|
Tab8715 posted:On the subject or World War 2 and tanks. Well, how exactly do you see out of a tank? Plus, you can't just have some cut-out or infantry or other tanks will start lobbing bullets threw the opening, but there's glass covering it, won't that just get cracked and leave the crew blind? Several ways. Tank commander was usually responsible for spotting and calling out targets. To do this, he was either half-exposed or peering out of the top hatch. For long-range engagements this offers best visibility and is generally advisable. Drivers also had their own hatches for long marches, since it made driving easier. Some early tanks had simple holes in the hull for viewing out. As long as the hole is suitably small (say, not much larger than your eye) it's very hard to hit it. This was the case for mostly machine guns, which only needed a very small viewport to be usable. Some tanks had layered armored glass. If hit, it gets damaged and hinders the view. That's why tanks have several viewports: nothing is as useless as a blind tank. For main gunners tanks use a type of periscope that allowed for accurate range adjustments. Here's one example from a Tiger tank.
|
#
?
Jul 27, 2010 09:40
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 27, 2024 14:39 |
|
|
Tab8715 posted:On the subject or World War 2 and tanks. Well, how exactly do you see out of a tank? Plus, you can't just have some cut-out or infantry or other tanks will start lobbing bullets threw the opening, but there's glass covering it, won't that just get cracked and leave the crew blind? Periscopes and tiny slits for driver you could see through.
|
|
#
?
Jul 27, 2010 15:30
|
|
|
So, Are the slits as big as the last part in Saving Private Ryan? Where, one of solider is able to stick his Thompson through the front window of the tiger? If so, that's just seems so crazy?
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2010 10:12
|
|
|
Tab8715 posted:Are the slits as big as the last part in Saving Private Ryan? Generally speaking you don't want to have enemy infantry crawling over your tanks. One man with a satchel charge can destroy or seriously damage even modern armor. The viewport in Tiger would have had armored glass on it, preventing an enemy infantryman from sticking his gun inside.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2010 10:39
|
|
|
To be exact, the drivers' viewport of a Tiger tank had SIX layers of armored glass, plus one sheet just behind them. I doubt a Thompson SMG would be enough to penetrate that, but I guess it would scrape it pretty badly, partially blinding the driver. It's still pretty silly.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2010 12:22
|
|
|
Tab8715 posted:On the subject or World War 2 and tanks. Well, how exactly do you see out of a tank? Plus, you can't just have some cut-out or infantry or other tanks will start lobbing bullets threw the opening, but there's glass covering it, won't that just get cracked and leave the crew blind? Vision ports, peepholes, periscopes and vision slits. While these represent theoretical holes in the tank's armor, they're usually very small targets.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2010 13:50
|
|
|
What effect had ww2 on demographics, escpecially for Germany and the USSR. They lost millions of men. And I know they lost millions of civilians also, but with alot of men dead from the war. Did this cause a serious shortage of men for women? The numbers are so huge it is pretty hard to imagine.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2010 17:16
|
|
|
MrDutch posted:What effect had ww2 on demographics, escpecially for Germany and the USSR. They lost millions of men. And I know they lost millions of civilians also, but with alot of men dead from the war. Did this cause a serious shortage of men for women? There were also massive population shifts, including the collapse of Eastern Prussia. There was also the turmoil going on in China at the time.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2010 17:42
|
|
|
MrDutch posted:What effect had ww2 on demographics, escpecially for Germany and the USSR. They lost millions of men. And I know they lost millions of civilians also, but with alot of men dead from the war. Did this cause a serious shortage of men for women? There's quite a lot written about the importance of WW2 for the Women's Movement. First it lead to women across the world moving into jobs that would normally be closed off for them, with said women being not so happy about just abandoning their newfound positions of authority as well as economical and social freedom to go back to being housewifes after the war ended. Secondly, the decrease in able bodied men afterwards lead to more openings for the women who wanted to stay in the work force after the war compared to previous decades.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2010 18:59
|
|
|
lilljonas posted:There's quite a lot written about the importance of WW2 for the Women's Movement. First it lead to women across the world moving into jobs that would normally be closed off for them, with said women being not so happy about just abandoning their newfound positions of authority as well as economical and social freedom to go back to being housewifes after the war ended. Secondly, the decrease in able bodied men afterwards lead to more openings for the women who wanted to stay in the work force after the war compared to previous decades. Couldn't you also say that about WW1?
