Erici Von Falkenhayn Quotes
When these inventions of the devil work, then what they achieve is more than amazing; when they do not work, then they achieve less than nothing.
He had just seen demonstrations of new military technology at the German War Games.
Erich von Falkenhayn, 1861-1922, German General and Minister of War, Statement about airplanes and other new military technology, 1912
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While this principle is usually true, the irony is that it did not hold for the Germans in WWII. Towards the end of the war, they had developed the first jet planes which in combat were far superior to anything the allies could contest them with. In every battle they shot down many more allied plans than they lost. However they had relatively few as allied bombers had destroyed key factories and already killed most of the German experienced pilots. Also the fuel facilities were crippled. So even though the German jets were technologically superior, they were so outnumbered that they were not strategicappy successful.
He was the author of the first “spy novel” and one of the first English writers to use his art and craft to promote public opinion to support more military spending to defend against Germany.
Later, he felt that the offense had become almost invincible. See {626741}. Tesla was one of the great American immigrant scientists. He found in America the kind of intellectual and operational freedom that did not exist in the rigid, monarch-controlled, Austro-Hungarian Empire. He developed patents and techniques that formed the technological bases of radio, telephone long distance, TV, cell phones, Wi Fi, just to name a few. Most important he was Thomas Edison’s great nemesis. Edison invented DC electric generators that could power factories or entire streets in a neighborhood. Tesler invented and developed AC electrical technology which could power entire cities and he could move electricity over long distances which Edison could not. Tesler was one of the first scientists to conceive of and try to implement “Big Science” where there were huge capital investments to develop machines and systems to do what had never been done before—philosophically like the CERN Hadron Collider. Tesler even convinced a large corporation to finance the construction of a massive building and tower so he could experiment with the wireless transmission of electricity. However, as the industrial democracies have learned, Big Science can only be funded by governments and it often takes sever working in consort to afford the huge investment that is required. In Tesler’s era, the federal and state governments did not fund scientific research so his work was not only technically ahead of his time but also conceptually. He anticipated most of the problems and need for a national power grid that was challenging America even at the beginning of the 21st century.
Ataturk quickly envisioned the importance of the airplane. He even sent is daughter to Russia to learn to fly a plane, and she became the first Turkish Military Officer to do so. This was typical of Ataturk—killing two or more reform “birds” with one stone. He not only brought the airplane into the Turkish consciousness by having his daughter fly which attracted great attention of the press and got people talking, but showed that women were capable of the most complex technological tasks. Before Ataturk, few women in Turkey ever did anything but parenting and homemaking. Ataturk gave Turkish women the vote before America adopted women’s suffrage.
This was the earliest version of a variant of the great WWII propaganda phrase, “Arsenal of Democracy”. See --{624746} and {624747} for quotations related to this famous phrase.
We face that situation now. Tesla was one of the great American immigrant scientists. He found in America the kind of intellectual and operational freedom that did not exist in the rigid, monarch-controlled, Austro-Hungarian Empire. He developed patents and techniques that formed the technological bases of radio, telephone long distance, TV, cell phones, Wi Fi, just to name a few. Most important he was Thomas Edison’s great nemesis. Edison invented DC electric generators that could power factories or entire streets in a neighborhood. Tesler invented and developed AC electrical technology which could power entire cities and he could move electricity over long distances which Edison could not. Tesler was one of the first scientists to conceive of and try to implement “Big Science” where there were huge capital investments to develop machines and systems to do what had never been done before—philosophically like the CERN Hadron Collider. Tesler even convinced a large corporation to finance the construction of a massive building and tower so he could experiment with the wireless transmission of electricity. However, as the industrial democracies have learned, Big Science can only be funded by governments and it often takes sever working in consort to afford the huge investment that is required. In Tesler’s era, the federal and state governments did not fund scientific research so his work was not only technically ahead of his time but also conceptually. He anticipated most of the problems and need for a national power grid that was challenging America even at the beginning of the 21st century.
Borden invented some of the basic methods of preserving food and assuring uncontaminated food—especially with dairy products.
When politicians make bad decisions or choose bad alternatives, there is usually a price which involves use of tax money and sometimes the sacrifice of life itself. In the case to which McCain was referring, the George W. Bush Administration had gone to war against Iraq for reasons that turned out not to be true, and then after a military victory with few casualties, botched the occupation of the country and a vicious insurgency developed bogging down the nation in its longest war in history. The major burden fell on the armed forces and their families while all Americans endured the highest financial deficits in the nation’s history.
He wrote this essay anonymously and signed it as “A Lover Of Peace”