Quotulatiousness

December 16, 2021

Supersonic Firsts

Filed under: Britain, Cancon, History, Military, Technology, USA — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

The History Guy: History Deserves to Be Remembered
Published 20 Aug 2021

On August 20, 1955, United States Air Force Colonel Horace A Hanes set the world’s first supersonic world speed record in a North American Aviation F-100C Super Sabre. Although we are well into the supersonic age, aircraft that can exceed the speed of sound are still rare machines, and marvels of engineering and pilot prowess. The early aviation pioneers who tested the terrifying sound barrier have helped scientists better understand the dynamics of superfast speeds.

This is original content based on research by The History Guy. Images in the Public Domain are carefully selected and provide illustration. As very few images of the actual event are available in the Public Domain, images of similar objects and events are used for illustration.

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All events are portrayed in historical context and for educational purposes. No images or content are primarily intended to shock and disgust. Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it. Non censuram.

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December 15, 2021

Is the Wehrmacht Defeated in 1942? – WW2 Special

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

World War Two
Published 14 Dec 2021

It’s late 1942 and the German Army is close to ruin. The Ostheer alone has suffered more than a million casualties in its fight against the Red Army. If the Wehrmacht cannot find a way to return to its former strength or reap decisive strategic benefits in the near future, it will ultimately face destruction in a war of attrition.
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Why Real Wasabi Is So Expensive | So Expensive

Filed under: Britain, Business, Environment, Food, Japan — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Business Insider
Published 19 Jan 2019

The green paste you’ve been eating with your sushi isn’t really wasabi. If you check the ingredients on the packet, you might see a mixture of sweetener, horseradish and perhaps a small percentage of the real thing. Real wasabi is hard to come across and it can cost $250 per kilo. So what actually is wasabi, and why is it so expensive?

For more from The Wasabi Company, go to: https://www.thewasabicompany.co.uk/

——————————————————

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December 14, 2021

Minoan Civilization

Filed under: Europe, History — Tags: , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

Thersites the Historian
Published 25 Jan 2018

In this video, I look at the Bronze Age civilization on Crete known as the Minoans.

Chatellerault M24/29: France’s New Wave of Post-WWI Small Arms

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

Forgotten Weapons
Published 26 Aug 2017

France fought the Great War with an array of weapons which were all sub-par in one way or another — the Lebel rifle was obsolescent by 1914, the Berthier was a cavalry carbine forced into rifle service, the Chauchat was an emergency wartime design optimized for production volume instead of quality, and the handguns were a mixture of old revolvers and desperate imports from Spain. Once the war finally ended, the French military would move to replace the whole lot with new and modern arms.

This would begin by finally replacing the 8mm Lebel cartridge with a non-tapered, rimless cartridge — something that would be well suited to use in magazines and repeating arms. Simultaneously, a new light machine gun would be found, as this was deemed to most important improvement to be made. The cartridge was adopted in 1924 as the 7.5x58mm, but it would soon be realized that there was a critical problem with that round. The French military had a large supply of German arms taken as war reparations, and the new 7.5mm cartridge looked very similar to the 8x57mm Mauser cartridge. Worse, the Mauser round would chamber and fire in the new French chambers, causing serious damage to guns when the 8mm bullet was squeezed down to 7.5mm. To fix this issue, the French cut their cartridge down by 4mm, resulting in the 1929 adoption of the 7.5x54mm round — the chamber of which would no longer fit a German 8mm round.

As for the machine gun, the first choice was to simply adopt the Browning BAR — but France insisted on obtaining the technical data package and producing the guns in France, and they could not come to an agreement with Colt over the price of such a license. So, the French held trials of other guns, looking at virtually everything then available. In the aftermath of the trials, it was decided that the Chatellerault arsenal could design its own weapon using the best features of the other existing guns. The arsenal rather quickly produced prototypes, and they were adopted in 1924 (and then updated to use the shorter version of the 7.5mm cartridge in 1929).

