Capitaine Vengeur

Not the primary intent of the name, but it happens that in French slang, 'rafaler' is also a verb that means to dominate overwhelmingly, to humiliate in contest. Now it takes sense...

I don't think that some ruddy potbellied Rebel re-enactors at Petersburg 2015 will look as skinny, ill and underfed as the average Rebel private looked in the last weeks of the War !

True, the last weeks of the War were very intense, a real fall of stars, and I found, especially among the ten top-scoring balloon-busters, who also took great risks to boost their scores in combustible flying sausages during these last weeks: - September 16: Maurice Boyau (F, number 4, with 21 balloons out of 35 kills) is killed either by Georg von Hantelmann or by an AAMG while passing under the falling last balloon he had just put aflame. - September 18: Jacques Ehrlich (F, #6, 18 out of 19) is shot down and captured, also after his last kill. - September 29: Frank Luke (US, #9, 14 out of 18) is forced to the ground by AA defense after scoring his last 3 balloons, and killed while resisting his capture. - October 14: Willy Coppens (B, #1, 35 out of 37) is wounded by an AAMG (or balloon MG?) while flaming his last balloon, and loses a leg. The same day, Friedrich von Röth (D, #5, 20 out of 28) is wounded (he scored his last kill on a DH.9 that day). - October 27: Karl Schlegel (D, #10, 14 out of 22) is killed by French cover while attacking balloons, possibly by Pierre Marinovitch. - October 29: Michel Coiffard (F, #3, 24 out of 34) is mortally wounded by German cover during an ill-coordinated balloon attack, and dies after landing back. Seven out of ten! (and actually, Heinrich Gontermann, #7, was dead already). It can explain why Fonck, always seeking for low-risk kills, attacked very few balloons...

Are there badges for Cubans, Syrians, Iranians, North Koreans, or at least a generic "Axis of Evil" badge? No? Tsss, everything is political...

I had read about a German ace (Georg von Hantelmann, Jasta 15) who was once credited with THREE noticeable aces among his ten claims within one week in September 1918 : David Putnam on 12 (13 confirmed kills, top-scoring American ace at that time), Maurice Boyau on 16 (35 kills, 4th highest-scoring balloon-buster with 21 - but as debatable as for the Red Baron: may have been killed by an AAMG rather), and Joseph Wehner on 18 (6 kills, Frank Luke's trustful wingman, put Luke into a fateful rage). Both last ones while protecting balloons. What a rampage!

Traitor or defender of civil liberties, is often a question of time, and side. Usually the stronger or winning side prevails in opinion. About time, it can be long before a traitor becomes a defender of civil liberties (Nelson Mandela), or sometimes the contrary (Oliver Cromwell). The question gets clearer when it comes to the motivations of the men/women, either if their choice came from pure debate of conscience, or from greed or political agenda. In that sight, at the Nazis, Kurt Gerstein who risked own's and family's lives for his Christian principles, was a much more decent "traitor" than the conspirators of July 20 who turned coats only when the tide of war turned against them. Regarding the USA, John Brown was a traitor at the time of his capture by the US Army, and became a defender of civil liberties a few years later in the songs of that same US Army. In the same Civil War, most of the Federal officers who joined the Confederate side did not choose to do so before the US Army was ordered to march against the secessionist States, even while still considered members of the Union. All of these officers, including Robert Lee, saw that as a divorce between the Government and the principles the President had sworn to uphold, which liberated them from their oath to that Government and these constitutional principles, as they were now conflicting. Defenders of civil liberties in their own mind, they were not tried as traitors when the South lost the war.

Condolences. So happy memories in these pics...

Indeed, Hasse, it was a reminiscence of the old siege warfare. Remember the first sequence of the movie "Cold Mountain" (2003), after an actual event, the Battle of the Crater (1864). When the Civil War around Petersburg VA turned into a trench warfare, the Union staff considered blowing the enemy lines an option. One Confederate company and one battery were turned into smoke, but the lack of decision in the assault made it a bloody waste. Earlier during the Napoleonic Wars, during the urban warfare into Zaragoza, 1809, the French routinely used mines to blow up the houses and monasteries the Spaniards had turned into fortresses. The sappers reported hearing these religious fanatics sing hymns to the end when they knew they were to be annihilated. Once faking an attack against a monastery, the French had the Spaniards garrison the place at maximum strength just before blowing it up. In "Les croix de bois", both the novel by Dorgeles (1919) and the movie (1931), following the fates of a squad of Poilus, one of the most poignant chapters is when the squad is sent to garrison an isolated outpost on a remote hill. After a few days, the men notice regular underground scratching noises, and understand that the Germans are digging a mine to blow up their position. The following days are very tensing, with various reactions at different stages: feverish hypnotic listening to the noise; or on the contrary, disinterest, resignation and catatonia; despair when the noise stops and joy when it starts again... And of course, an expectable moment of panic and attempt to flee from one man whose nerves have broken. When the relief squad finally comes, ten infantrymen and four machine-gunners, our Poilus leave the position as hurriedly as they can, yet trying quickly and lamely to comfort the demoralized relief men who know that they are condemned. Happy to have survived this terrible week, the boys even begin to sing on their way back. Suddenly, a deafening thunderclap behind them: the hill has been blown up. After a silence, the chapter ends with a few whispers: - How many of them were there? - Ten. And four machine-gunners...

