Nicolas ("Nick") Nascimento: Terror of Tiny Township!

[arayder]

Yeah, my aunt lives in the fantasy that the minutemen won the revolutionary war by plinkin' off redcoats from behind stone fences.

To her the assistance of the French army and navy and several thousand yanks learning to form a battle line and reload brown besses had nothing to do with it.

[arayder]

I don't [think] the Japanese were thinking real well when they decided to attack Pearl Harbor. We were the only nation in the world that actually had the power and manufacturing capability to fight a true two front war, and yet they didn't think we would or could.

From the little reading I've done about prewar Japan I gather that the militaristic right-wing nationalists had a case of over-confident, we-can-kick-the-world's arse, chauvinism that equaled that of the Nazis.

[JamesVincent]

There is a section of a letter that Yamamoto wrote that covered that completely. It goes:

Should hostilities once break out between Japan and the United States, it is not enough that we take Guam and the Philippines, nor even Hawaii and San Francisco. To make victory certain, we would have to march into Washington and dictate the terms of peace in the White House. I wonder if our politicians, among whom armchair arguments about war are being glibly bandied about in the name of state politics, have confidence as to the final outcome and are prepared to make the necessary sacrifices.

From a letter written to Ryoichi Sasakawa, a Japanese businessman and politician, of sorts. Yamamoto never believed that war with the US was winnable.

[arayder]

Thanks, James. That is good source material on a fasinating subject.

My wife and I went to Japan in 2003. We went to Hiroshima where we got verbally jumped by a Japanese peace activist who insisted the U.S. had never taken responsibility for dropping A-bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

My wife, a generally anti-war sort, told the poor guy the U.S. vaporized a couple of their cities out of duty to its citizenry. . .adding that if he wanted pin a rap on a country he should get after his for starting the scrape in the first place.

The poor fellow didn't know that my wife's father died in a work place accident at a navy ship yard a year before Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Had it not been for the war he'd have been working as a cook on a passenger steamship line.

[Famspear]

From the little reading I've done about prewar Japan I gather that the militaristic right-wing nationalists had a case of over-confident, we-can-kick-the-world's arse, chauvinism that equaled that of the Nazis.

One could argue that the confidence of the Nazis was not nearly as great as that of Japan if one considers how Hitler dithered over whether to invade England after France, the Netherlands and Belgium were conquered. Hitler and his generals and admirals knew that without air superiority, the Germans had little hope of crossing the thirty miles or so of water of the English Channel. The result of the Battle of Britain was that Hitler knew he could not reasonably expect to manage a successful landing on the shores of the British Isles.

Of course, he then made the mistake of turning east toward Russia. He was certainly overconfident on that score.

[arayder]

From the little reading I've done about prewar Japan I gather that the militaristic right-wing nationalists had a case of over-confident, we-can-kick-the-world's arse, chauvinism that equaled that of the Nazis.

One could argue that the confidence of the Nazis was not nearly as great as that of Japan if one considers how Hitler dithered over whether to invade England after France, the Netherlands and Belgium were conquered. Hitler and his generals and admirals knew that without air superiority, the Germans had little hope of crossing the thirty miles or so of water of the English Channel. The result of the Battle of Britain was that Hitler knew he could not reasonably expect to manage a successful landing on the shores of the British Isles.

Of course, he then made the mistake of turning east toward Russia. He was certainly overconfident on that score.

I have read that a common Nazi saying among the troops during the early stages of the invasion of Russia was that they were going all the way to India.

Then came Stalingrad.

The Russian saying was that "there is no Russia east of the Volga" meaning that they weren't going to give up one handful of ground to the east of Stalingrad (now Volgograd).

[JamesVincent]

The poor fellow didn't know that my wife's father died in a work place accident at a navy ship yard a year before Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Had it not been for the war he'd have been working as a cook on a passenger steamship line.

Quite a few stories like that in WWII. Two of my uncles served in the European theatre, both were wounded severely and received Medical pensions. My Uncle Ed lost his kneecaps on D-Day. While charging the machine gun crew that had his troops pinned down he was hit by an indirect mortar blast. My Uncle Foy was in an American tank in France when the tank was hit. He was the only one to escape it when it brewed. Both of them were Army, my Uncle Pete was Marines and saw service in the Pacific. If you want a little weird Kentucky history my grandfather was the only person I ever heard of drafted into both World Wars. During I he was 17 when he was drafted but not sent overseas, I think he served a total of a year. During II he was living in MD but drafted in Kentucky. He had been born and raised in Farmers, KY but had moved to MD during the late 30s. He was sent to a hotel in Louisville while they were getting the unit together. After sitting in Louisville for 5 months they realized my grandfather was 42 years old and sent him home. He was actually drafted at the same time as my uncles.

