1. Madman

    Madman Life is Sacred Contributor

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    The Devil is in the Details (War Research)

    Discussion in 'Research' started by Madman, Jul 20, 2021.

    Does anyone know of a good source where people recount in detail their experiences of war? Perhaps a book or site?

    My main project is about war, but I thankfully know very little about the whole thing. I would like to know the details of getting dirt and stuff sprayed into your eyes from a blast and the effects of it. How long do you generally stay visually impaired? (I guess it depends on a lot of factors.)

    How is it to walk around a minefield? How is it to lose a comrade in the heat of battle? Do you stop, do you continue? (This also depends on the person and training, I think.)
    How is it to fire a weapon at a living person? Or how it is to stab someone and watch them die?
    The details of being wounded and what it can do to the body in the short term.

    I've read some short accounts from soldiers of World War One which have been helpful. I am looking for accounts from everywhere and anywhere war has been present.

    I am also looking for accounts on melee warfare, if you know of any such. I have had some difficulties finding those.

    Some places I've been to in my research:
    https://firstworldwar.com/index.htm
    https://www.iwm.org.uk/history/rare-personal-accounts-of-life-in-the-trenches-in-1917
    https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/education/resources/letters-first-world-war-1915/
    Personal account from a German Veteran:

    And more.


    I would be very grateful for your help in this.
     
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  2. Bruce Johnson

    Bruce Johnson Contributor Contributor Contest Winner 2023

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    What is the time period, setting, and type of technology of your war?
     
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  3. Madman

    Madman Life is Sacred Contributor

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    It's sci-fi, fantasy.
    The setting is far-futuristic with elements of removing technological advancements by means of energy depletion weapons. It's a story with humans in it fighting a war across multiple galaxies, against different life forms. Each soldier is equipped with a bracelet that basically is their hand-held mind reading (their own mind) computer. The bracelet activates all their battle suit functions, such as a mobility pack on their back that lets them fly or traverse rough terrain. There is both melee and projectile/ranged combat. Projectile combat is used to soften up the enemy before sending in the troops in melee. (I know, I know, melee in a far futuristic setting isn't very plausible, but I have decided to go for it.)

    The battlefield can have both air and space support, there can be spaceships on and above (perhaps even inside and below) the battlefield, firing their weapons on the enemy. There are tanks and other mechanized units fighting alongside infantry. There are biologically modified cavalry units who can take quiet a few hits before they go down. Infantry is armored with light weight durable materials and both energy shields as well as normal shields. Infantry is also equipped with ranged and melee weapons. The melee weapons are something I call material separators that can cut or stab through almost any matter. Most gear is light weight and foldable, meaning a rifle for example can fold into a smaller rectangular thing that fits nicely underneath the mobility pack on the back. The shield is also fodlable and fits on the opposite side of where the material separator is, hanging from the belt.

    Medical-wise there is a universal healing salve that you apply on a wound, even an intestine wound, and it will heal/reconstruct the organ in a few seconds. All that matters is time, if you want to save someone. The only organ that the salve can not reconstruct is the brain.

    They have space craft that can travel from one galaxy to another in the space of a few days. (Faster Than Light, not Almost Light Speed). Light speed travel is seldom used in this universe. Most space warfare consists of boarding actions. At least from the human side. Space craft can have hull walls as thick as several hundred meters of very durable and strong materials.

    But still, the basic soldier, from whose perspective I am writing, will have a similar experience to those of World War One, even in such a far futuristic setting. With the exceptions of some future-convenient things.

    Sorry about the wall of text. I could have made it even more detailed, but I wanted to spare you the words. Hope this explains the setting more.

    Edit:
    With this, I would perhaps also need some information on space warfare, such as how much light a ball of plasma may produce, does it temporarily blind someone it flies past? (I guess this depends on a lot of factors as well, and if I want it in my story I could just write it that way?) And how low to zero gravity warfare may be.
     
    Last edited: Jul 20, 2021
  4. Joe_Hall

    Joe_Hall I drink Scotch and I write things

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    How is it to walk around a minefield? I've never walked through a real minefield, but I have experienced improvised explosive devices and been through HOURS of training during and prior to deployment in Iraq. You are on such high alert looking at everything as a bomb...even a cardboard box or a soda can may be an explosive device. It is mentally draining and you will be so amped up that even after you get back and can rack out you can't sleep because the adrenaline is still running. When you do sleep you start awake with dreams of something going off.

