#real world military

[czigonas]

Everyone's heard about any number of WWII badasses, but I was reminded of one in particular that made me think to myself, "this is the kind of person Johnny "Soap" MacTavish would absolutely know about and try to model himself after."

So I figured I'd give a little history lesson and tell other people about this guy too. Please meet:

Colonel Sir Ronald Thomas Stewart Macpherson, aka Tommy Macpherson, aka The Kilted Killer

So, first of all, this dude was Scottish, born in Edinburgh. He was commissioned in the Territorial Army in 1939 and served as a commando from 1940 until being taken prisoner in Libya by Italians after a failed exfil attempt on a recon mission in late 1941. He actually managed to escape (by holding up his 10-man arresting party with the gun they gave back to him!) but was recaptured and placed in solitary confinement. He attempted to escape again anyway before they moved him to a camp in Spain, where he tried again to escape (and made it pretty far but couldn't breach the outer wall). By mid 1942, they had moved him to a camp in Italy.

Mid 1943, the Germans took over the Italian camps and the prisoners were to be moved to Austria. Macpherson escaped again, but didn't get far before being recaptured. He was taken to a camp in Austria where he managed yet another escape, this time with two other men. They got recaptured in Italy on their way to Yugoslavia only because their rations gave them away as not being the Italian officers Macpherson had almost convinced the arresting patrol they were. Instead of being sent back to Austria, they were sent to a camp in Poland, where they escaped again (with two others this time), and made it into Sweden, from where they could fly home to Scotland.

So, let's count that up: In his first three years of being in the army, he was a prisoner of war for two of them and attempted escape five times from four different camps (well, three camps and once en-route to a camp) before finally making a sixth - successful! - escape.

During all of that, Macpherson held the rank of only a Second Lieutenant, though by the time he escaped the final time, he was considered an Acting Captain.

Despite his ordeal, or probably because of it and his general badassery, Macpherson was selected to Spec Ops within days of returning to Scotland. They trained until early 1944, after which he was promoted to Major (after only four years!!), and then parachuted into France in full battle dress which included a kilt.

The night after arriving, he blew up a bridge with the help of the local resistance. The night after that, they set mines in the road and surrounding forests leading towards Normandy and significantly hindered a Panzer Division attempting to reinforce German forces during the Allied Operation Overlord.

He and his two-man team, along with the resistance, then proceeded to spend the next three months blowing up bridges and disrupting road and rail traffic all throughout southwestern France. The Germans got so mad they put out a 300,000 franc bounty on his head.

He modified his machine guns to sound as though they were larger caliber than they were, causing the Germans to believe they were coming up against superior forces.

He booby-trapped a rail crossing guard to decapitate a German officer and his driver.

He cemented the surrender of 23,000 German troops at once - including a Major General! - by being driven unarmed (in his full battle dress with kilt!) and under fire into the village the Major General was commanding from and bluffing about being able to call down heavy artillery and a massive RAF strike.

He also did a lot more during the war, mostly in small-man teams and with local resistance fighters, including negotiating more axis-force surrenders and capturing or killing significant numbers of German troops.

Now, post-war, he had his rank reverted to Lieutenant (which is a thing that can happen, but not often out of wartime unless you're naughty). This wasn't a slight on his fighting or tactical prowess, but holding the rank of Major after only five years of service is insane and, frankly, he probably didn't have the education or experience to support such a rank. Especially as much of his fighting prowess came in what was, essentially, guerilla warfare, he likely had little to no practical ability to lead conventional troops and needed to learn that.

Additionally, the version of Spec Ops he had been recruited into in 1943 was not the SAS, but something called the SOE. Post-WWII, the SOE got disbanded and a number of operatives returned to their pre-war jobs while a good chunk was folded into MI6. Macpherson returned to the regular army, though he did do work with a regiment from the SAS while he was a Captain. Eventually he rose through the ranks to retire (into the Reserves) as a Colonel in 1967 and got knighted by the Queen in 1992.

