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| | | From: Ygraine (Original Message) | Sent: 8/4/2007 4:37 AM |
OK history buffs, I am 3/4 of the way through Steven Pressfield's Gates of Fire.(Battle of Thermopylae) It is beautifully written, with many sources acknowledged. It does appear to present things in an accurate fashion, as far as my poor knowledge can ascertain. But, he did not write an author's note to tell us what was simply conjecture, etc. regarding major characters or events, as authors often do. Does anyone know if there are any major discrepancies from the facts? Also, I have read that a Spartan officer's helm would have included a cross brush, not one that was a vertical back brush like the regular soldier. Pictures of King Leonidas's monuments, and many other pictures that I have seen, do not portray him with the cross brush helm. Did he wear the helm of an officer or a special designation, or perfer to wear the helm of his beloved regular soldier? Thanks to all, Ygraine. |
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Peter, no sweat on the name change, especially as I think you were thinking of Sgt James, another soldier and thus no sweat. You are spot on about the powder, and the problems it caused. Once we changed the chrome bolt & carrier for blued steel and placed the 'forward assist' (the A1 modification) on the upper reciever, then the M16 worked fairly well. My dislike of it stems from the design complexities and, truth to tell, when it is fired it just doesn't SOUND like a rifle. |
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Lew Am I right in remembering it had a rotating bolt face? Most actions are camming (like our SLR) or pillar (like the CETME/G3 actions) Always thought rotating bolt faces are too fine tolerance; Stoner built some of his systems on our FN type. Bren, GPMG, SLR allasame. Big 7.62 recoil forces. Still, getting too academic here. Yes, on a still night in Belfast you could distinguish AR18 (civvy M16?) 9mm, .45 (not much of that) and 7.62. Gosh! Sounds dramatic. Put things in perspective, I only did the one tour. Peter |
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Flash, yes the bolt rotated into the locked position. My main complaint is that the rifle was too complex. The M14 could very quickly be disassembled into 3 groups by the rifleman, wiped down and returned to service quickly. The M16, however, in all its modifications can only be field stripped by the rifleman and the lower reciever is off-limits to anyone other than the 3rd level maintenance shops. So if it breaks, the rifleman is screwed until he can either get his hands on another one or turn his in for repair. Stupid and wasteful and entirely political. However, to bring this thread back to the Spartans, I am sure they would have appreciated any type of firearm at Thermopolye. |
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Yes, returning to the Spartans, I spent most of my time kicking around rifle platoons and Companies, and will say throughout the time I handled the SLR, as reservist and regular, and reservist again, I never once encountered a single broken component, be it a spring, firing pin, sear, breech block. (the old bogy) firing pin spring, or whatever. And I was (unsurprisingly) junior enough to have direct contact with our riflemen. A gift to the Spartans. Read "Warrior in Bronze" by George Shipway. Was it the Mycaeneans who t*rded over the Spartans by using steel? |
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The History Channel had a program on the Battle of Thermopylae the other night and one of the historians said that there were an additional 1000 Greeks (Thespians?) with the 300 Spartans. Can someone fill me in on this because I missed the essential part of the program explaining this. Thanks. sunday |
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Sunday Are you trying to kid me the Spartans were helped by 1,000 screaming nances.? There's something a bit bent about that lot, the Scavengers, the Hoplites. And next I suppose you'll tell me the female population of Lesbos was hanging in the wings. Sounds worse than San Francisco on Gay pride week. |
