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Arch Enemy in concerto al Graspop Metal Meeting 2023 di Dessel foto di Andrea Ripamonti per www.rockon.it
Headstone in the Churchyard of St Peter, Kimberley
John
Third Earl of Kimberley
C.B.E MC
Born November 11 1885
Killed by Enemy Action
April 16 1941
From his Wikipedia article.
John Wodehouse, 3rd Earl of Kimberley, CBE, MC (11 November 1883 – 16 April 1941), styled Lord Wodehouse from 1902 to 1932, was a British peer and Liberal politician. He was a champion polo player.
Wodehouse was the eldest son of John Wodehouse, 2nd Earl of Kimberley. He attended Eton College and Trinity Hall, Cambridge. At Cambridge, he was a committee member of the University Pitt Club. He started playing polo at university, where he was a member of the Light Blue team. He later played for the Old Cantabs team. He holds the unique distinction of being the only person to win a Gold Medal at the Olympics in 1920 and a Silver Medal in 1908, both for polo.
Political career and military service
Wodehouse was Member of Parliament for Mid Norfolk between the General Elections of 1906 and January 1910. Aged 22 years and 2 months at election, throughout his service he was Baby of the House of Commons. In the former year he became JP for the county of Norfolk.
Lord Wodehouse was commissioned a Lieutenant in the Norfolk Yeomanry in 1911 and served with them until the beginning of the First World War in 1914. He served as a Captain in the 16th Lancers during the war, when he was wounded and twice mentioned in despatches. He was at the Western Front in France from 1914 to 1917, and on the Italian Front during 1917-18. He won the MC in the latter year, and also received the Italian War Merit Cross. From 1921 to 1933 he was on the Reserve of Officers.
From outside Parliament he served as unpaid Assistant Private Secretary to the Colonial Secretary, then Winston Churchill, in 1921-22, and was awarded the CBE in 1925.
He succeeded in his father's titles in 1932, enabling him to sit in the House of Lords.
Family
Lord Kimberley married the twice-divorced Frances Margaret Montagu, daughter of Leonard Irby, on 5 May 1922.
In April 1941, aged fifty-seven, he was killed in The Blitz at 48 Jermyn Street, Westminster, London, and was succeeded by his only child, John.
It is also said (Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable) that his kinsman P. G. Wodehouse based the character of Bertie Wooster on him.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Wodehouse,_3rd_Earl_of_Kimberley
A painting of him on a Polo Pony by Alfred Munnings can be seen here
uk.pinterest.com/pin/216665432047732806/
And a photograph of him and the rest of the 1908 polo team
thelionandunicorn.wordpress.com/2016/08/12/obscure-olympi...
Although he was 36 years old, Jack Wodehouse was the youngest member of the British team which won the gold medals in the 1920 polo tournament, held at Ostend, After leaving Eton, Lord Wodehouse went up to Trinity Hall, Cambridge and after being on the losing side in the polo match against Oxford in 1903 then captained the winning Cambridge team for the next two years. He was a Liberal Member of Parliament for Mid-Norfolk from 1906 to 1910 and it was during his period in the House that he won an Olympic silver medal with the Hurlingham team at the 1908 Olympics. He also played in three Westchester Cup matches and was a member of the old Cantab’s team which won the Champion Cup six times between 1908 and 1914. In the 1914-18 War, Lord Wodehouse served with the 16th Lancers, winning the Military Cross, the Croix de Guerre and the Italian War Cross. After the war, he was assistant private secretary to the Colonial Secretary, Winston Churchill, and was awarded the CBE in 1925. He succeeded his father to the Earldom in 1932 and in 1941, while paying one of his rare visits to London from his Norfolk estates, he was killed in an air raid.
www.sports-reference.com/olympics/athletes/wo/jack-lord-w...
1883 – Birth
The birth of a John Wodehouse was recorded in the Smallburgh District of Norfolk in the October to December quarter, (Q4), of 1883.
1891 Census of England and Wales
The 7 year old John, born Witton, North Walsham, Norfolk, was recorded living at The Hall, Witton. This was the household of his parents, John, Lord Wodehouse, (aged 42 and living on own means from Marylebone, London) and Isabel G, (aged 37 and from Brighton, Sussex). As well as John their other children are:-
Phillip….aged 4……born Witton
Isabel…..aged 2……born Witton
As well as two visitor from Australia, there are 9 live in servants and a governess.
1901 Census of England and Wales
The 17 year John Wodehouse from Walsham, Norfolk, was recorded living in one of the Houses that make up Eton College. His head of house was Thomas C Porter, a married Science Teacher.
