Quotulatiousness

November 18, 2019

The Opium War – Lost in Compensation l HISTORY OF CHINA

Filed under: Britain, China, Economics, History, Military — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 06:00

IT’S HISTORY
Published 22 Aug 2015

The Opium War started as a dispute over trading rights between China and Great Britain. Regular trade between Europe and the Chinese had been ongoing for centuries. But China’s trading restrictions frustrated the British who were eager to supply the Chinese people with the increasingly popular narcotic opium. Circumventing the government’s attempts to ban opium trade by smuggling and bribery, China declared the death sentence on Opium smuggling and refused to compensate British tradesmen for any losses. Furiously, the Brits sent out a fleet to demand compensation and end the Cohong trading monopoly. Fierce battles and attacks on the Chinese coast were followed. Find out all about the First Opium War from Indy in our new episode of Battlefields!

» SOURCES
Videos: British Pathé (https://www.youtube.com/user/britishp…)
Pictures: mainly Picture Alliance
Content:
Lovell, Julia: The Opium War: Drugs, Dreams and the Making of China
Wei, Yuan: Chinese Account of the Opium War
McPherson, Duncan: The First Opium War – The Chinese Expedition 1840-1842
Merwin, Samuel: Drugging a Nation – The Story of China and the Opium Curse
Bernard, William Dallas; Hall, Sir William Hutcheon: Narrative of the Voyages and Services of the Nemesis, from 1840 to 1843.
Isabel Hilton (The Guardian): “The Opium War by Julia Lovell – review”
Perdue, Peter C. (MIT): The First Opium War http://ocw.mit.edu/ans7870/21f/21f.02…

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» CREDITS
Presented by: Guy Kiddey
Script by: Dan Hungerford
Directed by: Daniel Czepelczauer
Director of Photography: Markus Kretzschmar
Music: Markus Kretzschmar
Sound Design: Bojan Novic
Editing: Markus Kretzschmar

A Mediakraft Networks original channel
Based on a concept by Florian Wittig and Daniel Czepelczauer
Executive Producers: Astrid Deinhard-Olsson, Spartacus Olsson
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Producer: Daniel Czepelczauer
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Contains material licensed from British Pathé
All rights reserved – © Mediakraft Networks GmbH, 2015

Fungus rock – the great placebo treasure (and the Mujahideen)

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

Lindybeige
Published 5 Jun 2015

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The things that people valued and fought over in the past were not as they are now. You might not guess the tremendous significance of one tiny island off the coast of Gozo.

NEWS FLASH (March 8th 2017): the Azure Window, featured in this video, has collapsed into the sea.

More videos from Malta to follow.

Lindybeige: a channel of archaeology, ancient and medieval warfare, rants, swing dance, travelogues, evolution, and whatever else occurs to me to make.

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Fungus rock – the great placebo treasure

November 17, 2019

Mark Steyn on the post-Basil-Fawlty John Cleese

Filed under: Britain, Humour, Media, Politics — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 05:00

He’s trying fairly hard not to turn into one or another of the stock characters he’s played over the years:

John Cleese at the Byline Festival, 2017.
Photo by Raphael Moran via Wikimedia Commons.

“John was a boy that kept to himself,” recalled Mrs Hicks, Reg and Muriel Cleese’s next-door neighbor in Totnes in Devon, deploying the formulation traditionally reserved for the landladies of suburban serial killers. “I suppose he was all right with his Cambridge people, but us being country folk he wouldn’t say very much. At one time I looked after John for a couple of days and did his bedroom when his parents were away. He was writing something on his desk at the time. Course I didn’t look at it, but it was sarcastic sort of stuff about Churchill. I do often wonder what happened to him.”

Listening to Mrs Hicks, you appreciate the particular challenge of comedy writing – for who could ever improve on that? Nonetheless, she’s not the only one to wonder what’s happened to John Cleese. He turned eighty a couple of weeks back, and the jubilations were more muted than one might once have expected. My local PBS station still shows Fawlty Towers as part of its Britcom lineup, but Sadiq Khan, Mayor of London, bemoans that Cleese has now turned into Basil Fawlty lui-même. Younger “comics” regret that the a great comedic talent is now the pub bore he played in his youth.

