Yep on Gilligans Island.

The up part of the trip is fun. It's the crash that makes taking the medication worthwhile.

Airbus is presently manufacturing A320s in China.....for their domestic use only.
Question: Didn't you know that?

oh by the way for you real men that appreciate FACTUAL HISTORY..............

ferdinands(maybach engines) at the battle of kursk, nov. 1943, from sPzJAGAbt 653,

killed 320 soviet tanks(all models) vs. a loss of only 13 of their own!

i like that kill ratio.



"MONTE WAS A MORON" "MONTE WAS A MORON" "MONTE WAS A MORON" repeat after me. this is your conscience............."MONTE WAS A MORON".


next week kiddies we will pick another interesting wartime topic/personality to FLAME ON and learn all sorts of interesting behind the scenes tattle-tale factoids.

alas i have to bid you adieu(thats french), but some topics that would be fun:

1) did goering really wear womens nylons while on duty?

2) did goebbels hot rod around in a mercedes or a surf nazi dune buggy vw?

3) did bormann really make it to argentina via a u-bote and open up the first vw dealership/u-bote repair/surf shoppe?

4) did speer really do the math and figure out how much concrete the krauts poured over all those years of the ill-fated "not even"a 1000 yr reich?

5) did hitler really die in da bunker with eva? or are they hiding out at some super secret antarctic sub base with stalin?

6) did the nazis really build a flying saucer? did they ever meet any martians?

7) did TOJO ever go to a "GO-GO" bar?

8) was hirohito a puppet of TOJO? or just a lowly cabana boy?

9) why were the torpedo tubes of the last TYPE XXI big mutha german subs allegedly lined with pure gold? not filled-lined. hint: it has sumthang to do with nuklar fission! ie. the sub was sunk on its way to japan at the very end of wwII. sketchy info here about the gold.

10) what if the japanese with their big mutha type big mutha subs had attacked the panama canal????? or L.A. or San Fran?

11) why do kamakazi pilots put their googles/helmets and seat belts on before a mission?

12) what if we NEVER got a hold of the nazi enigma machine?

13) what if we hadnt cracked the japanese codes?

14) what if the navajos from the spirit world had never been drafted?

15) and finally...........what the hell would our bomber crews have done if goofball hitler had allowed the me-262 to be a pure fighter and not a bomber and they had produced them in vast numbers. very SCAREY THOUGHT THERE!

all interesting as hell topics i assure you. until then............."VIVA LA FRANCE"

Why did the french invent speed humps? To slow the Panzers down.

I apologize.

PRECIOUS!...........on their way THRU/OVER/AROUND THE MAGINOT LINE!

LOL. Thanks for playing. It's good to get a fact injection into the jingoist rants that take the place of thoughtful posts around here.

Please don't think redneckery has won out... yet. They're just louder and have sticky caps lock keys.

CORRECT but the problem was those 13 losses were out of only 90 EVER produced. Russia , on the other hand, could afford the losses. They were withdrawn back to Germany after Kursk. If Germany would have ramped up war time production sooner and simply concentrated on the Panzer IV, they would have been much better off. The Panzer IV G and J was more than a match against any Allied tank. If I remember correctly, with the cost of one Tiger they could have produced 5-6 Panzer IV's. They could have built another 5000+ Panzer IV's if they didn't mess with the super heavy tanks.

Here is a little more

On the first days of action, Ferdinands were disaster due to the technical problems (few were lost because of the fuel line fires), the lack of adequate support and the most important the lack of a self-defense weapon. Many Ferdinands were destroyed either by their crews after being immobilized (by combat damage or mechanical problem) or by Soviet infantry and artillery as well as by SU-152 "Zwieroboj" heavy mechanised guns. It was recorded that some Ferdinand's crews (ex. Major Noak's crew) used to fire their 7.92mm MG34 machine guns through the barrel of main 88mm gun while others mounted their 7.92mm MG34 underneath the gun, in order to fire at the enemy infantry units. Temporary field-made solution was the rear mounted platform for Panzergrenadiers, but it only resulted in heavy casualties among them. During the Kursk offensive until November of 1943, Ferdinands from sPzJagAbt 653 destroyed some 320 Soviet tanks and lost 13 Ferdinands, while entire 656 sPanzerjager Regiment destroyed some 502 Soviet tanks and 100 other vehicles. Ferdinands proved to be very effective when employed behind the lines.

