I wonder if you could get Andre Codrescu to talk about it. He's a writer and does some experimental and surrealist writing, but he used to be a contributor on NPR and has written a lot about Ceausecu.

It wouldn't be exactly historically pertinent, but he could tell you about opposition and arts there. He had a podcast called Walls and Curtains that was kind of on that topic.

https://www.codrescu.com/

Was this a real incident, or fiction?

A family member has told a story for years about an airliner hijacking around 1970 where the U.S. military from Ft. Hood, TX, used machine guns to sever the tail section of the hijacked airliner, rendering it useless and thus ending the hijacking. They say that they witnessed it.

I am guessing from the story that it could have been at any area airport, even as far away as San Antonio, Dallas, or Houston.

I have looked for anything on this several times over several years and haven't found anything on it. Did this really happen, or is it just a made up story to share with and try to impress the family?

Thanks for ANY information.

Finished Cry Havoc:: The Arms Race and the Second World War 1931-41 by Joe Maiolo (review copied from Goodreads)

4>.25/5

>The book starts with the First Five Year Plan in the Soviet Union in 1928 and ends with the USA's entry into WWII. Covers a wide range of topics including economics, political divides (left vs right in the 1930s France for example), factional disputes and arguements between different military services (the Japanese army vs navy but also things the British navy and airforce competing for funding etc), the logic of the various political leaders and the reasons for their decisions etc. There is also a lot on how business leaders responded to rearmament (a mix of positivity due to the extra business with fears over the level of state intervention and control) and how democratic leaders tried to rearm without causing their countries to fall into being totalitarian states. The book is more positive about the prewar democracies than in the traditional 'appeasement' viewpoint, with a lot of focus on how they effectively rearmed. For example when the book comes to the fall of France the author blames that more on French military leadership and intelligence mistakes than any particular prewar economic or political failures of the Third Republic. There are some chapters on the USSR, Japan and the USA but the bulk of the book is about Britain, France, Germany and Italy. While the book does have lots of statistics (steel production, workforces, aircraft production etc) it doesn't feel like constant non-stop numbers. In terms of the different military areas I'd say the book priotises aviation the most, then naval and finally the land forces (artillery, tanks etc) the least.

>The book is 400 pages of (in the edition I read) rather small writing so it took me longer than I thought I would, but I still enjoyed it. I'd recommend it if you are interested in the politics and leadup to WWII but I would say you would benefit from going in with a basic knowledge of the big events and names. Not a first book on the time period. While it is a complex topic I'd say for comparison this book is a well easier read, in terms of writing and terminology, than The Wages of Destruction by Adam Tooze.

Now reading Confronting Leviathan: A History of Ideas by David Runciman which is basically summing up the works and ideas (mainly around the state and control) of various important thinkers starting with Hobbes then going onwards from that to more recent ones (I'm nearly halfway through the book and it is up to Marx and Engels). It's based on a podcast called Talking Politics which I've never listened to.

Hello! First time poster — I’m looking for resources about Hungarian and Romanian relations and politics between the 1960s and 2000. A LOT happened — Nicolas Ceausescu, the fall of the iron curtain, the rise of capitalism, massive inflation, to even begin the list —that we don’t learn a lot about in America, and the search is daunting.

I’m making a podcast, and I’m trying to get the lay of the land. Also, if anyone here is a scholar or researcher that would like to be interviewed for the podcast at some point, please let me know.

I've got a couple of things you might be interested in. There's the Atlantic World of Anthony Benezet. He's kind of the OG of protestant abolitionism in the Americas. It's a collection edited by Marie-Jeane Rossignol and Bertrand Ruymbeke.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/31110792-the-atlantic-world-of-anthony-benezet-1713-1784

There was a good interview with Luke Harlow on the New Books network about his book on religion and abolitionism and slavery in Kentucky. He claims Kentucky is great to examine the issues b/c it was a microcosm of everything else going on in the US at the time. https://newbooksnetwork.com/luke-e-harlow-religion-race-and-the-making-of-confederate-kentucky-1830-1880-cambridge-up-2014-4

PBS has an episode of Africans in America on Lemuel Haynes which is also worth checking out. I might also look for stuff on Richard Allen and Absalom Jones.

