Second Battle of the Piave River
The Second Battle of the Piave River, fought between 15 and 23 June 1918, was a decisive victory for the Italian Army against the Austro-Hungarian Empire during World War I. Though the battle proved to be a decisive blow to the Austro-Hungarian Empire and by extension the Central Powers, its full significance was not appreciated in Italy, yet Erich Ludendorff, on hearing the news, is reported to have said he'had the sensation of defeat for the first time'. It would become clear that the battle was in fact the beginning of the end of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. With the exit of Russia from the war in 1917, Austria-Hungary was now able to devote significant forces to the Italian Front and to receive reinforcements from their German allies; the Austro-Hungarian emperor Karl had reached an agreement with the Germans to undertake a new offensive against Italy, a move supported by both the chief of the general staff Arthur Arz von Straußenburg and the commander of the South Tyrolean Army Group Conrad von Hötzendorf.
In the autumn of 1917, the Germans and Austrians had defeated the Italians at the Battle of Caporetto. After Caporetto, the Italians fell back to the Piave and were reinforced by six French infantry divisions and five British infantry divisions as well as sizeable air contingents. Italy's defeat at Caporetto led to General Luigi Cadorna's dismissal and General Armando Diaz replaced him as Chief of staff of the Italian Army. Diaz set up a strong defense line along the Piave. Up until this point in the war, the Italian army had been fighting alone against the Central Powers. These, besides accounting for less than a tenth of the Italian forces in theater, had however to be redirected for the major part to the Western Front as soon as the German Spring Offensive began in March 1918; the Austro-Hungarian Army had recently undergone a change in command, the new Austrian Chief of Staff, Arthur Arz von Straußenburg, wished to finish off the Italians. After Caporetto, the Austro-Hungarian offensive had put many Italian cities, including Venice and Verona, under the threat of the Central Powers.
Austria's army had since longed to achieve these strategic prizes and force Italy into an armistice. Straußenburg's army group commanders, Conrad von Hötzendorf and Svetozar Boroević von Bojna, both wished to make a decisive assault against the Italians, but could not agree about the location of the attack. Conrad wanted an attack from the South Tyrolean Alps towards Vicenza. Boroević first favored a defensive action, but when pressed preferred a frontal attack along the Piave River. Straußenburg himself was in favour of an attack on the western part of the front leading to Brescia. Conrad and Boroević had a dislike for each other, Straußenburg and the emperor, unable to decide between these two strong personalities, divided the army between them, reserving only a small part of the forces for a diversionary action on the Giudicarie sector; the preparation of the offensive began in February 1918, after a meeting in Bolzano between the Austrian and German high commands. It was recommended by the Germans, as Ludendorff hoped that it could force the increasing American forces in France to be diverted to the Italian front, so Straußenburg modeled the attack after Erich Ludendorff's offensive on the Western Front.
The Austro-Hungarians, differently from their previous success at Caporetto and from the subsequent attempts to breakthrough on Monte Grappa, did not prepare the attack as a pinpoint one, but as an all-out frontal attack, employing the entire residual strength of their army all along the front. The Austro-Hungarian formations were trained to employ the tactics developed by the Germans on the Western Front for Operation Michael, as Austrian officers returning from the Eastern Front were extensively trained alongside their German counterparts. There were innovations on the Italian side. Analyzing the defeat of Caporetto, the staff of Armando Diaz concluded that the main tactical causes of it were the lack of mobility of Italian units, caught in a too rigid defensive scheme, the too centralized command and control system, the lack of depth of Italian defences, where too many soldiers were stuck on the frontline; the new schemes prepared for the battle led to the abolition of the continuous entrenchment and in the development of a mobile defence system, in which the smaller units were allowed to move between recognized strongpoints, independently decide to retreat or counterattack, or directly call the support of the artillery.
