The Killer Kocktail

And The Murderous Mulberry
For Lo! are we not ferreting around in the administrative hinterlands of the Second Unpleasantness, seeking enlightenment about such deadly dull matters as <cue sinister drum roll> logistics?
     Well, yes we are, in case you were wondering.  
     Here an aside, as it will look good in the preview on Facebook - Art?

"Hey, I like tinkering!  Tinker tinker tinker, that's me!"

As I am currently reading Peter Caddick-Adams "Sand And Steel" I note that one of the Teuton's problems was deciding exactly where the Allies would land.  Here, there, everywhere - all conditioned by the Teuton decision that the Allies HAD to capture a port early on.  No debate about perhaps or maybe, it was all HAD HAD HAD.
     Ah.
     Yes.  
     About that -
     Enter Mister Hughes-Hallett.  Art!

Sic

     Matey's idea was that, yes, an invasion force coming ashore in France needed a port to unload - and if you haven't actually captured one, why not just take one with you?  This is what you call Thinking Outside Of The Box, then and now, and the sheer audacity bears a little reflection.
     This is where Mulberries, and Gooseberries and Whales and Rhinos occur on the D-Day beaches.  The British Mulberry outlasts the storm of 19/06/1944 (unlike the shoddily-constructed South Canadian one) and operates for 10 months, allowing the unloading of 4 million tons of supplies, which is not bad for a structure intended to last 4 weeks.
     Going back to PCA, you can see why the Teutons were so wrong-footed about the Normandy beaches being a landing place, thanks to there being no port there.

"Let's do the show right here!"

    In the end, our South Canadian allies managed without their Mulberry, by using DUKW amphibious trucks in their thousands; but anything large or delicate had to use the British one, which was christened "Port Winston".  4 million tons; it's hard to argue with that, and the Teuton generals must have been weeping into their cornflakes when they understood what was happening.
    Let me just do a 200 knot dash past the motley's coracle and I'll be right with you.

Further To The Above -
Just a recap of more matters martial - you can skip this if you like BUT I WILL KNOW ABOUT IT - and a reference to the item I posted about James Holland and his BBC documentary about the whole Normandy campaign, not just D-Day.  He had recorded part of an interview with David Render, who had a couple of interesting points to make.  Art!

Dave then and now

     One was that you simply didn't dare boast about how well you'd done, or the OC, Colonel Stanley Christopherson, would lay into you.  Simply not on, old chap.
     And, a telling statistic, he said his regiment's (the Sherwood Rangers Yeomanry) brigade, 8th Armoured Brigade*, went through 1,073 tanks in order to keep their battlefield strength up to 150.  Not all of these were knocked out, of course - driving thousands of miles wore them out as they would have done any vehicle - but it's a telling statistic.  They never ran out of tanks, thanks to Detroit; it was always the crews who were the critical factor.
     Oh, and you should have seen the child-like glee on Jim's face when he got to fire a seventeen-pounder anti-tank gun!  

Only blanks, sadly

     As the curator told him, that shell would be heading away from you at 975 miles per hour, and anything it hit would be having a bad hair from hell kind of day.

I AM An Expert, Right?
Right, I have about ten minutes before nose-grindstone interfacing continues, so allow me to load this up - Art?

     You should know Conrad by now - I can proudly boast that I know next to nothing about the ballfoot game - except the offside rule is there to stop speculative hoofers hanging about the oppositions goal on the off chance - and am never likely to improve on this.  However, and stop me if I get too technical here, "Liverpool" (not "Liverpole" as I fondly imagined them to be) were "beaten" by another team called "Arsenal".  Still with me?
     On "Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons", however, I am in a class of my own.  What Thechangingman refers to is the roving circles of light that the Mysterons projected when making one of their threats, in their "War of Nerves" against Hom. Sap. and Earth.  Art?

Someone is about to get retro-metabolised ...

     Creepy rascals.  You never actually see a Mysteron, which makes Conrad suspect they are actually a machine intelligence, a super-AI if you will, rather than being individuals.  Nor does anyone ever call them "Martians", which is a telling omission, and surely indicates that they come from outside the Solar System?  
     I did say I was in a class of my own.  I could go on - but out of mercifulness shall not**.

Finally -
Today I have been working, which always leaves a bad taste in the mouth, and I bitterly regret Sophie leaving our team, because she was very definitely on my side when it came to coming up with reasons to NOT work on Saturdays.
     So, in case you were wondering, and even if not, this is why only one post today.
     Right, let us finish on an item that cheers up Ol' Grumpyfeatures (me!) and out of sheer self-indulgence I choose -
     <thinks>
     DAM DESIGNING!


     Yes, there is little in life more exciting than discovering how DAMS ARE DESIGNED!

With some maths added

     There's no room for being slipshod with a dam's design (as several dam disasters we have covered in the past have shown) because you are dealing with the retention of millions of tons of water, and the slightest flaw or crack will only get progressively worse.  
     Ah, all this talk of disasters has cheered me right up.

Pip pip!


*  Note correct spelling
**  Not today.