It would appear this was the house known as The Hopgarden.
collections.etoncollege.com/coll-le-0104
www.etoncollege.com/Hopgarden.aspx
His parents were still living at Witton Hall. Living with them are daughter Isabel, (12) and son Edward, (2, born Witton). As well as a visitor and a Governess, there are 10 live in servants.
1911 Census of England and Wales
The 27 year old Lord Wodehouse, from Witton, Norfolk was recorded as a guest of Hugh Gurney Barclay, a Bank Director, at Colney Hall, Colney, Norfolk. He was staying there along with his father, the Earl of Kimberley. Lord Wodehouse was then still single.
Great War years
The award of John’s Military Cross was gazetted in the Supplement to the London Gazette dated 3rd June 1918.
www.thegazette.co.uk/London/issue/30718/supplement/6495/d...
Postscript
Headshot can be seen here
geneall.net/en/name/548695/john-wodehouse-3rd-earl-of-kim...
and here
www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/portrait/mw59135/John-W...
www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/portrait/mw59137/John-W...
(On the latter site these are stated to have been taken on the 18th February 1920)
1922 Marriage
The marriage of a John Wodehouse to a Frances M Montagu, previously Crofton nee Irby, was registered in the St George Hanover Square District of London in the April to June quarter, (Q2), of 1922.
New York Times
Lord Wodehouse weds Mrs Frances Montagu
Bride of Polo Player and ex-Member of Parliament Had Been Married Twice Before.
London, May 5 – Lord Wodehouse, member of the English polo team which played against America last Summer, was married today at the Registry Office to Mrs. Frances Montagu. The bride, who is descended from the second Lord Boston, has been married twice before – to Sir Morgan George Croften, Bart., and to James Fountayne Montagu. She divorced the latter last year.
Only a number of relatives were present at the ceremony.
Lord Wodehouse was a member of the British polo team that played in the international match at Meadow Brook in 1918. He is the scion of a family which has always been renowned for its radicalism. For four years he was Radical member of Parliament for one of the divisions of his native county of Norfolk.
The ancestral home of the Wodehouses, Kimberley House, is an ancient place, with towers at the angles, built some four centuries ago. Among the many historical treasures in the house is the bedroom furniture used by Queen Elizabeth during her several stays there. Lord Kimberley also has extensive estates in Devonshire and Cornwall.
query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?_r=1&res=9805E...
freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~cbye/brandling...
This picture is captioned Winston Churchill and Lord Wodehouse departing for Paris, 1925.
l7.alamy.com/zooms/fc5f34d107f24966b4991235df0fec90/winst...
From his sons obituary
John Wodehouse was born on May 12 1924. His father, the 3rd Earl, was a well-known polo player and former MP who had won an MC on the Marne. His kinsman, P G Wodehouse, stood godfather to young Johnny.
Both of Johnny's parents had an eye for the opposite sex. His mother had already been twice married, and Johnny was her third child. He had a rather lonely childhood, spending large parts of his school holidays on his own with his nanny at Kimberley, which had been visited in 1578 by Elizabeth I.
www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/1395628/The-Earl-of-K...
WW2
His entry on the Commonwealth War Graves Commission database records him as dying on the 17th April 1941.
www.cwgc.org/find-war-dead/casualty/3123857/WODEHOUSE,%20...
On 17 April 1941, a Luftwaffe parachute mine exploded on Jermyn Street at around 3.10am. The damage was atrocious. The Hammam Turkish Baths (1862) at 76 Jermyn Street and No 50 Jermyn Street were both completely destroyed. Nos 77-79 Jermyn Street were severely damaged. Other premises to suffer included Fortnum & Mason, the Cavendish Hotel, Dunhill's and the southern end of Piccadilly Arcade.
By 3.16am the number of casualties was still unclear at the Westminster Report Centre. However, many requests for ambulances came from Jermyn Street, Duke Street St James's, Piccadilly and St James's Street. At 3.24am, a request for an ambulance was sent from the Devonshire Club, a gentlemen's club on St James's Street, stating that there were two women injured by blast. About the same time, at the Ritz Hotel, not far from Jermyn Street, the assistant manager reported an injured man. At 4.37am, another four casualties were found at 16 Bury Street. Jermyn Street and Duke Street St James's were reported blocked by debris at around 5.28am. A similar report at 9am noted that St James's Street was also blocked.
At 6am local residents requested a rescue team to help people who were trapped under the buildings. Mortuary vans went in and out of Jermyn Street. At 6.32am residents in Duke Street St James's and Piccadilly requested a mortuary van for five bodies. Around 10.20am, at the Unicorn Public House on Jermyn Street, a resident requested a mortuary van to collect two bodies.