Moreover, 13 divisions, equipped with 6000 trucks, were organized in a central reserve, ready to be sent where it was needed. General Diaz learned the exact timing of the Austrian attack: 3:00 a.m. on 15 June, so at 2:30 a.m. the Italian artillery opened fire all along their front on the crowded enemy trenches, inflicting heavy casualties. In some sectors the artillery barrage had the effect of delaying or stopping the attack, as Austrian soldiers began to retreat to their defensive positions, believing they had to face an unexpected Italian attack, but on the greater part of the front the Austrians still attacked as planned. Boroević launched the first assault, moving south along the Adriatic coast and in the middle course of the Piave River; the Austrians were able to cross the Piave and gained a bridgehead 15 miles wide and 5 miles deep in the face of Italian heavy resistance, before Boroević was stopped and forced to order a retreat. On the subsequent days Boroević renewed the assault, but the artillery barrage destroyed many of the river's bridges and the Austrian
Anthropomorphism
Anthropomorphism is the attribution of human traits, emotions, or intentions to non-human entities. It is considered to be an innate tendency of human psychology. Personification is the related attribution of human form and characteristics to abstract concepts such as nations and natural forces, such as seasons and weather. Both have ancient roots as storytelling and artistic devices, most cultures have traditional fables with anthropomorphized animals as characters. People have routinely attributed human emotions and behavioral traits to wild as well as domesticated animals. Anthropomorphism derives from its verb form anthropomorphize, itself derived from the Greek ánthrōpos and morphē, it is first attested in 1753 in reference to the heresy of applying a human form to the Christian God. From the beginnings of human behavioral modernity in the Upper Paleolithic, about 40,000 years ago, examples of zoomorphic works of art occur that may represent the earliest evidence we have of anthropomorphism.
One of the oldest known is an ivory sculpture, the Löwenmensch figurine, Germany, a human-shaped figurine with the head of a lioness or lion, determined to be about 32,000 years old. It is not possible to say. A more recent example is The Sorcerer, an enigmatic cave painting from the Trois-Frères Cave, Ariège, France: the figure's significance is unknown, but it is interpreted as some kind of great spirit or master of the animals. In either case there is an element of anthropomorphism; this anthropomorphic art has been linked by archaeologist Steven Mithen with the emergence of more systematic hunting practices in the Upper Palaeolithic. He proposes that these are the product of a change in the architecture of the human mind, an increasing fluidity between the natural history and social intelligences, where anthropomorphism allowed hunters to identify empathetically with hunted animals and better predict their movements. In religion and mythology, anthropomorphism is the perception of a divine being or beings in human form, or the recognition of human qualities in these beings.
Ancient mythologies represented the divine as deities with human forms and qualities. They resemble human beings not only in personality; the deities fell in love, had children, fought battles, wielded weapons, rode horses and chariots. They feasted on special foods, sometimes required sacrifices of food and sacred objects to be made by human beings; some anthropomorphic deities represented specific human concepts, such as love, fertility, beauty, or the seasons. Anthropomorphic deities exhibited human qualities such as beauty and power, sometimes human weaknesses such as greed, hatred and uncontrollable anger. Greek deities such as Zeus and Apollo were depicted in human form exhibiting both commendable and despicable human traits. Anthropomorphism in this case is, more anthropotheism. From the perspective of adherents to religions in which humans were created in the form of the divine, the phenomenon may be considered theomorphism, or the giving of divine qualities to humans. Anthropomorphism has cropped up as a Christian heresy prominently with the Audians in third century Syria, but in fourth century Egypt and tenth century Italy.
This was based on a literal interpretation of Genesis 1:27: "So God created man in His own image, in the image of God created He him. Some religions and philosophers objected to anthropomorphic deities; the earliest known criticism was that of the Greek philosopher Xenophanes who observed that people model their gods after themselves. He argued against the conception of deities as fundamentally anthropomorphic: But if cattle and horses and lions had handsor could paint with their hands and create works such as men do,horses like horses and cattle like cattlealso would depict the gods' shapes and make their bodiesof such a sort as the form they themselves have.... Ethiopians say that their gods are snub -- blackThracians that they are pale and red-haired. Xenophanes said that "the greatest god" resembles man "neither in form nor in mind". Both Judaism and Islam reject an anthropomorphic deity, believing that God is beyond human comprehension. Judaism's rejection of an anthropomorphic deity grew during the Hasmonean period, when Jewish belief incorporated some Greek philosophy.
Judaism's rejection grew further after the Islamic Golden Age in the tenth century, which Maimonides codified in the twelfth century, in his thirteen principles of Jewish faith. Hindus do not reject the concept of a deity in the abstract unmanifested, but note practical problems. Lord Krishna said in the Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 12, Verse 5, that it is much more difficult for people to focus on a deity as the unmanifested than one with form, using anthropomorphic icons, because people need to perceive with their senses. In Faces in the Clouds, anthropologist Stewart Guthrie proposes that all religions are anthropomorphisms that originate in the brain's tendency to detect the presence or vestiges of other humans in natural phenomena. In secular thought, one of the most notable criticisms began in 1600 with Francis Bacon, who argued against Aristotle's teleology, which declared that everything behaves as it does in order to achieve some end, in order to fulfill itself. Bacon pointed out that achieving ends is a human activity and to attribute it to nature misconstrues it as humanlike.
