Forum Chat Bar & Grill

[El_Phil]

So pretty standard colonialism fresh from the Spanish/Portugese book of exploitaion, only without the protective cloak of those fun (and child) loving dress wearers at the Catholic church?

[Growltiger]

Sounds a bit like us British...

You can imagine some ludricrously moustachioed upper class prat saying "I know we are at peace with those Zulu fellahs, but the peasants back at Blighty always like a decent victory to keep them in tip top condition. What say we gather 5,000 of our red coat chappies and go and give them wretched natives and jolly good kicking, what? oh, and dont forget the cavalry, cannon, rockets, Martini-Henry repeating rifles, machine guns and all that stuff, I know them Zulus only have spears and immense bravery but those spears do look rather sharp dont cha know - I wouldn't want to get put out for my next rugger game"......

Which probably explains why we lost at Isandhlwana. Sun Tzu waxed lyrical about the pitfalls of a general being an arrogant incompetent pillock who massively underestimated his enemy.

I suppose the problem we have is that (excluding the Boer war and the War of Independence in the states (which happened when we were embroiled in huge punch ups in Europe), Britain has pretty much won all its wars (not battles mind you but wars) and I suppose this kind of lead to a gung ho and arrogant approach to things. People need to lose every know and then to keep it real.

[Raging Deadstar]

Strategia_In_Ultima said:
During the Dutch rule of Indonesia (or the Dutch East Indies, as they were called back then) we (the Dutch) exploited them (the Indonesians) like they were animals. They suffered from poverty and famine, while the Dutch governors, merchants and whatnots led luxurious lives in their spacious country houses, waited on hand and foot by Indonesian servants. We conquered the northern part of Sumatra (Aceh) in a bloody war, wiping out entire villages. When they declared their independence, we sent in troops to repeat the actions of the conquest of Aceh only then A.) they had more modern weapons and B.) we called it a "police" action.

I'm still trying to decide if this is a commentary on Dutch Colonialism or on Modern Day Politicians, it seems too simillar

Also, anyone else noticing the sudden intellectual atmosphere here?

[El_Phil]

Honestly what did you expect to be done? "Let's go fight chaps, but leave behind the best weapons. Yes I know they outnumber us thousands to one, but we should try and fight on their terms."

The British Army was legendarily small once you took out those regiments that were just heavily armed colonial police. All the guns were needed to counter the fact there were never many men, and quantity has a quality all of it's own as the saying goes.

[Puke]

which is much like my local empire, technology replacing manpower. the more things change, and all that.

honestly, i hope we see more of it. not colonialism and imperialism NECESSARILY, but technolgoy replacing manpower. more advanced and autonomous weapons, less people shooting them. more automated factories and robots, less underpaid workers.

of course, this brings about other changes. like a requirement to retrain the workforce or have a generation of welfare pensioners. the requirement to either develop more jobs in the science and tech industry for the next generation, or to breed alot less.

[TurinTurambar]

Breeding will not slow down. There's an exponential quality to it that can't be undone, and we live longer now. Look at what's happening to Chevrolet and their pension problem.

Also, I'm a firm believer in the Second Law of Thermodynamics and all its corollaries. Society will not better itself; it will unravel and go backwards for awhile and be replaced by something else. There will be a backlash to technology and its replacement of the work force, and once China becomes the world economic power... well...

Suddenly I feel ill. Enough for now...

T[img]/threads/images/Graemlins/Dagger.gif[/img]

[Renegade 13]

That view of the future will never come to pass.

[Suicide Junkie]

TurinTurambar said:
Breeding will not slow down. There's an exponential quality to it that can't be undone, and we live longer now.

Most of the industrialized countries have a negative growth rate. We make up for it by immigration.

[Strategia_In_Ultima]

Growltiger said:.....Britain has pretty much won all its wars.....

AHEM There were three Anglo-Dutch wars and IIRC we won two of them. At sea. Even entering the Thames estuary one time. And breaking the chain at Chatham. And taking away your flagship. Ha.

[Growltiger]

Strat, they were not really wars as such, but minor fleet actions, akin to the scraps we had with the Danes, the Russians and pretty much every other minor European power other than the Prussians (who didn't have much of a navy) and the French (who did). The only "official" Anglo-Dutch war(at least accordingly to my History of Britain) was the one that resulted in Camperdown (and we all know what happened there).

On the general comment about how society will progress, I cannot really comment, but as a new father, I do really worry about the world my children will grow up in - declining fuel resources, climate change, globalisation leading to a more fragile economy, increasing urban crime and violence, escalating costs etc etc etc Make's me kind of glad that I will probably have shuffled off this mortal coil by 2050.

Re the remark about leaving best weapons behind, taking the Zulu campaign as an example, there were 10,000 brits (and local allies) and about 30000 zulus. A major imbalance on nummbers I agree, but not when you add in cavalry, cannon, guns etc - fully take the point about not leaving the weaponry at home, but I do wander what these Victoria and Edwardian "men of honour" really had going through their heads when they decided to whup native peoples with modern weaponry..... not nice really