Battle of the birds

Monty Python got some good alliterative mileage out of that term in their movie “And Now For Something Completely Different.”  One sequence in the movie is a fake WWII British newsreel, in black and white, with suitably bombastic narration that includes the opening line “Yes, the war against the Hun continues – and as Britian’s brave boys battle against the Boche…”  By the standards of genuine WWII newsreels, that’s actually not as over-the-top as it sounds to modern ears.  And during a real WWII deception operation, the fake letter from General Nye to General Alexander which was the centrepiece of the “Mincemeat” disinformation scheme used such phrases as “We have had recent information that the Boche have been reinforcing and strengthening their defences in Greece and Crete…”

That’s all three big battles in the show (Blackwater, The Wall & Bastardbowl) decided by a third army showing up in the nick of time and saving a losing force from being wiped out.

Jon Zombie Snow is a truly woeful military commander, why do people follow him? Sansa should be proclaimed Queen in the North and marry Sweetrobin.

Why didn’t Ramsey have scouts looking out for the Vale army (or any other reinforcements)?

Where was the Bolton cavalry (and archers) when the Vale Knights attacked?

Why didn’t Sansa tell Ramsey the Eagles were coming; she could have negotiated a deal where they got Rickon back alive and Ramsey slunk back to the Dreadfort.

The Maesters will have to cook something up to take out the dragons next season.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3xSeUl66rXM

I shouldn’t do these things when I’m pushed for time. Gavotti also flew the first night mission during this war. Even though the Tuabe has a bird like appearance the wings were based of the zagonia seed pod. There. Now I think I got it covered. At least what I know anyway.

I have no idea if there were any of the new Protestant nations represented at the battle.
I suppose they were mainly Northern ones, as  the Med was  surrounded by older Catholic ones.
It is weird to think the ships involved were the same type used two millennia before and that they were still rowed by slaves or prisoners of war. How many went down with the ships too?

July 16th 1212: the important battle of Las Navas de Tolosa, in Andalucia,  was fought and won by the Christian armies of Spain and Portugal. It was also Pope Innocent III’s fourth Crusade( 2 had been to the Holy Land and the other against the Albigensian heretics). It was a great feat to get the warring and jealous kings of Aragon, Navarre and Portugal to fight alongside Castille, but it was very necessary. The Moors had been on the Iberian Peninsula since the Arab chief Tarik crossed at what is now Gibraltar, in 711AD.
The battle did not see the eviction of the Moors from Spain, but it was the beginning of Spanish resurgence, which would culminate  with Ferdinand and Isabella’s capture of their last stronghold, that of Granada in 1492.
Never again did Europe have to fear from Muslim invasion from this direction.
The next wave would come from the East and towards Constantinople and then Vienna.

On the 24th May 1864 Grant gifted Lee the  kind of opportunity that rarely happens in a campaign: to wreck the other’s army.
After the bloodletting of May 5-12th, that cost Lee 22000 casualties and Grant 34000,'weakening both armies by 33% and 25% respectively, Grant again disengaged and moved South towards Richmond. Lee had followed and had been reinforced with 7 small Brigades from his capital.
Grant had inadvertentally straddled his large army across the North Anna river.
Lee saw the way to take advantage of his smaller numbers and punish the Federal II Corps, Grant’s best. He could throw 30000 men at the 24000 that were over the V in the river separating Grant’s two halves of his army. Hancock’s 24000 could not be reinforced, because of the V of the river, so he readied his assault.
On the afternoon of the 24th Lee fell violently sick with diarrhoea. He lay helplessly for hours while the opportunity to assault, before the Union commanders realised the sure situation were in.
The reason Lee’s defensive strike could not be undertaken was simple: the attrition of the last 19 days had robbed him of a subordinate able to manage it.
Time and opportunity passed. Grant and Hancock’s isolated Corps were extremely lucky.
We all know the loss of a quarter of Grant’s force would never have changed his resolve to “fight it all out, even if it takes all Summer”, but another battering would have diminished his potential to do so sooner.

Mussolini made the trains run on time. The rest of that made no sence… sorry.

Hahaha… but seriously, did you know way back in 1942 when the government released a video of Pearl Harbor a lot of parks were censored (like pictures of ships knelling over and sinking and how much we goofed up). Makes you think?