Got a Real-World Weapon, Armor or Tactics Question? Mk. XXIV

[snowblizz]

Does anyone know how common it actually was for captured spies to be executed in either world war, or for soldiers captured in articles of enemy clothing to be shot? I know it was done, such as in the case of those German sabuteurs caught in New York, or those Germans in American uniforms at The Bulge, but was it universal? Like, did we basically always execute spies, or were they sometimes improsioned for the war instead? If the second, who made the decision? What about that scene in Fury, where a German soldier who put on an American jacket to keep warm is shot? I don't doubt soldiers sometimes lost their temper at seeing an enemy wearing a jacket they clearly took off a dead American and shot the offender, but was it common or typical? Nobody thinks he was a spy, after all.

It wasn't universal no. But there were certain trends so to speak. The more democratic and "decent" a country was the more likely it'd be to capture and not kill. If you were the opposite so to speak or worse engaged in bitter partisan efforts and such well, kill rather than capture was the more likely scenario. So e.g. WW2 Germany would kill any "saboteurs", commandos and such outright for the most part, and would captrue, torture and kill spies, such as essentially all Allied operatives sent to the Netherlands for the entire war despite the captured agents failing to use the safewords that would alert the British of this exact thing, which they studiously ignored. Which is to say even though spies were killed they'd wring all the info out of them first or in this case keep em around. Though in most cases I know of few captured spies survived.

Of course this general ruthlessness led to the ww2 germans having few reliable spies of their own. And those who sorta "drank the koolaid" didn't make for good spies. Similarly the SS got a reputaion for not taking prisoners and I'd give them even odds of getting the same treatment unless a sufficiently conscientious higher officer was around.

I'd also say when it comes to spies it matters who they were, your own people as traitors tended to get a short trial and a firing squad whereas foreigners might be saved for a later exchange of some kind. This was kinda common during the Cold War period but that was also a period trying not to got hot and pretending stuff like that wasn't happening at all. During active war rules tend to fly out the window. And whoever thinks they ahve the upper hand tends to ignore the niceties, which has come back to bite more than one warring part.

Going to be hard to get solid numbers since executing prisoners is a warcrime so you don't tend to advertise it. Similarly spies and such by their nature is hush-hush so alot is classified even today. And ofc the crime part might apply too in that not every one cauhgt as a spy might have been so embarrasing details might be shuffled under the carpet.

[Vinyadan]

Afaik it's illegal to kill POWs as such, and captured spies don't always belong to this category. If they eg don't wear their country's uniform, or carry their weapons concealed, then they can laufully be denied POW status upon capture.

[Max_Killjoy]

Afaik it's illegal to kill POWs as such, and captured spies don't always belong to this category. If they eg don't wear their country's uniform, or carry their weapons concealed, then they can laufully be denied POW status upon capture.

True, spies and covert operatives aren't protected the same way uniformed soldiers are. Part of that is to keep soldiers and civilians as clearly separate categories for the protection of civilians.

[rrgg]

On the subject of crossbows, here's something interesting from Anna Comnene's description of the Frankish crossbow: https://sourcebooks.fordham.edu/basi...-Alexiad10.asp

In the middle of the string is a socket, a cylindrical kind of cup fitted to the string itself, and about as long as an arrow of considerable size which reaches from the string to the very middle of the bow; and through this arrows of many sorts are shot out.

So although she says the arrows it shoots were typically short, thick, and heavy, the length of the cylindrical groove between where the string latches and the bow is about as long as a normal arrow or longer. She then goes on to explain that the bow is very powerful and can pierce shields, armor, and bronze statues. So perhaps earlier medieval crossbows did have a draw length closer to that of a regular bow?

I do think that europeans probably had a good reason to make their crossbows in such an apparently inefficient manner in the late middle ages. IIRC crossbows in china were becoming smaller or falling out of use as well in the middle ages.