    How is it to lose a comrade in the heat of battle? Do you stop, do you continue? I have fortunately not had this happen in front of me but I have had friends die in combat. Most of my buddies that have witnessed it would tell you it depends, mostly you say "well that sucked" and keep fighting. Unless you just mentally snap, there isn't time to worry about your dead comrade in a firefight. If he gets sniped or something of the like you may be able to grab him and drag him behind cover but mostly, if you know 200% that he is positively dead and you are still fighting, you have to worry more about your still alive teammates than the dead guy. When you get back your leadership is going to keep you busy so you can't break down but when you are alone you will find a dark place and cry like a baby. For the rest of your life, on the anniversary of their death, you will probably get drunk. Sometimes very drunk. And you will cry like a baby. It is really hard to describe but even the people you couldn't stand on deployment end up meaning more to you then most of your blood relatives ever will.

    How is it to fire a weapon at a living person? Or how it is to stab someone and watch them die? You won't forget your first. Killing other humans, despite the prehistoric origins of warfare, is not something that comes naturally. You have to be conditioned to it, which is why the U.S. Military switched from bullseye targets to sillouete targets. It helps desensitize you to shooting at a human shape. After enough of it, and after losing friends, you don't really care anymore, and you kind of dehumanize your enemy in your mind. Can't answer the stabbing question because I have never stabbed anyone.

    The details of being wounded and what it can do to the body in the short term. Depends where the wound is and how severe. There are a lot of soldiers who have gone all the way up to losing limbs and not realizing it until something didn't work. You have so much adrenaline running through your system in the heat of the moment it kind of numbs you to a lot of damage. I have a medic friend who literally plugged bullet holes in infantry guys while they were continuing to fight. Many of them carried tampons for the purpose. They are quite effective at plugging holes and stopping blood loss.

    I am also looking for accounts on melee warfare if you know of any such. I have had some difficulties finding those. I would suggest Swordsmen of the British Empire by D.A. Kinsley. It is pretty much nothing but account after account of melee combat during the British Empire and has accounts about their encounters with all manner of melee troops around the globe during their colonial days up through the Napoleonic wars. It's a tad expensive...I think like $50 but it is a great read if you like military history.
     
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  5. Homer Potvin

    Homer Potvin A tombstone hand and a graveyard mind Staff Supporter Contributor

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    Storm of Steel by Ernst Junger is a great place to start. It's a memoir of a young German soldier in WWI. Seriously gritty and fucked up. Pretty much required reading in most history doctrines. Also one of Hitler's favorite books for some obvious reasons. It doesn't glorify war, but amplifies the idea of sacrifice, personal struggle, and the will to push through it at all costs. Again, Hitler loved it.
     
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  6. Madman

    Madman Life is Sacred Contributor

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    @Joe_Hall
    Thank you very much for sharing, gives me some things to think about. And thanks also for the source suggestion!

    @Homer Potvin
    Thank you! I've also read All quiet on the Western Front which is a book by a German WWI soldier. Will be interesting to see how their accounts match or diverge.
     
  7. J.T. Woody

    J.T. Woody Book Witch Contributor

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    The national archives has a collection of WWI diaries. There is the British Army war diaries and then the Unit war diaries. You can find them here:
    www.nationalarchives.gov.uk


    There is The American Soldier project which has a collection of diary entries and complain cards from American soldiers during WWII (if you can read their handwriting, it would be useful.... Ive found that some old-timey hand writing is harder to read tho)
    That can be found here: www.zooiverse.org/projects/ktotwim/the-american-soldier/collection

    The U.S. has WWII diaries at the Nat'l Archives too: www.catalog.archives.gov/search?q=war%20diary&tabType=online

    Please let me know if the links dont work.... Im typing them in from my phone (not copy/pasting them):geek:
     
    Last edited: Jul 21, 2021
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  8. Bruce Johnson

    Bruce Johnson Contributor Contributor Contest Winner 2023

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    Neither worked, but the first one is this I think:

    https://www.zooniverse.org/projects/tkotwim/the-american-soldier/collections

    What OS do you use? I copy urls all the time with Chrome in Android. I use notepad to store if I am copying multiple urls.
     
