Patrick Shrier

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Book Review: Dresden: A Survivor’s Story by Victor Gregg

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[FULL DISCLOSURE: I received my copy of this book free from the author. I was not paid for this review and the opinion expressed is purely my own] Victor Gregg’s Dresden: A Survivor’s Story is a short work describing the author’s experience as  POW who got caught in Dresden in February, 1945 when the Allies bombed the city in what would become known as the Firebombing of Dresden.  The attack essentially destroyed the city center and killed an estimated 25,000 German’s.  Wikipedia has a pretty good article on the attacks that also discusses the controversy surrounding them that has grown up since the war.  To sum up the controversy, general anti-war people claim they were a crime and … More after the Jump…

How to Build and Fire a Medieval Trebuchet

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Who would not want to build their own Trebuchet and rain down destruction on various targets in their backyard? I know I did. Luckily, I got a Trebuchet kit from my wife for Christmas. The below video is the result of that and one I put together for a class I am currently taking on Desktop Video Production. The assignment was to make a five minute video on a topic of our choice. It had to have x-number of transitions, background music, narration and video effects. That is why there are so many crazy transitions in the video. Believe me, shooting it is way more fun that watching me shoot it. That doesn’t bother me because … More after the Jump…

Book Promotion: The Mogadishu Diaries: Bloodlines by Eddie Thompkins

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Loyal readers, I was approached by Mr Thompkins via email about reviewing his novel The Mogadishu Diaries: Bloodlines. This is a self-published work and one I will not be able to read for at least a month because of the pile of other books I have recently gotten from publishers. I plan on reading this book and writing up a review on it but in the meantime in the interests of encouraging other people to write and giving them a chance to publicize their own work I offered to let him post a promotional piece here at Battles & Book Reviews. Below is the text he sent me to promote … More after the Jump…

Similarities Between the 1920’s and Today?

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I am currently reading The Origins of the First World War (3rd Edition), during a pause in my reading I started thinking about not the origins of WWI but its results.  To say that the peace of Versailles was flawed is an understatement.  Given the unsettled economic situation of the Euro and the recently announced renunciation of deposit guarantees by the government of Cyprus I started to wonder if there are parallels between then and now despite the lack of a just concluded titanic war on the continent.  I think that the economics are similar, even to the extent of the various crises being self-inflicted wounds. There were many things wrong with the Treaty of Versailles but … More after the Jump…

Deutsche Telekom’s hacker tracker

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Deutsche Telekom has website they recently put up that has a live “radar” like view of where the most hacker attacks in the world are coming from.  It is at their Overview of current cyber attacks.  If anybody thinks that the internet is a safe place they should look at this site, which logs roughly 450,000+ attacks per day just on the honey pot systems Telekom has set up to monitor cyber attacks.  Below is a screen shot of the site The ubiquity of cyber attacks should convince anyone that the US creation of Cyber Command a few years ago was a good idea.  The modern dependence on both computers and the … More after the Jump…

The Transformation of War Wrought by the Armies of the French Revolution and Napoleon

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In the years before the French Revolution, warfare in Europe was moribund at best.   The wars of the period were dynastic wars fought to maintain the traditional balance of power and were generally limited in scale and scope.   The armies of this era were professional armies with an aristocratic officer class and private soldiers drawn from the lowest segments of society and subject to brutal discipline.   Desertion and looting were rife in the pre-revolutionary or old regime army’s, which partly explains the discipline, the other part of the discipline equation was the need for soldiers to execute their battlefield actions in concert to maximize the effect of … More after the Jump…

What is Military History?

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The title of this piece is a very good question in my opinion. The question really came home to me recently when I was reading the Calls for Papers in the bi-annual newsletter of the Society of Military History of which I am a member. It strikes me more and more often that Military History, like other branches of history is increasingly splintered and Balkanized. Much as traditional history is now more concerned with what the average person did than with the trajectory of nations or kingdoms, modern military history seems to focus more and more on the experience of the average soldier instead of how and why wars were … More after the Jump…

Book Review: Ethical Chic by Fran Hawthorne

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I picked up Ethical Chic: The Inside Story of the Companies We Think We Love by Fran Hawthorne at my local library because I figured the book would be good for a laugh.  I was not wrong.  I was also treated to a view inside modern liberalism that I did not expect.  The whole premise of the book is an investigation to determine if some of the companies most beloved of the American left really live up to the chic, progressive image they project to the world.  The companies profiled are Starbucks, American Apparel, Tom’s of Maine, Trader Joe’s, Timberland, and Apple.  I will also be upfront and admit that I have never bought products from … More after the Jump…

Truth in Education and the Vietnam War

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This post is a direct result of my frustration with the garbage spouted by history teachers in the modern education system.  The subject is a photo taken during the Vietnam War and the lies that have grown up around the events leading to the picture.  The Photo is named “The Terror of War” and it won the Pulitzer Prize in 1973 in the Spot News Photography category. Along with the 1968 photo “Saigon Execution” (another post their as well), this is one of the most iconic images to come out of the Vietnam War.  What started this is when my son came home from school and asked me about the photo.  He was told by his history teacher that the … More after the Jump…

Book Review: Anatomy of the Castle by John Gibson

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Anatomy of the Castle by John Gibson is perhaps the best book describing Castles aimed at the general reader that I have ever read.  The author manages to make the somewhat technical and dry language of describing castles and their construction lovely and entertaining. It is a coffee table sized book that is jam packed with beautiful color photos of castles from all over Europe and the Middle East.  There are 200 pages with a glossary, index, and bibliography.  It is divided into 6 chronological chapters with a lengthy introduction that describes the development of the art of fortification up to the development of the first castles.  He also includes a chapter describing what living in a castle must have truly been like.  The glossary is … More after the Jump…

Loaded Cannon in NYC

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This is a curious item of interest: 18th century cannon in NYC found to be loaded with ammo

The cannon in Question. Image Courtesy CBSNews
The cannon in Question.
Image Courtesy CBSNews

Recently, a Revolutionary era cannon from a British warship that had been on display in Central Park  until the mid-90’s in New York was found to loaded during restoration efforts.  The cannon was apparently loaded with 2 pounds of black powder and a cannonball.  It was disarmed by the NYPD Bomb Squad after the police were notified.  The powder is claimed to have still been viable.  Now wouldn’t that be a hoot if somebody had figured that out while the cannon on was still on display and fired it.  Would we consider anybody injured a Revolutionary War casualty since that is when the cannon was loaded?

Ralph Peters and Afghanistan

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The Best quote about the failure of COIN I have read so far comes from Ralph Peters in a piece today in the New York Post.

But the simple fact the wise men missed was that killing terrorists works, while trying to buy the love of their fan base doesn’t.

At some point, probably another 20 years into the future when the US has sunk to second rate status we are going to look back and realize the collapse came not only because of economics but also because we forgot that war is about fighting, dying, and killing and that the US spent years and thousands of loves pursuing failed policies when all we really needed to do was concentrate on killing bad guys wherever they are at.

COIN is a failure because it is a strategy that ignores reality in pursuit of fantasy.  Anyone who doubts this should take the time to read FM 3-24, The Counterinsurgency Bible.

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