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Ainsley McTree posted:Now I have an idea for a sci-fi book for an alternative future in which the USA and USSR have a short space battle and shoot loads and loads of projectile weapons at each other, and one of the bullets or slugs or cannonballs or whatever, traveling infinitely through the forever vacuum of space, kills an alien 200 years later and starts an interplanetary war. 200 years later an alien is smoking outside at the, uhh, space bar, and his head explodes and all his buddies are like "what the gently caress?" ~*fin*~
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Mar 24, 2018 01:52
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Jamwad Hilder posted:200 years later an alien is smoking outside at the, uhh, space bar, and his head explodes and all his buddies are like "what the gently caress?" But the twist is that the aliens were earth all along. Pretty sure noone's done that yet
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Mar 24, 2018 01:54
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Ainsley McTree posted:Now I have an idea for a sci-fi book for an alternative future in which the USA and USSR have a short space battle and shoot loads and loads of projectile weapons at each other, and one of the bullets or slugs or cannonballs or whatever, traveling infinitely through the forever vacuum of space, kills an alien 200 years later and starts an interplanetary war. Leaving orbit requires a much higher velocity change than a bullet experiences.
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Mar 24, 2018 01:56
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VanSandman posted:Leaving orbit requires a much higher velocity change than a bullet experiences. The bullet slingshotted around the Earth the whole time until it got enough velocity to break orbit. Also the aliens were on the moon
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Mar 24, 2018 02:05
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The bullet slingshots around the earth and hits a Russian in the face. Turns out those fuckin commie freaks were aliens all along. Lets wipe em out, boys
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Mar 24, 2018 02:39
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Cosmonauts carried pistols because they landed in the Siberian wilderness sometimes right?
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Mar 24, 2018 02:47
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Shimrra Jamaane posted:Cosmonauts carried pistols because they landed in the Siberian wilderness sometimes right? Drillings IIRC. It's the bastard offspring of a shotgun and a rifle.
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Mar 24, 2018 03:05
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The Lone Badger posted:Drillings IIRC. It's the bastard offspring of a shotgun and a rifle.
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Mar 24, 2018 03:07
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The Lone Badger posted:Drillings IIRC. It's the bastard offspring of a shotgun and a rifle. It’s the sexy offspring of a shotgun and a rifle, you mean.
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Mar 24, 2018 03:11
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The Lone Badger posted:Drillings IIRC. It's the bastard offspring of a shotgun and a rifle. It was a sort of sawed-off drilling with two 40 gauge barrels and a 5.45mm barrel, the TP-82. They switched back to just carrying Makarovs.
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Mar 24, 2018 03:42
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Let's also not forget that the Soviets made a legit loving laser pistol. It was only useful for blinding spacecraft optics, but laser pistol!!!
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Mar 24, 2018 03:48
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Also the stock for the survival shotgun was a Woodman's Pal style brush axe that clipped onto the bottom of the gun and had a rubber buttstock on the end of the blade.
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Mar 24, 2018 04:08
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The Soviet-American cooperation during WWII kinda makes me sad that geopolitics made it cease; the Americans sending their tanks to the Soviets for testing is kinda adorable and a shame. Too bad aliens didn't invade us at around 1946 to restore what was clearly the bestest battle buddy friendship of history.
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Mar 24, 2018 04:13
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chitoryu12 posted:Let's also not forget that the Soviets made a legit loving laser pistol. It was only useful for blinding spacecraft optics, but laser pistol!!! There was a cool article posted in the spaceflight thread about ground-based Soviet anti-satellite lasers. I can't find it again, but to summarize a lot of information has come out in the last couple decades about the long running clandestine Cold War contest. The lasers were primarily targeted against U.S. surveillance satellites, especially the highly secret corona series. Although too weak to actually destroy a satellite, the lasers were targeted at the sensitive on board optical equipment used to capture imagery. While most of the information on this subject comes to us from anonymous sources or is very vague, it is likely the Soviets successfully disabled at least one U.S. spy satellite. It's likely modern imaging systems are much less vulnerable, as some government sources have suggested modern systems are better "hardened" against lasers and have better counter measures. Still there are lots of very secret ways to gently caress with satellites.
