Best military history books according to redditors
We found 4,468 Reddit comments discussing the best military history books. We ranked the 1,954 resulting products by number of redditors who mentioned them. Here are the top 20.
We found 4,468 Reddit comments discussing the best military history books. We ranked the 1,954 resulting products by number of redditors who mentioned them. Here are the top 20.
I thought it was a joke...I can't believe it's a real book: http://www.amazon.com/In-Defense-Internment-Racial-Profiling/dp/0895260514/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1396403690&sr=8-3&keywords=michelle+malkin
I've recently read Guns, Germs, and Steel and Collapse by Jared Diamond and found them to be quite intriguing.
GG&S
Collapse
For one thing, it's cold enough in East Asia and Europe (note they're at similar latitudes) for germs to die every winter, so people live longer and technology can advance accordingly. In the case of Australia, humans inhabited the continent and killed off all the big game before they domesticated anything, so they didn't have the advantage of cows and horses. In Africa, in order to avoid diseases carried by mosquitoes, people traditionally lived in small communities far from water sources, meaning they have to put in a lot of effort to carting water. This means that they lacked the benefits of a city like job specializations, etc.
"Guns, Germs and Steel" is a really interesting read to answer this question more fully.
There was a Cracked article that made me think we don't get the whole story about Native Americans. Supposedly they were very advanced, but a plague wiped them out and allowed Europeans to conquer them.
Maybe in a very general way you could say that. But the history is quite complicated.
If you haven't read Playing at the World, I would highly recommend it. It is, hands down, the best academic study of the history of roleplaying games. Peterson did a mind-boggling amount of research, and mines obscure old gaming 'zines for some really interesting stuff.
One of the biggest revelations to me was that Arneson had been playing a kind of proto-RPG called a "Braunstein," invented by a college kid named David Wesely. These were games where people would take on the roles of average people in a medieval or Napoleonic town, like the Mayor or the Baker. They would run entire campaigns around these towns and the lives of the people in them and it heavily influenced Arneson's later work on D&D.
In fact, it was Arneson's Braunstein-style world called Blackmoor that would later evolve into a D&D campaign. (Monsters literally showed up in the castle dungeon...)
In the last decade or so there has been a serious revision of the importance of the atomic bombs in ending World War II, due primarily to the work of Tsuyoshi Hasegawa. His book Racing the Enemy: Stalin, Truman, and the Surrender of Japan argues pretty effectively that in the minds of the Japanese Imperial government, the Soviet invasion of Manchuria is what really caused them to surrender when they did, not the atomic bombs. He has done quite a good job of going over the Japanese sources to really fill out their side of the story in a way that had been conspicuously lacking in previous historical work.
Not everyone is convinced (I'm a bit on the fence myself), but his book has certainly changed the terms of debate, and, at least with respect to every historian of the bomb I know (which is quite a lot of them!), pretty much everyone is willing to at least go half-way with Hasegawa, in that they are de-coupling the old cause-and-effect implications about the bomb and the end of the war.
That is, the typical story has always gone, "the US wanted to end the war quickly, they dropped two bombs, and Japan surrendered." Which is true! It's just that the correlation of those last two clauses may not actually equate with causation. The old debate about the "decision to use the bomb" always took for granted that the bomb actually mattered, in the end, but Hasegawa has really opened that up again as a live historical issue, and one which is actually in many ways entirely separate from the question of the motivation to use the bomb.
Heya. Sorry to hijack the top comment, but I'm coming into the tread late and I suspect this comment will just get buried.
I was a producer for four years at Ubisoft between 2003 and 2007, and I worked exclusively on Tom Clancy games. I definitely feel today the the Clancy games are jingoistic, though it took me a long time to realize it.
Right off the bat, I want to say it's not a conscious decision. The teams I interacted with in four different Ubisoft studios were incredibly diverse in terms of nationalities and backgrounds, so I think overall, for the production teams, American realpolitik was a bit of a fantasy world without much consequence in the real world. I certainly didn't give it much thought back then.
But then, I remember distinctly... I was at an E3 where Ghost Recon 2 was being shown, and amazingly enough, some North Koreans learned that they were the enemies in that game and reacted strongly through official DPRK papers. I initially found this hilarious, but it got me thinking how it must feel to be one of those enemies in a Clancy game. And little by little I grew uncomfortable with my involvement in those games.
That uneasiness grew when, around 2007, Ubisoft became the publisher on consoles for America's Army. I mean, it's one thing to make a war game fantasy a la Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter, but to actually publish a game built as a recruitment tool for the U.S. Army? It was a lot to swallow coming from a French company.
I worked close to writers on many of these games and we always tried to infuse some sense of morality, some actual thought about the cost of war and the ethical implications of it. But when your canvas is a team of badass American soldiers going into enemy territory to take out a cartoony villain, there's just so much wiggle room. I think the most successful series to do this was Splinter Cell, because Fisher was always caught in the consequences of his actions up close.
(Slight disgression here: yes, Ironside helped shape the character through his performance, but he had little if no influence in shaping the character besides suggesting some line rewrites in the sound booth. Him talking about defining Fisher is just playing off for the camera.)
Anyway, to come back to modern-day Clancy jingoism: I think what you're seeing is just developers playing to what they think the audience wants. They get inspired by Hollywood and other games, not the least, I suspect, being the CoD franchise. Based on my personal experience I don't think it's 1) a new thing at all, nor 2) a premeditated thing beyond wanting to give the fans what they think they want.
I'm glad I'm not on these games all the same, because I realize that, as innocent as the intent is, they feed into a collective, multimedia fantasy about the meaning and impact of military intervention abroad. And the older I get, the less comfortable I am with that.
A few years ago I read War is a Force That Gives Us Meaning by Chris Hedges and that shook me to my core as it made me realize the deep impact of war, what the experience truly is, and how we play it off for fun and patriotism in a way that's almost perverse. I'll admit I'm still involved in games that portray violence or fantasy war, but I'm glad I'm no longer feeding the perception of war in the present or near-future.
This.
OP, if you're interested in these kinds of questions, you should read Guns, Germs and Steel by Jared Diamond. The book looks a bit intimidating, but it's really easy to read and he goes right to the root of the inequalities in wealth, technological development, social organization, etc. between the old and new worlds. (Spoiler Alert: It ain't about genetic superiority.)
No, the rooms are in the buildings at either end where the cable lands. Those are the ... official? ones. But they can tap it even without your cooperation if they want to, as this book revealed around 16 years ago. They just prefer not to. Maintenance is easier, I guess.
Well then maybe you shouldn't read this or this. I am terrified of smallpox and ebola/hemorrhagic fevers thanks to Richard Preston.
It’s actually a really interesting view that is posited by Japanese historians. Racing the Enemy is an amazing Japanese paper on the realities of the final days of the war from the internal view of the Japanese government.
I highly recommend reading the entirety of the work, but the summary goes along the lines of this:
The Japanese knew they were going to lose the war. They knew the Soviets were going to enter the war with the European front at peace. The Japanese government was terrified of what a Soviet-occupied Japan would look like and they preferred an American occupation. The problem was how to surrender while saving face and hopefully keeping the imperial system intact. The Soviets would have established a communist satellite state like they had done in Europe, while the Truman administration was at least amenable to keeping the emperor in place for public peace. The Japanese code of honour meant surrendering at all was problematic, but the dropping of the nuclear bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki allowed the Japanese to a) surrender to the Americans before the Soviets could enter the war, and b) save public face amongst the population of Japan by pointing to an apocalyptic bombing and say “we have to surrender”.
Don't forget that she'd include a comment about how the she thinks the internment of Japanese Americans in World War 2 was totally justified, an opinion that she literally wrote a book about.
Michelle Malkin wrote "In Defense of Internment" -
http://www.amazon.com/Defense-Internment-Round-Up-Americas-Terror/dp/0895260514
I don't think we should take anyone like that seriously. In the interview, she wasn't even following her own pledge of ignoring Atheists.
No, it's not an isolated incident — in terms of scale, US atrocities pale in comparison to those atrocities carried out by both North and South Vietnamese forces, but My Lai was just the most-publicised incident.
A DoD working group set up after My Lai to examine alleged US war crimes identified 320 incidents (not including My Lai) that were found to have some basis in fact. Army investigators substantiated seven massacres by US troops in addition to My Lai.
The LA Times reported the working group's files extensively once they were declassified — the stories they published are here. Nick Turse, the reporter who led the Times investigations, wrote a book called Kill Anything That Moves, which documents atrocities against civilians in Vietnam.
Investigators concluded that there was enough evidence to charge 203 US servicemen in connection with violence against civilians; 57 were eventually court-martialled and 23 were convicted. From the Times:
> Fourteen received prison sentences ranging from six months to 20 years, but most won significant reductions on appeal. The stiffest sentence went to a military intelligence interrogator convicted of committing indecent acts on a 13-year-old girl in an interrogation hut in 1967.
>
>He served seven months of a 20-year term, the records show.
>
>Many substantiated cases were closed with a letter of reprimand, a fine or, in more than half the cases, no action at all.
>
>There was little interest in prosecuting Vietnam war crimes, says Steven Chucala, who in the early 1970s was legal advisor to the commanding officer of the Army's Criminal Investigation Division. He says he disagreed with the attitude but understood it.
It's also worth reading this long series of reports by the Toledo Blade (for which they won a Pulitzer prize) investigating atrocities by a US counter-insurgency unit called Tiger Force.
Here’s the backstory: I went to check out/purchase this Evo+ unit this morning. It actually had more optional features installed than I expected, so I was pretty psyched. When the seller opened up the hardshell on the back, I noticed a name inscribed on the scrubber canister – a name I recognized. Turns out that the original owner was John Chatterton, host of Deep Sea Detectives on the History Channel and author of Shadow Divers, one of my favorite diving related books. FTW!!!
Just some basic things can making them getting to you too difficult to continue. Basically make them go a different way.
Some books to learn from (I haven't finished them all yet). Some of these are just to understand modern warfare or conventional warfare which is important to understanding how to get around it.
The Soviet army was wholly unprepared for any large long term conflict. They learned that lesson in Finland and was common knowledge among the whole command structure, and punctuated by the initial German invasion. It's amazing the kind of things you can learn when you actually read books about history and study things. Here's a great book that you would learn a lot from (https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0700608990/ref=yo_ii_img?ie=UTF8&psc=1). Only 9 bucks! You have to be willing to learn of course.
Also, holy shit 100 million people! It's so crazy that Europe, with a population of only around 400 million people at the this time, had literally 1/4 of their population killed in Soviet prisons and yet people remember the Nazis as being bad. Yep, that sure is a crazy and I'm sure wholly realistic and rational numbers and not you just pulling numbers out of your own asshole.
When Titans Clashed: How the Red Army Stopped Hitler
You can find it on Amazon here, or, if you're a university student like me, you might be able to download a free e-book using online library resources.
Yes, obviously. Perception IS reality in people's minds. And when people are acting on false and extremely negative information, it can lead to racial discrimination, attacks, fear, hate, and even war. Look at what lots of people believe.
Tibetan genocide
Uyghur cultural genocide
Eating dogs is widespread
Steals hundreds of billions in ip each year
China's state subsidies to companies are unfair [this is common among numerous Western nations]
T square massacre
OBOR Debt trap
China is a colonizer
China is just as bad as America [https://github.com/dessalines/essays/blob/master/us_atrocities.md]
Live organ harvesting
Huawei is a spying system
etc
On top of that
America is NOT an empire so we don't need to worry where it goes [http://www.amazon.com/Rogue-State-Guide-Worlds-Superpower/dp/1567513743/]
America cares about human rights so when a massacre is reported we brush it off as an isolated incident [http://www.amazon.com/Kill-Anything-That-Moves-American/dp/1250045061/]
America's debt are transparent and fair [http://www.amazon.com/Confessions-Economic-Hit-John-Perkins/dp/0452287081/]
American dream is alive and well [social mobility is one of the lowest of developed nations]
America does not conduct economic espionage. [yes, it does since at least 1990's]
None of these things are true yet are widely believed. They aren't believed by everyone but they are believed by enough people that it's massively harming China's reputation.
> conservative personality Michelle Malkin
Just a reminder that Michelle Malkin became famous by using her Japanese heritage to advocate for the internment of Muslim Americans after 9/11
https://www.amazon.com/Defense-Internment-Racial-Profiling-Terror/dp/0895260514
If this question interests you, you will very much enjoy Jared Diamond's book Guns, Germs, and Steel. His thesis is that the potential for cultural advancement is in many cases restricted by geography and climate.
For example, he looks at the habitat range of various domesticable animals, noting that Europe's horse helped the continent's cultures make huge advancements in civilization, while South America's (IIRC) llama, suitable for different uses, didn't offer the same opportunities in agriculture, transport, and warfare.
Pangaea would surely have mountain ranges and deserts, but on the timeframe we're talking about (tens of My) I don't think those limit the spread of land animals the way that oceans do. If domesticable land animals could spread everywhere, human culture likely would too. At the very least, what we call the colonialism of the last millennium would have played out very differently!
This article is a fairly succinct summation of the revisionist argument.
This book by a Japanese historian is the long form.
EDIT: Since I was asked to be a bit more explicit about the context of these links, I'll summarize. The basic argument here is that the dropping of the atomic bombs and Japanese surrender coming so close together is, in a way, coincidental. Japanese cities had basically been flattened (see this link for a comparison of Japanese cities destroyed to similar-sized American ones. Sorry I can't find a better page on short notice) and many of the conventional attacks were just as destructive as the atomic ones.
The Japanese high command weren't idiots, although some of them were nationalist fanatics. They knew they were losing the war, and indeed always stood very little chance of winning. However, they were hoping that a deal mediated through the Soviets, with whom they had a non-aggression pact, would allow them to hold on to some of their colonial possessions. Remember they had ruled Korea for decades, and were accustomed to it being fully in their control. They didn't see why surrender should necessarily end that.
The Soviets ultimately decided to break their pact with the Japanese, though and attacked Manchuria (with many many atrocities committed against Japanese colonists, btw. Read Japan at War for some first person accounts.) Their massive war machine, having been done with Germany for months, could have been in Hokkaido in weeks, rather than the months it would have taken to mount the American invasion of Kysushu. The Japanese military had been fortifying Kyushu with its best veteran troops in anticipation of American landings there. They would have been completely rolled in the north and Tokyo would have fallen by December.
The argument is that it was the prospect of occupation by the hated Russians that drove the high command to surrender, not the atomic bombs.
They didn't have chickens either, as those evolved from red junglefowl found in Asia. I'm also unaware of there being any large scale domestication of the alpaca and their range is centered in Northern Peru and doesn't extend beyond that. Llamas are bound by the same circumstances, although I believe they had a larger historical range than alpacas. Incas also had access to the guinea pig.
In reality, the only domesticated animals available to central Americans would have been turkeys, which were domesticated roughly 2000 years ago. Dogs were likely kept as a starvation food, and were probably 'unintentionally' domesticated. It's arguable that because of the likelihood that there was a low density of domestic turkey populations, there was a low amount of contact between humans and their domesticated fowl (given that they weren't used for egg production), and that they were domesticated relatively recently, that any diseases carried by turkeys didn't have time or opportunity to find a foothold in New World Human populations.
It should also be noted that the orientation of the New World continents is not beneficial for the transmission of diseases. You must traverse through a variety of different biomes, and thus different species, if you traverse the continents of North and South American from tip to tip. On the other hand, Asia, Europe and the Middle East are oriented in the opposite direction, which causes lateral planes of similar climates (e.g. the climate of France is roughly similar to the Ukraine, which is similar to Kazakhstan). Because of that, similar species can exist along a long lateral corridor and pass diseases between neighboring populations. This effect becomes more pronounced as people use similar domesticated stock in a more widespread fashion.
Most of this can be found in Jared Diamond's book Guns, Germs and Steel in addition to a primer on other reasons why Europeans (and other historical populations) were able to colonize far off places without being fought back into the sea.
If you're interested in a complete list of domesticated animals worldwide, check here.
Cheers.
Edits: Details. Forgot about the tasty, tasty guinea pig.
Two book recommendations:
Killing Hope - explores the United States' covert and overt operations globally, including crimes like Colombia and Guatemala.
Kill Anything That Moves - focuses specifically on Vietnam.
Actually most highly decorated US warship of all time. You can read about her incredible missions in Blind Man's Bluff. It's a really great book that I'd recommend to pretty much anyone.
Granted, they are correct about the economic growth of the country. Intentionally or not Joseph Stalin took crib notes from the Imperial Russian Finance Minister who famously stated that given the choice between industrialization and allowing people to starve in the streets, people were just going to have to go hungry.
In that sense- and ironically doing what the Nazis could only imagine themselves doing under General Plan Ost- it's quite easy to grow your economy when you have no respect for human life or human rights and the rumbling of mouth breathing Germans on your border all collectively convinced there's a conspiracy of Jewish communists running your country to destroy western civilization then forced those people who generally loathed you into your 'loving' embrace. Seriously, to get a picture of what the early years of the Soviet Union was like, go read Ivan's War. Germany invading in some respects saved Stalin's experiment.
>Zero Unemployment
Because employment was a duty, even if your job was to sit in a stairway and read the newspaper.
>Zero homelessness
Man, who can say no to this? Construction companies are a brilliant way to build a fledgling economy but lets completely forgo that so everyone can live in concrete coffins.
>End Famine
You mean that thing you intentionally inflicted on the Ukrainians to cripple them? Or that thing where you forced everyone in bread lines? Jokes from the era were about how even heroes of the Soviet Union like cosmonauts had to wait in bread lines. Let that sink in: the Soviets could put man in space and achieved many important firsts in the wider space race but when tasked with making sure a country was fed they could not run an efficient bakery.
>Higher Calorie Consumption than the US
Someone's going to have to point me to this statistic but I don't see how they're not lying here. This certainly would not have started until the late 50's or early 60's because the Soviet Union was trashed in the wake of WW2 and the parts that were treated the worst was the bread basket.
NOOOOO!!!!!!!
Okay, that's out of my system. But I think that this is a poor example for /r/BadHistory simply because it isn't particularly BadHistory. Plenty of reputable historians have argued for the Soviets being the primary reason for Japan's Surrender, Hasegawa being the most famous one. While it's definitely not cut and dry, "The Soviets forced Japan to surrender" it's a completely reasonable position to take and IMO, makes more sense as the primary motivator for surrender than the A-Bomb.
/u/nemracbackwards
Since I got banned from your sjw sub (yeah, so much for your claims of them banning only for “rape threats”, “misogyny”, “racism”), I’ll respond to you here.
> Not to derail this topic, but your mod u/Natalie-Ng and a user I believe u/dat0kki (sp?) have resorted to calling me a slut and whore as a defense in threads.
lol dafuq???? Where the fuck did I ever called you a slut and whore? YOU were the one that came flying out of nowhere to attack me and called me an ad hominem when I wasn’t even talking to your dumbass in the first place and was politely explaining why the wording of a title can upset some readers. So please don’t try to pull that victim card bullshit here.
And speaking of victim card…
> Imho, this male toxicity has everything to do with Asian culture. Asian culture has been extremely patriarchal, while yes this exist in all cultures, I believe it's unique for Asian culture and heighten in some senses towards misogyny.
Lol, I see white brainwashing has done its number on you and you’ve successfully, and rather stupidly, eaten up every negative stereotype about our community thrown at you.
Since everyone with half a brain was already able to debunk your bullshit here, I would just like to know, if you truly care about misogyny so much, why don’t you spend half the time calling out the REAL misogynists that also happen to be both Asian men and women’s and every other POC’s oppressors as you do shitting on your own race?
Pedophile profile: Young, white, wealthy
http://www.zdnet.com/article/pedophile-profile-young-white-wealthy/
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CpH1gOUUMAAC02K.jpg:large
http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/08/01/cambodia-and-western-fabrication-of-history/
Your dearly beloved whites traveling to rape little kids
http://abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=2325416&page=1
Your dearly beloved whites most likely to commit familicide
https://www.nij.gov/topics/crime/intimate-partner-violence/pages/murder-suicide.aspx
Invading multiple countries and mass raping women? Not exactly something they’re unfamiliar with.
http://www.voltairenet.org/article177063.html
https://www.amazon.com/Hidden-History-Korean-1950-1951-Nonconformist/dp/0316817708/
https://www.amazon.com/Kill-Anything-That-Moves-American/dp/1250045061/
And please explain the Agent Orange Privilege
http://thiscantbehappening.net/node/2715
More and more sexual violence: http://imgur.com/AHK6D2R
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CmG07MuVAAAIqOP.jpg
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CmG08hxUYAAswLA.jpg
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CmG1B12UYAAdcOW.jpg
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CmG1DKGUYAAbZIe.jpg
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CmGWf4pXIAALmiv.jpg
More and more dehumanization by white men who pretend to be “egalitarian”
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CmG0blfUsAAIuHx.jpg
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CmG0lMkUYAAG4Rq.jpg
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CmG0mICUkAElY0j.jpg
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CmG0nfDUsAAo9K5.jpg
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CmG0OVwVEAA-rVx.jpg
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CmG0PYSUoAAmoIl.jpg
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CmG0QuUUgAAS78v.jpg
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CmG0SFRUkAAcBfe.jpg
MRA/MGTOW just sweeping the west happily
https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/intelligence-report/2012/leader%E2%80%99s-suicide-brings-attention-men%E2%80%99s-rights-movement
Apparently, you do.
http://imgur.com/6bkGKZL
> The history of Western imperialism in Asia and its lingering effects present the greatest source of inequality for Diasporic Asian women today. White sexual imperialism, through rape and war, created the hyper sexualized stereotype of the Asian woman. This stereotype in turn fostered the over prevalence of Asian women in pornography, the mail order bride phenomenon, the Asian fetish syndrome, and worst of all, sexual violence against Asian women.
> Without first undermining the White sexual imperialist regime, violent crimes against Asian victims will continue to be largely perpetrated by White men
> For the Asian woman at the intersection of gender and race, achieving equality means overthrowing not only male supremacy or White supremacy, but specifically White male supremacy.
> It is the White male’s sexual dominance over the Asian female which emerges as the source of inequality the Asian female suffers.
> White Sexual Imperialism: A Theory of Asian Feminist Jurisprudence
http://scholarlycommons.law.wlu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1243&context=crsj
> Sexual violence directed at Asian women by white men—and any Asian woman can tell you how unrelenting and commonplace such violence and sexualized racism are—is a direct result of Western imperialism
> No One Is Free Until All Are Free By Chris Hedges
http://www.rapereliefshelter.bc.ca/learn/resources/no-one-free-until-all-are-free-chris-hedges
> the foreigners here--mainly US and Canada--are unreal. It's a joke. And because of this, Korean women generally have a bad impression of western men. Add all of the ridiculous army assholes here…
>If you're not an English teacher, you're instantly higher value. Again, I cannot impress enough how deplorable the white man is here. It has to be seen...
> Thailand, Taiwan, Korea, China or Japan?
https://www.rooshvforum.com/thread-28141-page-3.html
> I know it sounds like an over-generalization, but it kind of seems that ESL teachers fall into to two categories: white guys with no game who want to give getting laid a try, so they go to some Pacific Rim country and hope the wealth disparity gives them that edge they need; and pedophiles who want to try out the underage hookers in Thailand or whatever.
> I don't know, it's just that I've known at least three guys who have gone across the ocean to teach english, and they've all been dirtbags.
> Tell me about it dude. Most of them don't even know how to teach or even have degrees. A lot of guys that get discharged in Korea stay here and teach english and make bank and use girls. And they don't even speak Korean!
Guys who teach english overseas are all scumbags | Sherdog Forums | UFC, MMA & Boxing Discussion
http://forums.sherdog.com/threads/guys-who-teach-english-overseas-are-all-scumbags.565263/
> “So you're coming to China to run away from your problems... Social anxiety, unattractiveness and/or loneliness. I don't blame you. I'm sure many here would admit to the same reasoning if they had the balls. Myself included…
> And you know what? It fucking works. You step foot in some shit tier city and suddenly you're the coolest, most interesting motherfucker in town. I get it. It’s an awesome feeling.
> But here’s the thing. Deep down, under the barriers and walls you’ve put up, all those problems will still exist. You can bang all the Rainies you want and feel like the biggest badass but there will always be a little feeling in the back of your mind, gnawing at your psyche like a ravenous molerat. A voice that whispers: I can’t cut it back home.
> Some guys will overcompensate to the extreme, banging anything that walks and being straight up assholes to everyone just because they can. Just to make that voice a little smaller. But it will still be there. That tiny, frustrating little whisper. This is all a dream. In 5 minutes, you’re gonna wake up in your old bed at your folks’ house in Bumfuck, Arkansas. And everything's gonna be shit again.”
> So you're coming to China to run away from your problems, eh? : China
https://np.reddit.com/r/China/comments/2bx4jg/so_youre_coming_to_china_to_run_away_from_your/
> Young guy is thinking of moving to China to work as a teacher. He'd heard about sexpats and alcoholic expats. China is full of them, he was told. What a bunch of losers.
> I've told the girls I'm not sure I'm ready for a serious relationship. It's their fault if the choose to hang on hoping for something more.
> He starts using tantan for hookups. It's so easy to have a few different girls on the go. I was hurting the girls I was hooking up with (they all seem to be looking for marriage).
> I'd become some sort of sexpat alcoholic. I'm just as shitty as any other guy.
