -- 1CAV lost in a sandstorm, literally parking on top of the berms "protecting" dug-in T-72s (once the fun started, they were shooting though the berms from beyond the max visibility range of the Iraqi guns), the vast majority of American vehicles knocked out were Bradleys with "slightly radioactive" holes in both sides (i.e., drove between the M1s and the Iraqis at the worst time, or were mistaken for T-72s in blurry thermal sights), prisoners asking why the American armor troopers have a portrait of their greatest foe taped up inside their vehicles (Their answer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dObTXYa-_n4&t=105s*) Speaking of flag officers who wrote the book on tactics, Leyte Gulf is great. Bull Halsey wanted to be the next Jellicoe, so he came up with a plan so cunning you could put a tail on it and call it a weasel, and then everything went to poo poo and the last battleship brawl was between WWI-vintage ships, and Halsey's Iowas never fired a shot in anger at a floating target. *Rommel's published book was on infantry tactics, he was working on a tank book when he died. The movie takes a bit of artistic license there, Patton wrote a tank book based on applying his heavy-horse tactics to tanks, with help from fighting Rommel. There's a reason British tankers are still called "lancers," they use the same playbook but now the lances are a couple miles longer. Chillbro Baggins fucked around with this message at 03:10 on May 25, 2016 |
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 03:05
|
|
|
Plan Z posted:As for SU-85s and SU-100s and StuGs and all that, they tended to be just viewed by their armies as "assault guns." They were a way to get a big cannon onto a chassis, sometimes as a stop-gap to get bigger guns on the field while better-armed tanks were being developed, or a cheap way of getting a big cannon onto a chassis, or some reason altogether. The big idea at the time was to give infantry as much mobile firepower as possible to aid their mission, so get what you can out there if it does the job. The SU-76 is close to the StuG, but the SU-85 and SU-100 are not. The StuG started out as an infantry support vehicle, and through equipping a better gun it became suitable for fighting tanks, while still remaining an infantry support vehicle. The SU-85 and SU-100, on the other hand, were tank destroyers created for the purpose of destroying tanks and were sometime begrudgingly forced to support infantry. The German equivalent of the SU-85 would be would be the Jagdpanzer IV, not the StuG. Flipswitch posted:Risking a can of worms in this thread but I'm curious, the loathing against Tank Destroyers in this thread, or TD chat, is that more the US doctrine of it or against the things themselves? Thinking that you hear people ragging on the idea of them, but less so individual models. Was curious as I was reading some stuff about the SU-85 and SU-100 and they don't get mentioned when it comes to TDs. Unlike the Americans, there was never any debate in the Red Army about which does the better job of killing tanks: towed guns, self propelled artillery, or other tanks. Each had their own place and each branch would relentlessly poo poo on people trying to use them incorrectly.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 03:21
|
|
|
Delivery McGee posted:Actually kinda half-decent History channel doco: haha LTG mcmaster is my boss, he gets off talking about that poo poo like no one else. also he'd love the gently caress out of this thread.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 03:21
|
|
|
Trin Tragula posted:100 Years Ago It's so interesting that Mugge's writing on the NCC constantly has one eye on posterity and the question of how history would remember the COs.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 04:06
|
|
|
Delivery McGee posted:There's a reason British tankers are still called "lancers," they use the same playbook but now the lances are a couple miles longer. What book did Patton write on tanks BTW? It's surprisingly hard to find his work these days.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 05:05
|
|
|
Ensign Expendable posted:The SU-76 is close to the StuG, but the SU-85 and SU-100 are not. The StuG started out as an infantry support vehicle, and through equipping a better gun it became suitable for fighting tanks, while still remaining an infantry support vehicle. The SU-85 and SU-100, on the other hand, were tank destroyers created for the purpose of destroying tanks and were sometime begrudgingly forced to support infantry. The German equivalent of the SU-85 would be would be the Jagdpanzer IV, not the StuG. My fault, then. From what l'd read, they never seemed interested in a dedicated tank destroyer analagous to the M10/M18 or Jagdpanzers. There were projects with anti-armor intent like the T-34-57, but it felt like they never really said "This is a tank destroyer. It is for destroying tanks." Appreciate the correction.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 06:24
|
|
|
The M60 upgrade is all fun and games before you leave them standing in the desert as sitting ducks for ambitious TOW teams.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 07:31
|
|
|
Cheers for the replies all. Once again this is the best thread. I was going to ask what drove the design differences between US and Soviet TDs but the thread answered that too kinda. 
Flipswitch fucked around with this message at 08:02 on May 25, 2016 |
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 08:00
|
|
|
atomicthumbs posted:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1wwUTEkRano What's that bulge on the gun about 1/3 of the way from the chamber supposed to do?