I have long been interested in the influence of religious movements on the abolitionist movement in America in the 18th and 19th centuries, but I haven't found any good books or sources on my own about this part of the history. I was hoping to find a good list of starter books to explore this topic in more detail, or even biographies on major figures in this vein. Thanks in advance!

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I read Maria Arana's book, Silver, Sword, and Stone last week. It's not really a history book, but I didn't figure that out until about halfway through. In the epilogue she says it's not a history book and that probably would have worked better in the preface. But it was an interesting read. It tried to trace back problems in Latin America to the conquest by focusing on silver mining and greed, violence (sword), and religion (stone).

It was an interesting book and I enjoyed it. I'm not sure I found her argument very convincing b/c I lean towards the institutionalists' explanation. But it was a good book. She uses interesting people to try and highlight her points. There was some really interesting stuff on the modern impact of mining in South America. B/c of the current state of Venezuela most of the mining there is illegal with huge environmental repercussions. It wasn't very long and covered a lot of territory. It's a decent survey of the topic and would make a good airplane book. I don't think I'd recommend it if you already know something on the topic.

That's on my list. She did an interview on History Extra Podcast a little bit ago. The website wants me to sign up for premium for a link, but I found it in my podcast app easily.

Could you link to some of those reviews please?

Recently finished the first book, and I absolutely loved it! Definitely checking out the second one as well. Thanks for the recommendation!

Imperial twilight: the opium war and the end of china's last golden age by Stephen Platt A book covering the opium wars, the China trade, and political dealings between China the u.k France and the USA. Starting with attempts by the British to establish a consulate in the imperial city in Beijing and ending with the burning and looting of the summer palace

Autumn in the heavenly kingdom by Stephen Platt A book about the taiping heavenly kingdom and its war with the waning qing dynasty. It makes some comparisons with the US Civil War I.e the quest for the taiping and confederate rebel quest for international recognition and diplomatic relations and trade. It covers the start of the rebellion, foreign mercenaries and the massive, multi front campaign to destroy the taiping

Hey everyone, happy Wednesday!

Just wrapped up Caroline Pennock's On Savage Shores: How Indigenous Americans Discovered Europeand found it to be a fantastic analysis and retelling of account where Native American/First Nations' people went to Europe post-1492. The book is also well-written, with a great flow, and does an excellentjkb of relaying the Native American/First Nations experience and perspective

For the Roman Empire I recommend Chris Scarre's Chronicle of the Roman emperors.

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Right it also was an attempt to take advantage of the Gallic numbers. The Roman's had repeatedly shown they were the master of the pitched battle due to organization. While the Gallic warriors by themselves were outstanding warriors. By pinning the Roman against a fortified position that had to be fully encircled the Roman forces would have to be spread thin and struggle to maneuver. so it would hopefully turn into into an extended meat grinder. It wasn't too late either. The Roman forces were very close to be overwhelmed during the battle. I think Vercingetorix underestimated the Roman's ability to fortify and stay in his position. In all it was a very ballsy move since Caesar's army was very large too and he was deep into Gallic territory once behind his wall no more supplies would get to him either.

I always wondered why Vercingetorix didn't kick all civilians out of the city early though.

What period in particular are you looking for?

For podcasts, The History of Byzantium podcast is very good

As is Mike Duncan's "Revolutions" podcast (which is excellent). Its not meant to be about "Europe" specifically, but you get dedicated seasons on English, French (several), Russian, and general 1800s European revolutions.

Also the episodes about non-European revolution (American, Haitian, South American) are still very European heavy, since A. They typically inspired or were inspired by other revolutions in Europe, B. Those revolutions in the Americas were... colonies throwing off their European rule. The Haitian revolution is French history. The wars of Simon Bolivar are absolutely Spanish history, etc.