---

Regarding the power of bows or crossbows in combat, another thing to keep in mind is that the weapons or arrows used by soldiers in combat might not be in the best condition or even designed to maximize performance in the first place. This seems to have been the case for the longbow at least according to Barnabe Rich's A Martial Confrerence

for although there be many that in their gaming bowes and there arrowes, fitted to their length, and neately feathered, will shoote sixteene or eighteene score, yet when they shall be brought to their liverie bowes, which are rather made to indure weather, then for free shooting, their arrowes likewise big timbered, their fethers ruffled, whereby they will gather winde, and ordinarily made of such length, that very few will draw them to the heads by two three inches, these things considered, if tenne amongst a hundred do shoote above tenne score, all the rest will shoote short of nine.

[snowblizz]

Afaik it's illegal to kill POWs as such, and captured spies don't always belong to this category. If they eg don't wear their country's uniform, or carry their weapons concealed, then they can laufully be denied POW status upon capture.

Right, which is why I mentioned warcrimes. There's theory and unfortunately there's practice.

True, spies and covert operatives aren't protected the same way uniformed soldiers are. Part of that is to keep soldiers and civilians as clearly separate categories for the protection of civilians.

And often uniformed soldiers aren't either. The germans in 1942 giving the infamous cammondo order for instance.
Wiki actually has some good info on the subject. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commando_Order
And OP can probably get more from the links.

[Slipperychicken]

But attack dogs can be trained to aggressively subdue an opponent, be it a man running away, or a bad guy who just pulled a gun or a knife. In this case, however, the point is that the dog isn't supposed to be there alone. So it isn't really dog vs human, more like dog protecting (armed) owner from human.

That is in line with my thinking. In the cyberpunk setting I'm considering, standard security forces' role when facing elite criminal mercenaries is to delay and suppress the intruders until the arrival of a SWAT-equivalent unit. My thought is for them to employ dogs to slow criminals in a way that reduces risks to human personnel.

I suppose I should have clarified the context: there would be less-well-armed humans (probably pistols and armor vests) protecting a facility, using dogs as part of an organized approach to fend off well-armed intruders who are in a hurry to get in and out. Delaying and subduing are both valuable since they slow people down and give time for some cop to shoot the bad guy.

One dog against one armed human is pretty hopeless for the dog.

But several dogs jumping on one human at once would probably look very different. That is an important distinction to make. Modern military armor would help some, but I am not sure how much.
How much a gun would help would highly depend on how many dogs and how early the human becomes aware of them. Single dog and a pistol would again be no fight. Four dogs charging around a corner on someone with a rifle would do much better. The first one might get shot, but if the other three can jump on the human, the rifle won't be any good after that. Knife would be great, if you don't lose it in the struggle.

If big weapons are less-effective while one is latched onto by a dog, that's good to know. I'll think of ways to incorporate that. Thanks!

[Clistenes]

It's unlikely the bows from the Mary Rose were particularly abnormal or monstrous. And even that 150lb Mary Rose replica doesn't perform as well as much lighter Manchu bows and other composites shooting heavy arrows probably did.

Some of those bows are said to have draw forces of 180-190 lbs when they were new, far above other surviving longbows...

[Mr Beer]

From what I've read, it was not uncommon for uniformed soldiers surrendering in WWII got shot anyway.

Sometimes this happened for practical reasons. If your company is storming a large enemy position and in the process a couple of guys in an outlying foxhole surrender, you can either take time out from the battle to take them back to HQ, or you go past and trust that they behave as prisoners despite being unsupervised or you can gun them down. Or say you are in the process of a rapid journey in enemy territory and you don't have any facilities or resources for transporting, securing and feeding prisoners.

Next, there's the fact that soldiers can get quite bitter about the opposition after they've seen a few friends killed. So once captured, prisoners might be shot 'trying to escape' while being transported back for interrogation. This was enough of a problem that officers issued directives about this or even wouldn't use certain individuals to transport prisoners.

Both of these problems occurred amongst British and American armies. The tendency to simply murder prisoners was of course much greater amongst Russian, Japanese and German troops, depending on the type of unit and their officers' attitudes on the subject. If not killed, prisoners might then be treated somewhere between acceptably and incredibly badly by these nations. British and American officers were generally treated reasonably well by the Germans, whereas Russian troops might well be starved to death in barbed-wire enclosures.

[Incanur]

Lately I've once again been think about how different melee weapons compare, particularly for unarmored single combat.

