Infinite Wisdom

"Strategy is the craft of the warrior."

La Triviata

• Although both consuls had commanded jointly in the defeat of the Carthaginian general Hasdrubal at the Metaurus on June 22, 207 B.C., Gaius Claudius Nero declined a co-triumph with his partner, preferring to walk behind Marcus Livius Salintor’s chariot, and thus cleverly upstaged his colleague, thus cleverly gaining honor not only for his participation in the victory, but also by his fine example of republican virtue.
• About 300,000 Koreans served, most reluctantly, in the Japanese Army during World War II
• At the end of the War of 1812, the Regular Army had an estimated 33,000-38,000 officers and men with the colors, its greatest strength until the Mexican War, though it was shortly greatly reduced.
• The large American division of World War I (initially 28,000 men), required 7,701 horses and mules, a figure that was reduced in January of 1918 to 7,578, and the following June to 6,663, partially due to a reduction in manpower (to c. 24,000), and partially to the adoption of motor transport, but primarily because of a global shortage of equines caused by the war.
•  At the height of the “Combined Bomber Offensive” against Germany in 1944-1945, nearly half of all RAF Bomber Command aircrew were men from the Commonwealth and Empire.
• During World War II, the infectious disease rate in the Red Army seems to have been 36.2 percent.
• From 1820 until the end of the German Empire, the men of the Prussian Lehr Infanterie Bataillon, would receive a special addition to their rations on their organization day, a half kilogram Schrippen, “a peculiar kind of small loaves” of white bread given to each man in commemoration of their role in the Battle of Großgörschen (May 2, 1813) which led to the day being called the Schrippenfest.
• Apparently, until some time in the nineteenth century, every commission in the British Army had to be personally signed by the sovereign.

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