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2010 19:02
|
|
|
Kingsbury posted:Couldn't you also say that about WW1? I'm no expert, but I'm not sure. One big reason might be that the most widely studied example is the US and the American Women's Movement, and the very short American action in that war meant less of a long term stress on the industry to get new workers, any workers. In addition, WW1 was followed by the Great Depression where job opportunities completely bottomed out, compared to WW2 which was followed by a surge in industry output all over the world with lots of job opportunities.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2010 19:58
|
|
|
MrDutch posted:What effect had ww2 on demographics, escpecially for Germany and the USSR. They lost millions of men. And I know they lost millions of civilians also, but with alot of men dead from the war. Did this cause a serious shortage of men for women? In Russia the differences weren't as pronounced because so many women died as well as men. In Germany, however, for a few decades after the war (as we saw after WWI also) there was a visible dip in the demographic size for the men born between 1910 and 1925 or so. Another major cost was care for the maimed solders...it was comparable to the American Civil War in that respect. One thing about Soviet manpower that I've always found fascinating is how close they really were to exhausting their reserves. I've seen a handful of analyses that argued they would not have been able to fight against the allies (had Patton had his way, for example) as their manpower reserves were dwindling so badly due to their losses throughout Barbarossa. It is stunning to me that a country could lose that many soldiers.
|
|
#
?
Aug 2, 2010 20:16
|
|
|
Couldn't a miniseries about Manfred von Richtofen's Flying Circus be just as superb as the Band of Brothers HBO miniseries? I look at movies like "Flyboys" and "The Red Baron" (2009) and cringe/weep. Then I read Peter Kilduff's detailed biography of not only von R.'s life, but also Jasta 11 (and later on, Jagdgeschwader 1) and think, Wow, there's some real connection and relationships here between all the different pilots and the pressure of the war, this could be turned into something visually and emotionally amazing...though I guess BoB had Tom Hanks and Steve Spielberg behind it, didn't it. There's enough there though to draw from though, i.e. letters/records/photographs etc., right? I guess this is really an opinion answer, but I won't let subjectiveness bother me.
|
|
#
?
Aug 3, 2010 05:59
|
|
|
Kingsbury posted:Couldn't you also say that about WW1? Yes. But the world was more industrialized in WW2.
|
|
#
?
Aug 3, 2010 09:49
|
|
|
Jedi Knight Luigi posted:Couldn't a miniseries about Manfred von Richtofen's Flying Circus be just as superb as the Band of Brothers HBO miniseries? I look at movies like "Flyboys" and "The Red Baron" (2009) and cringe/weep. Then I read Peter Kilduff's detailed biography of not only von R.'s life, but also Jasta 11 (and later on, Jagdgeschwader 1) and think, Wow, there's some real connection and relationships here between all the different pilots and the pressure of the war, this could be turned into something visually and emotionally amazing...though I guess BoB had Tom Hanks and Steve Spielberg behind it, didn't it. There's enough there though to draw from though, i.e. letters/records/photographs etc., right? There probably could be an excellent miniseries made about it. Even better (I think) would be one about the Eastern front in WWII. However, it's just more profitable in the US to make war stories that involve American soldiers so I don't see any huge budget projects happening anytime soon.
|
|
#
?
Aug 3, 2010 17:43
|
|
|
I've always been kind of appalled that more hasn't been done on WWI. The nature of the combat was so visceral and personal in nature that it seems like it would be perfect for movies/TV. Instead we appear to need to cover every imaginable element of American involvement in WWII. Up next: Gay, Sometimes: The Story of the United States Merchant Marine
|
|
#
?