And why would that be? Well, after supporting Brexit, he moved to Nevis in the British West Indies and announced that the imperial metropolis was “not really an English city anymore”. Mayor Khan replied that “Londoners know that our diversity is our greatest strength” – although, strong as it is, it doesn’t seem much use during a knife attack. During the ensuing Twitterstorm, an opposing Tweeter declared that “I can’t stand Englishness”, and Cleese wistfully responded:

    I suspect I should apologise for my affection for the Englishness of my upbringing. But in some ways I found it calmer, more polite, more humorous, less tabloid, and less money-oriented than the one that is replacing it.

The Two-Minutes Tweet-Hate rampaged on, and Cleese retreated to the charms of his post-colonial backwater:

    Nevis has excellent race relations, a very well educated population, no sign of political correctness… conscientious lawyers, a relaxed and humorous life style, a deep love of cricket, and a complete lack of knife crime …and the icing on the cake is that Nevis is not the world centre for Russian dirty money laundering…

    I think it’s legitimate to prefer one culture to another. For example, I prefer cultures that do not tolerate female genital mutilation. Will this be considered racist by all those who hover, eagerly hoping that someone will offend them?

Is this the room for an argument? Not anymore. There are just things you’re not meant to bring up, lest the hoverers pounce.

As it happens, I agree with almost all of the above. But then I always have. It’s odder to hear it from Cleese. In essence, he misses the England of Mrs Hicks, of couples called Reg and Muriel, of saloon-bar majors, bowler-hatted civil servants, Church of England vicars, socially insecure lower-middle-class hoteliers and all the other stock types of a now vanished Albion he mocked at the height of his celebrity. The counterculture triumphed so totally that there is no longer a culture to counter, and the void of “diversity” makes London feel, even overlooking the stabbings and clitoridectomies, just like a large version of every other cookie-cutter multiculti western city.

“I know they were very disappointed with John,” Mrs Hicks told Cleese’s biographer Jonathan Margolis. “Muriel was so excited when she came in here and said John had passed his exams at Cambridge. They thought he was going to be a solicitor, and then he fell in with David Frost and that was it.”

Britain shows Japan how to Attack Pearl Harbor – WW2 – 064 – November 16, 1940

Filed under: Britain, Europe, Greece, History, Italy, Japan, Military, Russia, WW2 — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

World War Two
Published 16 Nov 2019

Japan has two wins this week, and one might turn out to be very consequential for the rest of the war. In the meantime, the British RAF fights the Luftwaffe and Italy struggles in their offensive against Greece.

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Colorisations by: Julius Jääskeläinen, https://www.facebook.com/JJcolorization/

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Archive by Screenocean/Reuters https://www.screenocean.com.

Sources:
– Narodowe Archiwum Cyfrowe
– IWM: CM 164, C 1244
– Destroyed house icon by Gan Khoon Lay, people icon by Gregor Cresnar from the Noun Project

A TimeGhost chronological documentary produced by OnLion Entertainment GmbH.

From the comments:

World War Two
2 days ago
Do you want more World War Two in realtime? We have a great Instagram page, where we make a daily post about what happened in the war on that day. This might be something completely different from what’s covered in these videos, or might add some more details. You can follow it by searching @world_war_two_realtime or by clicking here: https://www.instagram.com/world_war_two_realtime/. See you there!
Cheers, Joram

The three cycles of a naval ship’s career

Filed under: Britain, Military — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 03:00

Last month, there was some concern over the state of the Royal Navy’s current fleet, based on things the Secretary of State for Defence had said to the Commons Defence Select Committee:

While discussing the size of the navy, and the minister made a valid point that it is hard to go to the Treasury and argue for more new warships when the RN is unable to make full use of the vessels already in service. “If I had more of our current fleet working, then I would have much more freedom to deploy to meet some of our ambitions and tasks. I’ve made it very clear to the First Sea Lord one of my priorities is to get what we’ve got working” he said.

