Quotulatiousness

February 5, 2019

Macron’s desperate efforts to keep the “European Project” on life-support

Filed under: Economics, Europe, France, Government, Politics — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

Justin Raimondo on the plight French President Emmanuel Macron is facing:

The EU was a joint project of Euro-intellectuals who wanted a super-socialist State and were afraid Europeans might turn away from “Europe.” They sought to create an ersatz Euro-nationalism that has still only caught on among deracinated yuppies and oligarchs, if anyone at all. What they wanted and still want is what every true state has – an army. Which Macron has been agitating about for some time now. He doesn’t want to persuade Italy and Poland and Hungary to take more refugees – he wants to force them. Even more, he wants a reliable force to crush domestic protests, one that is unlikely to sympathize with the protesters.

Protests are everywhere: the media loves to cover them provided it’s the right cause – and one of the qualifying requirements of coverage should be drama. One would think therefore that the most recent and most violent would attract the media. Not so! We hear nothing about the twelve-week riots that have shaken the Macronist regime to its foundations.

But as the so-called Yellow Vests run roughshod in France – and all over the self-proclaimed “anti-nationalist” Macron – their origins, their ideology, their story remains untold.

French President Macron, a fanatic environmentalist, decided to revise the fuel tax code so that the small urban cars beloved by his circle had their tax reduced, while fuel for trucks and more industrial uses went up as much as 30%. It was a deliberate insult to the rural working poor who must drive long distances.

Macron went out of his way to convey his contempt for the rural voters who did not vote for him. The original reduction was actually intended for long-distance fuel, but Macron changed it around at the last minute to punish this use.

The French “Deplorables” reacted swiftly and not with the usual threat to strike: they simply started an insurrection. No preliminaries. They call themselves Yellow Vests referencing the safety vests required by French law of all motorists to signal emergency: yes, they declare: there IS an emergency going on!

February 1, 2019

How Russia Stopped The Blitzkrieg

Filed under: France, Germany, History, Military, Russia, WW2 — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Real Engineering
Published on 27 May 2017

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Once again thank you to Maeson for his amazing music. Check out his soundcloud here: https://soundcloud.com/maeson-1/tracks

January 27, 2019

The Enigma of Germany’s Wartime Economy – WW2 – 022 – January 26 1940

Filed under: Europe, France, Germany, History, Military, WW2 — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

World War Two
Published on 26 Jan 2019

This week shows the Allies first attempts to break the German Enigma code. Meanwhile, the German war economy shows some flaws and the Soviets are massing artillery in an effort to break the Finnish defences.

As the Winter War rolls on the only help the Finns are getting are from volunteers. The Western Allies still have their thoughts on Norway, little do they know that the Phoney​ War almost ends this week…

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Colorizations by Norman Stewart.

Photos of the Winter War are mostly from the Finnish Wartime Photograph Archive (SA-Kuva).

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December 22, 2018

Christmas Dishes From Around the World – Anglophenia Ep 44

Filed under: Australia, Britain, Food, France, Germany, India, Italy, Japan — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 04:00

Anglophenia
Published on 16 Dec 2015

Join us for an international holiday feast, as Anglophenia’s Kate Arnell takes a look at several traditional Christmas dishes from around the world. Starting with the U.K., of course…

December 14, 2018

Dreadnought: The Battleship that Changed Everything

Filed under: Britain, France, Germany, History, Military, Russia, WW1 — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Historigraph
Published on 24 Nov 2018

So it’s probably worth noting here that when Dreadnought made all other battleships irrelevant, it didn’t do so equally. For example, Japan had constructed two ‘semi-dreadnoughts’ a couple of years earlier, with more 10-inch guns than was standard at the time. The Americans too were moving towards building an ‘all-big-gun’ battleship, but they were much slower at getting them built than the British.

If you enjoyed this video and want to see more made, consider supporting my efforts on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/historigraph

Sources:
Robert K. Massie, Dreadnought: Britain, Germany and the Coming of the Great War
Ben Wilson, Empire of the Deep: The Rise and Fall of the British Navy

QotD: Burgundy

Filed under: France, Humour, Quotations, Wine — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 01:00

If it’s red, French, costs too much, and tastes like the water that’s left in the vase after the flowers have died and rotted, it’s probably Burgundy.

Jay McInerney, Bacchus & Me: Adventures in the Wine Cellar, 2002.

December 10, 2018

One Million Subscriber Special! The French 75 – Guns, Drinks, and Shirts!

Filed under: France, History, Military, Weapons — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

Forgotten Weapons
Published on 9 Dec 2018

Holy cow, a million subscribers! When I started Forgotten Weapons, I never for a moment suspected it would end up this popular. Thank you to everyone who has subscribed! I think this required a celebratory cocktail … specifically, a French 75. So let’s talk about the French 75 the gun – the Canon de 75 modèle 1897 – as well as the cocktail named after it.