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This is the closest I could come to finding what I was looking for, Flashman: Historically, Thespiae figures chiefly as an enemy of Thebes. During the Persian invasion of 480 BC it was one of the few cities in Boeotia to reject the example set by the Thebans, sending seven hundred men with Leonidas to Thermopylae. After the city was burned down by Xerxes I, the remaining inhabitants furnished a force of 1800 men to the confederate Greek army at Plataea. During the Athenian invasion of Boeotia in 424, the Thespian contingent of the Boeotian army sustained heavy losses at the battle of Delium, and in the next year the Thebans took advantage of this temporary enfeeblement to accuse their neighbors of friendship towards Athens and to dismantle their walls. In 414 they interfered again to suppress a democratic rising. In the Corinthian war Thespiae sided with Sparta, and between 379 and 372 repeatedly served the Spartans as a base against Thebes. In the latter year they were reduced by the Thebans and compelled to send a contingent to the Battle of Leuctra in 371. It was probably shortly after this battle that the Thebans used their new predominance to destroy Thespiae and drive its people into exile. The town was rebuilt at some later time. In 171, true to its policy of opposing Thebes, it sought the friendship of Rome. It is subsequently mentioned by Strabo as a place of some size, and by Pliny as a free city. What the hell, it's all Greek to me. sunday |
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Flash, what was the down fall of Sparta, was it politics. The folk of Sparta were supported by the labour of the helots. While Athens was a democracy. Once again history shows us that a socialsist marxist system is doomed to failure. |
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I never had an M-16 break or jam. sunny |
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Sunny Why the thumb assist? I'll be bitchy now. we don't have jams, we have stoppages. We use the longer word because it almost never has to be used in British weapon reports. Whereas you'd be there all day learning how to spell stoppage. I believe in all seriousness you were a long serving and senior person, and I know you are proud of your weapon handling ability. So I am sure you went the extra distance in keeping your weapon, and those of your immediate juniors, in good order. As I did. (stolen graphite grease, linseed oil (wooden stock) Young's .303 cleaner, ) But your Army had to be issued with teflon ammunition to clean your bores. You yourself never had a stoppage or breakage. Good. but what about your unit? Peter |
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| James at Hell in a Handbasket received an email from a sergeant in Iraq discussing the 5.56 NATO round and M16 reliability in the sand: ...
www.murdoconline.net/archives/001236.html - 16k James at Hell in a Handbasket received an email from a sergeant in Iraq discussing the 5.56 NATO round and M16 reliability in the sand: The round that they chose is good in maiming people but not knocking them out for the count. They need to find or design a rifle and a round that can be put through hell and fire .Maybe go back to the 7.62 NATO(.308),the 6.8mm,7.62 Russian, some round that would fly stright though light armour and brush to kill the bad guys. I'm here in Iraq and it's dusty as hell , m16's jam unless cleaned two or three time daily, the Iraqies( hodges)have AK-47's they can be put in dirt, mud, and still fire at a good rate .The m-16 has one advantage over the Ak-47 it is hiting pin point targets. And as I've mentioned too many times to even bother linking to, many M16-equipped units have sharpshooters using M14s. | Those are the comments from your boys, Sunny. Ranges in the desert are long, which is why the Israelis use 7.62 at Platoon level as well as the .223 Galil. We used the 7.62 SLR in Aden, without the problems your people raise. Come Back the AR10? |
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| | | From: Ygraine | Sent: 8/17/2007 9:09 PM |
Wow - I've been away from my question for far too long! I have finished Gates of Fire, and I am using some of the information to help my students compare the film, 300 with the reality of the event, as much as possible. I did happen upon a wonderful website, 300spartanwarriors.com and in association, also read about the Leonidas Project - ongoing excavations at Thermopylae. Stephen Pressfield, the author of Gates of Fire is a member of the team, so I am even more impressed with the research that went into this book. According to a number of sources that I have read lately this seems to be the consensus: At the very end, only 100 Spartan knights were still able to fight. 400 squires, helots and Thespian warriors, who had all been given permission to leave, chose to remain also. So, the 300 have to share the glory with the others, who, sadly, got robbed of it through the ages. |
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| | | From: Ygraine | Sent: 8/17/2007 9:12 PM |
Also, regarding the helm of Leonidas. I found out (from the author of the website about the Spartans) that the king would have worn a cross-brush instead of the front-to-back brush that is shown in all the monuments. There is a magnificent new sculpture of Leonidas being created now, which will portray this correctly. |
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