I Will Leave You To Look Up "Repine" Yourselves
Okay, let's see if I can stitch this Intro together. Your Humble Scribe is working from the detailed notes as provided in Professor Peter Caddick-Adams' "1945 Victory In The West" in two completely separate areas, these being viniculture and logistics. Art!
That's Vinnie, being cultured (for him). I remember Terry at Connexions informing me that Vinnie Jones was in fact a big fat coward in real life, which makes me feel for him, being a big fat coward myself.
ANYWAY we are talking about the elixir of life here, which substance depends on whether you're a member of Hom. Sap. or a vehicle, as both are existentially different. You may have noticed this. Trying to power your car with a ham sandwich, or ingesting a 96 Diesel mix for lunch are both going to result in Failure. Plus a stomach pump in the latter. Art!
In May of 1945, Herr Schickelgruber's abode in the mountains, the Berghof, was reached by Allied troops, and not just any Allied troops, but French troops. The French have always been ruthless in war, and on this occasion they exploited their success to great effect, because what they discovered at the Kehlsteinhaus was an unbelievable treasure trove of wines and spirits. 500,000 bottles of vintages such as Latour '29, Mouton '34 and Lafite '37, together with spirits that dated back over a century. One suspects Ruffian-levels of bribery and corruption here, since Herr Schickelgruber was teetotal, yet someone was ordering wines and spirits on his behalf. Art!
This rakish young chap is Bernard De Nonancourt, an heir to the Lanson champagne family and who was also part of the Laurent-Perrier family business. In May 1945, having moved from the Resistance to the regular French army, he commanded one of the first tanks into the Berghof. He was impeccably well-informed about wines and spirits, and realised instantly what he and his fellow soldiers had stumbled across: a treasure trove in bibulous form. Art!
Out of sheer spite, the SS guard detachment had sabotaged the lift, so Nonancourt arranged for relays of stretcher-bearers to manhandle the bottles from their cellar to the waiting vehicles of the Division Leclerc. One can imagine the shade of Herr Schickelgruber watching this and howling with hatred and despair: his alcohol not only plundered but PLUNDERED BY THE FRENCH!
De Nonancourt got a gong out of his exploit, officially for saving the wines for France, and probably unofficially for sticking it to the Nazis, Herr Schickelgruber and the whole of Germany.
Okay, this is an example of stored liquid being distributed from a location via vehicle. Our next example is kind of similar, in the same way that a sardine is a fish and so is a pike. Art!
Say hello to the 436th Troop Carrier Command. These unsung heroes were the logistical support for South Canadians in Europe, amongst others, and whom supplied the ammunition, spare parts, medicines and fuel that enabled their infantry and armoured brethren to rampage across Germany.
What is a tank without fuel? A very expensive metal pillbox. How do you overcome fuel supply shortages and bottlenecks? why you FLY the magic go-juice in by plane. Art!
As the Prof recounts, the 436th flew in 400,000 gallons of fuel for the upcoming assault on Munich by four South Canadian divisions. This is over 1,600 tons of fuel, and since the Dakota aircraft flying them in carried about 2 tons each, this is 800 flights. What the Prof doesn't mention is that this aerial logistics lifeline was only possible because the Allies had total control of the air, with no worries about Luftwaffe intercepts or disruption.
As mentioned above, this is kind of the opposite of the Giant Nazi Wine Cellar Of Doom, because here the very widely-spread and disparate fuels are collected and distributed at a limited number of sources, instead of the other way around.
For Your Information, a Sherman tank might consume as much as a gallon of fuel per mile under the worst circumstances. Just so we're clear. Art!
At this point you may need to understand that 'Repine' is what the Teutons were feeling here, and no two ways about it.
"Department S: One Of Our Aircraft Is Empty"
I don't care if you're not interested in this seminal Sixties spi-fi caper series, I am and whose blog is it?
Exactly.
This episode was apparently filmed alongside the initial episode "Six Days", which makes perfect sense as both centre upon a civilian passenger airliner. Art!
Conrad is not going to put out any spoilers here, just to say that the background premise is perfectly acceptable as a conspiracy theory. The trouble for our DS Team is that there is a conspiracy theory working inside the conspiracy theory. This always complicates things, believe me.
Also Conrad not convinced that 1970's-era aircraft could land themselves with no problem. We might be able to do this today, emphasis 'might', and we are 50 years adrift from the 'Empty Plane'*.
Our Journey With Bernie
It doth continue. Allow me to check and see if the next card in FPG's "Masters Of The Macabre" is available on teh Interwebz.
Yes, it is. Say hello to #61, "Orthodonty 1".
To be honest, I have no idea who these people are or what "ALL-PRO TEAM" means, but I have a Word Count to hit and we've just got part of the way there. They look suspiciously muscular and beefy, which implies sporting stuff, which again is not very high on Your Humble Scribe's long list of Things He Wants To Do.
One succinct point that the cast make is that, although some of them have worked with Raza the Mexican revolutionary as mercenaries before, they will happily kill him in service to the almighty dollar. Nothing personal, it's just how the buck balances. Lee Marvin has an absolute killer line at the end of the film that I'm not going to SPOILER, but you need to see it for yourself.
Finally -
Conrad is wondering about that Arthur C. Clarke short story where they start to use tactical nuclear weapons to overcome the newly-arrived Arctic weather system, because it's cold enough now to manage same.
* I guarantee there is at least another blog on this that we may come back to
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