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Arquinsiel posted:I have heard that some places that means "OK", but in others it implies a coin and thus "this meal was too expensive". What does it mean in Bavaria? If it's anything like the other Catholics, it means "this is a butthole and you like to sodomize it".
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Mar 10, 2016 08:03
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Cartoon posted:
lol, australian racists loving hate indonesia, its been their version of mexico for the last few decades the occasional american will point it out as place out as where muslims don't really bother anyone, which gets ignored by other racists with more local grievances
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Mar 10, 2016 09:48
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Slim Jim Pickens posted:If it's anything like the other Catholics, it means "this is a butthole and you like to sodomize it". In Poland it means "ok", I don't think it's a religion thing. I've heard some places consider that sign for butt penetration related stuff, and you shouldn't use it when not sure.
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Mar 10, 2016 10:05
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So I asked my buddy who's ex-Canuckistan army, just gonna straight up quote him:Raging Beaver posted:it seems that the americans use slightly different names for things. For us, a platoon is +- 30 guys, a section is 10+- guys, and a fire team is always 2 guys.
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Mar 10, 2016 11:07
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hogmartin posted:Nah, you're right about modern weapons systems having capabilities far beyond what was available just a few decades before. WWII and Vietnam are a good comparison. That's not a totally fair comparison, though. There was a Mosquito bomber variant that could carry 2 tons of bombs and drop it a lot more accurately than the B-17, for instance (and a lot more cheaply than the Phantom). Your B-17 equivalent is more like a B-52 or something.
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Mar 10, 2016 11:17
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ALL-PRO SEXMAN posted:Can we talk about Napoleon now? Please? Would Napoleon have used Marines for his Old Guard  Before Napoleon became emperor, but how were the French revolutionaries able to assemble and organize a large and effective army in the early 1790s, capable of fighting much of the rest of Europe while under an unstable government and after executing/exiling most of their nobility(who I assume were their pre-Revolution officer corps)? Elyv fucked around with this message at 11:49 on Mar 10, 2016 |
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Mar 10, 2016 11:46
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Well, the allies spent a lot of time loving about, whatever officers left were super motivated and probably promoted frombthe experiences ranks, and a lot of new recruits were made of patriotic stuff. By the time of levee en masse they had also a credible threat of entire Europe trying to crush them. It probably helps that whenever people speak of musket era warfare (and earlier with ECW) it seems that creating armies was piss easy, with weapons somehow almost materialising in the hands of the fresh soldiers who are certain that they won't die like the previous batch.
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Mar 10, 2016 12:03
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Elyv posted:Would Napoleon have used Marines for his Old Guard Mass Conscription. The Revolutionary wars really hammered the point home that with a musket and a bit of drill, having a hundred thousand men more than your enemy to throw about can be a hell of a thing. Also wiping out most of the officer corps was the proximate cause of some harsh defeats early in the wars, but also resulted in some pretty efficient meritocratic promotion of people to the top who otherwise wouldn't have gotten anywhere near there. The end result was demographically devestating for France in a way that would become a massive problem 80-90 years later, but for a while they were able to keep on top of things with sheer mass.
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Mar 10, 2016 13:19
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Alchenar posted:Mass Conscription. Also, pre-Revolutionary France was already the Big Cheese on the continent militarily speaking (Army-wise anyway) and had been for decades. It was France versus pretty much all of Europe in the Nine Years' War in 1688 and (for the most part) France versus everybody else in the War of the Spanish Succession. Plus, not all the officer corps got purged - the artillery in particular was considered 'common' before the Revolution and thus more 'politically reliable' after it (note what Napoleon's job was at the time of the Revolution); and it was French artillery that won some of those early battles.
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Mar 10, 2016 13:33
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Elyv posted:Before Napoleon became emperor, but how were the French revolutionaries able to assemble and organize a large and effective army in the early 1790s, capable of fighting much of the rest of Europe while under an unstable government and after executing/exiling most of their nobility(who I assume were their pre-Revolution officer corps)? With respect to officers, you have to bear in mind that in most respects rising through the commissioned ranks of the ancien regime army had less to do with ability and more to do with social class, family connections, and politicking/hosting nice dinners and parties (which are the same thing). They lose a lot of officers but it's not like Stalin purging the ranks of the professional army in 1936-38, a lot of the guys who leave are deadwood and they're quickly replaced by ambitious officers who were cut off from advancement for whatever reason. You have liberal nobles who held obscure posts rising to prominence, and ambitious junior officers who grasp an opportunity they thought would never come. They're a mixed bag in terms of ability, but with the war emergency they get thrown into command positions quickly and anybody who fails the test is quickly shitcanned. Eventually a brand new officer corps emerges from the school of hard knocks, actually much better in the main than the one they lost. Of course the process takes a little time, and there's a lot of back and forth in the first years of the fighting.
