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Rockopolis posted:Good grief, I've been watching too many Eastern Front documentaries, I'd assumed that the MPs needed the machineguns to shoot deserters. Wehrmacht MPs were heavily involved in anti partisan duties. Lots of getting mixed up in rounding up the local Jews as well.
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May 30, 2017 23:05
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JcDent posted:Yeah, I thought that MPs guarded bases, captured rogue (drunk) grunts and breaked up POG slapfights. I know a few Russian/Soviet history PhDs who don't think highly of Ivan's war. My take away is that it's a fine book for getting the feeling of poo poo but used a narrow-ish source base and drew overly broad conclusions based on anecdotes. That said I still recommend it to people. There just aren't that many works in English about life as a soldier in the red army. It's great as an introductory text but if you start digging deeper you need to be aware of its shortcomings and where it gets contentious. Also I do t think anyone is saying blocking detachments never happened. It's more that they were not a common thing, wee probably very rare at that, and certainly not the SOP that Enemy at the Gates etc would have you think.
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May 30, 2017 23:11
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Oh and my MP story: I taught English in Korea for a year and drank a lot in bars that had a heavy military presence. You would see teams of MPs, one US one ROK, roll through looking for idiots. I grew my hair long because I got tired of explaining that I was just a guy teaching 4 year olds, not some drunk airman.
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May 30, 2017 23:14
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Cyrano4747 posted:Also I do t think anyone is saying blocking detachments never happened. It's more that they were not a common thing, wee probably very rare at that, and certainly not the SOP that Enemy at the Gates etc would have you think. Interesting reddit post about barrier troops as used by the Soviets, with lots of sources for further perusal. TL;DR Most regular units might have had blocking detachments at the start of the war due to the large retreats made my unsteady commanders but as the war went on its use dramatically decreased, when the men in a blocking unit could be at the front on the offensive. Penal battalions though definitely had them by design since the men were typically sentenced to them and to ensure they remained committed to an attack or defense. In most cases the main thing they did was catch deserters and retreaters and get them to rejoin the front, typically with arrests and a maybe a couple of executions to set an example.
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May 30, 2017 23:58
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I just finished reading this thread in its entirety a week ago so I'm glad I can contribute. Great thread by the way. Disclaimer: Its been 10 years since I've been out and I only spent a little under 4 years in the USA Army. 2 of those years were spent recovering from injuries. If you,re curious and have archives go here. Basic for Military Police is done at Fort Leonard Wood in Missouri. I'm not sure how other MOSs in the Army do basic, but for us basic training and training for our specialty was done all at once in the same place. That meant basic was 5 months long. They teach you the usual police stuff of defusing domestic cases, how to do hand-to-hand and subdue people, things of that nature. They also focused on our war duties which were guarding prisoners, how to set up and guard a checkpoint, how to survive an ambush, poo poo like that. From what I said earlier by the end we all figured we were going to Iraq or Afghanistan eventually. The big reasons why were because of how the enemy attacked and we were expected to train up the police forces. The most dangerous jobs in the military during that time were truck driver and military police. The enemy attacked convoys using ambushes all the time so that meant the poor fuckers guarding the convoys, military police, and the fuckers driving the trucks, truck drivers obviously, were hit more than others. If we weren't guarding convoys, we were guarding checkpoints with allied forces, usually Kurds since they hated everyone and everyone hated them, or training local police forces while guarding their police station. You should notice a pattern here that in war our job is to guard poo poo. That's kind of the point why we were loaded for bear. We would go out and guard poo poo as a squad and had to be equipped to defend that from whatever until reinforcements arrived. If its a convoy we're guarding as long as our Humvees can drive we just get the gently caress out of Dodge while laying down fire. My job while I was in Iraq was to guard bridges over the Tigris river. Some Kurds would have been there already and set up a checkpoint. We would hang out at that bridge for a few hours before driving to another one and repeat ad nauseum. After I was shot I learned my platoon moved every month or so to another base and was given a new mission. The mission usually involved, you guessed it, guarding poo poo. When I was stationed in Germany we didn't do much police duties. We usually trained to be deployed. It was originally Afghanistan first, but they just sent the one platoon at the last second. Then it was Iraq, which was cancelled after we loaded all of our poo poo. Eventually we went to Iraq for reals this time. Because of the constant changes in our deployment we couldn't switch over to police duties since we would have to be training for deployment again. They didn't need us on the base for security anyways. Most bases out-sourced their security and we were no different. Securitas was the company that ran gate security but they needed actual MPs to patrol and police the soldiers. Even though we were literally loving right there they deployed a national guard MP platoon for that. We did end up being actual police officers for a month. That involved what your average police officer does. Drive around doing nothing, get the occasional call where we went out