Macpherson's autobiography came out in 2010, and I suspect it was of great interest to a number of Scottish soldiers enlisted at the time. I also suspect that Soap would take a particular interest in his demolitions work and the sheer infrastructure damage he managed to accomplish on his deployment. If Soap were to want to switch to Officer track (which, as I pointed out before, is unlikely), he could certainly find worse role models than Macpherson in that manner as well.

[movie-robotnik-positivity]

Shadow's relationship with G.U.N is interesting. He doesn't seem to hold any resentment towards them and will even work with them if it helps his goal, but he also won't hesitate to go against them if they become an obstacle.

Commander Tower overlooks Shadow's trangressions as a way of paying him back for saving the world, but also because he's the only other living person who understands his grief.

[elevenenthusiast]

If those leaks about stranger things 5 on twitter are true then i have nothing else to say other than that it sounds ass.

[abbieshreevephotography]

Sally B my favourite plane. B17 😍

[mastermark1960]

I am once again so disappointed with the leftist demonazis constantly spewing nonsensical drivel every time they don't like someone elses opinion. Demonazis are so far to the left that they agree with and use the propaganda tools of the two worst extreme right ass holes that ever walked the earth. Hitler and Stalin both treated their own people with such disrespect and callousness that they created concentration camps and gulags to silence any opposition to their rule.

The following information comes from the holocaust encyclopedia. I wrote comments that are not after bullet points.

• The Nazis were skilled propagandists who used sophisticated advertising techniques and the most current technology of the time to spread their messages.

Think of CNN, MSNBC, NPR, ABC, CBS, NBC, all other "news outlets" for example the New York times, Boston globe, and Washington post are but a few. They don't report the news but continuously give us their opinions on everything. The 5ws are desperately needed to stop their propaganda. We can include the woke organizations like Disney and Hollywood movie makers for spreading propaganda for the demonazis.

• Once in power, Adolf Hitler created a Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda to shape German public opinion behavior.

▪︎Nazi propaganda played an integral role in advancing the persecution and ultimately the destruction of Europe’s Jews and all political Dissidents. It incited hatred and fostered a climate of indifference to their fate.

Think of how the demonazis allowed the likes of BLM and ANTIFA to destroy many cities. No action was taken by those in power to stop the destruction or prosecute the perpetrators. Then remember the hissy fit they had when they allowed, yes demonazis allowed, Republican protester into the capital. The demonazis prosecuted 100s of peaceful republican protesters. If the republican protesters were acting like BLM and ANTIFA the Capitol would be a smoking ruin.

• The Nazis wanted Germans to support the Nazi dictatorship and believe in Nazi ideas. To accomplish this goal, they tried to control forms of communication through censorship and propaganda. This included control of newspapers, magazines, books, art, theater, music, movies, and radio.

• When the Nazis came to power in 1933, the German constitution guaranteed freedom of speech and freedom of the press. Through decrees and laws, the Nazis abolished these civil rights and destroyed German democracy. Starting in 1934, it was illegal to criticize the Nazi government. Even telling a joke about Hitler was considered treachery. People in Nazi Germany could not say or write whatever they wanted. 

Examples of censorship under the Nazis included:

• Closing down or taking over anti-Nazi newspapers; 

• Controlling what news appeared in newspapers, on the radio, and in newsreels;

• Banning and burning books that the Nazis categorized as un-German.

• Textbooks are a good example of how propaganda and censorship worked together in the Nazi regime. The Nazis used both propaganda and censorship to control what students read in school. Nazi censors removed some textbooks from classrooms. New textbooks taught students to obey the Nazi Party, love Hitler, and hate Jews.

The demonazis took over education with the creation of the Department of education in 1979.

The Higher Education Act of 1965 introduced federal student aid and loan programs. These give away programs allowed higher education to run amuk with ever increasing cost of degrees. This needs to stop now.

