Forgotten Weapons
Published on 13 Apr 2019This Bren is lot #1013 at Morphy’s April 2019 auction:
https://www.forgottenweapons.com/shoo…The Bren gun is widely regarded as one of the best light machine guns ever built, but that reputation is based on the British .303 caliber version. How does the design perform in 8mm Mauser? Today I am going to find out, using one of the John Inglis “sterile” 8mm Brens.
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Contact:
Forgotten Weapons
PO Box 87647
Tucson, AZ 85754
April 14, 2019
Shooting the Inglis 8mm Bren Gun
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British diplomatic blunders in history – German unification
An interesting article in Vox, suggesting that the gradual unification of all the German principalities, electorates, duchies, counties, bishoprics, free cities, and miscellaneous other semi-independent bits and bobs of the Holy Roman Empire was not inevitable and that — absent British blundering after the Napoleonic wars — it would have produced a very different 20th century:
The Holy Roman Empire in 1789, before Napoleon “rationalized” hundreds of smaller entities into the Confederation of the Rhine.
Image from Wikimedia Commons.
The boundaries of states are the heart of many recent debates, be it the European refugee crisis, the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), or Brexit (Snower and Langhammer 2019). After decades of stability, today we are again seeing heated discussions about the shape and extent of political borders. Clearly, borders are neither naturally given nor random. In Europe and elsewhere, the current state borders have been formed and changed over centuries, sometimes peacefully, often in bloody wars. In Huning and Wolf (2019), we look at the formation of the German nation state led by Prussia and trace it back to a change in borders decided at the Congress of Vienna in 1814/15.
In a nutshell, we have two findings:
- First, the geographic position of a state can be a crucial factor for institutional change and development.
- Second, the formation of the German Zollverein in 1834 under Prussian leadership was a truly European story, involving Britain, the Russian Empire, and the Belgian revolution of 1830/31. We show in particular that the Zollverein formed as an unintended consequence of Britain’s intervention in 1814/15 to push back Russian influence over Europe.
In theory, why would the geographic position of a state relative to that of other states matter? Intuitively, it should matter as long as the costs of trade and factor flows depend on their routes. If a large share of my trade has to pass the territory of one or several neighbours, my trade and trade policy will depend on the trade policy of my neighbours. Moreover, if tariffs are levied not only on imports but also on transit trade, as was general practice until the Barcelona Statute of 1921 (Uprety 2006), policymakers face the problem of multiple marginalisation, which is well known from the literature on supply chains. In our work, we provide a simple theoretical framework (in partial equilibrium) to show how the location of a revenue maximising state planner will affect its ability to set tariffs. Some states can increase their tariff revenue at the expense of their hinterland. Next, we show that a customs union can be beneficial for a group of states exactly because it solves the problem of multiple marginalisation.
A major challenge to testing our idea empirically is that a state’s political boundaries (and hence its location) do not change very often, and if they do, the change is unlikely to be unrelated to trade or factor flows. However, the formation of the German Zollverein in 1834 can be considered as a quasi-experiment. Let us briefly revisit this historical episode. At the end of the Napoleonic wars of 1792-1814/15, only Russia and the UK were left as major military powers. Habsburg, Prussia, and the defeated France attempted to consolidate their positions at the expense of the many smaller states that had just about survived the wars, notably the former allies of Napoleon such as Saxony and Poland. Overall, the negotiations at the Congress of Vienna in 1814 were dominated by military-strategic considerations between the two great powers. Russia wanted to expand westwards, Prussia was desperate to annex the populous Kingdom of Saxony, which bordered Prussia in the south and would create a large and coherent territory. To this end, Prussia was willing to give up not only her Polish territories to Russia, but also her positions and claims on the Rhineland (Müller 1986). This met stiff resistance from Britain, joined by Habsburg and France, which feared a new Russian hegemony on the continent – the ‘Polish Saxon question’. After weeks of diplomatic struggle, the outcome was a division of Saxony, another division of Poland and Prussia being established as the “warden of the German gate against France” (Clapham 1921: 98). Figure 1 shows the result of these negotiations.
H/T to Continental Telegraph for the link.
