PYF historical photos/pictures: Newmatumbo shoved the rod up its spruehole

The Something Awful Forums > Main > Post Your Favorite: Carefully Curated > PYF historical photos/pictures: Newmatumbo shoved the rod up its spruehole

C.M. Kruger: Oct 28, 2013

Chillbro Baggins posted:

CF Desert Storm:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bhrtL_XVv3s

Whole lot of night-vision video of AAA missing the bombers, shot from a downtown Baghdad hotel.

Were the Iraqis seriously throwing flak shells at B-52s? That's what the clip from back then at the beginning looks like.

They weren't shooting at B-52s because Baghdad was only hit by F-117s and cruise missiles. :v:

But let me put it this way: you're a AA gunner in the military of a ruthless dictator and the capital is under attack, are you going to want to be the guy with a full load of ammunition in the morning?

Aesop Poprock posted:

Don�t know about B-52s in particular but ground-to-air assault brought down a total of 54 coalition aircraft in the gulf war after doing the math with the vast majority of that being American aircraft

The majority of coalition aircraft damaged or lost were hit by missiles fired by ground batteries. The handful of losses to AAA were ground attack aircraft attacking Iraqi military positions, and even then MANPADS were a much greater threat. In the jet age, anti-aircraft guns, especially ones without radar or infrared fire control, are largely ineffective against anything other than point-defense against helicopters and ground attack aircraft, since the gunner will only have a extremely short amount of time to fire at an aircraft if it even comes inside his weapon's engagement envelope.

3 days after the above video a large daylight strike was attempted:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Package_Q_Strike
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2uh4yMAx2UA
"fuuuuuuck there's another one!"

People tend to forget that in 1991, the Iraqi army was like the fourth or fifth largest in the world, had modern Soviet equipment, and had a ton of actual combat experience against Iran, and that their equipment and experience hadn't atrophied from decades of doing nothing but oppressing regional ethnic/religious/political minorities and "my cousin will make the perfect general" stuff. They also tend to forget that the coalition victory was the result of decades of preparing to take on a certain imperialist evil empire in Europe, and clear, well-defined goals, instead of decades of bombing goat herders in wars with no real goals while slashing budgets and procurement because "lol Russia isn't a threat to world peace any more so we don't need F-22s!"

# ¿ Oct 8, 2018 08:34

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# ¿ Apr 27, 2024 14:32

C.M. Kruger: Oct 28, 2013

Aesop Poprock posted:

World War I was so loving horrifying I�m pretty sure the entire world just did a �nope nope nope� and erased it from their memories which is how WWII managed to happen so soon after. Like a worldwide bleaching of how absolutely horrific it was that they wiped out an entire generation because it would have crippled the entire human species

Nah, a good portion of the anti-war/appeasement ideology before WWII was publicly popular and was motivated by a desire to avoid the horrors of WWI again. France had been bled dry and the UK wasn't in a much better state.

In the 30s the British had students doing mass pledges that "they'd never fight for the king" and a big "peace ballot" poll of the public where most of the respondents (something like 1/3rd of the voting population IIRC) were pro-disarmament and only lukewarm on the prospects of declaring war on Nation X that had attacked Nation Y and couldn't be dissuaded politically. Labor had their pacifist party leader resign in 1935 because the party voted to support sanctions against Italy, and he was replaced by a guy who wanted to disband national armies entirely and thought that rearmament was some kind of plot by militarists who secretly wanted to join Hitler in a war against communism. Even in 1938 Chamberlain's "Peace for our time" and so on was popular with the British public, partially because he'd been having the BBC suppress and censor information coming out of Germany (denounced as "Jewish-Communist propaganda") in an attempt to keep people from thinking that maybe Hitler needed to get the boot.

# ¿ Nov 12, 2018 08:15

C.M. Kruger: Oct 28, 2013

Shrapnig posted:

There are about 30 people in the second picture. A battalion contains between 3-800 soldiers.

We�re looking at a well over 90% attrition rate, that�s horrific.

It's a photoshop. And according to some stuff in the military history thread a few days ago, it would actually represent the casualties in a shorter period of time between August and the end of 1914, with 27 soldiers and 1 officer remaining from the original force of 1,000 soldiers and 27 officers.

https://twitter.com/I_W_M/status/1059760307332112384

# ¿ Nov 15, 2018 06:30

C.M. Kruger: Oct 28, 2013

Ernest Junger posted:

It's an easier matter to describe these sounds than to endure them, because one cannot but associate every single sound of flying steel with the idea of death, and so I huddled in my hole in the ground with my hand in front of my face, imagining all the possible variants of being hit. I think I have found a comparison that captures the situation in which I and all the other soldiers who took part in this war so often found ourselves: you must imagine you are securely tied to a post, being menaced by a man swinging a heavy hammer. Now the hammer has been taken back over his head, ready to be swung, now it's cleaving the air towards you, on the point of touching
your skull, then it's struck the post, and the splinters are flying � that's what it's like to experience heavy shelling in an exposed position. Luckily, I still had a bit of that subliminal feeling of optimism, 'it'll be all right', that you feel during a game, say, and which, while it may be quite unfounded, still has a soothing effect on you. And indeed even this shelling came to an end, and I could go on my way once more, and, this time, with some urgency.