Of historical sources, George Silver provided the clearest and most comprehensive weapon hierarchy.

Writing a couple decades later, Joseph Swetnam vehemently disagreed with his assignment of the short sword (baskhilt or backsword) against the long rapier, instead assigning odds to the latter. However, despite technique differences, Swetnam like Silver gave the staff (7-8ft for Swetnam, 8-9ft for Silver, with a sharp point for both) the advantage against most or all other weapons.

Almost a hundred years earlier in 1531, Antonio Manciolino offered the general principle that longer weapons trump shorter ones, specifically recommending the partisan over the two-handed sword and the lancia (12-14ft or so) over the spiedo (8ft or so).

The idea that staff weapons have the advantage against swords and the like comes up in a wide variety of sources.

Then you get Donald McBane, an experienced fighter who argued for the superiority of the smallsword over the broadsword and gave advice for how to defeat broadsword and targe with smallsword alone. And various other authors across the 18th and 19th centuries argued for the smallsword's advantage against broadsword, sabre, etc. Others disagreed. Folks argued endless about the merits of thrusting vs. cutting. And so on.

Note that 18th/19th century swords were generally shorter and lighter than 16th-century swords: Silver thought a 37-40in blade made for a short sword while 18th/19th-century smallswords, broadswords, and sabres tended to have 30-33in blades. Silver's method was revived in the hopes of military use at the end of the 19th century, but I don't know that anybody was using it was blades quite as long as he recommended. (The most famous modern Silverists, the Stoccata folks, use a conservative interpretation of Silver's measuring position and thus use slightly short blades than Silver specified.)

I've been YouTube commenting back and forth with Nick Thomas about this subject. A skilled fencer, he claims that the longsword has no advantage over the sabre for unarmored single combat. From my 16th-century perspective and Silverist perspective, this seems bizarre. Silver didn't even take weapons like the sabre seriously, lumping them into the broad category of weapons shorter than perfect length. Similar swords existed in the 16th century, like the messer, but they didn't get too much attention in either the civilian or military context. What was everybody doing with those longswords and single-handed swords with 36+in blades if a glorified messer/falchion would serve just as well?

From an RPG perspective, as I mentioned to Nick, if the longsword and sabre are even in an unarmored duel then the sabre is better for that purpose because is less of an encumbrance, both shorter and lighter. That's possible, but seems odd. It's this dynamic, as well as evidence from 21st-century sparring, that's really been making me doubt Silver's claim that the longsword has the advantage over the sword and target. A target (rotella/rodela) is bulky and heavy (6-9lbs). It's considerably more trouble than wearing a somewhat heavier sword with a somewhat longer handle.

In Silver's system, the longsword seems a bit overpowered. Even sword & buckler, which Silver says the longsword also beats, strikes me as a little more trouble to wear than a longsword, though it's close. The target here functions strictly as a weapon for the field, for fighting in formation and/or in armor.

By contrast, in contemporary sparring, sword & shield usually looks to have significant odds over the longsword. Sometimes this combination even appears competitive with staff weapons, though of course those are harder to simulate safely.

From a balance perspective, aligning advantage with difficulty of carry makes a lot of sense. Obviously this only goes so far if we want to match reality: a 50lb bag of manure doesn't beat a dagger. But for widely used weapons, I think it's got some merit. I remain deeply skeptical that sabres and smallswords are just as good as any other sword. I suspect they're optimized for both martial effectiveness and convenience. The same goes for the katana.

As an extreme example of the it-comes-down-to-skill position, Tom Leoni, an excellent fencer, years ago argued that halberd vs. dagger was an even fight. It's all a bit vexing and confusing.

[Mike_G]

Lately I've once again been think about how different melee weapons compare, particularly for unarmored single combat.

Of historical sources, George Silver provided the clearest and most comprehensive weapon hierarchy.

Writing a couple decades later, Joseph Swetnam vehemently disagreed with his assignment of the short sword (baskhilt or backsword) against the long rapier, instead assigning odds to the latter. However, despite technique differences, Swetnam like Silver gave the staff (7-8ft for Swetnam, 8-9ft for Silver, with a sharp point for both) the advantage against most or all other weapons.