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The Invasion of Norway and Denmark – WW2 – 033 – April 13 1940
World War Two
Published on 13 Apr 2019This week, the Phoney War seems to come to an end when Germany invades Denmark and Norway. The Allies seek confrontation with Germany in the hope to at least deny them full access to the Swedish iron mines. Nevertheless, the Germans are prepared and have been planning this for weeks. It looks like it will cost a lot to put a stop to it.
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Source list: http://bit.ly/WW2sourcesWritten and Hosted by: Indy Neidell
Produced and Directed by: Spartacus Olsson and Astrid Deinhard
Executive Producers: Bodo Rittenauer, Astrid Deinhard, Indy Neidell, Spartacus Olsson
Creative Producer: Joram Appel
Research by: Indy Neidell
Edited by: Iryna Dulka
Map animations: EastoryColorisations by Norman Stewart and JuliusJaa (https://www.flickr.com/photos/juliusjaa/)
Eastory’s channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCEly…
Archive by Screenocean/Reuters https://www.screenocean.comSources:
Riksarkivet
File reference: RA/PA-1209/U/Uj/L0203
Author: unknown
File reference: RA/PA-1209/U/Uj/L0203
Author: unknownA TimeGhost chronological documentary produced by OnLion Entertainment GmbH.
From the comments:
World War Two
1 hour ago
Hey all! The Phoney war is over, and although we have learned in the last months that it wasn’t as uneventful as is generally believed, the war really takes off here. While this is going live, we are in France to film future events, which I won’t spoil in this video. If you don’t mind too much, do check out our road trip vlogs (the many specials we shot here will have to be edited and will be published over the spring). We have seen very interesting things and we will challenge many misconceptions and myths about the upcoming events of World War Two. Thank you all for your ongoing support!Cheers,
Joram
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April 13, 2019
Canadian 8mm “Sterile” Bren Gun
Forgotten Weapons
Published on 12 Apr 2019This Bren is lot #1013 at Morphy’s April 2019 auction:
https://www.forgottenweapons.com/cana…The John Inglis company in Toronto first opened in 1859 as a metalworking shop, and grew steadily over the decades under first John Inglis, and then later his sons. Inglis did substantial amounts of military work during World War One, but the Great Depression hit it hard, and both William and Alexander Inglis died in 1935 and 1936 respectively. The company went into receivership but was purchased by one Major James Hahn (DSO) and a group of business partners in November of 1936. Hahn and his associates saw an opportunity to use this large manufacturing facility to make machine guns for the military, and they were successful – in October 1938 they were awarded a contract to make 5000 MkI Bren guns. More contracts would follow, and by the height of World War Two the company had some 15,000 employees and more than a million square feet of floor space.
Among many other projects, Inglis was contracted to make small arms for sale to the Nationalist Chinese government under Chiang Kai Shek – both High Power pistols and Bren guns in 8mm Mauser (to fit the Chinese standardization on that cartridge). A batch of 8mm ZB-30 light machine guns were brought in from the Far East to use as a pattern, and Inglis engineers were able to successfully redesign the Bren to use that cartridge and magazine.
Where the story gets hazy is in trying to determine how many were made and for whom. The Chinese guns are marked in Mandarin on the receivers, and have “CH” prefix serial numbers, like the Chinese contract High Power pistols. However, two additional variations exist without those Chinese markings. Some are marked “7.92 Bren MkI” and “Inglis 1943” (or 44 or 45), and others – like this one – are just marked “7.92 Bren MkI”. The dated ones are typically referred to as Resistance guns, intended to be supplied to European resistance units for whom 7.92mm ammunition was more readily available than .303 – although information on how many guns were supplied in this way (if any) is difficult to find. The last group is generally called “sterile”, and it is not clear what their purpose is. This particular example is one of 23 that were registered in the US in the early 1960s to Interarms, and it does appear that they were associated with some clandestine US military activities. The serial numbers of those 23 Interarms guns range from 1-5343 to 2-8045, suggesting a production of 13,000 or perhaps as many as 28,000 guns – that is quite a lot to be undocumented and missing.
