General Knowledge Quiz

[Izipo]

@Izipo: that's General of the armies (note the plural), hold by only two people : Pershing and George Washington.

Correct.
Actually, George Washington's rank is General of the armies of the United States, having "rank and precedence over all other grades of the Army, past or present" (link)

The line between 30 and 31 is rather long, it extend from North to South... Including France.

Yep, that's when I was posted in the Southwest of France... (In Cazaux, if you really want to know).

 

[Steph]

And what did you do in BA 120? I made my "classes" in BA 115, and then I was officially in 101, although I went there only twice, the first day and then 9 months later to give my gear back.

I have users of my software close to BA 106. In fact they are not really in the base, they are in the same building as the SIA, in the second stair : DIA / DIRCAM.

IT's not really general knowledge, but I find this fun...

In the French chasseurs alpins, it is forbidden to name one colour, except for specific circumstances.

What if is this colour, and what's the wayt to speak about it without naming it?

 

[Izipo]

And what did you do in BA 120? I made my "classes" in BA 115, and then I was officially in 101, although I went there only twice, the first day and then 9 months later to give my gear back.

Did basic training at the Plateau d'Albion (BA 200), where we used to have our ICBMs (it's closed now), further training in Nîmes (BA726, closed too), posted 2 years in Nice (BA943, radar base), then Rochefort (BA721) for some Non-com training, Toulon where I got my nursing diploma, as I was head of the class I get to pick my next posting and chose Cazaux (BA120). Spent 6 years there, great place, excellent job, finished my stint in charge of the pharmacy and deputy head nurse of the base. Then got promoted to head nurse of the CFAS headquarters (our Strategic Air Command) here in Taverny, where I'll stay for another couple of years.
As I always say, we have a lousy pay but get to go places and do interesting stuff.

I have users of my software close to BA 106. In fact they are not really in the base, they are in the same building as the SIA, in the second stair : DIA / DIRCAM.

Hmm, I might have seen your software in action, since we also have the DIRCAM HQ at my base. It's a small world.

IT's not really general knowledge, but I find this fun...

In the French chasseurs alpins, it is forbidden to name one colour, except for specific circumstances.

What if is this colour, and what's the wayt to speak about it without naming it?

Of course I know the answer to this one, but I'll let the others search for a while .
btw Steph, I'm always astounded at the vastness of your knowledge.
Cheers.

 

[Steph]

Hmm, I might have seen your software in action, since we also have the DIRCAM HQ at my base. It's a small world.

I know the DIRCAM HQ is at Taverny, but my software it use only by the DIRCAM cell in the DIA office at Bordeaux (at least for the French military).

btw Steph, I'm always astounded at the vastness of your knowledge.
Cheers.

That's because I pick the quizz where I know the answers, and keep a low profile for the others .

And I'm lucky that some ask questions about topic I know, such as the UTM one.

 

[Izipo]

Don't be shy, I've seen you in other threads...

So, no takers for the Alpine troops question ?

 

[Olav]

I don't know it.

 

[a_propagandist]

White? Say "neige" instead?

 

[Steph]

No. The "replacing name" is a lot more bizarre.

 

[Tee Kay]

White. Replacing name = charcoal?

 

[Steph]

The colour is not white.

Hint: the colour was "forbidden" after Napoleon III introduced a change of uniform.

 

[Perfection]

BLUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!?

 

[Steph]

Not blue. I know it's a rather hard question, and I don't expect you to know the answer, but you can perhaps guess it.
Hint 1: Think of the French uniforms of the late 19th century
Hint 2: Think of the role of chasseurs, and try to imagine what change of the uniform they would not like at all, to the point of banning the name of the colour.

 

[a_propagandist]

Red? With the zouaves and stuff?

 

[Steph]

Yes! Red!

Napoleon III wanted the chasseurs to wear red trousers, which was not seen as a very smart move for skirmish and recon, which are tasks that the chasseurs will do more often than line infantry.

So red is a forbidden colour (you have some exception, you can use red when speaking of the lips of women, or when speaking of the cords of the legion d'honneur).

Instead, chasseurs are using "Bleu cerise" (= cherry blue).

 

[Olav]

While we wait for a_p

What ship is this?

Spoiler :

Bonus points if you know where it was sunk!

A little hint: One of the ships supply vessels was involved in an incident infringing Norwegian neutrality during WWII.

 

[Izipo]

I'm pretty sure I've found it, but it involved a lot of (very instructive) searching.

Was it sunk in the southern hemisphere ?

 

[Olav]

I don't mind using searching to find answers, as it is a picture quiz... so go ahead and post your answer if you want to, Izipo.

And yes, it was sunk in the southern hemisphere.

 

[Izipo]

Another 10 minutes of Wiki, and I have positively ID'ed it.
Since it was a very interesting search, I'll let others search for it too .

My first guess was partly correct, and it launched me on the right track. I only used the supply ship hint to confirm the whole story.
The trick is to guess the class of that ship (took me 3 tries), the rest should be easy.

 

[Steph]

As it's in WWII and it involved a Norwegian neutrality, we can guess ithe hint points to a German, or possibly British ship.
It has only one turret of 3 guns on the front. So it's probably a Deutschland class Panzerschiff (armed with 6x280mm, cheers to Wyrmshadow who "forced" me to make an excel spreadsheets with info about all his units for my civ3 mod).

So it means 3 ships. Deutschland (Lutzow), Admiral Scheer, or Graf spee.

A quick complementary search gave the Altmark, supply ship of the Graf Spee, captured by an British destroyer Cossacks in Norwegian territorial water (my guess that the British would be somehow involved in a treacherous move was right).

The Graf Spee was scuttled by its crew after leaving Montevideo, to avoid a battle it couldn't win. If you need the exact location, it's there 34°58′18″S 56°18′4″W

 

[a_propagandist]

Sorry for the silence. Open floor. Or over to Steph. Or back. Whatever.