[SERIOUS] Did China force you to face your inner demons? : China
https://np.reddit.com/r/China/comments/481sbh/serious_did_china_force_you_to_face_your_inner/
Because otherwise, you reek of mentally colonized garbage.
> Again and again, he has urged the reader to bask in awesome feel-good moments of warmongering, such as Robb’s “King in the North” crowning, Dany’s “Dracarys” in Astapor, and Doran’s “Fire and Blood” speech to Arianne…
I like this a lot, because IMO there is something innate within humanity which loves conflict. We feel a mini adrenaline rush at those scenes, because it's a mini version of what war is like. As Chris Hedges wrote in fantastic book War is a Force Which Gives Us Meaning
> The rush of battle is often a potent and lethal addiction, for war is a drug.
In actual combat, this magnified many, many times over, but reading (and seeing) the Dracarys scene gave me a familiar "Fuck yeah!" feeling at watching people buy it. And sure, they were reprehensible, but I mean we are reading/watching people burn to death. Even your quote to end this blog post gave me this feeling.
> The dragons are now unchained, and the gloves are off.
Anyways, fantastic post, great series, looking forward to the next part. Cheers
Did a bit of searching and, as it turns out, this is far from an isolated, one-off position by the Republican Party platform. Michelle Malkin wrote an entire book on it! See here
Fred Korematsu's rebuttal
Eric Muller's rebuttal, in a nutshell, much more substantive
She also wrote a book titled [In Defense of Internment: The Case for Racial Profiling in World War II and the War on Terror] (http://www.amazon.com/Defense-Internment-Racial-Profiling-Terror/dp/0895260514/ref=sr_1_7?ie=UTF8&qid=1449718002&sr=8-7&keywords=michelle+malkin) in 2004. Here is the description of the book on Amazon:
Everything you've been taught about the World War II "internment camps" in America is wrong:
They were not created primarily because of racism or wartime hysteria
They did not target only those of Japanese descent
They were not Nazi-style death camps
I see what you guys meant by the term "mental colonized".
> What are some examples of actual wars where deaths occurred, actually involve religious motivation?
I am going to take "wars" to mean 'group/organization pre-mediated violent action' - cause I have a recent post I can use! heh.
I'll use Christianity as an example because I recently made a comment submission concerning events that solely occurred on command of church authorities or were committed in the name of Christianity - and were based, in large part or totality, upon Christian moral dogma/tenets/beliefs.
Warning, this is a long list: VICTIMS OF THE CHRISTIAN FAITH by Kelsos
Now, to advance the idea/claim that most wars and death was caused by atheism and not by religion, there is an apologetic argument that states (roughly):
>>> In the Encyclopedia of Wars, Phillips and Axelrod document the history of recorded warfare, and from their list of 1763 wars only 121/123 (7%) (and less than 2 percent of all people killed in warfare) have been classified to involve a religious cause, ....
And on the face of this argument, it is a good one. However......
From the introduction to Encyclopedia of Wars:
Wars have always arisen, and arise today, from territorial disputes, military rivalries, conflicts of ethnicity, and strivings for commercial and economic advantage, and they have always depended on, and depend on today, pride, prejudice, coercion, envy, cupidity, competitiveness, and a sense of injustice. But for much of the world before the 17th century, these “reasons” for war were explained and justified, at least for the participants, by religion. Then, around the middle of the 17th century, Europeans began to conceive of war as a legitimate means of furthering the interests of individual sovereigns. (Emphasis mine).
For the people who started war, many/most wars post 17th century, mostly were not started as a overt (more of this below) consequence of Theistic Religion. However, for the people fighting them, they, arguably, mostly have been based, at least in part, on Religion and Religious beliefs.
In the case of the oft used The Encyclopedia of Wars argument, the summary of the wars listed follows the format in this IMAGE (a screen shot of from my copy of The Encyclopedia of Wars). In the case of the specific war I presented to show the entry format, I picked one where a Theistic Religious cause was blatantly identified. While I personally did not go through the three volume set, I will not contest that only '123, or 7%, of the 1763 wars documented show a direct and blatantly obvious Theistic Religious "MAJOR ISSUES AND OBJECTIVES" cause or involvement.
However, what the entries of each war do not address is that the morality upon a great many of these wars is based is Theistic Religions in nature - from the Theism informed morality of the various governments and participants to justify the wars/military conflict - to - the anti-Religious Theism inherent in the advancement of many non-Theistic ideologies resulting in wars/military-type actions.
So while not an overt/obvious cause of most wars since the 17th century, an implicit contributing cause is Theistic Religion and the morality expressed therein - with emphasis upon the initiators of the war.
If you're a patchhead (I think I just made that up, not sure), you should check out this book -
https://www.amazon.com/Could-Tell-Then-Would-Destroyed/dp/193555414X
Fun fact, this patch had to be reworked to avoid a lawsuit with George Lucas -
http://www.sci-fi-o-rama.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/I_Could_Tell_You_But_Then_You_Would_Have_to_be_Destroyed_by_Me_02.jpg
There are a whole host of reasons. I don't claim that my list is exhaustive.
The war wasn't particularly popular. The North Vietnamese (Viet Minh) were never a threat to the USA except in the paranoid anti-communist atmosphere of the times. It was a war fought to demonstrate our willingness to uphold the treaty obligations in the SEATO pact.
US society was undergoing several huge convulsions; there was the civil rights (and later, black power) movement and the big counter-cultural upheaval (free speech, drugs, and hippies) going on at the same time the anti-war movement was becoming a political force.
Morale withing many of the ground forces was steadily sinking. The war was difficult and the campaigns seemingly unending. Much of the ground combat was fought at the platoon and company level and the way the rotations of men were scheduled there were new guys ("cherries") replacing seasoned men all the time. There wasn't the same sense of belonging to a particular fighting unit. Each GI had his own personal calendar with the dates of his return from overseas and estimated date of termination memorized.
The lousy fighting conditions — jungle warfare, invisible enemy, unfriendly and treacherous villagers. and later, a feeling of alienation —
resulted in well publicized atrocities carried out by US troops. A lot of this stuff happens in every war but in these early days of the infant Information Age more of these incidents were recorded, documented, and broadcast than ever before.
Since many people (in growing numbers) didn't believe in the rationale for fighting the war to begin with they were less likely to identify and sympathize with soldiers who were involved in massacres of civilians or other commonly reported acts of barbarism. See Nick Turse's book.)
Actual incidents where Vietnam veterans were attacked or spat on are hard to substantiate. I do know of incidents where returning servicemen attacked anti-war demonstrators and bragged about it, however.
The idea of a psychopathic murderous American fighting man was at odds with the society envisioned by the anti-war movement and the drugs and rock counter-culture. Much of the disrespect for the Vietnam veteran comes from the vets themselves. Or maybe I should say "ourselves" — I was drafted and spent '68 and '69 in Vietnam. And while I can gratefully say that I personally did nothing to be ashamed of, I can't say my experiences gives me any sense of pride or patriotism.
TL:DR Another '60s guy complaining about the Vietnam war
Read or listen to Kill Anything that Moves by Nick Turse. Excellent overview and description of the atrocities that occurred during the late 60s in Vietnam. Nothing went too far, literally the worse things you can possibly think of to do to other humans and just scale it up to US War Machine levels. To all humans: babies, children, women, and men. To animals, livestock, cultivated fields, and whole ecosystems. And the attitudes, no remorse, no empathy, just kill as many humans as possible as quickly as possible. I can’t believe it’s not generally known what the US did down there, it’s just not taught in schools. You’d be lucky to find someone who remembers the My Lai Massacre, but that’s about it.
In Defense of Internment: The Case for Racial Profiling in World War II and the War on Terror By Michelle Malkin
You talk to your local google datacenter over HTTPS (let's say). It hits their front door, they decrypt it there, and to service your request they may need to transport data from other google datacenters. Those requests are (currently) unencrypted, although they are traveling over private data lines and not the public internet. Somehow NSA is getting in the middle of that communication and intercepting the unencrypted (although supposedly private) traffic. This would also apply to replication traffic to support disaster recovery in case they lose a data center, Google needs copies of your data in more than once place in their infrastructure. So that's an opportunity for NSA to get your entire set of data going back as far as google has it, potentially.
So the real question here is how is NSA getting in the middle to attack these private links. One way would be they are either getting cooperation from or just outright breaking into the carriers of this private traffic and intercepting it. They'd literally just need access to the fiber traffic in a way to split the beams off to get their own copy - they've been caught doing this before. Also anyone who's read Blind Man's Bluff can see there's other crazier ways to break into trans-oceanic communications links.
If you enjoy reading, pick up a copy of Blind Man's Bluff: The Untold Story of American Submarine Espionage.
It's a fascinating read.
Some very inaccessible landmarks were first discovered by airplane. The world's highest waterfall, Angel Falls was first described to the world after being spotted by aviator Jimmie Angel (though it was probably discovered by earlier Europeans explorers and certainly was well known by indigenous inhabitants of the region).
Aerial exploration was extremely important in charting and exploring the Arctic and Antarctic regions as well. The flights of Richard Byrd and others were very important in charting and describing much of Antarctica. A very large section of the continent is today named after Richard Byrd's wife Marie.
Much of the interior of New Guinea was considered to be essentially uninhabited until the first aerial surveys revealed it to be densely populated by indigenous inhabitants. (I believe this was discussed in Guns, Germs and Steel but I can't find my copy of it right now, so I'm more than willing to be corrected on this one).
More recently, satellite images have been used to discover new achaeological sites in the Saudi desert and in Italy.
And I'm not sure if this is what you're looking for, but scientists first discovered that grazing cows use the earth's magnetic field to orient themselves using Google Earth satellite images.
EDIT: see my comment in reply to asdjk48 below for a more detailed citation of the New Guinea thing.
Hey you wanted an answer now you dont like it cuz "muh gun companies EVUL!"
Guess I'll go back to making improvised explosives and my own guns now. That help you feel safer since gun companies arent making profits?
https://www.armchairpatriot.com/Home%20Defense/Homemade%20Guns/Home%20Expedient%20Firearms%20-%209mm%20SMG.pdf
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1684112737/ref=ox_sc_act_title_6?smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER&psc=1
>U.S. Army Improvised Munitions Handbook by Army
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1724856685/ref=ox_sc_saved_title_1?smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER&psc=1
>Build Your Own Semi-Auto Handgun: A Step-by-Step Guide to Assembling an "Off-the-Books" GLOCK-Style P80 Pistol
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/162914438X/ref=ox_sc_saved_title_10?smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER&psc=1
>Advanced Gunsmithing: A Manual of Instruction in the Manufacture, Alteration, and Repair of Firearms (75th Anniversary Edition)
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0913022004/ref=ox_sc_saved_title_1?smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER&psc=1
>The Chemistry of Powder and Explosives
This book was a good read. These are the same tactics that have basically applied to fighter combat since forever, up to all aspect missiles, but excluding HOB missiles. There are great chapters on 2v1 and 2v2.
This trend went pretty mainstream among conservatives ten or fifteen years ago.
Nixon went from pariah to great president who made a single mistake.
Vietnam went from a bad idea and a huge clusterfuck to a just and righteous war that the damn democrats deliberately sabotaged.
Japanese internment during wwii went from a horrible injustice to a perfectly reasonable precaution. Michelle Malkin even wrote a book about it in 2004.
And I'm sure there are lots of other examples I'm forgetting.
The Trumpkins didn't start all this, but it's unsurprising that they'd latch on to it. Particularly Nixon.
I've had this book over 20 years, and its still a go to.
https://www.amazon.com/Fighter-Combat-Maneuvering-Robert-Shaw/dp/0870210599
That’s US education at its finest.
The public estimate used to justify the bombing after the war was 500,000 casualties, not lives. Strange how it’s become so inflated as people began to question the use of the bomb...
The Army did at one point used a worst case “strategic planning” estimate of 750,000 replacements needed to cover all types of casualties and soldiers rotating out. 135k deaths would have be in-line with other pacific theater operations. 300k Purple Hearts were ordered to cover everything through the end of the war. There is zero evidence to support the idea that the US was preparing for “well over a million” American deaths in an invasion without the atomic bomb.
Today, we know that the number used to justify the bombings and given to us post war might have been inflated by as much as ten times, as the records we have now show that the US Joint War Plans Committee wrote in June 1945 (a month before we had a testable-bomb) that they expected a Nov. 1 invasion date and “only” 40k American deaths — 75k casualties.
Roosevelt’s and Truman’s own advisors wanted to allow conditional surrender, as the “emperor clause” was a major barrier to Japan’s surrender. There’s evidence the bomb wouldn’t have been necessary if they would have allowed the emperor to remain, but Truman continued to refuse (fun fact, after the bombing we did allow him to remain anyway, despite refusing to do so before the bombing, partially because of concerns it would drive post-war Japan into bed with the soviets).
Truman’s entire negotiation tactics with the Soviets changed after the first successful bomb test, and he used the first bomb to force them into Japan (which, Japan’s own records showwas more influential in their surrender than the bombing of Hiroshima was).
We dropped bombs as a show of force, and killed 200,000+ Japanese non-combatants in doing so. Here’s a good book to help correct some of what we were taught in schools.
My Lai was not an one off event, it was standard operating procedure. It is only remembered because people found out about it.
The atrocities - massacres and rapes - the Americans committed in Vietnam was approaching what the Japanese did in Nanking. It is similar in level of brutality if not in scale. Here are some quotes from testimonies of returning Vietnamese vets.
Brutalizing women:
> I saw one case where a woman was shot by a sniper, one of our snipers. When we got up to her, she was asking for water. And the Lieutenant said to kill her. So he ripped off her clothes. They stabbed her in both breasts. They spread-eagled her and shoved an E- tool up her vagina, an entrenching tool, and she was still asking for water. And then they took that out, and they used a tree limb, and then she was shot.
---
> After she was questioned, and, of course, dead, this guy came over, who was a former major, been in the service for twenty years, and he got hungry again and came back over working with USAID, Aid International Development. He went over there, ripped her clothes off and took a knife and cut, from her vagina almost all the way up, just about up to her breasts, and pulled her organs out, completely out of her cavity, and threw them out. Then he stopped and knelt over and commenced to peel every bit of skin off her body, and left her there as a sign for something or other.
---
> As I was walking over to him, I turned and I looked in the area. I looked to where the VCS were -- supposed VCS -- and two men were leading a young girl, approximately 19 years old, very pretty, out of a hootch. She had no clothes on, so I assumed she'd been raped, which was pretty SOP. That's standard operating procedure for civilians. And she was thrown onto the pile of the 19 women and children, and five men around the circle opened up on full automatic with their M-16s. And that was the end of that.
Killing children:
> I was picked up by a truckload of grunt Marines with two company grade officers, 1st Lieutenants. We were about 5 miles down the road, where there were some Vietnamese children at the gateway of the village, and they gave the old finger gesture at us. It was understandable that they picked this up from the GIs there. They stopped the trucks -- they didn't stop the truck, they slowed down a little bit, and it was just like response, the guys got up, including the lieutenants, and just blew all the kids away. There were about five or six kids blown away, and then the truck just continued down the hill. That was my first day in Vietnam.
Massacring entire villages:
> and there was a river on each side, and there was another company behind each river, and like the people were running around inside, and they were just shooting them, and like the newspapers said, "Operation Stone, like World War II movie," and we just sat up there and we wiped them out. Women, children, everything. 291 of them.
---
> Because we went into the area, and it was to set the example to show that we weren't fucking around. So the first thing we do is burn down the village and kill everybody just to let them know we weren't fucking around.
---
> When we went out, I'd say 50% at least of the villages we passed through would be burned to the ground. There was no difference between some that we burned and the ones we didn't burn. It's just that some we had time and we'd burn them. We were given orders whenever we moved into a village to reconnoiter by fire. This means whenever we step into a village we're to fire upon houses, bushes, anything to our discretion that looked like there might be someone hiding behind or in or under. What we did was we'd carry our rifles about hip high and we'd line up low to the village and start walking, firing from the hip.
And there are many more stories like these. Photos and transcript here. There is also a book. If anyone doesn't believe you, look at this iconic photo from My Lai: women and children moments before their deaths. The woman in black had just been raped, and is still buttoning her shirt.
I have this book at home, it's pretty amusing.
No, I'm not. I just read "the book". :D
​
If you want to learn more about long range shooting, there's a great book by Ryan Cleckner called "Long Range Shooting Handbook." I highly recommend it.
​
https://www.amazon.com/Long-Range-Shooting-Handbook-Cleckner/dp/151865472X
​
He also did several great videos for the National Shooting Sports Foundation that are on YouTube. And he's got a podcast that's really good too.
When the DoD Improvised Munitions Handbook is available on amazon for $12 (or on the internet as a free PDF), they're living a double standard.
The US figured out how to tap into analog undersea phone cables using induction to avoid physically cutting into the cables back in the early 1970's. As others have pointed out, this article covers some of the details. The book Blind Mans Bluff covers more details on how we did it and how it continued at least into the Reagan era. If the CIA/NSA/etc. has been tapping undersea cables for 40+ years now then they're probably pretty darned good at it.
> source
It's from a book called "Ivan's War"
https://www.amazon.com/Ivans-War-Life-Death-1939-1945/dp/0312426526
unfortunately I got rid of the book, so I can't check the actual material cited.
I'll link you a proper study course further down, but here are the basics:
Speed is life, altitude is life insurance. Especially in US planes if you're not going fast you will die. Don't engage in combat under 450km/h IAS, and try to make sure you're pushing quite a bit faster than that so you have airspeed to burn during the fight.
Don't expect the P-38 to maneuver well, it's a twin-engine heavy fighter. Quite nimble for what it is, but never confuse that for being as agile as a single-engine aircraft.
BnZ is all about patience. Don't expect every one of your runs to score a kill. Heck, don't even expect most of them to do so. BnZ is all about manipulating your opponent's energy state and position to be favorable to you, then putting them under constant pressure so that they keep piling up little mistakes until they make the fatal one.
Don't use the keyboard for elevator control in turns, especially at high speeds. Keyboard input commands full control deflection and will usually lead to sharp, wasteful turns that leave you slow and vulnerable afterwards.
When making BnZ runs, apply the principle of CBDR to ensure that you're closing on a vector that will bring you in for a very close shot on the enemy.
And now on to the study course:
----
Start with /u/dmh_longshot's series of video tutorials, while they're for arcade the basic energy fighting principles still apply to all modes.
Follow up by reading In Pursuit (PDF) for more detailed coverage of air combat.
Supplement this with browsing the SimHQ Air Combat Corner Library for specific material. It's not all applicable to WT, and it's somewhat random, but it's all quality material and generally quite useful.
Finally, if you really get bit by the air combat bug and want to study it in tremendous depth, Fighter Combat: Tactics and Maneuvering will be your air combat bible.
This one
I'll stick with the testimony of the soldiers who were there, and that of the Vietnamese victims and the serious historians who've gone through the documents and archives.
I've spoken with Scott Camil who is featured throughout the Winter Soldier, he gave honest testimony corroborated by comrades and by Vietnamese victims whom he visited and apologized to in 94'.
Read Nick Turse's work "Kill Anything That Moves", every single atrocity is painstakingly verified by multiple sources many of which are direct US gov documents that were suppressed.
Also this:
https://www.amazon.com/Kill-Anything-That-Moves-American/dp/1250045061/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1479436423&sr=8-1&keywords=kill+everything+that+moves
Check out Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond.
According to some, it's about Guns, Germs and Steel.
Jon Peterson's Playing at the World is the gold standard for high-quality historical research as far as I am concerned. He runs an excellent blog on games too.
This article is about the same theory and historian Tsuyoshi Hasegawa's Racing the Enemy. I think it's considered a big deal because it's saying that neither the atomic bomb nor the conventional bombing that preceded it broke Japan's will, i.e. city-bombing doesn't break wills, i.e. military thinking and the political narrative of WWII has been wrong and needs to change, and leaderships basically don't care about population loss.... and thus, there is likely to be political unwillingness to accept such a theory in both the U.S. (the atomic bombs didn't do anything) and Japan (the government didn't really care that the people were being bombed to death).
>the source of most trouble in the world
Only 7% of all wars and 2% of all war casualties are from religious wars. Politics is far more of a source of trouble. So are desires for wealth, land and power. I thought you atheists liked facts and reasoning? Shame that some of you let it down for the sensible atheists we tend to get on this sub.
Btw, source is Encyclopaedia of Wars in case some of you are doubting this statistic.
>How do you talk about a group that often has individuals that work against AAPI well-being for personal interest, without being offensive?
Make sure to be clear about who is being addressed eg self haters. Do not generalize.
 
>We cannot override love.
Very wrong. You're assuming these relationships are love. I have facts and proof that very often, it absolutely is not. Do you realize that Af are preferred by sexist, racist, and misogynistic white men? Go read the redpill, hundreds of thousands of white men read that. Here's the latest..
https://www.reddit.com/r/TheRedPill/comments/4ojhit/how_to_stuff_your_white_meat_into_asian_girls/
 
If the Asian community is ever going to improve, they must face the fact that we're being divided and conquered by whites (mostly males). They are the enemy - not each other. See the list of crimes below. ALL done by wm who turn around and 24/7 show images of themselves "saving Af" from "evil Am". All Asians are being brainwashed constantly.
 
Some research below for support.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>White hegemonic ideologies of masculinity and femininity determine who gets to have sex with whom …We do not make choices of attraction in a vacuum…Hegemonic ideology becomes our commonsense notions.
>Women were painted as perpetually sexually available to white men while Asian American men were constructed as castrated or impotent…
Asian American Sexual Politics: The Construction of Race, Gender, and Sexuality: Rosalind S. Chou
http://www.amazon.com/Asian-American-Sexual-Politics-Construction/dp/1442209240
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>racialized images can cause Asian American women to believe they will find greater gender equality with white men and can cause white men to believe they will find greater subservience with Asian women. This dynamic promotes Asian American women’s availability to white men and makes them particularly vulnerable to mistreatment.
Asian American Women And Racialized Femininities 'Doing' Gender across Cultural Worlds
http://www.irows.ucr.edu/cd/courses/232/pyke/femininities.pdf
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>He defines internalized racism as “the ‘subjection’ of the victims of racism to the mystifications of the very racist ideology which imprison and define them” (Hall 1986 - 26).
>it is referred to as “internalized racial oppression,” “internalized racism,” “internalized White supremacy,” “internalized Whiteness,” and the much criticized term “racial self hatred.”
>The dominant group controls the construction of reality through the production of ideologies or “knowledge” (Foucault 1977 [1975]) that circulate throughout society where they inform social norms, organizational practices, bureaucratic procedures, and commonsense knowledge. In this way the interests of the oppressors are presented as reflecting everyone’s best interests, thereby getting oppressed groups to accept the dominant group’s interests as their own
>the subjugated inculcate, seemingly by cultural osmosis, negative stereotypes and ideologies disseminated as taken for granted knowledge.
>individual inculcation of the racist stereotypes, values, images, and ideologies perpetuated by the White dominant society about one’s racial group, leading to feelings of self doubt, disgust, and disrespect for one’s race and or oneself.
>All systems of oppression not thoroughly coerced through brute force and overt repression involve the dominant group’s ability to win consent of the oppressed.
>When the oppressed come to accept these identities as “real,” they are in effect internalizing their subjugated status
>One need not experience discrete, identifiable instances of overt discrimination to internalize racial oppression.
>White racism can infiltrate the world view of the racially oppressed without their conscious consent (Osajima 1993) in a subtle process some refer to as “indoctrination” and “mental colonialization” (hooks 2003).
What is Internalized Racial Oppression and Why Don't We Study it - Acknowledging Racism's Hidden Injuries
http://irows.ucr.edu/cd/courses/232/pyke/intracopp.pdf
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The origins of self hate and white worship are the same – racist stereotypes and lies that masquerade as “facts”…
>Even at a young age, the white racial frame that normalizes whiteness affects children.
>A study of sixty-five Asian Americans at an elite university found that respondents spoke more positively about their physical features when they seemed "less Asian" and more "white" or "American."
>Earlier research has shown Asian Americans being ashamed or attempting to hide their race or pass for white.
>At least I didn't have a Korean accent; then it would have probably been even worse.
>It made an impact over time, when all you hear is the negative instead of the positive. I always felt like the outsider and I was teased for just being Asian. They'd pull their eyes down, and they always thought I was Chinese.
>All sixty respondents had memories of being teased and feeling like a racial "other”.
>Asian Americans, especially girls and women, are disturbingly overrepresented with rates of depression and suicide. As recently as spring of 2011, The National Alliance on Mental lllness released a report that Asian American girls have the highest rates of depressive symptoms of any racial/ethnic or gender group.
Asian American Sexual Politics: The Construction of Race, Gender, and Sexuality: Rosalind S. Chou
http://www.amazon.com/Asian-American-Sexual-Politics-Construction/dp/1442209240
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A sliver of the crimes committed by whites against Asians.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
Cambodia
http://www.amazon.com/Sideshow-Kissinger-Nixon-Destruction-Cambodia/dp/0671835254/
Laos
Hiding America’s War Crimes in Laos | http://thiscantbehappening.net/node/2715
Vietnam
● http://www.amazon.com/Kill-Anything-That-Moves-American/dp/1250045061/
● http://www.amazon.com/Phoenix-Program-Americas-Forbidden-Bookshelf-ebook/dp/B00KGMIW6Q/
Korea
● http://www.amazon.com/Hidden-History-Korean-1950-1951-Nonconformist/dp/0316817708/
Philippines
● http://www.amazon.com/Benevolent-Assimilation-American-Philippines-1899-1903/dp/0300030819/
China
● China’s Rise, Fall, and Re-Emergence as a Global Power | http://dissidentvoice.org/2012/03/chinas-rise-fall-and-re-emergence-as-a-global-power/
● USA’s warfare against China ½ | http://www.voltairenet.org/article177063.html
 
Asians need to ask themelves....why are they talking about their "progressive afwm relationships" and taking foodie pictures and demonizing Am for their "toxic masculinity" while being TOTALLY SILENT on mass rape, genocide, the white male pedophile epidemic in Asia. I can provide sources for that too if required.
