RAF_Louvert

. "A World Undone: The Story of the Great War", by G.J. Meyer. Amazingly concise, outstandingly well-written, it offers superb perspectives of the inner workings of all the major personalities involved. You will not be disappointed Javito. .

. Javito, it should be noted that neither the Kasier nor anyone else outside of council in Vienna and Leopold Berchtold even knew what was in the ultimatum as Berchtold pushed hard to keep as much as he could secret, in his efforts to deceive enemies and potential friends alike. Germany learned of what was actually in the ultimatum at the same time all the other major players on boths sides did, which is really quite startling when you consider how the Kaiser had written a blank check of support to Austria just a few short weeks before. Berchtold did an excellent job of keeping the Kaiser out of the loop, but then Wilhelm really had no great interest in Austria's affairs with Serbia shortly after the whole thing began. He was much more intersted in racing about in his newest yacht. .

. Olham, you are quite right that Germany did not want to go to war unless it was absolutely necessary. They had agreed to stand by Austria-Hungary in the event of hostilities against that country, and Austria-Hungary used that agreement in an extremely underhanded way. But then, as you've mentioned as well, there was a lot of underhandedness by all parties that ultimately led to the Great War. Another factor that directly resulted in the War was Germany's Schlieffen Plan, which had been drafted years earlier to deal with the event that Germany might have to fight a war on two fronts. Because of this plan, how Germany and the rest of the world viewed the act of "mobilization" was completely different, (and in fact "mobilization" and "going to war" meant pretty much one and the same thing to Germany at the time). Other countries could ready their troops for the possibility of a war and it required nothing further than calling up extra men and reserves and preparing them and their equipment to move out. But the Schlieffen Plan made the act of mobilization something much more serious for Germany as it meant you not only called up the troops, but also put them on the trains and moved them to the Western front, along with their supplies and equipment, and then prepared to strike hard and win quickly there so that those same troops and supplies and equipment could be quickly moved to the Eastern Front before Russia and her allies had a chance to get their own troops in position to strike. It must be remembered that Germany was literally surrounded by potential enemies in 1914, and if they absolutely had to go to war at that time their only chance of preserving themselves was to strike first and strike hard. The disparity in what "mobilization" meant to Germany and what it meant to everyone else was one of the very real factors that brought about the War. As to the question: Had WWI not happened when it did, would there still have been a war soon thereafter? Very, very likely. .

. Thank you for the kind words, as always it is very good to know you folks are enjoying Paul's story. Olham, yes I do believe Basler Brunsli and Berliner Mandelbrot are quite similar. Smilingmonkey, your high praise may make me blush, however it warms me ol' heart to know the tale held your attention so well. I am back from the road now so I am hoping to add the next installment very soon. .

. Many thanks Olham, Javito, and Hasse Wind, I appreciate the positive feedback. HW, absolutely right about the impracticality of the old uniforms, but as you and Javito noted, quite pretty. Olham, I will be waiting a good long time before I consider beginning another such project, not only because of the marriage stress test you alude to, but also because my coffers need replenishing... Once I built a railroad, I made it run Made it race against time Once I built a railroad, now it's done Brother, can you spare a dime? .

. Beautiful pics Olham, thanks for sharing Sir. BTW, that one in the lower left corner could just as easily be a photo of the county road a mile south of my house. TSmoke, sorry to read about your grandmother Sir. That most certainly would put a damper on the holiday spirit. .

. I'll say an extra prayer to the Man Upstairs for all you folks in Aussie-land. Try and stay dry as best you can. .

. Now there you go Gents. Another round for all! .

. I wonder how much that site has been picked over. As little as it's changed in 90 years you'd think it wouldn't be too hard to locate artifacts from the old flugplatz. .

. Aaaah, I bet you're right HW, and he is a nasty bugger. I believe they modelled this smilie after him: .

. Olham, that cap is beautiful, but it's a leeeeeeeeeettle bit out of my budget. Now the book is a good price and a good read. I have the same first edition on my bookshelf and have read it through a couple of times. Very French and a bit flowery and wordy at times, but an insightful look into the famous ace. .

. I don't fly with TAC or any of the other little aids, so this is normally how I discover that enemies are nearby: .

. Many thanks for the kudos Foreigndevil, John, Dej, and Carrick. Glad to know others besides me think it looks good. When you work at something and stare at it over a long period of time you start to wonder if you're seeing it accurately after a while. .

. WM, I'm afraid you are likely quite right about the money under the table. Unlike technology, human greed has changed very little over the centuries. .

. Yuppers, I used to see it as well from time to time. I may have fiddled with a graphics setting at some point in the past to address the issue as I haven't experienced the magic bridges for quite a while now, but for the life of me I can't remember what I might have changed to fix the problem. .

. Huh, I've been to the Salisbury Plain and Stonehenge and I don't recall any forest in sight anywhere, in any direction. Must be aliens planting mutant shrubbery. .

. You are more than welcome Interlocutor, my pleasure to help out. Cheers! Lou .

. Apparently the gardner was conscripted into the King's Army at the onset of hostilities. Needs a good pruning and weeding before the next Druid meeting, (but then they're all likely serving at the Front as well). .