Hopefully, more information will turn up in the future to shed light on the purpose and use of these 8mm Brens. We do know for sure that many thousands did go to Chinese forces, and some were brought into the UK, where in the 1960s they were used in the development of the 7.62mm NATO L4 version of the Bren.
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Contact:
Forgotten Weapons
PO Box 87647
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TAB Episode 43: QF 2pdr Anti-Tank Gun
The Armourer’s Bench
Published on Mar 10, 2019Introduced just before the beginning of WW2 the 2pdr AT Gun was more than capable of dealing with Axis tanks at the beginning of the war but as tank armour got thicker it became outgunned. Despite this the 2pdr remained in service and equipped a plethora of tanks and armoured cars including the Valentine and Matilda.
The 2pdr performed well during the Battle of France, in North Africa and during the defence of Malaya against the Japanese but it was eventually replaced by bigger and better guns. In this video Matt looks at the history, development and use of Britain’s first anti-tank gun.
Check out our accompanying blog on the 2pdr AT Gun over at: https://armourersbench.com
If you enjoyed the video please consider supporting our work via Patreon, TAB is a viewer supported, non-monetised channel and any help is very much appreciated!
Check out our Patreon page here: https://www.patreon.com/thearmourersbench
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April 9, 2019
Blue’s Dumb History Tales
Overly Sarcastic Productions
Published on 8 Mar 2019Please check out That Works for the best blacksmithing on YouTube: https://goo.gl/vXsuFt
What do you get when you cross a month that has 5 Fridays with a historian who can’t do math? This nonsense, apparently.
PATREON: https://www.patreon.com/OSP
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April 8, 2019
April 7, 2019
Germans and British make their way to the North – WW2 – 032 – April 6 1940
World War Two
Published on 6 Apr 2019While China gets a new government, or at least in the eyes of Japan, the British are trying to cope with the rationing of meat and dairy products by trying out some new recipes. More importantly, Germany seems to be very serious about invading Norway. However, the British also plan to move closer to Norway.
Join us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/TimeGhostHistory
Or join The TimeGhost Army directly at: https://timeghost.tvFollow WW2 day by day on Instagram @World_war_two_realtime https://www.instagram.com/world_war_t…
Join our Discord Server: https://discord.gg/D6D2aYN.
Between 2 Wars: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list…
Source list: http://bit.ly/WW2sourcesWritten and Hosted by: Indy Neidell
Produced and Directed by: Spartacus Olsson and Astrid Deinhard
Executive Producers: Bodo Rittenauer, Astrid Deinhard, Indy Neidell, Spartacus Olsson
Creative Producer: Joram Appel
Research by: Indy Neidell
Edited by: Iryna Dulka
Map animations: EastoryColorisations by Norman Stewart
Eastory’s channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCEly…
Archive by Screenocean/Reuters https://www.screenocean.comA TimeGhost chronological documentary produced by OnLion Entertainment GmbH.
From the comments:
World War Two
2 days ago (edited)
The war seems to be heating up. As both the Germans and the Allies move towards Norway, the Soviets commit a big war crime in Katyn. We have made a ‘War Against Humanity’ episode in which we explain how Stalin and Beria ordered the mass murder. You can see that right here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gd5YhhNcC44 And a friendly reminder for the existence of our own discord server: https://discord.gg/D6D2aYN.Cheers!
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April 6, 2019
“The Prime Minister has repaid my loyalty with betrayal”
Despite the full applicability of the headline to Canadian politics, this isn’t about the Dauphin’s betrayal of cabinet ministers or the Canadian people, it’s actually Matt Ridley talking about Prime Minister Theresa May:
The Prime Minister has ignored the views of the majority of her Cabinet and ruled out No Deal. The reason, we are told, is that No Deal might lead to the re-imposition of direct rule over Northern Ireland, and might lead to a second Scottish independence referendum.
That either of these considerations should outweigh the independence of the United Kingdom from an increasingly decrepit but increasingly autocratic empire is bizarre. If No Deal causes a second referendum in Scotland – we were told that the vote itself would cause that too, remember, but it did not – then we will win that too.
