Russian and French Nazis Defend the Reich –ϟϟ Foreign Fighters Part 3
World War Two Published 19 Apr 2024 As the war turns ever more against Germany, Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler keeps loosening the racial standards of his Waffen SS. More and more non-Germans fill...
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How much of your language do you have to destroy to avoid the taint of...
For understandable reasons, German governments since the end of World War 2 have been twitchy about any symbols, songs, words and phrases that were used by Hitler’s various fascist organizations … to...
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QotD: The “omni-spear” of the Mediterranean World
So I first want to suggest a set of basic characteristics for what I am going to term the “omni-spear“, the standard kind of iron-tipped one-handed thrusting spear that almost everyone fought with in...
View ArticleHow The Channel Tunnel Works
Practical Engineering Published Jan 16, 2024 Let’s dive into the engineering and construction of the Channel Tunnel on its 30th anniversary. It is a challenging endeavor to put any tunnel below the...
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Publius Rutilius Rufus, an honest man in a dishonest era
Lawrence W. Reed discusses the life and career of Publius Rutilius Rufus, Roman consul and historian, who suffered the revenge of corrupt tax farmers (publicani) after attempting to protect taxpayers...
View Article300,000 Germans Surrender in the Ruhr – WW2 – Week 295 – April 20, 1945
World War Two Published 20 Apr 2024 The Soviet drive on Berlin continues, but it is now very much a race between the forces of Georgy Zhukov and those of Ivan Konev. In the west, over 300,000 Germans...
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Canada’s latest unlikely-to-meet-expectations defence update
In The Line, Michael Den Tandt considers the Trudeau government’s most recent update to Canada’s defence plans (where the cynic might be tempted to read “plans” as “vague gestures toward treaty...
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QotD: Before England could rely on the “wooden walls” of the Royal Navy
… given this general lack of geographical knowledge, try to imagine embarking on a voyage of discovery. To an extent, you might rely on the skill and experience of your mariners. For England in the...
View ArticleDid Japan Attack Pearl Harbor Because Of China?
Real Time History Published Dec 1, 2023 December 7, 1941: The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor shocked the world and brought the US into the Second World War. But why did the Japanese resort to such an...
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Canada’s Governor General is supposed to be above politics, not immersed in it
Colby Cosh says — quite correctly — that the issue with the Governor General indulging in partisan politics isn’t that people noticed and objected: Mary Simon, Governor General of Canada on a visit to...
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The internal stresses of the modern techno-optimist family
Ted Gioia on the joys of techno-optimism (as long as you don’t have to eat Meal 3.0, anyway): We were now the ideal Techno-Optimist couple. So imagine my shock when I heard crashing and thrashing...
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Roman Honor: The Fire in the Bones
From last week’s blog post, Bret Devereaux reviews a book by a former instructor from his undergraduate days, documenting Roman values and attitudes and how understanding their views of themselves...
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QotD: Who cares about you?
During my student days at a UCLA economics department faculty/graduate student coffee hour in the 1960s, I was chatting with Professor Armen Alchian, probably the greatest microeconomic theory...
View ArticleThe 1950 Marketing Contest to Name the S&W Chiefs Special
Forgotten Weapons Published Jan 19, 2024 Today we’re taking a look at a Smith & Wesson Chiefs Special, but not just any Chiefs Special. This is serial number 29, factory engraved and gifted to...
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Justin Trudeau’s legacy may not be something he ever wanted (or imagined)
Tristin Hopper outlines some of the attitudinal changes among Canadian voters during Trudeau’s term in office, with opinions shifting away from things we used to consider settled once and for all....
View ArticleKICKING IT TO THE MOON? Canada’s Military Procurement: A history of broken...
Esprit de Corps Canadian Military Magazine Published Apr 22, 2024 The Liberal government have finally released their long awaited Defence Policy Update which promises billions of dollars in increased...
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Debating the economic impact of the Raj on India
At The Daily Sceptic, Nigel Biggar looks at a few books making or refuting the narrative on how much or how little British rule in India extracted or contributed to the economic life of the...
