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Everybody to be about to enter let all hope behind you!
(Inscription above the gate to hell; Dante Alighieri in The Divine Comedy)
Course clear!
Authentic(?) radio communication between the aircraft carrier USS
Enterprise (USS) and a radar contact (Echo)
[according to P.M. 5/1999, p. 16]:
USS: Please change your course by 15 degrees to north to
avoid a collision.
Echo: Recommendation, you change your course by 15 degrees to
south.
USS: Here is the commander of a US warship. I repeat: Change your
course.
Echo: No, you'll change your course.
USS: This is the carrier vessel Enterprise. We are a very large
warship of the US Navy. Change your course - and do it now!
Echo: No we don't, we are a lighthouse.
Military correctness
Examples of the Book for Military Drill - Edition Army
and of the Zentrale Dienstvorschrift (ZDv; Engl.: Central
Regulations).
Once upon a time in the ZDv: With dusk closing in darkness
has to be taken into account.
ZDv: At water levels of more than 1.20 m swimming
movement has to be started independently.
Radio connections, F 65, chapter 331:
Call: »Lion to all, how do you receive me, over.«[...]
Possible reply: »Here Tiger, I cannot get you, over and out.«
([If] the words are not to be heard or to be
understood.)
Philosopher in uniform: A corporal after the room
inspection: »Everything is regular, clean and in due form.
But somehow - so unkind.«
Dismountable terminal
ramp
To be able to entrain heavy vehicles somewhere at the railroad
line the Bundeswehr has purchased dismountable loading ramps with
buffer-stop. Thus a small goods station may immediately arise. The
planers, however, didn't check that the railway embeds its rails
with ballast. And this ballast must be picked away at a length of
about 25 meters in order to completely lay open the sleepers.
No way out
[Source: ?] When the first pre-series of the Lockheed Starfighter
F-104 were produced, one was in fear that after the pilot had got
off with the ejector seat the force of the wind might throw him
against the high T-shaped tail causing serious or even deadly
injuries. Therefore one made the unusual decision to fire the
ejector seat downwards. During a test start, yet on the ground, the
engine caught fire and the pilot ...
Philosophy of life
After a heavy abuse by a corporal because of alternating left and
right closed belts of his guys, and the careful question how it
would be suitable then: »I don't know, too. But
uniform!«
Chicken nuggets
[Source: Urban legend?] After some incidents the air force decided
to study the effects of a collision between a jet and a bird. A
ground test range was built up in which one could shoot at aircraft
bodies with a special ordered high-speed catapult. High officers
were invited for the first tests and chickens as ammunition were
bought in the supermarket. The result was »effective«: The cockpit
glass was completely destroyed, the pilot's seat was penetrated as
well as the rear wall of the cockpit. Shocked one consulted an
engineering company to propose solutions: Some days later it came
out with the recommendation to defrost the chickens before
shooting.
Wörner Bros. 1985 - 1986 (after the Minister of Defense of those times)
Eminently it's true. According to Raymond M. Smullyan in: What is the Name of this Book?, Prentice-Hall, 1978:
The computer story I like the most deals with a military computer. The army had just launched a rocket to the moon. The General typed in two questions: (1) Will the rocket reach the moon? (2) Will the rocket return to the earth? The computer thought about it some time and then spilled out a card to read on: »Yes.« The General got furious; he didn't know whether the »Yes« was the answer to the first question, the second question or both at a time. Therefore he typed in angrily »Yes, what?« The computer thought about it some time and then a card came out with the printing: »Yes, Sir.«
Believe it or not - your track chain is flat.
Let shot come slowly!
Formation »Queue«
Edgy minded officer-in-command during a maneuver, Oberpfalz, 1986:
Only fools and lazybones get cold, hungry and wet.
By the way: Numerous recruits received serious frostbites during a winter maneuver, because of the non-functional equipment. Thus the GERMAN Bundeswehr accepted (after public pressure) winter equipment of the SWISS Army. After all since that time the Bundeswehr chiefs know - let's hope - that not only it may get dark at night, but also it may get cold in winter.
Extract of the labels on the meals of the Einmannpackung (Engl.: one man package; combat ration), also kindly named EPa warm parts:
The contents can be eaten even cold without a reduction in taste worth to mention.
Well, where nothing is... Even an inscription like »For dogs and soldiers only« wouldn't surprise. My tomcat Tom, however, shrank from them. And he even liked raw mice.
Ecclesiastical - catholic army chaplain in the »social knowledge lessons«, Amberg, 1986:
The commands of the superiors are god-deliberate.
Good to be Lutheran...
Experience when men were still all alone. A corporal before a maneuver, Amberg, 1986:
After 10 days in Grafenwöhr a woman's bike in 100 meter distance gets exciting.
As you know (perhaps) the German High Command has shown consideration... Since several years women may serve as well.
Enlighting - Bert Brecht's idea:
Imagine it's war - and nobody goes to it!
And up-to-date: Notice board, Chair for Computer-aided Circuit Design, Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg, Gulf War I, day 2, 1991:
Imagine it's war - and your TV isn't working!
©WP (1998 -) 2012
http://www.fen-net.de/walter.preiss/e/any_bund.html
Update: V8.4, 2012-03-02