/lit/ - Literature

Casualty rates from musket fire were actually kinda low. It wasn't until one side turned and fled and the cavalry chased them down that the body count started climbing. Mainly it was all about intimidation, each side trying to psyche out the other. Hence the silly uniforms.

>>4489940
How was it 'fucking retarded'?

What kind of tactics would you expect to work?

>>4489940
One would argue that all wars are idiotic

>>4490041
Go on, try your best.

>>4489955
On Killing, Dave Grossman

>>4489940
Muskets weren't accurate enough for guerrila warfare to be any fucking use. Pretty much the only way they could expect to actually hit something was if they all lined up and shot in the same direction.

What else would you advocate?

>>4490062
Wars are shit. To quote that black guy, "War, UH, what is it good foh? Absolutely nothing."

Case closed.

>>4490062
Which wars were not idiotic?

>>4490066
The War of Jenkins' Ear

>>4490066
Nice try.

I hope that's not your best.

>>4490066
He hasn't made any assertion, you haven't argued anything

Napoleonic wars weren't nearly as suicidal as WWI. The accurate rifles, artillery, machine guns, poison gas, tanks caused way more deaths, in Napoleonic regiments would fire and simply retreat to a safe distance since muskets have no range

>>4490064
>Muskets weren't accurate enough for guerrila warfare to be any fucking use.

>Spain
>Guerillas

...

>>4490079
But what about cavalry and artillery?

>mass suicide
>Napoleonic warfare

>>4490041
Kinda goes without saying buddy...

Wars are stupid. That is simply a fact. Each and everyone one of them has, was or will be a fuckfest of idiocy, if only because they amount of human life wasted could have been put to a better use.

That said, they are spectacularly useful tools for those intelligent enough to cause a war and clever enough to avoid dying in it.

>>4489940
well the whole problem with muskets was that they actually worked but only if you were close as shit so if you actually attempted melee combat without reverting to swords n shields you'd lose a free chunk of your dudes before even clashing
so formal warfare stood at a range because in basic combat, that's the only thing that really made sense. You'd take (a lot of) free losses trying to actually stab people from the get-go

and of course there's the whole psychology behind the entrance of guns like seriously what the fuck are guns they completely rewrite combat structure even when you're using shitty muskets and the ease of use and relatively cheap production of those things meant that countries would have to switch into it simply to keep up, they couldn't actually go around sword and shielding

I mean really I don't think there was anything terribly moronic about how they went about musket fighting if you look at it from their perspective

>>4490066
Wars to defend from Muslims raping your country?

>>4490206
How's that working out ALL OF EUROPE

>>4490210
I knew you'd say that, but I meant the Crusades and wars on the Balkans against fucking Turks. Those were more than justified.

>>4489955
This was pretty much the case in all warfare before the 20th century.

>>4490066
War is an integral part of nature. Creatures of every kind have to compete with each other for limited resources. Sometimes through guile other times through violence. If you do not fight, then others will take what is yours. True, we may use morality to create some resemblance of peace within our society. But in the end, might triumphs over morality.

>>4490232
>Specious crap.
Fuck off back to >>>C17th.

>>4490254
How so?

>>4490215
>Crusades
>justified

>>4490259
You're anthropomorphising animals by attributing uniquely human social processes, such as War which is a deeply contextualised act, to uncontextualised non-lingual animal processes like dolphins violently fucking dolphins.

>>4490206
Oh.. My.. God.. You are even more delusional than Sarah Palin after three hours of oxygen deprivation.

Muslims were SO much more advanced than anything any European could've dreamed of during the times of the muslim invasion in Europe.

The crusades? justified?
Yeah, murder of thousands of your own people with a false promise (go and you shall recieve a place in the kingdom of heaven, all your sins will be cleared) against the murder of thousands of others who were just living their lives is justified because the pope said so!

This is one of the most short sighted, most cultural pessimistic, most racist and most rediculous things I've ever read on this board.
Never post again.

>>4490291
But isn't religion, honor, and justice, simply justification we use to acquire material and power? Even the crusades itself were also propelled by greed and the Vatican's desire to weaken the warring kings.

>>4490306
Fuck me you're an illiterate cunt.

OP is a grade A moron. He actually thinks theres such a thing as non-retarded warfare. He is clearly a naive individual with no understanding of what war actually is.

captcha: victories nahiays

>>4490302
Oh please Sir, tell us about JUST HOW FUCKING GREAT THE MUSLIM CALIPHATES WERE.

In reality, not all that great. It was a B rate empire at its best.

Europe has produced more empires than any other continent. Empires that lasted.

Whats the status on the Islamic Ummah? Last time I checked the Arab world was reeling and writhing in violence after the Brits, French, Russians, and Americans tried to deal with the destabilization of an entire region after The Ottoman Empire fell.

Btw the only good country in that god-forsaken region are Turkey. And you can thank Based Abu Bakr for that.

>>4490306
>historical materialism

>>4493102
>Caliphate_s_
>_a_ B rate empire_

>Europe has produced the most empires
>Empires that lasted
Contradictory.

>Euros ruin the Mid-east
>Hur it's the mozlems fault

>Turkey
>Good

>>4493143
uhhhhh... it WAS the regions fault. I'm not blaming Muslims or any religion but the Caliphate's ineffective government.

And pro-tip, westernize or face economic imperialism

>>4490138
not all wars m8y

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emu_War

>>4493143
How did Euros ruin Middle-East?

>>4490062
Poo-tee-weet?

>>4490302
The fucking Muslims started it by fucking with the Byzantines and the Levant. The First Crusade was reactionary. Then the following jihads and crusades were reactionary to war prior to it. BUT it all started with the Muslims (the fucking ARABS, you would have a case if you said the then Zoroastrian Persians) invading a country they has no right to step foot in.

>>4493102
>only good country in that god-forsaken region are Turkey
You're wrong. Fuck Turkey. Remove kebab.

what's a good book on the french revolution and napolean?

>>4493244
Napoleon : A history of the art of war, from the beginning of the peninsular war to the end of the Russian campaign, with a detailed account of the Napoleonic Wars by Theodore Dodge

>>4493243
This
>Remove Kebab
only works for uncivilized kebab. Lets not forget who dismantled the religious caliphate.

>>4493262
Counterpoint: Tupac is living in Serbia