The Great War
Published on 13 Sep 2018The American First Army joins the fray on the Western Front with the Battle of Saint-Mihiel. All along the Western Front, the Allies are attacking or planning new attacks. The situation for the Germans looks dire even as the first war reparations from Russia arrive.
September 14, 2018
The Battle of Saint-Mihiel I THE GREAT WAR – Week 216
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Are Guards Historically Accurate? | Feature Enquiry
Feature History
Published on 22 Aug 2018Use this link to get your first 2 months of Skillshare for FREE! http://skl.sh/featurehistory2
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Often fantasy and medieval media will show armoured guards patrolling settlements and enforcing the law. Is that historically accurate? No.
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I do the research, writing, narration, art, and animation. Yes, it is very lonely
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September 13, 2018
Broadsword and targe – how Highlanders fought
Lindybeige
Published on 22 Aug 2018A quick introduction to the use of this weapon combination, shot very quickly at Fight Camp 2018. Sorry about the background noise.
Support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/LindybeigeThis was shot at the end of the last day, and I was a bit hoarse from shouting, camping, and beer. When the aircraft overhead gets very loud, I have added subtitles.
The targes we are using are the correct diameter, but the real things were a fair bit heavier, and offered some protection against even musketballs.
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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QotD: “God is dead”
The life and work of the maverick German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900) is associated with five interlinking ideas: the death of God; nihilism and the crisis in morality; the Superman; the will to power; and the eternal recurrence.
Nietzsche first announced that ‘God is dead’ in his 1883 work The Joyful Science. As with much that he wrote, this phrase of Nietzsche’s has subsequently been often misunderstood. Taken literally, it is obviously a nonsensical declaration, for either a Christian god is real and eternal, or else he never existed in the first place. What Nietzsche meant by the death of God was that European civilisation had lost its faith in Christianity, but was still living by values and a morality system based on it. For this reason he believed European civilisation was facing a crisis resulting from the approaching collapse in its morality system, and the dawn of the age of nihilism – hence the title of his 1886 work, Beyond Good and Evil, which was not the libertine manifesto it sounds like, but a contention that Christian values of good and evil have become redundant.
In this respect, Nietzsche was not a nihilist, another common misconception. He viewed the coming age of nihilism with much trepidation, fearing (rightly) that the result would be great wars in the 20th century. He believed that it was imperative that humanity create a new morality system for the coming post-Christian age. The solution, he believed, was a new individualistic morality system in which the strongest, bravest men would become their own masters and creators, and in turn would become philosopher kings and oligarchs of the spirit. This new man was to be embodied in his infamous, hypothetical Übermensch, or Superman (as Über means above and beyond in German, Nietzsche’s word used to be also translated as the Beyond-Man or Overman, but today is usually not translated at all. The Übermensch goes above and beyond.)
Patrick West, “Nietzsche and the struggle against nihilism”, Spiked, 2018-08-03.
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September 12, 2018
Forgotten History: The Americans Take Blanc Mont Ridge, October 1918
Forgotten Weapons
Published on 11 Sep 2018http://www.patreon.com/ForgottenWeapons
Cool Forgotten Weapons merch! http://shop.bbtv.com/collections/forg…The German army captured Blanc Mont Ridge in the early months of World War One and occupied it throughout the years of fighting, fending off repeated French assaults throughout 1915 and 1916. While the ridge looks far from imposing, it is a piece of high ground which overlooks a large part of the front in the Champagne region of France, and was a very valuable outlook for artillery observation. Its continuous occupation allowed it to be heavily fortified by the Germans as a major strong point in their defensive lines.
In October of 1918, the task would fall to the American Expeditionary Force to take the ridge as part of the ongoing offensive that was finally pushing the Germans back all along the front lines. Years of war had gradually sapped the strength of the German forces, and the last gasp spring offensive earlier in the year had destroyed the last remaining units of elite German troops. And yet, they still had their fortifications here, armed with more than 350 machine guns on this ridge alone.