It was after his service in the Marines that my uncle Pete decided he was not going to pay taxes and became my first contact with a tax protestor.

[Famspear]

I have read that a common Nazi saying among the troops during the early stages of the invasion of Russia was that they were going all the way to India.

Yes, and John Toland, in his monumental biography of Hitler, specifically mentioned that on February 17, 1941, Hitler actually ordered:

....preparation of a drive to the heart of Britain's empire, India. This would be accompanied by seizure of the Near East in a pincer movement: on the left from Russia across Iran and on the right from North Africa toward the Suez Canal. While these grandiose plans were primarily designed to force Britain onto the side of Germany, they indicated the extent of Hitler's vaulting aspirations. Russia was as good as won and his restless mind was already seeking new worlds to conquer, new enemies, America and Roosevelt in particular, to bring to heel.

-- John Toland, Adolf Hitler, p. 651, Anchor Books/Doubleday (1976).

[Famspear]

Then came Stalingrad.

The Russian saying was that "there is no Russia east of the Volga" meaning that they weren't going to give up one handful of ground to the east of Stalingrad (now Volgograd).

One of my favorite books is Alan Clark, Barbarossa: The Russian-German Conflict, 1941-45 (1965). The description of the weeks and months at Stalingrad is gripping.

It may be difficult for Americans to appreciate what happened there from the summer of 1942 to the first of February 1943: the largest single concentration of German military forces in Russia, consisting of almost the entire German Sixth Army and part of the German Fourth Panzer Army: the entire command organization of the Sixth Army, plus headquarters staff of five army corps, the men of thirteen infantry divisions, three panzer divisions, three motorized divisions, one anti-aircraft division, plus some special engineer units, for a total of 220,000 to 230,000 Germans, plus two depleted Rumanian divisions and a Croat regiment -- all completely surrounded by over a million Soviet troops.

If I recall correctly: other than about 30,000 German wounded that were evacuated by air, I believe only 90,000 or so survived the battle. Most of those died in POW camps, and only about 5,000 or so made it back to Germany after the war.

[arayder]

Hitler had a propaganda magazine called "Signal". My neighbor lent be a book that was a compilation of articles from that magazine.

Man, was it warped! They had articles on how much the French loved being occupied and how much they gained from it. It had pictures of happy, smiling Belgian girls who just loved being around the troops of the master race.

They had articles that mischaracterized the Allied powers and rewrote a bunch of U.S. and British history.

One article article that made my blood boil was critical of Sherman's use of total war during the civil war. . .a valid criticism. But the article went on to say that Sherman was happy when Lincoln was assassinated and inferred he let the assassination plot take its course because he wanted to clear the way for his buddy U.S. Grant to step right into the presidency.

The fact is Sherman was extremely apolitical and had nothing to do with the plot. He would have considered trying to help someone like Grant, who he admired, into the presidency to be like kicking a friend into a latrine trench.

The Signal article ignored the fact that Grant didn't move directly into the presidency as they inferred but rather served as Commander of the Army under Andrew Johnson for years before running for the presidency.

And rather than repay Sherman, who the Nazis said helped manipulate him into the White House, with a lofty post and a boat load of graft, all the honest President Grant did for his ole subordinate buddy Sherman was to have him appointed to his old post, Commander of the Army, a job he well carried out.

Upon his retirement from the Army in 1884 Sherman predictably and thoroughly dismissed any idea that he might run for the presidency saying, "I will not accept if nominated and will not serve if elected."

[ArthurWankspittle]

There is a section of a letter that Yamamoto wrote that covered that completely. It goes:

Should hostilities once break out between Japan and the United States, it is not enough that we take Guam and the Philippines, nor even Hawaii and San Francisco. To make victory certain, we would have to march into Washington and dictate the terms of peace in the White House. I wonder if our politicians, among whom armchair arguments about war are being glibly bandied about in the name of state politics, have confidence as to the final outcome and are prepared to make the necessary sacrifices.

