The History Thread!

Solving the mystery of Jim Thompson's disappearance.

I have disagreed with her a lot, but comparing her to republicans and propagandists of dictatorships is really low. - An idiot

What about this one?

That's only Caroleans. Kalisz was Caroleans vs Winged Hussars.

edited 4th Dec '17 6:10:03 PM by SantosLHalper

Here's a funny and informative video about the history of the English language.

I like to keep my audience riveted.

A piece of history has ended today in Belgium. Stop. They've ended their telegram service. Stop.

Telegrams date back to the 1830s for those who don't know.

So at the beginning of the thread their's a rejoinder against bringing in very recent history. Would the Iran nuclear agreement, specifically when it was agreed to, not it's current status under the Orange Ogre, count as very recent?

I Bring Doom,and a bit of gloom, but mostly gloom.

I tried watching a documentary about Samurai.

I think bill wurtz has forever altered my perception of the history of japan.

I believe so. It's still a thing in current politics, even if not discussed as loudly as it was. I'm no mod nor the original poster, but the circumstances leading up to it are worth discussing imho.

Still, to mitigate the risk: There is the General Middle Eastern Thread and the US Politics Thread.

Look with century eyes... With our backs to the arch And the wreck of our kind We will stare straight ahead For the rest of our lives

Here is an interesting youtube channel called Townsends I like this channel because it combines both history and cooking in one fell swoop. Some of the recipes are interesting to say the least and even tasty.

Who watches the watchmen?

On this date in history...

Dec. 23, 1787 — HMS Bounty, under the command of William Bligh, set sail on its ill-fated voyage to Tahiti.

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A short article on the US efforts to shut down "The Ho Chi Minh" trail Told from the perspective of one of the pilots who participated in the operations against the logistical road. It isn't a long read but still interesting.

US "Nuclear Doomsday" survival food. A history of items like the Survival Ration Crackers.

Who watches the watchmen?

I've read an analysis arguing that the best opportunity for the Allied forces to shut down the Trail was through launching ground offensives against PAVN sanctuaries in Laos and Cambodia during the time period from 1965 to 1967, when the North Vietnamese had yet to fully dig in and establish their networks with the southern NLF as they have done by 1968 (hence the Tet Offensive). Not only would the PAVN have been less well-trained, experienced, and equipped in contrast to when said theoretical ground offensives were launched in The '70s, but US popular opinion on the conflict would not be as hostile to the notion and in fact would probably have been openly more supportive of the measures during the last high of belligerent anti-communism in US society. .

Why didn't we do that then?

I Bring Doom,and a bit of gloom, but mostly gloom.

The Johnson Administration did a combination of these things:

• Feared damaging the US' image by violating the borders of not one but two "neutral" countries that were also relatively stable during that "sweet timeframe". The existence of the North Vietnamese sanctuaries was also by and large unknown to the public at the time.
  • Exposing them to the media would have had unpredictable repercussions ranging from the North Vietnamese panicking and deciding to launch an all-out offensive into South Vietnam - which not only would cost the lives of US troops but also Johnson's political career, as he had been freshly reelected in 1964 - to the North Vietnamese doubling-down on their actions and insert even more of their troops into Laos and Cambodia so that they couldn't be easily evicted by a single Allied ground offensive.
• Feared provoking a repeat of the Korean War if China became so intimidated by the US' use of military force below its southern border that Mao would openly commit Chinese troops into Southeast Asia and send the relatively stable region at the time into turmoil. With the US only having securing a ceasefire in Korea just over a decade earlier, a second war between China and the US would have disastrous for Johnson's presidency and his progressive domestic policy projects by which he won reelection from.
  • In hindsight, Johnson's fears of Chinese intervention were justifiable but overstated. The Sino-Soviet split was beginning to materialize but not to the open extent by which the Nixon Administration was able to take note of and exploit during The '70s. Because of this split, Mao launched the Cultural Revolution with intentions of purging his government of any perceived dissidence including that by the pro-Soviet faction of the CCP. As a result, Mao was incredibly unlikely to openly commit Chinese troops to aid North Vietnam - whose leaders also aligned themselves with the Soviets more than the Chinese - at a time of such domestic unrest that was already disturbing his country's warmaking abilities. Ironically, Mao also feared that the massive Chinese casualties suffered during the Korean War would be repeated if China intervened in Indochina and would downright spark anti-war dissidence in China that would compromise his rule.

TL;DR: the Johnson Administration, having just been reelected the year before 1965, feared that launching ground offensives into Laos and Cambodia "too soon" would ensnare the US in a repeat of the Korean War that would have distracted from its progressive domestic policy projects at home. Unlike Nixon, LBJ did not have the information to confidently determine that China would definitely not intervene on North Vietnam's behalf during his tenure as POTUS.

edited 31st Dec '17 12:31:51 PM by FluffyMcChicken

Question:

Are there any records of what was going on in the then-Confederate capital of Montgomery, Alabama on April 15, 1861? The day after Fort Sumter had ended and that Lincoln asked for 75,000 volunteers?

