HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: ravis@axion.bt.co.uk (Richard Avis)
Newsgroups: alt.war
Subject: Re: Greatest Military/War Games
Date: 9 Apr 92 07:54:44 GMT
Reply-To: ravis@axion.bt.co.uk (Richard Avis)
Organization: British Telecom Research Labs


In article <1992Apr7.030804.19912@descartes.waterloo.edu>, sjknell@descartes.uwaterloo.ca (Jason Knell) writes:
|> Ok.  Here's a RELATIVELY simple question that I need answered (out of 
|> curiousity):
|> 
|>    What are the greatest/best military/war games to play?  I'm more   
|>    interested in games of strategy and/or tactics.  Some people have
|>    suggested to me that chess is the ultimate.  But what do you war
|>    experts think?
|> 
Forget chess - Yes it's a good game but is now too 2-dimensional and so wrapped up in mathematical 
analyses to be worthless as a representation of war. 

I suppose it's horses for courses - chess represents a medieval war. The Japanese game Go is reputed to
be one of the best pure strategy games in the world. However, if you want a realistic simulation of a real war 
you have to look for a system or actual game designed for it. 

For modern war, Firepower is an excellent system with which you can represent virtually any
squad level infantry engagement. I once played it against a war-gamer whose one of
these who loves the sort of table-top bits and pieces game rooted in the 19th century - he
was useless and got wasted.

However, much above this level, no board game can represent the communications nightmare in
full surround sound freakorama that modern war represents. Too many board games assume
perfect comms and recce. It's interesting that the British Army's current Battle Group Trainer 
emphasises the communication aspects of an action above all else. Engaging the enemy
is no problem once you know what they're doing.




--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Richard Avis (Mr. Forgettable)

EMail : ravis@axion.bt.co.uk
Mail : BT Laboratories,
       Martlesham Heath,
       Ipswich,
       Suffolk,
       IP5 7RE.

"We had to destroy Ben Tre in order to save it." - Unknown U.S. Army Major

===========================================================================
Newsgroups: alt.war
From: youngs@ccu.umanitoba.ca (Scott D. Young)
Subject: Re: SUNDAY
Organization: University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, Canada
Date: Sun, 12 Apr 1992 02:26:54 GMT

In <1992Apr10.152418.1@acad3.alaska.edu> fsrla@acad3.alaska.edu writes:


>                       SUNDAY BLOODY SUNDAY  ---U2---
>-------------------------------------------------------------------------

   A cool song.  However, what are you trying to do?  Change the world by
   posting song lyrics to a newgroup?  The group's purpose is to discuss
   hostorical battles, strategies, and possibilities of future conflicts.
   (Among other things).  Of the people who read this group, some are
   probably "pro-war" people who will dismiss you out of hand.  Then there
   are people who dislike war but recognize it as a necessity, who will
   dismiss you as wasting time and space.  Then there are the anti-war
   people who will...oh, yeah, but they don't subscribe, do they?

   Basically, you are wasting your time and my space by doing this.  
   While I agree that if we could abolish war, the world would be a
   better place, it seems that we can't do it so far.  There will be war
   as long as our leaders tell us that "they" are a threat to "us".  There
   will be war as long as there is religion.  And there will be war as long
   as there is prejudice.  

   Believe it or not, most of the people who read this group are not warmongers
   and many of them are not violent poeple.  Most (myself included) have an
   interest in either the technology of warfare or the strategy and tactics
   aspect of war.  While I enjoy wargaming, I don't go out and shoot people
   for real.  

   Sorry this went on so long.  (How long?  Tonight...)
From: js43+@andrew.cmu.edu (James William Stepanek)
Newsgroups: alt.war
Subject: Re: How to stop wars
Date: 12 Apr 92 22:39:17 GMT
Article-I.D.: andrew.sdu=kJm00WBM043k4g
Organization: Fifth yr. senior, Metallurgy and Materials Science, Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA


> Just a quick solution that was put forward by a German poem entitled
> "Sagt Nein! (Say No!)" written just after WWII:
> 
> If all the soldiers refused to fight, if they just said no, then there would
> be no armies.  If all the laborers who produce war materials just said no, th
en
> the armies would have nothing to fight with.  If all the mothers who are told
> to raise their sons to be soldiers just said no, there would be no manpower.
> If all the scientists who are told to make new, more destructive weapons just
> said no, then there would be no more mass destruction.  In short, if everyone
> just says no, then the governements will find themselves without sufficient
> means to fight.  All it takes is the will of the people of the Earth to end
> war at all costs...
> 
> Just say no...
 