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 08:07
|
|
|
Delivery McGee posted:Stonewall Jackson was on the other end of that equation at Fredericksburg, in which good 'ol Ambrose Burnside attacked Jackson's fortified position on the heights...across two pontoon bridges...and Jackson had taught artillery at VMI before the war... That one didn't go well for the US. Nah, Jackson was commanding the south end of the line, without much in the way of heights or fortifications. He actually had his lines broken at one point by Meade's division. Lee spent most of the battle on the heights with Longstreet, which was why Longstreet was none too happy to be attacking heights at Gettysburg.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 08:23
|
|
|
Empress Theonora posted:It's so interesting that Mugge's writing on the NCC constantly has one eye on posterity and the question of how history would remember the COs. I'm giving a lecture on the post war lives of COs tonight, I think I'll nick "these pioneers of a far distant future" for the title.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 08:32
|
|
|
Splode posted:Hey musket era posters, I've been doing some stuff at work with black powder and I've noticed that the residue left after it's burnt really stinks (sulfur). Do your soldiers complain about this or is it so far down on the list of smelly awful experiences in their lives that they don't care? now, "smelling the match," not "the powder," in relation to something is a figure of speech in the 17th century for "figuring out what's going on from hints," "gathering clues about something" and i happen to think that's a good smell  It's wholesome, like the smell of dirt if you've been working in the garden.SeanBeansShako posted:Some soldiers when desperate enough used gun powder to season their meagre rations when things were tight. HEY GUNS fucked around with this message at 09:07 on May 25, 2016 |
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 08:35
|
|
|
Empress Theonora posted:It's so interesting that Mugge's writing on the NCC constantly has one eye on posterity and the question of how history would remember the COs. He did kind of want to be a historian; before the war he wrote English biographies of Nietzsche and Heinrich von Treitschke, evidently without much success. lenoon posted:I'm giving a lecture on the post war lives of COs tonight, I think I'll nick "these pioneers of a far distant future" for the title. For God's sake credit him and ask if anyone's ever heard of the guy
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 08:36
|
|
|
Delivery McGee posted:I've been involved with blackpowder all my life as a hobbyist/son of hobbyist (my parents were big into the mountain-man chic revival in the '70s, and competed in amateur shooting matches and such, I was pulling the trigger on a Kentucky rifle before I could walk). I kinda like the smell of gunsmoke. edit: Anyway, Splode, can I ask what you were doing with powder? HEY GUNS fucked around with this message at 08:51 on May 25, 2016 |
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 08:40
|
|
|
Grand Prize Winner posted:What's that bulge on the gun about 1/3 of the way from the chamber supposed to do? It's a Bore Evacuator, basically a gas reservoir that collects the poisonous and flammable propellent gases when the shell passes the bulge then ejects them out the front of the barrel when the shell leaves the gun. Without one you have toxic fumes leaking into the fighting compartment, just like the good ol' days! The alternative is firing compressed air into the breech after firing to clear the gases out, which you see on things like big naval guns if you have ever watched videos of an Iowa class battleship firing its 16 inch guns.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 09:46
|
|
|
MikeCrotch posted:big naval guns if you have ever watched videos of an Iowa class battleship firing its 16 inch guns. This is a bit silly, but I went around looking for videos of exactly this and ended up noticing a dumb YouTube argument that raised what I thought was an interesting question - how well can an Iowa-class stand up to modern anti-ship missiles? Our heroic YouTuber was arguing that modern anti-ship missiles are designed to kill the relatively thin armor of things like aircraft carriers and that an Iowa could hold up much better due to its thick plating. I imagine it's a lot easier that he suspects to mission-kill an Iowa even if you can't kill it, but is there a kernel of truth to his argument?
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 10:16
|
|
|
Me and girlfriend is on a Pentangle trip, and since we love High Germany: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yHXHd7LAmx8 I took to wondering which war it was about. Turns it's the War of Spanish Succession! I wonder if Billy ever made it back 
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 11:31
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 27, 2024 15:04 |
|
|
Tomn posted:This is a bit silly, but I went around looking for videos of exactly this and ended up noticing a dumb YouTube argument that raised what I thought was an interesting question - how well can an Iowa-class stand up to modern anti-ship missiles? Our heroic YouTuber was arguing that modern anti-ship missiles are designed to kill the relatively thin armor of things like aircraft carriers and that an Iowa could hold up much better due to its thick plating. I imagine it's a lot easier that he suspects to mission-kill an Iowa even if you can't kill it, but is there a kernel of truth to his argument? I suspect the sort of Soviet antiship missile designed to murder carriers would equally do a number on an Iowa-class, especially as they're not armoured all over (and that's not even taking into account some variants of those missiles were nuclear).
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 11:31
|
|