Almost a hundred years earlier in 1531, Antonio Manciolino offered the general principle that longer weapons trump shorter ones, specifically recommending the partisan over the two-handed sword and the lancia (12-14ft or so) over the spiedo (8ft or so).

The idea that staff weapons have the advantage against swords and the like comes up in a wide variety of sources.

Then you get Donald McBane, an experienced fighter who argued for the superiority of the smallsword over the broadsword and gave advice for how to defeat broadsword and targe with smallsword alone. And various other authors across the 18th and 19th centuries argued for the smallsword's advantage against broadsword, sabre, etc. Others disagreed. Folks argued endless about the merits of thrusting vs. cutting. And so on.

Note that 18th/19th century swords were generally shorter and lighter than 16th-century swords: Silver thought a 37-40in blade made for a short sword while 18th/19th-century smallswords, broadswords, and sabres tended to have 30-33in blades. Silver's method was revived in the hopes of military use at the end of the 19th century, but I don't know that anybody was using it was blades quite as long as he recommended. (The most famous modern Silverists, the Stoccata folks, use a conservative interpretation of Silver's measuring position and thus use slightly short blades than Silver specified.)

I've been YouTube commenting back and forth with Nick Thomas about this subject. A skilled fencer, he claims that the longsword has no advantage over the sabre for unarmored single combat. From my 16th-century perspective and Silverist perspective, this seems bizarre. Silver didn't even take weapons like the sabre seriously, lumping them into the broad category of weapons shorter than perfect length. Similar swords existed in the 16th century, like the messer, but they didn't get too much attention in either the civilian or military context. What was everybody doing with those longswords and single-handed swords with 36+in blades if a glorified messer/falchion would serve just as well?

From an RPG perspective, as I mentioned to Nick, if the longsword and sabre are even in an unarmored duel then the sabre is better for that purpose because is less of an encumbrance, both shorter and lighter. That's possible, but seems odd. It's this dynamic, as well as evidence from 21st-century sparring, that's really been making me doubt Silver's claim that the longsword has the advantage over the sword and target. A target (rotella/rodela) is bulky and heavy (6-9lbs). It's considerably more trouble than wearing a somewhat heavier sword with a somewhat longer handle.

In Silver's system, the longsword seems a bit overpowered. Even sword & buckler, which Silver says the longsword also beats, strikes me as a little more trouble to wear than a longsword, though it's close. The target here functions strictly as a weapon for the field, for fighting in formation and/or in armor.

By contrast, in contemporary sparring, sword & shield usually looks to have significant odds over the longsword. Sometimes this combination even appears competitive with staff weapons, though of course those are harder to simulate safely.

From a balance perspective, aligning advantage with difficulty of carry makes a lot of sense. Obviously this only goes so far if we want to match reality: a 50lb bag of manure doesn't beat a dagger. But for widely used weapons, I think it's got some merit. I remain deeply skeptical that sabres and smallswords are just as good as any other sword. I suspect they're optimized for both martial effectiveness and convenience. The same goes for the katana.

As an extreme example of the it-comes-down-to-skill position, Tom Leoni, an excellent fencer, years ago argued that halberd vs. dagger was an even fight. It's all a bit vexing and confusing.

I honestly don't think there's a real true hierarchy.

All weapons have advantages and disadvantages. People are built differently, and those differences will accentuate or alleviate those advantages and disadvantages. And hwat you are trying to do with the weapon has a huge effect on which advantages and disadvantages actually matter.

I don't think there is a perfect sword. But I think there's a perfect sword for me, with my height and speed and strength and training to use in a given situation. If you are taller, but slower and less aggressive, you want a different sword.

And it matters if you want a weapon to duel with in a planned encounter, or one you want to take to battle against unknown enemies on unknown terrain, maybe with armor.

This is one of my issues with slavish devotion to any given master. He may be right in a given circumstance, for a given fencer. But tehre's a reason that backswords and polearms and longswords and sabres and smallswords were all in use during overlapping time periods. There was no clear, perfect weapon, no obvious staff>longsword>backsword>rapier rule, or everybody would have tossed out their rapiers and got a much cheaper wooden stick.