 
Really, how does the ONE group that commits BY FAR, the most horrific crimes imaginable come out looking like heroes. That's the question everyone should be asking.
 
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>how do you respond when people claim that we don't have a right to complain about discrimination due to the fact that there is racism/sexism within our community?
Ask them if the "tone police" would rather be born Asian than white. Or, you can point out the myriad of wm oppression like 620+ % MORE domestic violence than Am, 297% more raping than Am, etc. Point out their ludicrous "stop white genocide" campaign. Never get gas lighted by white hypocrites. They are absolute experts in bullshitting. I've seen it too many times.
Try not to worry about it too much. There are plenty of resources to learn this stuff. :)
Here's my list:
Edit: Some additional resources of varying quality.
>look at the context. SK was a Western puppet that collaborated with compradors and the Imperial Japanese. They killed leftists. It's like "invading" your home to save your own family from thugs. See http://www.amazon.com/Kill-Anything-That-Moves-American/dp/1250045061/ same pattern [of killing leftists because they got in the way of Western capital] in every country.
https://np.reddit.com/r/aznidentity/comments/9au1ey/now_this_is_my_kind_of_movie_didnt_create_this/e4zcerf/
[Blind Man's Bluff] (https://www.amazon.ca/Blind-Mans-Bluff-Submarine-Espionage/dp/1610393589) by Sherry Sontag covers (among other things) the loss of USS Scorpion, including the original search for the lost sub and the investigation into its loss.
Religion is basically a virus, like Smallpox. Europe has had much more time to develop an immunity to it. Thousands upon thousands of years. The US is the New World, this is still practically our first exposure to it.
To read more on this perspective, check out "Guns Germs and Steel" which talks a lot about how viral immunity came about in Europe, as well as "The Selfish Gene" by Dawkins.
I can think of a few
Guns, Germs and Steel gives an almost biological view of conquest and innovation, and Collapse by Jared Diamond gives the cultural view.
Yes! I'm a student studying RPG design, so I like to think I have at least a vague idea of what I'm talking about.
Some various sources, some paid and some free:
That's a pretty good list of theory and texts and stuff.
One of the ways to learn good RPG theory, I've found, though, is to just read good RPGs.
It's also highly worth digging through acknowledgements and credits of your favorite RPGs and then tracking down the names mentioned. If you're reading a big, hefty RPG, like D&D, pay special attention to any consultants, specialists, or other people listed under strange credit areas.
Anyway, when you eventually dig your way through all of this, I'll probably have read some more, so hit me up if you want more suggestions. Those top seven or eight things are probably the best place to start.
Edit: my personal list of games was rather reductive, as several commentators have called me out on, so I've removed it. Go read lots of RPGs.
Shadow Divers
An incredible read, I highly recommend to anyone.
Plus, most wars throughout history weren't religious. The Encyclopedia of Wars lists only 123 of the cataloged 1,763 wars as being religious in nature.
someone did an analysis of every recorded war, Encyclopedia of War. hint: religion isn't as big a factor as you might believe.
>What is it with these types and war metaphors?
War Is A Force That Gives Them Meaning
That's...completely wrong. The novochik line of chemical weapons was only developed in an isolated military installation in the Russian Federation territory of the Soviet Union. We know this thanks to defectors from the actual program involved.
Longrange shooting handbook - Chapter 5.2.6
I'm sure there might be a few more examples/reasons, but I'm only on chapter 6.4.1
Blind Man's Bluff.
there's a whole book
some straight hoxha-posadist shit here
If you're interested in topics like contagions and the CDC, I highly recommend "The Demon in the Freezer" if you've never read it...it's about smallpox. It's a fascinating book and the story of stopping smallpox is a nail-biter. Highly recommend, link:
http://www.amazon.com/The-Demon-Freezer-True-Story/dp/0345466632
You might get "more" by starting to look at more specialized books. Biographies and non-fiction.
Playing at the World by Jon Peterson is exactly what you are looking for. First and final chapters is the history of D&D itself while the middle chapters are a much more technical look at how the core mechanics evolved from wargaming starting back from chess variants and evolving to the system in the original D&D. It also looks at the gaming and fantasy culture that played a huge part in shaping D&D.
While I found it simply fascinating how so many things happened at just the right time and the right people came together and how things connect. It is mind blowing honestly. I can't recommend the book enough.
If you are new to D&D I do recommend getting a hold of some PDFs of the original rules and giving them a read so you know what they are talking about a bit more. Something I wish I had done, but it didn't hamper my fascination or enjoyment at all.
Zones of Control
Or, since he was also into early RPGs:
Playing at the World
There are several books about the creation of D&D/biographies of Gary Gygax, my favorite is Empire of Imagination
>The problem with RPG design theory is that there are barely any references to speak of.
Look, that's both not entirely true if you actually put in the effort (and you can find many resources right here on this reddit) and not an excuse.
Like any field of study, RPG design can't spontaneously burst forth from a void of knowledge. It stems from other fields of study - in this case game design (RPG Design is, after all, roleplaying game design?), game studies, storytelling, writing, &c.
It's okay if that's not your objective, but from you writing the article and bothering to post it here, I figure you're trying to get somewhere with your methodology, right? At least to validate it, subject it to scrutiny. If your objective is to develop something that other people can rely on and refer to, you should find something to back it up.
​
Please, don't interpret this as an attempt to shut you down. Much on the contrary, I like that you wrote this. I'm all for people writing stuff, thinking about RPG design, &c. but when you write something so, as you put it, other people can benefit it I think it's only responsible to do some proper research and hold it to a higher standard.
Tsuyoshi Hasegawa, Racing the Enemy is the source.
Hasegawa presents an international history of the end of the Pacific War and although the atomic bombings were important in bringing about Japan's surrender, Hasegawa posits that the USSR's entry into the war provided a bigger shock to the Japanese government compelling surrender. Before the USSR's entry, the Japanese government was divided between those wanting unconditional surrender and those wishing to surrender under the condition that they'd retain the Emperor.
The Japanese approached Stalin with an offer to mediate a settlement with the US and Stalin exploited this situation to his own ends, keeping Japanese hopes alive that peace could be mediated. Once the USSR entered the war though, Japanese hopes were shattered and those in the government advocating unconditional surrender were empowered. After the surrender, the US occupational force decided to retain the Emperor anyways in the interest of a speedier, more stable reconstruction.
Hasegawa's argument is a mix of synthesis and original work and is an excellent history. There are the more radical interpretations though that are ludicrous because they remove the act of the bombings out of the context of the war and mobilization (See Gar Alperovitz's Atomic Diplomacy). The fact is that the US leadership from Truman to the generals never considered not using the bombs. The bombs were developed to be used and FDR green-lighted the Manhattan Project because he feared the Axis would get the bomb first and use it. Once the bomb was tested, the US leadership knew it was a powerful weapon but they never conceived that it would be a long-term game changer in warfare. The total war was still going on; there was no debate about using them, Truman just gave the order.
Well, Russia was eyeballing some northern Japanese islands and playing games with the Japanese government; it was a mess.
I don't know the text books, but I highly highly recommend Racing the Enemy:
https://www.amazon.com/Racing-Enemy-Stalin-Truman-Surrender/dp/0674022416
​
​
So this may not be the kind of advice you are hoping for but in order to really have success with the Mirage, it is important to really learn the aircraft. This goes beyond just understanding the basics of systems operation and gets into the very idea behind the specific model of the Mirage-2000C that we are using and how that specific model fit into France's air power "ecosystem". What I am talking about here is understanding the roles it was realistically expected to fill and what roles would be left to other aircraft in the French Air force.
All of that may seem boring or even pointless in the DCS PvP context but I think really understanding what the Mirage-2000C-RDI S5 (the specific model we have in DCS) is supposed to do and how it is used will help you avoid trying to use it in a way that will only lead to frustration.
On a more general level. I think that a big part of seeing any success with a plane in DCS PvP comes down to knowing everything you can learn about its systems and how they are used. This means knowing all the radar special modes. This means understanding the exact capability of your radar, weapons, ECM, and even your engine and aerodynamic properties. A lot of your opponents are in faster aircraft with better radar and much better weapons and there is a good chance that they have been playing for a while and know their stuff (at least in how it applies to PvP public servers anyway). If you don't bring your "A-game", you are easy meat for them.
Another element to look at is tactics. This is a difficult situation because DCS's PvP servers tend to promote a certain kind of approach that does not jive too well with how air combat would work in the real world. With this in mind, you have to really look at the flow of things on a the server itself and how you can exploit advantages from that flow. For example. It is generally safe to assume that you will be fighting aircraft that can out-range and out-gun you. With that in mind, perhaps it is better to simply avoid straight-on "fair fights" and instead try to find ways to approach the enemy from directions that they are not used to looking.
If I were to frequent a server like the 104th, I would probably spend some time looking at where the combat happens most. Try to determine the routes that both my team and the enemy team are commonly taking to get into combat. From there, I would try to rely on whatever data I could get from a AWACS (if it is a option) or other players. With that data, I would take long, wide routes so that I can intercept other players from angles that there radar can't see and hopefully get the drop on them while they are focused on looking in front where most of the action is going to be.
Another thing I would consider is your altitude. Many will tell you to stay low and there is value in that but flying rather high can also be useful. The Mirage's weapons (especially the Super 530D) work better at higher altitudes so in order to maximize your weapon range, you will need to start getting used to climbing up to about 35,000 feet or more. It may be smart to climb in a direction away from the action so you can approach the combat area at your desired altitude. Many flight simmers tend to not spend a lot of time climbing as that is time spent not fighting. take advantage of that and you will have one more advantage to leverage in a fight.
Finally. I suggest finding a person to wing up with you that you can count on. Someone that knows how to fly and knows how to work with you as a proper team. If you can apply some proper tactics as a two-man team, you will be in a good position to do some damage.
Overall, you should start doing your homework. Hit the manual (it is a important foundation that should not be replaced with more abbreviated material), Chuck's guides, and any meaningful youtube lesson you can find (I suggest xxJohnxx's channel and even Creative Fun's channel for good, useful tutorials) should all be studied alongside any real-life information you can google search about the plane (and the specific version we use in DCS). Doing all this in conjunction with learning about basic tactics will go a long way and will certainly give you a leg-up over some who frequent those servers who don't really bother to do all that book-work.
It may all seem daunting but take it one step at a time. Learning this stuff is not too different from the process one must take to learn how to play on a competitive level (I am talking e-sport style here) on a MOBA or even Counter-strike. The more effort you put into learning, the better you will be and the more enjoyment you will have in the long-term.
>but religions caused most every war
Actually this is very far from true.
In Encyclopedia of Wars by Charles Phillips and Alan Axelrod there is a very comprehensive listing of wars in history. They document 1763 wars overall, of which only 123 (7%) have been classified to involve a religious conflict.
Fighter Combat: Tactics and Maneuvering https://www.amazon.com/dp/0870210599/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_UC5yCbVE7KSBE
The only book for real and virtual fighters.
Yeah, you can buy his book on Amazon:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/State-Secrets-Insiders-Chronicle-Chemical/dp/1432725661
Contains the formula.
I highly recommend Long Range Shooting Handbook by Ryan Cleckner. Also look him up on YouTube. https://www.amazon.com/dp/151865472X/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_o3fPBbQPWJ6H3
Reading is fundamental
If this interests you, read Trevor Paglen's I Could Tell You But Then You Would Have to Be Destroyed By Me: Emblems from the Pentagon's Black World.
A fascinating look into the world of the patches and emblems of the US' secret or unknown military forces.
The story of Halibut is included in the excellent Blind Man's Bluff.
Such an amazing story. If people find this interesting, definitely read Blind Man's Bluff. This novel is written based off countless interviews of former submariners & others involved with US submarine espionage during the Cold War. USS Halibut is discussed in great length in there.
I loved biomedical pop-sci with a passion when I was in high school. "Stiff" was on my bookshelf for sure. Didn't read Atul Gawande's stuff until later, but enjoyed them very much. My favorites from when I was a teen were:
and others, such as The Spirit Catches You And You Fall Down. All are great reads.
I hear you. If you're interested in reading on the topic, this book by John Keegan is excellent. I read it once for a class in college and could not recommend it more highly.
Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies
I'll throw this in here as well because I see it in just about every thread similar to this. Jared Diamond basically tries to explain why some civilizations on our planet have advanced beyond others by leaps and bounds. So if you're looking for a good overview of the past 15,000ish years that attempts to explain how civilizations advance, this is definitely a good one.
These are both good reads for nerds and novices:
There's a new book that was released just recently [Empire of Imagination] (http://www.amazon.com/Empire-Imagination-Gygax-Dungeons-Dragons/dp/1632862794/ref=pd_sim_14_1?ie=UTF8&dpID=515zTJXi6UL&dpSrc=sims&preST=_AC_UL160_SR105%2C160_&refRID=1GDE6308Y0NQDQ0E5NQD) but it has some mixed reviews. Quite a few old school gamers have said it's lackluster in style and substance.
> do you believe that harmful traits can't intentionally be added to organism via modern genetic engineering techniques?
I recommend you read Demon In the Freezer.
https://www.amazon.com/Demon-Freezer-True-Story/dp/0345466632
The concept of weaponizing biology is old.
"GMO" is an industry term for a certain type of crop, correct?
Highly recommend reading the book Shadow Divers . It talks about what it takes to dive to these depths and to explore uBoats.
This is a pretty good read, too
Guns, Germs, and Steel is spectacular.
For the serious history deep-dive, it's gotta be Playing at the World
Closest will be Jon Peterson's work in the development of the RPG in terms of wargaming. Though he might not get down to the nitty-gritty of each stat. You'll have to pull up Chainmail and maybe the stuff from the 'rough draft' of 0e (if that's available).
*Here's a section on HD for example:
>Because of the murkiness of the system, it is
difficult to expose the linkage of the hit points in Dungeons & Dragons to
the Chainmail cumulative hit mechanism. A determined reader can
extrapolate, however, that hits in Dungeons & Dragons cause a
standard 1–6 points of damage.
>...
>But in the context where “cumulative” hits applied in Chainmail—to cases
like mundane Fighting-men attacking a giant—the parallel is inescapable: a hit
in Dungeons & Dragons deals the same range of damage that a hit die
grants, and a certain number of hit dice in Dungeons & Dragons provide
the same system effect on average that the ability to take that certain number
of hits provided in Chainmail. A giant could withstand eight cumulative
hits in Chainmail, and so a footman would need to score eight hits on
the giant to kill it. If a giant in Dungeons & Dragons has eight “hit
dice” worth of hit points, how many hits would a Fighting-man need to slay the
giant in Dungeons & Dragons? If we go by the arithmetic mean of 3.5
for a d6, then an eight hit die giant would have 28 hit points, and eight hits
from a Fighting-man (also dealing an average of 3.5 each) would suffice. Statistically,
it takes the same number of hits in both systems.
I'm currently reading When Titans Clashed: How the Red Army Stopped Hitler, by David Glantz.
It is based mostly on Soviet archives which opened to the West after the Iron Curtain fell. It is quite interesting, but can be incredibly dry at times. Lots of "General Sosoandsovski's Xth Rifle Division attacked General von Soandsohoffen's Xth Panzer Corps near Bumfuckėžys, Lithuania, supported by..." for pages and pages and pages.
Source?
https://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Wars-Library-World-History/dp/0816028516
If I am not mistaken that is exactly one of the subjects covered by Alan Axelrod and Charles Philips.
I think they end up stating that out of the 1763 wars they studied; only 7% had religious undertones or connotations.
Religions definitely do account for wars, but recorded history shows less than 10% of wars have been religious motivated.
Source: https://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Wars-Facts-Library-History/dp/0816028516
Also: https://www.reddit.com/r/badhistory/comments/4ec4jy/religion_is_the_main_cause_of_war_and_the_root_of/
I highly, highly recommend Hedges' book "War is a Force That Gives Us Meaning."
http://www.amazon.com/War-Force-that-Gives-Meaning/dp/1400034639
Bipod, go for a Harris, at least. There's a scope stickied at the top of the sub that's 700, and you're going to want decent rings. Expect at least another grand to get going, all things considered, because you really should have things like a single piece cleaning rod, and a bore guide, and so on.
You've got some reading to do, my friend.
It's available as an ebook and physically.
I would suggest Ryan Cleckner's Long Range Shooting Handbook
https://www.amazon.com/Long-Range-Shooting-Handbook-Cleckner/dp/151865472X/
Speaking only for my specialty, Blind Man's Bluff is an excellent book.
It focuses on the Cold War, but you could easily apply it to whatever country you consider to be a threat to the U.S. today.
You'd think...there's a book of patches that covers a lot more than just the bird of prey.
Link to said book
Edit: words
There's a great book a journalist put together from primary sources.
Kill Anything That Moves: The Real American War in Vietnam (American Empire Project) https://www.amazon.com/dp/1250045061/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_q74TCbEW3ZD02
Chris Hedges actually wrote a book about his experience in war zones, how some of his fellow journalists literally becoming addicted to the action. The books called War Is a force that gives us meaning. He called it a drug, a very potent one in fact. I'm simply borrowing the phrase as I've never seen combat myself. But it's not exactly a controversial view or anything.
There seems to be two types of people who goto war, those, like Smedley Butler who see war for what it is, largely an unglamorous and unvirtuous means for men in power to dominate the resources of those without it. And there is this dude, who buys into the myth his fathers and grandfathers have drummed into his head, that War is Glorious. That it makes you a Man. etc.
I don’t think it was that tightly guarded https://www.amazon.com/State-Secrets-Insiders-Chronicle-Chemical/dp/1432725661
Excepting any authors here, two classic books to recommend are Blind Man's Bluff (https://www.amazon.com/Blind-Mans-Bluff-Submarine-Espionage/dp/1610393589/) and, for the serious geeks, Cold War Submarines (https://www.amazon.com/Cold-War-Submarines-Construction-1945-2001/dp/1574885308/).
I don't normally read any fiction but I just read a brand new book called Arctic Gambit by Larry Bond and Chris Carlson (https://www.amazon.com/Arctic-Gambit-Jerry-Mitchell-Novel/dp/0765334925/) and I very much enjoyed it. Possibly a future classic.
A few hours on the internet can teach you that. THere is also the feely availalbe improvised munitions handbook
>They'll just trot out the "the Rights defined in the Bill of Rights are not unlimited," BS and claim that
And I doubt it will work here. The printing plans have already been published in a book. No fucking way is SCOTUS upholding a book ban. Also, this is legal and widely available everywhere in the US.
>much like shouting fire in a crowded theater
Oof.
I don't blame your for your cynicism, but I do believe it's misplaced here.
>None of our freedoms are unrestricted, nor should they be, less there would be anarchy.
Yes and 3D printed guns have to follow NFA regulations, have to contain certain percentages of metal (besides the fact all bullets are metal but some politicians saw die hard and thought a glock 7 was real), can't be sold to other people without being serialized and the seller is an FFL, and felons/prohibited persons can't own or use them.
​
​
>We already have laws preventing the printing and distribution of certain things, such as how to make bombs and shit.
No actually we don't, you can order books on how to make explosives easy.
https://www.amazon.com/U-S-Army-Improvised-Munitions-Handbook/dp/1684112737
This is a book on amazon how to make explosives. From the military, There is nothing illegal about knowledge and criminalizing knowledge is a violation of the first amendment.
You might want to read Blind Mans Bluff, it contains a bunch of stories about American / Soviet Cold War Submarine Espionage.
http://www.amazon.com/Blind-Mans-Bluff-Submarine-Espionage/dp/006097771X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1330708009&sr=8-1
Glantz, David M and Jonathan M. House. When Titans Clashed: How The Red Army Stopped Hitler. Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 2015. 384 pages, available as paperback, hardback, and ebook.
This is one of the best single-volume operational histories of the Nazi-Soviet War. It is not as in-depth as, say, Erickson's duology, but it's relatively quick and easy to read. Glantz is still the English-language historian par excellence of the operational aspect of the Nazi-Soviet War and of Soviet doctrine and theory, though he is unfortunately semi-retired now. Jonathan House's coauthorship saves When Titans Clashed from the worst of the usual criticisms of Glantz's writing, namely his dry "I have copy-pasted and translated this section of a Russian field manual" style.
​
Smelser, Ronald M., and Edward J. Davies. The Myth of the Eastern Front: The Nazi-Soviet War in American Popular Culture. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2008. 342 pages, hardback or paperback.
I recommend this book as a companion to Titans, as the two of them dismantle many Western assumptions & myths about the so-called "Eastern Front," albeit from different angles. Where Titans presents a less Wehrmacht-centric perspective on the purely military aspects of that conflict and sheds light on the actual military skill of the Red Army, The Myth of the Eastern Front explains the origins of many of those assumptions and is an important historiographic piece.
​
Merridale, Catherine. Ivan’s War: Life and Death in the Red Army, 1939-1945. New York: Picador, 2006. 462 pages, paperback, hardback, or audiobook.
Ivan's War is a social history of the Red Army, told partly through interviews with veterans and civilians and partly through memoirs, and contextualized by improved access to archives during the post-Soviet, pre-current-unpleasantness era. It is less academically rigorous than, say, Reese's Stalin’s Reluctant Soldiers: A Social History of the Red Army, 1925-1941, but more approachable and quite compelling. If you're wondering what it was like to be an anonymous frontovik in the wartime Red Army, this is a good place to start. By dispelling the implicitly dehumanizing and racist narratives of the largely Wehrmacht-influenced prevailing Western literature on the Nazi-Soviet War, Ivan's War also rounds out a sort of mythbusting trilogy with Titans and Myth of the Eastern Front.
​
Continuing the World War II theme, Robert Citino's Death of the Wehrmacht: The German Campaigns of 1942 (448 pages), The Wehrmacht Retreats: Fighting a Lost War, 1943 (440 pages), and The Wehrmacht's Last Stand: The German Campaigns of 1944-1945 (632 pages) are, as a trilogy, a good look into the institutional culture of the German officer corps. Citino posits that, in addition to the distortive effects of Nazism on that culture, the officer corps embodied a long tradition of a particular way of war - short, sharp, lively wars of strategic preemption and the pursuit of the rapid defeat by encirclement of enemy armies - that proved unsuited for modern industrialized total war, and ultimately contributed to the Reich's defeat. Citino is quite readable; his prose is actually *enjoyable* which can be quite rare for military history.
​
Glantz, David M. Soviet Military Operational Art: In Pursuit of Deep Battle. New York: Frank Cass, 1991. 320 pages, paperback.
Returning to Glantz and the Soviet focus, this is a good surface-level (but satisfactorily deep) introduction to the history, theory, and practice of the Soviet concept of operational art - the intermediate level of war between tactics and strategy, involving the use of large formations like armies to achieve coordinated tactical successes, the sum of which contribute to strategic victory. It is, as I mentioned before, rather dry, but compared to some of Glantz's other stuff it's still perfectly readable. In my opinion, this text is an indispensable primer for understanding how the Red Army expected to fight at various points in its history, but also the roots of modern Russian theories of war. It is unfortunately a little expensive, however. I think Glantz might have long-form essays floating around on dtic.mil that summarize some of the book's content but I'm not sure.
​
Ferriter, Diarmaid. A Nation and Not a Rabble: The Irish Revolution 1913-1923. New York: Harry N. Abrams, 2017. 528 pages, paperback.
A departure from the rest of the list, I really like this book as a survey of the Irish Revolution and the beginnings of the IRA. It covers military matters, but mostly social and political matters, and for that reason alone I think it's a good introduction to the (arguably much more important) broader & less technical-tactical parts of military history. The first ten chapters cover the historiography of the Revolution, and a few chapters in the last third of the book discuss memory and how different communities have constructed different histories of the Revolution. These sections helped me, as a student of military history, to learn to look beyond the pure battlefield matters and examine the impact of war on society as a whole, because war is nothing if not a social phenomenon.
www.amazon.com/The-Demon-Freezer-True-Story/dp/0345466632
I read this in high school. Shit was bananas
The Pity of War by Niall Ferguson
The Great War by Peter Hart
The First World War by John Keegan
The Guns of August by Barbara W. Tuchman
Jon Peterson's Playing at the World is probably going to be very helpful on this front.
It may be beyond the scope of your argument, which seems to be "What Alignment Has Come to Mean," but I think every DM would be well-served by considering the origins of the Alignment concept. Playing At The World goes into great detail, but a TL;DR is
When you take these three points together you come to the conclusion that Alignment is a feature of the default, assumed setting of OD&D. It's not necessarily appropriate for all fantasy settings. If the driving conflict for the setting of your home campaign is not the eternal struggle between Order and Disorder, and faction membership to Law or Chaos doesn't dictate your characters actions, then Alignment as a concept has little utility in your game.
