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Explanation: The Mongols (top/first) waited for good weather to invade enemy countries - typically whatever was the best season, locally, for grazing, but sometimes waiting instead for rivers to freeze for easy crossing.
The Nazis (second) invaded the USSR in the summer, and did little-to-no preparation for the inevitable and brutal oncoming Russian winter. They froze and died in great numbers, lmao.
The Swedish Empire (third) made the dubious decision to invade Russia in one of the worst European winters on record in the Great Northern War despite having good prospects for peace, resulting in the previously-winning positioning of the Swedish Empire reversing to a position of weakness and desperation.
And the newborn USA managed to kill a fair number of our own troops because we weren’t fucking prepared for our OWN winter in 1777-1778. In our meager defense, the Continental Army’s logistics were ‘strained’ to say the least to begin with, and it wasn’t like we had planned for… much of anything, even the outbreak of the war itself.
Explanation: The Mongols (top/first) waited for good weather to invade enemy countries - typically whatever was the best season, locally, for grazing, but sometimes waiting instead for rivers to freeze for easy crossing.
Random Turkish ramblings : It feels like in asia, the idea that warfare isn’t just against your opponent but also circumstances seems to be the perspective. Kinda explains why backgammon is popular among turkic peoples; you don’t just play against your opponent but the dice too.
The above could be 100% bullshit. I don’t care. Love me some backgammon.
LOL, the American troops were northern hillbillies without much of anything at all, let alone training and gear.
I need to study that war. No idea how we prevailed, even with France rolling in.
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American long rifles. No, really, despite the exaggerated mythology around them, the use of long rifles as a skirmishing weapon had an immense impact - nearly every European country in the 20 years after the American Revolutionary War began to adopt long(er) rifles of the American style for military use over the old, short-barreled rifles that were previously popular as primarily as hunting weapons. Previous noble dainty tools with barrel lengths of ~16 inches or less were replaced with rifles with barrels of 24-30 inches to resemble American long rifles (the reverse also occurred - as America’s post-independence military standardized, we reduced the length of our first standard-issue military rifle from the ~40 inches seen in the traditional long rifle to ~32 inches). Also a reason for their outsized impact in the American Revolutionary War in particular - fucking half the battles had numbers like “83 dead”; a couple of crack-shot yokels could make up a good percentage of that.
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The Brits were almost as reliant on local militias as we were - only about half of their forces were professional troops. We tend to focus on the slugfests between Continental Regulars and Redcoats, but much of the war was of frightened militia taking potshots at each other and then scurrying for the hills when panic struck.
Ah! Longer barrels mean more velocity and accuracy. As with black powder, as with with modern explosive compositions. Making it hilarious that we make saw-off shotguns (useless!) and short-barrelled rifles (useless!) illegal.
The real advantage in longer rifles was in the velocity, as you mentioned - earlier short rifles had superior precision to long-barreled muskets, but similar effective range. Longer rifles could double or triple the effective range for a skirmisher, which was (ha) revolutionary.
We generally restrict sawn-offs and carbines for reasons of concealability in civilian contexts, rather than military efficacy. Same reason why double-barreled sawn-offs (lupara) had a reputation as a bandit’s weapon in 19th and early 20th century Italy - it was something that could be hid under a mafioso’s coat and brought out on an unsuspecting target, then hid again. It won’t stand up to a dedicated search, but it’s much less obvious at a distance than a long-arm slung over your shoulder, decreasing the number and reliability of casual witnesses.
As you say, the National Firearms Act was mainly a dig on Italian mafioso. Not so relevant now.
And having experience, I say again that short barreled anything is near useless, ability to conceal notwithstanding. You can’t hit shit, and if you do, well, I’ve seen a .45LC through a 2" derringer bounce off a wooden pallet at 30’. Bounce. Imagine that same round through a 30" barrel. That’s for buffalo huntin’!
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History That Doesn’t Suck is a pretty solid podcast and it starts right before the American Revolution. (The podcast is, at least as far as I’ve gotten in to it, is just U.S. history.)
If you want a pretty good take on it, it is a good source.
The book on Benedict Arnold, ‘Valient Ambitions’, is also a pretty awesome inside look into the struggles of the U.S. and their army, as they were starting out.
To OP’s point, the cold and disease were definitely the worst enemies. But Congress trying to supply an army without a federal tax was not very effective.
I got to visit Valley Forge a few years ago! Interesting place. I couldn’t believe how small the cabins were that supposedly held like 8 people inside each. They were the size of a bathroom.
