Archives for History - Page 16
Book Review – First Light by Geoffrey Wellum
First Light by Geoffrey Wellum My rating: 4 of 5 stars If you want to know what it was like as a spitfire pilot in the Battle of Britain, then this is the book you need to read. The author was a public schoolboy that joined the RAF just before the outbreak of war. He signed up in the spring of 1939 and started training as soon as he finished school in July 1939. The first third of the book is a very detailed account of his entry to the service and the flight training. Through this we get to know the author as a typical public schoolboy, he struggles with the academic side, but has no problems with the discipline and dealing with being in a service institution. Flying is clearly his passion, and is most of the focus…
Game Design Notes: World War One Strategic Battles
This was originally written as a game design session prompt for a session at Chestnut Lodge Wargames Group back in April 2004. A discussion thread on about this excellent blog post lead me to dig it out and post it here. World War One Strategic Battles Turn structure Three turns per year, March – June (Spring), July to September (Summer) and October to February (Winter). Actions Small offensives can be prepared and launched within one turn. Large offensives take a turn of preparation and then take a whole turn of offensive action. Small offensives can be carried on into large offensives. Battles are fought in phases. Preparation: divisions are allocated to the line, first wave, second wave, exploitation, training and reserve tasks Bombardment Assault Counter-attack Continuation phases if appropriate Resolution Fighting is resolved at Army level, with Divisions as the…
Book Review – The Place-names of Scotland: A First Introduction by George Harris
The Place-names of Scotland: A First Introduction by George Harris My rating: 4 of 5 stars A very short introduction to where the place names of Scotland come from by George Harris, who is on twitter as This is a little tour around the peoples that lived in Scotland in the dark ages and a bit about the languages that they spoke. There are a few example etymologies of place names, but not a whole list of them, that would need to be a much longer work than this. I got this for free on an promotion, and it passed an entertaining half-hour one evening. View all my reviews Related articles Nae Gods, an' precious few heroes: no place for racism in the new Scotland Top Twenty scariest road names Crowdsourcing to Record Welsh Place Names
The Stress of Battle 5 – WW2 Heroism & Surprise
This is the fifth and final part of my extended review of The Stress of Battle by David Rowland. It is such a strong piece of operational research that I thought that it would be useful for wargame designers (and players) to understand what the research evidence is for what went on in WW2 battles. This part is on the effects of heroism and combat degradation. Combat Degradation Combat degradation is a measure of how less effective weapon systems and individual soldiers are in actual combat when compared to training exercises and range work. A score of is equivalent to not being degraded at all. Degradation to would mean that it was operating at 30% of its peacetime range effectiveness. the analysis by Rowland's team broadly matches that done by Wigram in 1943, that there are three classes of effectiveness. About 20% of those involved could…
The Stress of Battle – Part 4 – Op Research on Anti-Tank Combat
This is the fourth part of my review of The stress of battle: quantifying human performance in combat by David Rowland, which is an essential piece of Operational Research on WW2 and Cold War combat operations. Unlike small arms, the effectiveness of anti-armour weapons has changed considerably over the course of the mid-20th century. From non-specialist gunfire in WW1, to high velocity armour piercing in WW2 and then to Anti-Tank Guided Weapons in the Cold War period. This makes the operational research harder to do because the start point needs to be battles where only one kind of AT weapon is in action. Much of the analysis starts with the 'Snipe' action during the second battle of El Alamein in North Africa where data on each of the guns individually was available. 'heroic performance' plays a large factor in the effectiveness of anti-tank guns about a quarter of guns (at…