Unfortunately the Minister then rather confused the issue by stating that the RN has “only” 57 of its 76 surface ships available. This statement is technically true but it needs a great deal of context. It is only possible to reach the 76 figure by counting absolutely everything in commission that floats including the MCMVs, OPVs, Royal Fleet Auxiliary vessels, the hydrographic ships and the two small boats of the Gibraltar Squadron. 16 small unarmed P2000 patrol/training boats and inshore survey boat HMS Magpie are also included in this total. These vessels all have important roles to play but major surface combat vessels number just 23, even if both aircraft carriers and both LPDs are counted. Of that 23, about 10 are active at the time of writing. (HMS Queen Elizabeth (not yet fully operational) Albion, Defender, Dragon, Montrose, Kent, Argyll, Sutherland, Northumberland and Westminster)

In fact, 57 vessels “available” from a fleet of 76 would be very impressive. Any navy that has 75% of its ships ready for operations would be doing exceptionally well. But it rather depends on your definition of “available” as ships are in constant cycle at differing levels of readiness. A more normal approximate ‘rule of thirds’ would apply for most serious navies; a third on operations, a third preparing for operations, in transit, training or maintenance and a third at very low readiness in deep refit. This cycle is simply unavoidable, warships are highly complex pieces of engineering that are exposed to the harsh marine environment and must be maintained.

What Ben Wallace was really talking about is improving the readiness of the frigates and destroyers. As we have reported before, delays to the frigate LIFEX refits are contributing to lower than usual numbers of ships available. Currently, more than half of the frigate fleet are all either awaiting refit or undergoing refit at Devonport.

A view of Royal Navy ships at Devonport, 19th October 2019. (Top) HMS Monmouth out of routine and awaiting refit. (Middle) The depressing sight of the decommissioned nuclear submarine “flotilla” awaiting disposal, comprising more boats than are currently active. In the basin are (top) HMS Richmond, first of the frigates to receive new engines and (bottom) HMS St. Albans. HMS Portland, Somerset and Iron Duke are inside the covered refit complex to the right. (Left) alongside at No.1 Wharf is HMS Lancaster.
Photo by Andy Amor, originally posted at Save The Royal Navy, 2019-10-25.

November 16, 2019

History of Space Travel – Kill Devil to V-2 – Extra History – #3

Filed under: Germany, History, Military, Russia, Space, Technology, USA, WW2 — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 06:00

Extra Credits
Published 14 Nov 2019

Start your Warframe journey now and prepare to face your personal nemesis, the Kuva Lich — an enemy that only grows stronger with every defeat. Take down this deadly foe, then get ready to take flight in Empyrean! Coming soon! http://bit.ly/EHWarframe

Early flight started as a utopian dream but quickly became the military’s top priority: first as reconnaissance vehicles, and then as weapons in their own right. After WW1, the threat of German aircraft led to the Treaty of Versailles banning Germany from having an airforce at all. But the Germans also found a loophole: rockets didn’t count as an airforce. Enter Werner Von Braun & the V-2 rockets.

The British army’s “Tractable” shows the continued importance of logistics

Filed under: Britain, Europe, Military — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 05:00

Sir Humphrey discusses the ongoing commitment of nearly a thousand British soldiers to Estonia, and how the logistics to get them and their equipment there illustrates a rarely discussed but critical military capability:

One of the most significant exercise commitments this year has been the British Army and “Tractable” (sometimes referred to as either “Op” or “Exercise” but without a title on the British Army website. This major undertaking has been running for some weeks now and has highlighted how the British Army continues to excel at undertaking large scale movements of units in order to be ready to conduct operations as required.

The genesis of Tractable was the need to rotate assets out of Estonia and send new vehicles from the UK in their place. It is often overlooked that the UK now has over 900 British Army personnel permanently stationed in Estonia as part of wider NATO work to help send a strong signal to deter aggression from nations like Russia – which given its recent history of attacking and invading other countries and acting in a remarkably uncivilised manner is certainly required.

[…]

This may sound an obvious and straightforward thing to say, but investment in logistical tail is rarely something that features in many peoples “fantasy Army ORBAT” threads that litter the internet. Most people focus on combat power, looking at how many tanks or self propelled guns an Army has and then considering what this means for its combat power from there.

