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unwantedplatypus posted:So humans have ridden horses, camels, and elephants into combat, as well as occasionally using dogs. What other animals have we used for war? What are the traits which make an animal suitable for use in warfare? Before domesticated horses were a thing they used oxen for pulling chariots. No idea whether the chariots filled the same niche the later horse drawn ones did though, I don't see how they could.
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Sep 4, 2016 16:18
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Koramei posted:Before domesticated horses were a thing they used oxen for pulling chariots. Sumerians used donkeys for pulling chariots initially, before horses were domesticated. 
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Sep 4, 2016 17:04
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One reason for close order drills is that it's an efficient way for the supervising officer to see how well his men can take orders. He or she has everyone in view when in a realistic battle drill the same officer could at once follow the performance of only a handful of troopers because everyone is scattered and lying low.
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Sep 4, 2016 17:26
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SeanBeansShako posted:Shattered Sword and the crazy self defeating antics of the IJN have been brought up many times in the thread, but if you find something you'd like to talk about go ahead and post man. I would really love an effort post about the post midway carrier actions.
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Sep 4, 2016 17:51
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Spacewolf posted:Ender's Game 1. Others have hit it dead on already but I'm just gonna throw in my 2 cents anyways. Modern soldiers learning drill is more about discipline, learning to follow orders, and working as a team. Same reasons they learn to make beds perfectly, etc. 2. It really depends what you define as modern military training. I can't imagine 12 year olds would respond too well to big muscled Drill (branch specific title)s degrading them at every opportunity, but more academic things can be taught pretty early. Good example - when I was like 10 years old as a Cub Scout they already had us practicing marksmanship with BB guns, by the time I was a Boy Scout I was wearing a uniform, practicing marksmanship, and learning about gun safety and maintenance with both rifles and shotguns. Does that count as military training? See, it's complex. Anecdotally, though,my father does WWII re-enacting and collects vehicles (and now I do as well), so I was exposed to proper (if out of date) military uniforms, weapons, and vehicles since I was around 5 years old and knew the basics of Garand maintenance by the time I was 13. Point is, I'm pretty sure I'm not (too) psychologically damaged and I was exposed to (quasi-)military culture since I was pretty young. This society could probably get away with having a lot of military stuff as early as elementary school if they know for a fact that these kids are gonna be soldiers. For more info I'd suggest looking into heavily militarized societies (Sparta and Prussia immediately spring to mind) to see how they treated this stuff. On the off chance you haven't read Ender's Game (though I'm almost certain you have because your premise sounds like it's inspired by EG), it's full of good material for you. 3. Nothing I can say beyond what hogmartin said. As an aside, I'd love to read whatever it is you end up writing, I'm a sucker for sci-fi. Keep (at the very least) me posted.
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Sep 4, 2016 18:49
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it could be a real problem, op  
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Sep 4, 2016 18:54
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Stairmaster posted:I would really love an effort post I have more books than time, there's a lot of reading to do about carrier stuff. Right now I've got The First Team to get through again for notetaking, Dull's battle history of the IJN, The First Team's sequel for post-midway stuff, The Fast Carriers, Sunburst, maybe Shattered Sword again, and there's a few books by Friedman I'd love to get my hands on again. xthetenth fucked around with this message at 19:02 on Sep 4, 2016 |
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Sep 4, 2016 18:58
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A dude from Sarajevo wrote a moderately long "begginer's guide to war" post on FB, mostly as a warning to normal people/a "gently caress you" to politicians. It's been making rounds, and even got mentioned in a published article in a decent newspaper, here's some translated choice quotes: Don't worry, you don't have to get hit by a bullet or shrapnel to get killed. The pressure from an explosion can rupture your organs like tissue paper. Corpse exchange - always a fun one. Roll over 120 corpses to find your cousin's body. Nutritious value of margarine is lesser than its utility in boot maintenance. Better to go hungry than with frozen feet Turns out, blood fountain from a femoral artery rupture can reach up to half a meter in height while you're holding a hand on it and trying to get a hold on the poor dude's tongue with the other to stop him from choking on it from shock. Rat fever - You might get used to those annoying rats running around you, but your kidneys sure as hell won't. Shrapnel travels at speeds above 1km/s, at an irregular trajectory whilst rotating, has an irregular shape, what with being a multilayered chunk of exploded metal, is above 200 degrees celsius, and doesn't give a poo poo about your bones, tissues, arteries and veins getting in the way. Certain types of wood crack at -17C. You know this because you're on guard duty at the time. Telling your friend's family that he's dead is always fun, especially when you bring some meds to help them deal with it, but realize it's pointless because they can see you walking down the street and know there's exactly one reason you're all there and he's not. Apologies if it's not a suitable post for the thread. e: almost forgot this one: You have about ten seconds to use something to prevent pneumotorax after getting shot. On the bright side, you can do it with cigar box cellophane! my dad fucked around with this message at 19:33 on Sep 4, 2016 |
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Sep 4, 2016 19:20
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Modern soldiers could probably be fine without learning close order drill and there are a lot of military discipline things that are done more out of tradition than anything else. There are plenty of ways to instill discipline while making more efficient use of time than close order drill.