  9. Madman

    Madman Life is Sacred Contributor

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  10. J.T. Woody

    J.T. Woody Book Witch Contributor

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    I searched for them on the computer and typed them on my phone.
    I dont like jumping to multiple pages on my phone because, the more pages i have, the longer it takes to load.

    I have an Android.... Dont know what kind, though. Its 2 years old, i believe
     
    Last edited: Jul 21, 2021
  11. J.T. Woody

    J.T. Woody Book Witch Contributor

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    Madman likes this.
  12. Homer Potvin

    Homer Potvin A tombstone hand and a graveyard mind Staff Supporter Contributor

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    The subtext is so divergent that Hitler had it banned for promoting pacifism.
     
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  13. Le Panda Du Mal

    Le Panda Du Mal Contributor Contributor

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    The Long Walk by Brian Castner is a good memoir I read a few years back, by a US veteran of the Iraq war- he was in the bomb squad, specifically.

    An amazing semi-autobiographical novel by a veteran of the North Vietnamese army is Bao Ninh's The Sorrow of War. Bao Ninh was one of ten survivors of a unit of 500 soldiers, so as you can imagine, he had a pretty grim experience and the book conveys it beautifully.
     
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  14. Homer Potvin

    Homer Potvin A tombstone hand and a graveyard mind Staff Supporter Contributor

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    Makes me think of Ken Burns' Vietnam documentary series, which is very good. Still available on Netflix, last I saw.
     
  15. Javelineer

    Javelineer Active Member

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    Jerry Pournelle and Robert A Heinlein are often considered two pioneers of Mil-SF, so I would probably start there.
     
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  16. MartinM

    MartinM Banned

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    @Madman

    OK I’m going to give you a piece of gold. You owe me...

    The Face of Battle by John Keegan

    He recounts the direct experience of individuals at ‘the point of maximum danger’. It’s a study of three battles Agincourt, Waterloo and The Somme. It’s a horrific read that covers conditions the men were fighting under, their emotions and the behavior the battle generated. A man’s motive that impels him to stand and fight rather than runaway.

    Keegan gives a vivid description that’s sometimes hard to take in. However, the reader finds across the three battles that happened centuries apart a commonality occurring. In fact, to such an extent, battles fought in Afghanistan or on Mars in the not-too-distant future you can imagine what would be going through a single soldier’s mind.

    Let me know how you get on,

    MartinM
     
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  17. Madman

    Madman Life is Sacred Contributor

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    @MartinM
    Thank you, I will check it out.
     
  18. dbesim

    dbesim Moderator Staff Supporter Contributor

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    9BB1BB05-04BF-4370-91E7-5A2DDB6D2A55.jpeg
     
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  19. SapereAude

    SapereAude Contributor Contributor

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    Do you mean to walk around the periphery of a minefield, or do you mean to walk around in a minefield?

    I trained as a combat engineer during the Vietnam conflict. Back then, we didn't have the mechanized equipment the combat engineers now have for locating and detonating mines. The basic drill was: If you find yourself IN a minefield -- STOP. Freeze. Do not move one step, not one inch, forward. You turn around and go back. If you can see where you stepped, you carefully place your feet exactly where you stepped on the way in.

    If you can't see where you stepped on the way in, then it doesn't matter if you go back or forward. You have to probe. The bayonet is the instrument of choice, and the process is excruciatingly slow and methodical. You insert the bayonet into the ground ahead of you at about a 45 degree angle, pushing slowly so you can detect if you encounter a solid object. If the bayonet encounters a solid object, it might be a stone but you assume it's a mine. So you probe to one side or the other, each probe just a few inches from the last, to find a route that's clear of solid objects.

    Soldiers don't just tip-toe through known minefields, hoping they won't set one off.
     
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  20. Madman

    Madman Life is Sacred Contributor

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    I meant how it is to walk inside a minefield. Your description of using a bayonet was new information for me, and a good detail. Thank you.
     
  21. Joe_Hall

    Joe_Hall I drink Scotch and I write things

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    I can confirm that this has not changed in 50 years. This is still standard practice if you find yourself in a minefield. With modern technology, metal detectors and electromagnetic detectors....if you are not some advanced recon during an initial invasion or something, and you find yourself in a mine field someone seriously borked your intel or ignored reports.
     
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