1920s

1910s, 1920s, 1930s, Games and simulations

Gaming the knock-out blow — II

So, I want to construct a knock-out blow wargame. In my PhD/book, I define an ideal knock-out blow from the air as having six key characteristics. Three of these describe the attack itself: surprise, scale, and speed. Three describe what it destroyed: infrastructure, morale, and civilisation itself. Starting with the attack, as this will define […]

1910s, 1920s, 1930s, 1940s, Books, Counterfactuals, Games and simulations

Gaming the knock-out blow — I

As I discussed recently, Philip Sabin’s Simulating War: Studying Conflict through Simulation Games (London and New York: Bloomsbury, 2012) is primarily about using wargames to understand past wars. This is sensible; apart from the obvious benefit of helping us to understand history better, there’s also the useful featurethat there are some facts to go on

1910s, 1920s, 1930s, Books, Contemporary

Douhet and the Singularity

[Cross-posted at Society for Military History Blog.] In Giulio Douhet and the Foundations of Air-Power Strategy, Thomas Hippler describes what he calls Douhet’s ‘ahistorical historicism’: His thinking is ahistorical to the extent that it poses a concept of history (‘everything has changed’) that simultaneously cuts off history itself. His thinking is historicist, because this absolute

1900s, 1910s, 1920s, 1930s, 1940s, Archives, Periodicals, Tools and methods

British newspapers online update, October 2013

It’s been six months since the last one and so it’s time for another update of my list of early 20th century British newspapers online. The most pleasing addition to the list of newspaper archives for 1901-1950 is the Spectator, the most influential conservative weekly of the period. The Spectator archive is free; near-complete from

1910s, 1920s, 1930s, After 1950, Books, Cold War, Nuclear, biological, chemical, Periodicals, Phantom airships, mystery aeroplanes, and other panics

The Israeli rocket scare of 1963

[Cross-posted at Society for Military History Blog.] I learned something new from an article in the March 2013 issue of History Today: Exactly half a century ago, in the spring of 1963, Israel was suddenly gripped by a curious mass panic. Sensational newspaper reports and radio announcements claimed that the country was threatened by enemy

Dellschau 1969
1900s, 1910s, 1920s, Aircraft, Art, Before 1900, Books, Periodicals, Phantom airships, mystery aeroplanes, and other panics, Pictures

Seeking Sonora

The art of Charles Dellschau has been receiving some attention lately, thanks to the recent publication of a book about his work. Dellschau, who produced thousands of strange and wonderful watercolours, drawings and collages in Houston, Texas, between about 1899 and 1922, is significant as an early outsider artist, but he is mainly of interest

1900s, 1910s, 1920s, 1930s, 1940s, After 1950, Archives, Periodicals, Tools and methods

The many minutes of the Royal Aero Club

In May 1909, the three major organisations promoting aviation in Britain, the Aeronautical Society, the Aero Club, and the newly-formed Aerial League, announced that they would henceforth coordinate their efforts. The Aerial League would be recognised as ‘the paramount body for patriotic movements and for education’, the Aeronautical Society ‘the paramount scientific authority on aeronautical

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