While the mortuary vans and ambulances were assisting the casualties, more problems arrived. At 3.35pm the water-main in Jermyn Street and Duke Street St James's stopped working. A fire broke out in 48 Jermyn Street at 5pm. The fire soon spread to Jermyn Street, King's Street, Bury Street, and Duke Street St James's. The whole area up to Piccadilly was now threatened. Because the fires were so widespread, the fire service faced being overwhelmed. Two hours after the first report of fire, additional pumps were sent to the Jermyn Street area and finally brought the fires under control.
In this bomb incident 23 people were injured and 7 were killed. One of the fatalities was the popular 1930s singer Al Bowlly. Different stories are told about his death. The most popular version suggests that on 16 April 1941, the night before the incident, Al Bowlly was performing at the Rex Cinema in Oxford Street. Although he was offered an overnight stay in Oxford Street he insisted on going back to his flat at 32 Dukes Court (at the corner of Duke Street St James's and Jermyn Street). After he got back to Dukes Court, the parachute mine detonated outside. His bedroom door was reputedly blown off from its hinge by the blast, hitting his head. The impact was fatal.
(The article also has then and now pictures of Jermyn Street)
Cambodia (/kæmˈboʊdiə/ (About this soundlisten); also Kampuchea /ˌkæmpʊˈtʃiːə/; Khmer: កម្ពុជា Khmer: [kam.pu.ciə]; French: Cambodge), officially the Kingdom of Cambodia (Khmer: ព្រះរាជាណាចក្រកម្ពុជា, prĕəh riəciənaacak kampuciə, IPA: [prĕəh riə.ciə.naː.caʔ kam.pu.ciə]; French: Royaume du Cambodge), is a country located in the southern portion of the Indochina peninsula in Southeast Asia. It is 181,035 square kilometres in area, bordered by Thailand to the northwest, Laos to the northeast, Vietnam to the east and the Gulf of Thailand to the southwest.
The sovereign state of Cambodia has a population of over 16 million. The official religion is Theravada Buddhism, practised by approximately 95 percent of the population. The country's minority groups include Vietnamese, Chinese, Chams and 30 hill tribes. The capital and largest city is Phnom Penh, the political, economic and cultural centre of Cambodia. The kingdom is an elective constitutional monarchy with a monarch, currently Norodom Sihamoni, chosen by the Royal Throne Council as head of state. The head of government is the Prime Minister, currently Hun Sen, the longest serving non-royal leader in Southeast Asia, ruling Cambodia since 1985.
In 802 AD, Jayavarman II declared himself king, uniting the warring Khmer princes of Chenla under the name "Kambuja". This marked the beginning of the Khmer Empire, which flourished for over 600 years, allowing successive kings to control and exert influence over much of Southeast Asia and accumulate immense power and wealth. The Indianised kingdom facilitated the spread of first Hinduism and then Buddhism to much of Southeast Asia and undertook many religious infrastructural projects throughout the region, including the construction of more than 1,000 temples and monuments in Angkor alone. Angkor Wat is the most famous of these structures and is designated as a World Heritage Site.
After the fall of Angkor to Ayutthaya in the 15th century, a reduced and weakened Cambodia was then ruled as a vassal state by its neighbours. In 1863, Cambodia became a protectorate of France, which doubled the size of the country by reclaiming the north and west from Thailand.
Cambodia gained independence in 1953. The Vietnam War extended into the country with the US bombing of Cambodia from 1969 until 1973. Following the Cambodian coup of 1970 which installed the right-wing pro-US Khmer Republic, the deposed king gave his support to his former enemies, the Khmer Rouge. The Khmer Rouge emerged as a major power, taking Phnom Penh in 1975 and later carrying out the Cambodian genocide from 1975 until 1979, when they were ousted by Vietnam and the Vietnamese-backed People's Republic of Kampuchea, supported by the Soviet Union in the Cambodian–Vietnamese War (1979–91).
Following the 1991 Paris Peace Accords, Cambodia was governed briefly by a United Nations mission (1992–93). The UN withdrew after holding elections in which around 90 percent of the registered voters cast ballots. The 1997 factional fighting resulted in the ousting of the government by Prime Minister Hun Sen and the Cambodian People's Party, who remain in power as of 2018.
Cambodia is a member of the United Nations since 1955, ASEAN, the East Asia Summit, the WTO, the Non-Aligned Movement and La Francophonie. According to several foreign organisations, the country has widespread poverty, pervasive corruption, lack of political freedoms, low human development and a high rate of hunger. Cambodia has been described by Human Rights Watch's Southeast Asian Director, David Roberts, as a "vaguely communist free-market state with a relatively authoritarian coalition ruling over a superficial democracy".