Aug 3, 2010 18:43
|
|
|
bewbies posted:I've always been kind of appalled that more hasn't been done on WWI. The nature of the combat was so visceral and personal in nature that it seems like it would be perfect for movies/TV. Instead we appear to need to cover every imaginable element of American involvement in WWII. The literature and poetry written about ww1 was far superior to anything produced about ww2. I do agree that film and tv about ww1 is woeful though. These are two good books http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good-Bye_to_All_That http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memoirs_of_an_Infantry_Officer A more modern novel about Sassoon and Graves is http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regeneration_(novel) I think the first two books are still in print, but if not 2nd hand paperbacks shouldn't be that expensive.
|
|
#
?
Aug 3, 2010 21:10
|
|
|
I think the "what if" scenarios about WWI are fascinating too. What would Eastern Europe, indeed all of Europe, look like today had the Central Powers won? Could the Middle East be radically different? What about Japans role post WWI? How would the colonies have shaken out? And yet we get more questions along the line of "what if Hitler had zombie SS troopers armed with mini nuke launchers?"
|
|
#
?
Aug 3, 2010 22:35
|
|
|
Surprisingly, one of my strongest TV or cinema memory of WW1 was from the episodes of Young Indiana Jones (I know...) regarding the period. While I was just a kid and can't vouch for how well they would stand up to scrutiny today, I remember them as very dark and visceral compared to the ordinary feel of that show. Even trench warfare with flame-throwers, head-on charges on machine gun nests etc.
|
|
#
?
Aug 3, 2010 22:39
|
|
|
asbo subject posted:The literature and poetry written about ww1 was far superior to anything produced about ww2. I do agree that film and tv about ww1 is woeful though. Both the book and the movie adaptation of All Quiet on the Western front are absolutely amazing.
|
|
#
?
Aug 3, 2010 22:45
|
|
|
Another interesting read is Ernst Jünger's Storm of Steel. Jünger had a bit of an hard-on for war, and it shows. He was wounded 14 times during WW1 and was awarded both the Iron Cross 1st Class and the Pour le Mérite (he was the youngest-ever recipient of it). He wrote several other books too, and lived a pretty interesting life.
|
|
#
?
Aug 3, 2010 23:26
|
|
|
Puukko naamassa posted:Another interesting read is Ernst Jünger's Storm of Steel. Jünger had a bit of an hard-on for war, and it shows. He was wounded 14 times during WW1 and was awarded both the Iron Cross 1st Class and the Pour le Mérite (he was the youngest-ever recipient of it). I would like to read it, I heard it is the opposite of all quiet. Is that accurate?
|
|
#
?
Aug 4, 2010 00:11
|
|
|
Hob_Gadling posted:Several ways. Little stuff like this is the most interesting.
|
|
#
?
Aug 4, 2010 00:18
|
|
|
Chade Johnson posted:I would like to read it, I heard it is the opposite of all quiet. Is that accurate? Yeah, you could describe it as such. When it comes to graphic description of trench warfare, it's not all that different from All Quiet on the Western Front, and Jünger doesn't gloss over the many deaths that occur, but he does paint himself and his fellow soldiers as noble and dauntless men, glorifies combat, and in a preface written for one of the editions of the book, states that "Time only strengthens my conviction that it was a good and strenuous life, and that the war, for all its destructiveness, was an incomparable schooling of the heart".
|
|
#
?
Aug 4, 2010 10:01
|
|
|
asbo subject posted:The literature and poetry written about ww1 was far superior to anything produced about ww2. I do agree that film and tv about ww1 is woeful though. I'll add Now It Can Be Told by Phillip Gibbs to this list. I found a battered old library copy in a used bookstore in Portland and I bought it on a whim ($1.50...woo). Turns out it is available for free online! Anyway, Gibbs was one of the only "offical reporters" for the UK during the war and he spent a lot of time in the trenches as sort of a proto-embedded reporter. The book is unique because it was written in 1920, so it has a ridiculously near-term perspective and is unclouded by the events of WWII. It is a bit overly patriotic, but it doesn't compromise anything.
|
|
#
?