Ernest Junger posted:

Through the splintered shutters, the view was of a square furrowed by bombs, under the boughs of a ragged linden. This confusion of impressions was further darkened by the incessant artillery fire that was raging round the town. From time to time, the gigantic impact of a fifteen-inch shell drowned out all other noise. Clouds of shards washed through Combles, splattering against the branches of the trees, or striking the few intact roofs, sending the slates slithering down.

In the course of the afternoon, the bombing swelled to such a pitch that all that was left was the feeling of a kind of oceanic roar, in which individual sounds were completely subordinated. From seven o'clock, the square and the houses on it were subjected to fifteen-inch-shell bombardment at thirty second intervals. There were many that did not go off, whose short, dull thumps shook the house to its foundations. Throughout, we sat in our basement, on silk-upholstered armchairs round a table, with our heads in our hands, counting the seconds between explosions. The witticisms dried up, and finally the boldest of us had nothing to say. At eight o'clock the house next door came down after taking two direct hits; its collapse occasioned a huge cloud of dust.

From nine till ten, the shelling acquired a demented fury. The earth shook, the sky seemed like a boiling cauldron. Hundreds of heavy batteries were crashing away at and around Combles, innumerable shells crisscrossed hissing and howling over our heads. All was swathed in thick smoke, which was in the ominous underlighting of coloured flares. Because of racking pains in our heads and ears, communication was possible only by odd, shouted words. The ability to think logically and the feeling of gravity, both seemed to have been removed. We had the sensation of the ineluctable and the unconditionally necessary, as if we were facing an elemental force. An NCO in No. 3 Platoon went into a frenzy.

At ten o'clock, this infernal carnival gradually seemed to calm itself, and settled into a sedate drumfire, in which, admittedly, one still was not able to make out an individual shot.

At eleven o'clock, a runner arrived with orders to take the men out on to the church square. We joined up with the other two platoons in marching order. A fourth platoon, under Lieutenant Sievers, had dropped out because they were to take provisions up to the front. They now ringed us as we assembled in this Perilous location, and loaded us with bread, tobacco and canned meat. Sievers insisted I take a pan of butter, shook hands, and wished us luck.

# ¿ Nov 15, 2018 23:05

C.M. Kruger: Oct 28, 2013

Zudgemud posted:

Because the Soviet Union was not out to kill everyone and send the remaining ones to Siberia.

Except for all the times they did.

# ¿ Jun 9, 2019 19:06

C.M. Kruger: Oct 28, 2013

quote:

Portrait of a young Soviet prisoner of war in a steel breastplate SN-42, made of 2mm steel (.08″) and weighing 3.5 kg (7.7 lbs), captured by Finnish troops during the Finnish-Soviet Continuation War. A testament to the breastplate�s effectiveness, the young soldier had been shot three times in the chest and left unharmed. Image taken near Syskyj�rvi, Karelia, Finland (now, Syuskyuyarvi, Republic of Karelia, Russia), July 15, 1944.

http://www.tankarchives.ca/2013/10/soviet-infantry-protection.html

quote:

CAMD RF 81-12040-109

In 1942, according to the orders from the GAU of the Red Army, the Scientific-Investigative Institute #13 of the USSR NKV, developed a steel breastplate 3.3 kg in mass, 2 mm thick, that protects the main organs of the human body against German submachineguns at all distances, and rifles and machineguns at 300 meters.
According to GOKO order #2160ss from August 8th, 1942, the steel breastplates were sent to the army, and received positive reviews. The reviews mention the following:

The steel breastplates provide reliable protection from German submachineguns, as well as fragments of mines and hand grenades.
The maneuverability of soldiers with breastplates is almost unimpaired.
Aside from providing protection for the soldier, the breastplate also increases the soldier's morale when performing his duties.

The technical documentation on the steel breastplate was accepted by the GAU of the Red Army on August 7th, 1942, after which the breastplate was mass produced at factory #700 (city of Lysva). At this time, 85,000 breastplates have been produced, distributed as follows:

South-Western Front: 5,000
Stalingrad Front: 3,000
Leningrad Front: 1,000
Volhov Front: 1,000
Don Front: 5,000

70,000 units remain at the warehouse.

# ¿ Aug 8, 2020 10:49

C.M. Kruger: Oct 28, 2013

SA-Kuva posted:

Suomalaiset ovat naamioineet noi 10 km rajalta Raatteen tiell� maantien, ilmassa roikkuvilla kuusilla sill� aivan rajalla on ven�l�isten pystytt�m� t�hystystorni.
Suomussalmi, Kuivaj�rvi 1941.06.27

Google Translate posted:

The Finns have camouflaged about 10 km from the border on Raate Road, with spruce trees hanging in the air, because there is a lookout tower erected by the Russians right on the border.
Suomussalmi, Kuivaj�rvi 1941.06.27

# ¿ Mar 22, 2021 05:47

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# ¿ Apr 27, 2024 14:32

C.M. Kruger: Oct 28, 2013

On the other side of things:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XbSjD_ov_Wo

# ¿ Jun 5, 2023 10:02

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