While per capita income remains low compared to most neighboring countries, Cambodia has one of the fastest growing economies in Asia, with growth averaging 7.6 percent over the last decade. Agriculture remains the dominant economic sector, with strong growth in textiles, construction, garments and tourism leading to increased foreign investment and international trade. The US World Justice Project's 2015 Rule of Law Index ranked Cambodia 76 out of 102 countries, similar to other countries in the region.
NAME
The "Kingdom of Cambodia" is the official English name of the country. The English "Cambodia" is an anglicisation of the French "Cambodge", which in turn is the French transliteration of the Khmer កម្ពុជា kampuciə. Kampuchea is the shortened alternative to the country's official name in Khmer ព្រះរាជាណាចក្រកម្ពុជា prĕəh riəciənaacak kampuciə. The Khmer endonym Kampuchea derives from the Sanskrit name कम्बोजदेश kambojadeśa, composed of देश deśa ("land of" or "country of") and कम्बोज kamboja, which alludes to the foundation myths of the first ancient Khmer kingdom. The term Cambodia was already in use in Europe as early as 1524, since Antonio Pigafetta (an Italian explorer who followed Ferdinand Magellan in his circumnavigation of the globe) cites it in his work Relazione del primo viaggio intorno al mondo (1524-1525) as Camogia.
Colloquially, Cambodians refer to their country as either ស្រុកខ្មែរ srok khmae (Khmer pronunciation: [srok ˈkʰmae]), meaning "Khmer's Land", or the slightly more formal ប្រទេសកម្ពុជា prɑteih kampuciə (Khmer pronunciation: [prɑ.ˈteih kam.pu.ciə]), literally "Country of Kampuchea". The name "Cambodia" is used most often in the Western world while "Kampuchea" is more widely used in the East.
HISTORY
PRE-HISTORY
There exists sparse evidence for a Pleistocene human occupation of present-day Cambodia, which includes quartz and quartzite pebble tools found in terraces along the Mekong River, in Stung Treng and Kratié provinces, and in Kampot Province, although their dating is unreliable. Some slight archaeological evidence shows communities of hunter-gatherers inhabited the region during Holocene: the most ancient archaeological discovery site in Cambodia is considered to be the cave of L'aang Spean, in Battambang Province, which belongs to the Hoabinhian period. Excavations in its lower layers produced a series of radiocarbon dates around 6000 BC. Upper layers in the same site gave evidence of transition to Neolithic, containing the earliest dated earthenware ceramics in Cambodia
Archaeological records for the period between Holocene and Iron Age remain equally limited. A pivotal event in Cambodian prehistory was the slow penetration of the first rice farmers from the north, which began in the late 3rd millennium BC. The most curious prehistoric evidence in Cambodia are the various "circular earthworks" discovered in the red soils near Memot and in the adjacent region of Vietnam in the latter 1950s. Their function and age are still debated, but some of them possibly date from 2nd millennium BC.
Other prehistoric sites of somewhat uncertain date are Samrong Sen (not far from the ancient capital of Oudong), where the first investigations began in 1875, and Phum Snay, in the northern province of Banteay Meanchey. An excavation at Phum Snay revealed 21 graves with iron weapons and cranial trauma which could point to conflicts in the past, possible with larger cities in Angkor. Prehistoric artefacts are often found during mining activities in Ratanakiri. Iron was worked by about 500 BC, with supporting evidence coming from the Khorat Plateau, in modern-day Thailand. In Cambodia, some Iron Age settlements were found beneath Baksei Chamkrong and other Angkorian temples while circular earthworks were found beneath Lovea a few kilometres north-west of Angkor. Burials, much richer than other types of finds, testify to improvement of food availability and trade (even on long distances: in the 4th century BC trade relations with India were already opened) and the existence of a social structure and labour organisation. Also, among the artefacts from the Iron Age, glass beads are important evidence. Different kinds of glass beads recovered from several sites across Cambodia, such as the Phum Snay site in northwest and the Prohear site in southeast, show that there were two main trading networks at the time. The two networks were separated by time and space, which indicate that there was a shift from one network to the other at about 2nd–4th century AD, probably with changes in socio-political powers.
PRE-ANGKORIAN AND ANGKORIAN ERA
During the 3rd, 4th, and 5th centuries, the Indianised states of Funan and its successor, Chenla, coalesced in present-day Cambodia and southwestern Vietnam. For more than 2,000 years, what was to become Cambodia absorbed influences from India, passing them on to other Southeast Asian civilisations that are now Thailand and Laos. Little else is known for certain of these polities, however Chinese chronicles and tribute records do make mention of them. It is believed that the territory of Funan may have held the port known to Alexandrian geographer Claudius Ptolemy as "Kattigara". The Chinese chronicles suggest that after Jayavarman I of Chenla died around 690, turmoil ensued which resulted in division of the kingdom into Land Chenla and Water Chenla which was loosely ruled by weak princes under the dominion of Java.