But more bizarre is that these worries have existed all along. If the Prime Minister thinks the risk of direct rule in Northern Ireland (which is happening in practice anyway) trumps all other considerations, and rules out No Deal, then why did she not say so more than two years ago or at any time since? Instead, she said 108 times that we would leave the EU on 29th March, whatever happens; 50 times that she would not extend that date; and 32 times that No Deal is better than a bad deal. Not once did she say it was impossible.
[…]
Mrs May should have ruled out No Deal at the start of the negotiations, if that is what she thought, or she should have meant “No Deal is better than a bad deal” when she said it. As it is, the combination of threatening No Deal until the moment when it might actually matter in the negotiations, then dropping the threat on the feeblest of latest excuses, is about as foolish as one can imagine. And now rushing off to hand the initiative to an apologist for totalitarians, anti-Semites and terrorists instead. Thanks.
The Prime Minister and her allies are now chanting that it is all the fault of the European Research Group for rejecting her deal and are saying they have no alternative than the dismal choices of supporting her deal or no Brexit, as if amnesiac about the third option: their recent promises to leave with No Deal if necessary. Yet the truth is that ever since the debacle at Chequers in July, when everybody from half the Cabinet to the Democratic Unionists to the media to the people themselves told her quite clearly that she would never get the Chequers plan through Parliament, she has been the one at fault.
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April 5, 2019
The Brexit trainwreck is “revealing to the British public the extent of its political class’s incompetence”
Theodore Dalrymple in City Journal on the scale of political tomfoolery going on in the Brexit clusterfutz:
The imbroglio over Brexit has at least had the merit of revealing to the British public the extent of its political class’s incompetence. If it is accepted that people get the leadership that they deserve, however, thoughts unflattering to self-esteem ought to occur to the British population.
Theresa May did not emerge from a social vacuum. She is typical of the class that has gradually attained power in Britain, from the lowest levels of the administration to the highest: unoriginal, vacillating, humorless, prey to the latest bad ideas, intellectually mediocre, believing in nothing very much, mistaking obstinacy for strength, timid but nevertheless avid for power. Thousands of minor Mays populate our institutions, as thousands of minor Blairs did before them.
Avidity for power is not the same as leadership, and Brexit required leadership. There was none to be had, however, from the political class. From the very first, it overwhelmingly opposed Brexit — for some, the eventual prospect of a tax-free, expense-jewelled job in Brussels was deeply alluring — but found itself in a dilemma, since it could not openly deny the majority’s expressed wish. Many Members of Parliament sat for constituencies in which a solid majority had voted for Brexit. They feared that they would not win their next election.
The opposition Labour Party was as divided as the Conservatives. Irrespective of what its MPs actually believed about Brexit—its leader was, until recently, ardent for leaving the European Union, which he believed to be a capitalists’ club, changing his mind for reasons that he has so far not condescended to disclose — its main concern was to force an election that it believed it could win, a victory that would soon make Brexit seem like a minor episode on the road to ruin. The majority of the Labour MPs wanted first to bring about the downfall of a Conservative government and second to prevent Britain leaving the European Union without an agreement — what might be called the leaving-the-Union-without-leaving option. But they wanted the first more than they wanted the second, so under no circumstances could they accede to anything that Prime Minister May negotiated. Because of her tiny majority in Parliament, the hard-line Brexit members on her own side who want Britain to leave without a deal, and the refusal of her coalition partner, the Democratic Unionist Party, to back her, May needs the support of a considerable proportion of Labour MPs — which, so far, she has not received.
But the House of Commons as a whole, including the Conservatives, deprived May of leverage with which to renegotiate, because it voted that it would not accept leaving the Union without a deal. This deprived the European Union of any reason to renegotiate anything: it was a preemptive surrender to the demands of the E.U. that makes Neville Chamberlain look like a hard-bitten poker champion.
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If Shakespearean Insults Were Used Today – Anglophenia Ep 13
Anglophenia
Published on 24 Sep 2014Siobhan Thompson reacts to everyday office frustrations with some barbs from the Bard. Check out the Shakespeare plays from which the insults originated here: http://www.bbcamerica.com/anglophenia…
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