From a letter written to Ryoichi Sasakawa, a Japanese businessman and politician, of sorts. Yamamoto never believed that war with the US was winnable.

I'll just add to this as I recall a documentary on Yamamoto expressing this view (i.e. Japan taking on the US was unwinnable) and, IIRC, it said Yamamoto had actually been to the US which had helped him form this view. Pretty much no one else in the Japanese high command had set foot in the US.

[JamesVincent]

I'll just add to this as I recall a documentary on Yamamoto expressing this view (i.e. Japan taking on the US was unwinnable) and, IIRC, it said Yamamoto had actually been to the US which had helped him form this view. Pretty much no one else in the Japanese high command had set foot in the US.

Correct. Something else he was credited saying, can't remember exactly where, was that no one who had ever seen the automobile plants of Detroit or the oil fields of Texas would think that Japan could win a naval race. Much like Hitler under-estimated the Russian's will and it's innumerable troops, Japan under-estimated our ability to spin up our manufacturing and our resolve. And then gave us a reason to harden that resolve with Pearl Harbor. Like I had said before, Japan just wasn't thinking. There are ways to win wars against a superior opponent and they missed every single one.

[arayder]

[Yamamoto] was credited saying. . .that no one who had ever seen the automobile plants of Detroit or the oil fields of Texas would think that Japan could win a naval race.

. . .Don't tug on Superman's cape. Don't pull the mask off the ole Lone Ranger. . .

[arayder]

Before we yanks get too full of ourselves let's not forget one of the most misguided beliefs in the history of the western world. . . that "the rains follows the plow".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rain_follows_the_plow

[grixit]

One of my favorite books is Alan Clark, Barbarossa: The Russian-German Conflict, 1941-45 (1965). The description of the weeks and months at Stalingrad is gripping.

It may be difficult for Americans to appreciate what happened there from the summer of 1942 to the first of February 1943: the largest single concentration of German military forces in Russia, consisting of almost the entire German Sixth Army and part of the German Fourth Panzer Army: the entire command organization of the Sixth Army, plus headquarters staff of five army corps, the men of thirteen infantry divisions, three panzer divisions, three motorized divisions, one anti-aircraft division, plus some special engineer units, for a total of 220,000 to 230,000 Germans, plus two depleted Rumanian divisions and a Croat regiment -- all completely surrounded by over a million Soviet troops.

If I recall correctly: other than about 30,000 German wounded that were evacuated by air, I believe only 90,000 or so survived the battle. Most of those died in POW camps, and only about 5,000 or so made it back to Germany after the war.

Is it true that some of the romanians were allowed to go home, out of pan slavic sympathy?

[Mike]

I was reading this post and knowing the situation/Nick I honestly had to laugh at some of the misconceptions in this post. I’m not going to try and stick up for him or his checkered past. That would be just plain ignorance. What I do know however, Nick was never physically caught with the drugs or the gun. He was arrested two hours form where the drugs/gun were located. Neither were in his possession at all, or proven to ever be in his possession. Some of the information in regards to the free man on the land, is inaccurate as well. To long of a story to get into in all honesty. Just thought I would add that. Only reason I joined to make this comment, is because if you know Nick. Yes he has a past, which has to do with making money. He’s actually one of the nicest guys you would ever meet. He’s not a violent individual at all. He’s an individual who’s made bad choices to survive, choices I personally do not agree with. A lot of the weapons, knives, throwing stars, etc, are because he’s a highly trained martial artist that collects various types or weapons. Not to use them, but for his personal collection as it’s his passion/life. Some being illegal in Canada, but knowing Nick he’s not an individual who believes in man made/government laws. He believes we are all equal and should live under the same laws as the Queen and the rest of the higher ups. Reason he was in the process of becoming a free man on the land. He’s not a slave to the government/banks/corporations. Ever since he started the process he was being harassed on a regular basis by the police. Just a thought I would put that out there as we like to judge others.

[Burnaby49]

Welcome to Quatloos Mike. Feel free to defend Nick but more details rather than general comment would be helpful. What information "in regards to the free man on the land" is inaccurate as you have claimed?

[notorial dissent]

Mike welcome.

Moderator question, why is there a whole off topic arayder screed above?