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Subject: America's Worst Enemy in History
mongyu    1/2/2008 8:16:10 AM
The title says it all: Who do you think has been the greatest enemy ever to threaten America? My vote goes to the British hands down. No other country ever came as close as the British to physically ending the United States in our history. The Germans and the Japanese were formidable in their own right, but neither [or even both] could reasonably invade the United States. The Soviet Union had the theoretical potential to destroy the United States, but I think everyone agrees that this was not a practical capability in the way the British Empire's ability to take Washington DC was. The Soviets were a dangerous enemy ideologically in the way it could convert adherents in America, but they never out-did the British who successfully supported a rebellion in the United States by funding, arming, and giving moral support to the Confederacy. So what country would you choose?
 
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Wicked Chinchilla       2/1/2008 12:18:54 PM
by "Chinese" I mean the current ruling regime, not all Chinese.  Figured I needed to specify..
 
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paul1970    H now really losing the plot.   2/4/2008 12:14:17 PM





As for Paul's sources? Who cares? The best science NOW says no to all of his longbow myths.

He can cite anybody repeating the same 19th Century British Romantic malarkey he wants.

Until he comes up with 20th century archeology and weapon proofing that definitively proves his longbow case he, like you, has NOTHING.

Two people, who don't have a clue, agreeing with each other, doesn't impress me.

All I have to do here is reasonably negate unsupported assertions. This I've done.

Have a nice day the both of you.

Herald
Herald ignoring historical sources just goes to show how divorced from reality he is.... I guess we can all just laugh when he mentions anything historical in the future... and its almost like his last posting about artillery seeing off the Genoise doesn't come from an historical source..... what a donkey! (and guess which historical source......    yep one I have mentioned)
I gave the Cranfield tests as a modern test but H has ignored this. I suppose he will dismiss the stuff ON DISPLAY at the Royal Armouries in Leeds as well. please post this best modern science stuff that shows how the longbow cannot defeat Crecy period armour. you talk it but don't post it. so far all we have are words of someone far less credible on the subject than any of those I mention as respected historians and authors.
 
you want 20thC archeology... for Crecy??? you do realise that it happened 600+ years ago and anything being found now is what is left after the 600 years .... most of the evidence of the day being carted off in the days following..... ie dead knights and horses with arrowes in them... what is left to dig up now is what was missed or left as being of no worth to anyone.....
 but since you want modern sources.... you have already ignored two men in a trench and the royal armouries....... so I will give you another....look up the battlefield trust for the UK... there you will find plenty of 20thC archeology for the battles fought in Britain with the longbow... you will obviously want to ignore this as well since it clearly shows the results that you won't like.
 
you now want me to prove something that is generally recognised as historical fact... surely it should be you proving that the recognised battle descriptions (from people actually at the battles... and on both sides.....) are actually lies told for some nefrarious reasons and that your artillery and knife theory is correct. .... (sounds like Blackadder with King Richard on his Crusade surrounded and armed only with a.........)
 
 
as for saying 19thC romantics... clearly he has not even bothered to check out the authors for the dates of their work or the sources they use...
 
this simple fact is that at Crecy the French got slaughtered... the English say the longbow did it... the French say the longobw did it... H says it is some bloke with a knife who took out the flower of French chivallry without the longbow doing anything.
if the longbow didn't have the desired effect that the English wanted... ie the won the battles.... then why did they keep using it against the French and Scottish for all those years... and why were English mercenary longbowmen so well thought of by the continental armies hiring them......... ochrams razor comes to mind...
 
 
 
 
and once again.... I point out that this discussion is about HYW English against a ECW army.... the armour is hardly a factor but this is what H wants to focus on rather than actually addressing the issue.... perhaps he is trying to build a case to say that longbows cannot penetrate coat and cloth.....  
 
so we have a more arrows coming in than balls going out. they are more accurate, they are fired at a longer effective range, the archer carries more ammo than the musketeer generally does....... and the musketeers have no armour....... only a raving nutcase would still be taking the side of the muskets.... oh hang on...  :-)
 
Paul

 
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Ehran       2/4/2008 2:11:36 PM

   I remember that thread was a hypothetical about ONLY the UK vs. ONLY the Japanese.  You and a few others were rather reluctant to admit the Japanese would have done exceedingly well against the Brits for a good long while.  Herald laid out the plan rather well.  Of course, it could never have happened in reality because the Japanese couldnt spare that much resources on that front while fighting the U.S. but nevertheless...(another time, another thread...).  If you want to get back into that I am SURE he would oblige you if you start a thread but his facts and arguments were spot on, as outlandish as a Japanese base on Diego sounds now.