In celebration of the milestone, we have a two-day sale on some of the merchandise at the Forgotten Weapons store – which you should check out:

http://shop.bbtv.com/collections/forg…

I would also like to mention that you can now find lots of Forgotten Weapons content on Amazon Prime, where videos have been compiled into 1-2 hour themed series:

https://amzn.to/2QG9SS2

And last but certainly not least, a huge thanks to everyone who supports Forgotten Weapons on Patreon! Your support is what has made this possible, and what will keep it here for years to come.

http://www.patreon.com/ForgottenWeapons

Contact:
Forgotten Weapons
PO Box 87647
Tucson, AZ 85754

December 5, 2018

QotD: Patriotism

Filed under: Europe, France, History, Quotations, USA — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 01:00

Once upon a time, patriotism was a fairly simple thing. It was tribal identification writ large, an emotional attachment to a people and their land. In most of the world, where patriotism exists at all it’s still like this — tribal patriotism, blood-and-soil emotionalism.

A different kind of patriotism emerged from the American and French revolutions. While American patriotism sometimes taps into tribal emotion, it is not fundamentally of that kind. Far more American is the sentiment Benjamin Franklin expressed: “Where liberty dwells, there is my country”

Thus, most Americans love their country in a more conditional way — not as a thing in itself, but insofar as it embodies core ideas about liberty. It is in the same spirit that our Presidents and miltary officers and naturalizing citizens swear to defend, not the land or people of the United States but its Constitution — a political compact. This is adaptive in many ways; one of them is that tribal patriotism is difficult to nourish in a nation of immigrants.

In France, the ideology of the Revolution displaced tribal patriotism, just as it did in the U.S. But the French, roiled by political instability and war, have never settled on a political unifying idea or constitutional touchstone. Instead, French patriotism expresses a loyalty to French language and culture and history. It replaces tribalism not with idealism but with culturism.

America and France are a marked contrast with, say, Denmark. I chose Denmark at random from the class of civilized countries in which patriotism is still fundamentally tribal. You don’t become a Danish patriot by revering the constitution or culture of Denmark; you become one by being a Dane. Which partly means being a tribesman, connected to the Danish gene pool, and partly means identifying with stories of past Danish heroism.

It hasn’t been easy to find a fire-breathing Danish patriot for at least fifty years, though. One of the effects of the terrible convulsions of the 20th century has been to discredit tribal patriotism. Many people in Europe, not unreasonably, associate it with racism and Naziism and are suspicious of anything that smacks of immoderate patriotism.

Eric S. Raymond, “Patriotism And Its Pathologies”, Armed and Dangerous, 2008-07-09.

November 28, 2018

The Difficult Road To Peace 1919 I THE GREAT WAR Epilogue 2

The Great War
Published on 26 Nov 2018

After 4 1/2 years of war and millions of dead and wounded any kind of peace would be difficult. The peace process in 1919 was even more difficult because it happened in turbulent times with a rapidly changing landscape and new ideas about a future world order that should prevent this level of bloodshed in the future.

November 21, 2018

Allied War Economy During World War 1 I THE GREAT WAR Special

Filed under: Britain, Economics, France, History, Italy, Military, USA, WW1 — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 04:00

The Great War
Published on 19 Nov 2018

Check Out Supremacy 1914: https://www.supremacy1914.com/index.p…

Financing and supplying the First World War was a huge economic undertaking that influenced the British, French, American and Italian economies profoundly and shaped the global balance of power.

November 13, 2018

The Maginot Line: Actually a Good Idea

Filed under: Europe, France, Germany, History, Military, WW1, WW2 — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Historigraph
Published on 13 Oct 2018

If you enjoyed this video and want to see more made, consider supporting my efforts on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/historigraph

My old video on the invasion of France in 1940, which is useful for background info to this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4-l0…

Check out my Norway 1940 series: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list…

► Twitter: https://twitter.com/historigraph

Sources:

James Holland, The War in the West – A New History Vol. 1: Germany Ascendant 1939-1941 (kindle edition)

Lloyd Clark, Blitzkrieg: Myth, Reality and Hitler’s Lightning War – France, 1940.

Alistair Horne, To Lose a Battle: France 1940.

Charles River Editors, The Maginot Line: The History of the Fortifications that failed to protect France from Nazi Germany during World War II.

