So not the very model of a modern Major General
That’s a classic statistics problem, in almost the same context as its original application.
Well if you have a monstrous weapon that, upon release, could seriously affect the outcome, you might say something like that.
Given the trauma expected from having ones legs run over by a tank, death was highly probable
One can criticize wars as necessarily rackets, or as exercises that necessarily cause untold suffering among the civilian populations etc. But those models of war only really work if your object is to avoid war. If your job is to prosecute war, then you might believe that it is your job to shell cities instead of armies, that it is your job to plunder instead of attacking supply lines.
The general’s comments seemed ghoulish to me.
I know that in the US armed forces, flag officers have graduate degrees, even PhDs-- perhaps Gilbert and Sullivan are satirizing a similar 19th century impulse among the general staff.
They fit with the Russian attitude that the Ukrainian government is responsible for all the death and destruction because they refuse to surrender.
That doesn’t quite wash. One avoids intentional atrocity in war because it enables adversaries to do the same. War crimes beget war crimes. It also makes it more difficult to resolve a conflict. If you are in a war and committing atrocities, you know you are doing something wrong but doing it anyway. You just don’t care about the consequences or don’t think there will be any.
In Gilbert and Sullivan’s day, the officer class were largely people who bought their ranks, not earned them. The policy was abolished less than 10 years before the opera was written. Officers were usually the second or later sons of wealth. Those not in line to inherit family estates.
Poker players call that a “tell”.
This is what a leader does… no self aggrandizing, no “if there was someone else in charge”, just celebrate the people doing the real work, and making the real sacrifices.
That literally sounds like a Laura Ingram quote.
I think that’s true on the level of the state-to-state relations… though Italy, Germany, Spain, and Japan were able to do that for a short while, but that required Italy subordinating itself to German interests once the war started… But on the underground level, the white power internationale is going strong, I’d argue. The problem is that solidarity is difficult because of their strong belief in hierarchy, so any attempts to consolidate on a larger level than subcultures connecting online is often undermined by power struggles. But we should not dismiss the subcultural underground that’s formed since the 70s, as they’ve managed to do a decent amount of damage to liberal democracy over the years, without being part of state structures.
The wikipedia article says
he character of Major-General Stanley was widely taken to be a caricature of the popular general Sir Garnet Wolseley. The biographer Michael Ainger, however, doubts that Gilbert intended a caricature of Wolseley, identifying instead the older General Henry Turner, an uncle of Gilbert’s wife whom Gilbert disliked, as a more likely inspiration for the satire. Nevertheless, in the original London production, George Grossmith imitated Wolseley’s mannerisms and appearance, particularly his large moustache, and the audience recognised the allusion.[4]
but Garnet Wolesley doesn’t really seem like a “nerd who’s gone to war.” (Not the most pleasant of types either)