Read the masters, read the manuals, but then go fight somebody and try stuff.

I have done a lot of different stuff, and I really don't like longsword versus anything that isn't a longsword. I would much rather have a sword and buckler versus a longsword, or even a sword and dagger. I like sabres and rapiers, but that's probably because I can use a lot more of my 30 years of sport fencing experience with those weapons, so I'm starting out with a firmer base.

And being really short, I have always been at a reach disadvantage, so I am very good at overcoming it, and much less good at using superior reach when I do have it. I've always had to avoid or defeat the first attack then get into range, so sword and buckler versus a longer weapon is right in my wheelhouse. I have tall friends who like to keep distance and play reach games all day, so they probably feel more at home with a longsword or staff.

In short, I think the idea of "perfect length" is a weakness in Silver. My perfect length is probably different from yours.

[Incanur]

There was no clear, perfect weapon, no obvious staff>longsword>backsword>rapier rule, or everybody would have tossed out their rapiers and got a much cheaper wooden stick.

This is misleading for at least two reasons. First, obviously there are situations where a dagger trumps a staff: in a bar with a low ceiling, in a tight press on the battlefield, in a grapple, inside a covered wagon, most indoor environments, etc. Second, sidearms are fundamentally different from staff weapons and greatswords. If you can't wear it, a weapon becomes a lot more trouble. A staff can't do a sidearm's job. You can wear a rapier, even one with a 45in blade. You can't practically wear a 7-9ft staff.

Read the masters, read the manuals, but then go fight somebody and try stuff.

My sparring experience, which was limited and years ago now, felt consistent with Silver's claims. Silver's system worked pretty well for me, though we didn't have rapier simulators or decent shields. The longsword simulator definitely felt advantaged against the single sword, and that was without much longsword practice.

My perfect length is probably different from yours.

Note that Silver would have agreed with this. Each person's perfect length is different, but for most people [presumably males] according to Silver it fell into the 37-40in blade-length range.

[Haighus]

...no obvious staff>longsword>backsword>rapier rule, or everybody would have tossed out their rapiers and got a much cheaper wooden stick.

Further to what Incanur said, I think it is worth pointing out there is a distinction between sidearms and primary weapons. The vast majority of melee combantants in history essentially have used some kind of staff as a primary weapon, so you could say they did toss their swords and get a cheaper stick. Except instead of tossing them, you can wear them for back up.

I would say the historical record of use shows that wearable* swords are outclassed as weapons by polearms throughout history, with a few exception combining them with large shields (Roman legionaries), or for very specific roles like light cavalry and naval combat.

As for specific swords against each other, that all seems to be very context specific, with weapons good for the battlefield often not being as suited for duels and vice versa. As you have both discussed, there are a host of individual factors, but I still feel trends can be drawn, especially when looking at the kinds of preferred weapons in history.

*Wearable being swords that can be drawn from the hip, rather than big two-handers like zweihanders/montante/nodachi etc. I feel these are basically polearms.

[Mike_G]

This has nothing to do with pikes versus sidearms.

This was a response to musing about how Silver's advocacy of the longsword over sword and targe/sword and buckler seems to be contradicted by a lot of sparring, and similar issues.

1. Pretty much all the fencing masters were not dispassionate scholars and scientists of fighting, but guys trying to sell their style. And some have pretty odd ideas. See Capo Ferro's back weighted stances or Fabris' insane forward leaning guard. They all have adherents, and each style take advantage of certain strengths. Some work really well for tall people or aggressive people or fast people.

None of them is a universal tructh, but all of them claim to be.

Do not drink the Kool Aid.

2. Sabre is probably the most widely used sword type over quite a long period. It's a very good weapon if you are fighting unarmored enemies, and have to defend yourself with your sword instead of a shield or parrying dagger. It's light, it's fast, and generally has some decent hand protection. It loses a little bit of reach to a longer sword, but not as much as you think, and I say that reach is overrated. It's nice and all, but I have the medals to prove it's not an insurmountable advantage.