 

I have only seen Herald have bias against the Chinese or Communists etc. etc. He calls them "Bandits."  The British do not earn any negative bias from him.  If he has some negative opinions or harsh criticisms of capabilities or actions towards them at times he, generally, does not hesitate to put the reasons and souces supporting them out there. 

i never contested that the japs would do well at the start but herald's scenario for instance totally ignores the french presence in indochina.  for the jappanese to only indulge in a war with the english they cannot touch indochina which means they have to ship all the men and supplies around malaysia etc to burma exposing them to british air and subs along the way as well as greatly increasing the amount of hulls needed to support that operation.  the other option is to attack through indochina which most likely drags the french into things and complicates life for the japs.
then he assumes that singapore falls on schedule which is pretty iffy.  even assuming no british reinforcements to singapore just the british not hollowing out the garrison would probably have been enough to save the place from the japs.  fighting the 2nd and 3rd rank troops the british left in singapore the japs were within 24 hours of calling it a wash.  had the british sent even a single division of the BEF to singapore the japs attack would have been hosed from the get go.
now the japs are stuck tween a rock and a hard place.  their supply line runs between the phillipines owned by americans who are rather unhappy with them over their conduct in china and singapore which they just attacked and bounced off.
until they eliminate singapore would they dare try running supply lines around to burma?  bear in mind that the japs had a just painfully bad grasp of logistics and convoy work etc at this point. 

as for diego there is literally nothing there but sand and coconut palms.  given the tonnage that would have to be imported to build any kind of useful naval depot there i just don't believe the japs had the hulls to do it.  again they would have been suffering some losses from british subs and air attacks along the way to compound their shortage of hulls.  i find it hard to buy into the japs who failed to occupy the base at pearl at least partly for logistical reasons somehow managing to build a base on diego at what twice the distance from tokyo.
 
i just don't see the picture for the japs being nearly as rosy as herald does.
 
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Ehran       2/4/2008 2:22:18 PM
Well what the Japanese did at Truk and we did at Eniewetok is certainly possible at Diego Garcia in the same time period. And there is no dispute that during February 1941 the Japanese cleaned the RN's clock in the Indian Ocean, as in WIPED THE ROYAL NAVY OUT. Whether a follow up there would just postpone Midway is debatable, but they had the means to finish the British as an Indian ocean naval power forever. Remember that the British never defeated the Japanese at sea.
truk is far closer to the home islands and the base there was constructed largely unmolested.  diego would have been rather less lucky i think.  the RN presence in the indian ocean was less than impressive since they were committed to the atlantic at the time.
rather like saying that the sioux wiping out custer conclusively demonstrated that they could have crushed the us army at will.
 


The fact that you Ehran are a naval idiot concerning this is not my fault. You still have that Iraqi barge fiasco to explain.
i explained that to you over and over and over.  it's not my fault you are unwilling to accept that what the british did with steam powered paddlewheelers could be done today rather more effectively.

Two people, who don't have a clue, agreeing with each other, doesn't impress me.
the point isn't to impress you doofus. 


All I have to do here is reasonably negate unsupported assertions. This I've done.

all you've done since this started is drag in things irrelevant to the original discussion as though they mattered to the original discussion.  who cares about longbow penetration vs plate armour if bog all on that hypothetical battlefield had any.  how long it takes to train a longbowmen vs a arquebusier matters not a bit since the discussion starts with two armies on a battlefield facing each other and so on.

 
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Herald12345       2/4/2008 3:34:52 PM







As for Paul's sources? Who cares? The best science NOW says no to all of his longbow myths.

He can cite anybody repeating the same 19th Century British Romantic malarkey he wants.

Until he comes up with 20th century archeology and weapon proofing that definitively proves his longbow case he, like you, has NOTHING.

Two people, who don't have a clue, agreeing with each other, doesn't impress me.

All I have to do here is reasonably negate unsupported assertions. This I've done.

Have a nice day the both of you.