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Mar 24, 2018 04:31
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HEY GUNS posted:but did they take a .50 cal? checkmate atheists Atheists took arms to the space in case they needed to fight the God. (Actually in case the capitalists would use their new fangled Space Shuttle to steal the fruit of the proletariat's toil, as the Salyut would nicely fit in the shuttle's cargo space.) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salyut_3#On-board_gun
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Mar 24, 2018 05:03
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MrYenko posted:It’s the sexy offspring of a shotgun and a rifle, you mean. The heritage of that mutt is way more complicated, as it was also a flare gun (probably of more practical use in an emergency) and its stock could be used as a machete to cut your path through the impenetrable jungles of Siberia. http://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2007/10/13/tp-82-russian-space-pistol-shotgun-carbine-flare-gun-no-longer-being-carried-into-space/
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Mar 24, 2018 05:10
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Raenir Salazar posted:The Soviet-American cooperation during WWII kinda makes me sad that geopolitics made it cease; the Americans sending their tanks to the Soviets for testing is kinda adorable and a shame. Yeah too bad we didn't stay friends with these awesome dudes quote:Blokhin's most infamous act was the April 1940 execution by shooting of about 7,000 Polish prisoners interned in the Ostashkov prisoner of war camp in the Katyn forest. The majority were military and police officers who had been captured following the Soviet invasion of Poland in 1939.
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Mar 24, 2018 05:38
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OctaviusBeaver posted:Yeah too bad we didn't stay friends with these awesome dudes On the bright side, that's one hell of a work ethic.
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Mar 24, 2018 09:53
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Fly Molo posted:On the bright side, that's one hell of a work ethic. Yeah, go big or go to the gulag I always say
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Mar 24, 2018 09:54
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The US just outsourced their mass murder abroad, like any good capitalists
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Mar 24, 2018 11:01
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MikeCrotch posted:The US just outsourced their mass murder abroad, like any good capitalists How do we count the Philippines in this case? I know in the cold war most of our atrocities were committed by our proxies (the Duvalier and Somoza families come to mind) but we were pretty deep into commiting war crimes on Filipinos like it was going out of style.
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Mar 24, 2018 11:52
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If there is one thing that always brightens up the milhist thread it's "who was worse USA or USSR" (btw the answer is "the nazis were worse")
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Mar 24, 2018 15:00
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MikeCrotch posted:The US just outsourced their mass murder abroad, like any good capitalists Too bad we didn't outsource it to communists because then it would have been like a fun buddy cop movie instead of just vanilla mass murderer.
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Mar 24, 2018 15:14
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OctaviusBeaver posted:Too bad we didn't outsource it to communists because then it would have been like a fun buddy cop movie instead of just vanilla mass murderer. Tbf you got a lot of your own murdering done in the 18th and 19th centuries, against people nobody cared about. No need to outsource
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Mar 24, 2018 16:06
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OctaviusBeaver posted:Yeah too bad we didn't stay friends with these awesome dudes Man assuming a 12 hour shift that’s a killing every two and a half minutes. Probably shorter shift which makes it even more 
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Mar 24, 2018 16:12
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Cyrano4747 posted:Man assuming a 12 hour shift that’s a killing every two and a half minutes. The Good Guys of WW2
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Mar 24, 2018 16:54
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OctaviusBeaver posted:The Good Guys of WW2 The soviets did a lot of horrifically hosed up stuff under Stalin, full stop. poo poo that constitutes war crimes, crimes against humanity, etc. None of that should be minimized or swept under the rug. Even so, when fighting against a genocidal regime that systematically kills millions in the name of racial purity, yes, they come out as the good guys.
