The future of the History subforum...

[mayor]

As someone who expects to will start to visit WH on a more regulare basis and will start to create his own threads* I would love it if WH would stay as it is.
And if the mods do decided to merge it, it would be merged with 'The Chamber'.


*I'll be starting a Historybachelor in September with, hopefully, a double major

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

The civil war period? Or De Gaulle in general? There's very little analysis of the Gaullist-OAS Civil War, largely because it was a secret, dirty little war where both sides completely threw out the rule book. Funnily enough, Frederick Forsyth - author of The Day of the Jackal, and a former journalist who reported on the war more than most - might just be the world's foremost expert on the period, and he's hardly an academic. The various government files dealing with the issue that have been released since - notably those of Germany and Italy - are very, very circumspect in how they deal with the situation (and mostly blacked out), though after De Gaulle had several high-profile OAS officers kidnapped in Germany the German files get a little, shall we say, frosty in their tone towards the Gaullists.

With the Gaullist victory, any attempt to study the period as anything other than "filthy traitors fighting against De Gaulle, embodiment of France" is out of the question in France itself, and few non-French academics have spared the period even a cursory glance, prefering to focus on the bigger Cold War picture. I've actually read more books about Algeria during the period than France. If anyone knows some decent sources on the Gaullist-OAS War, I'd be eternally grateful for them.

Are you familiar with A Savage War of Peace by Alstair Horne? It's sat on my bookshelf for years, with good intentions of being read gone unfulfilled.

 

[Bowsling]

We can usually get something good going over the First World War, or at least, I can, because invariably people who talk about it are wrong.

 

[Lord Baal]

I had a long, detailed response written out to this, but my daughter walked over, pressed something on the keyboard, and roughly five long paragraphs disappeared. Needless to say, I am not very impressed with this. Summing up my response as briefly as possible before I go burn my daughter's effigy, I have read it, it's very good, but it only focuses on Algeria, which was not the most important battleground, despite being the proximate cause of the war. France itself was the most important battleground of the war, and the war was not about Algeria, but about control of France itself.

 

[Antilogic]

I had a long, detailed response written out to this, but my daughter walked over, pressed something on the keyboard, and roughly five long paragraphs disappeared. Needless to say, I am not very impressed with this. Summing up my response as briefly as possible before I go burn my daughter's effigy, I have read it, it's very good, but it only focuses on Algeria, which was not the most important battleground, despite being the proximate cause of the war. France itself was the most important battleground of the war, and the war was not about Algeria, but about control of France itself.

Control-Z a few times didn't work?

 

[Zulu Impi]

Though I haven't posted in here often, I can definitely reassert that this sub-forum has its own culture and user-base. Anyways the weekly discussion idea sounds good, as it would allow amateurs like myself to post without significant knowledge.

 

[Dachs]

Anyways the weekly discussion idea sounds good, as it would allow amateurs like myself to post without significant knowledge.

You should do that anyway.

 

[Lord Baal]

Control-Z a few times didn't work?

Sadly, no. I have no idea what she pressed, but I don't think I've ever been closer to punting her out the window.

You should do that anyway.

Agreed. Ignorance of the topic isn't a problem. After all, that's why we have a questions thread. The annoying thing is being ignorant of a topic but still thinking you know more about it than the experts, then refusing to acknowledge when your mistakes are pointed out. I've said dumb stuff on CFC plenty of times - Austria supporting Bavaria during the Napoleonic Wars, anyone? - but I admit it when I'm proven wrong. If other people do the same, it's not a problem at all.

 

[Antilogic]

Sadly, no. I have no idea what she pressed, but I don't think I've ever been closer to punting her out the window.


Agreed. Ignorance of the topic isn't a problem. After all, that's why we have a questions thread. The annoying thing is being ignorant of a topic but still thinking you know more about it than the experts, then refusing to acknowledge when your mistakes are pointed out. I've said dumb stuff on CFC plenty of times - Austria supporting Bavaria during the Napoleonic Wars, anyone? - but I admit it when I'm proven wrong. If other people do the same, it's not a problem at all.

That sucks, I've found so long as the window isn't refreshed, the undo command usually works for me. But there's always the exception--Civfanatics has taught me the hard way a few times to write in Notepad and copy-paste.

People have their pride; I've been guilty of not backing down when I should have a couple times, but I'm hoping most of you guys have forgotten those incidents by now. Unfortunately, for every person that realizes this there are probably 10 who will keep on yelling.

 

[Bowsling]

Or use Firefox with the Lazarus addon. It's a lifesaver.

 

[Antilogic]

I have the flaming fox browser, but I had to google Lazarus. That looks incredibly useful for when the Civfanatics site is acting up.

 

[Silurian]

I enjoy reading stuff in history and it would make me sad to see it disappear.

 

[Glassfan]

I like the History threads, there's often something interesting going on. I'd support whatever is decided to keep it.