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Mar 10, 2016 14:44
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There's also the fact that the First Coalition was absolutely plagued by dysentery, cholera and pretty much whatever else is infectious and loves killing soldiers.
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Mar 10, 2016 14:58
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Tevery Best posted:There's also the fact that the First Coalition was absolutely plagued by dysentery, cholera and pretty much whatever else is infectious and loves killing soldiers. 'Lets station our entire army out here on this lovely swampy Island, I am sure nothing will go wrong!' And then half of the British Army died of disease. The earlier 1st/2nd Coalition era stuff is insane.
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Mar 10, 2016 16:00
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What're some good MilHist books on the French Revolution and Napoleonic Wars? I just finished Mike Duncan's podcast on the French Revolution and I'm interested in digging into it a bit more, particularly the various coalition wars. Books available on Kindle are vastly preferred.
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Mar 10, 2016 17:00
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Swords Around the Throne is pretty fascinating for a book that's mostly about the French army's organization and structure. It comes recommended by this thread.
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Mar 10, 2016 17:39
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Raenir Salazar posted:Off hand I could imagine a situation where you're short handed so you send the only spare guys you got on a patrol. But the reason is it's for my final class project and as a programmer it's easier to start with a simple situation and the steering behaviours and pathfinding for four units, then add additional fireteams after the bugs are worked out. So my thinking is I have two choices; try to split the fire team to apply doctrine from the FM's as best I can with four people or just have them try to find cover and return fire; keeping things super basic until additional fire teams can be added. Slim Jim Pickens posted:If it's anything like the other Catholics, it means "this is a butthole and you like to sodomize it".
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Mar 10, 2016 17:51
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Arquinsiel posted:Just declare the fireteam the atomic unit then, unless you want to start mucking about with splitting a single person into fire and maneuver elements. Well clearly my legs are a maneuvering unit
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Mar 10, 2016 18:29
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You have two hands, so two fire units at least. You know what, just generalize to n fire units.
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Mar 10, 2016 18:52
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alex314 posted:In Poland it means "ok", I don't think it's a religion thing. I've heard some places consider that sign for butt penetration related stuff, and you shouldn't use it when not sure. Arquinsiel posted:Someone neglected to tell Ireland this. The other, other Catholics. Really though, after doing some research, I can confirm it has nothing to do with Catholics. Sadly, I don't know of any comprehensive list of rude gestures and what they mean in different countries.
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Mar 10, 2016 18:58
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100 Years Ago There is one very small piece of good news for the British Empire in Tanzania and Kenya, but it really is very small. At Verdun, once again Commandant Macker fought the war, but the war won; a German staff-major is trying to invent the modern air force; Grigoris Balakian gets a private chance to see what rotting entrails look like; Herbert Sulzbach remembers he has a diary; Clifford Wells is on guard duty; and Louis Barthas...is happy? quote:I felt a sense of deliverance from remorse, liberated from chains. I recovered my independence, my freedom. Has he been wounded? Been granted a month's leave? Finally deserted? Been given an absolute discharge from service? Been killed by a shell and is now completing his diaries via an ouija board and auto-writing? Click here to find out!
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Mar 10, 2016 19:22
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Trin Tragula posted:100 Years Ago
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Mar 10, 2016 19:27
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HEY GAL posted:come now; he's happy whenever he gets a chance to bitch Click the link. That's EXACTLY what made him happy.
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Mar 10, 2016 19:36
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Trin Tragula posted:Louis Barthas...is happy? Has he been wounded? Been granted a month's leave? Finally deserted? Been given an absolute discharge from service? Been killed by a shell and is now completing his diaries via an ouija board and auto-writing? Click here to find out! I had a job once for a very hosed up workplace and the one thing I knew early on was not to be promoted. As a base worker you had rights and did your job, and the bosses could all yell at each other. Glad to see the first World War working with the same logic.