Pictures of excellent quality. I like the lomçevak...

File Name: Colored screens for Wings Over Russia File Submitter: Capitaine Vengeur File Submitted: 26 May 2013 File Category: SF/WO* Hanger/Menu/Loadout This mod is intended to add 23 colored screens to the full-inclusive add-on Wings Over Russia, collective work for SF1 by The Dev A-Team, available at Capun Skunkworks. Several of these screens will be used in the campaigns that I plan to release. Regarding your own campaigns, you will just have to make by yourselves a little work in the campaigns files, for each of the flyable units you'd want to associate with an adequate BaseScreen. Details are given in the ReadMe file. August 2014 update: adds half a dozen screens, new or better quality, keeping the older variants for same models. Click here to download this file

Several elements about Fonck in this old post you started in Nov 2011: Mannock's Rules Also a personal anecdote. While in junior high school, already passionate about military aviation and aces, I had a couple of years with a classmate named Ludovic Fonck. He confirmed me that he was one of René Fock's relatives, and actually, at 13, he had the same baby face with wide eyes that can be seen on some close pictures of Fonck.

Would look fine on a T-shirt, jacket, baby cloth, tattoo shopfront... Have you registered a trademark?

I thought Jack the Ripper was indeed a Londoner, but Bill the Butcher was a New Yorker?! Anyway, that may probably revive the old endless debate, here and elsewhere, about the question of having wide population allowed or not to hold firearms, to avoid inflaming personal civilian quarrels. Some may emphasize that when a bastard wants to kill someone, or anyone, he doesn't need a firearm and could do the job with any blade. But not any bastard is as crazed as those two hashshashins seemed to be...

The pest in my coastal city is called seagulls. A flying bane actually. They repaint in stinking white buildings, cars and passing-by bikers and pedestrians (can you represent yourselves how much a big seagull can drop in once?!), they rip open the trash bags... Many people here can't even stand their ugly call. And be sure that behind their impressive beaks, they don't fear dogs at all. When my parents came to visit me by the sea, they brought their late dog, an insane jagd terrier used to assault and swiftly kill anything small and defenseless enough breathing within one yard from her nose. The first time the beast saw a sitting seagull on a bench back, of course she attacked him... and braked in surprise at a few inches, as the flying pest seemed not impressed at all, and just kept on looking downwards at her with conspicuous scorn. Very different from her usual inland preys. The pest is legally protected here, and the method to fight the bane is to locate the nests and sterilize the eggs, to have the birds keep on sit on them and waste a season for reproduction. Yet there seem to be more and more many of them each year.

File Name: Counters & screens for SF2: Korean Air War File Submitter: Capitaine Vengeur File Submitted: 11 May 2013 File Category: Menus I had once worked on several annual campaigns for the mythic Korean Air War Complete Mod for SF1, uploaded at CombatAce by Edward in 2005. I planned one campaign for each of the years 1951, 1952 and 1953, with actually one UN-sided and one Red-sided campaign for each year, six campaigns in all. Though the R&D work was very advanced, I have given up since long, and for the moment, I don't plan to reinvest time in this project before long. Yet there were many related works that I could deliver here for SF2:KAW after a swift conversion in picture format: A batch of colorful, reduced-size counters, devoted to each of the nationalities significantly present during the Korean War, 1950-53. Besides having a more attractive map and less confused stacks, you can also find more easily the units you're after. As a rule, the counters with rectangular national flags and brigade/division/corps/army devices show the ground units, while the counters with roundels concern the air units. Lots of screens initially intended to be linked to the campaigns I planned, now converted to jpg format (start screens, daily missions briefings, or campaign victory/ draw/defeat debriefings). For each of the six planned campaigns, a briefing synopsis, and three end-of-campaign debriefings in case of victory/draw/defeat. There is no notice about installation. Just consider everything graciously given here as raw materials to be renamed at will for building your own campaigns. Some new materials could also be uploaded in a next future. Click here to download this file

Hostia !

