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> There were not trenches in WWII. Not WWI-style, but I think there were a number of trenches. For example, Fortress Europe (Germany's efforts to secure Europe

> There were not trenches in WWII. Not WWI-style, but I think there were a number of trenches. For example, Fortress Europe (Germany's efforts to secure Europe), consisted of a number of Maginot Line-style entrenchments and tunnel complexes. I think that the Eastern Front also had a lot of that stuff. I believe that the Ukraine War is now featuring trenches, and I know that the Ethiopia/Eritrea War featured classic WWI-style trench warfare. WWII was real bad, and was one of the first modern wars to claim more civilian lives, than military. I think that's sort of become a standard feature of most wars, these days; even the small ones. I'm currently trying to figure out how my father[0] got a Silver Star, in Belgium, in WWII. He never told us, and the St. Louis fire destroyed his main records. It affected him badly. I think he fought in a similar fashion to this story. He was in mechanized artillery, but saw plenty of bad stuff, and was wounded twice. [0] https://cmarshall.com/miscellaneous/MikeMarshall.htm https://cmarshall.com/miscellaneous/MikeMarshall.htm

ricktdotorg 2y ago
that was a cool life your dad lived! hard, but he saw a lot and i'm sure became a better person because of that hardship. from eagle scout to omaha beach to CIA to idi amin-adjacent; wow! thank you for sharing. i enjoyed reading a little bit about your dad's exploits. /salute to Mike Marshall.
levinb 2y ago
Re your father; wow, what a life. Thanks for documenting that for us. My grandfather became a Navy navigator, B25s I think, right as the war ended. Chased hurricanes in the Pacific. I was the only person in the family to ever get much out of him about it in the last years before he passed. Even in peacetime operations, he watched many colleagues die in storms, fog, and from accidents. I think everyone who served then saw how arbitrary death could be, and how the entire service was designed to operate around the necessary assumption that lives would vanish for nothing - and that everything else had to keep humming along. Provides a very different perspective than the modern era.

ricktdotorg 2y ago

that was a cool life your dad lived! hard, but he saw a lot and i'm sure became a better person because of that hardship. from eagle scout to omaha beach to CIA to idi amin-adjacent; wow! thank you for sharing. i enjoyed reading a little bit about your dad's exploits. /salute to Mike Marshall.

levinb 2y ago

Re your father; wow, what a life. Thanks for documenting that for us. My grandfather became a Navy navigator, B25s I think, right as the war ended. Chased hurricanes in the Pacific. I was the only person in the family to ever get much out of him about it in the last years before he passed. Even in peacetime operations, he watched many colleagues die in storms, fog, and from accidents. I think everyone who served then saw how arbitrary death could be, and how the entire service was designed to operate around the necessary assumption that lives would vanish for nothing - and that everything else had to keep humming along. Provides a very different perspective than the modern era.