On the morning of October 3rd, 1918, a combined force of US Army and Marines (the 2nd and 36th Infantry Divisions) set off on an attack up the gradual slope towards the ridge. The attack was preceded by only a few minutes of artillery fire and then a creeping barrage behind which the men advanced. A thick layer of ground fog was perhaps their best ally, as they began the assault of the German position. A fierce fight left the positions on the front of the ridge in American hands by the end of the day, although the fighting would be tenacious for several days, as the Americans advanced well beyond the supporting French units on their flanks, and were left exposed on the reverse slope of the ridge.
By October 7th, the ridge position was consolidated, and the French and American forces continued their advance towards the next objective, the town of Saint-Étienne-à-Arnes. American casualties in the assault would come to approximately 7,800 men – this was not a position relinquished easily by the Germans. The battle was considered a major accomplishment at the time, although it has been largely forgotten in the century since.
Today, the summit of the ridge is the site of a major American war memorial:
https://www.abmc.gov/cemeteries-memor…
Thanks to Military History Tours for making this video possible! https://www.miltours.com
If you enjoy Forgotten Weapons, check out its sister channel, InRangeTV! http://www.youtube.com/InRangeTVShow
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September 11, 2018
Unleashing The Tank’s Full Potential – 1918/1919 Tank Tactics I THE GREAT WAR On The Road
The Great War
Published on 10 Sep 2018Support The Tank Museum: https://www.patreon.com/tankmuseum
Indy and David Willy from the Tank Museum sit inside a Mark V tank to talk about the evolution of tank tactics and how the Allies started to properly use tanks during and after the battle of Amiens.
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How the Media and Literati Class Determines the Politics of a Nation
rubatirabbit
Published on 15 Oct 2016From Yes Prime Minister S02E05 Power To The People
The prime minister intends to introduce a professor’s scheme for enacting bottom-up government. The civil service and reformists reacts to this scheme.
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September 10, 2018
HMS Victorious Receives New Strike Force (1966)
British Pathé
Published on 13 Apr 2014Full title reads: “Moray Firth. ‘Victorious’ Receives New Strike Force”.
Moray Firth, Scotland.
Air view Royal Navy warship, the aircraft carrier HMS Victorious at sea refuelling from tanker. Air view ditto. Angle shot as Buccaneer fighter jets flies overhead. LV Interior of bridge. SV The Captain DL Davenport talking to Senior Officer. CU The Captain.
LV As Buccaneer comes in and lands on Victorious. LV As wings fold up. GV As it moves to side of ship. Air view as another plane comes in and lands. LV As it misses the arrester wire and overshoots. SV Men watching. Air view as the plane comes in again. CU As it hooks the arrester wire. LV As the plane comes to a halt. CU The arrester wire comes back for next plane. LV Next plane coming in. CU As it hooks wire. LV As it comes to halt.
LV The FDO (Flight Deck Officer) signalling for catapult mechanism to be fixed to aircraft. LV The aircraft preparing for take off. SV As the plane is hooked up. LV Firemen standing ready. Steam is rising from catapult mechanism. CU Firemen. CU FDO signals for take off. LV As the aircraft takes off. SV Buccaneer with wings folded on deck. GV The deck packed with Buccaneers.
(Original Neg.)
FILM ID:1795.16A VIDEO FROM BRITISH PATHÉ. EXPLORE OUR ONLINE CHANNEL, BRITISH PATHÉ TV. IT’S FULL OF GREAT DOCUMENTARIES, FASCINATING INTERVIEWS, AND CLASSIC MOVIES. http://www.britishpathe.tv/
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September 9, 2018
World War Two Begins – WW2 September 8 1939
World War Two
Published on 8 Sep 2018The German-Polish war is the match that ignites the flames that finally burn British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain’s appeasement efforts to the ground.
Between 2 Wars: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list…
Join us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/TimeGhostHistory
Or join The TimeGhost Army directly at: https://timeghost.tvWritten and Hosted by: Indy Neidell
Produced and Directed by: Spartacus Olsson and Astrid Deinhard
Executive Producers: Bodo Rittenauer, Astrid Deinhard, Indy Neidell, Spartacus Olsson
Research by: Indy Neidell
Edited by: Spartacus OlssonA TimeGhost chronological documentary produced by OnLion Entertainment GmbH
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Holy Roman Empire Explained
WonderWhy
Published on 9 Aug 2018Looking at the origins and history of the Holy Roman Empire, assessing the claim by Voltaire that it was not holy, nor Roman, nor an empire, and finally looking at the complex hierarchical political structure of the empire.