3. Smallsword is a good weapon. It's fast, it's very light, and thrusts very well. It can't cut, really at all, and it's iffy parrying a heavier blade, but proper parrying form using the forte can compensate for this. Yes, it's a dueling weapon, but infantry officers carried the into battle fairly often and did fight with them. And it was carried as a civilian self defense weapon.

4, 37 inches of blade is waaaaaay too long for me, and I think it hampers infighting.

5. A buckler, shield or dagger in the off hand is a huuuge advantage against a single weapon, even a longsword or polearm, since you can occupy the weapon with one hand and attack with the other.

6. I don't like longsword because, like Epee, you have to defend and attack with the same blade, or get killed by the counter/afterblow, with no timer to save you like in sport, and I find that limiting. I'd rather stop his attack with my left hand and kill with my right.

Now if I were a master, I would say that the perfect single sword was a sabre with a 30 inch blade, but that the preferred combination is sword of 30-32 inches, capable of cut and thrust with a good hand guard and shield, or failing that, sword and dagger.

But since I'm not trying to lure students to my school away from some filthy foreigner's school, I will admit that this is the perfect system for strong, fast, angry guys under 5'6", but it isn't a universal, scientifically superior system for everyone.

So, my advice is: Don't be a disciple of any one master. Be Inigo Montoya. Use Bonetti's defense, which is appropriate given the rocky terrain, attack with Capo Ferro, cancel it with Thibualt, and study your Agrippa.

[gkathellar]

I think weapon hierarchies sort of miss the point, in part because the usefulness of any given weapon or technique is context-sensitive, and in part because they purport to make a statement about "the truth," rather than providing insight that may be useful.

Silver's conceptual models of time, observations of what can go wrong in a rapier duel, and thoughts on technique are useful; his weapon hierarchies are an attempt to start a pissing contest with the Italians.

[Incanur]

Someday we'll have near-perfect simulation and/or the medical tech for folks to fight to the death and then get back up again. These questions will have answers, eventually.

(Yes, the answers could include specific best weapons for individuals. Hell, maybe Tom Leoni's right and dagger's just as good as halberd!)

Are there any current tournaments that allow a range of weapons within certain limits? (Example: any sword up to 4.5lbs and 4.5ft total length.) That could be useful data.

[Mike_G]

Someday we'll have near-perfect simulation and/or the medical tech for folks to fight to the death and then get back up again. These questions will have answers, eventually.

(Yes, the answers could include specific best weapons for individuals. Hell, maybe Tom Leoni's right and dagger's just as good as halberd!)

More HEMA groups are springing up, and weapons are getting better, so there should be more actual testable evidence that years ago.

I studied sport fencing in college because that was the only option for swordfighting. There was some SCA stuff around, but that was all heavy guys bashing one another with rattan clubs and hiding behind a shield the size of a refrigerator door. They had some odd, game changing rules as well. For safety, I get it, but that made it a game, just like Olympic foil is a game

Rapier fighting ten or fifteen years ago was just a sport Epee blade on a complex hilt. HEMA groups went from using shinai to nylon swords to a lot of pretty good steel blades that act a lot more like the real thing.

I finally found a HEMA group with a reasonable hike after years of looking, and it's eye opening to use a sabre with some weight, rather than the car antenna I competed with in college. Stuff makes more sense after you dot it. I'm much better at hands on learning than book learning.

I think we have a much better picture of historical swordfighting today than we did 30 years ago when i picked up a foil for the first time.

Are there any current tournaments that allow a range of weapons within certain limits? (Example: any sword up to 4.5lbs and 4.5ft total length.) That could be useful data.

The guys at Academy of Historical Fencing post a lot of videos of unlike weapons sparring.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC_H...Ifxx31eYKDo4aA

These guys are a pretty good resource.

[Yora]

Both of these problems occurred amongst British and American armies. The tendency to simply murder prisoners was of course much greater amongst Russian, Japanese and German troops, depending on the type of unit and their officers' attitudes on the subject. If not killed, prisoners might then be treated somewhere between acceptably and incredibly badly by these nations. British and American officers were generally treated reasonably well by the Germans, whereas Russian troops might well be starved to death in barbed-wire enclosures.