The Khmer Empire grew out of these remnants of Chenla, becoming firmly established in 802 when Jayavarman II (reigned c790-850) declared independence from Java and proclaimed himself a Devaraja. He and his followers instituted the cult of the God-king and began a series of conquests that formed an empire which flourished in the area from the 9th to the 15th centuries. During the rule of Jayavarman VIII the Angkor empire was attacked by the Mongol army of Kublai Khan, however the king was able to buy peace. Around the 13th century, monks from Sri Lanka introduced Theravada Buddhism to Southeast Asia. The religion spread and eventually displaced Hinduism and Mahayana Buddhism as the popular religion of Angkor; however it was not the official state religion until 1295; when Indravarman III took power.
The Khmer Empire was Southeast Asia's largest empire during the 12th century. The empire's centre of power was Angkor, where a series of capitals were constructed during the empire's zenith. In 2007 an international team of researchers using satellite photographs and other modern techniques concluded that Angkor had been the largest pre-industrial city in the world with an urban sprawl of 2,980 square kilometres. The city, which could have supported a population of up to one million people and Angkor Wat, the best known and best-preserved religious temple at the site, still serves as a reminder of Cambodia's past as a major regional power. The empire, though in decline, remained a significant force in the region until its fall in the 15th century.
DARK AGES OF CAMBODIA
After a long series of wars with neighbouring kingdoms, Angkor was sacked by the Ayutthaya Kingdom and abandoned in 1432 because of ecological failure and infrastructure breakdown. This led to a period of economic, social, and cultural stagnation when the kingdom's internal affairs came increasingly under the control of its neighbours. By this time, the Khmer penchant for monument building had ceased. Older faiths such as Mahayana Buddhism and the Hindu cult of the god-king had been supplanted by Theravada Buddhism.
The court moved the capital to Longvek where the kingdom sought to regain its glory through maritime trade. The first mention of Cambodia in European documents was in 1511 by the Portuguese. Portuguese travellers described the city as a place of flourishing wealth and foreign trade. The attempt was short-lived however, as continued wars with Ayutthaya and the Vietnamese resulted in the loss of more territory and Longvek being conquered and destroyed by King Naresuan the Great of Ayutthaya in 1594. A new Khmer capital was established at Oudong south of Longvek in 1618, but its monarchs could survive only by entering into what amounted to alternating vassal relationships with the Siamese and Vietnamese for the next three centuries with only a few short-lived periods of relative independence.
The hill tribe people in Cambodia were "hunted incessantly and carried off as slaves by the Siamese (Thai), the Annamites (Vietnamese), and the Cambodians".
In the nineteenth century a renewed struggle between Siam and Vietnam for control of Cambodia resulted in a period when Vietnamese officials attempted to force the Khmers to adopt Vietnamese customs. This led to several rebellions against the Vietnamese and appeals to Thailand for assistance. The Siamese–Vietnamese War (1841–1845) ended with an agreement to place the country under joint suzerainty. This later led to the signing of a treaty for French Protection of Cambodia by King Norodom Prohmborirak.
FRENCH COLONISATION
In 1863, King Norodom, who had been installed by Thailand, sought the protection of Thailand from French rule. In 1867, the Thai king signed a treaty with France, renouncing suzerainty over Cambodia in exchange for the control of Battambang and Siem Reap provinces which officially became part of Thailand. The provinces were ceded back to Cambodia by a border treaty between France and Thailand in 1907.
Cambodia continued as a protectorate of France from 1867 to 1953, administered as part of the colony of French Indochina, though occupied by the Japanese empire from 1941 to 1945.[48] Between 1874 and 1962, the total population increased from about 946,000 to 5.7 million. After King Norodom's death in 1904, France manipulated the choice of king, and Sisowath, Norodom's brother, was placed on the throne. The throne became vacant in 1941 with the death of Monivong, Sisowath's son, and France passed over Monivong's son, Monireth, feeling he was too independently minded. Instead, Norodom Sihanouk, a maternal grandson of King Sisowath was enthroned. The French thought young Sihanouk would be easy to control. They were wrong, however, and under the reign of King Norodom Sihanouk, Cambodia gained independence from France on 9 November 1953.
INDEPENDENCE AND VIETNAM WAR
Cambodia became a constitutional monarchy under King Norodom Sihanouk. When French Indochina was given independence, Cambodia lost hope of regaining control over the Mekong Delta as it was awarded to Vietnam. Formerly part of the Khmer Empire, the area had been controlled by the Vietnamese since 1698, with King Chey Chettha II granting the Vietnamese permission to settle in the area decades before. This remains a diplomatic sticking point with over one million ethnic Khmers (the Khmer Krom) still living in this region. The Khmer Rouge attempted invasions to recover the territory which, in part, led to Vietnam's invasion of Cambodia and deposition of the Khmer Rouge.