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Sep 4, 2016 19:34
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Marching and ceremonial uses of soldiers was an integral part of national life in a lot of countries, as well. That's still echoed in some countries, like the UK or Russia, but it's only an echo of a much deeper historical phenomenon. Linda Colley writes about the power a marching band would have had, for example, in a time where popular access to professional musicianship was basically non-existent. Widespread military display in the 18th and 19th century was a form of nation building.
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Sep 4, 2016 19:39
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I think a case could be made it's still relevant for moving platoon-sized and bigger blobs of people around. It's easier to keep track of them when they're all standing in one place, and making orderly queues and such is way less a pain in the rear end.
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Sep 4, 2016 19:40
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D&C is actually useful in the sense that it makes it a lot easier to move hordes of teenagers around in a relatively organized manner, and get their attention, and so on. That being said we've been having a lot of discussion the last few years about the validity of the "teamwork and discipline" aspects of D&C; specifically, if we're wanting soldiers who can think and act and react to ambiguous situations, then what is the value in drilling reflexive reactions to discrete orders? If you can believe it there are some very serious opinions on both sides of this issue.
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Sep 4, 2016 19:47
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meh, there have been for at least three hundred years, so another year of it doesn't surprise me
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Sep 4, 2016 19:49
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bewbies posted:D&C is actually useful in the sense that it makes it a lot easier to move hordes of teenagers around in a relatively organized manner, and get their attention, and so on. I'd love to see a summary of the more common talking points on each side, if you could, bewbies. Those thinking my concept is inspired by Ender's Game - it kiiiinda is. Kinda. (In response to crazycryodude: Sure, but I have yet to put fingers to keyboard on anything resembling a draft of the first chapter, even. I'm just working out the world-building, since a big part of my writing approach is to do a lot of research first, to get the internal consistency of the world down, then start spinning plots. That said, a big problem with EG was that Card blatantly ignored/forgot bits of child psychology and development that are obvious and pose real problems to anyone trying to read his book with a straight face - to pick only the most obvious example, in what universe is it a good idea to have one girl...and 39 boys the same age...all sharing a barracks? (And that one girl, nominally, is the only girl in the whole school, an idea which makes no sense whatsoever.) So a lot of what you wind up doing as soon as you consider "Kid soldiers in space" is trying to correct the stupidities introduced by Ender's Game to the genre.)
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Sep 4, 2016 20:14
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Petra wasn't the only girl, the Shadow books retcon it to there being a lot more. Remember that the age groups too, these kids start at a very young age and only begin to enter puberty when they're transferred to Command School/Tactical School; and are constantly monitored. But Card wasn't really aiming for complete realism there, in Ender's Game he wanted the consistency of what the audience expects from the genre of a military training experience but with younger characters for contrast. If it doesn't seem right that's kind of the point. I wouldn't suggest writing to "correct" another book, that's rather presumptuous. Rather you should look at it as "This book covered these themes, and created this sort of contrast or made this point, I think it would be interesting to go a different direction." The most important thing is to write an enjoyable experience for your audience, accuracy is only of nominal importance unless you really know you're subject. Inspiration though is always good, everyone is inspired by something, so just write.
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Sep 4, 2016 23:24
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Drill and ceremonial does teach certain basic or foundational military skills. For example: One of the most important skills in fieldcraft is to be able to stay still for long periods of time, because the human eye is drawn to movement and you are more easily concealed when you remain still. This might require you to remain still for long periods in uncomfortable positions. Drill teaches you the basic concept of that. Drill teaches you to follow commands, immediately and without question. Modern NATO militaries might value low level initiative and independence a lot, but we still require military obedience before we teach initiative. Drill teaches that obedience. Modern military maneuvers require a keen sense of timing and ability to perform movements and tasks in unison or coordination with other members of your section, squad, platoon, whatever. Drill movements require the different parts of the formation to work in unison, to be aware of each other, and to maintain strict timings and synchronization. Drill itself is no longer of use on the modern battlefield, but drill is still useful as an instructional tool for various necessary and basic military skills
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Sep 5, 2016 00:18
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too much poo poo to do atm 100.05 Years Ago 16th August: yucky maggots, flora sandes, "death valley" 17th August: romania, sixth isonzo ends, nosy politicians, edward mousley 18th August: the problem of attacking reverse-slope trenches, playing golf on an airfield in Iraq, e.s. thompson does not gently caress up
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Sep 5, 2016 00:35
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Maggots. Because having your legs blown enough somehow isn't bad enough.