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Mar 24, 2018 17:01
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Cyrano4747 posted:The soviets did a lot of horrifically hosed up stuff under Stalin, full stop. poo poo that constitutes war crimes, crimes against humanity, etc. None of that should be minimized or swept under the rug. They didn't intentionally fight against the genocidal regime though. They allied with them, joined them in invading Poland and sent them vast amounts of oil, wheat and other raw materials. The only reason they ever fought a single Nazi is that they were attacked first and had absolutely no other choice but to defend themselves.
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Mar 24, 2018 17:20
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The thing about the Nazis is that they were evil, and basically everyone knows they are evil and can openly talk about it. Holocaust deniers exist but they are (rightfully) dismissed by mainstream discussion. In this thread we have talked about Nazi atrocities and everyone here agrees they are bad and nobody uses "whataboutism" to talk about Mongol mass killings or whatever. But when Soviet atrocities are discussed they are dismissed, joked about or deflected with "Yeah but what about the Nazis". A few posts up somebody responded to a detailed description of thousands of people being executed with "Gotta admire that work ethic lol". I can't picture someone having a reaction like that to a description of Auschwitz without being called out on it in this thread. I don't think any other country gets that much of a free pass. If someone says how horrible slavery in the US was you don't get 5 other people crawling out of the woodwork to say "Yeah but serfdom still existed in Russia and there were MORE serfs than slaves" because that would be stupid.
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Mar 24, 2018 17:29
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OctaviusBeaver posted:Yeah too bad we didn't stay friends with these awesome dudes I think he went through most of the .25 ACP ammo they had in the Soviet military. Do you think executions had to be delayed so they could get more boxes?
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Mar 24, 2018 17:38
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OctaviusBeaver posted:They didn't intentionally fight against the genocidal regime though. They allied with them, joined them in invading Poland and sent them vast amounts of oil, wheat and other raw materials. The only reason they ever fought a single Nazi is that they were attacked first and had absolutely no other choice but to defend themselves. Mind, all those countries invaded the Soviet Union in it's earliest stages, so that shows the desperation that Stalin and the Politburo had in trying to take down Hitler. They also sent vast amounts of raw materials to the United States, in exchange for technical know-how, because Stalin was paranoid about the capitalist countries trying to overthrow the Soviet Union (is it paranoid if you turn up being right?) and wanted to industrialise and build up a strong army to defend against that. PS: they invaded Poland after the government had abandoned the country, which put the border west and meant that Germany had to go further to Moscow when they invaded. I'm not saying Stalin did nothing wrong, but I'm not sure about taking Nazi Germany's propaganda as completely true is the best option either.
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Mar 24, 2018 18:06
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Let's talk about something else. (Let me just say trying to connect Katyn to the development of the Cold War is dubious to say the least, and any 'analysis' along of the lines of 'look at this atrocity! These guys are evil!' is kinda um. Also debatably pretty much nobody ~intentionally~ fought the nazis, everyone was either forced to uphold an alliance or got war declared on them. It's part of why the nazis were the bad guys) Fangz fucked around with this message at 18:17 on Mar 24, 2018 |
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Mar 24, 2018 18:11
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This is going places we've been to before and it's never ended well.
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Mar 24, 2018 18:11
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Fangz posted:Let's talk about something else. The British had no obligation to defend Poland until they intentionally guaranteed their western border in the face of Nazi aggression. It's arguable whether it was an alliance because it was a one-way obligation. That's pretty different from signing a pact with the Nazis to split up Poland after you invade. If the Nazis are the bad guys for invading people then wouldn't it make the Soviets also the bad buys for invading Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland? Also lol at the "nobody else talk about this, now listen to me talk about it".
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Mar 24, 2018 18:21
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Stop talking about bad guys. I was trying to find a diplomatic way of saying "you are sounding like a complete moron" and I don't want another 4 pages of people arguing with you about it.
