My question covers those vessels that are part of a military (either combatant or auxiliary), for either the same or different nations, and with spelling close to each other (so discounting translated names from, say, Chinese to English). If so, did it ever cause significant confusion, especially when a nation was at war?

I think we look back at the American and French Revolutions as primarily being about establishing democracy over monarchy. But when I look back at the reasons more in depth, they really seem to be more about taxation than anything else. Plus, the French Revolution in particular seems to have put in place some pretty anti-democratic institutions (Terror, Directory, and Napoleon). Even on the American side, Alexander Hamilton proposed making the US an elective monarchy.

Yet, I think it's difficult to doubt that desire for a democracy played some role. One of the key mottos of the American Revolution was "No taxation without representation", and that also influenced the French Revolution.

So how much did democracy influence these events?

I am reading The Third Manby Graham Greene, which takes place in post WW2 occupied Vienna. One of the characters says, "We all sell cigarettes and exchange schillings for bafs and that kind of thing."

What are some books you guys would recommend reading if you were interested in Arabic history-post or pre Islam?

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So I am pretty unfamiliar with both topics but I just notice there is always a fervor to force Turkey and Turkish people to admit that the Armenian Genocide in fact was an intentional attempt to exterminate Armenian Christians and not just a very, very poorly handled mass-deportation.

But werent the Trail of Tears and other forced relocations of Native Americans similar? As in they didn't intend or result in the complete extermination of the people involved but they did lead to many deaths due to starvation and exhaustion? I don't ever hear America's treatment of Native Americans refered to as a genocide however.

I guess I just want to understand both events a little better. Thanks!

I was reading "All Quiet on the Western Front" by Remarque recently and I remember a line that was something like "you aren't going to become an officer anyway" in English. That got me wondering, how would a private get promoted to a higher rank at the time - or if they could actually get promoted at all. I have no idea how military systems work, so any explanation would be appreciated.

When reading sources talking about Ancient navies in places like Athens or Rome, authors tend to just mention numbers of ships rather than amounts of men. Often, the number of ships in a navy seems to be very small, but despite this, these navies often engage with or are shown to be as effective in devastating their enemies as armies that are said to have tens of thousands of men in them, so how many men would be attached to each ship? Would the overall number of men in a navy be similar to a land army in some of these naval powers?

I know there are some that are universally recognised as actual people, but I'm not sure who they are exactly.

It seems based on my readings (and I don't just mean Sharpe books, I swear!) that the Napoleonic period saw a not insubstantial increase in the number of professional officers within the British Army due to its expansion, by which I mean those who entered it as a career, hoping to advance on merit, rather than simply expectation of class, having bought a commission. After all, nothing like a war to create vacancies...

I know that the purchase of commissions remained for many decades further, but nevertheless, I can't help but assume that there would be some effect from this so I was wondering how strongly it was felt at the time, and also whether it was enduring beyond that period, or instead dissipated with post-war contraction?

It was the official capital of Russia at the time, and much closer to friendly Poland. Was there a reason?

Don't know if this has already been asked. My question is if they had the demographic effects in mind when they raised their armies.

I hear this brought up sometimes in online debates about African slavery—basically, "the Arabs did it too!" How comparable are these two parts of history?

Who was the first US president to have a speech written for him? Are there any US Presidents who wrote their own speeches?

Building a wooden ship consumes a lot of lumber. Did this have any effect on the size and composition of forests in the seafaring European nations (England, Spain, or even Venice)? Also, was there always a sufficient amount of timber for shipbuilding? It almost seems like material for ships was never an issue, could that be true?