Yes, this will work for the five minutes untill someone says yes and
brains the poor idiot saying no without any way to defend himself. You
need mind controll to pull a stunt like this.

James Stepanek
esp
From: bwise@hemlock.mitre.org (Barry Wise)
Newsgroups: alt.war
Subject: Re: To the Pacifists (A Challenge Not a Flame)
Date: 16 Apr 92 20:46:22 GMT
Article-I.D.: linus.1992Apr16.204622.3854
Organization: The MITRE Corporation

In article <james.703443457@menaik> james@cs.UAlberta.CA (James Borynec; AGT  
Researcher) writes:
> bwise@hemlock.mitre.org (Barry Wise) writes:
> 
> >Pacifism had little or nothing to do with it.  The collapse of the Soviet  
> >Communist party and the nomencultura prevented the wars.  The only time  
> 
> The party collapsed because they (or their soldiers) got *squeamish*.
> If they had used their machine guns, they would still be in power.  When
> it became obvious that they weren't going to use them, they were run out
> of town.  In other words, they lost their stomachs *first* and then
> they lost their power - *non-violently*.
> 
> >Look what happened in China in the same timeframe you are referring to.
> 
> Exactly my point.  
> 
> j.borynec james@cs.ualberta.ca

No, you miss MY point.  The pasifism of the civilians stood no chance against  
someone who is NOT *squeamish*.  Gandi was only able to succeed because the  
British were squeamish. Wana bet what would have happened in Moscow if the coup  
plotters had gotten their Asian troops into town instead of the local Russians?
There is always some thug who is willing to use force and has to be stopped  
with force or the threat of it.
--
Barry Wise
(bwise@hemlock.mitre.org)
Newsgroups: alt.war
From: brian@garfield.cs.mun.ca (Brian Paquet)
Subject: Re: trajan and parthia
Organization: CS Dept., Memorial University of Newfoundland
Date: Mon, 6 Apr 1992 02:01:14 GMT

Damn mail sender! Sorry about the sig without a post. What I am looking for
is info on the tragan conquest on mesopotamia in 155-117 A.D. 
If there are any sourses I would apprecate a summery. 
Do it by post or E-mail.  I want to know everything, including if it could of been held [did Hadrian have to give it back?] As well as how it succedded 
[could it have been replicates earlier or later.
See my former post for my sig :)
From: smpod@venus.lerc.nasa.gov (Stefan)
Newsgroups: alt.war
Subject: Re: the greatest generals of all time
Date: 9 Apr 92 22:14:00 GMT
Article-I.D.: venus.9APR199218145175
Organization: who knows
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41

c34657b@saha.hut.fi (Tuomas Viljanen) writes...
>ningwang@acsu.buffalo.edu (Ning Wang) writes:
>>c34657b@saha.hut.fi (Tuomas Viljanen) writes:
>>>>their enemies outnumbered them most of the time.
>>>No. Mongols had superiority nearly all the time. For example, in the battle of
>>>Liegnitz 1241, the Mongols had some 100,000 - 150,000 men against King Henry's
>>
>>Hmmm, I didn't know the Mongols had that many men in one group, period..
>>Being from China, I have heard stories about how the Mongols rode all the way
>>down to the southern tip of China in just a few days and conquered a country
>>of 1-2 million people by total surprise..
>>
>This amount is taken straight from my source book, "Armies of the Feudal
>Europe" by Ian Heath, published by WRG. 

Turnbull says that at the time of Genghis death, the Mongol army numbered
123,000 TOTAL.  So it is difficult to believe that 75% of the army was used as
a flank guard into Poland, with the remaining 25% hitting the 100,000
Hungarians and guarding the empire.  Chambers mentions an invading force of
100,000 Mongols.
From: fsrla@acad3.alaska.edu
Newsgroups: alt.war
Subject: A word to Viking (that I posted anyway)
Date: 13 Apr 92 05:38:31 GMT
Article-I.D.: acad3.1992Apr12.203831.1
Organization: University of Alaska Fairbanks

Interesting comments, Viking.  Not that I agree with them or
anything... *GRIN*
Anyway, did you ever think that perhaps it was not our place to
be in the Middle East in the first place?  Explain to me why we
were there.  Was it to defend the rights of some small Mid. East 
country?  Well, considering few people but the rich have any rights
there, I somehow doubt it.  Ask any woman from the area.