In my personal campaign, Alignment is not applicable to creatures native to the Prime Material plane (or its equivalent); It only applies to creatures from the far planes (demons, devils, devas, angels) and creatures powered by their connection to those planes (undead). In my game's cosmology, the father you get from Prime, the closer to two-dimensional your fundamental nature becomes. As such, you become vulnerable to magic that acts against that fundamental nature, like Protection from Good/Evil. Such spells have no effect on creatures of the Prime, no matter how Evil or Chaotic they act.
https://www.amazon.com/When-Titans-Clashed-Stopped-Studies/dp/0700608990
…'Was interrupted while typing the reply above, yesterday, so here an attempt to complete it.
As described above, there were two schools of thoughts about the strategy of aerial warfare even within the USAF. Initially at least, the ideas by these two schools de-facto 'dictated' what the Pentagon then demanded the defence sector to deliver (over the time, the relationship between the two [the Pentagon and the defence sector] became something like 'mutual': i.e. the defence sector began exercising ever higher influence upon decision-making processes in the Pentagon.)
Cumulative results of this relationship, plus ideas about future air warfare were that the military wanted to fight a high-technology war, controlled from one point. Correspondingly, ever more complex, more advanced too, C3 facilities came into being: these were fed data from ever larger networks of sensors (early warning radar stations and other means of observation). Simultaneously, combat aircraft were packed with ever more navigation and attack systems (nav/attack), required to fly ever further and ever faster. The two were networked with help of data-links.
The GenStab in the former USSR actually followed in fashion. Already in the late 1950s, it developed a strong C3 system (or 'integrated air defence system', IADS) for the purpose of air defence of the Rodina ('Motherland') against attacks of Western bombers armed with nuclear weapons. When the bombers began receiving missiles that enabled them to attack from stand-off ranges, the GenStab reacted by ordering interceptors that would be faster so to kill bombers before these could deploy their missiles (that's what, between others, led to the development of types like Su-15, MiG-25 etc.). For 1960s, it envisaged the development of a similar C3 system on the tactical plan too, this time with intention of countering a huge number of F-104 Starfighters that were about to enter service with the NATO and expected to operate at low altitudes against targets in eastern Europe (that's what, between others, led to the development of types like MiG-23).
Meanwhile, the USSR was not only lagging in regards of developing the necessary high-tech, but could also not afford installing it into all of its aircraft. Indeed, Moscow couldn't even afford training all its pilots to the levels comparable to those to which the West was training its pilots. The GenStab's solution was to improve the sophistication of its C3 (i.e. systems supporting the same), but also increase the number of sensors feeding the data into it. I.e. it attempted to provide a C3 with superior targeting information, so to enable first/single-shot/single-kill solutions. The advanced C3 required no advanced interceptors and fighter-bombers: these could operate along orders from the ground, indeed, literally 'per remote control'.
Thus, instead of requiring combat aircraft that could, for example, take off, fly a combat air patrol at 200 miles away from their base while waiting for their targets etc., then shoot once, wait for result, and shoot again (if necessary) etc., their solution was to have 'no bullshit' combat aircraft: combat aircraft 'brought to the point'.
Along that way of thinking, there was no need for super-advanced on-board radars, not even for RWRs. All of this was 'unnecessary', because interceptors were not expected to search for their target, not expected to dogfight, not expected to get surprised by the enemy etc.: all the related issues were to be solved by the C3/IADS. Instead, the purpose of an interceptor was to scramble in reaction to a clearly defined target, rush to that target along a course computed from the ground, acquire the target with help of simple onboard sensors, kill it and return to base. Period. Similarly, their fighter-bombers were expected to fly relatively straightforward attacks on tactical targets close to the frontline: even single SAM-sites were planned to be blasted by nukes. Shortly after, other tactical fighters would nuke selected targets close to the frontline in order to enable their ground forces to breach the enemy frontline and advance deep (and fast) into the rear. Training on such aircraft was also much simpler (and, therefore, cheaper): in essence, their crews only had to know how to take-off, control the work of on-board systems, follow orders from the ground, and land.
That was 'all' the Soviet air force was expected to do, and, therefore, was also equipped to do. In this regards, and because the Soviets largely ignored experiences from diverse 'local wars', of the 1960s and 1970s, very little changed in the way they thought over the time.
The situation began to change only in late 1970s, due to the changes of the NATO's strategy, and then in 1980s due to experiences from Afghanistan. The former made the option of a conventional war in Europe possible (i.e. there was a chance of the NATO vs Warsaw Pact war fought without nukes): this in turn required different types of combat aircraft, capable of delivering a more powerful conventional punch. The second has shown that theory and practice are two different pair of shoes, and that no sophisticated C3 can suitably replace 'flexible fighter-bombers' (i.e. fighter-bombers having the sensors, endurance/range and speed necessary to, for example, re-acquire and re-attack their target with conventional weapons). Before the Soviets could realize all of their related ideas, they not only lagged ever more massively in the field of high-technology, or bankrupted themselves (partially due to the Chernobyl catastrophe of 1986, too), but also the Cold War came to an end, in 1989-1992 period.
On basis of this, here few direct answers to the original questions:
Make no mistakes: the Westerners were seeking for exactly the same solution (i.e. one granting the opportunity to conclude an air combat right at the start, with the first shoot, first kill). It was only experiences from diverse 'local wars' (Vietnam, Middle East etc.), that taught them that there is a high probability that the first attack would miss; when that happened, the outcome of a re-engagement depended on on-board sensors, skills of the pilot/crew, aircraft performances etc.
Finally, an advice: do not try to gauge how the Soviets would (or should) operate their combat aircraft based on modern-day video-games. That is likely to end in a host of massive mistakes, and outright illusions. If you want to inform yourself properly about this topic, you might need books like On Target (strategic level of planning for the USAF), Russia's Air Power at the Crossroads and The Russian Way of War (the way the Soviets/Russians think about fighting wars, organization and planning), Fighter Combat, (tactical level) etc., etc., etc., or even Moscow's Game of Poker (for a summary of all of this, plus recent combat performance in Syria).
These two are great, and the 2nd one is basically the bible for A2A combat. A lot of the maneuvers will not apply to zero-g space fighters, but the lessons you learn about firepower, awareness, and strategy will hold up for the next 500 years.
PM me if you ever want help or advice. My Org is always looking for bright eyed recruits :-P
https://www.amazon.com/Kill-Anything-That-Moves-American/dp/1250045061
neat book
> This article seems to have some interesting points
I'm sorry, but it's nothing but pop history and armchair general's what-ifs IMHO.
It doesn't account for potential potent counter-attacks on the South flank of the over-stretched AGC, it assumes that the Soviets would themselves surround at Bryansk, it assumes that one of the most regular meteorological event of the Russian climate wouldn't happen, it assumes that AGC somehow has enough fuel and supplie to actually lead such a battle, it assumes that the Soviet would stand still and don't counter-attack everywhere they can, etc.
If you want an excellent book to get a good grasp on the situation of the Easter Front, I strongly commend When Titans Clashed from David Glantz – US Army historian specialized in Soviet military history – which is a cheap and incredibly good source of informations.
Seems like it's too long, so I'll split it up in two here:
General accounts:
When Titans Clashed
Russia at War
Thunder in the East
Absolute War
Hitler's War in the East
The Road to Stalingrad
The Road to Berlin
A Writer at War
THE ROLE OF THE SOVIET UNION IN THE SECOND WORLD WAR: A Re-examination
Why Stalin's Soldiers Fought: The Red Army's Military Effectiveness in World War II
If you're interested in memoirs I'd suggest:
Blood on the Shores
Over the Abyss
Sniper on the Eastern Front
GUNS AGAINST THE REICH: Memoirs of an Artillery Officer on the Eastern Front
PANZER DESTROYER: Memoirs of a Red Army Tank Commander
Through the Maelstrom: A Red Army Soldier's War on the Eastern Front, 1942-1945
Red Road From Stalingrad: Recollections Of A Soviet Infantryman
Red Star Against the Swastika: The Story of a Soviet Pilot over the Eastern Front
Penalty Strike: The Memoirs of a Red Army Penal Company Commander, 1943-45
BUT NOT FOR THE FUEHRER
Through Hell for Hitler
A Stranger to Myself: The Inhumanity of War : Russia, 1941-1944
Barbarossa:
War Without Garlands: Barbarossa 1941/42
BARBAROSSA DERAILED: THE BATTLE FOR SMOLENSK 10 JULY-10 SEPTEMBER 1941 VOLUME 1: The German Advance, The Encirclement Battle, and the First and Second Soviet Counteroffensives, 10 July-24 August 1941
Operation Barbarossa and Germany's Defeat in the East
Kiev 1941
Operation Typhoon: Hitler's March on Moscow, October 1941
THE VIAZ'MA CATASTROPHE, 1941: The Red Army's Disastrous Stand against Operation Typhoon
THE DEFENSE OF MOSCOW 1941: The Northern Flank
What Stalin Knew: The Enigma of Barbarossa
War of Annihilation: Combat and Genocide on the Eastern Front, 1941
Germany and the Second World War: Volume IV: The Attack on the Soviet Union
To be fair, shamefully enough there are some who do think it was ok.
Didn't Malkin also write a book dedicated to the idea that government can lock up a whole group of people simply based on their ethnicity? Yes she did.
He did. And the book is available on Amazon or Google Books. Link 1, link 2.
But noone stops to ask: If Russia wanted to get away with a highly political murder, why the fuck would they use a nerve-agent solely used by Russia? They might aswell drop a calling-card on the corpse.
Either it wasn't Russians, or they wanted to get caught.
So why the hell would they want to get caught?
Further still, the nerve-agent isn't even solely available to Russians: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/what-novichok-nerve-agent-center-russian-ex-spy-poisoning-n856001
>"The Novichok agents are thought to be far more difficult to detect during manufacturing and far easier to manufacture covertly, because they can be made with common chemicals in relatively simple pesticide factories,"
The creator of the agent: https://www.yahoo.com/news/russians-says-chemist-uncovered-existence-novichok-075342077.html
>The only other possibility, he said, would be that someone used the formulas in his book to make such a weapon.
So where can i get his book? On Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/State-Secrets-Insiders-Chronicle-Chemical/dp/1432725661
So anyone with an amazon-account and access to a laboratory can create the agent.
Yeah, i aint buying it. Someone is banging on the drums of war, and i dont like it.
Nice one. Thanks for your honest post. If you’re just starting out, I might suggest: https://www.amazon.com/dp/151865472X/ref=cm_sw_r_sms_c_api_i_0uATDb2WJJQG5
>The cable isn't armoured so in theory someone could easily cut it and plug in a laptop to gain access to the house network for nefarious purposes.
Common things are common. It would be much more likely that someone would yank your cable out and take it to sell as scrap.
If there was an economic reason for you to have an armored guarded cable, you'd be able to afford an armored guarded cable.
It's much more likely someone will break into your home and steal stuff than someone would "tap into" an outdoor ethernet cable.
Incidentally, lightning hitting that cable, or near it, and destroying everything on your network is also much more likely than the Mission: Impossible team doing a cable tap.
The US Navy tapped into Soviet communications cables. It took AT&T and a billion dollar nuclear sub:
https://www.amazon.com/Blind-Mans-Bluff-Submarine-Espionage/dp/1610393589
Again, if you have super valuable data, an outdoor cable is not your first concern.
Dude, do yourself a favor and pick up a copy of this book. One of the best reads ever.
https://www.amazon.com/Blind-Mans-Bluff-Submarine-Espionage/dp/1610393589
If you are interested in some crazy US Military patches check out the contents of "I Could Tell You But Then You Would Have to Be Destroyed By Me: Emblems from the Pentagon's Black World"
Amazon has it here: http://www.amazon.com/Could-Tell-Then-Would-Destroyed/dp/193555414X
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/006097771X/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?qid=1415992265&sr=8-1&pi=AC_SY200_QL40
Cheers!
For more info, read Richard Preston's Demon in the Freezer. It's a fascinating (and scary as fuck) book that also covers smallpox.
I made the mistake of reading it right before I read The Demon in the Freezer, which, even though I know that Preston has a tendency to exaggerate (as was mentioned in Spillover, actually), made for a profoundly depressing few days. "If the
batsanimals don't kill us, we're going to kill us. ohgodwhy."I find John Keegan's analysis (in his WW1 book) most convincing. The Schleiffen plan:
was out of date when it was implemented
badly underestimated Russian mobilization, not entirely but significantly due to racism and stereotyping
had no real contingency for British intervention in the west
was held in secret from the German diplomats
The First World War by Keegan is not a bad read.
The First World War by John Keegan is a really excellent overview of the war that's a really great read in its own right.
People interested in diving and finding stuff, should read this book. It's totally awesome...
Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II
https://www.amazon.com/dp/0375760989/ref=cm_sw_r_awd_Hhdfvb1PCVHAW
I cannot overstate how much I loved this book, and if maritime mysteries are your thing, stop reading this comment and find a copy!
Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond: An amazing look at how civilization was formed
On Killing by Dave Grossman: If your characters kill anyone, know what it will do to them
*edit: Hero of a Thousand Faces by Joseph Campbell: You think Eragon is a rip off of Star Wars, or that Star Wars is a rip off of Jesus, or that Jesus is a rip off of some obscure norwegan god, find out the true origins of just about everything you have ever read and find out why Harry Potter had to die and had to come back from the dead!
Guns Germs and Steel by Jared Diamond. It explains why there has been such disparity in income and technology between Eurasia and the rest of the world. It touches on most of the topics you said you'd like to learn about.
If you can find Churchill's chronicles of the World War II, they are thoroughly enjoyable. Maybe he read them already:
http://www.amazon.com/Second-World-War-Six-Boxed/dp/039541685X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1324409954&sr=8-1
I read an abridged version (still 2000 pages long in 2 volumes) and felt I was missing out on the whole thing.
I read finished Volume 5 of Churchill's WW2 memoirs, and then took a break and read the first three trades of The Wicked + The Divine and The Rise And Fall of D.O.D.O.
Churchill remains an extremely rewarding read, even though it's taken me ages, I'm really glad I've done it. It really gives a strong perspective on the period, supported by so many documents.
Wicked and Divine is fantastic from the stuff I've read so far. Definitely gonna continue reading it when I get a chance.
Rise and Fall of DODO was kind of disappointing, but it was a halfway decent novel. Just not as good as I was hoping. Having Stephenson co-write is probably a good idea, because there are actual coherent characters other than the Competent Nerd Dude. In point of fact, the Competent Nerd Dude is a super-minor character, and the book is actually written partially first person from a lady's perspective!
Definitely looking forward to August or so, when I finish up the Churchill memoirs and read a whole stack of novels for a break.
> I don't think you can have quality emergent complexity (depth) without elegance. Elegance is a byproduct of a strong core mechanism, and without that you really have no chance.
Sorry, but that is just euro-gamer-snobbery. Emergent complexity is very strong in over-designed complex games like many oldschool roguelikes (Nethack etc) or Cataclysm: DDA or Dwarf Fortress. Nothing elegant about the designs, but just throwing in that amount of complexity creates an environment where interesting complex stories emerge all the time.
There is at least one equivalent in boardgames I have experience with: Advanced Squad Leader. Hundreds of pages of rules, but thanks to there being rules for everything and lots of different units moving on different terrain fun things happen all the time.
Of course almost any pen-and-paper role-playing game ever would probably be a good examples of this as well. Even when the rules are (unusually) short, the presence of a human game-master means that complexity is limitless.
This is something that comes up a lot in the book Playing at the World: Games where players can "try anything". Of course only real rpgs can really do that, but some roguelikes, computer-rpgs, and ameritrash-games (and a few wargames like ASL) also comes close. Allowing the player to attempt to do anything that would make sense in a situation, rather than restricting them to some small set of "elegant" rules, is a fantastic way to make interesting things emerge.
Many of those figures were exaggerated and fabricated after the war, as historians have known for around fifty years.
Even the pre-war figures were also based on faulty, often racist assumptions, about the unwavering tenacity and fanaticism of the Japanese population, in which they argued that much of the civilian population would either fight invaders with their bare hands, or commit suicide rather than be conquered.
Both left out the fact that eight straight years of war, and being completely cut off from their empire in the last year, the Japanese were only months away from being completely without the resources, gasoline/oil/rubber/steel etc... necessary to continue the war. A fact which was not unknown to us, nor does it mention that Japanese were seeking conditional surrender for months before we dropped the bomb.
Edit: For further reading on the topic, I would recommend John Dower's War without Mercy, Tsuyoshi Hasegawa's Racing the Enemy, Gar Alperovitz's Atomic Diplomacy and The Decision to use the Atomic Bomb
>WARNING:LONG POST
>Whether they had an accurate appraisal of the situation or not, the only things that matter in determining what ended the war are the subjective reasons that Japanese leaders chose to surrender when and how they did. Whether the US made the right choice is a separate question.
>Using the diaries and records of the meetings among Japanese leaders, Hasegawa has conclusively demonstrated that the atomic bomb had less of an influence on the debates in Tokyo than the standard American narrative would suggest. These strongly suggest that Soviet entry into the war was the critical point that made fighting on untenable, and also that up until that point, they were still expecting to fight the Allies on Japanese soil, despite the use of the bombs.
>It’s important to realize that the destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were not, at first, particularly novel experiences for Japan. The firebombing of Tokyo had a higher death toll (estimates from 80,000-200,000; 130,000 a commonly cited figure) than either in terms of people killed outright. The true horror of the atomic bombs did not become clear until weeks, months and years after the fact (For Hiroshima, roughly 70,000 people died in the initial blast, 100,000 by the end of the year, and over 200,000 in 5 years). While the new bomb did condense thousands of planes worth of destruction into a single bomb, the actual level of destruction was not higher at the time that the Japanese government was making the decision to surrender. Disease and deaths from radiation would later change the balance of destruction, but it is incorrect to assume that the Japanese command was aware of the delayed effects of atomic bombs.
>This is not to say that the bombs did not have an effect, because they undoubtedly did. They sped the decision to capitulate, even if the Soviet entry into the war was the deciding factor. The bomb was also influential in solidifying Hirohito's stance on surrender, and gave the peace faction some ammunition against the war faction.
Courtesy of /u/t-o-k-u-m-e-i.
Full comment here.
The point of this post is to dispel the myth that millions more Americans would have had to die if the bombs weren't used.
I'd also recommend Blind Man's Bluff as a companion piece for Cold War submarine operations. The Navy did equally crazy things trying to gather intelligence and track Soviet subs. The cable-tapping operation during the 80's was mind blowing.
https://www.amazon.com/Ivans-War-Life-Death-1939-1945/dp/0312426526
Here you go
It's based on WWII but the experiences cannot have been all that different for many in WWI. The difference in WWI is that divorce was much less widely available, certainly in Russia! Many men likely turned to drink and suffered dead marriages as a result.
Biological weapons!
http://www.amazon.com/Demon-Freezer-True-Story/dp/0345466632?ie=UTF8&keywords=the%20demon%20in%20the%20freezer%20by%20richard%20preston&qid=1462893057&ref_=sr_1_1&sr=8-1
Demon in the Freezer
You will spend the next few weeks trying to figure out how to move to an isolated place, where no human being will ever find you again. And it's all freakin, true...
Have you read Demon in the Freezer and/ or The Hot Zone? http://www.amazon.com/Demon-Freezer-Richard-Preston/dp/0345466632/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1291143784&sr=1-1 Good stuff.
It's infectivity is very low compared to other diseases and especially viruses. One big concern could be smallpox though. I've heard The Demon in the Freezer is a good read for this.
I highly recommend John Keegan's The First World War - it's quite long, but very approachable to someone not familiar with the period.
EDIT: Fixed the link. That's what happens when I try to look up books on Amazon on my phone.
Et forslag kunne være John Keegans bog om krigen:
https://www.amazon.com/First-World-War-John-Keegan/dp/0375700455
Alt af John Keegan er generelt værd at læse, hans klassiker "The face of battle" har også noget om Somme slaget.
For en detaljeret generel gennemgang af krigen set fra Tyskland/østrig ungarns synspunkt er Holger Herwigs bog her fantastisk:
https://www.amazon.com/First-World-War-Austria-Hungary-1914-1918/dp/0340573481
Jared Diamond has an interesting take on that very subject. read or watch Guns, Germs and Steel. Link
Guns, Germs and Steel: The Fates of Human Societes
An amazing read if you like anthropology/geography. It very briefly recaps the history of human civilizations from evolutionary migratory patterns to civil conquests for land and so forth. The emphasis is on how western civilization achieved it's global dominance today. I would recommend this to everyone.
Jared Diamond wrote a book on this topic: Guns Germs and Steel
He argues that culture and civilization is determined by geography, not genetics.
There's this great documentary about his life, absolutely insightful. Also his books are interesting to read, e.g.
I've been reading Jon Peterson's book about the origin of D&D, so I am really curious to see what a modern version of The Ruins of Castle [Greyhawk] looks/plays like. Colville is great at mixing the best (and oft-forgotten) aspects of classic D&D into What The Game Has Become.
I'm also curious about the source material he'd use for a megadungeon like this. If he uses TSR's cheeky Castle Greyhawk book from 1988, I hope the PCs get farther than that damn gas spore that totaled my party when I was 12. (Y'see, the DM described it as a "sphere," but we thought he said "spear...")
For an exhaustive (720 pages) history of RPGs check out Playing at the World. Short version: kind of yes, but really the Germans did it first.
I find JRPGs fascinating, particularly the early games; they took D&D in an almost retro direction, skipping over a lot of character customization and emphasizing exploration of a huge, monster-filled landscape. It's like they refocused on the games that inspired D&D, making modern fantasy-themed miniatures wargames.
I heartily recommend Jon Peterson's Playing at the World for a deep history of role-playing games. You might also be interested in The Creation of Narrative in Tabletop Role-Playing Games, The Fantasy RPG: A New Performing Art, and Gaming as Culture. And my book, of course.
There are definitely games that rely too much on the Tolkien tropes, but overall, I think it's not a problem --there's so many good RPGs that have nothing to do with fantasy at all, and plenty of great sword & sorcery games that bring their own ideas to the table.
Was waiting for someone to bring up Tsuyoshi Hasegawa. Pretty cool that he is your prof.
He wrote a whole book on this specific issue: http://www.amazon.com/Racing-Enemy-Stalin-Truman-Surrender/dp/0674022416/ref=ntt_at_ep_dpt_1
There is an interesting theroy out there that suggests that the Japanese simply didn't surrender solely because of the atomic bombs, but were in fact much more affraid of the Soviets invading. A fellow redditor pointed this out to me after i inquired about the esatern front in WWII .http://www.amazon.com/Racing-Enemy-Stalin-Truman-Surrender/dp/0674022416/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1319085719&sr=8-1
TL;DR theory that the japanese were going to surrender anyway in fear of Soviet invasion
"when titans clashed" by david glantz
examines all military campaigns in the east in great detail and even details the 10+ years of turmoil and upheaval within the soviet ranks prior to 1939 - stalin's purges, internal politics etc - which left the red army woefully underprepared for the war when it hit in 1941.
http://www.amazon.com/When-Titans-Clashed-Stopped-Studies/dp/0700608990
You'd think they would learn a thing or two about Winter Warfare after the Winter War no? They ''failed'' in the Winter war because of poor leadership (result of the purges in the Army) that sent Divisions from the Kiev military district to Finland without proper equipment.
Russians in WWII were much better prepared for winter. Just look at how the Red Army's major offensive operations in 1941-1942 were performed exclusively in Winter, when they knew they had an edge on the Germans.
> they just had unlimited supply of cannon fodder.
The manpower balance never went beyond 3:1 in Soviet favor in the entire war. Also combat losses ratio was around 1:1.3 in German favor, when you exclude the murder of POWs by the Germans.
TL;DR pick up a book on the Eastern Front and educate yourself. I'd recommend this one
According to the Encyclopedia of Wars (Phillips and Axelrod, Facts on File, December 2004) of the 1,763 major conflicts in recorded history, only 123 of them were classified as having been fought over religious differences. That’s just under 7 percent. The encyclopedia also explains that the number of people killed in these conflicts amounts to only 2 percent.
The truth seems to be that non-religious motivations and secular philosophies bear the blame for nearly all of humankind’s wars [93%] and war deaths [98%].
So does that mean that those who said that they hate God and religion because of war will now say that they hate the non-religious and secular?
Fighter Combat: Tactics and Maneuvering https://www.amazon.com/dp/0870210599/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_zSRCCbRDCYX8T
This will serve you well.
It'd take a book to answer your question in the depth it deserves. WWI represents a major turning point in how militaries used (and thought about aircraft). At the outbreak of the war, aircraft were used mostly as scouts and flying messenger boys. In the United States, for example, the Army's few aricraft all belonged to the Signal Corps!
Although initially regarded as "toys," by old-school military officers, scout aircraft quickly proved their worth. The Western and Eastern Fronts of WWI started off as swirling, mobile campaigns as armies rapidly marched into battle. On the ground, horse-mounted cavalry tried to sniff out the enemy. Above their heads, airmen put a modern spin on the scouting mission. In August 1914, one French spotter plane noticed a gap between two advancing German forces. Allied troops counter-attacked, halting the German advance and arguably saving Paris. But for one lone plane, the Great War mighy have ended very differently.
As the mobile warfare of mid-1914 gave way to trench warfare in late 1914 and 1915, aircraft became even more valuable. Cavalry, the armies' traditional scouts, couldn't penetrate the trench lines of the Western Front (the Eastern Front is still a more fluid affair at this point. Interestingly, future ace Manfred von Richtofen was a cavalry officer here at this point in the war).