Aug 4, 2010 14:35
|
|
|
The Wipers Times was a trench newspaper produced by 12th Sherwood Foresters from 1916; it's fairly satirical and generally pretty funny (although it helps to be familiar with the historical facts of the war and contemporary British society/politics). It's a fascnating insight into the humour and attitudes of those in the trenches. And it's been reprinted! http://www.amazon.co.uk/Wipers-Times-Complete-Wartime-Newspaper/dp/1906251177/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1280931999&sr=8-1
|
|
#
?
Aug 4, 2010 15:32
|
|
|
Were/are Spetsnaz Alpha group/Vympel as highly trained and deadly as they are often portrayed in the popular media? I always imagined this image is due to the little information that was available to the western public during the cold war.
|
|
#
?
Aug 5, 2010 13:15
|
|
|
Qvark posted:Were/are Spetsnaz Alpha group/Vympel as highly trained and deadly as they are often portrayed in the popular media? Probably, but their numbers are also tiny. They have very through training comparable to SAS or similar special forces counter-terrorism unit.
|
|
#
?
Aug 5, 2010 13:31
|
|
|
I dont know if "popular media" portrays them at all, let alone in a good light. Two incidents I can recall that involved them, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beslan_school_hostage_crisis and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moscow_theater_hostage_crisis neither of them showed their expertise.
|
|
#
?
Aug 5, 2010 16:14
|
|
|
Alpha was better during Soviet times. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Storm-333
|
|
#
?
Aug 5, 2010 18:23
|
|
|
Can anyone recommend books on Roman military history? Mainly interested in the Caesers war in Gaul, or the civil war(s) that followed.
|
|
#
?
Aug 5, 2010 20:26
|
|
|
Midnight- posted:Can anyone recommend books on Roman military history? Mainly interested in the Caesers war in Gaul, or the civil war(s) that followed. I heard this one was good. http://classics.mit.edu/Caesar/gallic.html
|
|
#
?
Aug 5, 2010 20:28
|
|
|
Midnight- posted:Can anyone recommend books on Roman military history? Mainly interested in the Caesers war in Gaul, or the civil war(s) that followed. Adrian Goldsworthy's books are pretty easy to approach IMO, so I'd suggest Caesar: Life of a Colossus. It's a biography, so it covers his life from the beginning, but the conquest of Gaul and later civil wars are also well covered.
|
|
#
?
Aug 5, 2010 21:26
|
|
|
Chopstix posted:I dont know if "popular media" portrays them at all, let alone in a good light. I mean Discovery channel and the likes. I know some about which operations they have conducted, but I was more interested in their training and comparison with other special forces. Guess most of the stuff is secret though.
|
|
#
?
Aug 5, 2010 23:56
|
|
|
Qvark posted:I mean Discovery channel and the likes. You should watch the "Green Beret vs Spetsnaz" episode of Deadliest Warrior. It's a highly scientific and very historically accurate program.
|
|
#
?
Aug 6, 2010 03:53
|
|
|
Freeze posted:You should watch the "Green Beret vs Spetsnaz" episode of Deadliest Warrior. It's a highly scientific and very historically accurate program. I hope that was sarcastic. I don't think anything on Discovery Channel qualifies as scientifically or historically accurate anymore.
|
|
#
?
Aug 6, 2010 04:20
|
|
|
Ensign Expendable posted:Alpha was better during Soviet times. Read a linked detailed description of this and wow, it sounds like a real life 80ies action movie. quote:As planned, Sakhatov’s group moved out fifteen minutes prior to the beginning of the assault. As they drove through the Afghan 3rd Battalion area, they saw that the battalion was on alert. The battalion commander and deputies were standing in the center of the parade ground while weapons and ammunition were being issued to the battalion personnel. Quickly estimating the situation, Sakhatov decided to capture the command group of the 3rd Infantry Battalion. Moving at top speed, the truck full of Spetsnaz suddenly braked by the Afghan officers and within a few seconds, the officers were lying on the floor of the truck. The GAZ-66 jumped forward leaving a cloud of dust behind. During the first few minutes, the soldiers of the battalion did not understand what had happened, but then they opened fire on the fleeing vehicle. It was too late. The dust cloud hid the vehicle and the firing was ineffective. Sakhatov drove two hundred meters and then, reaching advantageous terrain, stopped the vehicle and unloaded his personnel. The Spetsnaz immediately lay down and opened fire on the pursuing 3rd Battalion soldiers. The leaderless Afghans bunched up presenting a fine target. The two machine guns and eight assault rifles of Sakhatov’s group killed over two hundred personnel. quote:Fratricide was also a problem. In the assault on the Tadzh-Bek palace, personnel from the Muslim battalion and the KGB Spetsnaz identified one another by the white armbands on their sleeves, the challenge and password “Misha—Yasha,” and Russian cursing.  - "Misha!" - "Yasha! And gently caress your mother, too!"