Also, how far along was the Confederate military at that point? Were there any cities with actual Confederate troops moving about?

"Somehow the hated have to walk a tightrope, while those who hate do not."

Something that took me forever to find, after it kind of disappeared:

Stephen Turnbull: The Ninja: An Invented Tradition?

He essentially goes through some claims and myths (that even he propagated). I think he's also having a book come out this year.

edited 13th Jan '18 10:02:29 AM by TerminusEst

Si Vis Pacem, Para Perkele

I had to dig up an alternate link but good find all the same.

Who watches the watchmen?

InRangeTV has a weeklong series going on the British WW 2 ration diet:

I have disagreed with her a lot, but comparing her to republicans and propagandists of dictatorships is really low. - An idiot

This thought occurred to me recently. Which of the tropes popularly associated with pirates actually happened in real life and which ones were mostly inventions of fiction?

I like to keep my audience riveted.

Walk the Plank was (largely) fiction. There is no recorded instance of any pirate ever doing this to their captives during the Golden Age of Piracy in the late 17th and early 18th centuries. Some latter-day pirates may have done so, but only in imitation of the old-time pirate yarns.

The legendary practice probably stems from some anecdote where a bigwig passenger on a ship captured by the pirates demanded his freedom on the grounds that he was a bigwig. The pirates, caring nothing for titles or political influence or other societal niceties, would laugh in his face and tell him that he was free to walk home. However, aboard a ship out at sea, there was nowhere to walk to — except over the side and into the shark-infested waters.

Similarly, the Black Spot only seems to have occurred in Treasure Island and its later derivatives.

edited 4th Feb '18 2:59:57 PM by pwiegle

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Hook hands are chiefly a invention of Peter Pan. Historical pirates did lose limbs quite often (one book observed it was easier to list the pirates who weren't horribly maimed in some way), but none of the historical ones ever replaced them with a hook. Peglegs however, were quite common.

Pets, like parrots and monkeys are plausible but rare and kind of counter-productive (pirates would often end up eating animals on board during times of starvation).

Part of the issue is pop culture portrayals of pirates conflate general golden pirates with corsairs, which are a whole different ballgame. The well-dressed, soft-spoken, piano playing suave Captain Hook for example, is much more reminiscent of a Henry Morgan-style Corsair than a pirate. Pirates didn't tend to be anywhere near that refined or wealthy.

edited 4th Feb '18 7:47:43 PM by Gaon

"All you Fascists bound to lose."

The word "pirate" was also used by rival countries to denounce the privateers and mercenaries each other commissioned to raid each other's ships during wartime. The British addressed the early US Navy and its heroes such as John Paul Jones as pirates for example.

Privateers were basically the CIA and GRU of their day. Want to steal some gold from the Spanish without starting a war? Hire some privateers to share some of the loot with you once they're done with their thing.

Of course. I'm referring to actual, hostis human generis pirates here and by Corsairs I'm more alluding to folks like Sir Francis Drake, Sir Henry Morgan or the Spanish (also the equivalent Spanish of Sir) Amaro Fargo. These elite royal privateers were the fancy pirates with royal titles, lands, social prestige, often quite wealthy and refined due their elevated social standing with the court. The Captain Hook-style of Wicked Cultured villain mostly comes from that image.

Actual caribbean hostis human generis pirates were, as I said, much more humble and working class people. Pirates of the Caribbean, for all its fantasy, at least gets the visual aspect of pirates dead on the money: a bunch of Rummage Sale Reject types looking absolutely filthy and terrifying.

There were two pirates who were known to carrying themselves in a more refined and wealthy manner, and those were Stede Bonnet (as he was Barbarian aristocracy who became a pirate for the sake of the adventure) and Bartholomew Roberts (who was just fond of the high culture I guess). They're few and far between. Most others such as Blackbeard, Black Sam Bellamy, Calico Jack, Ben Hornigold and Charles Vane were much more Lower-Class Lout types.

There's the running tendency to portray pirates as either sadistic sociopaths or heroic rogues. Curiously, historical Caribbean pirates did have members who fit in either category. Black Sam Bellamy was reported treat his prisoners very mercifully and generously and often carried himself in the vein of a Robin Hood figure, dubbing himself "the Prince of Pirates" and his men as "Robin Hood's Men". There's even a very dramatic quote of his that went down in history as he parlayed with a captain of the royal navy observing how Pirates and royal governments are Not So Different when it comes to stealing shit:

"All you Fascists bound to lose."

I think Uncharted did pretty well with the characterisation in Thief's End. Avery especially.

Si Vis Pacem, Para Perkele

New DNA testing has revealed that Cheddar Man, Britain's oldest complete skeleton, most likely had dark or black skin, curly dark hair and blue eyes, and probably came from the Middle East.

That's going to annoy the anti-immigration crowd

Avatar from here.