Demonazis try to stop the political middle and right from voicing their opinions by controlling who can and can't post on many social media sight. Censorship at it worst. Thank God Elon Musk bought out Twitter and turned it into X. No more censorship there. Of course the demonazis scream foul.

We The People who love the United States of America must stand by her in her hour of desperate need. If we don't our great country is doomed. I know this is a long winded post but I felt it was necessary to explain how dangerous the deep state and New World Order are. This is why I call the democrats demonazis as the word fits perfectly.

Thank you for reading this post. If you like my post please repost it and start calling the democrats exactly what they are, demonazis.

[baget-blue-does-everything]

No no, please God NO

PLEASE LET THIS BE A MISTAKE, PLEASE

I DON'T WANT 4 YEARS OF TRUMP I DON'T WANT HIM TO WIN PLEASE GOD NO

PLEASE LET HARRIS WIN SOMEHOW PLEASE I DON'T WANT TO FLEE THE COUNTRY I DON'T WANT A FELON IN THE WHITE HOUSE I DON'T WANT TO FIGHT A CIVIL WAR WITH THE STRONGEST MILITARY IN THE WORLD

PLEASE LET THIS BE A MISTAKE PLEASE LET THERE BE SOME HOPE

WHO WAS APATHETIC, WHO DIDN'T VOTE!? WHO DECIDED THAT 4 MORE YEARS OF GODDAMN TRUMP WAS BETTER THAN A BLACK WOMAN!?!?

I HATE EVERYONE WHO VOTED FOR TRUMP, I HATE EVERYONE WHO COULD VOTE BUT DIDN'T, I HATE EVERY SINGLE PERSON WHO THOUGHT TEACHING A LESSON TO THE DEMS WAS MORE IMPORTANT THAN DEMOCRACY!!! LOOK AT WHAT YOU HAVE BROUGHT UPON YOURSELF YOU SELFISH BASTARDS!!!

[compacflt]

Would you ever consider writing about a different path Ice and Mav could take, one where they choose to leave the Navy and pursue a more open relationship and civilian life? Thinking it would be easier but maybe the sacrifice to their careers brings its own challenges?

(hi, jan 2024 me here, this was an ask that I answered when it was sent in in May 2023 & didn't post because I felt I actually answered it fictionally in the "icedad" one-shot the week after [and you can obviously see how these thoughts affected the writing of other pieces like "tremors & aftershocks"], but I still mostly agree with this take [though it's a little overgeneralizing] & I think it sums up a lot of my final "meta" modern-military-theory thoughts on ice & mav & their relationship, so im posting it now before I post the compacflt masterpoast)

see,��� the thing is, i just… can’t see that happening!! i have no idea how to write that!!! Maybe i really do have a lack of imagination. But i can’t see that happening for a number of reasons. So short answer, no.

Long answer (and it’s long):

1. lame reason to start out, but it, uh, it’s canon that ice ends up at O-10 and mav ends up at O-6. not saying that im beholden to canon obviously (my mav ends up at O-7 and my ice ends up alive) but I do base my characterizations of them on the implications of the political struggles of both their careers so… taking away ice’s fourth star is basically starting from square one wrt my characterization of him. which is a lot of work. i could start from the beginning with a top gun 1986 ice who knows he’s gay—that would be a fun AU (i think other people than me have definitely done that better, though—I’m a one-trick pony). So if that’s what you mean then disregard the rest of this post. but if what you mean is a divergence from my existing work (i.e. homophobic/rank-climbing ice&mav) then… yeah, can’t see that happening, for further reasons below.