For the British Army, the investment in heavy armour, APCs and artillery is important, but equally so is the important in assets like logistics enablers – the ability to lift by train or sealift in order to actually get the Army where it needs to be, and not stuck somewhere irrelevant. The purpose of Tractable has as much been to test that the Army can still do this well, and that the various enablers work as intended to deliver a force that can fight.

In practical terms this has meant a focus on areas that often get relatively little attention. For example the skills required to pull vehicles out of storage, conduct road and rail moves across Europe and then deliver them to Estonia are complex and perishable. There is a lot of work required to ensure that a train can be safely loaded with the right armoured vehicles and then sent through the Channel Tunnel for onwards travel.

Air, land, and sea transportation routes from the UK to Tapa, Estonia.

This work often puts significant responsibility in the hands of very junior soldiers who are responsible for ensuring that millions of pounds of equipment is safely handled and put in place properly. One slip up could have huge consequences and potentially cost lives as well. It is only by practising this activity regularly that it can be done safely and effectively for real though.

In the case of Tractable what it has demonstrated is the critical importance of the Royal Logistics Corp to the wider British Army. While logistics may not be a supremely “sexy” subject to many people, being able to ensure that the Army has the right equipment, people and training to be able to do this sort of work is essential – without it, things would rapidly grind to a halt.

Similarly, Tractable has helped focus attention on other critical capabilities like strategic sealift. The use of the “POINT” class strat ro-ro ferry force to help move vehicles across the channel and into Emden (and then onto Estonia) has helped show how key these vessels are to British Army capability. Without them it would be much harder to do the complex business of deploying overseas. Here too we are also reminded of the critical importance of units like 17 Port and Maritime Regiment, one of the most unusual (and vital) units in the Army today, responsible for co-ordinating the sealift and deployment of vehicles around the globe.

War Exiles: Kaiser Bill, Polish Forces, and US Volunteers – WW2 – OOTF 006

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

World War Two
Published 14 Nov 2019

What happened to Kaiser Wilhelm II after World War One? How did Polish soldiers flee to Allied territories after the 1939 invasion? And did any American volunteers serve in the war in 1939 and 1940? We answer all of this in this episode of Out of the Foxholes.

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Hosted by: Indy Neidell
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Executive Producers: Bodo Rittenauer, Astrid Deinhard, Indy Neidell, Spartacus Olsson
Creative Producer: Joram Appel
Post Production Director: Wieke Kapteijns
Research by: Rune Vaever Hartvig
Edited by: Mikołaj Cackowski
Map animations: Eastory

Eastory’s channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCEly…
Archive by Screenocean/Reuters https://www.screenocean.com.

A TimeGhost chronological documentary produced by OnLion Entertainment GmbH.

From the comments:

World War Two
2 days ago (edited)
We get a ton of questions about the war on a daily basis. A lot of them are already answered in the YouTube comments to you all directly, but because some questions are very interesting indeed, we like to showcase some of them on the channel. Because the YouTube comments are hard to navigate, we have made a section on our forum where you can submit questions to be covered in Out of the Foxholes. You can do that here: https://community.timeghost.tv/c/Out-of-the-Foxholes-Qs

Cheers,
The TimeGhost team

Report on the collision that sank HNoMS Helge Ingstad last year

Filed under: Europe, Military — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

The Norwegian frigate HNoMS Helge Ingstad was eventually declared a total loss due to the damage from the collision and the resulting water damage as the ship sank near the Sture Terminal in November 2018. The first part of the report on the accident has been released:

HNoMS Helge Ingstad, a Fridtjof Nansen-class frigate commissioned in 2009.
Photo detail via Wikimedia Commons.

The frigate HNoMS Helge Ingstad and the tanker Sola TS collided in the Hjeltefjord in the early hours of 8 November 2018. The frigate had 137 persons on board with a mix of conscripts and permanent crew. A total of seven watchstanding personnel were present on the bridge, including two trainees. The tanker Sola TS was operated by the Greek shipping company Tsakos Columbia Shipmanagement (TCM) S.A. There was a total of 24 persons on board. The bridge was manned by four persons, including the pilot.