In many ways, Germany was fighting two very different wars at the same time. The Western Front seems to have been something of a quite ordinary European war on a massive scale. The Eastern Front was a very different story more comparable to the Mongol Horde or 30 Years War in its scope of massacres and destruction.

[Mike_G]

In fact, here's a sabre vs longsword bout.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=INscVidE_ts

I wouldn't say either weapon has a huge advantage.

[Blackhawk748]

More HEMA groups are springing up, and weapons are getting better, so there should be more actual testable evidence that years ago.

I studied sport fencing in college because that was the only option for swordfighting. There was some SCA stuff around, but that was all heavy guys bashing one another with rattan clubs and hiding behind a shield the size of a refrigerator door. They had some odd, game changing rules as well. For safety, I get it, but that made it a game, just like Olympic foil is a game

Rapier fighting ten or fifteen years ago was just a sport Epee blade on a complex hilt. HEMA groups went from using shinai to nylon swords to a lot of pretty good steel blades that act a lot more like the real thing.

I finally found a HEMA group with a reasonable hike after years of looking, and it's eye opening to use a sabre with some weight, rather than the car antenna I competed with in college. Stuff makes more sense after you dot it. I'm much better at hands on learning than book learning.

I think we have a much better picture of historical swordfighting today than we did 30 years ago when i picked up a foil for the first time.

*eye twitch* I have a pathological hatred for the foil. You are, in essence, wielding a pointy car antennae as a weapon. It looks like someone could just grab it and bend it straight up, then gut you with a "real" sword. Though that may be my backsword bias showing.

[Mike_G]

*eye twitch* I have a pathological hatred for the foil. You are, in essence, wielding a pointy car antennae as a weapon. It looks like someone could just grab it and bend it straight up, then gut you with a "real" sword. Though that may be my backsword bias showing.

If somebody can grab your foil, you deserve to get gutted.

That said, it's NOT a weapon.

It is the shinai version of a smallsword.

[Blackhawk748]

If somebody can grab your foil, you deserve to get gutted.

That said, it's NOT a weapon.

It is the shinai version of a smallsword.

I thought there was a weapon called a foil...Now i wanna know what it was i was thinking of. Its like a rapier, but only has a proper edge on the last few inches of the blade and i believe its French.

[Mike_G]

I thought there was a weapon called a foil...Now i wanna know what it was i was thinking of. Its like a rapier, but only has a proper edge on the last few inches of the blade and i believe its French.

Nope.

This is a foil.

It's purely a trainer invented to teach fencing with the smallsword. The sport evolved from there.

A foil has a rectangular blade cross section, is crazy light, and bendy on purpose so you don't kill your students with a thrust, the blunt point stops and the blade bends.

Comparing it to a sword is like complaining about the stopping power of a paintball gun.

[Incanur]

In fact, here's a sabre vs longsword bout.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=INscVidE_ts

I wouldn't say either weapon has a huge advantage.

That's the video where I'm commenting back and forth with Nick Thomas that I mentioned earlier.

I agree Nick's group is a good resource, but to get really solid data you'd need lots of folks from different styles competing over an extended period of time. Nick tends to win because he's a skilled fencer and more practiced with sabre and rapier than with longsword.

Paul Wagner, a Silverist, also tends to win on his home turf and in localish contests. He can make backsword against longsword seem favorable to the former but at least back in the day he unequivocally agreed with Silver that the longsword has the advantage in that contest.

[Mr Beer]

In many ways, Germany was fighting two very different wars at the same time. The Western Front seems to have been something of a quite ordinary European war on a massive scale. The Eastern Front was a very different story more comparable to the Mongol Horde or 30 Years War in its scope of massacres and destruction.

This is absolutely true.

To put it another way, Germany was fighting one land war which was called the Eastern Front and also a sideshow called the Western Front.

This is not an opinion shared by popular Western culture though.

[Max_Killjoy]

This is absolutely true.

To put it another way, Germany was fighting one land war which was called the Eastern Front and also a sideshow called the Western Front.

This is not an opinion shared by popular Western culture though.

It certainly wasn't a sideline for the French, Dutch, Belgians, etc.

And without the Western Front, Africa, and Greece, and gobs of logistical support to the Soviets, the Eastern Front is likely a German victory in the end.

