Feldgrau.net

Nothing more than a casual mention in the beginning of this article, but here's something:

http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/08/09/enolagay.pilot.ap/

As I re-read this thread, it sounds like things are confused. When I read the original post (about a Japanese infantry brigade getting wiped out in Poland), I thought of an Imperial Japanese Army unit somehow fighting with the Germans. Then we have the possibility of Asiatic, but non-Japanese, soldi...

Can it be argued that battleships were never the mainstay of battle fleets other than in the minds of the admirals? With the exception of Jutland, I cannot think of any encounters in which two main battle fleets comprised of battleships took one another on without the involvement of aircraft carrier...

I would have to look this up, but I think I read "somewhere" that the auxilary cruisers ( Atlantis, Orion, Pinguin, etc.) were far more successful at sinking merchantmen and taxing the resources of the Royal Navy than the surface ships of the Kriegsmarine. Perhaps Germany may have better o...

That's easy enough - "The Kingdom of Thailand"

Invaded, yes. Sustained, no.

Japan lacked the logistical basis to supply a garrison in Pearl Harbour so many thousands of kilometers from home.

A principality is also a nation is it not? If I recall correctly, a principality is a nation that exists mostly through the good graces of a neighbour. For example, Monaco's relationship with France makes it a principality. I think one of the other conditions is that its leader cannot be a king, wh...

I watched the news earlier today and was shocked to see two persons holding up a banner that said "America deeply regrets dropping the atomic bomb on Hiroshima". Horrific as the bomb was, surely the casualties (both Japanese and American) would have been far worse had an invasion of Japan ...

I'd first read about that many years ago in Bernard Fall's book "Hell in a Very Small Place" in which Japanese troops were kept on in Indochina. I don't recall that it was a shortage of men and materiel so much as the Japanese already had an organisation in place to maintain order.

Who is the name of the German actor in Stalingrad, and The Pianist? He might be a good "known" or bankrollable actor, with the huge advantage of being a German.

Thomas Kretschmann. He was also in Downfall.

I will admit - when not much older than you, I had the cheek to send a missive to the war department giving them a few hot tips on how to defend the Fulda Gap!

Did you get a reply?

I've forgotten about that album - Past, Present, and Future - with the song "Roads to Moscow" on it. That, and the Pink Floyd song "When The Tigers Broke Free" are probably the only rock songs with references to Tiger tanks!

The tragedy is that Japan brought this upon itself by pursuing Imperialist conquest in China and risking the Western reaction. I wonder if a credible argument can be made that Japan was able to secure its interests far better economically than it did militarily? If so, Japanese aggression is even m...

ok ... about the Graf Spee, when was the last time a Royal Navy captain scuttled his ship to prevent it from facing a superior foe? Or an American commander? There was no confirmed reports for him to base his actions on, just rumor. I can see scuttling your ship if the vessels are staring you in th...

As I recall, those German POWs that survived trickled back from the late 1940s to as late as 1955. The year 1955 was also important because the USSR formally recognized West Germany. (Don't know about East Germany.) However, I don't know when (if?) peace treaties were signed. There was quibbling ove...