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Cyrano4747 posted:Man, I dunno about that one dude but on a whim I googled "japanese admiral beard" and turned up this guy *Approaches door* *Turns sideways*
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Dec 8, 2020 06:23
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White Coke posted:1. Did the Swedes reintroduce shock tactics to cavalry in the 30 Years War, was there already a transition going on, or is the use of the caracole and similar tactics overstated so there wasn't much a decline in the first place? the caracole is not "retrograde" and a charge isn't "future oriented and therefore better." a caracole is how you shoot pistols from horseback and then retire to reload. if you have pistols this is one of the ways you will do it. gustavus adolphus can't afford to field cuirassiers (3/4 plate; at least two pistols). his cavalry is also not very good and every time he fights where the real cavalry fighting is, in Poland, he gets beaten soundly and quickly. there is a long debate about the use of the word "shock tactics" for cavalry. one side of this debate emphasizes that the horses probably touch the foot very rarely in a charge. on the other hand their examples are often things like riot police, where both the cops and the rioters are carefully calbrating their actions to minimize harm to the other side. that said, cavalry's biggest impact s probably psychological--the men on foot break and run whch is the worst thing you can do if faced by cavalry, and then the cavalry's role is to destroy the retreat. the ratio of cavalry to infantry increased in the 1640s, i do not know about the rest of the century. for instance this is the strength of the saxon army from 1618 to 1651.  cavalry is much easier to supply. this seems counterintuitive. after all you have to feed the horse. while infantry pay varies cavalrymen are paid a flat 15 gulden per month per horse for this reason (many troopers have more than one horse. the officers have tons. you can see this in personal accounts.). you have to think about it like a seventeenth century quartermaster or captain which means like a complete psychopath: the soldiers are supplying themselves and cavalrymen are more mobile. they can spread out more. individual regiments and companies also get smaller but battallions (on the field) do not change size. the units just amalgamate on the field. so at the end of the war you see these cav-heavy fights. credit to pellisworth for the graph HEY GUNS fucked around with this message at 06:29 on Dec 8, 2020 |
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Dec 8, 2020 06:25
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fartknocker posted:Holy poo poo, it’s like something out of anime.  I had wondered how such a kind-of-ugly design got picked. Now I know!
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Dec 8, 2020 06:49
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HEY GUNS posted:in the first place i want you to stop thinking in terms of "regress" and "progress." Most of the sources I've read that discuss the topic seem biased towards the idea that cavalry should be charging the enemy to deliver a "decisive" blow instead of running around shooting at them, and I forgot to put quotations around things like regression. It's why I wanted clarification because the biases seemed so clearly coming through from the authors that I wanted verification from the thread. People really seem to hate the idea of cavalry shooting at the enemy then retreating to reload for some reason.
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Dec 8, 2020 07:14
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White Coke posted:Most of the sources I've read that discuss the topic seem biased towards the idea that cavalry should be charging the enemy to deliver a "decisive" blow instead of running around shooting at them, and I forgot to put quotations around things like regression. It's why I wanted clarification because the biases seemed so clearly coming through from the authors that I wanted verification from the thread. People really seem to hate the idea of cavalry shooting at the enemy then retreating to reload for some reason.
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Dec 8, 2020 07:18
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What made the 16th;/17th cavalry actually use pistols or carbines and have any effect when the Napoleonic ones nearly gave up on them for not actually hitting with them?
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Dec 8, 2020 08:47
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Comstar posted:What made the 16th;/17th cavalry actually use pistols or carbines and have any effect when the Napoleonic ones nearly gave up on them for not actually hitting with them? This guy shoots one but he has no idea how to load without fumbling around. He knows more about these guns than I do but has probably never fired them from horseback. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ldz0AviUYvI Anyway you can see it hit a few targets.
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Dec 8, 2020 09:30
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Would it have been a factor that most muskets in the 17th century were not rifled, unlike 19th century muskets? Unrifled pistols would be relatively worse by comparison.
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Dec 8, 2020 09:37
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Napoleonic muskets weren't rifled tbf it's only mid-late 19th century we start seeing rifled muskets.
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Dec 8, 2020 09:52
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Comstar posted:What made the 16th;/17th cavalry actually use pistols or carbines and have any effect when the Napoleonic ones nearly gave up on them for not actually hitting with them? Pistols were useful in the 16th/17th century as anti-cavalry weapons. They were basically improved lances, with better range and armor penetration as a trade off for having to aim and reload them. Against infantry they weren't as effective because a musket has better range and armor penetration than a pistol, and the infantry are probably not going to be as heavily armored anyway. As for why they didn't use them much by the Napoleonic Wars I'm not so sure. I think they would still fire them with a charge at least.