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Mar 10, 2016 19:37
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Cyrano4747 posted:Click the link. That's EXACTLY what made him happy.  and 
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Mar 10, 2016 19:52
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Arquinsiel posted:It is just so He may be the most perfectly French Frenchman I've ever run across.
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Mar 10, 2016 19:59
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HEY GAL posted:
Those who are being accurately depicted by that sign?
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Mar 10, 2016 20:00
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Elyv posted:Would Napoleon have used Marines for his Old Guard Other people have answered better than I could, but I just wanted to add that the revolutionary army changes weren't implemented by Napoleon, but by Lazare Carnot. Napoleon was only a minor officer at this time and wasn't in charge of anything this important whereas Carnot was an organizational and mathematics genius. Also, the revolutionaries didn't exactly exile or execute all of the nobility and many of them were able to rise to high positions - often times to fall when they were accused of harboring secret royalist beliefs. Trying to stay out of Paris while fighting in the Netherlands, Italy, or against the Bretons could keep you out of political reach if you did well enough, but lose and you'd get a fast ticket to an execution.
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Mar 10, 2016 20:17
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Ithle01 posted:Other people have answered better than I could, but I just wanted to add that the revolutionary army changes weren't implemented by Napoleon, but by Lazare Carnot. Napoleon was only a minor officer at this time and wasn't in charge of anything this important whereas Carnot was an organizational and mathematics genius. Also, the revolutionaries didn't exactly exile or execute all of the nobility and many of them were able to rise to high positions - often times to fall when they were accused of harboring secret royalist beliefs. Trying to stay out of Paris while fighting in the Netherlands, Italy, or against the Bretons could keep you out of political reach if you did well enough, but lose and you'd get a fast ticket to an execution. I think it's important to understand that while Napoleon was an incredible commander, the commanders of other French armies did quite well, too. The French Revolutionary armies were not badly served by their generals and benefitted well from the border fortresses in their campaigns.
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Mar 10, 2016 22:49
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I want to know what is the fanciest/most badass soldier hat. And when did the whole biggest hat=baddest dude thing start anyway?
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Mar 10, 2016 22:52
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Illegal Username posted:I want to know what is the fanciest/most badass soldier hat. When the second Neanderthal to invent the grass hat stuck a feather in it to outdo the first one.
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Mar 10, 2016 23:04
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Illegal Username posted:I want to know what is the fanciest/most badass soldier hat. All of them. All of them are wonderful.
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Mar 10, 2016 23:22
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Illegal Username posted:I want to know what is the fanciest/most badass soldier hat. 
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Mar 10, 2016 23:23
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What a monster.
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Mar 10, 2016 23:31
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Panzeh posted:I think it's important to understand that while Napoleon was an incredible commander, the commanders of other French armies did quite well, too. The French Revolutionary armies were not badly served by their generals and benefitted well from the border fortresses in their campaigns. That's pretty much how I understand it after reading War of Wars by Robert Harvey. Napoleon was one of many capable French commanders, but mostly in his early years. In his later years he started to break down and was capable, but not brilliant, with several instances of outright mediocrity.