Herald

Herald ignoring historical sources just goes to show how divorced from reality he is.... I guess we can all just laugh when he mentions anything historical in the future... and its almost like his last posting about artillery seeing off the Genoise doesn't come from an historical source..... what a donkey! (and guess which historical source......    yep one I have mentioned)

I guess you think you are clever?  The effect of the cannon was noise and smoke. Never seen before or experienced it produced the panic as described.



I gave the Cranfield tests as a modern test but H has ignored this. I suppose he will dismiss the stuff ON DISPLAY at the Royal Armouries in Leeds as well. please post this best modern science stuff that shows how the longbow cannot defeat Crecy period armour. you talk it but don't post it. so far all we have are words of someone far less credible on the subject than any of those I mention as respected historians and authors.

Baloney; How about some REAL science, cretin? To wit.

Published results.

Lets see:

[quoting]

The science

A longbow is typically made from a single yew wood stave. The beauty of yew is that it is a natural lamination of two types of wood. The cream-coloured sapwood resists tension so is placed to the back of the bow. The dark honey-coloured heartwood resists compression and so is placed at the front.

These natural properties produce a weapon with incredible power. Arrows can leave a longbow at over 140mph, and their effective range can be as great as 180 metres (590 feet).

Against plate armour

Tests at the Royal Military College of Science Testing Ground at Shrivenham investigated longbow performance in both range and against plate armour. It was discovered that the arrow can lose velocity rapidly after leaving the bow and that accuracy and damage were more easily achieved at shorter distances.

In tests against a steel breastplate, a bodkin-tipped arrow would dent the armour at 80m (260ft), puncture it at 30m (98ft) and penetrate right through plate and underlying doublet coat to the flesh at 20m (65ft).

Longbow versus crossbow

Tests were also conducted to determine the rate of fire from a longbow compared to the crossbow used by some professional and mercenary soldiers. In a 30-second time trial, the longbow could loose nine arrows, whereas the crossbow managed only four bolts. At over twice as fast, the longbow was certainly a formidable weapon, especially at close range.

Less effective than musket  fire in the direct fire role against armor. So says the science as WEAPON PROOFED..








 

you want 20thC archeology... for Crecy??? you do realise that it happened 600+ years ago and anything being found now is what is left after the 600 years .... most of the evidence of the day being carted off in the days following..... ie dead knights and horses with arrowes in them... what is left to dig up now is what was missed or left as being of no worth to anyone.....

Dead bodies dug up on battle site are dead bodies in a sample set for study. We do good science on the dead ossified remains of animals from 200 MILLION YEARS ago, even going so far as determining probable cause of death
 
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Herald12345       2/4/2008 3:42:47 PM
Crecy not Pavia, though Francis I and the French fouled up there too, and for much the same reason.

Herald

 
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Nichevo       2/5/2008 2:32:05 AM

Compute the strike energies for a longbow arrow and the arquebus 7 gram musket ball, cretin.

Then we'll discuss how really stupid you are.

Herald

Herald I hate to get in between you and these guys, but comment.  7 gram musket ball?  Wouldn't that be somewhere between a .60 -.80 cal round ball?  Surely not less than half an ounce to an ounce ball or even larger (IIRC a 12 gauge shotgun, 12 balls/lb, 1 1/3 oz ball, is about a .72 cal bore). 

A 7 gram bullet would be under 100gr, like a flyweight 9mm or a reasonable .32 or maybe .380 ACP - I think Winchester makes a Silvertip about 115gr in one of those two?  And at subsonic velocity, which is what you would have got with muzzleloading blackpowder round bullet smoothbores, that would be like getting hit with one pellet of 00 or maybe 000 buckshot.  I'd stand in front of that, aimed at random and fired from 50-100 yards, in street clothes and a leather jacket,  for a million dollars.  Esp. aimed by a guy who has to close his eye because otherwise the powder in the pan will blind him.  I admit a 110gr rifle bullet, like say a .243 Win at ~1km/sec would be unwelcome today, but that wasn't in the cards of that time.

Also, even in the heyday of the British square a la Wellington, I think they got maybe 3, maybe 4 volleys a minute.  (Actually I think the Brits got 4, everybody else got 3, and that why England won, if memory serves.)

The bow and arrow - IIRC you would get 6 aimed shots a minute, and if it was just loosing arrows their 'cyclic' was faster.  And one broadhead striking you near anything at all important could ruin your whole day.

