Infinite Wisdom

"No son-of-a-bitch, no commander."

La Triviata

• Although generally a teetotaler, Adolf Hitler occasionally took a little brandy in warm milk to help him sleep, and would sometimes drink a glass of Moet & Chandon champagne on celebratory occasions, such as when he learned of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor or when he married Eva Braun.
• In 1804 the Secretary of War found that of 525,000 men in the Militia, perhaps 10 percent had a proper musket.
• To encourage thrift, the great Helmuth von Moltke gave every child in Kreisau, near his Silesian estate, a bank account upon entering school, opening it with one mark, and thereafter adding another each time the child added one.
• When he invaded Egypt in 1798, Napoleon Buonaparte issued a proclamation declaring, “In the name of Allah, the Merciful, the Compassionate. There is no God but Allah, tell your people that the French are also faithful Moslems.”
• In the Spring of 1942, Josef Goebbels’ Propaganda Ministry distributed in occupied areas of Russia a carefully doctored film that showed Adolf Hitler reviewing troops in Red Square.
• The most decorated Italian general during World War I was Emmanuelle Pugliese, who happened to be Jewish, one of about 50 generals of that faith in the Royal Army.
• By 1837, 231 of West Point’s 940 graduates had worked as civil engineers, many in the new railroad industry.
• During World War II, on average, in each of the 513 instances on which American. destroyers or larger surface warships were damaged by enemy action, 38 men were killed and 35 wounded; for the 335 instances in which amphibious or auxiliary vessels were damaged, the average was 11 killed and 16 wounded.

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