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What really is the difference between a castle and a fort? Be honest, there actually isn't any.
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Dec 22, 2013 23:22
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What about the complexes that are called "forts" in India, such as the Red Fort in Delhi? What's the difference between the castles built by Edward I on the Welsh border and the forts built in the Scottish highlands after the Jacobite risings in the 18th century? Forts on the American frontier could be political centers, just as those on the frontiers of ancient Rome. What about the constantly shifting line between a hill fort and a castle? It seems to me that there are fortifications, and some of those get to be called castles, mostly the ones built by Europeans between the 11th and 16th century. However there isn't an actual difference between a "castle" and other subsets of fortifications.
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Dec 23, 2013 16:41
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The Viets don't have many big guns, but if somehow they do have heavy artillery they'll never get it up the mountainsides, and if somehow they do get it on top of the mountains they'll never be able get enough shells up there, and if somehow they do manage to keep the guns resupplied their accuracy is so terrible it'll never have much of an effect, and if somehow they do accurately shoot at us we'll just destroy them with our counterbattery fire, and if somehow they are NOT destroyed by our counterbattery fire, the Americans will save us somehow.
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Dec 23, 2013 21:19
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If you like Dien Bien Phu, you'll love the Battle of Harper's Ferry in the ACW. Confederate soldiers dragged artillery by hand up nearly vertical slopes surrounding the town of Harper's Ferry and proceeded to blast the poo poo out of its Union garrison, which was forced to lay down its arms. It was the largest surrender of American troops until Bataan. The Confederate soldiers were then force marched north in time to fight at the Battle of Antietam. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_harpers_ferry 12,419 Union prisoners taken. 39 Confederates killed.
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Dec 23, 2013 21:27
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Yes, slaves were used extensively by Confederate forces as laborers.
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Dec 23, 2013 21:40
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Slavvy posted:Was Napoleon as much of a tactical genius as popular culture leads me to believe? I don't know much about him at all, aside from him getting closer to Moscow than Hitler did before turning around and loving off home.
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Dec 24, 2013 09:45
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Don't forget all the adorable cooperation there was between the two opposing sides on the other Christmases of WWI, by which I mean the high command on both sides ordering lots of artillery barrages on Christmas/Christmas Eve to avoid a repeat of 1914.
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Dec 24, 2013 18:07
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EvanSchenck posted:Pankaj Mishra's fierce takedown of Ferguson in the Guardian is a great read and a good explanation of why Carlin's citation of The Pity of War turned me right off. He's basically a Tory piece of poo poo who writes books about how we'd all be better off if stuffed shirt Brit aristocrats had ruled the world forever.
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Dec 27, 2013 03:05
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Q is a pretty amazing book.
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Dec 27, 2013 20:42
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If someone was setting out to spend their life studying the life and times of Otto I, how would they do that? What kind of languages, if any, would they need to learn? What sort of degrees would they need to pursue? What writings would they need to produce to be considered an expert, and where would these works have to be published? Please help me with this.
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Dec 30, 2013 11:10
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a travelling HEGEL posted:Why do you ask--are you writing a character in a work of fiction that is an Otto I expert?
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Dec 30, 2013 22:27
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I find that summary of German submarine warfare to be automatically bullshit, because you barely mention the role of Q-ships. These were disguised merchant ships that would blow the gently caress out of German submarines that had surfaced and allowed vessels time to discharge their crew into lifeboats in accordance with the laws of war. They are a great example of how the British refused to play good cricket in the North Atlantic when the drat Germans were doing their best to follow the laws of war. Not mentioning them in a history of sub warfare during WWI is like not mentioning the Laconia Incident in a history of sub warfare during WWII. It's an automatic indication that you are approaching the subject from one single point of view, a completely bullshit one.
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Jan 1, 2014 11:37
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The thread has moved on, but I'd like to apologize for my last post. It was very harsh and unreasonable. I'm not abandoning what I said, or the discussion, but I wasn't arguing in good faith. My thoughts about the submarine campaigns in the Atlantic tend more towards the political rather than the military and I get a little out of hand when talking about that stuff sometimes. I'm sorry again. Here's a fun question: are there any good memoirs written by people who were from non-French areas annexed by Napoleon who served in his armed forces? Such as a Croat from the "Illyrian Provinces". Including puppet states but not allies.
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Jan 2, 2014 10:38
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Russia had a serious revolution in 1905. It was simultaneously crushed and reforms were made. There's no indication that with no war, any other revolution would have created a different result. The weakening of the mechanisms of control caused what happened in 1917.
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Jan 22, 2014 07:55
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There's a really affecting passage in a war memoir by a Wehrmacht soldier about how Germany has been stripped of all its horses and they've all died on the Eastern Front. Maybe it was Guy Sajer? That's just a shot in the dark
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Jan 30, 2014 02:51
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BurningStone posted:I'm not a Keegan fan myself.
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Apr 2, 2014 15:01
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Here's a fun obscure bit of milhist: the world's most recent amphibious assault. Essentially, a military strongman was being a total dick and running his own private tiny kingdom on the Comoran island of Anjouan. In 2008, the other Comorans, assisted by the AU, decided to take him down with "Operation Democracy".