It reminds me of another bad-ending story: An African man goes to the swimming-pool, and while in the changing-room, he is shouted at by a very ill-mannered yokel: - Wowowowow!!! How long is your Black Mamba, man!? What did you do to have it that long? Quite disgusted by the redneck's impoliteness, the African man still answers with a very straight face: - Well, you see, in my village, we hang turtles to the young boy's willy, small turtles at first, heavier ones later, until it gets longer. - Wowowow! That's fine, dude. I'll just try the stuff... One week later, the African man at the pool meets again the yokel, who shouts at him once more: - Hey brother, I have tried your stuff. With hanging turtles, remember? The African just can't believe the jerk is that dumb, and asks: - Ah? And is there any progress? Is your willy longer? - Nope dude. But there is some progress: it is all black already...

Today, 30 April 2013, is the 150th "Camerone Day" commemorated by the French Foreign Legion. Fewer than the Spartans at the Thermopylae, more overwhelmed numerically than the Texians at Alamo, and less prepared than both of them, the Legionnaires gave at Camerone an example of determined stand, courage and self-abnegation that entered History. On 30 April 1863, during the French intervention in Mexico, a detachment of 65 Legionnaires (French, Belgians, Poles, Swiss, Germans, Italians...), led by Capitaine Danjou, was screening an important convoy to the French army besieging Puebla, when they first had to face 800 Mexican Juarist horsemen in the early morning. Standing fast in the open ground, they could fall back in order to a local inn with a walled courtyard, known as the Hacienda Camaron, and firmly entrenched there. Later in the morning, up to 3000 Mexican troops surrounded and repeatedly assaulted the place. Aflame by their oath to their captain, killed shortly afterwards, to fight to the death, the diminishing handful of heroes held their position and fixed the enemy till the evening, hitting more than eight times their own number in Mexicans. The last few survivors were hacked by a volley fire while leading a gallant last bayonet charge out of their flaming shelter, after running out of ammo. That day the convoy was saved, and the Legion of expendable stateless bastards was recognized at last as a formidable elite corps. Battle of Camarón - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Every April 30 since has been celebrated as the "Camerone Day", the most important day in the Legionnaire traditions. It was so even in 1954 at Dien Bien Phu, one week before the strongpoint fell. On this day, on any place in the World where Legionnaires stand, the account of the feat is ceremoniously read, the oath repeated, and in France, respectful tribute is paid to Capitaine Danjou's prosthetic wooden hand, the most sacred relic in the Legion. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [ Also 150 years ago on this 30 April 1863, a few thousands miles North: The maneuvers in Northern Virginia between Robert Lee's Confederate Army and Joe Hooker's Federal Army had stopped somewhere West of Fredericksburg, at the side of the Wilderness Forest. The next days would see what is considered as Lee's most daring maneuver and brilliant victory, at Chancerlorsville. ]

File Name: P-40E Soviet skins Pack File Submitter: Capitaine Vengeur File Submitted: 04 May 2013 File Category: P-40 Working on a new campaign for Wings Over Russia (the liberation of Crimea, April-May 1944), I realized that I needed skins for the Lend-Lease 'Kittyhawks' used by several air units of the Black Sea Fleet during this campaign. So a little makeshift trick appeared to be necessary, to provide skins to the A-Team's P-40E. Clearly not a graphical artist, I had to select an existing skin that could be modified at lowest costs. Two of these skins are modified from a Desert skin by Scrapper, the third from a two-tones skin by Starfighter2. All of the credits and links are given in the ReadMe file. The P-40E with a shark-mouth nose-art (borrowed from Gramps' Desert skin for the No.112 Sqn RAF) is dedicated to the 7th Naval Fighter Regiment, which displayed this design for some time in 1943-44. Click here to download this file

Just scary! The poor guys had time enough to count their last seconds...

Hello Phantom. To answer here, I do confirm that I have included in my Crusader and Gazala campaigns some flyable units for whom markings had not been designed in WoA, but which I found interesting to fly in campaign anyway. The 803 & 806 Naval Squadrons are a good example. Alongside the 805 Sqn (Martlets), they were part of the RN Desert Squadron the Royal Navy assembled for the second part of 1941 while repairing its carriers damaged before Crete, and so they flew the Hurricane I in Desert skin. But their participation was quite short and anecdotal, and so their squadron markings/ insignias were not created when the Hurricane I Desert skin was designed (sqns #202 & 205 in the PilotData/SquadronList.ini file - No SqnCode202 or SqnCode205.tga files in the HurricaneI/Desert/D folder). About the Italians, I also made flyable a couple of bombers units, groups rather than squadrons, who were not in WoA's SquadronList, but only when it was the sole way to have this given plane model flyable in campaign. Between little and nothing, I'll always do the little choice.

Happy birthday! And happy 1st of May, too...