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Mar 10, 2016 23:35
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I've ended up writing waaaayyyyy more sections of this than I thought I would, the next one only takes us up to 1918. I've been following up his post-war story a bit though, see if I can find out who that "little brown slip of a girl" was, and whether or not he married her in the end. George and the Frenchmen In May 1916 George Baker is grumbling about his position in the Army, continually hounded by evangelical Christians and generally feeling neither one thing nor the other - not a fighting soldier, but not quite a full-on pacifist. His position is difficult, but after a month in the Non-Combatant Corps, he seems to be reaching some kind of equilibrium based on “pure indifference” to his place in the 5th Eastern Battalion. That is, until events over in France provide a sterling example of the kind of Objector he wishes he could be. I’ll let George take over for a while, with some rather severe editing: “In July, 30 Absolutists, the majority of whom belonged to the 1st and 2nd Companies of the Eastern NCC were sentenced to death in France. Rumours came to us in Seaford that the sentences had been carried out. These rumours were false. The true story is worth repeating here. The Military Authorities in May 1916 tore up the various scraps of paper to which the highest civilian authorities had put their pens. The promise that pacifist objectors should not be taken out of the country was broken. From Landguard Fort, from Richmond (Yorks) and from Seaford, 37 men were transferred to France... ...The men were split into parties, that, themselves divided, their spirit might be conquered. One party was marched to the Field Punishment Camp at Harfleur, where it was to undergo 28 days of Field Punishment Number One...On the second day, they were placed with their faced to the barbed wire of the fence. The ropes, fastened round thin barbed wire instead of thick wooden posts, were tied so much the more tightly” “On Monday 9th of May, the cowards were led out to hear the promulgation of their sentences... In the middle of a camp upon the hill-top, several thousand soldiers were formed into the three sides of a huge square. In the square’s centre these ignoble men who had refused to fight for freedom against the militarist hordes which threatened it, were grouped together, and kept in a state of well deserved suspense... The Adjutant called the first coward forward and read from the paper in his hand - the paper at the top of which was printed in large, red letters, doubly underlined, the word ‘Death’. The adjutant read, and the coward listened: ‘For disobedience while in a combatant zone.... is ..... sentenced to death by being shot.’ The Adjutant paused and continued to read, while the coward continued to listen: ‘Sentence confirmed by General Sir Douglas Haig”.... “and commuted to ten years penal servitude.’ And so, with the other cowards” George is pretty accurate with the details here, and he probably took them pretty much straight from one of the first full accounts of the CO experience during the war, John Graham’s incredibly dry “Conscription and Conscience”. Hearing first the rumours, and then the truth that the sentences had been commuted - and that the men involved had resisted to the last - had a profound effect on George, both at the time and when he came to write his experiences down. He compares their courage to the soldiers that he has always had a sneaking admiration for: “There is no need for me to accuse Authority in the name of these men. The facts themselves accuse. At Mons, the Old Contemptibles of War upheld the honour of England, in so far as consummate physical bravery may uphold the honour of a country. At Henriville, the Old Contemptibles of Peace by their superb moral courage honoured no less their country and their country’s finest traditions of liberty” He also sees a (justifiable) parallel with the then emerging accounts of those who had been shot, that “it is the Thirty who accuse Authority of the murder of fellow-Englishmen, soldiers whom bombardment crazed or sleep overcame”. Back in Seaford in July, George is fired by the news of these men (“the Frenchmen”, as they became known), and resolves to follow their example in resistance. He refuses to obey military orders, and spends a night in the guard room before he’s scheduled to go in front of the O.C and while there receives that most will-destroying thing: a letter from his mother. “For the second time my resolution was broken” Still, George’s trip to see the Major isn’t as uneventful as it might have been. He’s determined to not be cowed, even though his mother’s letter has made him abandon the idea of total resistance. He becomes, temporarily, a cheeky chappy, though there’s an element of stdh about this, I’m going to believe it’s word for word true. “The big bellied red-faced Major proceeded to fling at me words as he would not have flung bones to his dog. I pointed out this fact to him. He returned, neatly, that his dog was an honest dog, while I was a white-livered skunk. Your score, sir! I said” Later, when the Major says “if he had his way he would put all white-livered skunks against a wall, and have them shot out of hand”, he maintains that his response was “your zoological knowledge leaves something to be desired” which makes the NCO observing “titter”. I’ll give him that one, because “ACTUALLY LIVERS ARE A KIND OF PURPLE BROWN, MAJOR” seems like such a ... well, such a George thing to say. Little comes of this meeting, though George believes he’s drawn out the man in the Major, and a week or two later, he’s packed up and sent to load cargo at Newhaven. Possibly an opportunity for further resistance - as the rumour goes round that the NCC will be made to load weapons, he seems almost disappointed when it turns out to be whiskey and rum. But it’s at Newhaven that his determination to resist slips, of his own choice. George, by nature and inclination a fairly solitary man, makes friends. Noel, another political CO hounded by the “incorrigible hunters of souls” Plymouth Brethren, becomes a confidant