12. Because if time travel is ever perfected, and you can bring all of them back to the Alamo, Davy Crockett, Bill Travis and Jim Bowie are going to think YOU THE MAN!Oh, admit it. Like you've never read a time travel story and thought "Dang, now if I had been there..."
In this spirit, I just finished re-reading Eric Flint's 1632
and, like always, came away thinking that the town of Grantville's biggest problem was that I didn't live there. "Okay, you five guys take these rifles in 8mm Mauser, and you five get these Mosins. You four get the .30-'06's, and make sure that the best shooter gets the Garand. K-frames for everybody!"
You oughta take a look thru Turtledove's Guns of the South, another fun time-travelling/ alternate history novel.
ReplyDeleteEric would have certainly acknowledged how well you would have fit in with the rest of Grantville, but he would have had you out of town at a gun show with your entire collection or something. He specifically wanted modern resources limited so as to force integration with the 1632 world rather than having the time travellers simply out shoot/blow up everything/one in sight.
ReplyDeleteHe said so on Baen's Bar. :)
Several of us gave him a bit of a hard time for his kinda cliche' weapons choices, but it was all post-publication so we were all stuck with them. Now, make my day and tell me you were one of us. :)
Who needs time travel? Just give the economy a few trillion dollars of that old Ben Bernanke magic, and bammo, we'll all be back in the 19th century fighting a civil war.
ReplyDelete*shudder*
Got tallow?
Also: ix-nay on the urtledove-tay. You should never mention the AK-47 around these parts...
Huh? Tam's an equal opportunity gun lady and I've seen her Norc AK under folder. If she still has it..
ReplyDeleteI found the enormous supply of primers and ammo somewhat humorous. I have a fair supply of ammo and I'd be hard pressed to supply a platoon for more than perhaps two good fights, unless .22LR was used.
Excellent series anyway and I enjoy them bunches.
Al T.
Meant to add:
ReplyDeleteWhat a fun filled thread, sort of like old times on TFL. 45king is alive and well by the way.
Al T.
@Mattexian...Doesn't Harry Turtledove have a doctorate in Byzantine History?
ReplyDeleteOn the original subject, there was a Time Tunnel episode wherein a guy from the 20th Century travels back to Troy, I think with a Thompson! Point made.
And Eric Flint has a masters in some sort of history.
ReplyDeleteI love the 1632 universe--my biggest issue with it is how big it got, and how hard it is to figure out which book to read next. In terms of problems to have, that one's not too bad.
I thoroughly enjoy the 1632 series, but must confess that I enjoy reading articles about steel-production methods and farm mechanization. The fiction ain't bad either.
ReplyDeletewv: cortedu. A very brief Italian college semester.
1632 has spawned a whole series. Perhaps a little (well a lot) too much 17th century politics and not enough blasting away with the Remington 742's but still ok. Flint's an ex coal miner unionist so you can forgive the leftist retoric.
ReplyDeleteI haven't thought of that thread, and its offspring, for YEARS. I recall one offshoot thread where we stipulated that the time travel device would move your body and 200 lbs of gear to the Alamo, so what would you bring? I think I loaded my answer up with a buncha .22 auto rifles.
ReplyDeleteI just finished "Written in Time" by Jerry Ahern. I like his writing and I've read all of his series, but that man needs an editor.
ReplyDeleteThere was a Twilight Zone episode on just this premise, having to do with the battle of Little Big Horn. It was all hetero-normative, and white-guys-are-the-best, and all, but it was an interesting Gedankenexperiment.
ReplyDeleteM'self? I think Custer got what he deserved. It's a damned shame he got all those other troopers killed.
Custer's behavior in Virginia, in the War, was sufficient to earn him a slow hanging, IMHO.
Oh, yeah, Mattexian. Molly (Melvin) Bean actually WAS a whore with a heart of gold. It all came right for her in the end, and she married Nate in the Baptist church.
ReplyDeleteI wonder what the boys at the Alamo could have done with a Daisycutter mounted up high on a wooden framework and disguised as a "water tower" out amongst the bad guys.
ReplyDeleteYou'd have to tell D.C. et al, "You'll want to go ahead and plug your ears for a minute... tee hee "
On a long car trip out west, about the time the John Wayne Alamo movie came out, my brother and I built up quite an extensive fantasy around the "time travel back to the Alamo, with modern weapons, and save the day" theme. We were around eleven or twelve years old. I still have the primary reference book we used. It is titled Leatherneck by C B Colby. By the time we tired of it, our scenario involved about an infantry company, equiped with Garands, Browning machine guns, and mortars, reenforced with tanks and helicopters.
ReplyDeleteWell hell, a bunch of Enfields or 1903s with a pile of ammo would have done the job nicely there.
ReplyDeleteOne of the 'What if's I've wondered about is "King Cetshwayo, I cannot provide arms to you; but I can teach your soldiers to properly use the rifles you obtain." The disciplined fighting force that was the Zulu if they'd know how to use the sights and such; that would've made the southern African situation a bit of a mess.
Couple of Cases of 91/30's and a case of bandolier and stripper cliped 7.62 X 54 Rimmed per. Not too much really. Three-Four cases you'd have a platoons worth.
ReplyDeleteA time travel fantasy of mine has been to drop a battalion of Israeli paratroops with full air support onto the 1936 Nuremberg Rally.
ReplyDeleteAs for the Alamo, any thing from the Mauser 98 on up for giving the individual troops.
But to really be effective you'd want mortars, at least one Barret .50, and a Recoiless rifle to practice counter-battery and C3CM (i.e. sniping Santa Anna and his staff). Those in and of themselves might be enough without upgrading individual weapons.
If you have the time lift capacity, razor wire and claymores. Lots and lots of claymores.
There's also L. Neil Smith's online graphic novel, "Roswell, Texas" at Big Head Press. It truly is a "alternate history" story, no time traveling involved (well, not at first, that comes later), where the Texians win the independence and stay that way, no joining the US and Confederacy.
ReplyDeleteAh, Mattexian, have you read "Lone Star Planet" by H. Beam Piper?
ReplyDelete