Hello, so for summer classes I have to do a written disseration/extended essay and a topic I want to do is why the myth of German superiority during WW2 is so ingrained in media, whether it be movies, games, shows, and even documentaries.

You know, German troops are shown to be far better disciplined, trained, cold killers in movies. Or in games where the German factions tend to have the best units though more expensive. Even in documentaries we hear a lot of historians go on and on about how flawless the Tigers and Panthers were despite the handful of technical issues they had, even demonizing tanks like the Sherman because it happened to not be able to fulfill a role it was never really meant to have (Shermans were supposed to support infantry and offer 'decent' anti tank capabilities).

In any case, i'd like some comments and also books that would help explain why it's considered common to say that the Germans were the best at everything except for manpower and resources C:

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In a lot of fantasy novels/movies/etc. the size of forces for medieval armies numbers in the thousands or tens of thousands. How accurate is this? What numbers could a lord or a king reasonably rely on having if war broke out?

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Apart from Goscinny and Uderzo comic books where Romans had almost always green uniforms, I can't recall any common depiction where the red theme would be absent.

I am wanting to put a portfolio together of some really nice photos, but, I want to know there the great king (in my eyes) of Richard the thirds throne is? Does anyone know?

In my research I recently came across an asylum superintendent who suggested in 1862 that newspapers reporting on suicides could lead to imitators. Yet I've found papers reporting on suicides in specific detail well into the late nineteenth century. I know that sometime in the recent past news outlets began to observe an implicit ban on such reporting. What is the history of media reporting on suicides?

I was thinking about this the other day and something came trough my mind, during the romans baths were a common thing, why was this abandoned during the middle ages?

Did what was left of the roman empire took baths during the middle ages? if not why not?

I might be completely wrong about this trough so what was the common bath and general hygiene practices during the middle ages?

I'm someone who's been debating on whether the atomic bombings of Japan were justified. Before I go further, my main questions are basically as follows:

-In Operation Downfall, the invasion of Japan, why was there seemingly no consideration of bombing areas that were a target of the invasion, which would have drastically cut down on Allied casualties and made an invasion much easier?

-Why was a full-scale invasion seemingly the main option? What was the exact goal of an invasion if Japan's fighting ability revolved around the decisions of their government? Wouldn't smaller forces with more immediate goals been preferable, such as targeting the Emperor and high command? What were Operation Downfall's goals, and how would it have made Japan surrender?

-Why weren't the Emperor and High Command targeted for bombing?

I don't want to get too heavily into the morality of the bombings, but one thing I've come to find really strange is the overall strategy and mindset behind Operation Downfall, in that, with a full-scale invasion, the allies were expected to suffer mass casualties due to just how many Japanese civilians would resist.

At the same time- and I say this purely from a practical perspective in regards to the invasion- if we were to invade Japan and expected massive Japanese casualties, why didn't we mass-bomb atleast the areas (preferably with fire bombs) we intended to invade before we engaged in any sort of landing? This wouldn't solve the problem of potentially greater Japanese casualties, but it would drastically cut down on American/Allied ones. What I've read about Operation Downfall, the amount of troops devoted to the invasion, and the projected casualties, it seems to have been planned with minimal bombing (whether aerial or naval) of the target areas. Operation Coronet, which involved a landing at Tokyo, was set to occur over half a year after when we originally nuked Japan. The main landing areas for Operation Downfall all seemed like they were meant for areas bound to be extensively defended. In reality, I think we were capable of potentially wiping out most of Japan's population through conventional bombing (especially firebombing.) We had been bombing mainland Japan since April 1942, and before we nuked Hiroshima and Nagasaki, we had killed hundreds of thousands of Japanese through bombing. In contrast, we lost under 3,000 airmen. Our firebombing of Tokyo, which killed atleast close to 100,000 Japanese, left us with under 250 casualties. Japan's aerial defenses by the later stages of the war were pitiful. For this, there was ultimately nothing stopping us from wiping out most of Japan through conventional bombing, either predominantly or entirely, and getting them to capitulate even without nukes. There was nothing really stopping us from destroying even just Hiroshima and Nagasaki through firebombing. And we probably could have completely destroyed Tokyo months beforehand if we wanted to.

On top of all of this, I do not really understand why a full-scale invasion, with or without bombardment of the target areas and more, was the ultimate plan. Why weren't smaller-scale landing forces or strike forces planned instead? Since Japan's fighting spirit revolved around the will of the Emperor and their high command, wouldn't a plan that mainly targeted them, possibly through killing or capturing them, have been preferable to a full-scale landing force? Or, why couldn't we have targeted them alone through bombing? A full invasion really seems excessive in any regard. And for that, I don't understand the ultimate aims of Operation Downfall. What was our main goal with a full-scale invasion? Was it just to target the Emperor and the high command or more?

The Germans committed terrible war crimes in the Soviet Union. When the Soviets started to advance, they also began treating the German population they came across horribly, especially when it came to the rape of women. Was this behavior by the Soviets brought on by the brutality they had suffered at the hands of the Nazis or are there any other factors -- possibly cultural as Norman Naimark asserts -- that played a role?

"Norman Naimark also notes the allegedly patriarchal nature of Russian culture, and of the Asian societies comprising the Soviet Union, where dishonor was in the past repaid by raping the women of the enemy. The fact that the Germans had a much higher standard of living visible even when in ruins "may well have contributed allegedly to a national inferiority complex among Russians". Combining Russian feelings of inferiority, the resulting need to restore honor, and their desire for revenge may be the reason many women were raped in public as well as in front of husbands before both were killed."

I imagine it can't be before widespread production of toothpaste and toothbrushes, but maybe I'm wrong.

Romanis seem to have retained much of their ancestral culture without assimilating. Their language even originates from India, and much of their traditions are of Indian origin.

I read one theory that said Romanis originally came to Europe to flee the spread of Islam in India. Whether this is true or not, is there any known reason why Romanis are mostly Christian and Muslim today, instead of following some Indian religion like Hinduism? They retained so much of Indian culture, except their religion.