And also.....

German losses were high. For example, the German 653rd Heavy Panzerjäger Battalion began the attack with 49 Ferdinand self-propelled guns; 37 of them were lost in the minefields before 17:00 on 5 July. Although most of the lost vehicles were mobility kills rather than permanent losses, they were out of action until they could be repaired. They were also easier for Red Army artillery to knock out permanently. However, since the Germans were advancing, any repairable vehicles could be recovered, repaired, and put back into action.
The Germans also noted a fundamental flaw in their armoured vehicles, particularly the Elefant. Although excellent against any Soviet tank at long to medium range, they lacked secondary armament and were vulnerable to attacks from Soviet slit trenches once separated from the heavy machine gun protection of the lighter tanks, vehicles and infantry. Guderian noted in his diary:
Once they had broken through into the enemy's infantry zone they literally had to go quail-shooting with cannons. They did not manage to neutralise, let alone destroy, the enemy's rifle and machine guns, so that our own infantry was unable to follow up behind them. By the time they reached the Soviet artillery they were on their own[62]

I love Speer's jacket in that one.

Isn't the guy on the R (AH's L) an Italian officer? Mussolini wore a hat like that.

Is Speer the other one?

Speer is to Hitler's right, cameraman's left.

speer is wearing a custom -


"FRENCH BABY FUR SEAL" jacket.


and.................


der uber fuhrer is wondering "how can ve make more of ze freenchy fries out of the pointy tipped freenchy fry factory behind me, and make all ze amerikaner ge-redneckens FAT?" " ve vill vin ze war, i tell ya!"

"now ve must be off to the versailles rail car and rub ze frenchys nose in poodle poo as they did to us after our wwI surrender!"

note: historical freeking fact der uber goofer was still so pissed off at ze frenchys, that he had the wwI surrender rail car sent into versailles, so he could rub ze frenchys nose into their wwII surrender papers.

and thats a FACT jacques!


just the facts Madam!

Very good. The first accurate posting of history by you on this entire thread. There may be some hope for you yet.

I learned that one from watching The World at War series with my dad when I was a kid. Don't remember reading it in any books though. Maybe it was in Shirer's Rise and Fall.

got sent this today, thought it was kinda clever and reminded me of this thread

http://fc00.deviantart.com/fs46/i/20...ngusMcLeod.jpg

http://fc09.deviantart.com/fs22/i/20...ngusMcLeod.jpg

Kind of interesting, I stumbled across this photo the other day:

http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...24508_4853.jpg

Rather eclectic collection of small arms, and I bet their quartermaster is suicidal trying to find all the various types of ammo needed to feed them all.
"Lets see, I need some 8mm Mauser, 6.5mm Carcano, 7.62NATO, oh, and 7.92x33mm Kurz" :rolleyes:

The chick with the Sturmgewehr was a surprise. How the heck did an African tribeswoman end up with a WW2 German rifle?

Didn't take long to find out, a quick look at the Wikipedia entry for the StG44 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stg44 says this:

Fascinating, especially that last line.

http://necrosant.oranc.co.kr/zbxe/fi...stg44_iraq.jpg

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3129/...441375.jpg?v=0

I did not know that. Really goes to show how revolutionary a design it was, that ~40 years after it was produced it was still in service by front line troops of other countries. Good thing they didn't start work on that sooner.

I also stumbled across this interesting piece from English-Russia:
http://englishrussia.com/?p=2728#more-2728

It is an interesting collection of period photos of German uniformed troops who clearly were not "German" or even western European.

For example:

http://media.englishrussia.com/southern_hitler/5.jpg

http://media.englishrussia.com/southern_hitler/12.jpg

I also did not know that. I was aware Germany used conscripts from conquered areas, but I never heard of Korean or Indian troops serving Germany.

Fascinating.

quite a few FRENCH signed up for NAZI duty. ie. VICHY!




ya just gotta love turncoats. hmmmmm once again me making it up as i go along here or REALITY?????

Dutchmen also signed up for the cause of anti-Bolshevism.

Many of those that you see in the picture were not so much Nazis but anti communist, ethnic freedom fighters. Most were probably recruited in the occupied Soviet territories or turned prisoners of war.

Lithuanians, Latvians, Estonians, Ukrainians and probably many from the Caucasus mountain region signed up with the Germans.

Those Stg 44's are worth BANK...