Quotulatiousness

February 17, 2020

Sieges and Siege-craft

Filed under: Britain, France, History, Middle East, Military — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 06:00

Lindybeige
Published 2 Jun 2016

Sieges in the ancient and medieval worlds were on quite different scales. 10,000 men can do things differently from 500.

Support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/Lindybeige

This video’s subject was chosen by Jack Sargeant, the winner of the DeepArt art competition a couple of weeks ago. The topic is a large one, but I hope I gave it a decent enough shot.

Castle illustration by Mathew Nielsen.

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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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February 15, 2020

The Best Couples in History — Valentine’s Day Special

Filed under: Europe, History, Humour, Middle East, Military — Tags: , , , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

Overly Sarcastic Productions
Published 14 Feb 2020

Happy Valentine’s Day! Celebrate the history of Love with a rundown of these outstanding couples — for better and for worse.

Our content is intended for teenage audiences and up.

This video was edited by Sophia Ricciardi, AKA “Indigo”.

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February 10, 2020

History Buffs: Kingdom of Heaven

Filed under: History, Media, Middle East, Military, Religion — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

History Buffs
Published 15 Aug 2015

Apparently, Orlando Bloom was suffering from a nasty cold when shooting a big chunk of this movie. I think it shows … Anyway, it’s time for a brand new episode of History Buffs! Enjoy guys and thank you so much for all your support!

February 4, 2020

The Macedonian Phalanx

Filed under: Greece, History, Middle East, Military — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

HistoryMatters
Published 30 Jan 2016

A short introduction to the Macedonian phalanx, from conception to demise.

February 3, 2020

Yet another attempted settlement of the Arab-Israeli conflict that will go nowhere

Filed under: History, Middle East, Politics, Religion, USA — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

Ted Campbell on the recent peace plan proposed by US president Donald Trump:

On the subject of the Trump Mideast Peace Plan, I agree with both The Economist which says, “as a blueprint for a two-state solution it was dead on arrival,” and with the Globe and Mail‘s Mark MacKinnon who writes that “President Donald Trump’s Middle East peace plan … aims to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict almost completely on Israel’s terms [and, while] Mr. Trump’s allegiances came as no surprise [to the Palestinian leaders, but] some of [their] bitterness was reserved for the leaders of Arab states that Palestinians see as quietly going along with the designs of the U.S. President and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.”

I think that is because President Trump, and much of the world, has lost patience with the Palestinians who still demand a right of return that, if ever seriously considered by anyone, would destroy Israel. Only Iran really wants that.

The strategic situation in the region, indeed in the entire Islamic Crescent which stretches from Mauritania and Morocco on the Atlantic coast of West Africa to Indonesia in East Asia, has changed in the past 70 years. There is no longer a unified Muslim “world” that opposes the very existence of a Jewish state in the Middle East. Indeed, a few Arab and Islamic states have correct, even friendly relations with Israel and others trade with the Jewish state (without having diplomatic relations) to their mutual advantage. The current problems in the region are centred on a power struggle between the Shia Islamic community, centred in Iran and the larger but socially and politically fragmented Sunni Islamic community …

… the differences are more than just religious. Iran, backed by China and Russia, and Saudi Arabia, backed by the USA, are engaged in something close to a real shooting war while Egypt and Turkey egg them both on. All four have some claim to dominance in the region and none is a real “friend” to any of the others and none gives a damn about Palestine or the Palestinian people.

[…]

President Trump has done a big political favour for Benjamin Netanyahu … but, ultimately it is probably pointless, and he and his successor and her (or his) successor, too, will likely still be seized with this issue in 2025 and 2030 and beyond.

Eventually, a solution will be found … it will, I suspect, involve Israel ceding a bit of territory to a new Palestinians state and, perhaps, establishing some sort of controlled, limited access corridor from the West Bank, possibly across the Northern Negev Desert. More importantly, it will involve Israel and Jordan, working in tandem, helping the new state to grow and prosper and live in peace with its neighbours. It’s a dream, of course, but it’s better, better for everyone, than is another war.

Classics Summarized: The Odyssey

Filed under: Books, Greece, History, Middle East — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Overly Sarcastic Productions
Published 3 Feb 2015

Funny story. Exporting this monster was almost as difficult as getting back to Ithaca was for our intrepid hero, who — as viewers of The Iliad may note — has inexplicably lost his Solid Snake voice in this production.

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February 2, 2020

Israeli M1919 Brownings and the US Semiauto Market

Filed under: History, Middle East, Military, USA, Weapons, WW2 — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Forgotten Weapons
Published 28 Mar 2018

Sold for $4,888.

