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Oh, yeah.

By The Armorer on June 14, 2005 | | Comments (20)

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Though you wouldn't know it from all the plane pictures... but two thirds of the staff here at Castle Argghhh!!! are Army. Happy Birthday, Army! 230 years old and showing the wear and tear!


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Heh. Typical of us, we decided to publish a field manual to commemorate the event, imaginatively titled, FM-1, The Army.

The Heartless Libertarian posts the actual resolution, here. Man, we were a *deal* back in the day!

Also on this day in history...

1645 Battle of Naseby, Cromwell's Parliamentarians defeat the Royalists. Flinty bassid, is Cromwell. Supported the killing of a King, he did. An action that was not appreciated by the Royalists...
1775 US Army formed from the New England forces before Boston - See Army Birthday, above!
1777 Congress adopts the Stars & Stripes, replacing the Grand Union flag - so it is also Flag Day.
1864 Congress orders that Black soldiers receive equal pay with whites
1942 Bazooka goes into production at Bridgeport, Ct. Oh wait - wrong one!
1942 German merchant cruiser Thor begins operating in the Indian Ocean.

1982 Argentines surrender to Britain on the Falkland Islands; 74-day war
ends.

I have an album of Falklands pics here.


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20 Comments

By Sgt. B. on June 14, 2005 3:48 PM
Happy Birthday to the United States Army! Two hundred and thirty years of honest and faithful service to the United States of America! Thank you for maintaining, in times both fair and foul, the ideals of Duty, Honor, Country. From your Marine Corps brothers and sisters: Semper Fi, Army! Happy Birthday!
 
By Boquisucio on June 14, 2005 5:15 PM
Talk about a blunder of historical proportions. I do not what the Military Junta in Buenos Aires was thinking when they conceived this half-baked invasion of The Falklands. As I understand, the whole affair was hatched and executed in less than two weeks. Instead of using their crack troops stationed in Puerto Belgrano; troops that well well trained, equiped and fully aclimated to the rigors of the weather & topography of the Falklands, they rushed conscript battalions from the arid northern part of Argentina to cannon fodder **er** spearhead the invation forces to the Islands. Once dropped in the Island, these raw recruits were all on their own. No Logistics train to follow. For these and other reasons, which I do not have time to detail, it is no wonder this was a one sided affair.
 
By Fuzzybear Lioness on June 14, 2005 5:21 PM
Happy Birthday, Army!
 
By Boquisucio on June 14, 2005 5:24 PM
Oh how rude of me... A VERY HAPPY B-Day to all them Dawg Faces out there!!!
 
By Barb on June 14, 2005 5:34 PM
Happy Birthday, Army! Where's the balloons? *grin*
 
By John of Argghhh! on June 14, 2005 6:11 PM
Boquisucio - my guess would be along these lines... 1. They hoped the Brits would accept the fait accompli. 2. If they didn't - they didn't want to lose their good troops. They never thought they would win if it came to war. 3. At the strategic and operational level - they sucked. No disrespect to the soldiers - they were what they were made into, by those people who sucked. 4. As far as the Argentine military went - their pilots shone. Especially the one who flew the Learjet. What a sad waste. 5. And the Captain of the Belgrano, whether or no he thought he was outside the Exclusion Zone, was also an incompetent. There was no way he shouldn't have been steaming at full readiness.
 
By Boquisucio on June 14, 2005 6:47 PM
John, On all five points: idem, idem, idem, idem et idem. I have interfaced with many Colonels in the Argentinan Armed Forces. Colonels that were back then pimple-faced cherry Lts. All of them openly confide on the folly of it all. Though as professional Soldiers, and Airmen (haven't had much exposure to their Navy) they are all proud to have executed their orders to the outmost and best of their abilities.
 
By Neffi on June 14, 2005 7:15 PM
"Air War in the Falklands" is a good read- it covers every mission by every aircraft on both sides that resulted in contact. Highly recommended...
 
