BE QUIET YOU SNICKERING PERVERTS!
I warn you, the Remote Nuclear Detonator needs a trial run. Okay, you may be confusing today's title city with YES IT'S A CITY NOT A MIS-SPELLED FEMALE the port in France, which is quite understandable. Art!
The castle at Brest. This city got a fearful knocking-about in the Second Unpleasantness, which reflects another Brest, except this one is at the other end of Europe. Art!
This is Brest in what we used to call "White Russia", which you may be more familiar with as 'Belorussia'. I do hope this isn't too confusing. Bear with me, there's lots more to come!
Okay, let us cast our minds back to 1917, and thus let us prod Art with the electrically-aware staff of succour -
Hmmm just about the opposite of what I wanted.
OKAY! you may recall that Russia is a hard party to knock out of any international internecine competitions you may be having, such as the First Unpleasantness. The Teutons managed to inveigle their Slavic cousins into a second revolution in the year 1917, after which they imposed what was seen globally as a swingeing, punitive, hateful and thoroughly unpleasant 'peace treaty'. This was signed at Brest-Litovsk in March of 1918. Which was basically the Ruffians admitting to being at fault, agreeing to pay off huge fines, suppling the Teuton's occupying army with food, passing the port to both port AND starboard, adjusting the calendar and adopting 31st Of June as National The Comsat Angels Day in perpetuity. Art!
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| Perhaps not that last one |
This was a bitter pill to swallow as regards the Austro-Hungarians, since the Ruffians had been giving them a right shoeing since mid-1916. The Teutons, who might be cads but whom weren't stupid, knew that the Bolshies would stab them in the back at the first opportunity, which meant keeping 150,000 Teuton soldiers ensconced on Ruffian soil as 'Oberkommando Ost'.
Well now, what do we abruptly switch tracks to but "The Great War In Europe Deluxe", because Your Humble Scribe came across what seemed like an oddity. Art!
No, that's not a typo. Yes, '190 divisions'. This will give you an idea of how big Continental warfare was back in the age of artillery. Art!
The Teuton counter mix. There's about 240 divisions present here, with the cavalry divisions converted to infantry (bar one) and half a dozen randomly taken away since they would have been in Italy. Just so we're clear. Art!
That's nearly all the German units deployed. The black ones are 'Stosstrppen' divisions specially trained and equipped to carry out assaults.
This is the point at which I was thinking "190 units on the Western Front?" until the next day, when I realised that this is the 1918 Scenario and that Tsarist Ruffia had been removed, forcibly, from the conflict by the time this scenario begins. In real life the Teutons had been frantically railroading their now-surplus troops westwards over winter to get ready for 'Kaiserschlacht', their war-winning offensive of March (they hoped).
And yes, it's taken ages to place all those counters, especially after having to scrape the old Blu-Tak off them and apply new.
Magically Making Money
As you may be aware, Conrad occasionally listens in to Ryan Kinel on Youtube, as he manifests an almost permanent state of vindicated righteous rancour, disses the 'Mainstream Media' and rarely posts anything more than 5 minutes long. Art!
Ryan's vitriolic diatribe of late was concerning the finance's of Disney's Marvel franchise, and most especially a film that came out in 2022: "Doctor Strange: The Multiverse Of Madness", because 'Forbes' magazine had gotten hold of recently-released British tax data about the film. Art!
You see, Hollywood likes to film in This Sceptred Isle because we give them lovely perks like tax breaks, and you will rarely (if ever) find anyone clamouring to pay more tax, not less.
The downside is that the UK will eventually release lots of financial data concerning these films, which makes the bean-counters pale and nervous. Art!
Hmmmm not according to 'Forbes'. They say the final bill after adding in reshoots and post-production and advertising and promotion was really $414 million. Numbers not looking so good now, hmmmm? Don't forget the Box Office Returns Rule - at least 50% of those takings goes to the cinemas and in The Populous Dictatorship that figure can be 70%. So the film made $477 million, meaning a profit of $63 million at the most favourable possible interpretation. A lot more modest than the $217 million otherwise.
Imagine that, a film studio not telling the truth - I'm shocked, I tell you, shocked!
"City In The Sky"
Well, now we find out if Ace and Captain Kirwin did it right.
It was
guessing, lucky guessing, and their mistakes cancelled each other out: Ace had
aimed too low and Kirwin had called for firing too soon. Not only
that. Kirwin realised from the sonic signature of the blast that Ace had
selected for the missile launcher’s anti-tank warhead, a warhead with little
explosive payload but a fantastic velocity. More importantly (but
not for them) the launch had been from a concealed position, at very short
range and beneath the flying eye’s sensor array.
CHAPTER
TWENTY SIX: The Pride and the Pain
The Americans, with an unpleasantly ironic sense of humour, had
christened Arcology One’s de-orbiting as “Operation Cueball”. In this case the
sphere would be the ball, and MEV the cue. There would be assistance
from several dozen solid rocket boosters, welded to the sphere’s hull at very
carefully calculated angles.
Once
committed to descent and in the upper atmosphere, the sphere would be almost
uncontrollable, subject instead to gravity, friction and
meteorology. To this end Davros and his mathematics team were
calculating now, in order to have a definitive, specific and
within-ten-decimal-places landing point then. Time was
limited. The Index now stood at 94.54%.
Which
was when the Doctor threw his massive cast-iron spanner into the works.
‘From
whom?’ asked Davy, surprised enough to manage his grammar
effectively. ‘The Doctor?’
He
looked at the mute and unremarkable Tab as if it were about to sing, dance and
bite him. A rice-paddy planter by the name of Hoang had jogged up to
the scion, politely begged his attention and then offered the Tab, in the name
of Doctor John Smith. “You know, that bloke who flies about in time
and stuff.”
The
mathematics staff, all Pure/Applied qualified, looked at him with
interest. He could see their minds churning and working.
‘Okay!’
he breezed, falsely. ‘Opinions on why we really, really need to land
on the Nullarbor Plain. Anyone?’
I guess that's textbook Getting It Right
No, we've had enough about armed conflict in the blog so far, thus no "The War Illustrated" today.
Get Ready To Be Trumped, Swindled And Traduced!
Just to let you know that Pumpkinhead is apparently too cowardly to dare take the stand in New York to testify, because he's certainly not holding off on account of his lawyer's advice. Pimpkinhead always thinks of himself as the smartest guy in the room, despite being in possession of an IQ lower than room temperature. Art!
O boy, someone's not a happy bunny, are they? And he's still haemorrhaging money to his attorneys - Todd Blanche, lead counsel in NY, picked up $845,000 in April alone. Mind you, if the Farting Fraudster gets convicted then Mr Blanche won't get another cent out of his employer, who refuses to pay his legal teams if they don't get him acquitted. Or even if they do. Along the way he still has to pay them, which is why his coffers perpetually run dry. Bring on the wheelie-bins of popcorn!
Conrad Has To Join In
Hmmm, 'Has to' might be better put as 'Intends to', because Your Humble Scribe saw the following. Art!
For my money, "Karma Police' by Radiohead is up there with the best. We're not short on the word count or I'd add the lyrics, and may do so tomorrow.
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