So why did they go the way of the dodo?

Well, they demanded a high level of craftmanship and training to properly make and use.  Any fool can be drilled and beaten into reloading a musket.  TTP, not an art.

Basically I always understood it as a function of the oncoming Industrial Age.  Mass manufacture, mass armies.  Teamwork - I once heard a saying that one Korean will whip one Japanese, but ten Japanese will whip ten Koreans.  Interchangeable parts, ultimately.  I'm not sure if England was literally running out of the proper yew wood but it could have been a problem.

...


Now back to your regularly scheduled Brit-ignoramus-beating.  Yeah, England definitely wanted to send another half a million men west after getting done on the Continent.  Sho 'nuff.  Aye, give us more of ye olde taxation, matey, we likes it, yus we do!  (or not - in 1821 they would have let the RN rot at its moorings before reimposing the income tax.)

Wasn't England at starvation-point at that time, grain logistics on the very verge?

What imported colonial opium or bhang have they been at, do you think? 

It was nice of them to support the Monroe Doctrine however.  Albeit with 'four wherries and a gig' after the post-Napoleonic drawdown that would have made Clinton's peace dividend look like warmongering.

Speaking of unnecessary wars after 1815, how did they do as a rule?  Do I remember them kicking ass and taking names in the Crimea?  Uh, not really?  Against wogs, mostly good, sometimes bad.  I'm sure the Sepoy Mutiny or the Afghan mess or the Sudan business would have gone all the more smashingly with England's best mucking about in the Western Hemisphere.  Mmm, yes, quite.  (I an't thinik of any circa-1820 conflicts to mock because as a rule the English of 1820 were still sensible of the blessings of peace.)








 
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paul1970       2/5/2008 7:17:26 AM











As for Paul's sources? Who cares? The best science NOW says no to all of his longbow myths.

He can cite anybody repeating the same 19th Century British Romantic malarkey he wants.

Until he comes up with 20th century archeology and weapon proofing that definitively proves his longbow case he, like you, has NOTHING.

Two people, who don't have a clue, agreeing with each other, doesn't impress me.

All I have to do here is reasonably negate unsupported assertions. This I've done.

Have a nice day the both of you.

Herald



Herald ignoring historical sources just goes to show how divorced from reality he is.... I guess we can all just laugh when he mentions anything historical in the future... and its almost like his last posting about artillery seeing off the Genoise doesn't come from an historical source..... what a donkey! (and guess which historical source......    yep one I have mentioned)

I guess you think you are clever?  The effect of the cannon was noise and smoke. Never seen before or experienced it produced the panic as described.





I gave the Cranfield tests as a modern test but H has ignored this. I suppose he will dismiss the stuff ON DISPLAY at the Royal Armouries in Leeds as well. please post this best modern science stuff that shows how the longbow cannot defeat Crecy period armour. you talk it but don't post it. so far all we have are words of someone far less credible on the subject than any of those I mention as respected historians and authors.

Baloney; How about some REAL science, cretin? To wit.

Published results.

Lets see:

[quoting]


The science


A longbow is typically made from a single yew wood stave. The beauty of
yew is that it is a natural lamination of two types of wood. The cream-coloured
sapwood resists tension so is placed to the back of the bow. The dark honey-coloured
heartwood resists compression and so is placed at the front.


These natural properties produce a weapon with incredible power. Arrows
can leave a longbow at over 140mph, and their effective range can be as
great as 180 metres (590 feet).


Against plate armour


Tests at the Royal Military College
of Science Testing Ground
at Shrivenham investigated longbow
performance in both range and against plate armour. It was discovered that
the arrow can lose velocity rapidly after leaving the bow and that accuracy
and damage were more easily achieved at shorter distances.


In tests against a steel breastplate, a bodkin-tipped arrow would dent
the armour at 80m (260ft), puncture it at 30m (98ft) and penetrate right
through plate and underlying doublet coat to the flesh at 20m (65ft).


Longbow versus crossbow


Tests were also conducted to determine the rate of fire from a longbow
compared to the crossbow used by some professional and mercenary soldiers.
In a 30-second time trial, the longbow could loose nine arrows, whereas
the crossbow managed only four bolts. At over twice as fast, the longbow
was certainly a formidable weapon, especially at close range.


Less effective than musket  fire in the direct fire role against armor. So says the science as WEAPON PROOFED..