I find your insentivity toward civilians rather alarming.  I hope most
of America doesn't share your views.  They are frightening.  Tell me how
you propose telling the families of these civilians that they were "Just
in the way"  That is plain ignorant.  In Korea over 1 million civilians
died.  Were they all just "In the way"  or were they diliberatly targeted?
Perhaps to demorilize the "enemy"?  How can that many people just be in the
way?  Tell me how the poor farmers of the Vietnamese plains could ever know
that there fields were good for the next battle-field.  Explain to me why
poor and INOCENT men, women, and CHILDREN were burned out of there homes
and shot in the dirt roads in Vietnam.   EXPLAIN THAT TO ME!  Or can you?
Somehow, I doubt it.
Don't spend your time babbling about "Orders"  why not spend a second and
take a thought about morals.  We all have the ability to say no.  Even to
our highest superiors.  Tell me, which would you rather have on your 
concious.  A dead child, or a discharge from the military?
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Roger Asbury                           email:  fsrla@acad3.alaska.edu
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Find the cost of freedom buried in the ground"  ---CSNY---
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: alt.war
Subject: Re: To the Pacifists (A Challenge Not a Flame)
From: jsast@unix.cis.pitt.edu (Jonathan S. Anderson)
Date: 13 Apr 92 02:32:44 GMT
Organization: University of Pittsburgh

In article <1992Apr13.012824.4651@cs.yale.edu> yarvin-norman@CS.YALE.EDU (Norman Yarvin) writes:
>jsast@unix.cis.pitt.edu (Jonathan S. Anderson) writes:
>>Accepting any possible good which might come from evil does not negate the
>>evil.  If you disagree, then you must accept that the ends justify the
>>means.  I claim that such a philosophy is dangerous as:
>>
>>	1) human beings can never predict with %100 certainty what the
>>	   consequences of their actions will be.
>>	2) it makes almost any possible action morally acceptable
>
>If actions are not to be measured by their consequences... then what are
>they to be measured by?  What else can possibly be used to judge the worth
>of an action than the events that it causes?
>
>--
>Norman Yarvin						yarvin@cs.yale.edu
> "... and I realized, we did not live in a scientific society."
>	-- R. P. Feynman, "Cargo cult science"

Well, I claim my moral code to come from my religion.  The reason you cannot
judge an action by it's results is simply because good things can occur
through evil actions and vice-versa.  As this is the case, I believe that
each individual needs their own "code of morals" in order to judge their
behaviour against.  You might claim that such codes come about by individuals
who sat down at some point and calculated the risks of doing certain actions.
I agree with you, to a point.  However, from my Christian upbringing, I believe
that my code comes from God alone.

As I'm afraid this discussion is moving somewhat away from "war" and
going toward philosophy or religion, might I suggest that if anyone wishes
to continue this, we do so via E-Mail or in another newsgroup.

-Jon Anderson

  ><>  ><>  ><>  ><>  ><>  ><>  ><>  ><>  ><>  ><>  ><>  ><>  ><>  ><>  ><>  
  Jon Anderson                                      jsast@unix.cis.pitt.edu
      "Won't you look down upon me Jesus, you gotta help me make a stand,
       You've just got to see me through another day.
       My body's aching and my time is at hand,
       And I won't make it any other way. "                 -James Taylor
  <><  <><  <><  <><  <><  <><  <><  <><  <><  <><  <><  <><  <><  <><  <><
From: fsrla@acad3.alaska.edu
Newsgroups: alt.war
Subject: SUNDAY
Date: 11 Apr 92 00:24:18 GMT
Organization: University of Alaska Fairbanks


                       SUNDAY BLOODY SUNDAY  ---U2---
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
I can't believe the news today.
I can't close my eyes and make it go away.
How long, how long must we sing this song?
How long?  Tonight we can be as one.
Broken bottles under children's feet,
Bodies strewn across a dead end street,
But I won't heed the battle call,
It puts my back up, puts my back up against the wall.

Sunday, bloody Sunday.  Sunday, bloody Sunday.

And the battle's just begun,
There's many lost, but tell me who has won.
The trenches dug within our hearts, 
and mother's children, brothers, sisters, torn apart.

Sunday, bloody Sunday.  Sunday, bloody Sunday.
How long, how long must we sing this song?
Tonight, tonight.
Sunday, bloody Sunday.  Sunday, bloody Sunday.