In the world of converted semiautomatic “machine guns,” the Browning 1919 is a happy example of one of the most iconic and historically important US machine guns and also one of the cheapest semiautomatic belt fed guns available. This stems from two factors, primarily. One is that the Browning 1919, being developed from the water-cooled M1917 Browning, is a closed bolt system. Open bolt semiautomatic designs are not allowed by ATF, and so most semiauto machine gun conversions require substantial alteration to convert from open bolt to closed bolt — which the M1919 does not need. Second, the IDF used the Browning M1919 for many years and in large numbers, and surplussed many of them in the late 1990s. These guns came into the United States as parts kits in large numbers. This meant a glut of cheap guns, easily built as semi autos, and in an easily shootable caliber — 7.62mm NATO (as converted by Israel from their original .30-06 chambering).

Today, we are looking at an example of a semiautomatic converted M1919, and specifically at the various changes made by Israel to both improve the design and convert it successfully to the NATO cartridge.

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February 1, 2020

The Greco-Turkish War & The Turkish War Of Independence I THE GREAT WAR 1920

Filed under: Europe, Greece, History, Middle East, Military, WW1 — Tags: , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 06:00

The Great War
Published 31 Jan 2020

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The Ottoman Empire was among the losing powers of World War 1 and left a power vacuum after the armistice of Mudros. The Great Powers had already made plans for the territory beforehand and now Greece had ambitions to take over the parts of Turkey where Greeks lived.

» SUPPORT THE CHANNEL
Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/thegreatwar
Merchandise: https://shop.spreadshirt.de/thegreatwar/

» SOURCES
Criss, Nur Bilge: “Occupation during and after the War (Ottoman Empire)”, in: 1914-1918-online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War, ed. by Ute Daniel, Peter Gatrell, Oliver Janz, Heather Jones, Jennifer Keene, Alan Kramer, and Bill Nasson, issued by Freie Universität Berlin, Berlin 2015-08-05 https://encyclopedia.1914-1918-online…

Leonhard, Jörn. Der überforderte Frieden. Versailles und die Welt 1918-1923 (CH Beck, 2018).

Macmillan, Margaret. The Peacemakers: Six Months that Changed the World (London: John Murray, 2001).

Karsh, Efraim and Inari Karsh. Empires of the Sand (London: Harvard UP, 1999).

Llewllyn Smith, Michael. Ionian Vision: Greece in Asia Minor (London: Hurst, 2016 (1973))

Gerwarth, Robert. The Vanquished. Why the First World War Failed to End, 1917-1923 (Penguin, 2017).

Fromkin, David. A Peace to End All Peace (New York: Avon, 1989)

McMeekin, Sean. The Ottoman Endgame (Penguin, 2015)

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»CREDITS
Presented by: Jesse Alexander
Written by: Jesse Alexander
Director: Toni Steller & Florian Wittig
Director of Photography: Toni Steller
Sound: Toni Steller Editing: Toni Steller
Mixing, Mastering & Sound Design: http://above-zero.com
Maps: Daniel Kogosov (https://www.patreon.com/Zalezsky)
Research by: Jesse Alexander
Fact checking: Florian Wittig Channel

Design: Alexander Clark

Original Logo: David van Stephold

A Mediakraft Networks Original Channel

Contains licensed material by getty images
All rights reserved – Real Time History GmbH 2019

History Summarized: Byzantine Empire — The Golden Age

Filed under: Europe, Greece, History, Humour, Middle East, Military, Religion — Tags: , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

Overly Sarcastic Productions
Published 31 Jan 2020

What do you do when life takes away half of your empire? Well, if you’re the Medieval Byzantines, you make comprehensive structural reforms to better manage a changing geopolitical landscape — And then you make an absolute crapload of mosaics.

Our content is intended for teenage audiences and up.

This video was edited in part by Sophia Ricciardi, AKA “Indigo”.

FURTHER SOURCES: A Short History of Byzantium by John Julius Norwich.

PATREON: https://www.Patreon.com/OSP

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January 28, 2020

Classics Summarized: The Iliad

Filed under: Books, Greece, History, Middle East, Military — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Overly Sarcastic Productions
Published 23 Jan 2015

I’m baaaaaaaack!

This one took me a while. The reason why should be pretty obvious. Enjoy your adorable murderfest.

Troy may be a good movie (though I have my doubts) but it sure as hell isn’t the Iliad.

PATREON: https://www.patreon.com/user?u=4664797

Find us on Twitter @OSPYouTube!

January 25, 2020

Swedish K: The Carl Gustav m/45B and the Port Said

Filed under: Europe, History, Middle East, Military, USA, Weapons — Tags: , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

Forgotten Weapons
Published 24 Jan 2020

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During the 1930s, Sweden acquired an assortment of different submachine guns, including Bergmanns, Thompsons, and Suomis. As World War Two progressed, they decided that they really needed to standardize on a single caliber and model of gun, and requested designs from both the Carl Gustav factory and Husqvarna. The Carl Gustav design won out, and was adopted as the m/45.