HNoMS Helge Ingstad sailed south at a speed of approximately 17–18 knots with the automatic identification system (AIS) in passive mode, i.e. no transmission of AIS-signal. The frigate’s bridge team had notified Fedje Vessel Traffic Service (VTS) of entering the area and followed the reported voyage. Sola TS had been loaded with crude oil at the Sture Terminal, and notified Fedje VTS of departure from the terminal. Sola TS exhibited navigation lights. In addition some of the deck lights were turned on to light up the deck for the crew who were securing equipment etc. for the passage.

In advance of the collision, Fedje VTS had not followed the frigate’s passage south through the Hjeltefjord. The crew and pilot on Sola TS had observed HNoMS Helge Ingstad and tried to warn of the danger and prevent a collision. The crew on HNoMS Helge Ingstad did not realise that they were on collision course until it was too late.

At 04:01:15, HNoMS Helge Ingstad collided with the tanker Sola TS. The first point of impact was Sola TS‘ starboard anchor and the area just in front of HNoMS Helge Ingstad‘s starboard torpedo magazine.

HNoMS Helge Ingstad suffered extensive damage along the starboard side. Seven crew members sustained minor physical injuries. Sola TS received minor damages and none of the crew were injured. Marine gas oil leaked out into the Hjeltefjord. The Institute of Marine Research has ascertained the effect of the oil spill had little impact on the marine environment.

HNoMS Helge Ingstad after grounding, 13 November 2018. Due to the steep nature of the seabed at the shoreline, the frigate slid down until it was almost totally underwater after initial grounding.
Photo via The Drive.

There is an embedded video with the report that neatly summarizes the series of events leading up to the collision.

Funny English Idioms – and why we say them!

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

Joolz Guides – London History Walks – Travel Films
Published 7 Jan 2018

Funny English Idioms – and why we say them!

English people use some funny idioms and expressions. We love them, especially if they are about going to the toilet!

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Julian McDonnell, that’s me, runs a London vlog and youtube channel where he talks about all things to do with London which you may not have known. This includes language and the way English people speak. Amongst many other funny idioms for going to the toilet one of the oldest ones is “To Spend a Penny”. This came about because it used to cost one penny to go to the public lavatories when they first appeared on the streets in 1851!

Hopefully this video will help you to understand the origins of these funny English idioms and expressions and help you to learn English or they may even be helpful if you are an ESL teacher or TEFL.

Another funny English idiom is when we say “He was sent to Coventry”. This indicates somebody who has been ostrasized and no one wants to talk to. Watch the video to find out how this came about.

Did you ever hear someone use the idiom “To hear a pin drop”? This actually originates from the tea auctions where you were only allowed to bid for a certain amount of time. They put a pin into a candle and let it burn down. When the pin fell out if there were no more bids you could hear a pin drop!

Our fourth funny idiom is a baker’s dozen. Anyone will tell you that a dozen is 12 but a baker’s dozen is 13! This is because in 1266 there was a law that would penalise bakers if they sold less than they said they were selling! So to make sure they weren’t short of their weight they would add a thirteenth loaf just to make sure.

Then comes our final idiom – To be on the wagon.

This means that someone is not drinking alcohol and it originates from the days when criminals would be hanged. They would stop at the Resurrection Gate pub and be bought one last drink but after that drink they had to get back onto the wagon and couldn’t drink any more. Then the wagon would take them to the gallows.

To make it more fun I have tried to show some of the locations which would have been affected by these expressions as well as point out some interesting historical facts which are related to them.

I go to Twinings in The Strand, The Royal Exchange, Pudding Lane and St Giles in the Fields

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QotD: Millennials as barbarians invading our civilization

Filed under: Greece, History, Humour, Media, Quotations — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 01:00

Hannah Arendt is said to have remarked that civilization is always being invaded by barbarians we call “children.” I don’t like to put a dangerously hard-to-trace quotation in the newspaper, but I first heard this half-jest decades ago and its depth has only impressed me more every year. Whoever said it first was obviously pretty learned and subtle, even if it wasn’t Arendt. “Barbarians” is a Greek word for incomprehensible, gibberish-spewing foreigners, but one of the great discoveries of the Greeks is that of the barbarians’ point of view, and the additional idea that this point of view deserved equal esteem.