Wipe the tears from your eyes,
wipe the tears away, wipe your bloodshot eyes

And it's true we are immune
When fact is fiction and T.V. is reality.
And today the millions cry,
We eat and drink while tomorrow they die.
The real battle just begun.
To clain the victory Jesus won, 
on a Sunday, bloody Sunday.
Sunday, bloody Sunday.
____________________________________________U2____________________________
Roger Asbury                                  email:  fsrla@acad3.alaska.edu
__________________________________________________________________________
"Find the cost of freedom buried in the ground"    ---CSNY---
__________________________________________________________________________
From: fsrla@acad3.alaska.edu
Newsgroups: alt.war
Subject: Re: Interesting challenge.
Date: 15 Apr 92 04:18:56 GMT
Organization: University of Alaska Fairbanks

In article <1992Apr14.150207.6613@pimacc.pima.edu>, ppugliese@pimacc.pima.edu writes:
> In article <1992Apr14.155958.5363@linus.mitre.org>, bwise@hemlock.mitre.org (Barry Wise) writes:
>> In article <viking.703133928@aviator.cc.iastate.edu> viking@iastate.edu (Dan  
>> Sorenson) writes:
>>> 	Because killing him would have made him a martyr, and as
>>> a defeated but alive political leader he is much less powerful.
>> 
>> It would have been an assassination and we don't do those things do we? We'd  
>> much rather kill the grunts out in the field. Wars are started by leaders but  
>> the soldiers do the dying. I don't think a leader has led the charge since the  
>> War of the Roses.
>> --
>> Barry Wise
>> (bwise@hemlock.mitre.org)
> 
> And then there was also the big flap over the legality/illegality of assas-
> sinating a foreign head-of-government.
> 
> PHIL
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Gee, uhm, then why didn't this stop us from "arresting" one in Panama????
Just a simple thought.....
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Roger Asbury                  email:  fsrla@acad3.alaska.edu
-------------------------------------------------------------------
"Find the cost of freedom buried in the ground"  ---CSNY---
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Xref: sparky alt.war:658 soc.culture.asian.american:3402
From: geoffb@coos.dartmouth.edu (Geoff Bronner)
Newsgroups: alt.war,soc.culture.asian.american
Subject: Re: The War in 2020 (was US military policy)
Date: 9 Apr 92 19:37:15 GMT
Reply-To: geoffb@Dartmouth.EDU
Organization: Amos Tuck School

In <viking.702795922@aviator.cc.iastate.edu> viking@iastate.edu (Dan Sorenson) writes:

>Weapons are weapons,
>and it is indeed a rare case that a weapon is unused because it is
>"just not humane" or is "just too terrible" to use.

That is for sure. The only time a weapon is not used for humane reasons is
because the person who is considering use of the weapon doesn't have an
adequate defense against retaliation.

My response to people who whine about 'inhuman' weapons is this: Show me a
humane weapon. Really, I'd like to see it.

-Geoff
--
geoffb@Dartmouth.EDU  -  Computing Support Consultant, Tuck School of Business
    "An ancestor of mine maintained that if you eliminate the impossible,
     whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth."
		-Spock, "STVI:TUC", Stardate 9523.8
Xref: sparky alt.war:743 soc.culture.asian.american:3579
From: d9bertil@dtek.chalmers.se (Bertil Jonell)
Newsgroups: alt.war,soc.culture.asian.american
Subject: Re: The War in 2020 (was US military policy)
Date: 14 Apr 92 14:26:33 GMT
Organization: Chalmers University of Technology

In article <viking.702795922@aviator.cc.iastate.edu> viking@iastate.edu (Dan Sorenson) writes:
>	Humans are quite good a killing each other.  Accept it, and
>remember that the Nobel prize is given in the name of the man who
>invented TNT, declaring that he has discovered a substance so
          ^^^
>powerful that it would end warfare because it was just too powerful
>and would make the cost in lives too great.  And they call it the
>Nobel "Peace Prize"...
  
  Dynamite actually. Up to then the prime explosive had been nitroglycerin,
which is rather nasty both as a poison and in terms of accidental detonation.
What Alfred Nobel did was use a type of sand to suck up the nitroglycerin.
The resulting paste was called dynamite. This was later improved by replacing
the sand with cotton nitrate.
 
  TNT (tri-nitro-toluene) is produced by nitrating toluene while nitroglycerin
is produced by nitrating glycerine. That is their only relation.

  And Alfred instituted several prices, all called the "Nobel price" in 
(if I remember correctly) Medicine, Chemisty, Physics, Litterature and Peace.
The last of which are issued in Oslo (in Norway) because Sweden and Norway was
united when he lived. 