Modern criticisms followed Bacon's ideas such as critiques
Battle of Arras (1917)
The Battle of Arras was a British offensive on the Western Front during World War I. From 9 April to 16 May 1917, British troops attacked German defences near the French city of Arras on the Western Front; the British achieved the longest advance since trench warfare had begun, surpassing the record set by the French Sixth Army on 1 July 1916. The British advance slowed in the next few days and the German defence recovered; the battle became a costly stalemate for both sides and by the end of the battle, the British Third and First Army had suffered about 160,000 and the German 6th Army about 125,000 casualties. For much of the war, the opposing armies on the Western Front were at stalemate, with a continuous line of trenches from the Belgian coast to the Swiss border; the Allied objective from early 1915 was to break through the German defences into the open ground beyond and engage the numerically inferior German Army in a war of movement. The British attack at Arras was part of the French Nivelle Offensive, the main part of, the Second Battle of the Aisne 50 miles to the south.
The aim of the French offensive was to break through the German defences in forty-eight hours. At Arras the Canadians were to re-capture Vimy Ridge, dominating the Douai Plain to the east, advance towards Cambrai and divert German reserves from the French front; the British effort was an assault on a broad front between Vimy in the north-west and Bullecourt to the south-east. After a long preparatory bombardment, the Canadian Corps of the First Army in the north fought the Battle of Vimy Ridge and took the ridge; the Third Army in the centre advanced astride the Scarpe River and in the south, the British Fifth Army attacked the Hindenburg Line but made few gains. The British armies engaged in a series of small operations to consolidate the new positions. Although these battles were successful in achieving limited aims, they came at considerable cost; when the battle ended on 16 May, the British had made significant advances but had been unable to achieve a breakthrough. New tactics and the equipment to exploit them had been used, showing that the British had absorbed the lessons of the Battle of the Somme and could mount set-piece attacks against fortified field defences.
After the Second Battle of Bullecourt, the Arras sector became a quiet front, that typified most of the war in the west, except for attacks on the Hindenburg Line and around Lens, culminating in the Canadian Battle of Hill 70. At the beginning of 1917, the British and French were still searching for a way to achieve a strategic breakthrough on the Western Front; the previous year had been marked by the costly success of the Anglo-French offensive astride the River Somme, while the French had been unable to take the initiative because of intense German pressure at Verdun until after August 1916. The battles consumed enormous quantities of resources while achieving no strategic gains on the battlefield; the cost to Germany of containing the Anglo-French attacks had been enormous and given that the material preponderance of the Entente and its allies could only be expected to increase in 1917, Hindenburg and Ludendorff decided on a defensive strategy on the Western Front for that year. This impasse reinforced the French and British commanders' belief that to end the stalemate they needed a breakthrough.
The mid-war years were momentous times. Governing politicians in Paris and London were under great pressure from the press, the people and their parliaments to win the war. Hundreds of thousands of casualties had been suffered at the battles of Gallipoli, the Somme and Verdun, with little prospect of victory in sight; the British Prime Minister, H. H. Asquith, resigned in early December 1916 and was succeeded by David Lloyd George. In France, Prime Minister Aristide Briand, along with Minister of Defence Hubert Lyautey were politically diminished and resigned in March 1917, following disagreements over the prospective Nivelle Offensive; the United States was close to declaring war on Germany. The United States Congress declared war on Imperial Germany on 6 April 1917 but it would be more than a year before a suitable army could be raised and transported to France. Although the French and British had intended to launch a spring offensive in 1917, the strategy was threatened in February, when the Russians admitted that they could not meet the commitment to a joint offensive, which reduced the two-front offensive to a French assault along the Aisne River.
In March, the German army in the west, withdrew to the Hindenburg line in Operation Alberich, which negated the tactical assumptions underlying the plans for the French offensive. Until French troops advanced to compensate during the Battles of Arras, they encountered no German troops in the assault sector and it became uncertain whether the offensive would go forward; the French government needed a victory to avoid civil unrest but the British were wary of proceeding, in view of the changing tactical situation. In a meeting with Lloyd George, French commander-in-chief General Robert Nivelle persuaded the British Prime Minister, that if the British launched a diversionary assault to draw German troops away from the Aisne sector, the French offensive could succeed, it was agreed in the London Convention of 16 January
David Copperfield
David Copperfield is the eighth novel by Charles Dickens. The novel's full title is The Personal History, Adventures and Observation of David Copperfield the Younger of Blunderstone Rookery, it was first published as a serial in 1849–50, as a book in 1850. The novel features the character David Copperfield, is written in the first person, as a description of his life until middle age, with his own adventures and the numerous friends and enemies he meets along his way, it is his journey of change and growth from infancy to maturity, as people enter and leave his life and he passes through the stages of his development. It has been called his masterpiece, "the triumph of the art of Dickens", which marks a turning point in his work, the point of separation between the novels of youth and those of maturity. Though written in the first person, David Copperfield is considered to be more than an autobiography, going beyond this framework in the richness of its themes and the originality of its writing, which makes it a true autobiographical novel.
