Tank Pioneer

Ludwig von Eimannsberger was an Austrian military officer and armored theorist whose 1934 book “Der Kampfwagenkrieg” proved prescient (though as with everything else, there’s argument about just how influential he truly was).

Regular infantry divisions for the grinding, independent tank brigades designed to be attached to the infantry units for support, and a pair of specialized exploitation forces-divisions with hundreds of tanks to spearhead the exploitation and motorized infantry divisions with massive amounts of antitank artillery to guard the flanks of the tanks. The heavier artillery (Eimannsberger was an artillery officer) was intended to be multipurpose, able to be used for anti-tank, anti-air, and both direct and indirect support fire.

His armored division is a little (forgivably) tank-heavy and infantry light. The formations overall are, with hindsight a little too pure and over-specialized. More interestingly, Eimannsberger was a World War I artillery commander who still thought like a World War I artillery commander in terms of command and control. It’s an open question as to whether a more modest and stiff but doable system like his or a shoot-for-the-moon deep attack that the Soviets proposed at the same time, but were unable to meaningfully do in practice until after years of war and hard lessons was “better”.

Still, it’s an interesting historical footnote.

My 2019

I had a good 2019, all things considered, and had several major accomplishments.

1. Completing the CMO manual. This was the biggest task and it’s my proudest accomplishment this year. In 2013, I was just someone watching a stream of Command: Modern/Air Naval Operations. In 2019, I’d completed three official DLCs and had the honor of writing the manual for the sequel, Command: Modern Operations.
2. Getting my first Sea Lion Press book published. The Smithtown Unit, an alternate history homage to “men’s adventure” novels, was written in the summer of 2019 and published in late September.
3. Revving up Fuldapocalypse. Now, I read incredibly fast, so I didn’t lack for books to review. Still, Fuldapocalypse really got going this year. I ditched the clunky format meant for differentiating very similar books and made all my reviews “unstructured”, enabling me to write a lot of of them very quickly.

Action Hero Names And Backgrounds

So reading this Nader Elfhefnawy speculation on “Thrillers and Social Class” brought me to some of my thoughts I had on the subject.

• A lot of character background in the pulpier stuff extends only to their ability to buy their arsenals. John Rourke somehow got the money to build his mountain bunker lair, his wife wrote children’s books, and that’s basically all we know of his pre-apocalyptic social status. It’s generally not mentioned that much.
• W.E.B. Griffin preferred wealthy characters for the flippant explanation of “Rich people are more interesting than poor people. “
• Irish names seem to be strangely common. John Rourke, Blake Murdock, John Brannigan, and of course, Blaine McCracken are some of the names I’ve seen. I honestly think this is a pure coincidence that wasn’t conscious on the part of any of the authors, but an interesting one nonetheless.
• I’ve encountered three different main characters by three different authors who all have the last name “Stone”. Mark Stone, Luke Stone, and now John Stone. It’s a coincidence with a common name, I’m sure, but still interesting as well.
• The worst cases have obvious author Mary Sues. For instance, Ben Raines in William W. Johnstone’s Ashes series mysteriously was a paperback book author before becoming Mary Sue Alexander Temujin.

 

The Worm And The Snake

There is a piece of fiction that, although deservedly obscure, has attracted a mammoth amount of attention on a small part of the internet, an instance of being incredibly narrow and incredibly deep.

Said piece of fiction has a legitimately distinctive setup that attracts attention, yet is filled with darkness for darkness’ sake and a huge amount of author explanations that can make it across as more possible to a casual observer and less possible to a trained critical eye. However, it has flaws that can deter more casual readers.

Yet the story is in the right place at the right time to enter and fill the niche, attracting controversy and written fanworks in response. However, those fanfics diverge not just in terms of accuracy, but in terms of tone as well. People come to know it from those fanfics and an internet telephone game, not the original source.

That describes Worm, the Spacebattles/Sufficient Velocity darling.

Yet, with me having finally read the four novels in the infamous Draka series, the stereotypical bane of the alternate history community, it can describe them pretty decently as well.

There’s obviously differences, especially in terms of personal taste. Stirling, for all his flaws, is an overwhelmingly better prose writer than Wildbow. A web serial is different from four conventionally published books. A consistent YA-styled superhero drama is different from the zigzagging genres of the Draka series. Worm doesn’t have as explicit a “bad guys win” in spite of its darkness.

But the biggest similarity I’ve found is that a sort of “huh, that’s it” feeling I felt when actually seeing the original(s) in depth. I agree with a lets reader that Worm is ultimately just insubstantial, and my impression of the Draka series was that it was middling trashy pulp. Yes, they have a “superheroes that aren’t the big two or a knockoff” and “distinct alternate history” as their legitimately interesting setups, but the meat isn’t that substantive. Almost certainly not enough to propel them to their (limited) notoriety alone.