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Sep 5, 2016 01:08
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http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2016/08/18/when-we-loved-mussolini/ Re: Fascism. quote:When We Loved Mussolini
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Sep 5, 2016 01:41
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EricD posted:Drill and ceremonial does teach certain basic or foundational military skills. For example: One of the most important skills in fieldcraft is to be able to stay still for long periods of time, because the human eye is drawn to movement and you are more easily concealed when you remain still. This might require you to remain still for long periods in uncomfortable positions. Drill teaches you the basic concept of that. Drill teaches you to follow commands, immediately and without question. Modern NATO militaries might value low level initiative and independence a lot, but we still require military obedience before we teach initiative. Drill teaches that obedience. Modern military maneuvers require a keen sense of timing and ability to perform movements and tasks in unison or coordination with other members of your section, squad, platoon, whatever. Drill movements require the different parts of the formation to work in unison, to be aware of each other, and to maintain strict timings and synchronization. Speaking as a military veteran, you are full of the most odious poo poo imaginable. Go inhabit a trench in WW1.
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Sep 5, 2016 04:05
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Until an army drops drill for good, we'll never truly know.
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Sep 5, 2016 04:13
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So here's a weird question. Every country would like to have the technological edge in their military if at all possible, and nobody wants to be left behind, so naturally everybody will try to be at least as good as their neighbor and replicate any advancements if they fall behind, right? So, is that accounted for in patent laws? Is their a specific exception built into patent laws for that sort of thing, or could, say, the US if it wanted to, launch a bunch of lawsuits against other countries for their usage of nuclear weapons after we were the first to develop them, or other similar things?
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Sep 5, 2016 04:17
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SlothfulCobra posted:So here's a weird question. Every country would like to have the technological edge in their military if at all possible, and nobody wants to be left behind, so naturally everybody will try to be at least as good as their neighbor and replicate any advancements if they fall behind, right? In this specific case, I'm pretty sure nobody actually holds a patent on nuclear weapons (and governments tend not to be patent holders anyways as far as I understand it - patent law is about protecting the IP and inventions of individuals (corporations are people too apparently)). In more general terms, however, states (at least the big ones that have the power to stand up to each other) tend to not care so much about laws when it comes to maintaining/leveling a military edge. Keeping/catching up to a technological advantage has been done mostly through the wonderful world of (counter)espionage in all its forms because by the time something is no longer a state secret/classified it's no longer cutting edge anyways and who cares. Basically, if it's useful it's probably kept secret and if it's secret you're only gonna get to it/protect it through shady poo poo and nobody cares about laws when it comes to national security.
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Sep 5, 2016 04:41
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Crazycryodude posted:In this specific case, I'm pretty sure nobody actually holds a patent on nuclear weapons Well Leo Szilard did secure a British patent for nuclear chain reactions way back in 1933, and convinced the Admiralty to classify it. But yeah, if it involved strategically important weapons, any state level actor would just tell a developer to go stuff themselves. Also, it doesn't make the most sense to patent a cutting edge military technology, because you usually have to publish the details, and then hostile nations are pretty free to steal your work.
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Sep 5, 2016 04:52
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Yes, it's like a lava lamp.
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This has been a thing for decades. Most famous instance I can remember is Mosin losing out to Nagant since he invented a magazine system first, but could not patent it since it was declared a state secret. The USSR gave no such fucks, resulting in patents for reverse engineered German HEAT shell tech being held by Soviet citizens. Also there were straight up clones of German designs like the early D-25 muzzle brake with no civilian intermediary.
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Sep 5, 2016 05:04
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On the other hand, I've heard the Germans continued to pay royalties to the British for the proximity fuses used to take out British bombers.
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Sep 5, 2016 05:25
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The Germans never had proximity fuses though. That poo poo was one of the closest guarded secrets of the whole war, on par with the Manhattan project.
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Sep 5, 2016 06:32
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I'm doing some prep-work for a WW2 game I'm planning to run, and I wanted to ask: the game system I'm using only has generic stats for: Shotgun, Double-barreled Shotgun, Sawed-off The double-barreled shotgun does 4d6 damage within 10 meters, 2d6 damage within 20 meters, and 1d6 damage within 50 meters The sawed-off shotgun does 4d6 damage within 5 meters, and 1d6 damage within 20 meters, and specifically cannot deal any damage farther out than 20 meters. If either of these are supposed to be a stand-in for something like, say the Winchester M1897, which would be closer?