It was a very simple open-bolt, tube-receiver, fixed-firing-pin design chambered for 9x19mm Parabellum ammunition. The original guns were built around Finnish Suomi magazines, both 71-round drums and 50-round “coffin” mags. After the war these were replace by a new 36-round traditional box magazine, and magazine well adapters were fitted to the guns which precluded the use of the larger mags. The new magazines were much more convenient to carry, less expensive, and more reliable.

The name “Swedish K” comes form the full designation: Kulsprutepistol m/45. The guns were used by American special operations forces in Vietnam until the Swedish government stopped export sales to the US, at which point the Navy commissioned Smith & Wesson to produce the Model 76 submachine gun (essentially a copy of the m/45). The design was also licensed by Egypt, which also licensed the AG-42 Ljungman rifle at the same time. The Egyptian copy was called the Port Said, and shows the features fo the original Swedish m/45 pattern, where the guns in Swedish service were mostly updated to the m/45B pattern.

Photo of m/45C with bayonet from: http://www.gotavapen.se/index_eng2g.htm

Check them out for a ton of information on Swedish small arms!

Contact:
Forgotten Weapons
6281 N. Oracle #36270
Tucson, AZ 85740

January 17, 2020

Zionism, Arabism & Colonialism in the Middle East | BETWEEN 2 WARS I 1936 Part 1 of 3

Filed under: Britain, France, History, Middle East, Military — Tags: , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 06:00

TimeGhost History
Published 16 Jan 2020

After more than twenty years of colonial management, promises made but few promises kept and ethnic & cultural clashes in the area, unrest in the Middle East erupts in violence. A series of movements originate in this time, with long lasting consequences.

Watch our episode about the Middle east in the 1920s here: https://youtu.be/y6tSvRbvh2s

Join us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/TimeGhostHistory

Hosted by: Indy Neidell
Written by: Joram Appel
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: Joram Appel
Fact-Checking by: Jonas Srouji
Edited by: Daniel Weiss
Sound design: Marek Kaminski

Sources:
Arab by LINECTOR from the Noun Project
Bomb by P Thanga Vignesh from the Noun Project

Colorizations by:
– Dememorabilia – https://www.instagram.com/dememorabilia/
– Adrien.Colorisation – https://instagram.com/adrien.colorisa…
– Norman Stewart

Soundtracks from Epidemic Sound:
– “Dawn Of Civilization” – Jo Wandrini
– “The Inspector 4” – Johannes Bornlöf
– “Easy Target” – Rannar Sillard
– “First Responders” – Skrya
– “Not Safe Yet” – Gunnar Johnsen
– “Deflection” – Reynard Seidel
– “The Charleston 3” – Håkan Eriksson

A TimeGhost chronological documentary produced by OnLion Entertainment GmbH.

From the comments:

TimeGhost History
42 minutes ago (edited)
We have already covered “Carving up the Middle East” in one of our first Between Two Wars episodes (watch here: https://youtu.be/y6tSvRbvh2s), but we felt like we had to return to the area one more time as all that carving had quite some consequences. This means that a large part of this episode is about colonialism, Zionism, Arabism, race and ethnicity. I’m also aware of the complicated modern-day conflict in the area, many of which originate in [the events covered in] this episode. However, we would like the comment section to be reserved for debating the history. We’re not going to engage with people discussing modern-day issues and politics, and we’re going to be quite strict in monitoring any racist or otherwise hateful comments.

Cheers,
Joram

The crying need for “regime change” … in Canadian newsrooms

Filed under: Cancon, Media, Middle East, Politics — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

Chris Selley discusses the amazingly tone-deaf “corrections” issued by CBC and CTV over their malicious misquoting of former Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s comments on the Iranian government:

Harper did not advocate military intervention in Iran, or indeed any particular intervention whatsoever. Despite describing Iran (accurately) as an “anti-Semitic state” premised on “religious fanaticism and regional imperialism” that is standing resolutely in the way of cooperation between other Middle Eastern nations, Harper didn’t even advocate “a complete change of government.”

Prime Minister Stephen Harper speaking at the Annual Meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, January 26, 2012.
World Economic Forum photo via Wikimedia Commons.

“I do believe we need to see a change in Iran if we are going to see peace in the Middle East,” he said.

“Without a change in the nature of the government of Tehran,” he said, “the Middle East will continue to be in turmoil.”

He said he hoped the furious protests in Iran might nudge the country toward “a better trajectory.”

These are perfectly anodyne statements. Who doesn’t want the Iranian regime to alter its behaviour?

Clarification or correction? I would say this calls for something more like “colossal embarrassment necessitating deep introspection.”