The Chatellerault M24/29 is a quite good weapon, especially considering how early it was designed. It uses a tilting bolt and a top-mounted 25 round magazine. It has two triggers, the front one firing in semiautomatic and the rear one in fully automatic. The wooden front handguard allows for fire from the hip or shoulder if desired, and a set of thorough dust covers keep the gun free from ingress of mud or dirt. About 188,000 would be manufactured, and it would stay in service for many decades.

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QotD: Insulated from reality

Filed under: Britain, Environment, Media, Politics, Quotations — Tags: , , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 01:00

To understand the green movement, really understand it, you could do worse than look at the photographs of today’s vast tailbacks on the M25. Here were thousands of ordinary people – workers, deliverymen, mums and dads, holidaymakers – delayed for hours by the self-righteousness of middle-class greens. Activists from a group called Insulate Britain – which, almost comically, agitates for the insulation of British homes – blocked various junctions on the M25, causing distress to people who had places to be. It was eco-elitism distilled: the sanctimonious zealots of the green religion disrupting the lives of the plebs to make some daft point.

The first notable thing about today’s act of public nuisance masquerading as a protest was the hilarity of the campaign group itself. Remember when radicals fought for higher wages or better working conditions or for a revolution to replace capitalism with something else? Not anymore. Today’s self-styled militants demand the insulation of houses. “What do we want? The creation of a thermal envelope in people’s homes! When do we want it? Now!” What a crock to go to the barricades for. Also notable is the irony of supposed planet-lovers causing so much pollution by forcing hundreds of cars and trucks to sit still for ages, chugging fumes into the air for nought. Well played, greenies.

But the most striking thing about these kinds of protests is their sheer arrogance. Their inherently anti-democratic, anti-masses nature, where the aim is always, but always, to inconvenience the little people and teach us a lesson. You’re on your way to Heathrow for a much-needed jaunt to Malaga to escape the stresses of work? Not anymore, you’re not – the eco-elitists blocked junction 14, which leads to one of Heathrow’s terminals. You’re a knackered trucker who’s been driving all night long and now wants to get back to his family? Tough shit. These plummy alarmists have decided to make you the collateral damage of one of their narcissistic stunts.

Brendan O’Neill, “Environmentalism is a revolt against the people”, Spiked, 2021-09-13.

December 13, 2021

The Battle of Cannae (216 B.C.E.)

Filed under: Africa, Europe, History, Italy, Military — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Historia Civilis
Published 29 Jun 2015

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Music is Beethoven’s “Sonata No. 32 in C Minor, Op. 111” – I. Maestoso – Allegro con brio ed appassionato, performed by Daniel Veesey

QotD: Cultural undermining of the British “establishment” was effectively complete by 1970

Filed under: Britain, History, Media, Politics, Quotations — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 01:00

Beyond the Fringe, Forty Years On and TW3 created a tradition of “anti-establishment” comedy which continued long after its roots were forgotten. There may still have been an “establishment” of snobbery, church, monarchy, clubland and old-school-tie links in 1961. There was no such thing ten years later, but it suited the comics and all reformers to pretend that there was and to continue to attack this mythical thing. After all, if there were no snobbery, no crusty old aristocrats and cobwebbed judges, what was the moral justification for all this change, change which benefited the reformers personally by making them rich, famous and influential?

[…]

It also made the middle class, especially the educated and well-off middle class, despise themselves and feel a sort of shame for their supposedly elitist prejudices, based upon injustice and undermined by their failure to defend the nation from its enemies in the era of appeasement. Thanks to this, in another paradox, they have often felt unable to defend things within Britain which they value and which help to keep them in existence, from the grammar schools to good manners. They are ashamed of being higher up the scale, though for most middle-class people this is more a matter of merit than birth, and nothing to be ashamed of at all.

[…]

Since the 1960s, when the Left began its conquest of the cultural battlements, it has always been surprised and annoyed by Tory election victories. The 1970 Tory triumph, though entirely predictable, took the cultural establishment by surprise. The 1979 Tory win, though even more predictable, infuriated them. They had won control of broadcasting, of the schools, of the universities, the church, the artistic, musical and architectural establishment? How was it possible that they could not also be the government? Their rage was enormous, and increased with each successive Labour defeat. It was an injustice. How could the people be so foolish? Now, instead of aristocratic snobs misgoverning the country, the establishment was portrayed as a sort of fascistic semi-dictatorship, hacking at the NHS and the welfare state, waging aggressive wars abroad and enriching itself while the poor lived in misery.