Every nation believes its own customs and habits are the best, Herodotus said, and you would have to be nuts to dismiss those prejudices as though they were somehow objectively wrong. (I grant that this is a free translation, but he said it, and it is one of the intellectual breakthroughs with which we associate the Greeks.) As with nations, so it is with generations. The formative experiences, inherited expectations, and learned fears of somebody born in 1985 are hardly less different from mine than a foreigner’s would be.

If I say that my attitude toward millennials is that they are barbarians, I am asking for trouble, but I must insist on being understood: it is only that they are persons whose habits, prejudices, and values are foreign, formed by a different set of events and influences — not that they are inferior. In the right mood I can even be persuaded that their actual knowledge is simply of a qualitatively different character, rather than simply being more meagre because they have lived less long.

Colby Cosh, “‘Millennial’ gets used as an insult. But millennials aren’t actually inferior”, National Post, 2017-10-25.

November 15, 2019

Murder and Fascism – Rise of the Ustaše | BETWEEN 2 WARS I 1934 Part 3 of 4

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

TimeGhost History
Published 14 Nov 2019

King Aleksandar has been working to forge a single Yugoslav identity in his troubled Balkan state. But ethnic nationalism still runs strong, and a shadowy fascist movement fiercely committed to destroying Yugoslavia is emerging.

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Hosted by: Indy Neidell
Written by: Francis van Berkel & Spartacus Olsson
Directed by: Spartacus Olsson and Astrid Deinhard
Executive Producers: Bodo Rittenauer, Astrid Deinhard, Indy Neidell, Spartacus Olsson
Creative Producer: Joram Appel
Post-Production Director: Wieke Kapteijns
Research by: Francis van Berkel
Edited by: Wieke Kapteijns
Sound design: Marek Kamiński

Colorizations: Klimbim/Olga Shirnina: https://klimbim2014.wordpress.com

Oleg M, Dememorabilia, Julius Jääskeläinen, Adrien Fillon.

Image sources: FORTEPAN / Gyöngyi, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, TH-Bibliothek Zürich: Wehrli, Leo.

Icons from the Noun Project: jail by Strongicon, Police by IconTrack, Hand by Fahmi, coin stacks by emilegraphics, Government by Adrien Coquet, president by bezier master, dots by Alexander Skowalsky, List by Gregor Cresnar, Protest by Juan Pablo Bravo, crack by Dilon Choudhury, thunder by Phonlaphat Thongsriphong, Music by sanjivini, Death by Icon Island, curtains by Bartama Graphic.

A TimeGhost chronological documentary produced by OnLion Entertainment GmbH.

From the comments:

TimeGhost History
2 days ago (edited)
There is a lot going on in this episode. Extreme nationalism, fascism, authoritarianism, terrorism, and so on so forth. These things are controversial enough, but they’re also taking place in one of history’s biggest minefields: the Balkans. We’ve done absolutely everything we can to stick to the facts and stay objective. It’s a tough one to research but we have used credible academic texts and know we’ve done a good job.

If you think we’ve got something wrong, then feel free to (politely!) point it out in the comments. But remember that just because you don’t like how a particular group or person has acted, it doesn’t mean that the facts are wrong. Also, try to refrain from drawing any parallels with the modern-day to support your agenda. The fact that Yugoslavia struggled with ethnic tension has nothing to do with present-day debates on immigration and multiculturalism. Let’s stick to history, not myth.

Cheers,
Francis

“Sparta” – The Battle of Thermopylae – Sabaton History 041 [Official]

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

Sabaton History
Published 14 Nov 2019

The Battle of Thermopylae of 480 BCE may be one of the most famous battles in Ancient History. King Leonidas and his 300 Spartans were certainly not as alone in their last stand against the Persians, but are nevertheless remembered as being an underdog who would rather die than lose their freedom.