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Apr 18, 2014 16:37
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Tom Clancy-esque question: how would drones be used in a "conventional" war in 2014?
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May 14, 2014 07:48
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ArchangeI posted:Recon/strike would be the obvious answer, but there are several problems with it. The survivability of drones in a modern air defense environment is doubtful at best, unless we are talking about the very high-end stealth drones. A first world army would also probably have the equipment to jam the control signal, which usually leads to a crash of the drone. There is non-trivial chance that the answer to your question is "not at all".
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May 14, 2014 09:52
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I'm not big on Great Man stuff, but Charles le Téméraire getting killed at Nancy hosed a lot of things up.
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May 16, 2014 16:27
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American battleships were able to sail up to the Japanese coast and shell shore targets with impunity. Their air power had collapsed totally, not partially.
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May 21, 2014 05:55
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Slavvy posted:D-Day was the much-needed relief action that prevented the soviet union from completely collapsing under the relentless nazi onslaught. They were basically just constantly retreating and attacking in human waves while waiting for the Americans (only the Americans btw) to land in europe and distract hitler.
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May 28, 2014 10:15
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The Merry Marauder posted:I don't know if it's possible to "heartily" recommend Come and See.
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Jun 2, 2014 02:19
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Raenir Salazar posted:There's also this Flash Presentation which is itself pretty amazing.
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Jun 2, 2014 03:30
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Baron_(1990_video_game) Was the most accurate aerial combat simulator ever made. Because there was lots of nothing involved in some of those missions.
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Jun 2, 2014 05:29
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PittTheElder posted:People always post that line, and it always strikes me as completely meaningless. At the very least, you need to include the amount of wheat Britain normally kept on hand. For all I know, Britain only ever had seven weeks of wheat at the best of times, because why would you need more? And even if the U-Boats continue being effective, they're still not going to stop every ship.
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Jun 9, 2014 10:14
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Fangz posted:Is the case of Germany and Russia in WWI the only real example of one side *overestimating* their opponent's will to fight?
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Jun 9, 2014 12:24
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For everyone defending 'plucky little Britain', how could the Nazis knock the UK out of the war, realistically?
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Jun 9, 2014 20:43
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Fangz posted:Edit: Ultimately the Germans expected the British to cave after the defeat of France. If the Germans didn't do Barbarrossa, and US support was not forthcoming, I think that is a reasonable expectation. I mean, there is little prospect of Britain winning, even if an invasion can be staved off, so for what purpose would the country hold out?
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Jun 9, 2014 21:31
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Hegel, I feel like I've asked you this in this thread, or a previous iteration, but how do you feel about Q? If you have read it, how accurate is it?
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Jun 11, 2014 10:22
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RE: Q From wikipedia quote:The book follows the journey of an Anabaptist radical across Europe in the first half of the 16th century as he joins in various movements and uprisings that come as a result of the Protestant reformation. The book spans 30 years as he is pursued by 'Q' (short for "Qoèlet"), a spy for the Roman Catholic Church cardinal Giovanni Pietro Carafa. The main character, who changes his name many times during the story, first fights in the German Peasants' War beside Thomas Müntzer, during which time he takes part in negotiations which are eventually formalised as the Twelve Articles. Following this, he battles in Münster's siege, during the Münster Rebellion, and some years later, in Venice.
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Jun 11, 2014 22:58
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It's one of my favorite books, especially the parts about the Münster Rebellion.
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Jun 11, 2014 23:00
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You won't regret it! Have you read any of the 1632 series? I haven't but they sound atrocious.
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Jun 11, 2014 23:23
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AATREK CURES KIDS posted:I read the first one. I'd rank it far above Turtledove, at least.
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Jun 11, 2014 23:51
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AATREK CURES KIDS posted:Definitely, and how are you not insane? The first time I read a Turtledove book I was thinking "decent plot but this guy's writing style is really repetitive." I read a bunch more and it got unbelievably repetitive. Being in a remote cabin with a hurt leg and a stack of Turtledove books made for one lousy summer.
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Jun 12, 2014 01:55
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gradenko_2000 posted:Speaking of historical fiction, I am just having the most difficult time finishing Fall of Giants by Ken Follett. At first it was all the sex scenes that just caught me off guard, but thankfully the actual outbreak of war put a stop to that. But now were in 1917-1918 and he's making the goddamn Russian Revolution sound boring, which I didn't know was even possible. It's all committees this and Lenin yelling that and it turned into a real slog.
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Jun 12, 2014 07:21
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Thousands and thousands of years ago. I mean, the Egyptians definitely had borders like you're thinking about, and so did the Greeks.
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Jun 15, 2014 10:08
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You guys seem to have a romanticized notion of the past. Land surveying is something that is older than history.
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Jun 15, 2014 11:53
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Plenty of border areas before modern cartography were poorly defined. The type of in-between border march regions mentioned did exist, and they're one of my favorite things to learn about. However, borders as surveyed, invisible lines that are shapes on a map and policed as such by states who think of themselves as shapes on a map are not a recent innovation, and that is what the original question seemed to be assuming.
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Jun 15, 2014 22:45
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HEY GAL posted:I think the Holy Roman Empire is more of a state of mind, really.
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Jun 15, 2014 23:21
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