By John of Argghhh! on June 14, 2005 7:40 PM
Read it, Neffi. Its where I found out about the Learjet pilot. Second the recommendation. Along with Simon Jenkin's/Max Hastings The Battle for the Falklands, and John Frost's book, 2 Para, Falklands. And Mark Adkins, Goose Green: A Battle is Fought to Be Won.
 
By Justthisguy on June 14, 2005 8:24 PM
Happy Anniversary to all of you Greenly Earnest Dangerous Folks, and Many Returns of the Day! On the Falklands thing, I've seen some of the video. Those Argy A-4 pilots did Ed Heinemann proud: They went in so low and close before they released that a lot of their bombs didn't have time for the fuzes to arm. One must figure size of aviator's balls when calculating fuze equations, apparently. P.S. Much as I and Harry Truman's Granma hate to admit it, the US Army wears BLUE when it dresses up. I got to see a neighbor put his on once, just before he left the service. A very cool, studly, manly uniform.
 
By John of Argghhh! on June 14, 2005 8:33 PM
Our Dress Blue uniform honors the Army of the Plains, (Headquartered here at Leavenworth). The soldiers routinely doffed their blouses while on detail, which caused their trousers, bleached by the sun, to be a lighter color than the blouse. Hence, dark blue blouse, lighter blue trousers.
 
By Justthisguy on June 14, 2005 8:43 PM
W00t! Even cooler! A traceable, traditional reason for something I like!
 
By Justthisguy on June 14, 2005 8:58 PM
Got any pix of yerself, in yours, when you were young etc., which you'd care to share? Don't worry, I'm not gay; I'm *much* weirder than that!
 
By Brucie on June 14, 2005 9:15 PM
Well, thothe of uth who are gay would jutht love to thee Big John in hith Blues... and doff that jacket, Dude! mmmmmmmm....
 
By John of Argghhh! on June 14, 2005 9:17 PM
Think of a tall Danny Devito as the Penguin, with better teeth. You *don't* want to see me nekkid! Only SWWBO has the strength for that, inured by long exposure. All others suffer hysteric blindness.
 
By Brucie on June 14, 2005 9:24 PM
hythteric blindneth... thankth tho much... thlut [thtalks off in huff] ;)
 
By Barb on June 14, 2005 10:50 PM
Just remember that one of John's nicknames is Big-Tribble-with-Legs ;-)
 
By Heartless Libertarian on June 15, 2005 7:04 AM
Now, imagine this if you will...back in the day when the Army wore those blue uniforms (made of wool, IIRC), and Fort Leavenworth was the furthest west major outpost of the Army. The Army needed to send troops to see to the security of the new state of California. The 6th Infantry Regiment (Regulars, by God!), then stationed at Ft Leavenworth, was ordered to California. And so they marched, from Fort Leavenworth to the Presidio of San Francisco (although they may have made the last bit of the journey on boats. This still stands today as the longest overland march made by any unit in the United States Army. And they did it all in those blue wool uniforms.
 
By John of Argghhh! on June 15, 2005 1:16 PM
Dang! I forgot what was, for me, the best single overall book on the Falklands War, One Hundred Days - the Memoirs of the Falklands Battle Group Commander, by Admiral Sandy Woodward. Out of print and hard to find (though I wouldn't mind this copy, being signed by Woodward and all!) The only book in English I found that covers the Argentine side is The Fight for the Malvinas, by Martin Middlebrook. Boq? Know any others, since you seem to have some insight on the Argie side...
 
By Justthisguy on June 15, 2005 6:37 PM
Oh, Heartless, I think I remember reading somewhere, that the wool uniform was not that bad in the desert as long as you had enough water to drink. You would sweat until the thing was saturated and in sweat equilibrium. It then served as an evaporative cooling device. Now think of the guys a few years earlier, in the Seminole Wars around here, who had to wear that in 100F and 100% humidity.