|
|
#
?
Aug 6, 2010 11:36
|
|
|
Back in high school, one of my history teachers used to go on how if the Confederates had won at Gettysburg, Canada would be part of the United States. His reasoning was that a Confederate victory would have resulted in the British openly supporting the South, leading to a US invasion of Canada (perhaps not immediately, but at some point). According to him, the US at the time had the strongest land army in the Western world, since most European powers were recovering from Napoleonic conflicts, and that they would have washed over British forces sent across the pond. Was he smoking something?
|
|
#
?
Aug 6, 2010 13:44
|
|
|
Kolodny posted:Back in high school, one of my history teachers used to go on how if the Confederates had won at Gettysburg, Canada would be part of the United States. His reasoning was that a Confederate victory would have resulted in the British openly supporting the South, leading to a US invasion of Canada (perhaps not immediately, but at some point). According to him, the US at the time had the strongest land army in the Western world, since most European powers were recovering from Napoleonic conflicts, and that they would have washed over British forces sent across the pond. Was he smoking something? Well, the US army at the time probably was among the most powerful on the planet (large size due to war recruitment, recent battlefield experience) and the British Army was fairly small (unlike the European powers, Britain never had peacetime conscription until the 20th Century and then only briefly). The Napoleonic Wars had been over for nearly 50 years in 1863, so the European powers were pretty much over them. If the US had lost at Gettysburg, would the war have even continued? It's entirely possible that the US would have settled for a negotiated peace. If the war had continued, would the US have risked sending a chunk of its army north with Confederate armies threatening Washington? If Britain had formally recognised the Confederacy, would that have led to war? There was no compelling reason to, and no significant internal pressure for Britain to side with the Confederacy. Not to mention that by 1863, the Confederacy had already had an invasion of the US turned back at Antietam. Britain also imported a lot of grain from the US, as well as the Union being a large and profitable market for British manufactured goods. Even more importantly, the Emancipation Proclaimation would have made it rather difficult, politically, for Britain (the leading anti-slavery power) to side with the CS. Plus the British government was aware of Canada's vulnerability and while Palmerston was agressive in his defence of the rights of Britain and Britons, I doubt he'd be willing to risk such a blow to the Empire. There really wouldn't have been any upside to Britain intervening (which is basically what the British decided in real life). As with all counterfactuals, it is a possibility, but there's no way of knowing what would have happened. But I don't think it's likely that defeat at Gettysburg would have led to war between Britain and the US.
|
|
#
?
Aug 6, 2010 14:07
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 27, 2024 14:39 |
|
|
Yeah, the actual chance for CSA to gain the recognition (and possible support) of Great Britain most likely passed with the Battle of Antietam in September 1862. It's funny how history sometimes goes. Had those two Union soldiers not found Lee's Special Order 191 that had been lost by some Confederate officer, it's unlikely that the whole Battle of Antietam would have happened, as George B. McClellan was far too cautious in pursuing Lee. Without the battle, Lincoln wouldn't have had the confidence to go ahead the Emancipation Proclamation. Lee would have been able to march further into Maryland, and later probably into Pennsylvania, and eventually engage McClellan (and probably to do so in his own terms, as there's little question as to which one of the two was the better general). Whatever would happen, it would certainly affect both the British and French views of the legitimacy of CSA, and also the 1862 elections in Washington.
|
|
#
?
Aug 6, 2010 17:07
|
|