In 1955, Sihanouk abdicated in favour of his father to participate in politics and was elected prime minister. Upon his father's death in 1960, Sihanouk again became head of state, taking the title of prince. As the Vietnam War progressed, Sihanouk adopted an official policy of neutrality in the Cold War. Sihanouk allowed the Vietnamese communists to use Cambodia as a sanctuary and a supply route for their arms and other aid to their armed forces fighting in South Vietnam. This policy was perceived as humiliating by many Cambodians. In December 1967 Washington Post journalist Stanley Karnow was told by Sihanouk that if the US wanted to bomb the Vietnamese communist sanctuaries, he would not object, unless Cambodians were killed.
The same message was conveyed to US President Johnson's emissary Chester Bowles in January 1968. However, in public Sihanouk refuted the right of the U.S. to use air strikes in Cambodia, and on 26 March he said "these criminal attacks must immediately and definitively stop". On 28 March a press conference was held and Sihanouk appealed to the international media: "I appeal to you to publicise abroad this very clear stand of Cambodia—that is, I will in any case oppose all bombings on Cambodian territory under whatever pretext." Nevertheless, the public pleas of Sihanouk were ignored and the bombing continued. Members of the government and army became resentful of Sihanouk's ruling style as well as his tilt away from the United States.
KHMER REPUBLIC (1970–75)
While visiting Beijing in 1970 Sihanouk was ousted by a military coup led by Prime Minister General Lon Nol and Prince Sisowath Sirik Matak. US support for the coup remains unproven. However, once the coup was completed, the new regime, which immediately demanded that the Vietnamese communists leave Cambodia, gained the political support of the United States. The North Vietnamese and Viet Cong forces, desperate to retain their sanctuaries and supply lines from North Vietnam, immediately launched armed attacks on the new government. The king urged his followers to help in overthrowing this government, hastening the onset of civil war.
Soon Khmer Rouge rebels began using him to gain support. However, from 1970 until early 1972, the Cambodian conflict was largely one between the government and army of Cambodia, and the armed forces of North Vietnam. As they gained control of Cambodian territory, the Vietnamese communists imposed a new political infrastructure, which was eventually dominated by the Cambodian communists now referred to as the Khmer Rouge.[56] Between 1969 and 1973, Republic of Vietnam and US forces bombed Cambodia in an effort to disrupt the Viet Cong and Khmer Rouge.
Documents uncovered from the Soviet archives after 1991 reveal that the North Vietnamese attempt to overrun Cambodia in 1970 was launched at the explicit request of the Khmer Rouge and negotiated by Pol Pot's then second in command, Nuon Chea. NVA units overran many Cambodian army positions while the Communist Party of Kampuchea (CPK) expanded their small-scale attacks on lines of communication. In response to the North Vietnamese invasion, US President Richard Nixon announced that US and South Vietnamese ground forces had entered Cambodia in a campaign aimed at destroying NVA base areas in Cambodia (see Cambodian Incursion). Although a considerable quantity of equipment was seized or destroyed by US and South Vietnamese forces, containment of North Vietnamese forces proved elusive.
The Khmer Republic's leadership was plagued by disunity among its three principal figures: Lon Nol, Sihanouk's cousin Sirik Matak, and National Assembly leader In Tam. Lon Nol remained in power in part because neither of the others was prepared to take his place. In 1972, a constitution was adopted, a parliament elected, and Lon Nol became president. But disunity, the problems of transforming a 30,000-man army into a national combat force of more than 200,000 men, and spreading corruption weakened the civilian administration and army.
The Communist insurgency inside Cambodia continued to grow, aided by supplies and military support from North Vietnam. Pol Pot and Ieng Sary asserted their dominance over the Vietnamese-trained communists, many of whom were purged. At the same time, the CPK forces became stronger and more independent of their Vietnamese patrons. By 1973, the CPK were fighting battles against government forces with little or no North Vietnamese troop support, and they controlled nearly 60% of Cambodia's territory and 25% of its population. The government made three unsuccessful attempts to enter into negotiations with the insurgents, but by 1974, the CPK were operating openly as divisions, and some of the NVA combat forces had moved into South Vietnam. Lon Nol's control was reduced to small enclaves around the cities and main transportation routes. More than 2 million refugees from the war lived in Phnom Penh and other cities.