and listened to people complain about each other, poo poo like that. Personally I loved working weekend nights. My partner and I would go around to the clubs and get to know the bouncers. We would then go inside for free and scare the poo poo out of the Infantry guys in there. They had have this thing called the Courtesy Patrol (CP). These were basically a squad of infantry that went to the clubs while on the clock to give rides to drunk soldiers and make sure they didn't get picked up by us. Most people treated them like poo poo or ignored them, unless we were standing there next to them. You would literally see them change as they laughed at them until they caught sight of me next to them, at which point they would IMMEDIATELY stiffen up and be respectful. Most of the time I didn't give a poo poo and honestly didn't have to pick up any drunks. The CP guys took care of them. To be honest I was more interested in making friends with the bouncers so they would let us in even after they turned away women for the club being too full. Like civilian cops we would also call whoever was on duty to come pick us up if it was too early in the morning for the cabs to be running.Keep in mind that I was a TERRIBLE police officer and had no business being one. I chose that over Military Intelligence after acing the ASVAB. I was quite young and very stupid. I already kind of explained how an MP company is set up but I'll go in a bit more detail. Our company had 4 platoons which were spread out among various bases in Germany. I was part of 3rd platoon out of Schweinfurt (spelling?) and to get to company HQ was roughly a 90 minute drive. 1st platoon and 5th platoon (maybe?) was out of HQ, close to Frankfurt I think. The reason why I'm unsure is because 1st platoon went to Afghanistan but all the support guys stayed. I'm not sure if all the mechanics, medics, cooks, and quartermasters were their own thing. Our platoon medic didn't come live out with us for a while and our platoon mechanic was always at HQ with all the others. For most of my time there a squad was made up of 3 teams of 3 with 2 squads in the platoon. Getting numbers for deployment was a bitch since we had a guy go AWOL, a few peoples' orders expire, and when deployment orders come in a mixed gender platoon suddenly a lot of women are mysteriously pregnant. Can't be deployed if you're pregnant. If anyone wants me to go into more detail I can try.
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May 31, 2017 01:45
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Chillyrabbit posted:Interesting reddit post about barrier troops as used by the Soviets, with lots of sources for further perusal. It's kinda wacky if you think about it that the state is generally accepted to be allowed to prioritize its survival over that of its citizens. Like I pay my taxes so that some dude can be paid to shoot me for not charging towards my death enthusiastically enough. I'm running the loving show I should be formally allowed to go you know what, I'll take my chances with the foreign invaders.
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May 31, 2017 02:29
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aphid_licker posted:It's kinda wacky if you think about it that the state is generally accepted to be allowed to prioritize its survival over that of its citizens. Like I pay my taxes so that some dude can be paid to shoot me for not charging towards my death enthusiastically enough. I'm running the loving show I should be formally allowed to go you know what, I'll take my chances with the foreign invaders. That's the draft for you. Although 18 year olds don't generally pay much in taxes.
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May 31, 2017 02:34
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Maybe a weird question but since someone mentioned it: I'm aware officer/enlisted fraternisation is a thing and most militaries try and avoid it, but what is the officer/enlisted relationship actually like (or supposed to be like), then? I'd assume leading a group of guys would involve some degree of those guys having confidence in you, and it feels like it'd be hard to have much confidence in someone you never see except for when he's telling you to get shot at.
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May 31, 2017 02:34
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spectralent posted:Maybe a weird question but since someone mentioned it: I'm aware officer/enlisted fraternisation is a thing and most militaries try and avoid it, but what is the officer/enlisted relationship actually like (or supposed to be like), then? I'd assume leading a group of guys would involve some degree of those guys having confidence in you, and it feels like it'd be hard to have much confidence in someone you never see except for when he's telling you to get shot at. although england is hosed up and probably immoral edit: the duel thing is important because you only fight with someone if you think you're their equal. HEY GUNS fucked around with this message at 03:03 on May 31, 2017 |
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May 31, 2017 02:42
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Chillyrabbit posted:Interesting reddit post about barrier troops as used by the Soviets, with lots of sources for further perusal. I always found it kind of funny that the unnecessary tacked-on Hollywood romance is actually the most historically accurate thing about Enemy at the Gates
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May 31, 2017 03:01
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I went to the Aquino Tank Weekend at the Ontario Regiment Museum and took some videos! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hAaf68Jtr2s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-EuAlbqe3Eg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NhrjY3_6b7k https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wiOu2CdWSDw One thing that struck me as odd is how many Wehrmacht reenactors there were. That infantry squad you see in the video is all the Allies in attendance, minus two guys that were left to watch the tents and weapons. The Germans had 20-30 guys on the field and at least another dozen hanging out at their tents.