This series of falsehoods has now become a weapon ready and waiting for unscrupulous demagogues to harness, and perhaps use against the new “establishment” which has benefited so much from the satire boom and the alternative comedians. Once you have begun to use dishonest mockery as a weapon, you can never be entirely sure that it will not eventually be turned against you, by others who have learned that abuse and jeering pay much easier and swifter dividends than hard fact or serious argument. It could be that the civilized mirth of the sixties leads in a direct line to the crude hyena cackling of the mob. In any case, there is no sign of the humour industry taking the side of traditional morality, patriotism or civility. The best it can do is dignify itself with noisy and public collections for sentimental and prominent charity. Once you step beyond the fringe, you sooner or later find yourself in very wild country indeed.

Peter Hitchens, The Abolition of Britain, 1988.

December 12, 2021

One Year Since Pearl Harbor – WW2 – 172 – December 11, 1942

Filed under: Africa, Australia, Britain, Germany, History, Italy, Japan, Military, Russia, USA, WW2 — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

World War Two
Published 11 Dec 2021

The Japanese try and fail to supply their starving soldiers. The Allies fail to break through in Tunisia and New Guinea. The fighting in the USSR is bloody, but the Axis prepare for a new offensive there.
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How They Did It – Pet Dogs in Ancient Rome

Filed under: Europe, History — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Invicta
Published 12 Sep 2018

Our history with man’s best friend stretches far into the past. Today we take a look at the lives of dogs in ancient Rome; how they named, trained, and raised them.

Bibliography:
Xenophon and Arrian: On Hunting (1999) translated by A. A. Phillips and M. M. Willcock
Metamorphoses Book III by Ovid
Names of Dogs in Ancient Greece by Adrienne Mayor
Greek and Roman Household Pets by Francis D. Lazenby

Artwork:
Beverly Johnson (https://www.behance.net/bevsi)

Music:
“Strings and Drums Comedy” by 8th Mode Music
“Emotional” by 8th Mode Music

#RomanHistory
#HowTheyDidIt

QotD: Britain’s alienated intelligentsia of the 1930s

Filed under: Britain, History, Politics, Quotations, WW2 — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 01:00

In intention, at any rate, the English intelligentsia are Europeanized. They take their cookery from Paris and their opinions from Moscow. In the general patriotism of the country they form a sort of island of dissident thought. England is perhaps the only great country whose intellectuals are ashamed of their own nationality. In left-wing circles it is always felt that there is something slightly disgraceful in being an Englishman and that it is a duty to snigger at every English institution, from horse racing to suet puddings. It is a strange fact, but it is unquestionably true that almost any English intellectual would feel more ashamed of standing to attention during “God save the King” than of stealing from a poor box. All through the critical years many left-wingers were chipping away at English morale, trying to spread an outlook that was sometimes squashily pacifist, sometimes violently pro-Russian, but always anti-British. It is questionable how much effect this had, but it certainly had some. If the English people suffered for several years a real weakening of morale, so that the Fascist nations judged that they were “decadent” and that it was safe to plunge into war, the intellectual sabotage from the Left was partly responsible. Both the New Statesman and the News-Chronicle cried out against the Munich settlement, but even they had done something to make it possible. Ten years of systematic Blimp-baiting affected even the Blimps themselves and made it harder than it had been before to get intelligent young men to enter the armed forces. Given the stagnation of the Empire, the military middle class must have decayed in any case, but the spread of a shallow Leftism hastened the process.