 
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paul1970    Nichevo   2/5/2008 7:39:15 AM



Compute the strike energies for a longbow arrow and the arquebus 7 gram musket ball, cretin.

Then we'll discuss how really stupid you are.

Herald


Herald I hate to get in between you and these guys, but comment.  7 gram musket ball?  Wouldn't that be somewhere between a .60 -.80 cal round ball?  Surely not less than half an ounce to an ounce ball or even larger (IIRC a 12 gauge shotgun, 12 balls/lb, 1 1/3 oz ball, is about a .72 cal bore). 

A 7 gram bullet would be under 100gr, like a flyweight 9mm or a reasonable .32 or maybe .380 ACP - I think Winchester makes a Silvertip about 115gr in one of those two?  And at subsonic velocity, which is what you would have got with muzzleloading blackpowder round bullet smoothbores, that would be like getting hit with one pellet of 00 or maybe 000 buckshot.  I'd stand in front of that, aimed at random and fired from 50-100 yards, in street clothes and a leather jacket,  for a million dollars.  Esp. aimed by a guy who has to close his eye because otherwise the powder in the pan will blind him.  I admit a 110gr rifle bullet, like say a .243 Win at ~1km/sec would be unwelcome today, but that wasn't in the cards of that time.

Also, even in the heyday of the British square a la Wellington, I think they got maybe 3, maybe 4 volleys a minute.  (Actually I think the Brits got 4, everybody else got 3, and that why England won, if memory serves.)

The bow and arrow - IIRC you would get 6 aimed shots a minute, and if it was just loosing arrows their 'cyclic' was faster.  And one broadhead striking you near anything at all important could ruin your whole day.

So why did they go the way of the dodo?

Well, they demanded a high level of craftmanship and training to properly make and use.  Any fool can be drilled and beaten into reloading a musket.  TTP, not an art.





as you say... basically you get far more shots with longbow than you do with musket. 10-12 longbow at a mass of men. less when aiming directly for a man.

British Napoleonic.... the ideal was for 3 a minute the British trained with ammunition more than any other nation and so tended to be be better trained than others but still the hit ratio is not great at anything other than point blank.
 
now back to the HYW versus ECW hypothetical clash bit which was the original discussion that H keeps trying to move away from..... matchlocks give you 2 shots a minute if lucky. they are not as accurate as brown besses. the engagement range is not too far beyond the "whites of their eyes" bit..... and... they don't wear armour which takes away a lot of the bows advantage...
 
Paul
 
 
 
 
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Herald12345    Nice try cretin.   2/5/2008 10:42:10 AM
I said at the ranges you claimed it would not penetrate plate.  You are such a  LIAR.

I also demonstrated that you get one aimed shot where the arrows would actually penetrate into the Human body through armor to  poerce to do any damage at all at what is substantially  arquebus range. or about 20 meters. the very whites of your eyes range you claim {You overlooked that Nichy? That is called MEAN EFFECTIVE RANGE) 

And as I pointed out the contemporary Spanish Tercio DID wear armor-specifically as pike defense. The english imitated this to some extent.  

So that is the double LIE.

And as usual Paul 1970: you are wrong on the interpretation of your so called facts..

Maybe you shopuld go back and take a course in reading comprehension? In do not contradict myself in the mosaic I build up. Its applied physics against rhetoric. Physics wins every time.

For example, how fast could French cavalry charge that last 500 meters, Paul?  15 meters per second. or 33 miles an hour which is slow for a burdened horse. You need to do that math before you ask me a stupid question like that. Means the horseman, at the gallopwill be in some kind of MER for about 15 seconds and possible direct fire lethal range for 5? One flight before the horseman cuts the archer down? There was a reason English men at arms mixed with the archers carried SPEARS.

A burdened frightened man can run about 5 mps, which means he  takes about 100  seconds to cross that ground. He is subject to lethal range fire for half that distance or 50 seconds; if he is lightly armored that is about ten vollies of unaimed fire or five of aimed fire. If he is an armored  tercio with an arquebus he has a direct fire advantage MER of 3x or more. over an archer against an equivalent armored target, if he hits anything at all. Since he volley fires into a packed mass of men, he will hit something. They are after all a much bigger footprint than a barn.

Physics here, gentlemen, and cretin



Herald

 
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