  So go blame the Norwegians for their strange choises:)

><Daniel R. Sorenson   Dod #1066  |If Iowa State University agreed with me >

-bertil-
--
"It can be shown that for any nutty theory, beyond-the-fringe political view or
 strange religion there exists a proponent on the Net. The proof is left as an
 exercise for your kill-file."
From: fsrla@acad2.alaska.edu
Newsgroups: alt.war
Subject: A point to be made....
Date: 8 Apr 92 18:19:49 GMT
Article-I.D.: acad2.1992Apr8.141949.1
Organization: University of Alaska


                     excerpt: Soldiers of Peace: 
                           Cosby, Stills, Nash, Young
_____________________________________________________________________
Men who were fighting for all of their lives,
are now fighting for children, homes and for wives.
Fighting for the memory of all who fell before.
But the soldiers of peace just can't kill anymore.

So come all you warriors who live for the fight
Come listen to sombody, some who might
have been there before you, they have the right.
They've been dieing to tell you the score.
Your warriors don't want you to hurt, anymore.

The soldiers of peace can still hear the crys
when the people were dieing and losing their lives.
When spirits were ripped and body's were torn,
but the soldiers of peace do not want you to mourn.
______________________________________________________________________

Just a point to be made against war..............
______________________________________________________________________
Roger Asbury                                 email: fsrla@acad3.alaska.edu
______________________________________________________________________
      "Find the cost of freedom buried in the ground"----CSNY----
From: riiali@lut.fi (Beke)
Newsgroups: alt.war
Subject: Re: Greatest Military/War Games
Date: 9 Apr 92 11:48:38 GMT
Organization: Lappeenranta University of Technology, Finland


   Ok.  Here's a RELATIVELY simple question that I need answered (out of 
   curiousity):

      What are the greatest/best military/war games to play?  I'm more   
      interested in games of strategy and/or tactics.  Some people have
      suggested to me that chess is the ultimate.  But what do you war
      experts think?

    Jason Knell, Undergrad (Math)         |  I defend my opinions with the
    U. of Waterloo (Canada)               |  fanatical conviction of a psycho!
    sjknell@descartes.waterloo.edu        |                  -me


The most realistic one is Harpoon (Naval Strategy).
--
+ internet:  riiali@kannel.lut.fi               ++ Pekka Riiali           +
+      irc:  Beke  ham:  OH5LUQ@OH5RDT          ++ Laserkatu 2 D 12       +
+ The evil that men do lives on and on..        ++ SF-53850 LPR   FINLAND +
Newsgroups: alt.war
From: manuelp@bullet.ecf.toronto.edu (MANUELPILLAI Gerald N.)
Subject: Re: What about the worst generals ever?
Organization: University of Toronto, Engineering Computing Facility
Date: Wed, 15 Apr 1992 00:15:20 GMT

In article <1992Apr14.155427.5148@linus.mitre.org> bwise@hemlock.mitre.org (Barry Wise) writes:
>In article <204855@unix.cis.pitt.edu> hnkst2+@pitt.edu (Hanhwe N Kim) writes:
>Would Hitler count since he acted as a general in planning such wonderful  
>debacles as Barbarossa?
>--

I had already suggested Hitler, but for his "campaigns" in Russia _after_
Barbarossa.  Hitler did not have any say in planning Barbarossa (except for
the timing).  Anyways, in all probability, given the originally planned early
starting date, Barbarossa had a very good chance of succeeding, so it wasn't
really a planned "debacle".

Gerald M
Newsgroups: alt.war
From: cmort@NCoast.ORG (Christopher Morton)
Subject: Re: Peru: what on earth is going on?
Reply-To: cmort@ncoast.org (Christopher Morton)
Organization: North Coast Public Access *NIX, Cleveland, OH
Distribution: alt
Date: Wed, 8 Apr 1992 12:11:46 GMT
Followup-To: alt.war

As quoted from <14584@vela.acs.oakland.edu> by rwstarke@vela.acs.oakland.edu (Ross W. Starkey):

> This morning I heard on Ted Turner's Headline News Nuggets channel that
> Fujimori (the President of Peru) had suspended the government, dissolved the
> legislature and declared martial law with the military's backing!  WHAT ON
> EARTH IS GOING ON DOWN THERE?

Are you implying that a shogunate is not the traditional Peruvian form of
government...? :)



-- 
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"Well whose opinions did you THINK these were...?" 
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Newsgroups: alt.war