It is clear that the special position of the English intellectuals during the past ten years, as purely negative creatures, mere anti-Blimps, was a by-product of ruling-class stupidity. Society could not use them, and they had not got it in them to see that devotion to one’s country implies “for better, for worse”. Both Blimps and highbrows took for granted, as though it were a law of nature, the divorce between patriotism and intelligence. If you were a patriot you read Blackwood’s Magazine and publicly thanked God that you were “not brainy”. If you were an intellectual you sniggered at the Union Jack and regarded physical courage as barbarous. It is obvious that this preposterous convention cannot continue. The Bloomsbury highbrow, with his mechanical snigger, is as out-of-date as the cavalry colonel. A modern nation cannot afford either of them. Patriotism and intelligence will have to come together again. It is the fact that we are fighting a war, and a very peculiar kind of war, that may make this possible.

George Orwell, “The Lion And The Unicorn: Socialism and the English Genius”, 1941-02-19.

December 11, 2021

Belisarius: The Battle of Rome

Filed under: Europe, History, Italy, Military — Tags: , , , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 06:00

Epic History TV
Published 10 Dec 2021

Thank you to our sponsor Private Internet Access.
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Big thanks to Legendarian for Total War: Attila gameplay footage, check out his YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCOI2…

Thanks also to our series consultant Professor David Parnell of Indiana University Northwest, who you can follow on Twitter here: https://twitter.com/byzantineprof

Total War: Attila gameplay footage used with kind permission of Creative Assembly — buy the game here: https://geni.us/qDreR

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🎨 Original artwork by Miłek Jakubiec https://www.artstation.com/milek

📚Recommended reading (as an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases):
📖 Procopius, History of the Wars https://geni.us/L3Pgc
📖 The Wars of Justinian by Michael Whitby https://geni.us/Xxrd3
📖 Rome Resurgent by Peter Heather https://geni.us/ZFoU1
📖 The Armies of Ancient Persia: the Sassanians by Kaveh Farrokh https://geni.us/jMQo3z
📖 Late Roman Cavalryman AD 236–565 (Osprey) by Simon MacDowall https://geni.us/XMGl

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The Stahlhelm

Filed under: Germany, History, Military, WW1, WW2 — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

World War Two
Published 10 Dec 2021

The Stahlhelm. Perhaps the most iconic symbol of German military power, ever present in images of the war. Hitler believes it strikes fear in his enemies and makes his own troops fearless. But where does it come from and why is it so enduring?
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December 10, 2021

The Frozen Battlefields of France – Battle of Beaugency 1870

Filed under: France, Germany, History, Military — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 06:00

Real Time History
Published 9 Nov 2021

Support us on Patreon: https://patreon.com/realtimehistory

On the frozen battlefields of France, the exhausted German and French armies are still fighting. The Battle of Beaugency sees a desperate struggle in which soldiers on both sides suffer from the harsh winter conditions. Meanwhile, the Siege of Paris continues to starve the population of the French capital.

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Arand, Tobias: 1870/71. Der Deutsch-Französische Krieg erzählt in Einzelschicksalen. Hamburg 2018

Buk-Swienty, Tom: Feuer und Blut. Hauptmann Dinesen. Hamburg 2014

Gouttman, Alain: La grande défaite. 1870-1871. Paris 2015

» SOURCES
Chanzy, Général: La deuxième Armée de la Loire. Paris 1872

Goncourt, Edmond de: Journal des Goncourts. II.1. 1870-1871. Paris 1890

Horne, Alistair: Es zogen die Preußen wohl über den Rhein. Bern, München, Wien 1967

Kühnhauser, Florian: Kriegs-Erinnerungen eines Soldaten des königlich bayerischen Infanterie Leibregiments. Partenkirchen 1898

Sarcey, Francisque: Le siege de Paris: impressions et souvenirs. Paris 1871

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How WW2 Created a Welfare State – WW2 – On the Homefront 013

Filed under: Britain, Economics, Government, History, WW2 — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

World War Two
Published 9 Dec 2021

In predicament due to the extreme situation of war, people are in dire need for a working system of social security. Therefore, Beveridge is instructed by the British government to draw up a report on the state of the country´s insurance schemes. But in his opinion, a war is no time for patching up a collapsing system – and he is ready to make some waves.
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