Have you ever wondered what the world would be like if the Holy Roman Empire existed today? This video is a collaboration was RealLifeLore, who looked at that very question. Link here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIwNR…
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QotD: Minimum wages hurt the very poorest workers
The theory that minimum wages discharged the least productive workers had been a constant of Anglophone political economy, dating to John Stuart Mill’s (1848) Principles of Political Economy. When England established a minimum wage with the Trades Board Act in 1909, it did so notwithstanding the objections of a generation of England’s most eminent economists – Henry Sidgwick, Alfred Marshall, Philip Wicksteed, and A.C. Pigou – all of whom observed that while the law could make it criminal to pay a worker less than the minimum, it could not compel firms to hire someone at that rate. Even the intellectual champions of the English minimum wage conceded the point.
Thomas Leonard, Illiberal Reformers, 2016.
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September 8, 2018
British tabloids try to stir up trouble with Argentina … again
Sir Humphrey tries to talk the tabloid press in off the ledge over some terrible reporting from the Falkland Islands:
River Class Patrol Vessel HMS Clyde is pictured exercising at sea. HMS Clyde patrols the territorial seas and monitors the airspace around the Falkland Islands whilst conducting routine visits and reassurance to the many small settlements found throughout the islands.
Photo via Wikimedia Commons.
This week it was revealed that an Argentine survey vessel had been reported near the Falkland Islands, and that the local patrol ship HMS Clyde had reportedly been sent to investigate. This simple story led to a barrage of negative news suggesting that the RN had ‘confronted’ the vessel which was apparently looking for oil.
One of the greatest success stories in the last few years for British foreign policy has been the way a formerly tense and difficult relationship with Argentina has so rapidly been reset to become a genuinely productive one. Under the Kirchner regime, which used foreign policy gripes as a means of distracting attention from domestic woes, the relationship between Argentina and the UK was far less productive and strong than it could, or should, have been.
[…]
It is therefore immensely depressing to see some utter rubbish being spouted in the newspapers about what may or may not have happened off the Falkland Islands. The reality is far more simple than is being reported – the vessel in question was a scientific research ship conducting operations near the Burwood bank. Extremely bad weather forced a course change, which brought the vessel closer than planned to the Falkland Islands. (Full source can be found HERE).
The UK and Argentina operate a sensible arrangement to notify each other of movements in certain areas to reduce concerns and maintain effective communications. This agreement means that both nations provide 48hrs notice when a naval vessel will be within 15nm of the others coast line (noting territorial waters usually extend out to 12nm). Usually vessel movements and operational plans are known well in advance, and it is possible to communicate this in a timely fashion. Sometimes though, this doesn’t always go to plan – for instance when a vessel is changing course unexpectedly due to the weather.
On this occasion, it appears to have been the case that the Argentine authorities notified the UK of the vessels course and presence as soon as they were aware of its situation. The vessel herself is not one that is normally covered by these notification arrangements anyway (being a civilian research vessel).
What may have happened is that the UK may have identified an unknown vessel in the local area that they were not expecting to see (noting these waters are reasonably quiet) and began the process of sending HMS Clyde to investigate. As soon as it was clear that in fact this was an entirely legitimate presence, she returned to her normal duties. It is not even clear that HMS Clyde sailed, let alone went close to the Argentine vessel. As the Argentines themselves made clear, no overflight or challenge was made, and normal business continued as the weather improved.
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QotD: Reactions to, and criticisms of, Epicureanism
Hedonism has always been a controversial doctrine, so far as it is opposed to the teachings of the explicitly altruistic philosophies and religious systems. There are difficulties with hedonism when it comes to the exact comparison of pleasures. We do not have any of the more detailed works in which Epicurus might have attempted what Jeremy Bentham later called a “felicific calculus”. But, bearing in mind the difficulties that Bentham and the 19th century utilitarians found when they tried to move from principles to details, there is no reason to suppose he was more successful.