[Blackhawk748]

It certainly wasn't a sideline for the French, Dutch, Belgians, etc.

And without the Western Front, Africa, and Greece, and gobs of logistical support to the Soviets, the Eastern Front is likely a German victory in the end.

Its one of those moments where both sides where necessary. Without one, the other fails.

[rrgg]

It certainly wasn't a sideline for the French, Dutch, Belgians, etc.

And without the Western Front, Africa, and Greece, and gobs of logistical support to the Soviets, the Eastern Front is likely a German victory in the end.

I wouldn't go that far. Operation Barbarossa was ill concieved to begin with and even against Russia alone the German army would have eventually run out of men, material, and food for their horses. But aid from the western allies definitely helped ensure that the war was over quicker and saved a lot of lives.

[Max_Killjoy]

I wouldn't go that far. Operation Barbarossa was ill concieved to begin with and even against Russia alone the German army would have eventually run out of men, material, and food for their horses. But aid from the western allies definitely helped ensure that the war was over quicker and saved a lot of lives.

With the earlier start and extra divisions freed up by not having to defend in the west, fight in Africa, and help the Italians in the Balkans, it's very possible that the Germans roll the Soviets so far back that there's no recovering for the Soviets.

On the flip side, if there's no eastern front... Hiroshima is probably not the first city hit with an atomic weapon.

[Mr Beer]

It certainly wasn't a sideline for the French, Dutch, Belgians, etc.

Obviously not, nor for the British, Americans, Canadians etc.

And without the Western Front, Africa, and Greece, and gobs of logistical support to the Soviets, the Eastern Front is likely a German victory in the end.

Maybe, maybe not. Western assistance was hugely important to the Soviets, although they underplayed that both at the time and since. Whether it was decisive is not, I think, an answered question.

My point is not that defeating Hitler was a solo effort but rather I'm remarking upon the fact is that the Eastern Front pretty much was the land war against Germany. 80% of what was required i.e. killing German soldiers, was done on the Eastern front.

[Vitruviansquid]

Some thoughts that are either unintuitive to me to too suspiciously intuitive to me, submitted for the opinions of this thread:

1. The rate of fire for bows and crossbows was not considered that much of a big deal for bowmen and crossbowmen. Arrows and bolts are not bullets, and are much larger and more difficult to carry. These weapons are also man-powered rather than chemical-powered. As a result, you are only generally getting some number of shots out of every archer or crossbowman before they had to re-supply or they became too tired to be effective shots, and that evened out the "rate of fire" for these weapons even if the bowman was shooting X number of shots for each shot that the crossbowman was shooting. Sure, you can re-supply everyone with arrows, but they would have to go to an arrow stash or cart or something, or an arrow stash or cart would have to be attached to the unit and slow it down, or they would have to waste manpower on people going to fetch arrows for the shooters.

2. This one I saw on the "Metatron" youtube channel here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wgRjGlzoRvk. Metatron makes the point that medieval soldiers who were able to equip themselves with full plate armor were filthy rich. He makes this point by discussing how a modern-day replica suit of armor for something like re-enactment costs an enormous sum of money, and is also produced with efficient modern tools and using cheaper, more abundant modern materials. Therefore, a medieval suit of armor must be even more comparatively expensive for a knight trying to acquire one than a modern suit of armor would be for a re-enactor trying to acquire one.

I don't think this is true for a few reasons. First, I think there may not be as much supply of steel for making armor, but there is simply a larger supply of armor. In modern times, there is less expertise around for making armor because it's not a practical or desirable skill for most people, driving down supply. In medieval times, there is a larger supply of people able and willing to make armor because it was a relevant and important profession, driving up supply. As well, there must have been more armor simply floating around because armor seems likely to survive its owner, and then be passed on to someone else, and this should raise supply. As well, in modern times, it seems like armor is a very niche good that sellers will charge more for because there is only a limited pool of buyers and those buyers tended to want to spend more on it. In medieval times, armor would've been a necessity, and with more suppliers and more purchasers, there are more people who are willing to shop around for quality at a lower price and more people who are willing to compete with each other to provide it.