. Interlocutor, I run a Logitech Extreme Pro 3D which uses the same profiler and software as your FF version. I have always used the JS profiler with OFF, and it works fine with the latest version of BHaH HiTR. You will need to pick your "custom" profile as the global profile in order for OFF to recognize it, but apart from that it works the same as it always has. Hope this helps. Cheers! Lou .

. The very best of luck in your new career Widowmaker. I hope it all goes just the way you wish Sir. .

. Greetings All, How it can possibly be 2011 already is beyond me, but in certain ways it's a good thing 2010 is behind us all. I also find it a bit hard to believe I began this little project over a year ago, but it is at last wrapping up. After much searching about in second-hand stores, garage sales, and eBay I finally came across an inexpensive pair of red wool pants in beautiful shape that I was able to rework into a proper looking set for my WWI French aviateur's uniform. Here is the completed outfit standing proudly in the corner of my flying room: I think it all came together quite well, and apart from a couple of very minor tweaks, it is done. Now then, I wonder how much work it will be to put together a German Flieger's kit? Cheers! Lou .

. HAPPY NEW YEAR ! .

. Hellshade, I am not a professional writer and I’ve had very little actually published, so my opinions here should be considered in that light. However, I did serve as a teaching assistant in numerous college literature and writing courses where I had to read and grade hundreds of budding authors’ efforts. Also, I’ve helped my good lady wife raise three college graduates who all came to me on many occasions to critique their writing. So, here goes. Let me start by saying that you’ve chosen one of the classic tales to tell: A young man’s coming of age and his quest to prove his mettle. This epic has been a staple in classic adventure writing for centuries, and you can hardly go wrong choosing it as your first effort. If well written it will have a wide appeal to adolescent and young adult males, but to that audience you must be sure to keep the action high and don’t get bogged down in too much flowery speech or detail. This brings me to my second opinion: Keep the writing tight and concise. This is not to say you shouldn’t build a complete scene and flesh out your characters, but try to avoid over-telling. Ofttimes in writing less is more. Next, while you say to forget about grammar and that’s what editors get paid to do, you absolutely DO want to have a strong command of proper use and structures of the written language you are attempting to work in. To try and write without such is akin to building a house with little knowledge of construction and no blueprints. Yes, you can build the house, but it will be of inferior quality and may well fall apart later. Let me give you an example from your own story. You wrote: “The robed and hooded stranger paused a moment, eyeing the visibly angered ogre carefully and mentally measuring the distance between them as being roughly 8 feet.” What I imagine you meant here was that the hooded stranger was carefully and mentally measuring the distance between himself and the ogre, however your sentence structure instead is telling the reader that it was the ogre who was measuring the distance. An editor would likely not change this in the rewrite as there is nothing actually wrong with the structure, so it falls on your shoulders as the writer to make certain what you mean is being conveyed precisely to the reader, (that’s not to say there aren’t times you wouldn’t wish to intentionally create ambiguity in the course of a story, but I’m betting that was not your intent in this case). Allow me to offer my rewrite of the sentence in question: “The cloaked stranger paused a moment as he studied the angered ogre, mentally calculating the distance between them to be roughly eight feet.” You have aleady indicated to your reader that the stranger is robed and hooded, so repeating it is unneccesary and can become tedious. “Visibly angered” is a bit wordy, and we as readers can assume that the ogre’s anger is visible since the stranger is engaged in the act of eyeing him. “Carefully and mentally” is rather akward and detracts from the flow of your sentence. All in all Hellshade, you have a very good start here and I strongly encourage you to continue crafting your story. But remember it is a craft, and you really owe it to yourself to develop your art fully and use all tools at your disposal to do so. Never be satisfied with “good enough”. I personally have gone back many time in the course of writing a story only to change a single word, or the placement of a punctuation mark, in order to better hone the point I am attempting to make. That being said, be careful of overworking a piece too. It’s a fine line that is walked between too little refinement and too much. I honestly believe it is the mark of the truly great author to know when the story is done. Best of luck with your continued writing Sir, this old world needs all the storytellers it can find. Cheers! Lou .

. VP, I'm not saying we don't live under a democratic or parliamentary system, (or in the case of the US a "republic"), and that there aren't true faces that can be named and pointed to. The problem is that our politicians and leaders have become so deeply beholden to those with money that it is ultimately "money's" interests that are being looked after, and the electorate just becomes something that needs to be controlled rather than served. When political systems and governments reach this point they are no longer of the people, by the people, and for the people, and need to be torn down and rebuilt to truly serve the citizens. That usually requires drastic action of some form: be it revolution; mass turnout at the polls to elect a complete new slate over the course of a decade or so of elections; total refusual by the masses to support the current government by refusal to pay taxes; whatever. Until such things happen I am afraid it will continue to be business as usual with the occasional scapegoat thrown to the general public to keep us all placated. .

. Here's hoping that 2011 will be a banner year for all those who deserve one, and a real son-of-a-bitch for those who mucked up 2010 for everyone else. HAPPY NEW YEAR! .