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QotD: The psychological trap for teens in our social media-saturated era
I’ve written a lot on how teenagerhood used to be. In my day, when dinosaurs roamed the earth, it was just given that any one person would “be” many different things over the course of his or her...
View ArticleWhat Were Victorian Attitudes Towards Sex?
History Hit Published Dec 15, 2023 They’re famously thought of as a buttoned up prudish bunch, but we all know they loved to bump uglies as much as anyone today. Were the spanking punishments of...
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Alternative für Deutschland is gifted a blueprint for governing by their...
Was it Napoleon who said to never interrupt your enemy when they’re making a mistake? If so, the German populist Alternative für Deutschland leaders must be congratulated for not interrupting the...
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“What is to be done?”– N.S. Lyons at the National Conservatism Conference in...
I suspect the recent National Conservatism Conference in Brussels would have been a mere blip in the media if it hadn’t been for the dedicated and persistent efforts of local Belgian politicians and...
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Australia cribs from Trudeau’s notes and tries to censor the internet outside...
Tim Worstall explains to the Australian federal government why their attempt to force Elon Musk to obey Australian diktats on Twit-, er, I mean “X” outside Australia is extreme over-reach and should be...
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QotD: The risks of artificial intelligence
Unfortunately, pickleball wasn’t the only existential threat to emerge in 2023. There was also Artificial Intelligence, or AI. What is AI? To put it in simple layperson terms, it is a computer thing...
View ArticleThe Handley Page Hampden; A Plane for Fat Shaming
Ed Nash’s Military Matters Published Apr 29, 2022 One of the key British bombers at the start of the war, the Hampden was eclipsed by its more successful equivalent, the Vickers Wellington, and the...
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Jeremy Black reviews Empireworld by Sathnam Sanghera
The author of a book on the same topic says that Sathnam Sanghera’s work “really should have devoted more attention to the pre-Western history“: With its pretensions and authorial conceit, Sanghera’s...
View ArticleWere the Waffen-SS Really Germany’s Elite Fighters? – WW2 – OOTF 35
World War Two Published 24 Apr 2024 It’s time for another thrilling installment of Out of the Foxholes, but what sort of questions does Indy answer today? Well, it’s good stuff — about Allied security...
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“… good Lord, is [Chrystia Freeland] ever terrible at politics”
In The Line, Matt Gurney recounts Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland’s terrible response to a topical question from a reporter: Screencap from a CPAC video of Chrystia Freeland speaking in...
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QotD: The secret rulers of Japan
Okay, but how well does that version of history line up with the reality of Japanese government in the second half of the 20th century? Johnson brings a lot of evidence to back up his claim that Japan...
View ArticleGuns for the Pope’s Police: Mazzocchi Pinfire Revolver
Forgotten Weapons Published Jan 22, 2024 The revolver we are looking at today is a 9mm pinfire revolver adopted for the Papal Gendarmerie in 1868. At that time, the Papal States controlled roughly the...
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Economic inefficiencies in the water market? Don’t worry, here’s the...
Tim Worstall discusses the economics of water markets in the US … that Senator Elizabeth Warren and Representative Ro Khanna seem determined to make far less efficient if their plans come to fruition:...
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The British Army from the start of the Cold War
Dr. Robert Lyman discusses the state of the British Army through the Cold War years down to today, with emphasis on the defence budget tracking against perceived threats to the UK and allies over that...
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Out –“GenZ”: In –“Waffen ZZ“
Peachy Keenan invites us to meet the new hotness, the Zoomerwaffen: These crazy Zoomer kids are bringing back all the old trends: baggy jeans, the band Sublime, and casual, no-big-deal, fanatical...
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QotD: Roman magistrates during the middle Republican period
Last time we discussed Rome’s popular assemblies, which at least notionally expressed the will of the people. One of the key tasks those assemblies had, we noted, was the election of magistrates, the...