The Backlog Is Even Bigger

It’s one of those times when my book backlog keeps growing and growing and growing.

As I’ve said many times already, I don’t necessarily view this as a bad thing. The few times I haven’t had a big backlog are times when I scramble around for new books. If I find a new book in a time without a backlog and it turns out to not be very good, then I have to scramble anew.

Yet if I read a backlog book and that turns out subpar, then, well, I can just grab the next book out of that. And frequently that turns out a lot better than the previous one. I try to balance my book purchases, even within the “cheap thriller” types so that I don’t get too overloaded by any one genre. It may be counterintuitive to have a big pile of unread books, but it works for me.

 

RIP René Auberjonois

René Auberjonois has just passed away.

The actor had a very long and diverse career, from Father Mulcahy in the original MASH movie to Odo on Deep Space Nine to independent films. I know Auberjonois best from his role as the reclusive Howard Hughes-esque businessman and scientist Mr. House in Fallout New Vegas. Auberjonois played that part very well.

RIP.

The World War III Blog On Red Dawn

The World War III 1987 Blog has been doing a series on Red Dawn, the classic 1980s invasion movie.

The three entries (to date) are available here (part 1), here (part 2), and here (part 3).

Naturally, it’s making me want to do a Fuldapocalypse piece on the movie specifically and/or “invasion fiction” in general.

Alternate History Types

There are five main types of  alternate history, I’ve found. Three are only technical: Alternate Presents, Alternate And Historical But Not AH and Secret History. Two are more firm: Alternate History As Setting, and Alternate History As Genre.

Alternate Presents

This is the kind of “Alternate History” that’s only so in the most nominal fashion. Almost none are ever sold as alternate history, and if it’s mentioned at all, it’s as a “ok, I guess this happened” when talking about the background. So if there’s a fictional city it takes place in, it’s an “alternate present”.

Really, almost all fiction falls into this category. The only fiction that doesn’t is historical fiction that contains no made-up characters and is explictly trying to reenact a historical event as quickly as possible.

Alternate And Historical But Not AH

This is a strange classification, and it mainly has to do with events in a piece of historical fiction that A: diverge from actual history, but, B: Doesn’t change the grand-scheme events, and C: Isn’t really sold or promoted as “alternate history.”

The prime example I have of this is, of all things, Kelly’s Heroes. Yes, there’s an ahistorical gold raid there in World War II, occurring long before the movie was made. But it’s not sold or considered alternate history, and doesn’t explore the ramification.

Secret History

This is when there was a big divergence in the past but which didn’t cause an actual change in history as we know it until the moment of the story. The Casca series is “Secret History”-yes, an immortal Roman mentored Genghis Khan and killed Adolph Hitler, but the Mongols still achieved what they did and Hitler still died in a bunker in Berlin in 1945.

And speaking of that mustached man, my favorite “secret history” divergence comes from Jerry Ahern’s Survivalist series. That has many styles. It’s post-apocalyptic action, then it becomes science fiction, and then the “secret history” part kicks in with the plot point of Hitler’s dead body being kept in a New York facility. Did that change anything up until Book 1? Not really.

Those three are only really considered alternate history in the most broad view.

Alternate History As Setting

A lot of alternate history, and, more importantly, a lot of stories that aren’t sold as or even considered alternate history fall into this category. There is a big divergence, and it did have an effect.

And yet, it’s there as a setting, a backdrop, to a main story taking place in a clear genre. Lots of “Alternate History As Setting” pieces are sold as alternate history. Others basically aren’t-a stereotypical steampunk story, The Yiddish Policeman’s Union, and Hotline Miami (three very different pieces of fiction) are all “Alternate History As Setting”.

Alternate History As Genre

This is the top of the pyramid and is reserved for works where the alternate events themselves are front and center, driving the plot. It encompasses a lot of Harry Turtledove’s fiction and essentially every work written in the “pseudo-history book” style.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

As with every category, not everything fits exceptions and there’s bound to be countless exceptions/works of fiction that don’t clearly belong to any one or could reasonably be considered both. But I’ve found a lot of stuff can fit pretty neatly into them.

The Most Strangely Prominent Book

David Alexander’s Marine Force One is not prominent or popular by any standard. The best you can say is that it led to a few more book in its series. It has its quirks, but it’s a very middling novel. That’s the reason why I cite it so much in later Fuldapocalypse reviews.

Like the elusive “replacement-level player” in sports analysis, the “51% book” is a term I use a lot, used to describe something that’s merely adequate in all forms. And this was one of the most 51% books imaginable. It’s so middling it somehow stands out as something that is the perfect example of a decent book.

Fuldapocalypse Presents: A Thousand Words

So I’ve decided to expand Fuldapocalypse into occasional reviews of visual media (movies, games, etc..) So what better topic for the first installment than Dr. Strangelove?