On New Year's Day 1975, Communist troops launched an offensive which, in 117 days of the hardest fighting of the war, collapsed the Khmer Republic. Simultaneous attacks around the perimeter of Phnom Penh pinned down Republican forces, while other CPK units overran fire bases controlling the vital lower Mekong resupply route. A US-funded airlift of ammunition and rice ended when Congress refused additional aid for Cambodia. The Lon Nol government in Phnom Penh surrendered on 17 April 1975, just five days after the US mission evacuated Cambodia.
KHMER ROUGE REGIME 1975–1978
The Khmer Rouge reached Phnom Penh and took power in 1975. Led by Pol Pot, they changed the official name of the country to Democratic Kampuchea. The new regime modelled itself on Maoist China during the Great Leap Forward, immediately evacuated the cities, and sent the entire population on forced marches to rural work projects. They attempted to rebuild the country's agriculture on the model of the 11th century, discarded Western medicine and destroyed temples, libraries, and anything considered Western.
Estimates as to how many people were killed by the Khmer Rouge regime range from approximately one to three million; the most commonly cited figure is two million (about a quarter of the population). This era gave rise to the term Killing Fields, and the prison Tuol Sleng became notorious for its history of mass killing. Hundreds of thousands fled across the border into neighbouring Thailand. The regime disproportionately targeted ethnic minority groups. The Cham Muslims suffered serious purges with as much as half of their population exterminated. Pol Pot was determined to keep his power and disenfranchise any enemies or potential threats, and thus increased his violent and aggressive actions against his people.
Forced repatriation in 1970 and deaths during the Khmer Rouge era reduced the Vietnamese population in Cambodia from between 250,000 and 300,000 in 1969 to a reported 56,000 in 1984. However, most of the victims of the Khmer Rouge regime were not ethnic minorities but ethnic Khmer. Professionals, such as doctors, lawyers and teachers, were also targeted. According to Robert D. Kaplan, "eyeglasses were as deadly as the yellow star" as they were seen as a sign of intellectualism.
Religious institutions were not spared by the Khmer Rouge either. Religion was so viciously persecuted to such a terrifying extent that the vast majority of Cambodia's historic architecture, 95% of Cambodia's Buddhist temples, was completely destroyed.
VIETNAMESE OCCUPATION AND TRANSITION 1978–1992
In November 1978, Vietnamese troops invaded Cambodia in response to border raids by the Khmer Rouge. The People's Republic of Kampuchea (PRK), a pro-Soviet state led by the Kampuchean People's Revolutionary Party, a party created by the Vietnamese in 1951, and led by a group of Khmer Rouge who had fled Cambodia to avoid being purged by Pol Pot and Ta Mok, was established. It was fully beholden to the occupying Vietnamese army and under direction of the Vietnamese ambassador to Phnom Penh. Its arms came from Vietnam and the Soviet Union.
In opposition to the newly created state, a government-in-exile referred to as the Coalition Government of Democratic Kampuchea (CGDK) was formed in 1981 from three factions. This consisted of the Khmer Rouge, a royalist faction led by Sihanouk, and the Khmer People's National Liberation Front. Its credentials were recognised by the United Nations. The Khmer Rouge representative to the UN, Thiounn Prasith, was retained, but he had to work in consultation with representatives of the noncommunist Cambodian parties. The refusal of Vietnam to withdraw from Cambodia led to economic sanctions by the US and its allies.
Peace efforts began in Paris in 1989 under the State of Cambodia, culminating two years later in October 1991 in a Paris Comprehensive Peace Settlement. The UN was given a mandate to enforce a ceasefire and deal with refugees and disarmament known as the United Nations Transitional Authority in Cambodia (UNTAC).
RESTAURATION OF THE MONARCHY
In 1993, Norodom Sihanouk was restored as King of Cambodia, but all power was in the hands of the government established after the UNTAC sponsored elections. The stability established following the conflict was shaken in 1997 by a coup d'état led by the co-Prime Minister Hun Sen against the non-communist parties in the government. In recent years, reconstruction efforts have progressed and led to some political stability through a multiparty democracy under a constitutional monarchy.
In July 2010, Kang Kek Iew was the first Khmer Rouge member found guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity in his role as the former commandant of the S21 extermination camp and he was sentenced to life in prison. However, Hun Sen has opposed extensive trials of former Khmer Rouge mass murderers.
In August 2014, a UN-backed war crimes tribunal, the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (also known as the Khmer Rouge Tribunal), sentenced Khieu Samphan, the regime's 83-year-old former head of state, and Nuon Chea, its 88-year-old chief ideologue, to life in prison on war crimes charges for their role in the country's terror period in the 1970s. The trial began in November 2011. Former Foreign Minister Ieng Sary died in 2013, while his wife, Social Affairs Minister Ieng Thirith, was deemed unfit to stand trial due to dementia in 2012. The group's top leader, Pol Pot, died in 1998.