2. wrt my characterization of him: it’s based on a broad historical overview of armed service officers and the expectations of their careers. in my view, high-ranking officers aren’t after power—or maybe they started their careers wanting power, but somewhere down the line, it just becomes an expectation. if you do everything right and follow all the rules, you are expected by the institution to lead, whether you want to or not. That’s just the pipeline. at some point you start losing agency. which is what I mean when I keep saying ice doesn’t have a choice in advancing his career (besides the meta fact that this is fanfiction and canon demands that he have 4 stars lol)—high ranking military officers are continually and continually groomed for bigger and better positions; and the longer they spend in the military, the harder it is to leave that lifestyle for something else. And with ice’s canonical (and characteristically INTEGRAL, as I mentioned a week or so ago) refusal to rebel against the wishes of the navy as an institution, plus this historical expectation to lead placed upon the shoulders of excelling officers, I really do think ice is destined for four stars & nothing less, even if it gives him chronic depression. It’s his highest priority not because he wants it to be, but because…it just is. that’s how the institutionalized system of advancement in the military works. it just is. it has to be.

3. I mentioned in this post that I can’t ever see a foot in the door with them talking about their relationship unless maverick dies and is resurrected, and I feel the exact same way about them & their retirement plans. There’s a lot that ice and mav don’t talk about: the biggest one is obviously Goose’s death, the foundation of their relationship; but also their love for each other obv, what they did to rooster, AND their careers, which have to end at some point. Them talking about everything is totally inevitable, it was gonna have to happen eventually before they died, and I think one foot in the door MIGHT have been them eventually talking about retirement (someone sent in a prompt asking for this exactly & i am brainstorming it furiously) but before the Navy FORCES them to retire… i think they would studiously avoid talking about it. For a couple reasons: a) what does retiring with each other mean? living in the same house until they die together? hard to do if you’re just good friends. talking about retirement is tantamount to talking about Them. and b) what are they gonna do outside the navy? Ice has a lot of options, as I mentioned in the slider one-shot—general/flag officers are SUPER sought after in leadership/intelligentsia/management positions post service, so maybe if he were offered a crazy cool civilian position somewhere in San Diego in like the 2000s he would quit the navy for it… but what about maverick? I have no idea what a non-navy mav would do. Civilian airline pilot? Hoo boy. I think he’d hate that. I could maybe see emergency helicopter pilot, lol, or race car driver (i just watched days of thunder can you tell?) but none of the above offers the institutionalized honor the navy does (that, as a reminder, he *killed people* to obtain in the first place). I suggested his test piloting expertise would make him an attractive technical advising candidate to A&D companies like Boeing, LockMart, GD, etc. so that might be one option. But it might have been kind of a touchy subject for him before he racked up the expertise he’d need for those high-level civilian positions… the navy was kinda his only option. So they wouldn’t talk about it because it might hurt his feelings.

4. The biggest reason: again… open rebellion like rocking the boat by quitting the navy to be in an open long-term gay relationship, in upper mil brass ranks, and even retired upper mil brass ranks, just… isn’t done. And REALLY wasn’t done in the 2000s, when i think the scenario in this ask is positioned. And it’s not like “oh but whatever who cares about the navy, ice and mav are in love, they deserve to be happy no matter what, they should do what they want, fuck the navy…” no. Ice and Mav care about the navy. Clearly. Canonically. By necessity. The military requires cohesion and on some level repression of individuality & personal expression to FUNCTION, even when you’re retired. Yes, maverick certainly strains against that repression (which is why you Could spin top gun as an anti-military franchise if you were desperate enough), but he rebels through his ACTIONS (stupid plane maneuvers) not through his personal IDENTITY. his personal identity (headstrong overtly masculine white male pilot, whether gay or straight who cares) is NEVER challenged throughout the franchise (i.e. no one really challenges his masculinity specifically) & his personal identity does not POSE a challenge to the navy. Both he and ice in their outward-facing personal identities really fit in quite neatly to the navy’s overarching identity & contribute to the navy’s cohesion in a way that is favorable to both their careers and the establishment. Lack of imagination or not… i can’t see a universe in which Ice and mav would actively WANT to rock the boat and wreck the navy’s cohesion and their reputations for an open relationship and definitively rebellious personal identities, with the obvious caveat being Maverick’s death recontextualizing both their priorities (yes we’re in love AND we’ve finally proven ourselves to be ultra-capable officers regardless of our sexuality so no one has a license to judge us anymore etc.).