View ArticleFloating Fun: The History of the Amphibious Boat Car
Ed’s Auto Reviews Published Aug 9, 2023 A classic car connoisseur dives into the general history of amphibious cars and vehicles. When did people start to build boat-car crossovers? What made Hans...
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“… when it comes to energy policy Germany is an undisputed champion of crazy”
eugyppius explains how Angela Merkel’s government reacted to the Japanese Fukushima disaster in a sane, measured, and sensible way … naw, I’m pulling your leg. They looked at all the options and then...
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Climate science or climate “science”?
David Friedman is a very intelligent man and I wouldn’t want to face him in a debate, even on a topic I feel well-informed about. He’s not a scientist and hasn’t made a serious study of climate but he...
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QotD: “I love Big Brother!”
I suppose my defeatist attitude is precisely what they — they being governments and corporations — are trying to cultivate with all of this oppression. I don’t relish the Winston Smith role. I’ll just...
View ArticleLook at Life – The Car Has Wings (1963)
Classic Vehicle Channel Published Apr 19, 2020 Transporting cars by sea, air and rail. This film features wonderful traffic archives. Related posts: Look at Life – Oil Aboard (1963) Look at Life –...
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How Britain got out of the Great Depression (and no, it wasn’t WW2)
Tim Worstall, in refuting something being pushed by Willie Hutton, explains how the British government escaped from the Great Depression and set off a nice little boom in the mid- to late-1930s:...
View ArticleThe Battle of Berlin! – WW2 – Week 296 – April 27, 1945
World War Two Published 27 Apr 2024 The battle for the German capital rages on all week, as the Soviets get ever closer to the Reich Chancellery, under which lies Hitler’s bunker. Berlin is...
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QotD: The draft
What frightened me was not going to Vietnam. What frightened me was going in the Army. The haircut, the uniform, the discipline: If I’d been allowed to go to Vietnam in my old clothes … The minute the...
View ArticleBattle Rifles of World War Two: Overview
Forgotten Weapons Published Jan 26, 2024 Today we are going to take a look at the three main battle rifles of World War Two — the M1 Garand, the SVT-40, and the Gewehr 43. We will also consider the...
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“The Earth goes around the Sun, or so they would have you believe …”
Colby Cosh on a recent “grand theory” from Andrea Matranga, an Italian economist who outlined his thoughts in a paper accepted by the Quarterly Journal of Economics, summarized in the sub-hed...
View ArticleGreek History and Civilization, Part 7 – Alexander
seangabb Published Apr 28, 2024 This seventh lecture in the course covers the career of Alexander the Great and its consequences for the world. Books by Sean Gabb:...
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“The disaster at Imphal was perhaps the worst of its kind yet chronicled in...
Dr. Robert Lyman makes the case for the Japanese defeat at the battles of Imphal and Kohima being one of the four great turning points in the Second World War: It is clear to me that the great twin...
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QotD: The ambitious Roman’s path to glory and riches
The Romans, for one, admitted all the time that they screwed up … to themselves, in private (what passed for “private” in the ancient world, anyway). A big reason an ambitious man (a redundancy in...
View Article3 Chisel Mortise Method | Paul Sellers
Paul Sellers Published Jan 19, 2024 Sometimes, we avoid simple joinery because we believe it cannot be done well, and efficiently by hand. This mortise, 4″ long and 1 1/2″ deep by half an inch, took...
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DNA and India’s caste system
Earlier this month, Palladium published Razib Khan‘s look at the genetic components of India’s Caste System: Though the caste system dominates much of Indian life, it does not dominate Indian American...
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The CDU’s “five-point plan to protect German democracy from … the free and...
German mainstream politicians are struggling to keep extreme right populist anti-democratic voices from being heard by innocent and trusting German voters, so the leader of the CDU in Thuringia has a...
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TikTok for Tots (and Instagram, and Facebook, and Twitter, and …)
Ted Gioia has some rather alarming information on just how many kids are spending a lot of time online from a very early age: The leader in this movement is TikTok. But the other major platforms...
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