I’m seriously intrigued by the Wannsee conference and how 15 men (of which nine were lawyers by trade/education) decided on the fate of millions of people during a meeting that lasted only 1,5 hours. What gave them the confidence that their proposed solution was okay. Was there also a level of wanting to please and agree to the top brass

Edit 1: what stills fascinates me is the possible “power (in)balance” among the different governing bodies that participated in the Wannsee conference. Who had the upper hand, who were the up an coming etc.

Hi! This may seem like a really stupid question but I thought I'd ask here anyway! I'm unsure it it's allowed, but I hope it is. I'm also sorry for how long-winded this is.

I'm in my final year of my history degree (in the UK) and I've been struggling at taking notes for my dissertation due to confusion with secondary literature. (Some quick context - I had to take a break from uni due to mental health and an ADHD diagnosis, which has made my confidence with academia quite shaky. Plus in my previous years, probably due to the ADHD, I worked very last minute and have never really taken solid/good notes before! So I'm a bit overwhelmed at all the information and the how to know what will be useful).

My dissertation is on a specific topic within the Cold War and since starting I've been basically rewriting entire books and journal articles, but I've been told by my tutor that I'm supposed to get most of the facts from primary sources and just use the secondary literature for historiography/opinions. However, I sometimes can't tell when the historians are giving their opinions? For example, an historian could say something like 'X country's attitude compromised her negotiating position', or 'there were signs that Y was willing to negotiate', or 'Z was concerned about an event' - I'm unsure if those are opinions or facts because surely that's an opinion based of the facts? But my friend said thing's like that aren't opinions so now I'm even more confused!

Thank you for readings this and any help at all would be really appreciated! :)

One could understand why a lowly baron might eye a duchy or why a duke might covert a throne. But why do kings wage war? If you are a French nobleman in the late middle ages, your estate already provides you with plenty of food, entertainment, luxury, and the opportunity for a mistress or two or even a harem. Why wage war?

It's such a pain in the backside. Some rulers spent most of their lives on the road going from one campaign to the next. Always managing quarreling commanders, military logistics, arduous terrain and various diseases one might get in army camps. Then you endure the stress of desertions, mutiny, and the actual combat part where you and some of your brothers and cousins might die, or you might get captured.

Why? Why bother? Especially easily defensible countries like Spain or England. Why bother yourself in terrible military campaigns in the pursuit of land gains your dumb ass heirs will probably squander in the future, when you can just lay back in your comfy castle with some wench washing your feet, quelling a peasant rebellion every once in a while and managing court drama.

I've read that in the past 20 or so years the historical consensus on the number of people executed by the Inquisition has changed (something about a conference in 1998 followed by an apology by the Pope in 2000, and generally more books being published after access to the Vatican archives was relaxed). I was discussing this with a friend who brought up the idea that he's reluctant to trust books that use sources from the Vatican archives because the Vatican has its own interests and might somehow influence things by hiding certain sources or something along those lines.

Has this been discussed before? What are some arguments for or against the idea that the recent change in narrative might have been corrupted by the Vatican?

For context, I'm doing some first-time research on the Mongol Empire. I've been looking into its origin and leaders and am confused about Genghis Khan, is that his name, or a title given to him? I've seen that as his name, but I've also seen it as a title. For example, Britannica Encyclopedia says he "was elected Genghis Khan", while most sources refer to Genghis Khan as his name. Any explanation on this would be greatly appreciated.

My great-grandfather was German and was a pilot in the Luftwaffe. He died in 1940 because his plane fell down. He had a Dutch wife and a young son at the time (who was ironically born a day before the German invasion in The Netherlands). My family always told me that he didn't want to join the Luftwaffe and was forced into it. So I thought about those options:

1. He was drafted
2. He was against the Nazis and they said he could join the army/Luftwaffe or he and/or his family would die.

Could what my family said be true in any way?

During a speech at the recently held Summit for Democracy, the Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi said that democracy in India is more than 2500 years old. However from my understanding of Indian history, kingdoms in India have primarily been monarchies and I hadn't heard of democracy being such a long revered practice of the country. Could someone help shed more light on this please.

I was told that it took 11 ships, from the British and Polish, to sink him, but just what made the Bismarck so great? If someone could provide me with an expert opinion, I would greatly appreciate it.

Are they trustworthy? Are they biased?

Thank you!

How would the military measure this statistic?

Could there have been any point in time that could've led to a connected new world?

Considering that HVAP-s had far more penetration than othee types of rounds like APCBC and APHE, and usually it required only one penetration to knockout an enemy, so why wasn't it used as main anti-tank round?

You hear a lot about how Kings lead their armies into battle, however, I couldn't find any instances about if any historical kings led their navies into battle in ancient to medieval history. Not sure if this is because I can only find things about the Royal Navy, or if there were some other reasons for it (Besides the danger of course).

Hi there, I’m interested in building a portrayal of the military forces of the Nasrid Emirate during the Granada war which was concluded in 1492. I’ve managed to dig up one or two depictions, but they’re all very western, and I can’t help but wonder if they are biased. For those of you who are in the know, how should I depict them? I know they had access to firearms, but also that they relied heavily on light infantry and light cavalry.

If a slave escaped on the underground railroad to Canada, what happened next? Would they be able to get jobs or start a family? Would they still be hunted to be returned to the US? How were they treated in Canada?

I´m going to add the colonies France had that were not immediate warzones, so Algeria until November 1942, Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia during the war, even Madagascar at first, to the territory of France for the purposes of this question. It was officially neutral and mostly disarmed during this time, as were plenty of other places like Spain, Sweden, Ireland, Switzerland, Portugal, a good chunk of Latin America, Turkey, Iran, and Vichy France was recognized as legitimate even by the Allied Powers, who were skeptical of De Gaulle.

Places like Paris are some of the most popular tourist destinations, and France was home to much theatre and science as well.

We have disaster tourism even today, as well as war correspondents, people even visit North Korea from the United States which is still at war with the country. I wouldn´t imagine that Vichy didn´t have something like that, even as people were divided by their loyalties over the new Petainist regime and the ethics of going to such places.