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Showing posts from February, 2013

Imperial German Air Power, 1914-1918 Part II: The ‘Red Battle Flyer’ and the Aces of 1916-1918

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Part I The deployment of the Imperial German air services  Jastas followed closely to what Hauptman Oswald Boelcke had envisaged before his death, the 'Red Baron', Manfred Freiherr von Richthofen in particular, always having took pride in having  stayed true to his late contemporary and friend’s pedagogy. However the Jastas rosters or lineups themselves changed rapidly with the death or disablement of pilots during missions. By 1917 many more of  Jagdstaffeln, or Jastas, hunting groups, were created in Bavaria , Saxony and elsewhere, with their bases of operations spread between the various theaters of war, from France , to Russia , Macedonia , Palestine , and Turkey , the German air services rapidly expanded in the months from 1916 into the spring 1917. Depiction of Royal Prussian Jagdstaffeln,  'Jasta 18'  in action 1916-1917 Though all the major German Kingdoms fielded Jagdstaffeln , Bavaria, Prussia, Saxony, & Württemburg among them, it was the Prussians who w

Imperial German Air Power 1914-1918: First German Aces of the War, 1914-1916

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Imperial German Air Power: Part II Imperial German air power can be described as nonexistent in the period before 1914. Though Prussia and Saxony developed air wings prior to 1914 almost the whole of German military finances and strategy went into the infantry and the navy budgets. Though the production and use of dirigibles and zeppelins for observation purposes was seen as generally more useful in the event of a large conflict with France or Russia . [1] Anthony Fokker in his plane When the Great War began infantry, cavalry, and artillery were called upon to wage war and thus received the most attention from military strategists, as they always had before even though Germany and the Entente powers had already met in bloody stalemate on both fronts in 1915. The first units to see service in support of the German Army Corps were the Fliegertruppe , two seat reconnaissance planes that were tasked with monitoring troop deployments and enemy positions. Many of early trainees were from

Texas Revolution 1835-1836: Battle for North Mexico and the Birth of the Texas Republic

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American interest in ‘Norte’ (North) Mexico, what would become the nation and later American state of Texas, dated back to the Mexican struggle for independence from Spain, which stalled Moses Austin plans for colonization of the fertile Texas river valley. Known as the first empresario (a settler bound by contract to lead other settlers and homesteader parties to the territory), Austin was unable to complete his vision of a new settlement in what would become Texas , dieing in 1821 before he could see the territory himself. Stephen F. Austin It was his son second son Stephen F. Austin (b.1793-1836), who received his fathers’ grant for colonization in Southeastern Texas, though it is long handed down that the younger Austin was reluctant to travel to Texas . The first settlers, the “Old Three Hundred” remain an enduring symbol of the founding of Texas and in a sense represent the spirit of those who still reside there today. Though it is now believed that the beloved ‘Ole Three Hundre