In the words of the author, this novel was "a complicated weaving of truth and invention". Some elements of the novel follow events in Dickens's own life, it was Dickens' favourite among his own novels. In the preface to the 1867 edition, Dickens wrote, "like many fond parents, I have in my heart of hearts a favourite child, and his name is David Copperfield."Dickens wrote this novel without an outline, unlike the way he wrote Dombey and Son, the previous novel. He wrote chapter summaries; some aspects of the story were fixed in his mind from the start, but others, like the obsession of Mr Dick with Charles I, the profession of David Copperfield as a writer, the sad fate of Dora, were not decided by Dickens until the serial publications were underway. At first glance, the work is modeled in the loose and somewhat disjointed way of "personal histories", popular in the United Kingdom of the 18th century, it begins, like other novels by Dickens, with a rather bleak painting of the conditions of childhood in Victorian England, notoriously when the troublesome children are parked in infamous boarding schools he strives to trace the slow social and intimate ascent of a young man who, painfully providing for the needs of his good aunt while continuing his studies, ends up becoming a writer.
The novel has the changes that occur on the way to maturity. In addition, Dickens included many aspects of Victorian Era life that he wanted to highlight or wished to change, which were integrated into the story, using satire as one device; the plight of prostitutes and the attitude of middle class society to them, the status of women in marriage, the rigid class structure, are aspects that he highlighted, while the system for handling criminals, the quality of schools, the employment of children in the fast-spreading factories of the 19th century were aspects he wished to influence, to change for the better. He, among other authors, achieved success in bringing about changes regarding child labor and schooling for more children up to age 12; the story follows the life of David Copperfield from childhood to maturity. David was born in Blunderstone, England, six months after the death of his father. David spends his early years in relative happiness with his loving, childish mother and their kindly housekeeper, Clara Peggotty.
They call him Davy. When he is seven years old his mother marries Edward Murdstone. To get him out of the way, David is sent to lodge with Peggotty's family in Yarmouth, her brother, fisherman Mr Peggotty, lives in a house built in an upturned boat on the beach, with his adopted relatives Emily and Ham, an elderly widow, Mrs Gummidge. "Little Em'ly" is somewhat spoiled by her fond foster father, David is in love with her. They call him Master Copperfield. On his return, David is given good reason to dislike his stepfather, who believes in firmness, has similar feelings for Murdstone's sister Jane, who moves into the house soon afterwards. Between them they tyrannize his poor mother, making her and David's lives miserable, when, in consequence, David falls behind in his studies, Murdstone attempts to thrash him – to further pain his mother. David bites him and soon afterwards is sent away to Salem House, a boarding school, under a ruthless headmaster named Mr Creakle. There he befriends an older boy, James Steerforth, Tommy Traddles.
He develops an impassioned admiration for Steerforth, perceiving him as someone noble, who could do great things if he would, one who pays attention to him. David goes home for the holidays to learn. Shortly after David returns to Salem House, his mother and her baby die, David returns home immediately. Peggotty marries the local carrier, Mr Barkis. Murdstone sends David to work for a wine merchant in London – a business of which Murdstone is a joint owner. David's landlord, Wilkins Micawber, is arrested for debt and sent to the King's Bench Prison, where he remains for several months, before being released and moving to Plymouth. No one remains to care for David in London, so he decides to run away, with Micawber advising him to head to Dover, to find his only known remaining relative, his eccentric and kind-hearted great-aunt Betsey Trotwood, she had come to Blunderstone at his birth, only to depart in ire upon learning that he was not a girl. However, she takes pity on him and agrees to ra
Demobilization
Demobilization or demobilisation is the process of standing down a nation's armed forces from combat-ready status. This may be as a result of victory in war, or because a crisis has been peacefully resolved and military force will not be necessary; the opposite of demobilization is mobilization. Forceful demobilization of a defeated enemy is called demilitarization. In the final days of World War II, for example, the United States Armed Forces developed a demobilization plan which would discharge soldiers on the basis of a point system that favoured length and certain types of service; the British armed forces were demobilised according to an "age-and-service" scheme. The phrase demob happy refers to demobilization and is broadly applied to the feeling of relief at imminent release from a time-serving burden, such as a career. In the Russian language it is known as dembel and has become a certain tradition in the Soviet and post-Soviet Armed Forces. A United States equivalent is "short-timer's disease", comparable to "senioritis" among United States high-school students.