Airplanes, and to some extent, observation balloons, could roam wherever they pleased. Two-man spotter planes soon combed the skies over the Western Front. Observers sketched maps and even used primitive cameras to take aerial reconnaissance photos. The intelligence they gleaned was vital. Before offensives, it helped planners discover enemy positions, particularly hidden artillery batteries. Those guns could savage attacking troops in no-man's land, so knocking them out with counterbattery fire was essential for a large-scale attack to succeed. For defenders, recon planes could spot enemy troops and supplies massing for an offensive, giving the defenders time to prepare a response.
Since one scout aircraft could indirectly do immense damage, more and more effort went into shooting down enemy scouts. Early air-to-air combat had an air of enthusiastic amateurishness to it. Pilots and observers brought aloft pistols, hunting vehicles, shotguns, and even a few machine guns. The tactics weren't terribly complex: Fly alongside your target and blaze away.
Eventually, people on both sides of the war started seriously thinking about how to effectively arm an aircraft. The initial Allied solutions are crude, but fairly effective. Some fit a Lewis gun to the top wing of a biplane so it fires over the top of the propeller arc. It's hard to aim, but its better than nothing. French mechanics fit heavy metal deflectorsi to the propellers of a few planes. It's an awkward solution, to say the least, but it's enough for pilots like Roland Garros to start rackin up a few kills.
Robert Shaw's book has the best publicly-available breakdown of Air Combat Maneuvering. It's very much worth a read.
https://www.amazon.com/Fighter-Combat-Maneuvering-Robert-Shaw/dp/0870210599
This one:
https://www.amazon.com/Fighter-Combat-Maneuvering-Robert-Shaw/dp/0870210599
I'd recommend using KB/mouse to be more effective. For immersion, joysticks are awesome but they cannot compete with manual gimbal aim. The gamepad is going to give you the worst experience in current implementation IMO.
I recently read a really great book on dog fighting. It deals with atmospheric flight, but there is a lot of great info in it.
http://www.amazon.com/Fighter-Combat-Maneuvering-Robert-Shaw/dp/0870210599/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1427749842&sr=8-1&keywords=robert+l+shaw+combat
Had no idea this exists. A conservative, Asian! commentator making a defense of Japanese internment during WWII and racial profiling for the war on terror.
From what I can gather, historians didn't take too well to it considering it sounds as though she gets some basic chronology wrong (she works under the assumption Japan ruled most of the Pacific ergo attack on homeland imminent ergo internment is justified while in reality the internment didn't begin until after the Battle of Midway where the Japanese navy was dealt a pretty defining blow in the Pacific).
But yeah, i can try getting away with the argument that a few bad apples (or a rival nation) justifies removing the civil liberties of an entire ethnicity.
Has anyone read this book?
That is great. Her guest didn't let her get away with being nuts. Too bad he didn't study up on her history. She is warning about the dangers of Holocaust denial when she wrote a book defending the internment of Japanese-Americans during WWII: http://www.amazon.com/Defense-Internment-Racial-Profiling-Terror/dp/0895260514
PART TWO
>The distinction I was trying to make is between serious religious study, and the cheap bullshit used to justify horrendous crimes.
Argument can be made, and has been made by the likes of Harris, Dawkins, et. al. that fundamentalists are actually espousing the realities of the foundational religious tenants, whereas moderates are not. I see theology as a way to meld reality with religious dogma in order to hold onto outdated and irrelevant belief structures - such as god. I had this conversation with someone just yesterday who identified as an agnostic deist. I asked him why he felt he needed to hold onto the concept of god. Essentially what I got from him is that it gave him a sense of community because, although his concept of what ‘god’ is was probably different than others they could still share the common bond offered through using the same linguistic term to define this supreme being.
I am totally in the Harris/ Dawkins camp that sees religious moderates as only providing legitimacy to fundamentalism, and that the practice of fundamentalism is the true practice of these religious ideologies in their unaltered, unabridged, to-the-letter, way. I’m an antitheist because I don’t believe it’s feasible to have an individual relationship with religion and use it to make just yourself feel better. Religion comes with tremendous baggage, and ultimately there’s runoff. Those who attach themselves to religion are those who are not satisfied with reality – they need to have more, there needs to be a higher purpose to things, as if what they have is not enough. This thinking ultimately leads to classism (it’s the foundational thinking of capitalists – never being satisfied with sustainability – always wanting more). Classism dictates the need for superiority over others and in religious terms this translates to othering non-believers. Now, this is all fine and well if an individual adopts a religious perspective completely on their own and lives a monastic life without contact with anyone else that may be affected by their beliefs – but that is statistically highly improbable. (This idea is used by many religious and self-loathing atheists as a justification for the perpetuation of religious thinking: “It’s alright if it makes them feel better, do good things and doesn’t hurt anybody else.”) Ultimately there is spill-over, because of the human need to collectivize and socialize with the like-minded. The worst part, in my opinion, is the ultimate indoctrination of children (of which the majority of religious adherents have been). I’m in the Hitchens/ Dawkins camp that view childhood religious indoctrination as a serious form of child abuse. There is no training manual for parents, and they want what’s best for their children so they tend to mimic and bestow the best parts of their perception of their upbringing and lives onto their children. Because they were brainwashed into believing religion is one of the best parts of their lives they pass that onto their children. As so many commenter’s in this thread have already said, statistically, religious indoctrination instills a lack of skepticism and stunts critical thinking outside the borders of their prescribed faith. By indoctrinating their children into their religious beliefs parents are stunting their children’s mental development with regards to being the best uninfluenced individual decision maker possible once they reach maturity. I speak this from experience as someone who was raised Jehovah’s Witness. It took me a LONG time to free myself from that, and had I not been forced by the government to attend school, I would probably never have had an out intellectually.
Last points:
>Would you agree with this [re. my Vietnam Statement]?
Yes and no. I do see religion as playing an important if not often mentioned part in the historical narrative of Vietnam. At the “great man” political level, there was a heavy influence from the Catholic Church in the affairs of the Vietnam War. (Here’s an interesting read on that)
With regards to the American soldiers on the ground I haven’t been able to locate the demographics from 1958-75, but considering the current religious demographics of the U.S. Military, I would fairly assume that the levels would have been higher in previous years (especially considering the recent uproar over an atheist in the air force refusing to pledge “under god” and the after effects of that in the courts). Also if you boil down the tenants of Nationalism as being the same as religiosity, you can argue that the same mind set is at work, and they go hand in hand. (I’m just as opposed to nationalism as I am to religion, by the way – both stifle critical thinking).
Two notable examples on either end of the spectrum is that of Ron Kovic, who was devoutly catholic when he enlisted for the Vietnam War, and then fought against it after he returned disabled (If you’ve seen “Born on the Fourth of July” you’ll know Ron’s story). And that of the soldiers who took part in the “Incident on Hill 192”, particularly Pfc. Steven Cabbot Thomas who was a co-founder of a white supremacist church following his crimes in Vietnam. (The incident on Hill 192 was dramatized in the Michael J. Fox/ Sean Penn film “Casualties of War”).
>it seems more like common human cruelty, considering that the majority of these soldiers probably weren't that well versed in Christianity anyway.
Considering the amount of army chaplains in the military and the requirements that still exist, It is fair to say that most were well versed in various forms of Christianity. There would need to be a study of Vietnam Veterans which would pose the question of how their religiosity played a role in their view of the war to come to a definitive conclusion and I know of no such study.
>From what I have seen, it seems as if racism and bigotry play a larger role than religious belief in many conflicts, even those based on religion.
Racism and Bigotry played a tremendous role in the Vietnam Conflict, and in fact those ideas have come to dominate the Historical narrative on that war. A fantastic book to read that covers the topic of American atrocities committed in Vietnam is “Kill Anything That Moves” by Nick Turse. Turse doesn’t really talk about religion but does talk a great deal about racism and ideas of National and ethnic superiority as being justification for horrible things like the Incident on Hill 192 and the Mai Lai Massacre.
But again, I wouldn’t absolve Religious influence by separating it from Racism and Bigotry – they work hand in hand. Religion has historically played a tremendous role in fostering racism and bigotry. As I explained above, religious adherence comes from a need to have more, which is the same as needing to be better than others. This is a core tenant of racism and bigotry – the adherence of superiority/inferiority. I assume you’re a theologist? If so, how many pages of the Old Testament are spent describing the ethnic superiority of the Jews (chosen people) and their military conquests over inferior races with the blessing of god? This plays a tremendous reinforcement of the concepts of racism and bigotry. There is significant weight in the argument that children are born racist, just as Dawkins says all children are born atheist.
Historians have to be careful because the information that is omitted from the factual accounts can play an important role in supporting and shaping the public perception and can tremendously aid the goals of state propaganda. As I mentioned in my previous wall of text, Many Cold War Historians have talked about how the Orthodox Church was persecuted because the Soviets wanted to take their land. This paints the Soviets as being the bad guy – flat out. What they don’t mention is the additional information of the Church’s resistance because they wanted to maintain control of the lands they owned and the power they had over the peasants. They don’t mention the incitement for rebellion for selfish reasons because it challenges the pro-capitalist message that has been established. “Great Man” history succeeds by simplification and omission, whereas Marxist History that focuses on the people and mass movements is a clearer, fuller and thus more accurate account in my opinion at least.
[https://www.amazon.com/Kill-Anything-That-Moves-American/dp/1250045061] Not leftist per se, but honest.
Not that irrelevant. You claimed that the US "condemned" the Khmer Rouge genocide thus somehow absolving it of genocidal responsibility. So I mentioned that the US has no moral high ground here as it was committing a genocide of its own. And I do dispute your opinion that the US presence didn't somehow affect the intensity of the genocide.
http://www.amazon.com/Kill-Anything-That-Moves-American/dp/1250045061
I referred to it elsewhere in this thread, this book shows that My Lai was just the tip of the iceberg.
Chris Hedges has a great book based on his life as a war reporter, War is a Force That Gives Us Meaning. As you say, people in those situations feel a heightened sense of life, and then have a hard time adjusting to the world without that struggle.
This book authored by the man that was on the team that created the nerve agent. https://www.amazon.com/State-Secrets-Insiders-Chronicle-Chemical/dp/1432725661
https://www.amazon.co.uk/State-Secrets-Insiders-Chronicle-Chemical/dp/1432725661/
I have the book. I’m pretty set on what rifle I want. But he says in the intro “read the whole book before you buy if you’re serious”
on Amazon
What scope rings did you buy? I see Vortex. What height?
That sounds cool. Definitely gonna grab a copy.
Here's the Amazon link to "Blind Man's Bluff" for those that are interested in it.
Anything by Henry Petroski
Skunk Works by Ben Rich Military aircraft aren't really developed this way anymore, but the stories are amazing.
Blind Man's Bluff
Nicely done /u/whibbler. Do you know if Parche replaced Halibut vis-a-vis Blinds Man's Bluff and Operation Ivy Bells? I am curious how that timeline all fits together.
This! Submarines are really underrated tools of surveillance and intelligence. Just look up the USS Parche.
9 Presidential Unit Citations, and it's records are still sealed til this day. Also, shoutout to Blind Man's Bluff if you want to know more about the hush side of submarines!
>I'd still have some sort of low range ping to detect objects within like 20 feet.
The Los Angeles class subs (of which the USS San Francisco is a part of) is 362 ft long, 33 ft in diameter, displaces 6,900 tonnes, and has an official speed of 20 knots (which equals 33.8 ft per second). At that size and speed, they would need a couple thousand feet of detection range just to start to react, and a couple thousand more to actually avoid a collision. Any active sonar that would give a usable return at that distance is also powerful enough to be detected tens of miles away and thus give away the subs position.
>If there is an enemy sub 20 feet away...
If any sub is 20 feet away and it hasn't been heard on passive sonar then it is because it is dead in the water and a collision is less than 1 second away.
>What's the point of being a war sub that can't see nearby giant objects?
Depends on the type of sub. Missile boats basically just go park off someones coast and wait until they receive orders to launch their missiles towards preprogramed coordinates without ever seeing the target. Attack boats (like the San Fran) have a variety of rolls but generally speaking are not looking for silent terrain. Typically they are looking for other vessels, and they do that by listening for the sounds of machinery. Surface ships are noisy as fuck, and don't require any effort to track passively, but even really quiet subs can be tracked by a well trained passive sonar crew. Coastal defense boats are basically the same as attack boats, except they are smaller and have a more limited range. There are a few other types of subs, but the only type I can think of that might even remotely do what you suggest is sonar mapping subs, but those are not combat vessels and are typically operated by civilians.
I'm not really certain what else you think there would really be to "see". Terrain isn't normally a big problem in the ocean. It's just certain locations that should be indicated on depth charts that you would need to limit operating depth to stay safe and collision free. Else-wise, the ocean is pretty empty, and subs are surfaced when pulling into/out of harbor.
If you want to get a decent idea of what subs do, and how they operate, read the book Blind Mans Bluff. It's probably the most accurate non-classified accounting you will find. Also watch the movie Down Periscope. It's a comedy, and takes some Hollywood liberties, but gives a fair representation when it comes to looking around with sonar.
I might also suggest the following manuals. You can probably find digital downloads of them as well, but they are pretty cheap and I like paper:
U.S. Army First Aid Manual
U.S. Army Improvised Munitions Handbook
U.S. Army Special Forces Guide to Unconventional Warfare
this book is great, lost my copy a while back.
https://www.amazon.com/Could-Tell-Then-Would-Destroyed/dp/193555414X/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1468632181&sr=8-2&keywords=if+i+told+you+i+would+have+to+kill+you
a colleague on my visual effects and animation team at a big defense contractor designed lots of patches for missile defense tests and other programs. Typically everything present on the patch has some meaning, even if its not obvious. I always loved seeing what he would come up with.
[this was my favorite, for FTM-14 stellar scorpion. sorry i cant find any better images of it.]
(http://thumbs.ebaystatic.com/images/g/FwwAAOSwubRXMXYs/s-l225.jpg)
Disclaimer: I don't know anything.
On Vietnam: really? From what I've gathered, I've thought up to now that American forces were pretty brutal at times - leading to accounts such as this https://www.amazon.com/Kill-Anything-That-Moves-American/dp/1250045061.
I'm taking this bait because you're making a very serious claim: that American failure in Vietnam (among other countries) was, I repeat, solely due to a lack of sufficient brutality by Western forces. That's somewhat testable, and I'd be interested to learn more.
You're entirely missing the point of Miss Saigon.
This is what happened
This is what they show you
It's brainwashing.
They were not caught in the middle but deliberately killed by the US military. There is a good book about that, it is called Kill Anything That Moves.
We have no idea on the Viet Cong losses, as Nick Turse explains in Kill Anything that moves civilian deaths were explained away as VC on an epic level to meet targets that were set in place. Was really a fucked up system introduced to reach some fabled "Attrition Rate" that never happened. What we do know is that the longer the war lasted, the larger the NV Army became.
The perfect example of this was General Ewell of the 9th Infantry Division who led Operation Speedy Express in the Mekong Delta and claimed that his men had a Kill Ratio of 134:1. American medical teams who were treating the wounded however claimed that upwards of 80% were in fact civilians, earning him the nickname "The Butcher of the Delta".
> This will only get worse for them over time; and I suspect we will see a lot more white violence because of it.
Bring it on I say. This isn't the Vietnam or Korean war era where their superior tech and firepower allowed them to kill asians like stepping on ants.
The comments will make your blood boil:
http://www.amazon.com/Kill-Anything-That-Moves-American/product-reviews/1250045061/ref=cm_cr_dp_qt_hist_five?ie=UTF8&filterBy=addFiveStar&showViewpoints=0
>...Recruits in boot camp were trained never to call the people "Vietnamese" but gooks or dinks. Even our southern Viet allies in the war. There was an acronym "MGR": The "Mere Gook Rule". Recruits were trained to dehumanize all Vietnamese, they weren't real humans. Commanders wanted body counts, the higher the better, and there was hell to pay if the numbers weren't good. The quality and weapons recovered weren't important. Soilders learned fast they wouldn't be held accountable as long as they were giving the body count numbers leadership wanted to report. Intense pressure for high count rates. The dead tell no tale if they were civilian or not.
>The "My Lai Massacre" story of over 500 civilians killed that Seymour Hersh broke turns out to be the rule, not the exception. The metric of "body count" was a driving motivation. Immediate reports after the My Lai incident painted it as a glowing victory in the American press. Amazing. The driving metric was almost like commanders in civilian police forces issuing ticket quotas to officiers is the ananolgy I took away from this. They wanted body count numbers to convey back on American stateside nightly TV news how well they were doing in the war. And that is one vivid takeaway I remember as a child, seeing the nightly body count numbers on the evening news. "Yea! We're winning" my childhood mind would think. The adults at the time thought no differently, apparently. Journalists were taking the Pentagon press releases and brainwashing Americans with it. Nixon's 72 landslide win backs that ...
>...As a combat veteran of the Viet Nam war, I can attest the "mere gook rule" was operative throughout the war. Most GI's had complete disdain, if not intense hatred, for the Viet Namese people. I distinctly remember numerous conversations with troops who said "gooks" were not fit to live. They carried that mentality with them on combat operations. The body count was all important. Some commanders, fortunately including mine, were equally concerned with the weapons count; and fully expected the weapons count to be in line with the body count. But there were other unit commanders who cared less about the weapons count and accepted any recording of Viet Namese dead as VC. Torture? Yes, it occurred and was common. Rape? That too. One of my best friends in ROTC was commissioned in Military Intelligence (I was Airborne Infantry), and had the misfortune of getting assigned to the Phoenix Program. After going to MACV HQ in Sai Gon to beg for any kind of reassignment and being refused, he committed suicide. Why? Because, as he said, he could not bear going out night after night, pulling farmers and their entire families out of their hooches, watching as all of the family members, children included, were tortured, women and girls raped, bodies mutlilated and eventually, the entire family killed.
>...Even former U.S. Senator Bob Kerrey admitted to having massacred villagers.
This is not to minimize the racism that other groups have against mongoloid looking people. If these other groups have the same degree of tech disparity, maybe they would be slaughtering mongoloid looking people too.
Victory Point: Talks about Operations Red Wings and Whalers; really good book that tells you the other side about Lone Survivor, and how the Navy Seals were so into themselves that they ignored all recommendations about how to perform the operation.
War is a Force that gives up Meaning: Talks about those who experience war and how they become dependent on it (having served combat in Iraq, this book really stuck with me).
War is a force that gives us meaning.
I'd recommend reading War is a Force that Gives Us Meaning. Pretty short read and you can find paperbacks for less than five bucks.
'War Is A Force That Gives Us Meaning', very much worth a read.
https://www.amazon.com/War-Force-that-Gives-Meaning/dp/1400034639
>A very rare chemical only produced in quantity by Russia.
For which the formula can be found in this book on Amazon.
edit: I see a lot of downvotes but not a lot of convincing arguments hahaha
and this, kids, is how wars get started on nothing but empty soundbites and herd mentality...
 
> No motive for anyone else to do it
As a matter of fact, Russia is the one country that stands to gain the least from all of this. But seeing that you are so fucking sure about yourself why don't you enlighten us with Russia's motive?
I know, they did it to "send a message". What message, exactly? That they went into a lot of trouble to hide an illegal program from OPCW watch dogs only to reveal it months later?
https://www.opcw.org/news/article/opcw-director-general-commends-major-milestone-as-russia-completes-destruction-of-chemical-weapons-stockpile-under-opcw-verification/
If they really wanted to send a message to the spy community and possible defectors, they wouldn't have use a fucking megaphone, a simple whisper would suffice.
 
>Governmental level of knowledge to produce this poison
Propaganda bullshit.
>>Scientists who worked on the Novichok project disclosed details from 1992 onwards. They stated that the project goals included developing weapons that:
>> could not be detected by the then standard NATO chemical weapons detection sensors
>> have potential to circumvent the Chemical Weapons Convention
>> would be easier to produce using methods and materials prevalent in pesticides industries
>> were designed from the outset to be “binary” chemical weapons (where two relatively non-toxic materials are mixed together just before dispersal to minimise the danger to the personnel delivering the weapons).
Also to keep in mind, what is the point of developing a program designed to be "secret" just to advertise it to the whole world by using it to poison a literal nobody?
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-we-know-about-novichok-the-newby-nerve-agent-linked-to-russia/
The details are also published on a book that anyone can get from amazon or other stores.
https://www.amazon.com/State-Secrets-Insiders-Chronicle-Chemical/dp/1432725661/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1520920301&sr=8-1&keywords=vil+mirzayanov
We know, for a fact, that it has been developed outside Russia.
http://www.ieee.es/en/Galerias/fichero/docs_opinion/2012/DIEEEO33-2012_AnalisisAmenazaQuimicaBiologicaSiria_RenePita_ENGLISH.pdf
 
>It fits with a pattern of Russia killing its traitors
No it does not. Russia has been engaged in spy swapping for decades and if they really tried to kill a double agent it would seriously hinder their ability to attract defectors from other countries and their ability to swap agents in the future.
https://nypost.com/2018/03/08/putins-latest-murder-breaks-the-biggest-rule-of-the-spy-game/
 
>Britain and its partners don't have licences to kill any more.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Chc1U04bRM
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novichok_agent
> To circumvent the Chemical Weapons Convention list of controlled precursors, classes of chemical and physical form
http://www.sciencemadness.org/talk/viewthread.php?tid=1693
https://www.amazon.com/State-Secrets-Insiders-Chronicle-Chemical/dp/1432725661
> The big area of interest here seems to be about Phosphorylated Alkanoyl Chloride Oximes, from Zhurnal Obshchei Khimii. The Trialkyl Phosphate should be relatively easy to prepare, as it is seen in the syntheses of many nerve agents:
> PCl3 + ROH --(CCl4)--> P(OR3) + RCl + HCl
> As for the second reactant, X-C(R1)2-NO2, What if the two R1 groups were substituted with Cl and F, respectively? Alternately, if they were ALL substituted with Cl, then it becomes a very familiar compound--Chloropicrin. The question then is whether or not this would react in the same way.
> If so, then the reaction to produce a very dangerous Nerve Agent looks to be unbelievably simple:
> PCl3 + ROH --(CCl4)--> P(OR)3
> P(OR)3 + CCl3NO2 --(CCl4)--> PO4R2(N=CCl2)
One of the reason Soviets wanted it was precisely because it would be easy and legal to make, thus available anywhere
Thanks for your apprehension and let me add some thoughts to your list:
-First of all, Skripal.
He was arrested in 2004. In 2006 he was sentenced to 13 years in prison and was pardoned and freed as part of spy swap between UK and Russia in 2010.
So, if Russia wanted him dead, why not to kill him silently in prison? Why pardon him?
He did not pose a danger for Russia as they freed him. Consequently, it seems irrational for Russian gov/specs to hunt him instead of many pain-in-the-ass defectors who really cooperate with UK, US.
-The gas.
Inventor of Novichok lives in US for a long time: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vil_Mirzayanov
He even wrote a book https://www.amazon.com/State-Secrets-Insiders-Chronicle-Chemical/dp/1432725661 where he tries to publish Novichok's formula (not exact though).
Novichok was produced mainly at Nukus site in Uzbekistan (it was part of USSR at the time).
After USSR collapsed and Uzbekistan become independent state, Nukus site was dismantled and decontaminated with help of US Department of Defence (ref: wikipedia page on Novichok).
According to this, it's hard to say that only Russia had access to Novichok.
-Motivation
Personally, I don't see any benefits from this event for Putin, only drawbacks.
Why kill him just before elections? He will easily win without world scandal.
Why kill him just before World Cup? Russia spend a lot of money to prepare for WC.
Today's Russia reputation is well-known. Russia is under sanctions. Why risking much heavier sanctions or even WW3 just to 'send message'?
Instead. Someone in this thread noted that West has united against Russia. Paraphrasing Voltaire, "if Russia did not exist, it would be necessary to invent it".
Da nakon sto su izvrsili svoju "istragu", nakon sto su izneli svoje zakljucke i osude i nakon sto su sazvali savet bezbednosti.
Ono, obicno kazna i osuda dolaze nakon nezavisne istrage, ali jebiga nema potrebe sada :)
I to doslovno za sada sve sto imamo jeste rec UK da je koriscen uopste taj nervni gas. Niko drugo nije to potvrdio. Britanija je sada spremna na saradnju kazu sa OPWC, ali OPWC jos ili nije dobio uzorke ili nisu jos testirali, jer od njih zvanicne reci nema.
Eksperti iz velike britanije i bivsi OPWC naucnici doslovno kazu da uopste koriscenje ovog nervnog gasa bi bilo nemoguce i detektovati.
Takodje Rusija nije jedina koja moze da stvori ovaj gas
>"The Novichok agents are thought to be far more difficult to detect during manufacturing and far easier to manufacture covertly, because they can be made with common chemicals in relatively simple pesticide factories," the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons says in its Weapons of Mass Casualties and Terrorism Response Handbook.
Lik koji tvrdi da je dizajnirao gas je objavio knjigu na amazonu
https://www.amazon.com/State-Secrets-Insiders-Chronicle-Chemical/dp/1432725661
Prema njemu ako neko razume knjigu dovoljno mogao bi sam da napravi...
Nice! If you haven't I'd recommend picking up a copy of the long range shooting handbook: https://www.amazon.com/Long-Range-Shooting-Handbook-Cleckner/dp/151865472X
It's not exhaustive, but it was pretty useful in coming up to speed (and cutting through the chaff).
