In his talks with his son, Manfred, Rommel's comments were not directed at Italians in general, but their horrible officer Corps (especially senior officers) who lived like kings while the EM were treated like serfs. That, and their poor tanks and AT guns led to very poor morale. He recognized that some Italian formations preformed well despite poor senior officers and equipment.
"An SB-17 Flying Fortress on Okinawa. Note the camel print in the front. This B17 had to have made a flight over "the hump"."
Yes, I have read that the Italian officers had massive apartments in Benghazi and had a nice time. And that under German officers Italian soldiers performed well in North Africa. Also that there were pro units like Trieste, Folgore etc that fought well.
"Japanese destroyer Yoizuki (宵月 "Evening Moon") moored at Kure, note her No.2 turret has been removed, 16 October 1945."
"Washday on a German Typ XIV "Milchkuh" supply U-Boat. The Boat is flooded on half diving cell and trimmed so it does not submerge. Therefore the crew has enough time to wash themselves. Somewhere in the Atlantic, date unknown." Is that 'neutral buoyancy'?
Milking U-boat and all else I would hold onto the wire at least. Quite a believer in the distance rom safety with the u-boat. Having watched the tv series of The US crews catching big crabs with cages the waves take men even if they are in the safety of the boat.
I am only seeing a "If you are looking for an image, it was probably deleted." message box. As there are not a lot of Milch cow at sea photos floating around on the internet, is it this one? If so, the boat is probably ballasted down at the stern to facilitate fuel transfer, the appears to be a hose by the stern. Another suggestion would be that the boat is still mostly loaded with fuel and supplies causing her to ride deeper in the water (loaded condition). Also, she could be what American submariners called "Riding the vents.", where the ballast tanks are almost filled, when the main air vents are closed - leaving just a little bit of positive buoyancy, but riding very low in the water. This was done when enemy contact was expected or imminent, as such a condition would allow for a much quicker dive. If the boat is on the surface, it still has positive buoyancy. Neutral buoyancy was once you submerged, you trimmed the boat so that it neither rose nor sank. Every so often, the boat would conduct a "trim dive", where it remained underwater just long enough to adjust the trim to achieve neutral buoyancy. This was done, because over time, the boat would lose it's neutral trim, with frequent trim dives, a boat required only minimal corrections to regain neutral buoyancy.
There were still, I believe, binocular guards to all directions for aeroplane attacks all the time. If they gave a warning , the guards would jump in and close the door.If you were too slow the other guard would land on your back. And immediate dive. Even during " the good times". Well, my view...interesting photo anyway.
The impression I got was that the boat was a steady ~1 or 2 feet below the surface. The men could walk around on the hull and hung on to a line to keep from getting washed off.
The author of the milkcow post agreed with the term "neutral buoyancy". He's a non-English speaker, the luck bastard.
Whats luck(y) about not speaking English? It's the world language...Even Americans speak it. If you don't know it you should learn it... If there are aliens, they have learnt English...
In Finland we learnt English, Swedish and German. Some also French or Russian. Unfortunately you don't always understand all the meanings of a sentence and you could mix a Monty Python sentence to a serious saying and vice versa. So far the weirdest English they spoke to me was in Liverpool. Then again we have some ten different ways to speak Finnish so not fair to anyone as we ourselves don' t understand our language in some areas.. But I love English the most of other languages as I read books in English one per week....
Interesting insight mate thanks... French competed with English for years as the global language...but lost in the end. Not surprising really...there are so many awesome songs and movies in English that one cannot help but want to understand better (not to mention how much money is tied up in English speaking countries)...I watch a bunch of European shows, one of my favourite is "Adam and Eve" where a man swims to an empty island, but not before taking all his clothes off and then a woman does the same and they meet on the beach naked...And see if they can hit it off...a few twists with an unexpected man or woman turning up half way through...the point of my story is that I was amazed at how many phrases the (Germans) used that they didn't translate to German but used the English language it came from. English is definatley penetrating Europe... Indians learn English in their millions...wanting to get a job in a lucrative country, they do this so well one can't help but be impressed. This is Indians trying to learn "Australian"...from the Delhi College of Linguistics...Of course a little language warning. Liverpudlians have their own special accent...the "scouse" accent to me is nice to the ear, but too difficult for some. But Britain is FULL of accents...20 miles in any direction and you will encounter a different accent.
Finland and the Nordic countries have films texted but I still think most other countries in Europe dub the films to their own language. Before EU the French even had a law that if there was English words even in an advertisement you might get up to two years of prison...during interrail in the 80's I had a friend who spoke French the people would not speak any other language.
With allot of the call centers located in India it is hard to avoid speaking with an Indian speaking persons. I find them difficult to understand. The delivery is sing songy and my old ears find it hard to follow especially if the speaker is female. If you ask for an English speaking person they always state they are speaking English. My usual reply is, " Yes,but you are not speaking American." Such is life, patience is the key.
As we have a translated text in films there are some juicy mistakes. My top2: A man is taking a woman to her home. When the woman is leaving the car the man still tries to get to spend the night. The woman says no to the man. When alone the man says according to the text " No desert tonight." Lost one s-letter. A military group in the desert. Enemy planes above. One of the group wishes they had some kind of AA gun. The translation turned the weapon into an "air rifle ." That sure would help alot. Now I leave it to pix.
I was sitting at a cafe Unter der Linden and heard two young ladies doing their English homework. They were struggling. At one point I had to interject, giving them the word they were looking for. One of the ladies groaned and thanked me. Then she said, "Do you really teach this to babies?" And "ubiquity is not congruent with quality."
"[1300 x 978]Three Hampden torpedo bombers attack USS Alabama (BB-60) and USS South Dakota (BB-57) during exercises with the Combined Fleet, taken from HMS Anson, June 24, 1943."