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Hosted by: Indy Neidell
Written by: Markus Linke and Indy Neidell
Directed by: Astrid Deinhard and Wieke Kapteijns
Produced by: Pär Sundström, Astrid Deinhard and Spartacus Olsson
Creative Producer: Joram Appel
Executive Producers: Pär Sundström, Joakim Broden, Tomas Sunmo, Indy Neidell, Astrid Deinhard, and Spartacus Olsson
Post-Production Director: Wieke Kapteijns
Maps by: Eastory
Edited by: Iryna Dulka
Sound Editing by: Marek Kaminski

Eastory YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCEly…
Archive by: Reuters/Screenocean https://www.screenocean.com
Music by Sabaton.

Sources:
– Photo of Persian warriors relief by Jakub Hałun from Wikimedia Commons
– Xerxes I by Mbmrock from Wikimedia Commons
– Bayerische State Painting Collections
– Rijksmuseum

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“In a functioning system, the head of the government sets foreign policy and the diplomats enact it. So naturally there’s not a chance of that in Washington”

Filed under: Bureaucracy, Government, Politics, Russia, USA — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

Mark Steyn on the foggiest of Foggy Bottom diplomatic bafflegab on the first day of the :

Yesterday I caught a bit of the impeachment theatre en route to a lunchtime speaking engagement. To be honest, if they’d come round and performed it live in my hotel room, I’d still have fled. If universally respected eminent lifelong career foreign-service bigshots Bill Taylor and George Kent are Adam Schiff’s star witnesses, their chief purpose seems to be to get Democrats pining for the charisma of Bill de Blasio and the self-effacement of John Kerry.

In a functioning system, the head of the government sets foreign policy and the diplomats enact it. So naturally there’s not a chance of that in Washington. When Taylor and Kent whine that there seemed to be a “shadow foreign policy”, the shadow is theirs; they spent a day testifying that everything had been going ticketty-boo for decades just as they’d always done things – and then Trump came along and took a different view. Oh, my! Anyone would think that, as Barack Obama once proposed, “elections have consequences”.

First up was George Kent, the “Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Eastern Europe and the Caucasus”. He warmed up the crowd with some extensive biographical material about the “nearly sixty years” of George Kents (I believe he’s George III or some such) who have “chosen” to endow America with the blessings of their “public service”. It didn’t help that he wore a bow tie. Eventually he stopped talking about himself and started talking about Ukraine:

    Our strategic aim for the entirety of my foreign service career is not possible without a Ukraine whole, free, and at peace, including Crimea and Donbas, territories currently occupied by Russia.

Crimea is, of course, familiar to anyone who’s read “The Charge of the Light Brigade”:

    Theirs not to reason why
    Theirs but to do or die…

Or, in the case of low-level diplomats who’ve never had a single conversation with the President, theirs not to reason why, theirs but to do or tender their resignations after first ensuring that their pensions won’t be affected. Instead:

    Into the valley of the SCIF
    Rode the six hundred hearsay witnesses…

As I said, any Tom, Dick or Harry can bandy Crimea, but it takes a career striped-pants Foggy Bottom public servant to toss in “Donbas” with gay abandon. It would have been interesting to see whether Adam Schiff or anyone else in the room could have found Donbas on a map. The odds of pinning the tail on the Donbas blindfolded are better. It’s bordered to the north, east and south-east by Russia, so it’s akin to the Russian foreign ministry regarding northern Mexico as a vital national-security interest of Moscow’s.

In fact, northern Mexico is a vital national-security interest of America’s, but, under the mass wankerization of public policy, Perma-Beltway cares more about the borders of Ukraine than it does about the borders of the United States.

Shakespeare Summarized: Romeo And Juliet

Filed under: Europe, Humour, Italy, Media — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Overly Sarcastic Productions
27 April 2014

Yeah, sorry. I don’t like this play very much. I know it’s a classic, I know it inspired countless other love stories… I… I can’t help it. It’s just too funny. I’m sorry if you actually thought this play was tragic, because I did not respect your opinion here at ALL.

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