Just got this for Christmas yesterday.
Long Range Shooting Handbook https://www.amazon.com/dp/151865472X/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_hntyybWQ3F683
book
honestly this book will give you just about everything you need to get started on long range.
Glad you liked it! That’s Ryan Cleckner, and I agree with you. I’ve really gotten into his stuff. He has more videos on YouTube (try searching “NSSF Ryan Cleckner”) and I’m loving going through his book (I’m a beginner). Best of luck!
someone has a copy of http://www.amazon.com/Could-Tell-Then-Would-Destroyed/dp/193555414X...
i actually HAVE some of those patches
http://i.imgur.com/Jgephq4.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/MGmVXbR.jpg
>How is that not ridiculous? I work for a top secret intelligence service. Here's my badge that proves it! LOL
Reality is unrealistic
https://www.amazon.com/Could-Tell-Then-Would-Destroyed/dp/193555414X
The second link is actually a book. I just like to source a free pdf so everyone can read.
https://www.amazon.com/Could-Tell-Then-Would-Destroyed/dp/193555414X
>In 2008 by the means of hundreds of Freedom of Information requests, Trevor Paglen obtained and analyzed forty mission patches.
no, mainly these are replicas of Black project patches.
all of them come from a book called "I could tell you, but you would have to be destroyed by me"
Anyone into this kind of stuff might enjoy a book called, "I Could Tell You But Then You Would Have to Be Destroyed By Me: Emblems from the Pentagon's Black World" by Trevor Paglen.
Cool book and an interesting read.
After loads of reading on the bus to work every day, here follows my reading list for military aviation:
Modern
Vietnam
WWII
Overall/Other
Bonus non-military aviation
I highly second the recommendations of Snow Crash, Cryptonomicon, and Diamond Age. I would also recommend:
Have you read "Blind Man's Bluff"?
https://www.amazon.com/Blind-Mans-Bluff-Submarine-Espionage/dp/006097771X
He's probably in it....
ah I was going to suggest red storm rising but it sounds like you have read it.
Blind Mans Bluff is an excellent non fiction book on American Subs in the cold war. It is basically a series of real stories from the 1950's-1990's. Some great stuff, especially because it all actually happened. All the things you mentioned, close quarters, technical, espionage, conflict are right on the money with this one. There is a really good part about an American fast attack trailing a Russian Boomer through an entire deployment on the east coast, also great accounts of how the americans wire tapped soviet comm's cables in the Barrents sea
http://www.amazon.com/Blind-Mans-Bluff-Submarine-Espionage/dp/006097771X
No problem. Some of the books on the nuclear subs, Cold War espionage, etc etc are actually quite cool if you haven't read them. Here's a good one.
My stateside job was a SIGINT Analyst at the NSA - I worked on a Navy watch, and if you want what amounts to a TRUE inside story, check out Blind Man's Bluff.
Can't say much more than it was a fascinating look into my career field, and a very many things checked out compared to my daily experience!
Read Ivan's war https://www.amazon.com/Ivans-War-Life-Death-1939-1945/dp/0312426526
You are wrong about the Soviets.
Read this Book, one of the best books about second world war and incredibly intense!
https://www.amazon.com/Unwomanly-Face-War-History-Women/dp/0399588728
Also great: https://www.amazon.de/Ivans-War-Life-Death-1939-1945/dp/0312426526
Ivan's war isn't quite diary level, but it is still a very intimate look at soviet soldiers and their feelings of war.
mp3 the only one
used copy of physical book Demon in the freezer. I believe there are a few "very good" condition for a penny!
Thanks for the contest. And good luck with the bike! (fingers crossed)
Instead, read The Hot Zone and/or Demon in the Freezer. They're scarier.
Just to say, there's a book by Richard Preston called Demon in the Freezer that goes into detail on how smallpox was eradicated from nature. And how it was lost into the unknown. Quite a nice read and the author really does his job well. It's somewhat of a mix of fiction and non-fiction but both parts are scary believable.
Actually I have Demon in the Freezer to read next. https://www.amazon.com/Demon-Freezer-True-Story/dp/0345466632. It’s about anthrax.
You should read The Demon in The Freezer. As someone studying genetics from a Russian Cold War defector, this book scared the crap outta me. My prof. said he could engineer a deadly super bug with homemade equipment in his basement. It is scary how simple and deadly genetic engineering can be.
The First World War by John Keegan https://www.amazon.com/dp/0375700455/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_RKNLxbX912QTD
I also have this absolutely monstrous six volume set: The Great War: The Illustrated History of the First World War: 6 Volume Set https://www.amazon.com/dp/B000OTDY5A/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_YMNLxbPYYR9FQ
That one might be a little more than you're looking for though.
The First World War by John Keegan
Thank you for the book suggestion. I read Shadow Divers years ago and it sounds like Torpedo Junction should be right up my alley.
If you want more, read this insane book.
And then this one.
One of my favorite books is Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II
https://www.amazon.com/dp/0375760989/ref=cm_sw_r_awd_UuWPub08PTZA4
True story that reads like fiction about extreme deep sea divers and the mystery they found at the very edges of what is humanely possible to dive.
At lot of people mentioned some pretty cool map books already, but these are two geography-related books I'm getting for Christmas: How the States Got Their Shapes (probably better if she's American) and Guns, Germs, and Steel. The latter is less to do with maps and more to do with how geography influences civilizations. Hope that helps!
Any book by Mary Roach- her books are hilarious, random, and informative. I like Jon Krakauer's, Sarah Vowell's, and Bill Bryson's books as well.
Some of my favorites that I can think of offhand (as another poster mentioned, I loved Devil in the White City)
No Picnic on Mount Kenya
Guns, Germs, and Steel
Collapse
The Closing of the Western Mind
What is the What
A Long Way Gone
Alliance of Enemies
The Lucifer Effect
The World Without Us
What the Dog Saw
The God Delusion (you'd probably enjoy Richard Dawkins' other books as well if you like science)
One Down, One Dead
Lust for Life
Lost in Shangri-La
Endurance
True Story
Havana Nocturne
Old dead classical dudes are always good. I ransack Epicurus and Marcus Aurelius for good ideas and advice fairly regularly. There are some excellent secular philosophers and thinkers out there. I enjoy Sam Harris' work the most. One of my favorite reference books is The Portable Atheist, which is a collection of secular philosophers, edited by Hitchens.
To get a sense of your place in the universe, try to find an old full-color hardback copy of Cosmos.^1 For your place in the Human story, Guns, Germs, and Steel, and your place in the American story with A People's History.
[1] As a minor biographical note, I credit this version of Cosmos for getting me through horrible angsty teenager time.
Edit: Also, good question.
There are lot of popular books that venture into these type of topics. I recommend The 10,000 Year Explosion, which is about how civilization and agriculture shaped recent human evolution. It's very interesting, though at the same time it sometimes creeps me out thinking to much about human biology in this way. I might add that they have a chapter on human intelligence which is controversial because of the nature of the topic. Anyway it's a good read, just don't turn into an eugenicist. ;)
I also the often recommended Guns, Germs and Steel on my reading list, which looks on how biology and illness shaped human civilizations.
Sorry this is a big post, but you've asked a big question
If you want a full and complete (but lengthy) answer, you need to read Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond
I'll sum up some of his main points to give you an answer here. It all began with food production. There are many different parts of the world that independently "invented" the farming of many different local crops, but it was mainly the Fertile Crescent area that really began having agriculture on a large enough scale to support enough people in a small enough area to form cities. Why? Well, long story short, they had the right types of indigenous plants for farming. The same goes with the domestication of animals. There are many types of wild cattle, horses, and sheep in the middle east/fertile crescent region. What did north/south america have? They did domesticate animals, but mainly dogs, chicken-like birds, and alpacas. They had no large animals to break the land and increase the productivity/acre. All of this began in the fertile crescent and eventually was imported into Europe.
Another obvious advantage Europeans had was resource allocation. Iron and copper (along with other elements) were readily available throughout Europe, and other less obvious but equally vital resources such as rivers and wild animals were easier to navigate/hunt. The geography of Europe is also such that it isn't too difficult building roads that can carry goods quickly and efficiently from point A to B. Trying building/maintaining a road in the Amazon.
Next germs. As I'm sure you were taught in history class, Europeans wiped out most native americans in North and South America with several diseases, mainly smallpox but also the flu, malaria and others. What you probably weren't taught was just how massive this die off was. Tens of millions of native North/South Americans were killed off decades before whites even made it to most areas. The devastation that smallpox wreaked on these native populations was massive, swift, and in some cases, total. Whole societies were wiped off the map in a matter of months, so invading whites didn't really have to complete (ie go to war) with millions of natives. So why was it Europeans giving diseases and not the other way around? Once again he answer lies with livestock. Many of these diseases were a result of either humans living in very close contact and constantly spreading them around (the flu), or they were diseases in livestock that "jumped" to humans, like the cowpox virus. After thousands of generations of battling these diseases, Europeans became (comparatively) immune but Native Americans were left with no defense. This doesn't really answer why Europe was "ahead" of the Americas, but it certainly is telling when it comes to wondering why it was seemingly so easy to colonize the New World and subjugate the natives.
Another huge reason (perhaps the largest one you could actually point to) was that Europe became organized socially much sooner than anyplace else in the world. I mean this in terms of religion, class, and especially government. All other places in the world had these ideas at some level or another, but it seems that in Europe it reached a sort of critical mass where all of these institutions fed one another to form a stratified and organized culture. Once you have specific classes of people that are either on top or the bottom, the "ruling class" and run the land, making laws and a government that funds things like infrastructure and trips around the world looking for gold to steal.
Finally a more minor point, but one that I found most interesting. Look at a world map. All the continents except Eurasia are "tall" and not "long". In theory, being "long" is much much better for the transmission of crops and livestock because when you move longitudinally the climate changes rapidly, but when you move along a latitude line the climate doesn't change nearly as much. All livestock, and especially crops are very sensitive to the climate they live in. If it's too cold or too hot or too wet or the season isn't the right length, your crops won't grow well. Therefore it's much easier to spread agriculture and crops east west instead of north south.
If you like those books, also try [Guns, Germs, and Steel](http://www.amazon.com/Guns-Germs-Steel-Fates-Societies/dp/0393061310/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1229375628&sr=8-1 "basically a short history of humanity") by Jared Diamond.
The book list just keeps growing in so many different directions that it's hard to identify which I want to tackle next (I also have a tendency to take meticulous notes while I read and that slows the process down even further!). Some of the topics I intend to read about once I'm done with the books mentioned:
Plus a bunch of books by Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Christopher Hitchens, Carl Sagan, and others. There are way too many. And all the fiction books I want to read too! It's not that I didn't read books before, but my faith transition has sparked an intense desire to study and learn far greater than I ever experienced before.
I've read a lot on the subject of food, so these two recommendation go beyond winning some debate points on reddit.
Real food
guns, germs and steel
To those interested in this topic, I highly recommend this book:
http://www.amazon.com/Guns-Germs-Steel-Fates-Societies/dp/0393061310/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1335808328&sr=8-1
Guns, Germs, and Steel
You're doing this wrong. If you approach books as a task for self-edification that you view as a duty, you're going to hate it. Read whatever you want, for entertainment. Read funnystuff. Read thrillers. Read fantasy. Read weird science fiction. Heck, read history, economics, and science.
TL;DR: Read whatever the hell you feel like, and I guarantee you you will feel better about yourself than you would have by forcing yourself through Ulysses or War and Peace.
http://www.amazon.com/Guns-Germs-Steel-Fates-Societies/dp/0393061310/
Europeans didn't come to dominate the globe because of any inherent superiority.
We lucked out when it came to access to domesticable crops and animals, on which to build a thriving technological society.
Our Enlightenment era values, philosophical and legal heritage, and technological prowess are good things, with which we can help the world. Our history of colonialism, the theft of land and culture from the natives, and legacy of self-interested exploitation of vulnerable peoples around the world are not.
Marsden is simply a racist who doesn't see the value in trying to build a world in which everyone can benefit equally.
If you're interested in questions like this, you should really take a look at Guns, Germs, and Steel, the good old classic by Jared Diamond. I love it because it confronts questions about human history from a very academic perspective.
Guns, Germs and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies
I haven't read it myself, so I can't comment, but Winston Churchill himself wrote a six-part series called, simply, The Second World War. It is available on Amazon in a styling box-set for $75. Bit pricy but seems like a wonderful gift.
Churchill wrote a set of books about WW2. I don't know if you're looking for fiction or non fiction, but you might be interested in these.
It's not bad, but I felt it was too focused on the author's own life story in relation to gaming, and thin on details. Playing at the World is better, but has a lot of build-up about the history of wargaming (going back centuries) and stops around the time of AD&D 1st edition shipping. The author said he wanted to avoid the ugliness that occurred after that (Gygax's exile to the west coast, the Lorraine Williams hire and takeover, general lack of direction) because it's negative, but the 2nd edition era was still an amazing time for creativity even if the head of the company was weird, and I haven't seen a book that chronicles that. I'd love to get a follow-up to PatW that has a similar scholarly tone and covers the highs (The D&D 'fad' era when they were merchandising like crazy, various big releases) and the lows (morale-killings at TSR, the utter failure to be cool with the internet for years, forced Buck Rogers games, eventual near-bankruptcy and sale to WotC). The designers who were important in that era re often still involved in gaming (often in computers) but they're not getting any younger, and I'd love to read their stories now, instead of rumors and 3rd party anecdotes.
If anyone is interested, about the first half of this (huge, heavily researched) book covers the history of D&D starting with ancient chess and progressing through 18th-19th century wargames. There's a fair amount of discussion about the things Gygax used which video games subsequently adopted (XP, levels, hit points, polyhedron dice, etc.) It's a big book, and dense, but it is fascinating reading if that's your thing.
Playing at the World
There exist no roleplaying games prior to 1974, so that avenue of inquiry is right out the window.
There's a good number of strategy and combat board games from earlier, but looking through the brief mechanical descriptions on BGG, and having actually played a decent number of them, I feel confident in saying that the idea of "leveling up" or persistent play with advancement did not exist prior to D&D.
To reiterate, D&D did in fact invent "killing things to get OP."
edit I also don't recall reading about any earlier games with progression in either Shannon Applecline's Designers & Dragons serires, or Jon Peterson's Playing at the World
I would suggest reading Playing at the World by John Peterson. I had a lot of questions regarding the history of rpgs and this book was the most precise and well researched book I could find. I would highly recommend it.
I’m really excited to see this. I’m guessing you’ve already read Playing at the World ? If you haven’t, it goes into great detail about Braunstein, Blackmoor, and the rest of the hobby’s DNA.
Hey Mr. Ewalt, thanks for stopping by.
I recently read Playing At the World, which seems to cover similar territory. What distinguishes your book from that one? I'm going to need a defense to tell my girlfriend about why I have two big histories of D&D.
As a fantasy, I guess it's ok. But that is so not the accurate history at all. So much so I call it an outrageous misinformation could do actual damage to education / history. I hope it does not become popular.
If you want the actual history read this https://www.amazon.com/Playing-at-World-Jon-Peterson/dp/0615642047
Don't get me wrong, I've never played it. I've just had it described in a book I'm reading: https://www.amazon.com/Playing-at-World-Jon-Peterson/dp/0615642047
Highly recommended, by the way.
Here is a 100 citations: http://www.rpgstudies.net/
John Eric Holmes of "Holmes D&D" fame: https://www.reddit.com/r/DnD/comments/2v6e2q/confessions_of_a_dungeon_master_an_article_from/
Pretty much "THE TEXT" on D&D right now: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0615642047/ref=as_li_tf_il?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=0615642047&linkCode=as2&tag=playattheworl-20
It is impossible to resolve the question as to whether or not Truman could have got an unconditional surrender from the Japanese government without the atomic bombs. It's one of the greatest 'What ifs..?" in history. Efforts were made and he and his advisors didn't believe they could have so we have to take them at their word. Truman was too good a man to have used those bombs unless he had felt that there was no other option to bring the war to a quick end. Truman and his staff did not know, and could not have known, how the Japanese cabinet was viewing the situation.
But Tsuyoshi Hasegawa's 2006 book, Racing The Enemy, based on the most comprehensive examination of archival resources in Japan, argues that it was the Soviet entry into the Pacific war that was decisive. The Soviets declared war on Japan just two days after the Hiroshima bombing. Most Americans look at that event and just see it as Stalin trying to score some glory and territorial gains on the back of America's efforts and never consider how that news played with the Japanese leadership.
Hasegawa's research argues that it was this Soviet entry into the war that was the final straw that broke the camel's back. Communism was something totally anathema to japan's extremely conservative leadership. Losing the war to the Soviets would have meant, with no doubt, an end to the Japanese way of life and a far, far more brutal occupation. Surrendering when they did allowed them to escape any level of Soviet occupation. And in the end the Soviets only occupied (and Putin's Russia still occupies) some small fishing islands off the northern coast of Hokkaido.
Even if the ratio was 1:2, that's still a far cry away from the soviets using human waves
This essay does a good job evaluating german and soviet causalities: http://sti.clemson.edu/publications-mainmenu-38/publications-library/cat_view/33-strom-thurmond-institute/153-sti-publications-by-subject-area/158-history
Skip to page 13-14 to dig right into casualty comparison.
For further reading this book is high quality and on the shorter side:
https://www.amazon.com/When-Titans-Clashed-Stopped-Studies/dp/0700608990
My understanding is that there is consensus on the USSR's motives for invading Poland, which was to by time for the inevitable war with Germany.
I've been reading this recently, and the author sure interprets the things that way.
https://www.amazon.com/When-Titans-Clashed-Stopped-Studies/dp/0700608990
The T-34, and especially in terms of its sloped armour, was some of the most advanced in the world at that time. Initially in 1941 the Pz IV was armed with a low velocity 75mm gun. This was entirely inadequate against both the T-34 and the KV-1. Later, the F and G series would reach parity with the T-34, being armed with a High V 75mm. But by the time the G series came out, 1943, the Panther outclassed the Pz IV, and tank like the IS-2 and T-34-85 also outclassed the Pz IV.
As for the Russian deficiencies, they largely came from the Great Officer Purge of 1937. The Soviets and the Germans pioneered mobile warfare during the joint research Treaty of Rapallo. Yet by 1937, while Heinz Guderian was writing his book, basically outlining German wartime doctrine, the Soviets were busy arresting and executing all of its top leadership. This was especially true of the officers who championed armor theory similar to the Germans (who were also veterans of Rapallo). And, in classic Stalinist Purge fashion, these experienced officers were replaced by rookies who lacked experience commanding large formations, let alone any experience commanding in actual combat conditions. Further, these new officers had military regulations drummed into them. Officers were "encouraged" to follow only the textbook maneuvers and dispositions (and when you get your job because the last guy was executed, it makes a person far less likely to argue). When it came to the war, the Soviets were indoctrinated in how they should fight. This led to many mistakes which would have to be corrected during 1942 an '43. The real flaw of the Red Army in 1941 and early 1942 wasnt that they lacked technology or the tactics to use it. Its that they wernt able to properly employ it, except in rigid and obvious attacks which the Germans could easily identify, or simply ignore. By 1943, the Red Army resurrected theory developed at Rapallo and created an army very much the equal of the German army. Further, the Soviets perfected the maskirovka or deception. Not only could the Soviets create breakthroughs just as well as the Germans, they were able to deceive the German army as to where the attack would fall. This would draw off reserves from the initial breakthrough, which would only allow the exploitation phase to start earlier and last longer. In fact, by Operation Bagration, the Soviets were only really limited by their logistical train in how deep they could penetrate the German line.
If youre interested in a good book on the Eastern Front, David Glantz's When Titans Clashed. Glantz is an expert on the Eastern front, and he goes through the Eastern Front from the Russian perspective. He discusses their failings and their origins, then later how the Red Army overcame those flaws and created an army which, by 1944, resembled the German army of 1940.
according to this, only about 7% of all documented wars were religious, so its not all that common of an occurrence
Read this.
Watch this and read this.
And practice... practice.... practice...
Already a lot of good advice here, and I did see In Pursuit mentioned, so I thought I'd just help point to the source of the good theory.
Alright, check out crash laobis youtube channel, and if you wann learn some BFM check out this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OCFMX5z-ed4
and this https://www.amazon.com/Fighter-Combat-Maneuvering-Robert-Shaw/dp/0870210599
I wish I was as optimistic as you, one-half. Published July 1, 2004: In Defense of Internment: The Case for Racial Profiling in World War II and the War on Terror
Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go look at some pictures of cats.
Just one of the millions of reasons: http://www.amazon.com/Defense-Internment-Racial-Profiling-Terror/dp/0895260514
Read this book, it's written by a German soldier from his eastern front experiences.
What exactly do you mean by Nazi anyway, do you mean a solider specifically in the Waffen SS (the military wing of the Nazi party) or more broadly a German solider?
Not all Germans were Nazis, and not all Nazis were German. There were many in the German army that were no friends of the Nazis, indeed there were many times they planned attempts on Hitler's life.
If you want to learn more about WW2, then I would also suggest this written from the Soviet perspective. It's concerned mostly with overall strategy, so most people might find it boring, but I find it incredibly interesting. If you don't understand the eastern front in ww2 then you don't understand the history of the war, imho.
> 36,183 IL-2s were produced between 1941 - 1945.
IL-2s were known for being dependable after working out teething problems during first trials. Very widely known of taking awful amounts of damage and still being able to fly home. Pilots loved them mostly because of this fact. It was dubbed the "Flying Tank" due to the amount of damage it could handle and still be flyable. I'd say that is some great quality. Just because an aircraft is produced in huge numbers, does not make it shit.
>Should I also check casualty numbers of WW2 alone to prove that Russia tends to take the brute force approach?
Being that Russia was on the offensive for nearly 4 years of the war, I'd say that's quite an easy thing to grasp. A defensive military will almost always take less casualties than a military on the offensive. This is a commonly accepted fact that has been known since the dawn of warfare.
>That's the thing with having lots of resources and a chain of command focused only on wining.
What else are you supposed to concentrate on during a war? Kill ratios? Propaganda? I'd say winning is by far the most important aspect of a war. Wouldn't you agree?
>They can just keep throwing bodies at a problem until it goes away.
No. They did no such thing. I recommend reading this book and this book especially because it addresses the Goebbels propaganda of "Soviet human wave" bullshit. You realize that's where this thought comes from correct? Nazi propaganda. It was meant to make Soviets look like barbaric animals....and it apparently still holds salt in some minds today. Your's for example.
>Look at the battle of Stalingrad. 1,129,619 casualties, 4,431 lost tanks, and 2,769 lost aircraft.
First off, your numbers are ridiculously way off. Approximately 4400 tanks? The Soviets lost around 1500 tanks total. Your number is probably including half tracks, SPGs, and things of that nature which makes it look like something it is clearly not. When adding up Axis vehicles total, it nearly triples the losses if I simply pass them all off as "tanks".
"Look at the Battle of Stalingrad. ~900,000 casualties, ~1,000 aircraft, ~700 tanks (actual tanks, not armor in general) and 5,500 artillery pieces for the Axis." I'm unsure of the point you are trying to make. It was the absolute biggest loss of human life in the history of warfare and there were huge losses on both sides.
>This is also the same military force that had a secondary line of soldiers behind the front lines that was ordered to shoot any deserters running from the battle.
Enemy at the Gates is not a documentary. The NKVD attachments were there to corral deserters or broken down men who could not take the front anymore. Most were put into hospitals. A minuscule amount were executed. Let me make this a point, every one of the belligerents in WW2 executed deserters.
Back to the NKVD:
>The order also directed that each Army must create "blocking detachments" (barrier troops (заградотряд, заградительный отряд)) which would capture or shoot "cowards" and fleeing panicked troops at the rear. Both measures were cited in the preamble of the order as having been successfully used by the Germans during their winter retreat. The requirement for Armies to maintain companies of barrier troops was withdrawn after just three months, on October 29, 1942. Intended to galvanize the morale of the hard-pressed Soviet Army and emphasize patriotism, it had a generally detrimental effect and was not consistently implemented by commanders who viewed diverting troops to create barrier units as a waste of manpower, so by October 1942 the idea of regular blocking units was quietly dropped.[3] By 20 November 1944 the blocking units were officially disbanded.
So after 3 whole months the blocking detachments were not a thing anymore. And most commanders did not execute anyone retreating. A lot were simply put back at the front. To think this happened throughout the war is naive at best.
So much of what you said is just ignorance. Hopefully not willfully. I'd highly recommend the two books I mentioned. It shows the way the Soviets truly operated and quite frankly, it's damn impressive.
Edit for quotes
Most of my information is from sporadic readings of Wikipedia over the years and following /r/AskHistorians and /r/badhistory. I can recommend the Soviet Storm documentary series, which should be on YouTube. It gives an almost neutral overview of the Eastern Front, although it kinda glosses over Soviet war crimes.
I've also heard good things about When Titans Clashed, but I haven't read it myself.
Thanks for the video with barebones information and kids animation. Here are some academic sources that you can cross-reference it with.
https://www.questia.com/library/journal/1P3-26324710/the-rommel-myth
https://www.amazon.com/When-Titans-Clashed-Stopped-Studies/dp/0700608990
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sbim2kGwhpc
Eigentlich war der Krieg an der Ostfront schon von Anfang an verloren. Wen das Thema interessiert:
When Titans Clashed: How the Red Army Stopped Hitler
USSR and Communist China were still atheist regimes
7% of all wars were religious wars.