However, it is hard to see anything so scandalous in the pursuit of happiness through moderation and through friendship that should have brought on a flood of often hysterical denunciation and misrepresentation in antiquity that began in his own lifetime and did not end even with the loss of virtually the whole body of Epicurean writings.
The early accusations are very detailed, and are cited by Diogenes Laertius. Among much else, it is alleged:
- That he wrote 50 obscene letters;
- That one of his brothers was a pimp;
- That his understanding of philosophy was small and his understanding of life even smaller;
- That he put forward as his own the doctrines of Democritus about atoms and of Aristippus about pleasure;
- That in his On Nature Epicurus says the same things over and over again and writes largely in sheer opposition to others, especially against his former teacher Nausiphanes;
- That he was not a genuine Athenian;
- That he vomited twice a day from over-indulgence.
Three centuries after his death, Plutarch (46-127 AD) wrote against him in almost hysterical tone. He says:
Epicurus… actually advises a cultivated monarch to put up with recitals of stratagems and with vulgar buffooneries at his drinking parties sooner than with the discussion of problems in music and poetry.
And again:
Colotes himself, for another, while hearing a lecture of Epicurus on natural philosophy, suddenly cast himself down before him and embraced his knees; and this is what Epicurus himself writes about it in a tone of solemn pride: ‘You, as one revering my remarks on that occasion, were seized with a desire, not accounted for by my lecture, to embrace me by clasping my knees and lay hold of me to the whole extent of the contact that is customarily established in revering and supplicating certain personages. You therefore caused me,’ he says, ‘to consecrate you in return and demonstrate my reverence.’ My word! We can pardon those who say that they would pay any price to see a painting of that scene, one kneeling at the feet of the other and embracing his knees while the other returns the supplication and worship. Yet that act of homage, though skillfully contrived by Colotes, bore no proper fruit: he was not proclaimed a Sage. Epicurus merely says: ‘Go about as one immortal in my eyes, and think of me as immortal too.’
Now, all this and more was said against Epicurus when the whole body of his writings was still available, and by men who had access to those writings. It is unlikely, bearing in mind their general ability, that they were incapable of understanding plain Greek. So what could have been their motivation for misrepresenting him in defiance of the evidence, or in repeating personal libels irrelevant to his philosophy?
A possible answer is that they hated his philosophy for other reasons that they were not able or did not wish fully to discuss.
What does make Epicurus and his philosophy so controversial is one further piece of advice on the pursuit of happiness. It is impossible to be happy, he insists, unless we understand the nature of the universe and our own place within the universe.
Sean Gabb, “Epicurus: Father of the Enlightenment”, speaking to the 6/20 Club in London, 2007-09-06.
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September 7, 2018
Red Terror in Soviet Russia I THE GREAT WAR Week 215
The Great War
Published on 6 Sep 2018After an almost successful attempt on Lenin’s live, the Tscheka under Felix Dzerzhinsky responds with a terror campaign to consolidate Soviet power through fear. At the same time, a supposed Allied plot is unveiled that would get Russia back into the war.
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Suomi m/31 – Finland’s Excellent Submachine Gun
Forgotten Weapons
Published on 17 Aug 2018More info: https://www.forgottenweapons.com/suomi-m-31-finlands-excellent-submachine-gun/
http://www.patreon.com/ForgottenWeapons
Designed by Aimo Lahti, the Suomi m/31 submachine gun is in my opinion one of the standout submachine guns of the World War Two era. Despite its hefty weight (10.4lb / 4.7kg) and lack of a good pistol grip stock, it still manages to be tremendously controllable and accurate, with a very high rate of fire (about 900 rpm).
For a detailed written description of the history and development of the weapon, I would refer you to the excellent article by Jaeger Platoon: http://www.jaegerplatoon.net/MACHINEP…
If you enjoy Forgotten Weapons, check out its sister channel, InRangeTV! http://www.youtube.com/InRangeTVShow
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