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Sep 5, 2016 06:37
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The sawed off is just game mechanic silliness. Buckshot is just getting started at 20m. With a decent load (i.e., not just dead-soft lead), you're likely to get all (or at least most) of the pellets into a man-sized target at 40m or more.  Random example from GIS of something akin to an 1897 in barrel length at 46-ish meters. Edit: tbh buckshot when the M1897 was hot poo poo probably was lovely and looked like that at half the range, but still, you get the idea. Edit again: If I were writing the rulebook, I'd say roll a D12 to see how many hits (with, say, -1 for every 3m of range, just for balance reasons), then roll [number from the previous roll] D6 [or D4, depending on how your damage scales] for damage.  Edit again: The dice-rolls you posted look about right for the larger varieties of birdshot, actually, but you'd be using something a bit heavier (and thus less-spreading and harder-hitting) for the most dangerous game. Chillbro Baggins fucked around with this message at 07:48 on Sep 5, 2016 |
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Sep 5, 2016 07:26
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Bad Angus! Bad!
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my dad posted:Turns out, blood fountain from a femoral artery rupture can reach up to half a meter in height Arterial blood under pressure can go six metres horizontal, too.
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Sep 5, 2016 08:09
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http://spitfiresite.com/2012/01/modification-xxx-beer-carrying-spitfires.htmlquote:In his book “Dancing in the Skies”, Tony Jonsson, the only Icelancer pilot in the RAF, recalled beer runs while he was flying with 65 Squadron. Every week a pilot was sent back to the UK to fill some cleaned-up drop tanks with beer and return to the squadron. Jonsson hated the beer runs as every man on the squadron would be watching you upon arrival. Anyone who made a rough landing and dropped the tanks would be the most hated man on the squadron for an entire week.
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Sep 5, 2016 11:39
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SeanBeansShako posted:Until an army drops drill for good, we'll never truly know. The trouble with debating military policy is that there's always this undercurrent of "well, we've been doing it for hundreds of years so it must be optimal" that somehow flies even if we'd never believe that any more for anything else. We have this idea that military tradition is sacred and perfect and should not be messed with.
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Sep 5, 2016 12:02
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Panzeh posted:The trouble with debating military policy is that there's always this undercurrent of "well, we've been doing it for hundreds of years so it must be optimal" that somehow flies even if we'd never believe that any more for anything else. We have this idea that military tradition is sacred and perfect and should not be messed with. "I had to endure [lovely job/worthless practice] to get to where I am today, so should you whippersnappers!" plays a big part too I bet
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Sep 5, 2016 12:30
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Somebody post that Spit IX pic with the wooden beer case underneath the wings.
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Sep 5, 2016 12:32
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Oops didn't mean to post
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Sep 5, 2016 14:14
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After the first episode I'm quite liking Our World War, but more than modern music and camera techniques I'm annoyed by the volume. The speech is done at a level where if you want to listen to a normal conversation the bullets deafen you, and vice versa. And, while I agree that might be realistic, I think in this case having the sound balance be such that I can hear what people are saying might be good
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Sep 5, 2016 14:52
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Can anybody recommend me some good sources on the creation of the clean Werhmacht myth?
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Sep 5, 2016 14:53
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spectralent posted:After the first episode I'm quite liking Our World War, but more than modern music and camera techniques I'm annoyed by the volume. The speech is done at a level where if you want to listen to a normal conversation the bullets deafen you, and vice versa. And, while I agree that might be realistic, I think in this case having the sound balance be such that I can hear what people are saying might be good Music does need to be softer for sure, It does draw you out a bit.
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Sep 5, 2016 14:58
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spectralent posted:After the first episode I'm quite liking Our World War, but more than modern music and camera techniques I'm annoyed by the volume. The speech is done at a level where if you want to listen to a normal conversation the bullets deafen you, and vice versa. And, while I agree that might be realistic, I think in this case having the sound balance be such that I can hear what people are saying might be good The remastered Victory at Sea is kind of like this. It's got an amazing iconic Richard Rodgers score but they amped it up so much that it's really unpleasant if you have the volume set to where you can hear the narration. hogmartin fucked around with this message at 15:05 on Sep 5, 2016 |
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Sep 5, 2016 15:03
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That's a lovely down mix from surround to stereo. Check your audio settings or buy a surround system.
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Sep 5, 2016 15:23
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