and a mate, while an encounter with local dockworkers is far funnier: “I met with representatives of a section of the working class which was neither puritan, nor thrifty, not tee-totaller. Some of their talk might have impressed Rabelais himself. For a space I was sickened.” Once he abandons the casual snobbery of the aspirational socialist working class, George makes friends with a man he calls Fat Fred, when Fred offers George an introduction to his sister and “has her attractions and her underclothes described in a language as graphic as obscene, and to be told that the price of my virtue, if not of hers, would vary from thirty pence to ten shillings according to - circumstances”. He doesn’t take him up on the offer, but he does get some excellent advice, and sees more poverty that hardens his socialist resolve. Fat Fred and the other dockers earn a pittance of a wage for hard and dangerous work, they support their own families and the families of those hurt and injured - “one of their number who had been caught in the private parts by a crane-hook” (christ), try to give money to their wives and kids, and Fred at least subsidises his sister’s occupation “when business is bad”. It’s Fred that gives George the most substantial kick in the arse to lift him out of gloomy introspection and the NCC. George likes Fred more than he likes his fellow Non-Combatants, especially as the “cursed Plymouth Brethren” only see Fred as a “man of sin, a self-confessed fornicator”. Fred says towards the end of 1916 (I’m substituting “obscene” for “loving”): “I understand the tommies in France, I half-get the Reds in prison, but for my loving life I don’t understand loving blokes like you who did neither. You hate the loving khaki don’t you George? Then why the gently caress do you wear it?” In January 1917, he’s transferred away from Newhaven and Fred to Larkhill and road-works, where he meets a very different man who says the same thing. Otto, a Saxon prisoner of war, is erudite, educated and socialist. George likes him and admires him, putting off his decision to refuse to carry on with the NCC until he’s read Otto’s small collection of philosophy (how and why POWs were getting volume after volume of Nietzsche in German I do not know), and Otto’s parting words to him are: “Be a man! Either fight for your country or for L’Internationale!” He finally decides to do it in May. Along with another CO at Larkhill, he plays chess all the way through work parade. When they’re found by the Sergeant, George cheerfully say: “We’re through. Give us an order and get it over.” George refuses with the officially correct response when told to put rubbish into a bin, faces a perfunctory court martial and is sentenced to a year’s hard labour. Civilian prison, not military. He sees it as a great triumph. He will still be thinking so when he arrives in Wormwood Scrubs on the 27th of May 1917. lenoon fucked around with this message at 23:58 on Mar 10, 2016 |
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Mar 10, 2016 23:55
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Fangz posted:What a monster. Total brosephus daniels move.
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Mar 11, 2016 00:01
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lenoon posted:(how and why POWs were getting volume after volume of Nietzsche in German I do not know) Both sides allowed families to send letters and parcels to prisoners via the Red Cross, which is the most likely route.
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Mar 11, 2016 03:33
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So, Animal and I were talking in PMs and he mentioned that I haven't done a lot of talking about the women of the 17th century. In part this is because the women of the Mansfeld Regiment left fewer records than the guys, which is the case for most women of the period. But there is no lack of female badasses in this period, like Julie d'Aubigny, who seems to have screwed/swordfought her way through most of France and the Netherlands. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julie_d%27Aubigny If you click on that link, don't skim the entry, or you'll miss things like this: quote:Her Paris career was interrupted around 1695, when she kissed a young woman at a society ball and was challenged to duels by three different noblemen. She beat them all, but fell afoul of the king's law that forbade duels in Paris. She fled to Brussels to wait for calmer times. There, she was briefly the mistress of Maximilian II Emanuel, Elector of Bavaria. Her entire life was like that. She died at 33.
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Mar 11, 2016 04:18
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HEY GAL posted:So, Animal and I were talking in PMs and he mentioned that I haven't done a lot of talking about the women of the 17th century. In part this is because the women of the Mansfeld Regiment left fewer records than the guys, which is the case for most women of the period. But there is no lack of female badasses in this period, like Julie d'Aubigny, who seems to have screwed/swordfought her way through most of France and the Netherlands. Holy poo poo, you weren't kidding: quote:In order to run away with her new love [her girlfriend who had just been put in a convent], she stole the body of a dead nun, placed it in the bed of her lover, and set the room on fire to cover their escape.
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Mar 11, 2016 04:27
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Tonight I go to bed depressed that I did not get to live in the same time as Mademoiselle Maupin and never had a chance to get stabbed by her on a duel, run away together, and then have my heart broken by her.
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Mar 11, 2016 04:42
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Nebakenezzer posted:Holy poo poo, you weren't kidding: Did she just happen to have a dead nun on her when that happened? I hope she didn't have to go out and "obtain" one.
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Mar 11, 2016 05:24
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