And also, they’re not enlisted seamen. Nor are they mediocre officers who have the luxury of fading into obscurity. Things are different when you’re that high in the ranks, and when your job publicly matters more. sorry, but even post DADT (probably until about biden’s election), an open relationship would end their careers. They might not be fired, but they’d never be promoted again. Too much of a liability getting subordinates to still respect them, from the higher-ups’ perspective, especially if there are other qualified candidates who fit the navy’s core identity better. Like—sorry. This is such a jaded oversimplification. But if you rock the boat like that (i.e. break the service’s united front to be individualistic in a way that does not match the service’s overarching identity), from the perspective of your officer peers, you simply are a bad officer. Being an open individual in a job where you are required to fit in and represent your service is not your job. You are not doing your job well. Straight-up. Even if you’re retired. I met US Army 4-star gen. David Petraeus (retired obv) in February—he led the successful-ish surge in iraq and Afghanistan in the mid-2000s—and he’s STILL a laughingstock for his disastrous affair with his biographer a decade ago, even after he retired from AD service. That’s what people remember him for, not the fact that he was one of our only successful commanders in any of our Middle East campaigns.

Something like that might be one of ice and mav’s worst fears—being known for their affair/scandal instead of the institutionalized honor they’ve fought and killed for. That kind of thing just Isn’t Done. It's bad taste. You have to keep it quiet. If you’re an officer representing the service, you have to represent it well & according to the service’s preconceived identity, even in retirement. (see, for another shitty example of "not fitting in" even in retirement, Lt. gen. Mike Flynn [his whole scandal is actually kinda geopolitically relevant to my fic if you squint lol] whom everyone fucking hates)

To summarize: i hope I’m not mischaracterizing your ask when i reframe it like this—would you ever write ice and mav without the institutionalized pressure to advance in rank and conform to institutional norms?

and yes, I would (and will if you ask—it looks like this: ice & mav meet & fall in love & it’s boring and fine. end of story), but I guarantee you someone else already has. I’m all about interrogation of institutional norms here. And i think until maverick dies & comes back from the dead, there is absolutely no *REALISTIC* incentive for ice & mav to leave the navy and/or have an open relationship. Like it’s just not possible. Idk how else to say it.

[agalychnisspranneusroseus]

RiAAU Sasha's complicated relationship with her adoptive parents, Percy and Braddock, stems from an awkward mixture of unconditional love, resentment over their inability to protect her from Grime in her childhood, and their fear of what she's become.

[psycosispunpun]

[windor-truffle]

Hubert is a huge fucking dork 💙💙💙

[nando161mando]

This is honestly a good question

[czigonas]

So, I just wanna have a little rant about military ranks (because, look, I say I don't go there but I have consumed a lot of mw2 stuff over the last few weeks so yeah I guess I do). There's... a lot to unpack with the decision to switch Soap from a captain to a sergeant in the new one but I am not going to touch that at all. I'm also putting it under a cut because I will probably ramble.

(I am going to preface this by saying I have not held a military rank myself, and certainly not in the UK, so if I get something wrong please feel free to correct me [so long as you're not mean about it] but that to the best of my knowledge, the information below is factual.)

So what I am going to talk about here is the idea that someone can easily move between those two ranks. I've seen posts about Soap should just get promoted to either lieutenant or captain and, please, it's just... not feasible. Not in any small amount of time.

In most standing militaries there are two enlistment tracks: Enlisted and Officer. Soap is in the Enlistment track of the UK Army (which is the branch that oversees the SAS, despite it being the Special Air Service) with the rank of Sergeant (or Staff Sergeant at the most). This is what's called a non-commissioned officer rank (shortened to NCO).

Lieutenant and Captain are both Commissioned Officer ranks (shortened to CO, though that can also mean Commanding Officer, so...) and the difference is right there in the name: the commission. This is an actual piece of paper saying that the officer in question has and works under the authority of the sovereign power that commissioned them (in this case: the British Crown). In ye olde times you had to buy your commission, and so most Army COs were from the upper classes because, well, they had the money.