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Dec 8, 2020 09:54
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I've read some stuff on the War of Spanish Succession (particularly the Battle of Blenheim) where the author took the view that the Anglo-Dutch cavalry had at that point mostly abandoned the caracole in favour of sabres and the all-out charge, and credits that with some really lobsided victories.
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Dec 8, 2020 10:11
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White Coke posted:Pistols were useful in the 16th/17th century as anti-cavalry weapons. They were basically improved lances, with better range and armor penetration as a trade off for having to aim and reload them. Against infantry they weren't as effective because a musket has better range and armor penetration than a pistol, and the infantry are probably not going to be as heavily armored anyway. As for why they didn't use them much by the Napoleonic Wars I'm not so sure. I think they would still fire them with a charge at least. I don't think it's really true that cavalry ditched carbines and pistols during the Napoleonic Wars. Perhaps for shooting up formed infantry, but IIRC Napoleon actually deliberately asked for more carbines for his cavalry for the 1812 campaign in Russia, due to the need for them in not-so-pitched battles.
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Dec 8, 2020 10:14
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Nebakenezzer posted:Destroyers: Fast, heavily armed, zero armor. Originally invented to protect dreadnoughts against newly invented torpedo boats, they branched out into protecting against submarines, aircraft, and generally screening larger ships, as well as getting torpedoes for sinking larger ships. Point of order but destroyers were absolutely not invented to protect dreadnoughts from torpedo boats. They were invented specifically to hunt down torpedo boats more than a decade before Dreadnought herself was even an idea.
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Dec 8, 2020 13:29
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Stop me if you heard this mine about Pearl Harbor. Have you ever heard the story of the USS Aylwin, DD-355? The USS Aylwin was a Farragut-class destroyer built 1933-1935. On Sunday, December 7th 1941, she was anchored near Pearl Harbor like much of the Pacific fleet. Too small to earn any pier space, still more than 50% of her ship's force wasn't aboard that morning, gone on leave or liberty for the weekend. Only one small boiler was lit providing "hotel services," electricity, water, etc. When the explosions and gunfire echoed through the harbor, the USS Aylwin returned fire. At 0800 the black gang started light-offs, and by 0815 had two main boilers online and tied into the main steam. At 0829 she received orders to put to sea. Remember how only 50% of her crew was present? Her ship's log reads that at 0858 she was underway, "Ensign Stanley B. Caplan, commanding." The senior-most person on board, one of 4 ensigns, he had 8 months of at-sea experience. He ordered the cutting of the anchor chain so they could get their rear end moving. While departing Pearl, the fantail crew saw the most amazing thing. There in their wake was the Captain's launch, the small boat full of the CO, the XO, the EO... everyone you "need." But the destroyer was faster than the launch, and to stop and pick up the officers would have created a bottleneck for other ships trying to get underway. ENS Caplan gave the order to maintain speed and put to sea. They performed ASW patrols and returned to Pearl the next day to pick up her CO. LCDR Rodgers wrote, ""The conduct of ENS Caplan in superbly taking command for 36 hours during war operations of the severest type is a most amazing and outstanding achievement. The conduct of the personnel was magnificent.... Every man more than did his job and was eager to fight."
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Dec 8, 2020 14:16
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Elendil004 posted:He ordered the cutting of the anchor chain so they could get their rear end moving. This is a pretty big loving deal, BTW. Anchors are big, annoying to ship in a replacement, annoying to find and recover if you can, and very necessary. Cutting anchor is something you try to avoid. An ensign just yeeting that fucker is peak “poo poo you only get away with in war time”
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Dec 8, 2020 14:23
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Whatever happened to that spreadsheet of book recommendations someone put together?
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Dec 8, 2020 14:23
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Acebuckeye13 posted:Whatever happened to that spreadsheet of book recommendations someone put together? Here you go.
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Dec 8, 2020 14:25
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Nothingtoseehere posted:Napoleonic muskets weren't rifled tbf it's only mid-late 19th century we start seeing rifled muskets. To clarify, rifles were used in the Napoleonic era, but they weren't the predominant arm. A goon even has an original specimen!
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Dec 8, 2020 15:08
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Awesome. Thank you!