Yes: Encyclopedia of Wars is quoted as having tallied up all historical wars and rated about 7% as "classified to involve a religious conflict." That, in turn, is quoted in Wikipedia's article on religious war. I'm not about to shell out $300 to find out for myself, I choose to trust the people who did the quotation. I consider the number plausible.
EDIT: a number of details fleshed out as I backtracked my sources.
> Yes, I did. By a rabi. Surely non-biased sourcing my friend
I'm trying to be polite, but you're making it hard. I specifically said it's the sources referred to in the article, not the article itself.
If you prefer, here is the book itself:
https://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Wars-Library-World-History/dp/0816028516
Oh and you want to trade Wikipedia articles? Try this:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religious_war#Criteria_for_classification
Para 2 talks about the same book, which is about ALL wars, not just your cherry-picked few, and says this:
"In their Encyclopedia of Wars, authors Charles Phillips and Alan Axelrod attempt a comprehensive listing of wars in history. They document 1763 wars overall,[3] of which 123 (7%) have been identified and listed as primarily religiously motivated.[4][5][6] Of these, religious wars account for less than 2% of all people killed in warfare. This includes 3 million during the Crusades and 3,000 during the Inquisition."
Any thoughts on that? How does 2% = "most"?
Stalin, Pot, Lenin and Mao would like to have a word with you. Tell me more about how horrible religion is.
Religion was/is used as a device -an excuse, if you will - to reach their goals. If it didn't exist, they'd simply find another tool.
Also, I like how you bundled all religions together.
>An interesting source of truth on the matter is Philip and Axelrod’s three-volume Encyclopedia of Wars, which chronicles some 1,763 wars that have been waged over the course of human history. Of those wars, the authors categorize 123 as being religious in nature,2 which is an astonishingly low 6.98% of all wars. However, when one subtracts out those waged in the name of Islam (66), the percentage is cut by more than half to 3.23%.
Source citing this book called: Encyclopaedia of Wars
> Thank god wars have never been fought in the name of religion!
According to the encyclopedia of wars, by Phillips & Axelrod ( https://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Wars-Facts-Library-History/dp/0816028516 ) 93% of wars have been secular in nature.
Interesting how he links to his source, which has a review stating that it is "un-Christian" because it uses the BCE/CE dating method, rather than BC/AD.
Also, what's this guy's definition of an "atheist war"? Did Stalin one day decide to wake up and kill millions of people, specifically because the Bible told him not to? And that's assuming that what Stalin did was counted as a "war."
"Fortunately, there are only five nations governed by atheist worldviews remaining in the world today, of which three are presently occupied with murdering a portion of their citizenry with the explicit goal of exterminating religion, North Korea, China and Laos."
Yeah. That's their one, sole motivation. Not political or military power or any silly things like that. Mao just woke up one morning and decided to destroy religion.
> Si tu t’intéresse au combat aérien Je ne peux que te conseiller ce bouquin https://www.amazon.fr/Fighter-Combat-Maneuvering-Robert-Shaw/dp/0870210599 c'est simplement la bible
Ca se lit aussi pour du space sim tu penses ?
> Tu veux parler du gros ressort extérieur à la base du joystick ? Il n'est pas là pour éviter les petits mouvements ?
Oui celui-la, en fait sa résistance est non linéaire ce que fait que tu vas faire des mouvement largement trop brusques (tu perdra le retour au neutre mais c'est pas plus gênant que ça).
Et avec ces mouvements brutaux tu perdras de l'Energie et ça c'est moche en dogfight
go ici : https://www.helisimmer.com/tips-and-tricks/making-your-joystick-more-helicopter-friendly/
Si tu t’intéresse au combat aérien Je ne peux que te conseiller ce bouquin https://www.amazon.fr/Fighter-Combat-Maneuvering-Robert-Shaw/dp/0870210599 c'est simplement la bible
Wow, I read Fighter Combat: Tactics and Maneuvering back in the day; I'm guessing this kinda changes a lot of the maneuvers taught there. I remember trying to get the nose around on an adversary and not being able, this thing would have made it a piece of cake.
Off the top of my head, a couple reasons. One is closure rate would be way too fast for reliable missile tracking. There would also be issues with the difficulties in managing the mental calculations the pilot would have to go through in obtaining missile lock, engagement tactics, etc. For the details of all that is involved in air to air combat, I highly recommend the book Fighter Combat: Tactics and Maneuvering by Robert Shaw. It's practically the bible for air to air combat. Once you study that, you'll see why it's not practical, and pick up some good info to help you out as well in your combat flying. https://www.amazon.com/Fighter-Combat-Maneuvering-Robert-Shaw/dp/0870210599
The thing about BVR is that it isn't a science. You can learn all the maneuvers, nomenclature, and tactics, but at the end of the day BVR combat is about 40% luck and 60% art. I think what nealius posted is about the best you'll find outside of military practice. I always recommend Shaw's book but even his book is fairly light on the BVR stuff.
I guess a good way to put it is that the rote learning that most of us are used to gets you about 90% of the way with WVR combat, but with BVR combat it only gets you about 10% of the way. The only way to improve at BVR is practice every situation you can simulate.
Shaw's "Fighter Combat".
A bible for any aspiring combat pilot.
Confounding variable. The lack of a gun wasn't what caused the Navy's success, recognition of the value of proper ACM training was the cause of their success.
As an aside, I don't know what you do for a living in the Air Force, but I greatly enjoyed this book. https://www.amazon.com/Fighter-Combat-Maneuvering-Robert-Shaw/dp/0870210599 I haven't read it in many years, but it was a real eye-opener.
Here is the Amazon link for anyone interested.
http://www.amazon.com/Fighter-Combat-Maneuvering-Robert-Shaw/dp/0870210599/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1374916106&sr=8-1&keywords=fighter+combat+tactics+and+maneuvering
Completely inappropriate for GA, but the wanted-to-be-a-fighter-pilot in me absolutely loves Fighter Combat: Tactics and Maneuvering.
Very, very technical book. It's the Ph.D of aerial warfare.
And Stick and Rudder, of course, but someone has already mentioned that.
http://www.amazon.com/In-Defense-Internment-Racial-Profiling/dp/0895260514
https://www.amazon.com/Defense-Internment-Racial-Profiling-Terror/dp/0895260514
She wrote this book and then complains that liberals see racism where there is none.
READ THIS if you want to learn about the Vietnam War, from the men involved.
Kill Anything That Moves
and here's some videos.
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=kill+anything+that+moves
i read the book, "Kill Anything That Moves: The Real American War in Vietnam" by Nick Turse and in it Turse makes the argument that the United States government was so focused on the body count that they did not care if the bodies were NVA, or civilian. Do you agree with this?
ya...China's neighbors were "protected" by USA..especially Vietnam right?
http://www.amazon.com/Kill-Anything-That-Moves-American/dp/1250045061/
 
oh look, USA protected China too
http://www.zakkeith.com/articles,blogs,forums/anti-Chinese-persecution-in-the-USA-history-timeline.htm
USA’s warfare against China 1/ - http://www.voltairenet.org/article177063.html
> I'm saying we helped stop Hitler.
We? You mean the Americans stopped Hitler in WWII? Doubtful you were even alive then. And that statement is pretty meaningless. A lot of things stopped Hitler. One, he was almost out of oil. Two, the Russians. Three, his mental health due to his various drug addictions. Yes the Americans are somewhere on that list but to say "We stopped Hitler" is not accurate.
>And yes, the Vietnam War was a waste, because congress decided to break our promise, abandon South Vietnam, despite South Vietnam desperately begging us not to leave, and we let the North Vietnamese burn, pillage, enslave, and murder their way through South Vietnam, killing hundreds of thousands, throwing a million in slave labor camps, and displacing millions more.
Are you just parroting your government history books? This is far from the truth. Please read this book Kill Anything That Moves and get back to me: https://www.amazon.com/Kill-Anything-That-Moves-American/dp/1250045061 It is well documented that American soldiers were burning down villages and mass raping women in Vietnam. Leaving was the only thing they could do, because they were also getting their ass kicked.
>And Cambodia also fell because we left,
Wrong.
>and over one million were slaughtered in the Killing Fields as a result. Worst atrocity in US history.
That wasn't US history, that was Cambodian history, which you aren't accurately describing. The US bombed the shit out of Cambodia for a decade, killed thousands of innocent people, and even to this day, innocent Cambodians get mangled by US land mines. "We" fucked up that country beyond belief, then left and the Khmer Rouge came in and continued fucking it up.
> South Korea would not exist today if the US didn't fight the North Koreans. It would be one big Korea, only it would be like North Korea is today, a slave state.
Where is your proof of this claim?
> The nuclear bomb on Japan? That ended the Japanese Empire,
It was already over before the bomb(s). They were running out of oil as well.
>which up to that point, had murdered over twelve million people across Asia.
Link?
>Right up until they surrendered, they were still committing mass genocide in several Asian countries. The bomb put a stop to that, and it was the right thing to do.
I'm sure the surviving families of the nukes would totally agree! Anyway there were 2 bombs and the second one was 100% unnecessary, but the US wanted to flex its muscles and show the world what it had, to hell with the innocent Japanese people!
>Yeah the USSR taking over Europe sucked, but the US and Britain were fighting the greater evil at the time, the Nazis.
I know that's what the history books say, but where is your proof that the nazis were worse than the Soviets? Do you know how many died under communism? It's even more than Hitler managed to kill.
I'm just asking you to step away from the mainstream narrative a little. That's not where the truth lies here.
Here is the mobile version of your link
War Is a Force that Gives Us Meaning
--Chris Hedges
http://www.amazon.com/War-Force-that-Gives-Meaning/dp/1400034639
"War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning"
Great book
http://www.amazon.com/War-Force-that-Gives-Meaning/dp/1400034639/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1393981296&sr=8-1&keywords=war+is+a+force+that+gives+us+meaning
I actually guessed Cyprus from reading Chris Hedges book War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning. Thanks; I love stuff like this.
Pretty amazing book about this very topic. Not as much about the logistics but the philosophy of the topic. Not a happy read but worth it.
http://www.amazon.com/War-Force-that-Gives-Meaning/dp/1400034639
War Is A Force That Gives Us Meaning by Chris Hedges.
A succinct essay about the horror of war and its paradoxical allure.
Matterhorn by Karl Marlantes.
Probably one of the best war novels I've ever read. Based on the author's own experiences as a platoon leader in Vietnam.
War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning
>> It's classified because it has potentially dangerous information about Chemical Weapons
>
> 12 : The name and structure of the identified toxic chemical are contained in the full
classified report of the Secretariat, available to States Parties.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/State-Secrets-Insiders-Chronicle-Chemical/dp/1432725661
You can go to Amazon to find out the formulae of these agents. £5.89 for a kindle edition.
How can telling us what chemicals be a leak of "potentially dangerous" information?
It's all circumstancial "evidence" strung together very carefully to try to ignore all the inconvenient evidence as a massive propaganda exercise to try to kick Russia of the UNSC.
I'm not the one misleading, you are.
Nope, there's a layer of deniability still available to Russia:
The Weapon was originally made by Russia, sure. I mean we did keep it secret for years, but someone defected and wrote a book on how we were skirting the OPCW... But once this secret was out, plenty of people could have made it. Hell you can buy the instructions on Amazon.
This attack was obviously just a rogue chemical engineer that decided to create and use this obscure chemical weapon to settle a score or something...
https://www.amazon.com/State-Secrets-Insiders-Chronicle-Chemical/dp/1432725661/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1520920301&sr=8-1&keywords=vil+mirzayanov
Published in this book by a russian defector who used to work on it. You can also google when and where the recipe got released and it all comes back down on this book.
What do you mean I necro'ed this comment? I don't even know what that means. Why would I be afraid of your response? I'm not pushing for any narrative here, I'm actively seeking answers and giving you the opportunity to share the evidence.
Here is the "TV show" and as it turns out, its an interview. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v5nHrCMExaQ&ab_channel=RT Why don't you check your own sources?
First of all, Novichok originated in Russia yes. But it might surprise you that this Russian chemist Vil Mirzayanov https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vil_Mirzayanov exposed the formula to the public which anyone can use to create their own Novichok, you can even buy a book on amazon that details its production https://www.amazon.com/State-Secrets-Insiders-Chronicle-Chemical/dp/1432725661 This chemist now lives in the US. Also the OPCW concluded that they could not find evidence against Russia, so you are wrong that "all" intelligence agencies confirmed it was Russia that did it. Which agencies are you talking about anyway?
No I am not, this has got to be the worst attempt at straw manning I have ever encountered.... I actually feel ashamed for you..
Really, all I am asking is for evidence and I am still patiently waiting.
Craig Murray was British Ambassador to Uzbekistan from August 2002 to October 2004.
Further - since you apparently didn't bother reading.
He simply saved me the typing of the evidence from Dr. Robin Black, Head of the Detection Laboratory at the UK’s only chemical weapons facility - you know the guy in charge of the only facility in the UK's government that could make the claim that is being made by May.
Oh, and then he also provided evidence from The Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) - THE UN body in charge of classifying and enforcing international Chemical Weapons bans - you know the people that we used to justify wars in Syria, Iraq, etc.
OH - and... the evidence claims this "Newcomer" agent came from Soviets working in Uzbekistan... you know, the country that this "no name blogger" was the British Ambassador to when:
>And finally – Mirzayanov is an Uzbek name and the novichok programme, assuming it existed, was in the Soviet Union but far away from modern Russia, at Nukus in modern Uzbekistan. I have visited the Nukus chemical weapons site myself. It was dismantled and made safe and all the stocks destroyed and the equipment removed by the American government, as I recall finishing while I was Ambassador there. There has in fact never been any evidence that any “novichok” ever existed in Russia itself.
In case you missed it:
>#while I was Ambassador there
But yeah, scraping the bottom of the barrel with a complete nutter on the Internet here.
OH, and lest I forget:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/State-Secrets-Insiders-Chronicle-Chemical/dp/1432725661
The fucking formula is in that book, you can go buy it right now.
The $20 spring kit for the Compass from Mcarbo helped me a lot, brings the trigger way down and does it safely from what I can tell. Before I installed that kit, I was actually moving the reticle just trying to squeeze the trigger on the lowest setting. With it installed it feels somewhere around 2-3lbs, breaks a lot cleaner, and there's no more jump when I squeeze the trigger. Also, if you're dialing distance with your turrets, you want a bubble level attached to the scope. A $10 one off amazon is doing fine for me. Without one, a couple degrees of cant between shots is inches (or feet) off at distance.
Also, even as an experienced shooter, when I started getting involved with long range this book from Ryan Cleckner taught me quite a few tips that made me even better.
I also bought a T/C Compass this year in 6.5CM, got a discounted shooting mat on Midway, a $20 bipod off amazon and a $100 UTG scope. I plan on upgrading to a Vortex, but the so-so UTG scope does okay for now. With that setup, I'm handloading Hornady ELD-X bullets and am doing a good job whapping golf balls at 300 yards currently.
https://www.amazon.com/Long-Range-Shooting-Handbook-Cleckner/dp/151865472X
Long Range Shooting Handbook Paperback – January 31, 2016
by Ryan M Cleckner (Author)
It's been done before, and probably many/most/all cables are monitored by someone.
For what it's worth, Blind Man's Bluff includes the story of the US tapping an underwater cable between Kamchatka and Vladivostok. The tap was found and is now on display in Moscow. Picture
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Ivy_Bells
to new depths.
Nope. US subs already did that 30-odd years ago.
https://www.amazon.com/Blind-Mans-Bluff-Submarine-Espionage/dp/1610393589
Absolutely. I would direct you to this for a great history of US and Russian submarine operations. It also discusses the current state of the Russian (and US) submarine fleet. It's a very accurate and interesting resource.
>there are issues with exporting files overseas. That's been determined to be a legitimate state security issue, and you'll see the same thing with Software distribution.
https://www.amazon.com/U-S-Army-Improvised-Munitions-Handbook/dp/1684112737
You can order a book online to other countries and pdfs written BY THE GOVERNMENT on how to make explosives and ordinance from conventional, household materials and it is freely available and legal for anyone to buy and download. Hell it is even free to download off of government websites.
It seems to me if it has always been legal to buy books, as you have said, how to make machine guns, explosives, suppressors, and things which are outlawed or legal to make with only with a licence and sell it online to anyone.Interesting how now the government wants to take a stand.
>And, TBH, I don't know why people get so fixated on DD
I am fixated on it because it is a blatant violation of the first amendment and it pisses me off they think they have the authority to ignore the constitution to virtue signal about guns that don't, and never have, threatened public safety. People have been milling out "ghost guns" for years and there was no increase in crime or use of those guns to commit more crimes.
>Two words: Muslim ban. It's against the Establishment clause to discriminate against religions, and yet, Trump did it.
the supreme court ruling said:
>https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/26/us/politics/supreme-court-trump-travel-ban.html
>
>the president’s power to secure the country’s borders, delegated by Congress over decades of immigration lawmaking, was not undermined by Mr. Trump’s history of incendiary statements about the dangers he said Muslims pose to the United States.
Trump is using his authority under the Immigration Act of 1990 to control immigration and:
https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/8/1182
8 U.S. Code § 1182 - Inadmissible aliens
Whenever the President finds that the entry of any aliens or of any class of aliens into the United States would be detrimental to the interests of the United States, he may by proclamation, and for such period as he shall deem necessary, suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of aliens as immigrants or nonimmigrants, or impose on the entry of aliens any restrictions he may deem to be appropriate.
​
If we want to change that, I am fine if we go through congress. I am not saying it is morally right just it is technically within his powers to legally do. He has a right to ban entire classes of immigrants so long as he can justify they are "detrimental to the interests of the United States".
A book for a fellow comrade.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1684112737/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_uhjMDbYNWSYG8
You're completely incorrect about this. An IED is not difficult to make - you can construct one from scratch from common materials without anyone raising an eyebrow. There are instructions online the average person can follow - there's even a manual released by the U.S. military:
https://www.amazon.com/U-S-Army-Improvised-Munitions-Handbook/dp/1684112737
Making an effective and untraceable gun is much more complicated. I can't think of an instance of a shooter who has done this.
Reminds me of this book: http://www.amazon.com/Could-Tell-Then-Would-Destroyed/dp/193555414X
I'm using general symbology, the shape and colors. I've been interested and studied militaria since I was a kid. I've also served in the military and been assigned to facilities that are home to USASOC, AFSOC and JSOC units and some that house and assemble projects that show up on the congressional budget with nothing more than a two word title.
Not having anything to back up an explanation of a black project's or super secret unit's or facility 's insignia is sort of the point. They're kept vague on purpose so as to be confused with many other things, yet at the same time, have clear symbolism that have direct and explicit ties to what they represent.
Without a slogan or company name or personal rank, title or name, it points toward something that's unpublicized. Because of the selection of the red circle around the diamond shape, it tells me that a few things. Given that there is a near perfect representation of the Have Blue aircraft in the color blue inside a red circle, it's easy to deduce that the circle represents a radar display that shows nothing as the aircraft (Have Blue) is flying through the observed area. This flight path is shown by the blue vector line that bisects the aircraft. It is all represented on a desert tan background, because the aircraft was tested and flown out of Groom Lake. At the time of the project, military flight suits were sage green, so the desert tan is there to add emphasis for some reason.
Also, there can be a few different flight suit or uniform insignia used on black projects, because it confuses people and the insignia aren't required under the Geneva or Hague Conventions or the more modern UN conventions, rulings or guidelines for R&D projects that don't initiate hostilities.
I could be really wrong, I'm just positing one rather obvious theory. I'm just giving a fairly educated guess without having done any research.
If I was to seek further verification personally, I'd take a look at the works of Trevor Paglen. He has done a lot of work into researching the insignia of secret US defense projects and units. He has a book or two that have been published on secret US insignia and seems to be obsessed with them. He's a pretty good guy, look up his website and contact him, if he doesn't outright have an answer, he'll at least be very interested in researching it.
https://www.amazon.com/Could-Tell-Then-Would-Destroyed/dp/193555414X/ref=mp_s_a_1_4?keywords=trevor+paglen&qid=1565136762&s=gateway&sprefix=trevor+p&sr=8-4
I've got relatives that have retired after a life working in defense and aerospace, as well as some that were USAF lifers that have worked on interesting bases from Eglin to Beale. I'll ask them and get back to you if they've any ideas.
Here is a good source for stories on some of these emblems.
Keep in mind sonar is not my specialty, everything I know is effectively 20 years of hearsay. That being said, I do not know of a single time that the surface guys were able to find us without us giving them an unfair advantage. A submarines mission is to hang out, be quiet, and gather information without being detected. It's all about being hidden and unseen. The name is the Silent Service after all. If you want more info you should read Blind Man's Bluff. However, a submarine is one of the weakest and most vulnerable unit's so that when it comes to a shootout a submarine is sort of a single use weapon.
Have you ever read Blind Man's Bluff? I found it to be absolutely fascinating.
Here is the non-mobile link from the comment above
***
This bot is supported by the referral link above. If you wish to not use a referral link, you may use this link instead.
Blind Man's Bluff
I had an awesome recently published book on submarine warfare, that had a story very much similar to this in it. (Unfortunately I have given the book away) edit: this is the book http://www.amazon.com/Blind-Mans-Bluff-Submarine-Espionage/dp/006097771X/ref=pd_sim_b_5
An American sub had gone down, in the 1950's - 60's and no one knew why, they suspected a bad torpedo, with a reason like that article, but the bosses didn't want to know as it would put them in a bad light.
So this might be based on fact.
Check out operation ivy bells. Then check out the book blind man's bluff. Such a great read, and it will blow your mind some of the things that are done around the world.
You'll want to read Ivan's War, by Catherine Merridale. It's the best English-language treatment of the average soldier's experience.
This article has a detailed explanation. As I mentioned the "Hitler didn't use gas in the battlefield because of his own experiences" was a one theory and( I probably should have pointed out) not the most likely one. The article mentions also that chemical weapons were possibly used in battlefield at least one occasion.
> While Hitler may not have dropped chemical bombs, some believe the Germans did use poison gas against enemy soldiers in World War II. In her book “Ivan’s War,” Catherine Merridale writes that Nazis used poison gas to kill some 3,000 Soviet troops and civilians holed up in caves after the Battle of the Kerch Peninsula in 1942.
This also probably has some additional information.
Ivan's War: Life and Death in the Red Army 1939 - 1945 by Catherine Merridale
The Fall of Berlin 1945 by Anthony Beevor
Ivans War is a solid start from there I've read a number of books about individual battles some of which include personal anecdotes from soldiers but I've yet to come across a book, in English, written from a Russian soldiers perspective.
>Thanks! Just ordered Merridale, Catherine. Ivan’s War: Life and Death in the Red Army, 1939-1945. on the bay ($3.86freeshipping)
>
>Personal accounts are of interest. Have you read Tapping Hitler's Generals: Transcripts of Secret Conversations ...?
>
>Only just started but of interest especially the dissidents (?)
>
>for example pg 79 THOMA: I foresaw the whole thing....I regret every bomb, every scrap of material and every human life that is still being wasted in this senseless war. The only gain that the war will bring us is the end of the ten years of gangster rule...
>
>Every day the war continues constitute a crime. They must put Adolf Hitler in a padded cell. A gang of rogues can't rule forever. It would be a pity if any one of them was shot. They ought to be made to do heavy work until they drop down dead."
​
​
​
​
​
​
One wonders if he suspected he was being recorded;playing for the audience. Of course, it's easier to be judicious when one is safe, and, also, correct in hindsight
​
Thanks again!
Richard Preston has already written it
If you want a good, nonfiction book about this disease that will scare the living crap out of you, you can't do better than this one:
The Demon In The Freezer
Rabid, The Demon in the Freezer, and The Ghost Map are all books I've found fascinating about various diseases.
I would second /u/Amprvector's suggestion of both The Emperor of all Maladies, and The Selfish Gene as well.
The small pox vaccine is the only one I’m aware of that leaves a mark, most people in the U.S. used to have one but its much less common since small pox was all but eradicated.
The only small pox left in the world is government bioweapons and if those break out A) we’re fucked globally and B) the vaccine probably wont make much of a difference since they’ve been tinkering with them to make them worse than they were naturally. Check out Robert Preston’s “The Demon In The Freezer”
The new hotness in WWI history right now is "Sleepwalkers", but that has a lot in common with the scope of Catastrophe 1914. It's mainly focused on the lead-up to the war, beginning with the turmoil in Eastern Europe around the start of the 20th Century and zooming into much more in-depth diplomatic history about why the war actually started. It's excellent (if you're into that sort of thing) and offers a long, gripping tick-tock that is much more up-to-date than the classic "Guns of August".
If you're interested in reading about the military conflict itself, it's hard to go wrong with Keegan's The First World War. It's a broad overview history of the war that is very readable and might give you some ideas of topics worth further diving into.
/r/AskHistorians provides a Book List in their Wiki including [WWI] (https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/wiki/books/wwi) books.
I listened to "Blueprint for Armageddon" and liked it. Dan Carlin cites John Keegan a lot who wrote The First World War.
I personally like Margaret MacMillan's books The War that Ended Peace and Paris 1919 which deal with the political steps toward the war and the attempts at a permanent peace, respectively.
