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retrench - Word of the Day - Tue Dec 12, 2023


Myr

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retrench - (verb) - to cut down (esp expenses); economize

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Stores retrenched their Star Wars toys selection after Star Wars Mary Sue destroyed the franchise.

 

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8 minutes ago, JamesSavik said:

There's a good reason there are so few stories about World War I. It was such a shitshow, almost anyone who had anything to do with it desperately wanted to forget it. Millions were killed as the Europe's armies trenched and retrenched, after heavy losses, their way across the continent as they slaughtered each other with machine guns, artillery and poison gas.

Any accurate histories of the conflict may accurately be placed in the horror genre.

Having happened a century ago, most of the survivors are gone now, and most historians seem to want to avoid the subject, but the lesson we must learn is clear: humanity must never allow another gigantic atrocity like it to ever happen again.

The men are gone but, even after a century, the scars are still on the land.

france-ww1.jpg

A battlefield in France, c. 2014.

So few stories? There are plenty of them.

Johnny Got His Gun, A Farewell to Arms, Storm of Steel, and All Quiet on the Western Front come to mind offhand, but there are many others.

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11 minutes ago, drpaladin said:

So few stories? There are plenty of them.

Johnny Got His Gun, A Farewell to Arms, Storm of Steel, and All Quiet on the Western Front come to mind offhand, but there are many others.

Sure. They are some, but not nearly as many as WW2 inspired, which many seemed to think was "the good war" where the morality of the conflict was unambiguous.

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I'm going by what my daddy told me, so if anything is inaccurate, you can dig him up and tell him so :) 

Dad was part of the Canadian Armed Forces and in the mid sixties he was part of the UN Peacekeeping Force in Cyprus. He did two separate 6 month tours. 

One story he liked to tell about on his first tour was that there was a 'green line' (buffer zone) in Cyprus that designated the territory between the Greek and the Turks. Each side had trenches dug within a certain distance from the green line.

One night one side, I don't remember whom,. decided to move up their trench a couple of meters closer to the line in a certain section. To do it in one night was a huge undertaking, ,but they worked throughout the night and dug a new trench a few meters ahead and just dumped all the dirt into the old trench right behind them into the old trench. Dad said it was really obvious what they did.

The British Colonel in charge of the UN Peacekeeping Force during the next day, had all his septic trucks drive around and collect as much raw sewage they could fill up with. Then, staggered along the new trench on the buffer zone, they backed up and emptied it all in the new trench. Didn't fill the whole trench, but enough that they could not use a lot of it. Hence, they had to go back and dig their trench back where it was originally. No shots fired, no diplomats needed. 

You'd think they'd learn after once, but sadly no :( 

So whenever I hear of trench warfare, this is what I think of.

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1 hour ago, wildone said:

I'm going by what my daddy told me, so if anything is inaccurate, you can dig him up and tell him so :) 

Dad was part of the Canadian Armed Forces and in the mid sixties he was part of the UN Peacekeeping Force in Cyprus. He did two separate 6 month tours. 

One story he liked to tell about on his first tour was that there was a 'green line' (buffer zone) in Cyprus that designated the territory between the Greek and the Turks. Each side had trenches dug within a certain distance from the green line.

One night one side, I don't remember whom,. decided to move up their trench a couple of meters closer to the line in a certain section. To do it in one night was a huge undertaking, ,but they worked throughout the night and dug a new trench a few meters ahead and just dumped all the dirt into the old trench right behind them into the old trench. Dad said it was really obvious what they did.

The British Colonel in charge of the UN Peacekeeping Force during the next day, had all his septic trucks drive around and collect as much raw sewage they could fill up with. Then, staggered along the new trench on the buffer zone, they backed up and emptied it all in the new trench. Didn't fill the whole trench, but enough that they could not use a lot of it. Hence, they had to go back and dig their trench back where it was originally. No shots fired, no diplomats needed. 

You'd think they'd learn after once, but sadly no :( 

So whenever I hear of trench warfare, this is what I think of.

If only it all ended so well, with just a huge stink-bomb.  However, during World War 1 they used a different type of stink-bomb, mustard gas, and that killed a lot of people. 

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