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Dec 8, 2020 15:08
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Ataxerxes posted:It was actually the predecessors of Charles/Karl XII, dude who lost the Great Northern War and died during it, who pushed the borders of Sweden to its furthest extend (Charles X and XI if memory servers). Also, the Hakkapeliittas are a matter of considerable discussion. The Swedish Intelligencer, a series of books written during the 30yw by English/Scots officers in Gustafs army mentions Torsten Stålhandske (who was fluent in Englishj) talking about how some of his cavalry, the "hackapels" were Finnish troops who were ferocious. The people in our 30yw re-enactment group (many career historians and museum staff) have dug up descriptions of Swedish orders of armour for cavalry during the war. Also the fact that Stålhandskes cavalry (which at Lutzen included all the ethnic Swedish and Finnish cavalrymen left) beat and routed heavy Imperial cavalry at Luetzen would imply that they can't have been lightly armoured/armed by that point. The ferocity often attributed to the Hakkapeliittas might be due to the fact that they had few if any pistols initially (so the would have to charge and fight hand to hand) and I think Hey Guns mentioned ages ago that they trounced Imperial Croat cavalry during the first winter after Sweden entered the war (as they were likely used to harsher winters than the Croats). Yeah, you're correct about the Swedish expansion, I'll edit that later. As for Hakkepeliittas, like you said, sources are contradictory. Lots of accounts of primarily scouting, raiding and harassing flanks, which means light cavalry but also accounts of getting stuck in where the fight is the thickest, which is something that heavy cavalry do. I recall reading something about how their role changed based upon what equipment was available, but it was basically the same dudes doing both things at different times. I think Part 2 will be tomorrow and cover (briefly) the Finnish War, autonomy, and the birth of Finnish nationalism. Part 3 will be times of oppression/Russification of Finland, ww1, and declaration of independence. Part 4 will be civil war and the aftermath, and how Finland almost became a German vassal state and a monarchy.
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Dec 8, 2020 15:08
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Panzeh posted:I don't think it's really true that cavalry ditched carbines and pistols during the Napoleonic Wars. Perhaps for shooting up formed infantry, but IIRC Napoleon actually deliberately asked for more carbines for his cavalry for the 1812 campaign in Russia, due to the need for them in not-so-pitched battles. Yeah all types of cavalry rolled with firearms. It would be crazy not too.
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Dec 8, 2020 15:43
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To what extent could caracole vs sabre shock be something of a (for lack of a better term) metagame tactical decision? i.e. Infantry with pikes who have experience and expectation of being sabred at are going to be an extremely difficult target, perhaps verging on a wasteful one, for a heavy charge. Over a longer period infantry who haven't been charged might start carrying fewer pikes (or have fewer ready fixed bayonets) proportionally, and perhaps be less armoured, and then become good targets - both psychologically and materially - for the shock tactics.
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Dec 8, 2020 15:55
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Oh, can I add some stuff to this?
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Dec 8, 2020 15:59
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White Coke posted:As for why they didn't use them much by the Napoleonic Wars I'm not so sure. I think they would still fire them with a charge at least. Also, they didn't go out of fashion for long. By the American Civil War it wasn't at all unusual for cav to be packing like 4 pistols. Check out this chap for instance.
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Dec 8, 2020 16:11
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glynnenstein posted:To clarify, rifles were used in the Napoleonic era, but they weren't the predominant arm. A goon even has an original specimen! The various Germans loved the loving things, but you are right that they were never predominant. The rifle armed units were smallholders, petit bourgeoise, and foresters that could provide their own arms and were called up essentially on an as-needed basis. Therefore a lot of them owned rifles and were proficient either through hobbies (hunting) or profession (hunting, forestry, land management). You can draw some very high level parallels to English bow-armed yeomanry from medieval times. These units were perceived as relatively intelligent and industrious and based on capability and arms they were used for skirmishing, recon, and light infantry work. In the early Coalition wars, Jaeger rifles were still nonstandard or semistandard (especially compared to the relatively standard smoothbore muskets of the time) and really were not aggressively standardized for any of the German entities until the Prussians went heavy on a standard rifle design after Jena - Auerstadt.
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Dec 8, 2020 16:12
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SeanBeansShako posted:Yeah all types of cavalry rolled with firearms. It would be crazy not too. at min having guns in addition to swords is very useful for intimidating local farmers and stealing their poo poo as well as killing game and whatnot
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Dec 8, 2020 16:13
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Dragoons got to dragoon too. It's hard to do picket duty with swords, how you going to sound the alarm?
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Dec 8, 2020 16:14
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Elendil004 posted:Oh, can I add some stuff to this? I didn't actually create it i just had the link handy, i cant remember who originally did but i think its just editable by anyone with the link.
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Dec 8, 2020 16:17
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feedmegin posted:Also, they didn't go out of fashion for long. By the American Civil War it wasn't at all unusual for cav to be packing like 4 pistols. Check out this chap for instance. Carrying multiple revolvers on horseback is as much a function of how hard it is to reload on horseback as it is any tactical necessity or higher doctrinal reasoning. Especially when we're talking cap-and-ball Civil War revolvers.