November 10, 2018

Emperor Karl’s last attempt for peace, 1917

Filed under: Britain, Europe, France, History, Military, WW1 — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

Part of a post at Essays in Idleness from last month by David Warren:

As we approach the centenary of the Great Armistice, I see the plastic poppies circulating from the little boxes in the liquor stores. My thoughts turn to war qua war. Though sometimes necessary, it is not a good thing (“bad for children and animals” as the peaceniks say); and given the ambiance of our high-tech weaponry, little heroism is left to raise the tone. Contemporary battles are not confined to the soldiers, as once they could be. The devastation of cities and towns, the routine destruction of infrastructure, the civilian suffering that follows from that, must match or quite exceed ancient incidents of rapine.

While I’ve never thought war should be avoided at all costs, I recognize that the cost is very high. Opportunities for peace should not be overlooked, even while the carnage is in progress.

When, for instance, the newly-enthroned Emperor Karl of Austria-Hungary — “fanatic” Catholic Christian — discreetly proposed a separate peace to the allies in the spring of 1917, his agents were rebuffed, outed, and mocked. The Americans were coming to tilt our fortunes, the Germans were distracted overrunning the Russians, and while the Western Front was in catastrophic stasis, our nationalist politicians could now hope to utterly crush the foe. They would demand unconditional surrender.

The incident haunts my historical imagination. This was a serious opportunity to restore something close to the status quo ante, while resolving casus belli (very much plural) from Belgium and Alsace to Serbia and Constantinople on the principle of sweet reason. Drowned in the gunfire was this Blessed Karl’s expressly Christian plea. In an instant the decision was made, in the West, to persist till millions more were slain, and the conditions were assembled for international violence and totalitarianism through the next seventy years.

The gentlemen I call “the three stooges of the apocalypse” — Wilson, Lloyd George, Clemenceau — were all modern politicians, whose nationalist ideals were now buttressed by the vast democratic constituencies of countries at war, goaded on by the screaming headlines of a paper mass media. They wanted a New Europe, a New World Order, in which antiquated empires and all the sleepy old aristocratic polities would be smashed and replaced — with modern, ethically homogenous, democratic States. The consequences were unforeseeable to them, wrapped in their flags and the rhetoric of liberté, égalité, fraternité.

It was a war to end all wars! … Both the malice and the naivety were astounding.

War Graves: Honouring the Fallen of the First World War | The Tank Museum

Filed under: Britain, Europe, France, Germany, History, Military, WW1 — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 02:00

The Tank Museum
Published on 2 Nov 2018

On a visit to the Cambrai Memorial to the Missing at Louverval, Curator David Willey took the opportunity to explore the Allied First World War graves. In this video he explains how they were set up by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission during WW1 and why they look the way they do.

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November 8, 2018

The Franco-Prussian War

Filed under: France, Germany, History, Military — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Epic History
Published on 29 Dec 2015

The Franco-Prussian War or Franco-German War, often referred to in France as the War of 1870 (19 July 1870 – 10 May 1871), was a conflict between the Second French Empire and the German states of the North German Confederation led by the Kingdom of Prussia. The conflict was caused by Prussian ambitions to extend German unification. Prussian chancellor Otto von Bismarck planned to provoke a French attack in order to draw the southern German states — Baden, Württemberg, Bavaria and Hesse-Darmstadt — into an alliance with the North German Confederation dominated by Prussia.

November 7, 2018

Romagne 14-18 Museum Tour

Filed under: France, Germany, History, Military, USA, Weapons, WW1 — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

Forgotten Weapons
Published on 4 Nov 2018

http://www.patreon.com/ForgottenWeapons

Jean-Paul de Vries runs a very interesting private World War One museum in the village of Romagne-sous-Montfaucon in the Meuse region of northeastern France. It is the exact opposite of typical modern museums, as it has a massive number of artifacts on display with almost no printed explanation. It is also unusual in displaying almost exclusively recovered artifacts of the war, the majority of them have been left on the fields or buried for decades. You will not find new specimens here; you will find remnants of war and weather.

That may sound dreary to some, but to me it is a very interesting way to approach the war and its history. You know that every item in this museum was actually used on the field of battle, and that can provide some interesting insights. For example, the American .30-06 Chauchat automatic rifles here indicate, contrary to most printed sources, that those guns were actually used in combat actions by American soldiers and not just for training. Tired of museums that have great open rooms with a single item on a glass case in the center? Then this is one place you will really appreciate!

The museum is an entirely private operation, and includes a small restaurant for sandwiches and such, and a shop offering books, reproduction items, and original artifacts for sale. If it located near the huge American Meuse-Argonne Cemetery, and I would highly recommend it to anyone traveling in the area with an interest in the Great War.

You can see the museum’s web site here:

https://romagne14-18.com/index.php/en/

Contact:
Forgotten Weapons
PO Box 87647
Tucson, AZ 85754

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