Big point here, the Revolutions entire podcast series makes a great unintentional education on modern European history, because

Reason 1, it gives the chronological story of "how did Europe go from pretty much all monarchies, to pretty much NOT monarchies?" (only 12 out of 44 European countries still have monarchs, and only 1, the Vatican, is still an actual "absolute monarchy" i.e., the monarch has final say decision making power)

Reason 2, those revolutions are all connected. Its less about a list of national events, and more about a string of dominoes.

The process of Europe as a whole doing away with rule by monarch, is sort of like one big, 235 year, rolling brush fire. The podcast walks you through the entire thing, from "it was a hot day with some dry grass" to "when we sift through all these ashes"

Agree with u/en43rs 's answer, so I'll just add some follow on thoughts in line with that

First thought, if you start your question with "Besides the Romans" I'd feel like every logical reason that makes you want to exclude the Romans as a too obvious answer, excludes the Greeks for the same reasons.

Then, as previously noted, you really can't begin to scope this question until you narrow it down to what type of impact you're looking for.

Let's start with Language for a moment though.

Beyond the root influence of languages (Greek, Roman, German, Chinese, etc) lets take a look at modern spread of languages as we know them today.

How many nations speak English? Spanish? Arabic?

The point of that question is not to say "oh look how great an impact those countries had on the languages we speak today". The point of that question is to hint at... hmm... WHY do the countries that speak their languages speak them? How did that happen? I.e., how many nations fell under those empires control, to the point of still having assimilated to their culture even today.

Spain recalibrated the entire future of the majority of the Americas, and the number of Spanish speaking countries in the West is pretty much a road map of that.

And HOW great was the impact of the Spanish Golden age and the territory they took over?

Well, there is a pretty fair argument that for all the attention American and French colonial slavery gets, the reality is the Spanish were major drivers in the Trans Atlantic slave trade.

Also, what about the physical, ethnic, genetic impact?

What do the Spanish and the Mongols for example, have in common?

The fact (at least I would argue) that the entire ethnic/cultural/genetic make up of entire regions was drastically, and irreversibly changed by the massive part of the native populations they either displaced or exterminate though conquest.

Put simply, there are ethno-cultural groups that used to live in regions, but don't, and maybe no longer exist at all, because the Mongols, Conquistadors, etc outright killed them. (Killed as in on the spot killed, or killed as in rounded up and sent to the silver mines until they were used up, etc etc)

what part of Russian history are you looking for? Russian history covers a ton of ground.

I know you asked for a book, not a podcast, but if you just want some great familiarization in a coherent (but massive) timeline,

Mike Duncan's Revolutions podcast (free) go straight to Season 10, which the Russian revolution from the leading before it (episode one starts 1864) about 100+ episodes later to the struggles of the USSR

(and FWIW, Duncan lists his sources on his website, so if you want to dig in yourself you get a good reading list)

Just finished this series on Audible. Very good, fairly comprehensive and you will pick up a lot of history in oft neglected regions in university level History of Civilization courses. Broad overviews of Japan, China and Korea were enlightening.

I read somewhere that a union officer was interviewed about “amphibious assults” (I don’t think that’s what it was called but that’s what what it is. It was after a battle in the western theatre) and asked if the army or navy was more important. He replied along the lines of “the blades of a pair of shears are useful alone but together can do so much more”. I don’t remember the exact quote, who said it (though I believe it was an admiral) or where I even read it. I can’t find any info on it. Does anyone know who said it?

The early archeologists teams throwing rocks at each other when their digs were close was my favorite part.

I found sapiens interesting, and it's an okay start. But you'll get the most out of it if you read some critical reviews of it once you finish. That gives you a much more rounded understanding of the topic. I do it for every history/science book I read

For a more entertaining take, try Larry Gonick's 'The Cartoon History of the Universe' and 'The Cartoon History of the World'.

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