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Dec 8, 2020 16:18
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Didn’t ACW cavalry follow fairly different doctrine to contemporary european cavalry? There’s nothing equivalent to lancers or cuirassiers, and they all seem to basically be dragoons.
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Dec 8, 2020 16:35
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Elendil004 posted:Stop me if you heard this mine about Pearl Harbor. Have you ever heard the story of the USS Aylwin, DD-355? He went on to have his first command, USS Long, sunk out from under him by kamikaze during the invasion of Luzon. He had a rather eventful war, all told.
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Dec 8, 2020 16:41
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Edgar Allen Ho posted:Didn’t ACW cavalry follow fairly different doctrine to contemporary european cavalry? There’s nothing equivalent to lancers or cuirassiers, and they all seem to basically be dragoons. I think the main difference is that Europe doesn't have the vast empty spaces that the US continent does, so while full blown independent Cavalry raids and expeditions are a thing in the ACW, when it comes to the Austro-Prussian war or the Franco-German war they exist much more as a screening and scouting force.
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Dec 8, 2020 17:09
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Vincent Van Goatse posted:Carrying multiple revolvers on horseback is as much a function of how hard it is to reload on horseback as it is any tactical necessity or higher doctrinal reasoning. Especially when we're talking cap-and-ball Civil War revolvers. I mean, I get that, but if your main doctrine is 'charge home with the sabre' Napoleonic-style then you don't need one revolver let alone three, now do you? You're planning to do a lot of shooting. If revolvers had been available to caracole-doers back in the 16th century I'm sure they'd have loved to have them too.
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Dec 8, 2020 18:03
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I don't know where this is from but it is nice to see 'taking the piss' is universal
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Dec 8, 2020 18:07
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I added It Never Snows in September, Hell in a Very Small Place: The Siege of Dien Bien Phu, and Scars of Independence: America's Violent Birth to the book list, highly recommend all three. It pains me to wonder what other incredible books Bernard Fall would have written if a landmine didn't get him in `67
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Dec 8, 2020 18:10
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Vincent Van Goatse posted:Point of order but destroyers were absolutely not invented to protect dreadnoughts from torpedo boats. They were invented specifically to hunt down torpedo boats more than a decade before Dreadnought herself was even an idea. So ships that could keep up with the fleet but were fast/small enough to waste trash mobs of PT boats?
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Dec 8, 2020 18:34
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Alchenar posted:I think the main difference is that Europe doesn't have the vast empty spaces that the US continent does, so while full blown independent Cavalry raids and expeditions are a thing in the ACW, when it comes to the Austro-Prussian war or the Franco-German war they exist much more as a screening and scouting force. The Russians actually paid a lot of attention to cavalry in the ACW and sought to develop a cavalry arm as an independent raiding and striking force.
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Dec 8, 2020 18:40
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feedmegin posted:I mean, I get that, but if your main doctrine is 'charge home with the sabre' Napoleonic-style then you don't need one revolver let alone three, now do you? You're planning to do a lot of shooting. If revolvers had been available to caracole-doers back in the 16th century I'm sure they'd have loved to have them too. Charging home with the sabre usually involves substantial reforming and you should shoot at the other dudes on your way in, so yeah, you should have a pistol. Napoleonic cav carried pistols. Your primary way that you are supposed to be decisive on the battlefield may be the sword but that is not the majority of the work that the cavalryman does. It's almost all picquet, outpost, and recon. Guns are very convenient for this purpose.
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Dec 8, 2020 19:17
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Edgar Allen Ho posted:Didn’t ACW cavalry follow fairly different doctrine to contemporary european cavalry? There’s nothing equivalent to lancers or cuirassiers, and they all seem to basically be dragoons. The US Army's oldest cavalry regiments were originally founded as regiments of Dragoons. John Buford's cavalry at Gettysburg identifying and holding onto the high ground until the rest of the Union army could arrive is frequently used an an example for the professional development of modern US Army armor/cavalry officers. The mission of modern American cavalry squadrons isn't all that different than it was in the past.
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Dec 8, 2020 19:43
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Mustang posted:The US Army's oldest cavalry regiments were originally founded as regiments of Dragoons. John Buford's cavalry at Gettysburg identifying and holding onto the high ground until the rest of the Union army could arrive is frequently used an an example for the professional development of modern US Army armor/cavalry officers. The mission of modern American cavalry squadrons isn't all that different than it was in the past. I hope they aren't dismounting their helicopters to fight on the ground
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Dec 8, 2020 19:53
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