For an accessible book that represents the expanse of WWI, I love Eugene Rogan's The Fall of the Ottomans: The Great War in the Middle East.
John Keegan's The First World War is a well written one-volume history.
I don't know how badly out of date it is, since it was written in 2000, but Keegan is a top-notch military historian.
I'm actually in the middle of First World War by John Keegan and he makes the same claim (except for Britain). I don't know what his primary sources are though.
I can recommend two. 1) politics https://www.amazon.com/Sleepwalkers-How-Europe-Went-1914/dp/0061146668. Military https://www.amazon.com/First-World-War-John-Keegan/dp/0375700455.
Ghost in the Wires - The story of famed hacker Kevin Mitnick
Any Mary Roach Book if you like Science
In the Heart of the Sea - The true story behind Moby Dick
The Omnivore's Dilemma - A great walk through our food landscape
Gang Leader for a Day - Behavioral Economist embeds with a Chicago Gang
Shadow Divers - My first audiobook. It's a thriller about a scuba discovery of a Nazi Submarine on the Eastern US coast.
The Devil In The White City - A story about a serial killer at the Chicago World's Fair of 1893
Non-fiction for sure. I do really like history but sometimes its just too dense. I like to switch it up with non-fiction (or some sci-fi) that are kinda self-contained and only relate tangentially to larger events or just a lighter biography. Thinking Shadow Divers, The lost city of Z, Lost in Shangri-La, At Ease - Eisenhower or An American Doctor's Odyssey
Shadow Divers is a great book about the discovery and subsequent identification of a U-Boat off the coast of New Jersey
It's kind of a niche genre but I too am a history buff. I'm also a certified scuba diver and my all time favourite book is Shadow Divers by Robert Kurson.
https://www.amazon.ca/Shadow-Divers-Adventure-Americans-Everything/dp/0375760989
It's the true story of a WWII U-Boat found off the coast of New Jersey by a couple of divers. The book jumps back and forth between present day while the divers are trying to figure out what the heck the wreck is and figure out how it got there, and the ships history.
I've probably read it half a dozen times now! History, real life adventure and scuba :)
Shadow Divers by Robert Kurson.
From the book description: In the tradition of Jon Krakauer’s Into Thin Air and Sebastian Junger’s The Perfect Storm comes a true tale of riveting adventure in which two weekend scuba divers risk everything to solve a great historical mystery–and make history themselves.
The audio book is particularly good with great narration by Michael Prichard with his raspy and dramatic voice.
http://www.audible.com/pd/ref=sr_1_1?asin=B002V57VVS&qid=1348609611&sr=1-1
Here is the mobile version of your link
Guns Germs and Steel
A Short History of Nearly Everything
A Briefer History of Time
The Magic of Reality
Read Guns, Germs, and Steel.
Isaac Asimov wrote quite a few books on physics, some more textbook-y than others.
the book it seeks to explain why certain civilizations rose above others due to environmental differences as oppose to certain races/peoples just being superior.
http://www.amazon.com/Guns-Germs-Steel-Fates-Societies/dp/0393061310/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1311947161&sr=8-1
Must-read for topics like the one you are describing. There is a strong belief that Europe had the right blend of raw resources, timely technological discovery, and immunities to otherwise lethal pathogens. Meaning that if we were to turn back the clock and let everything play out again, Europe would likely be a colonial power just as it was in our history.
You will notice the absence of A short history of nearly everything, which is a good book, but frankly it didn't speak very much to me. Bryson is almost only interested in geography.
If you're interested in this topic, you should check out Guns, Germs, and Steel, an anthropology book that's basically about why Europe conquered the 'rest of the world' and not the other way around.
I highly recommend Jared Diamond's "Guns, Germs, and Steel" if you are interested in this topic. Definitely one of my favorite books.
http://www.amazon.com/Guns-Germs-Steel-Fates-Societies/dp/0393061310/ref=mt_hardcover?_encoding=UTF8&me=
> read Guns, Germs, and Steel, check it out.
...and try to get the British edition, not the US one (the cover picture is far more interesting)
EDIT: actually, the notable difference is between the non English language version and the English language version.
If you'd like a richer understanding of the many factors tied into such a question, try reading Guns, Germs, and Steel: the Fates of Human Societies by Jared Diamond.
No, it's actually correct. For an in-depth explanation, see Jared Diamond's Guns, Germs, and Steel, chapter 13, "Necessity's Mother: The Evolution of Technology." The short version is that things don't get invented until their enablers exist, and once those enablers exist, the floodgates open and we find uses for things, solutions to problems we hadn't previously realized were even problems.
There are some really good suggestions here, but a couple of books that were good entry points for me haven't been mentioned yet:
Sync by Steven Strogatz.
How The Universe Got Its Spots by Janna Levin.
Both of these books are rather specific interest type books, but they're both written so well that they are easy entry points into more reading later.
Edit: Ooh ooh I forgot about Plagues and Peoples. A great read that really makes you rethink global history, along the lines of (and drastically predating) another great book about cultural history Guns, Germs and Steel. Both of these books are kind of a mix of history, sociology and science, so it might not be what you're looking for though.
Guns, Germs and Steel. http://www.amazon.com/Guns-Germs-Steel-Fates-Societies/dp/0393061310/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1278186522&sr=8-1
Or just watch the DVD.
Hmm..., I've read the interview and something about it rubs me the wrong way. I find it unlikely, even in primitive times, that love was as free or casual as the author suggests. I'm not an expert, but don't humans have high maternal mortality rates that would discourage such behavior among women? That's not to say that I believe monogamy is necessarily the default position for humans, but I have trouble with several things the author purports. (The first link you posted, for example, claims that foraging tribes don't suffer from internal parasites, which I find to be highly unlikely). I am probably just going to have to break down and read this thing >.>
Since you seem to be interesting in this sort of thing, may I recommend:
Yale's open course on global population growth, which starts off with a good discussion of our evolutionary heritage.
Guns, Germs, and Steel, which I believe provides evidence for why the humans of today little resemble the primitive tribes of yore, and:
The Red Queen, which directly addresses this topic from the standpoint of evolutionary biology.
Don't feel obliged, though! ;-)
Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies by Jared Diamond
Based on those interests, he might like 1491 or maybe Guns, Germs and Steel, I mean, not to be quick to judge, but my stereotypical image of someone that likes gardening and southern shit would probably be turned off by YA fantasy/action fare and would probably be willing to tackle a harder book that is more close to his interests. AskHistorians has a monster book list but I'm not really familiar with which of those listed are accessible.
As a History major, I can't help but suggest Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond
Agree. Why, when I had history in high school, did no one think to mention that one of the primary figures of WWII wrote a history that earned him the Nobel prize in LITERATURE??? http://www.amazon.com/Second-World-War-Winston-Churchill/dp/039541685X
My recollection of Churchill's account of this event from his (excellent) history of WW2 roughly matches your description.
I think the imminence of the fall of Singapore was far more evident to the commander on the scene than to Churchill, who seemed certain that the fortress city could withstand a long siege and was shocked when it fell so rapidly.
Well, there's always Winston Churchill's six-volume work on the subject, The Second World War: https://www.amazon.com/dp/039541685X/ref=cm_sw_r_sms_awdb_-ovzybAE3R3F1
This is what I'm talking about: abridged version on Amazon vs. the six volume set on Amazon
If you want history the best you can get is "Playing at the World". Very thorough.
https://www.amazon.com/Playing-at-World-Jon-Peterson/dp/0615642047/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1495168274&sr=8-1&keywords=playing+at+the+world
I'm currently working through Playing at the World by Jon Peterson. While the primary focus is on how D&D evolved out of war-gaming, its a great read on how all the early war gaming culture working and how such games themselves also evolved.
Fair warning it is very cool but written in a rather academic tone. (Which i love as a history nerd because the fact his sources include all the war game zines just makes it so great)
thanks, i'll have an eye on it, love the way you are doing this, for sure you have me for this game!
You should get on twitter an tweet your progress... i'm also there (@WLueger), making a card game about the habsburgs, also always wanted to make a war-game, especially the "stalingrad" theme i was interested in. but as i started with this book:
https://www.amazon.de/Playing-World-Simulating-Adventures-Role-Playing/dp/0615642047/ref=sr_1_18?ie=UTF8&qid=1479442167&sr=8-18&keywords=history+war+game+book
i realised that i'm not that far ;-)
The Japanese historian Tsuyoshi Hasegawa made the most thorough research on the matter to date, including all manner of Japanese political records from that time. It's always been known among people who know WW2 history, but the Soviet intervention that really pushed the Japanese over the edge at least to a substantial degree. Having dozens of their cities bombed and firestormed by the US already with similar or more destruction before the atomic bombs didn't cause them to surrender anyways, which is more telling than anything else.
One article regarding his research: http://foreignpolicy.com/2013/05/30/the-bomb-didnt-beat-japan-stalin-did/
He also wrote a book called Racing the Enemy. At the very least, it's a far deeper critical analysis than other existing works on the matter and especially the lazily-repeated "The nukes saved millions of lives."
Also, think about it this way: Do you really think the US government would admit their Soviet rivals pushed Japan over the edge after using nuclear weapons? Do you also think the US would give their Soviet rivals any credit for surrender of Japan? The biggest (and false) argument that is made to defend the use of nuclear weapons is "It saved lots of lives." Once that goes out the door, there's nothing left.
As I said above, this is a controversial issue, and there are many people who believe this would not have been the case.
Eisenhower wrote in his memoirs that he did not believe it to be strategically necessary:
>my grave misgivings, first on the basis of my belief that Japan was already defeated and that dropping the bomb was completely unnecessary, and secondly because I thought that our country should avoid shocking world opinion by the use of a weapon whose employment was, I thought, no longer mandatory as a measure to save American lives.
There is a good book on the factors that led to the surrender of Japan by Tsuyoshi Hasegawa which I recommend.
There is of course a lot of opposition to this thinking. This article comes to mind. To your point:
>"We would have kept on fighting until all Japanese were killed, but we would not have been defeated," by which he meant that they would not have been disgraced by surrender.
The Japanese parliament did approve a civilian defense force called Kokumin Giyū Sentōtai with a theoretical strength of 280,000. They were extremely poorly armed, but were charged with the defense of the mainland in the event of an invasion. They were disbanded without incident after the surrender was formalized. It is worth noting that Germany gave similar orders for a total defense of the homeland in the final weeks of the war - which went nowhere due to the lack of supplies, and tapped out manpower.
I have complex feeling on the subject, but I think I do believe that nuclear weapons were not a necessary part of why there was no insurgency within Japan after the war - the declaration of surrender, and the emperor's address to the nation was. Whether the declaration of surrender could only be obtained with nuclear weapons is a slightly different issue.
That's a discredited theory that's not supported by the evidence. Gar Alperovitz is a crank - he wants the history to support his clear moral vision re: Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and he twists whatever facts he needs to, and ignore every source he can, to do so. His theory was at best speculative in 1964, and disproven since.
(Psst, if Japan was "going to surrender anyway," why did the Big Six dead lock on a *conditional* surrender after the nukes dropped? Why was unprecedented intervention of Hirohito necessary?)
​
A much better, and much more comprehensive, account of the end of the Pacific War, based on American, Russian, and Japanese sources (the latter two virtually ignored by Alperovitz) is Downfall by Frank.
https://www.amazon.com/Downfall-End-Imperial-Japanese-Empire/dp/0141001461
​
If you only trust "revisionist" historians, they've also concluded that Gar Alperovitz's thesis is wrong. I believe this is the standard text for contemporary revisionists: https://www.amazon.com/Racing-Enemy-Stalin-Truman-Surrender/dp/0674022416
You're welcome. My next step will be to read the book mentioned in the article.
I, too, am hopeful that scholarship in this area will expand in the near future.
Tsuyoshi Hasegawa's book "Racing the Enemy: Stalin, Truman, and the Surrender of Japan", to which the Counterpunch article refers, can be found here.
Seems relevant not only because today's August 6, but in light of the recent revelations about the US fabrications of the rationales for and progress of the wars in the Middle East.
I'm starting to get the sense that you didn't read my first comment. I literally said a very specific two year period before the end of stalingrad.
I then went on to talk about the people who joined the red army in the early war after the shock of operation barbarossa.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Barbarossa
Read the following Books for more information:
Ivan's war
Stalingrad
Leningrad
The Fall of Berlin
I don't know why you keep posting things from after the date range I specified. So many of the men who faugh in the early battles were dead by the time even operation Uranus took place, let alone during invasion of Germany.
Here's the book I read that went into detail on this:
http://www.amazon.com/Ivans-War-Life-Death-1939-1945/dp/0312426526
It's about 3/4 of the way through, talking about the average Soviet soldier's experience during and after the war.
OP, read this book. It does a good job of explaining why Europeans and East Asians have dominated the rest of the world. Really good read, and it will explain in an relatively unbiased way why a lot of the unequal shit in the world is the way it is.
Also, it is my humble opinion that black people are the funniest race. So, there will always be that, despite the small minority of screw ups that can give a whole race a bad name.
Gun, Germs and Steel. That is what Jared Diamond says, that is why they won.
But then there is also the James Webb thesis: Born Fighting. While Webb is writing about the Scots-Irish in America I think some of his conclusions can be extended to all of Europe. North Europe held one of the last people to have a warrior culture, one of the last places to be civilized. Perhaps they (and we) carry the seeds of that in their genes, making them more willing to fight than most other cultures that have a longer history of civilization.
Guns, Germs, and Steel
You might enjoy reading Guns Germs and Steel by Jared Diamond. He discusses among other things the evolution of languages and dialects and how they spread, specifically in Africa. The book tries to explain the reason certain people's from certain continents prevailed over others. It's pretty awesome read if you're into that sort of thing.
http://ebookee.org/Guns-Germs-and-Steel_318098.html
Or if you feel like paying
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0393061310?ie=UTF8&force-full-site=1&ref_=aw_bottom_links
Can you do a better job summing up WWII in one pithy sentence? If you want the more detailed version here you go.
No information? You didn't look very carefully. There are whole message boards dedicated solely to the campaigns currently running and modding it.
http://ruinsofmurkhill.proboards.com/
http://odd74.proboards.com/
The modules are easy and cheap to buy: http://www.dmsguild.com/product/28306/ODD-Dungeons--Dragons-Original-Edition-0e
Believe it or not, the rules weren't arbitrary and were playtested extensively. Here's a fantastic document that goes through the rules and the reasons behind them: http://www.grey-elf.com/philotomy.pdf
Here's a popular essay on the playstyle and mindset behind 0th edition. http://www.lulu.com/shop/matthew-finch/quick-primer-for-old-school-gaming/ebook/product-3159558.html
Playing at the World is one of the most well-known book son D&D and it covers the development of 0e in ridiculous detail. https://www.amazon.com/Playing-at-World-Jon-Peterson/dp/0615642047
There's even a youtube channel by that book's author that really fascinating: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCwYnGnADL76LauJhAYPoivA/videos
Read for yourself, as this is THE definitive history of tabletop RPGs. You may have a copy in your local library system. Also, the testimony (included in the book) of surviving original gamers make this quite clear: THEY DID NOT CARE.
Again, please stop trying to compare me to you. Nothing is going to get me to support pedophilia like you, my friend. It's gross.
I like how you said there are plenty of sources other than Zeitgeist, which you haven't provided. Just give me a respected New Testament scholar who believes Jesus didn't exist. It's not a hard concept.
Ahhh the old "most suffering ever" line. Have you ever read The Encyclopedia of Wars? It's a study of all wars fought throughout history, which demonstrates that religion is the cause of about 7% of all of histories wars, and Islam brings up about half of those.
Way to ignore the violent atheist regimes of the 20th century, btw. Atheism is violent and holding us back.
See? 2 can play at that game, but only one of us is right (HINT: It's the guy who sources his info and doesn't link to long debunked bullshit lmao, quit while you're this far behind, kid.)
> More wars have been fought and more people have died over the Bible than any other piece of written scripture in history. Yeah religion had a big role in the US. It started as missionaries from England coming over and starting "churches" that taxed the hell out of the locals.
You have a very cynical and twisted view of religion. What's more, it's completely factually untrue. In the history of the world, only 3.23% of wars were motivated by a religion other the Islam, and only 6.98% of wars were motivated by religion including Islam. Religious-based wars account for less than 2% of people killed in warfare. The idea that religion is a major cause of wars is a serious myth. Here's a little graph to put that in perspective: https://carm.org/images/religious-wars-bar-chart.jpg. My source by the way for this is Encylopedia of Wars: https://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Wars-Library-World-History/dp/0816028516.
I'm not even sure what you're referring to when you talk about missionaries coming over and taxing people. How would missionaries tax people? I'd like a source on that. Even the government didn't have the right to tax people as it needed to in the original U.S. government, which is partially what led to the constitution. I was referring to the many people who came to America seeking religious freedom and the heavy influence religion had on some of the founding fathers and their ideas.
> Organized religion has no purpose
It's like you're telling Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin no one has ever gone to the moon. Organized religion has done so much good for so many people I personally know throughout my life it's amazing. It brings people together in communities that help each other, teach each other, encourage each other, give support to each other, and improve society. Without organized religion, you have none of that. You have no charitable donations. You have no service projects. You have no one looking after you, encouraging you, supporting you, lifting you up. Do you really think you can make it in this life alone? That's the purpose of organized religion.
https://www.amazon.com/Defense-Internment-Racial-Profiling-Terror/dp/0895260514
I haven't had a chance to read this yet but it looks very interesting
>Everything you've been taught about the World War II "internment camps" in America is wrong:
They were not created primarily because of racism or wartime hysteria
They did not target only those of Japanese descent
They were not Nazi-style death camps...
>In Defense of Internment shows that the detention of enemy aliens, and the mass evacuation and relocation of ethnic Japanese from the West Coast were not the result of irrational hatred or conspiratorial bigotry. This document-packed book highlights the vast amount of intelligence, including top-secret "MAGIC" messages, which revealed the Japanese espionage threat on the West Coast.
Malkin also tells the truth about:
who resided in enemy alien internment camps (nearly half were of European ancestry)
what the West Coast relocation centers were really like (tens of thousands of ethnic Japanese were allowed to leave; hundreds voluntarily chose to move in)
why the $1.65 billion federal reparations law for Japanese internees and evacuees was a bipartisan disaster
how both Japanese American and Arab/Muslim American leaders have united to undermine America's safety
Hi! I admit that FDR effected internment of Japanese-Americans during WW2 and that that was a terrible thing for him and America to do.
I think most liberals are now of the opinion that that was a terrible thing - that's why they don't like people suggesting the same be done for Muslims.
If you are looking for a prominent current figure who has endorsed internment and defended it, you can find her on Fox News or read her book:
http://www.amazon.com/In-Defense-Internment-Racial-Profiling/dp/0895260514
https://www.amazon.com/Kill-Anything-That-Moves-American/dp/1250045061
Yeah...no. There was pretty horrific brutality, the equivalent of a Mai Lai massacre every week of the war. Millions of civilians were killed. In Vietnam the only potential 'game change' would have been invading the North and shutting down the NVA bases/recruitment centers. The reason that wasn't done was because of fears of fighting China again as was the case in Korea...which given their performance against Vietnam right after the Vietnam war (conflict over the Vietnamese invading Cambodia and toppling Pol Pot) shows that they were a paper tiger at the time. Still, given the rate of casualties was much higher for the US in the Korean war vs. Vietnam, I could see how the politicians were deathly afraid of fighting the Chinese again for political reasons (high body counts were not politically popular), especially just to secure Vietnam.
The truth is that we pink monkeys crave war and seek to create the conditions for it.
The historical mess in the middle east will not be resolved until something drastic happens; the history of Israel in the region is one of repeated bellus interruptus (to coin a phrase) where hostilities started, but were stopped by external forces before being resolved...
At least that's what I think on more cynical days. (like today)
Long Range Shooting Handbook
​
Ryan Cleckner, former Ranger sniper, covers long range shooting (obviously), but the vast majority of the material is applicable to any kind of rifle shooting. He goes into a little history, terminology, choosing and setting up your rifle and gear, rifle maintenance, ballistics, calculations and scope adjustments, shooting technique, and a bunch more.
​
Despite the 'long range' label, he doesn't go overboard on the minutia of reading wind or correcting for Coriolis force. He has a follow up book ("Advanced Long Range Shooting") for the more esoteric stuff. It's all written for a layman, and anyone with two brain cells to rub together could understand it. Essentially, you can read the book with no previous knowledge and come out with a great baseline for getting started with rifles.
Trevor Paglen: Classified World of Military Patches
His book is called I Could Tell You But Then You Would Have to be Destroyed by Me
Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond
This book gives good insight to why certain societies developed at different rates. The short answer is geography - this is the most basic necessity for humans to move from hunter gatherers to more developed societies is the presence of very specific, interdependent circumstances based on geography.
Guns Germs and Steel is a book you might want to read. It talks about this exact subject.
Someone wrote an entire book on this: http://www.amazon.com/Guns-Germs-Steel-Fates-Societies/dp/0393061310/
tl;dr: Europe was much better suited for farming and such so society there could develop faster. You should probably just read it though. There was also a series of documentaries you could watch.
Without religion, you wouldn't have [all of these things] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Role_of_the_Christian_Church_in_civilization) which exactly what make up what you call a "civilization" in the first place, and it is just the contributions of one religion. Religious institutions have been running schools and hospitals long before governments did. In fact, the origins of the education, hospital and legal systems, science, arts, charity, nearly all aspects of a civilization can all be traced back on religion. It was only rather recently that secular institutions emerged to fulfill the roles that religions have been doing for thousands of years. Religion is literally civilization itself.
It is only but a tiny minority of religious people who perpetrate evils in the name of their religion. The atrocities committed by non-religious people, for reasons that have nothing to do with religion, far, far outnumber those few people who claim religion as their motivation. Religion has been responsible for only the tiniest miniscule fraction of atrocities in history and this is supported by evidence. According to the [Encyclopedia of Wars] (http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Wars-Volume-Library-History/dp/0816028516) only less than 7% of wars in history have been religious in nature and only less than 2% of people was killed in these wars.
Without religion, there would have been more wars and atrocities in history because religion is actually the tool societies use to suppress the animalistic nature of man. The foundational teachings of all major religions are suppression of selfish desire and control of human behaviour, and high esteem for the value of the life of man. Without religion, Islamic terrorism would not cease to exist but rather the entire Middle East would be in chaos as religion has been the main source of morality for most people and for most of history. Without religion, there would be no civilization for all wars and atrocities to occur in the first place as it is religion that is the [foundation of civilization] (http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2011/06/gobekli-tepe/mann-text/2
]earliest archaeological evidence).
Educate yourselves ladies. Smallpox is one of my favorite bugs right behind Ebola and Marburg.
http://www.amazon.com/Scourge-Once-Future-Threat-Smallpox/dp/0871138301
http://www.amazon.com/Demon-Freezer-Richard-Preston/dp/0345466632/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1321538440&sr=1-1
http://www.amazon.com/Hot-Zone-Terrifying-True-Story/dp/0385495226/ref=sr_1_6?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1321538440&sr=1-6
> It was only the sheer certainty of systematic destruction of every major Japanese city by atomic bombings that got the Japanese to surrender.
>
> A conventional invasion, the next and only other option, would have killed millions of Japanese civilians, directly and indirectly.
It really wasn't.
America were too slow, and it could be argued that the soviet invasion of Manchuria was far more influential towards ending the war as the japanese government feared a russian invasion far more than nuclear weapons.
this book makes a fairly good case into how it was the entry of the Russians that became the deciding factor, not the bombs:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0674022416
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombing_of_Dresden_in_World_War_II&ved=2ahUKEwjB6Ynr9sHlAhVtwcQBHTHVAmkQFjAaegQIBhAP&usg=AOvVaw0f-Zu4889XYPIL7_vqNYH0
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bengal_famine_of_1943&ved=2ahUKEwich7aD98HlAhVS0aYKHW02BgkQFjAUegQIBRAB&usg=AOvVaw1yx2CdhanuhqHxo-kYK6YV
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attack_on_Mers-el-K%25C3%25A9bir&ved=2ahUKEwjpvp7X98HlAhU54KYKHfD6DogQFjAcegQIBxAX&usg=AOvVaw1sKVt554Rvtv18gzd6_5_m
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rape_during_the_occupation_of_Germany&ved=2ahUKEwjW5-P398HlAhXHwqYKHQ-FCAIQFjAJegQIBBAI&usg=AOvVaw0vEdSlpE5N1_b4jz0bsYUy
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internment_of_Japanese_Americans&ved=0ahUKEwjRk8eN-MHlAhUO06YKHURACOMQFgh5MA4&usg=AOvVaw2_y4sEZdcrOYMuwJ9ow6KC&cshid=1572368442040
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://www.amazon.com/Racing-Enemy-Stalin-Truman-Surrender/dp/0674022416&ved=0ahUKEwjHn8PF-MHlAhUVxMQBHYZeA6UQFghbMAU&usg=AOvVaw0ZQqZOxoHohKuP9t0uRhdv
Anyone could've bought Mirzayanov's book from 2008. To think that government agencies that spend trillions on defence do not have the capability to buy a book and recreate it is naive. Honestly, I think they'd have the knowledge even without it - for a state to recreate a nerve agent is nothing sophisticated really.
The coolest thing of all this is probably its Mission Patch.
Edit:
Apologies. Was not trying to promote sales just trying to encourage thoughts on mysterious and clandestine mission patches. Not sure how accurate these are, pulled from Google images.