I've heard this theory floated and am curious if it is something there is serious academic consideration of.

In a scene of a German movie called Downfall, Adolf Hitler, with several of his henchmen present (including Goebbels), he exposits on a insane scheme to win the war (Keep in mind, this movie takes place in April 1945)

He claism that the Battle of Berlin was part of a huge decoy manouvre to trick the Soviets into thinking they have won. He claims that Donitz is mobilizing in the north of Germany with Kesselring mobilizing in the south. He says that three armies, launching from Prague, will attack the Russians simultaneously from behind. Hitler tells one of his generals that he made sure that the general will have 1000 of 'the most modern jets' at his disposal.

Now, I've heard that Hitler was beyond insane in the last days of the Reich, but was he seriously this delusional? Is there any proof that this insane scheme was actually spoken of by Hitler?

I'm particularly interested in learning about the structure, logistics, and equipment of the ancient Chinese military from the Warring States to Three Kingdoms periods (~400BCE-~200CE), but I'm having a hard time finding reliable academic sources or books that go into specifics. Do we have many surviving texts at all or are there translation/communication problems with Chinese academia/scholarship? I'd be grateful to hear of any books or papers anyone knows of regarding this topic.

If it is not true then how come the U.S. suddenly decided that it was acceptable to kill civilians of an enemy of war?

I can understand that the U.S. was willing to end the war for good with the act of making their enemies terrified that they eventually managed to make an actual W.M.D, the first ones that were ever developed.

But was the act of intentionally killing civilians a war crime back then?

From everything i've ever read about Roman Gladiators, they were always slaves or extremely poor people. But im wondering if any gladiator in particular ever became famous?

I'm thinking about it now and frankly find it hard to believe that the US would have had a difficult defensive war vs Germany. Germany had a very difficult time invading England and this shortcoming would have only been magnified if they tried to cross the Atlantic.

Another example I can think of is the very reason the US felt it needed to save Britain in order to push the Western front. Germany would have had no safe staging area for which it would be able to invade from outside of Cuba, which is pretty far inland and could have been attacked from the North, West, and South, making it a terrible defensive location. If Germany tried for the Northern cape of Canada, the invasion would have still been difficult if the Canadians/US prolonged the war into the Winter, as proven by Germany's huge losses pushing into Russia and Stalingrad.

Thoughts?

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I am currently reading The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt, by Edmund Morris.

On Theodore Roosevelt's time as a junior at Harvard in the autumn of 1878, Morris writes about Roosevelt's "familiar routine of recitations, study, exercise..." (p. 77).

What is Morris talking about here? Is this like going to 'discussion section', or reciting knowledges/passages from memory?

Has it always (as far as we know) been standing in its current condition? Was it known to be manmade and ancient in the Middle Ages? Was it ever "rediscovered"?

Has the area around Stonehenge always been as clear as it currently is, or was it once heavily forested?

It just seems absolutely amazing to me that this ancient wonder has been standing ostensibly untouched by all the wars and development in England over several millennia.

Obviously there are sociological differences in how we view the childhood/adulthood divide and Lafayette was a special individual. I also understand that enlisted soldiers could feasibly go as young as whoever can hold a gun. However, I have a hard time believing that putting an 8th grader in charge of a military function would be a pragmatic idea even in the most desperate of situations. I am trying to find sources that say how well 13 year old lieutenants performed (may have been very well), I am just coming up blank.

How did selective breeding work before people really knew about genetics? What did they think caused traits to be passed down from one generation to the next?

Hello historians. A lighthearted comment on another sub has made me super curious, and I can’t stop thinking about pockets.

With the recent LIDAR discovery of the Mayan city, what do we know about the clothing and fashion of its’ residents? Did they have pockets in their clothing? Some form of satchel or pouch? How did they carry their currency, and what even was their currency?

I would also be curious to learn about the history of pockets in general. What is known about the history of pockets? I would imagine they came shortly after we figured out pants.

Thank you for any and all help!

Am I correct in assuming that during the slave trade ages in the United States, slaves took on the last names of the people that kept them? Or is there another reason such as European rule in some African nations?

I often see African-Americans in the US with what seem to be European last names, Williams being the one that sticks out to me. (I know that my family came to the United States to escape genocide and translated their name to English to avoid dealing with prejudices against them, and also did not speak their native tongue in public.) While I don’t like to assume, one would think that we would see Africans with African surnames (Ibe, Mwanajuba, etc.) especially seeing as some Africans do not take their father’s last name but instead receive a last name dependent on the circumstances of their birth.

When Nazi Germany invaded france and took control of it's colonies, what happened to french guiana? Were there opposition to the french? Did the french guiana-an (what's the plural form? :c) fight the nazis or the nearby "enemy" colonies or did nothing happen? I hope Someone can answer me! I'm just really curious.

It seems like they would be easier to control if they were as scrambled as possible. For example, making a state half Latvian half Russian, or merging Kyrgyzstan with half of Kazakhstan.