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May 31, 2017 04:49
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HEY GAIL posted:although england is hosed up and probably immoral Thread title.
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May 31, 2017 05:06
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So I have been binge watching a fair bit of time commanders recently; after it was brought up in this thread a bit. I mean its got Aryeh (lynette) Nusbacher and she is pretty awesome. And they do a good job of laying the context of the battles and how they were fought and what happened. It would be worth watching for that alone. It generally looks like they are playing on a super easy difficulty level. Also does anyone know how the enemy is controlled, if there is generally some goon in a cupboard playing as the enemy being directed by the historians? Also, the "technicians" must just hate everything that is going on.
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May 31, 2017 05:24
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Ensign Expendable posted:
Sounds like most WW2 reenactments, then. Not sure about the US, but in most of Europe it looks like at least a 5:1 German/Allied ratio is the norm. People just love playing Pretty Princess Dress-Up: Nazi Edition.
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May 31, 2017 05:34
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Comrade Koba posted:Sounds like most WW2 reenactments, then. Not sure about the US, but in most of Europe it looks like at least a 5:1 German/Allied ratio is the norm. People just love playing Pretty Princess Dress-Up: Nazi Edition. i used to be an acw reenactor, and i had some friends who also did ww2. they depicted americans, and they mentioned an event they went to where it began to rain and while the guys playing americans slept in a local barn the guys playing the germans (ss of course) all went home. my friends hadn't seen them at any civil war or revolutionary war events either. the implication being that instead of being experienced reenactors (everyone gets rained on) who were there for the history, they were there for something else edit: i'd do it, but only if i could go as this guy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Schmorell HEY GUNS fucked around with this message at 06:20 on May 31, 2017 |
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May 31, 2017 06:17
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You can do both at once as long as you depict an Abwehr agent
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May 31, 2017 06:49
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StashAugustine posted:You can do both at once as long as you depict an Abwehr agent
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May 31, 2017 06:50
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HEY GAIL posted:i almost mentioned sick canaris cosplay, but it turns out dude was for hitler before he was against him i mean even the ones that weren't ideologically anti-nazi were allied double agents or so hilariously incompetent they might as well have been
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May 31, 2017 06:54
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StashAugustine posted:i mean even the ones that weren't ideologically anti-nazi were allied double agents or so hilariously incompetent they might as well have been even now, germans can't really do a espionage http://www.ndtv.com/world-news/arrested-german-spy-was-a-onetime-gay-porn-actor-and-a-secret-islamist-1632458
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May 31, 2017 06:57
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people who are good at spies
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May 31, 2017 07:01
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thatbastardken posted:people who are good at spies not kidding
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May 31, 2017 07:02
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yeah jesuits have a rep for espionage, don't they?
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May 31, 2017 07:03
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thatbastardken posted:people who are good at spies Britain was totally clowning on the Germans in WW2. Not sure what they're like now.
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May 31, 2017 07:12
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The Lone Badger posted:Britain was totally clowning on the Germans in WW2. Not sure what they're like now. In WW1 even more so. WW1 German intelligence was a full on clown show.
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May 31, 2017 07:21
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HEY GAIL posted:the vatican Don't leave us hanging! There's gotta be some great stories here!
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May 31, 2017 08:27
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About blocking detachments: The Wehrmacht had these dudes: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feldj%C3%A4gerkorps The interesting part about them is that they were the last part of the Wehrmacht to be demobilized by the Allies, since they helped out with overseeing the disarming and the demobilization of the rest of the Wehrmacht. If I ever get the time, I'd write a book about that.
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May 31, 2017 08:42
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It's pretty bad rear end that you had to be decorated to be a member.. although the wiki says at least 4.5 million IC 2nd class were awarded during the war itself, so it's not the baddest of the bad  I always got a kick out of having a squad of Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross holders in Company of Heroes, though I doubt you'd actually farm them together in squads in real life.