Fangz fucked around with this message at 18:29 on Mar 24, 2018 |
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Mar 24, 2018 18:26
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I'm not sure what productive purpose is served by deliberately being contrarian in order to grind a particular ideological axe. Relations between the West and the USSR broke down primarily due to the iron curtain and associated diplomatic conflicts regarding Berlin and the occupation zones; Soviet pre-war atrocities and being an authoritarian form of government and being communist, none of these things factually speaking necessitated* the cold war, Soviet actions (for various reasons of varying levels of justification and rationalization) are what prompted it; which, short of that, it's possible the cold war needn't have happened which I think would've resulted in a vastly better world than what we have been through. *The Soviets being well, the Soviets, didn't stop the US from allowing GM, Chrysler, and others from setting up shop in the Soviet Union; and there were some high ranking officials that would've been interested in US aid and the Marshall Plan if it didn't come with whatever conditions they balked at. I think Soviet-US cooperation was interesting and resulted in legitimately cool things, I think it isn't unreasonable to be melancholic at what could have been, such as the Space race being a cooperative venture instead of a short sighted competition; and the United Nations Military Staff Committee actually being fully realized in its intended role. edit: Sorry Fang didn't see your post. 
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Mar 24, 2018 18:38
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I finally got around to reading one of my christmas presents, a big old book about the invasion and occupation of Denmark during WW2. It is about 1000 pages and aims to cover just about everything that went on for both military, civilian, politicians and businessmen during the Nazi occupation. For a while Denmark was used a sort of rest and recovery area for German divisions coming from the Eastern Front and as that war in Russia went on, the composition of troops in Denmark ended up being pretty much a mix of completely fresh recruits and WW1 veterans, all of which were judged as being unfit for actual combat areas. There was even statements from locals mentioning how the German soldiers in their area were all very nice elderly WW1 veterans and they never caused any problems. Towards the end of 1943 however, the Oberkommando started shifting even the recruits and old men to the East front and instead (and against the wishes of the local commander in Denmark who felt that they couldn't be trusted) started stationing Eastern European divisions in Denmark. It was mainly Russians, but also Hungarians, Ukrainians, Italians, Georgians, Azerbaijani and groups from the Caucasus and Baltic areas. The funniest one was a Cossack regiment of 800 men and 400 horses being stationed in a forest in the middle of Jutland. Apparently the Germans figured that that all these non-German soldiers were good enough to man the various cannons on the newly constructed Atlantic Wall (mainly built so they wouldn't need so many German troops in the country) but not good enough to fight in Russia. Rather amusingly, the locals all assumed that the Hungarians were there against their well and as such sympathised with them and even tried to help them. And of course, some of the Russian elements got involved with resistance groups later on, presumably because the Danish communists were very involved in the active (violent) resistance on account of them being outlawed by the Germans. From all accounts, the Germans loved being stationed in Denmark though. They were far away from the eastern front in a peaceful country and they were allowed to buy up food and goods to send back home to their families.
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Mar 24, 2018 18:39
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Ardent Communist posted:PS: they invaded Poland after the government had abandoned the country, which put the border west and meant that Germany had to go further to Moscow when they invaded. The rest of your post is a point of contention among historians and I don't want to stir up that particular hornet's nest, but this claim is patently and objectively untrue: the government left the country because of the Soviet invasion, not before it. EDIT: and moreover the government leaving by no means allows or justifies Soviets moving in, particularly considering that the government was leaving explicitly to reconstitute in the West and continue the fight. Tevery Best fucked around with this message at 18:41 on Mar 24, 2018 |
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Mar 24, 2018 18:39
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Ardent Communist posted:PS: they invaded Poland after the government had abandoned the country, which put the border west and meant that Germany had to go further to Moscow when they invaded. Poland never helped murder jews because the Government left before the atrocities were committed! 
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Mar 24, 2018 18:55
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Ardent Communist posted:PS: they invaded Poland after the government had abandoned the country, which put the border west and meant that Germany had to go further to Moscow when they invaded. This is really loving dumb. Then again... your username.
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Mar 24, 2018 18:58
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