41–50 of 69 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Being good at tactics can win battles. Being good at strategy can win a war. Being good at economy allows you to win war after war.
The typical phrase is “infantry wins battles, logistics wins wars.” It gets at the same idea as you. https://www.czdefence.com/article/infantry-wins-battles-logi... .
Nostalgic - Mongols using silk shirts to make removing arrows easier was a favorite anecdote of my World History teacher in High School. Movies and stories always make pre-gunpowder war seem like a face-to-face battle between warriors, but arrows were always the biggest killer, both in battle and through attrition due to infections and laming. Another anecdote I always remembered was that the lead balls fired by earl…
Do you remember your source for this? It doesn't sound right. I thought most death/injury occurred when the losing army fled, and the victorious army hunted them down. Also, just mechanically, even moderately sized armies were at least a mile long across their front; there's no way that massed volleys could've been used across the whole front, or even, really, more than a small fraction of it.
> lead balls fired by early muskets were often more deadly than modern firearms
If slow lead balls are deadlier than fast jacketed bullets, then modern armies would use slow lead balls. Maybe slow lead balls are more dangerous when they hit, but less dangerous overall?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
If one thing the Russo-Ukrainian war footage has though me is that scouting drones plus artillery has given both sides big impact sniper rifles.
ive been thinking that down the line both of these would be moved to space
Nostalgic - Mongols using silk shirts to make removing arrows easier was a favorite anecdote of my World History teacher in High School. Movies and stories always make pre-gunpowder war seem like a face-to-face battle between warriors, but arrows were always the biggest killer, both in battle and through attrition due to infections and laming. Another anecdote I always remembered was that the lead balls fired by earl…
> but arrows were always the biggest killer Do you remember your source for this? It doesn't sound right. I thought most death/injury occurred when the losing army fled, and the victorious army hunted them down. Also, just mechanically, even moderately sized armies were at least a mile long across their front; there's no way that massed volleys could've been used across the whole front, or even, really, more than a s…
Not sure if there was any factual evidence behind his theory, but I found this idea fascinating when I heard it.
See also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_the_AK-47_and_M1...
Nostalgic - Mongols using silk shirts to make removing arrows easier was a favorite anecdote of my World History teacher in High School. Movies and stories always make pre-gunpowder war seem like a face-to-face battle between warriors, but arrows were always the biggest killer, both in battle and through attrition due to infections and laming. Another anecdote I always remembered was that the lead balls fired by earl…
> but arrows were always the biggest killer Do you remember your source for this? It doesn't sound right. I thought most death/injury occurred when the losing army fled, and the victorious army hunted them down. Also, just mechanically, even moderately sized armies were at least a mile long across their front; there's no way that massed volleys could've been used across the whole front, or even, really, more than a s…
WRT muskets, they are slow to load and fire, inaccurate, low-range, the bullets move slow enough that you can see and dodge them - good for massed warfare during the transition from cold weapons to hot, but not at all for the modern battlefield. IIRC it was in battles during the US Civil War that rifles which were accurate over long distances and allowed a small number of soldiers to defend a position came to the forefront.
Deadliness also doesn't seem to be the selection criteria for modern weaponry. If it were, militaries would all be using chemical weapons, firebombing, nuclear bombs, hollow-tips, poisoning water supplies, etc., but they aren't. Killing soldiers can be a part of strategy, but from what I see usually more of the strategy is about controlling key locations and resources, and winning through logistics and politics, while destruction is largely strategic or symbolic.
Nostalgic - Mongols using silk shirts to make removing arrows easier was a favorite anecdote of my World History teacher in High School. Movies and stories always make pre-gunpowder war seem like a face-to-face battle between warriors, but arrows were always the biggest killer, both in battle and through attrition due to infections and laming. Another anecdote I always remembered was that the lead balls fired by earl…
> but arrows were always the biggest killer Do you remember your source for this? It doesn't sound right. I thought most death/injury occurred when the losing army fled, and the victorious army hunted them down. Also, just mechanically, even moderately sized armies were at least a mile long across their front; there's no way that massed volleys could've been used across the whole front, or even, really, more than a s…
* Infections
* Getting stabbed as you routed
But I don’t understand your logic about the arrows. The width of the line shouldn’t cause some sort of scaling issues. I mean, the army of archers would be limited in the sense that training a ton of archers and making a ton of arrows is expensive, but assuming it is possible to produce and supply that many archers, there’s no reason to think they couldn’t all carry their arrows to the front, right?
Eventually your guys run out of arrows of course, but getting them resupplied after the battle is the same logistics problem that you solved before the battle.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
There's a difference between "young men killed on the battlefield" and "everyone else also being killed" - while (sadly) the latter did happen, e.g. Hiroshima, or as Russian troops swept through Germany, or Dresden, it wasn't par for the course or expected as what happens after the losing side lost.
The Soviets* pretty clearly did not kill all of the civilians in Germany, nor did they attempt to. Unlike the Germans themselves, who exterminated whole towns and had a plan that involved total genocide of their conquered peoples. Pretty wild to miss such an obvious example. *really neither the sins nor the wins in WWII belong exclusively to the Russians. Another subtlety misleading aspect of this post.
As one of the first leaders of the Cheka said, "We are not waging war against individual persons. We are exterminating the bourgeoisie as a class".
I thought it was all because of a genetic mutation that allowed them to digest milk... https://annemontgomerywriter.com/2022/02/11/the-power-of-mil... .
Guess what, there wasn't a single reason and it was a multitude of reasons and whoever tells you they found the main contributing factor is more likely to just want more attention than they'd get with a more mild version like "this contributed to it".
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> but arrows were always the biggest killer Do you remember your source for this? It doesn't sound right. I thought most death/injury occurred when the losing army fled, and the victorious army hunted them down. Also, just mechanically, even moderately sized armies were at least a mile long across their front; there's no way that massed volleys could've been used across the whole front, or even, really, more than a s…
My uncle was career officer in the Army and told me once that the M16, with its smaller faster bullet would wound the enemy, compared to the AK47 with its large slow bullet would kill, and that a wounded enemy was more expensive than a dead solider because you had to extract and care for the wounded. Not sure if there was any factual evidence behind his theory, but I found this idea fascinating when I heard it. See a…