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May 31, 2017 08:50
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There's a reason we have a million historical accuracy mods for CoH to the point where combat mission becomes an easier game to play. I liked the soundbite for researching highest veterancy. From the grateful fatherland for the glorious struggle, honor and blood, I present to you this iron cross.
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May 31, 2017 09:54
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Cyrano4747 posted:Wehrmacht MPs were heavily involved in anti partisan duties. Lots of getting mixed up in rounding up the local Jews as well. Particularly since in 1941/42, whole categories are often lumped together. A communist is a partisan is a Jew is an enemy combatant.
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May 31, 2017 09:56
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Rockopolis posted:Good grief, I've been watching too many Eastern Front documentaries, I'd assumed that the MPs needed the machineguns to shoot deserters. I mean, in a Germany in 1945 type situation, who else is going to do the policing? The area the MPs are in has been conquered. The Gestapo aren't around any more, nor are the regular German criminal police; someone's got to do it. As for early 20th century fraternisation, you think the British army is p distant for officer/enlisted relations (and it was), from the sounds of it the French were worse.
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May 31, 2017 10:20
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The Lone Badger posted:Britain was totally clowning on the Germans in WW2. Not sure what they're like now. Well, y'know, it's not the present day but https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cambridge_Five 
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May 31, 2017 10:21
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feedmegin posted:As for early 20th century fraternisation, you think the British army is p distant for officer/enlisted relations (and it was), from the sounds of it the French were worse.  i guess
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May 31, 2017 10:27
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feedmegin posted:Well, y'know, it's not the present day but https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cambridge_Five yeah and clowning on german intelligence is like beating up a kid in a coma.
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May 31, 2017 10:53
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HEY GAIL posted:varies wildly by century, early 17th century officers can beat you or order you to do something that may result in your death but they drink in the same bars and sleep in the same rooms (sometimes) as their men, and duel them, while I talked to trin about this once and he said early 20th century officers aren't supposed to associate with the dudes like...at all Huh, that's kind of fascinating. It sounds like there's no real concept of fraternisation at all.
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May 31, 2017 11:48
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spectralent posted:Huh, that's kind of fascinating. It sounds like there's no real concept of fraternisation at all. but physically there just is no room where these people end up staying. oh sure, the general himself will end up occupying the nicest house they've just liberated from a member of [$Not_Your_Religion], but I've read an account of a regimental quartermaster throwing a party in his room and like all of his officers were sitting around a table on the bed. If they're in that room and the enlisted men are in the hall outside, different ranks are going to interact with one another, whether you'd like to prohibit it or not.
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May 31, 2017 11:58
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JcDent posted:Yeah, I thought that MPs guarded bases, captured rogue (drunk) grunts and breaked up POG slapfights. Interestingly enough the Italians had blocking detachments in WW1 even before the Soviets starting using them in the Russian civil war. The Italian front is so screwed up that it makes the other front look like quite a good experience in comparison. If anyone want a truly fascinating and depressing read I recommend "The White War: Life and Death on the Italian Front 1915-1919" by Mark Thompson.Also, gently caress Cadorna forever. Pump it up! Do it! fucked around with this message at 13:46 on May 31, 2017 |
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May 31, 2017 12:24
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I second that. In fact, Ask Us About Military History Mk. III: gently caress Cadorna forever.
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May 31, 2017 12:39
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/r/askhistorians does it again. For the question "I'm a restless German peasant with violent tendencies in 1520. I hear about the Landsknechts and other mercenaries, and being a professional solider sounds more interesting than working the farm. How could I become one?" every comment except one has been removed. 
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May 31, 2017 12:41
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Boiled Water posted:/r/askhistorians does it again. For the question "I'm a restless German peasant with violent tendencies in 1520. I hear about the Landsknechts and other mercenaries, and being a professional solider sounds more interesting than working the farm. How could I become one?" every comment except one has been removed. Not too familiar with reddit. What does that mean? Were all but one responses super racist? Or was only one response super racist enough?
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May 31, 2017 12:58
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Grand Prize Winner posted:Not too familiar with reddit. What does that mean? Were all but one responses super racist? Or was only one response super racist enough? and the answer, i think, is "figure out who's recruiting and where and just show up"
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May 31, 2017 13:00
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