19th of April Movement Demobilization of United States armed forces after World War II World War 2 UK Demobilization Centres Demob suit Disarmament and reintegration Military discharge E McGaughey,'Will Robots Automate Your Job Away? Full Employment, Basic Income, Economic Democracy' SSRN, part 3
A. A. Milne
Alan Alexander Milne was a British author, best known for his books about the teddy bear Winnie-the-Pooh and for various poems. Milne was a noted writer as a playwright, before the huge success of Pooh overshadowed all his previous work. Milne served in both World Wars, joining the British Army in World War I, was a captain of the British Home Guard in World War II. Alan Alexander Milne was born in Kilburn, London to parents John Vine Milne, born in Jamaica, Sarah Marie Milne and grew up at Henley House School, 6/7 Mortimer Road, Kilburn, a small public school run by his father. One of his teachers was H. G. Wells, who taught there in 1889–90. Milne attended Westminster School and Trinity College, Cambridge where he studied on a mathematics scholarship, graduating with a B. A. in Mathematics in 1903. He wrote for Granta, a student magazine, he collaborated with his brother Kenneth and their articles appeared over the initials AKM. Milne's work came to the attention of the leading British humour magazine Punch, where Milne was to become a contributor and an assistant editor.
Considered a talented cricket fielder, Milne played for two amateur teams that were composed of British writers: the Allahakbarries and the Authors XI. His teammates included fellow writers Arthur Conan Doyle and P. G. Wodehouse. Milne joined the British Army in World War I and served as an officer in the Royal Warwickshire Regiment and after a debilitating illness, the Royal Corps of Signals, he was commissioned into the 4th Battalion, Royal Warwickshire Regiment on 1 February 1915 as a second lieutenant. His commission was confirmed on 20 December 1915. On 7 July 1916, he was injured while serving in the Battle of the Somme and invalided back to England. Having recuperated, he was recruited into Military Intelligence to write propaganda articles for MI7 between 1916 and 1918, he was discharged on 14 February 1919, settled in Mallord Street, Chelsea. He relinquished his commission on 19 February 1920. After the war, he wrote a denunciation of war titled Peace with Honour, which he retracted somewhat with 1940's War with Honour.
During World War II, Milne was one of the most prominent critics of fellow English writer P. G. Wodehouse, captured at his country home in France by the Nazis and imprisoned for a year. Wodehouse made radio broadcasts about his internment. Although the light-hearted broadcasts made fun of the Germans, Milne accused Wodehouse of committing an act of near treason by cooperating with his country's enemy. Wodehouse got some revenge on his former friend by creating fatuous parodies of the Christopher Robin poems in some of his stories, claiming that Milne "was jealous of all other writers.... But I loved his stuff."Milne married Dorothy "Daphne" de Sélincourt in 1913 and their son Christopher Robin Milne was born in 1920. In 1925, Milne bought Cotchford Farm, in Hartfield, East Sussex. During World War II, Milne was Captain of the British Home Guard in Hartfield & Forest Row, insisting on being plain "Mr. Milne" to the members of his platoon, he retired to the farm after a stroke and brain surgery in 1952 left him an invalid, by August 1953 "he seemed old and disenchanted."
Milne died in January 1956, aged 74. After graduating from Cambridge College in 1903, A. A. Milne contributed humorous verse and whimsical essays to Punch, joining the staff in 1906 and becoming an assistant editor. During this period he published 18 plays and three novels, including the murder mystery The Red House Mystery, his son was born in August 1920 and in 1924 Milne produced a collection of children's poems, When We Were Very Young, which were illustrated by Punch staff cartoonist E. H. Shepard. A collection of short stories for children A Gallery of Children, other stories that became part of the Winnie-the-Pooh books, were first published in 1925. Milne was an early screenwriter for the nascent British film industry, writing four stories filmed in 1920 for the company Minerva Films; these were The Bump. Some of these films survive in the archives of the British Film Institute. Milne had met Howard Mr Pim Passes By in London. Looking back on this period, Milne observed that when he told his agent that he was going to write a detective story, he was told that what the country wanted from a "Punch humorist" was a humorous story.
He concluded that "the only excuse which I have yet discovered for writing anything is that I want to write it. Milne is most famous for his two Pooh books about a boy named Christopher Robin after his son, Christopher Robin Milne, various characters inspired by his son's stuffed animals, most notably the bear named Winnie-the-Pooh. Christopher Robin Milne's stuffed bear named "Edward," was renamed "Winnie" after a Canadian black bear named Winnie, used as a military mascot in World War I, left to London Zoo during the war. "The pooh" comes from