The root problem, I think, is that so much of Canadian politics is purely for show. We are a sparsely populated, not very powerful nation where the differences between the two major federal parties are remarkably small — and thus so are the stakes. It requires special measures to keep people interested, as much for the media as for politicians.

[…]

That’s how the big outlets like CBC and CTV make the sausage of the day, and it’s understandable. They do great investigative work, but the beast needs feeding not just every day, but all day every day. During the campaign I would watch colleagues set up for live hits in various parking lots and back yards and sometimes even on the campaign bus, and imagine them speaking the truth: “I’m here in Delta, B.C. and there’s f–k-all to report. Back to you, Kent.” But the viewers must never know. They need drama, as weak as it might be. I can easily imagine how that principle transformed “a changed regime” into “regime change.”

The real problem with this reporting regime is when it’s applied to things that actually do matter. There are serious potential consequences to telling the world that Stephen Harper thinks, in essence, that we should declare war on Iran with an eye to bouncing the ayatollahs. Harper’s successor and his government are in the midst of an extremely delicate and frankly improbable operation to find out precisely what happened the morning of Jan. 8 in the skies above Tehran and seek justice for the victims and their families. Those families don’t deserve fake news about a warmongering former PM, and I’m sure our diplomats would prefer members of the unchanged Iranian regime didn’t come across it either.

This isn’t a Canadian federal election. It’s real life, and needs to be covered as such.

January 13, 2020

The Nika riots in Constantinople (with bonus NASCAR analogies)

Filed under: History, Middle East, Military, Religion, Sports — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

Not only does Tamara Keel provide interesting and informative gun information, she also has at least a vague interest in late Classical/early Medieval history:

Court of Emperor Justinian with (right) archbishop Maximian and (left) court officials and Praetorian Guards; Basilica of San Vitale in Ravenna, Italy. The bearded man to Justinian’s right is believed to be Belisarius. (via Wikimedia)

The center of social life in Constantinople was the Hippodrome, a massive stadium where chariot races were held. Chariot racing was wildly popular with all strata of society, and everybody was a fan of one team or another; the Blues, the Greens, the Whites, and the Reds. Although as time went on, hardly anybody paid attention to anybody other than the Blues and the Greens. Kinda like Dale Jr. fans and Jeff Gordon fans and who cares about Kurt Busch anymore ’cause he’s a tool.

So, everybody who was anybody was a fan of the Blues or the Greens. You only hung out with fellow Dale fans, all the Jeff Gordon fans voted the same way, you beat the crap out of rival fans in bar fights when you could. Trouble really erupted, however, when some popular ringleaders from each faction were imprisoned on murder raps after a bit of friendly head-busting got out of hand after a contested race.

Dale fans and Jeff Gordon fans united and went wild in the streets, burning and looting and actually laying siege to the palace in a mob scene. The emperor Justinian (via someone expendable, no doubt) announced his willingness to accede to their demands, even to the point of agreeing to abdicate in favor of their choice for a new ruler. Fortunately for Justinian, his wife Theodora and a senior eunuch in the palace bureaucracy named Narses had the stones the emperor lacked. They put their heads together with Belisarius and Mundus, two great Byzantine generals, and hatched a plan.

As the tens of thousands of rioters thronged in the vast Hippodrome, waiting for the new emperor’s coronation, Belisarius and his bodyguard of no more than a couple hundred steppe archers took the passageway under the street from the palace to the imperial box in the stadium. With the crowd focused on the impending ceremony, nobody noticed the archers fanning out in the skybox until they started volleying into the crowd. Panic ensued and, leaving a litter of 24 flags and 88 mesh-back ball caps and shot-up, trampled bodies, the crowd stampeded for the big main gates off the racetrack.

Unfortunately, Mundus and his bodyguard were drawn up in ranks blocking the exit, and they opened fire into the front rows of the fleeing mob. Needless to say, when all was said and done, the backbone of the rioters was broken. Thousands had been shot, and many thousands more were crushed in the press. Justinian held onto his crown, no thanks to his own dithering.

Deadly Moments in History – The Nika Riots

Filed under: History, Middle East, Military, Religion — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Invicta
Published 27 Feb 2018

We relive the deadly Nika Riots which brought the Emperor Justinian to his knees and resulted in the death of 30,000 civilians. In our journey we will explore the history of chariot racing, the undercurrents of dissent, and the blow by blow unfolding of the riot.

Support future documentaries: https://www.patreon.com/InvictaHistory
Twitter: https://twitter.com/InvictaHistory

Documentary Credits:
Research: Invicta and Luas McCahill
Script: Invicta
Artwork: Robbie McSweeney
Editing: Invicta
Music: Total War Soundtrack, Dreamnote, Recognition

Literary Sources
–History of the Wars, I by Procopius
–Empress Theodora by J. A. S. Evans
–Justinian: The Last Roman Emperor by G. P. Baker

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