These days there a bunch of ways to get a commission (some of which are still kind of restricted by wealth, since they rely on having college degrees in various fields). However, the way Ghost probably entered the Officer track was by attending the Royal Military Academy at Sandhurst or being recommended for an Officer Candidate School by someone higher in his chain of command while he was still an Enlisted soldier.

Because Soap is still in the Enlisted track, his next promotion would be Staff Sergeant (if he's just a sergeant now) or Warrant Officer Second Class (if he's a staff sergeant now). While technically Ghost ranks above him as a lieutenant, they're not at all comparable.

The Officer Candidate School absolutely opens up a path for how Soap could switch tracks! He could, in theory, be recommended for Officer Training by Price or anyone higher in the chain of command. Then he'd go back to Sandhurst for like three months of training and get himself promoted to second lieutenant. Here's the thing, though. I don't think he would want to.

There's a certain pride to be held in gaining ranks in enlisted service that is hard to translate. Especially in a body where the purchase of higher rank was allowed and encouraged for so long, the idea of gaining your rank on merit alone (as you had to, to advance in any NCO rank) holds a deeper pride and sense of accomplishment. Obviously these days you can only advance in CO ranks by merit as well, but the culture and competition between the tracks is still tainted by that history.

In addition to that, I think Soap would see promotion to lieutenant as (at least initially) a step down. Ghost's pay grade is OF-1 as a lieutenant, and Price's is OF-2 as a captain. Soap? Soap's rocking a pay grade of OR-5 or 6 as a sergeant or OR-7 as a staff sergeant. That's impressive for his age. I'm also pretty sure Soap and Gaz are being paid more than Ghost and on par (or nearly) with Price's lowest possible pay rate.

I've only seen a few fics that touch on it (possibly only two in total), but Soap's (and Gaz's) job is to be the liaison between the officers (Ghost and Price) and the regular enlisted men. They are there to support and facilitate whatever orders come down from higher up the chain, and to know which of their soldiers is best for whatever they're going to get up to. Officers are taught to listen to their Sergeants, and for good reason. It's possible that Soap and Gaz might even have more years of service under their belts than Ghost does.

Now, this falls apart a little when they're separated from the main bulk of command into a Joint Task Force under a foreign General, but not a lot! It just means that their enlisted soldiers (the privates and corporals and specialists that would make up the bulk of their actual fighting power) have to maybe double check what a rank insignia looks like and who you're supposed to salute when (because that shit is country and even branch specific).

The next big question is... who's is the ranking officer of JTF141 now that Shepherd is gone? Because while Laswell is a Station Chief, that just means that she's 'in charge' from an intelligence point of view, and she's still a civilian from a foreign government. She has no actual authority over the military members (especially the non-U.S. ones). At the very least, I would think they'd promote Price to Major, since that's the lightest rank I would expect to see in charge of a company.

I guess we'll see.

[goldenstarprincesses]

Watched They Shall not Grow Old for thanksgiving (it's a ww1 doc that only consist of real interview audio/photos/videos) and...it's not funny

But the part where the audio narration (which was a British commander or something) says that the Canadians and Australians were annoyingly always getting caught with French prostitutes and commenting war crimes against the Germans without permission, made me snort

[bardicious]

Honestly if anyone deserved to survive into the new timeline it was Lila and Five. 😭😭😭

[bleachposting]

watched psycho pass providence today ...

there's like no other anime after this...

always grateful to psycho pass making itself known every 2-3years and reminding me that media will never top what it has done...

[dogsplayingpoker]

saw an online self-identified socialist talking about fantasy military fiction he was writing and he basically said "this WAS russian inspired when i started the project but that was years before #TheWar and now idk if i want to deal with the Complicated Social Issues around that...I might just make them french or something idk" and like. my love i have bad news about the french