GEOGRAPHY
Cambodia has an area of 181,035 square kilometres (69,898 square miles) and lies entirely within the tropics, between latitudes 10° and 15°N, and longitudes 102° and 108°E. It borders Thailand to the north and west, Laos to the northeast, and Vietnam to the east and southeast. It has a 443-kilometre coastline along the Gulf of Thailand.
Cambodia's landscape is characterised by a low-lying central plain that is surrounded by uplands and low mountains and includes the Tonle Sap (Great Lake) and the upper reaches of the Mekong River delta. Extending outward from this central region are transitional plains, thinly forested and rising to elevations of about 200 metres above sea level.
To the north the Cambodian plain abuts a sandstone escarpment, which forms a southward-facing cliff stretching more than 320 kilometres from west to east and rising abruptly above the plain to heights of 600 to 180–550 metres. This cliff marks the southern limit of the Dângrêk Mountains.
Flowing south through the country's eastern regions is the Mekong River. East of the Mekong the transitional plains gradually merge with the eastern highlands, a region of forested mountains and high plateaus that extend into Laos and Vietnam. In southwestern Cambodia two distinct upland blocks, the Krâvanh Mountains and the Dâmrei Mountains, form another highland region that covers much of the land area between the Tonle Sap and the Gulf of Thailand.
In this remote and largely uninhabited area, Phnom Aural, Cambodia's highest peak rises to an elevation of 1,813 metres. The southern coastal region adjoining the Gulf of Thailand is a narrow lowland strip, heavily wooded and sparsely populated, which is isolated from the central plain by the southwestern highlands.
The most distinctive geographical feature is the inundations of the Tonle Sap, measuring about 2,590 square kilometres during the dry season and expanding to about 24,605 square kilometres during the rainy season. This densely populated plain, which is devoted to wet rice cultivation, is the heartland of Cambodia. Much of this area has been designated as a biosphere reserve.
WIKIPEDIA
Public Enemies, Public Enemies Fragman izle, Public Enemies izle, Public Enemies indir, Public Enemies download, Public Enemies divx, Johnny Depp, Christian Bale, Marion Cotillard, Emilie de Ravin, Channing Tatum, David Wenham, Giovanni Ribisi, Stephen Dorff, Leelee Sobieski, Lili Taylor, Rory Cochrane, Billy Crudup, James Russo, John Ortiz, Matt Craven, Rebecca Spence, Stephen Graham, Stephen Lang, Michael Mann, Elliot Goldenthal, Robert De Niro, Michael Mann, Kevin De La Noy, Kevin Misher, Michael Mann, Bryan Burrough, Ann Biderman, Ronan Bennett, Dante Spinotti
PE (Public Enemy)
ATP Iceland 2015
Atlantic Studios (Asbru)
Keflavik, Island
July 2015
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“The greatest challenge for me is to keep improving every aspect of the compositions and arrangements,” says ARCH ENEMY founder/guitarist Michael Amott about new album, War Eternal. “I’m always searching for ‘the perfect ARCH ENEMY song.’ When I started the band in 1995 I had the idea to create the most heavy melodic band of all time.”
And he did. Over the course of 19 years, ARCH ENEMY, under Amott’s guidance, crafted 10 acclaimed full-lengths, dominated sales charts, and toured the globe. If Amott were a smart man, he’d retire now to some tropical island with his favorite Michael Schenker records in tow and the setting sun on his face. But neither he nor ARCH ENEMY are done. Not by a long shot.
With vocalist Alissa White-Gluz replacing long-time frontwoman Angela Gossow in 2014 respectively, War Eternal is ARCH ENEMY reborn. “Changes in the band lineup are hardly ever looked upon favorably by the fans,” Amott acknowledges, “which I completely understand. Nonetheless, it does happen and the changes that have been made in the ARCH ENEMY camp were necessary in order for the band to survive and keep going. I love the energy of working with new people and Alissa has certainly brought a lot of talent and enthusiasm to the band!”
When Amott recruited Angela Gossow to front ARCH ENEMY for the Wages of Sin effort, he changed extreme metal forever. With White-Gluz, he has a new weapon. She’s a veritable firebrand on War Eternal, her unrelenting roar, cruel rasp and unique looks are the mark of a woman ready to conquer the world. “My goal is to keep ARCH ENEMY alive and thriving!” White-Gluz exclaims. “I want to open a whole new chapter for ARCH ENEMY, powerful and diverse, all the while respecting the legions of fans that love traditional ARCH ENEMY. Fans can expect loads of pure fucking metal.”
At 13 tracks, War Eternal is the quintessential ARCH ENEMY album. It’s both a nostalgic nod to the band’s past (“Never Forgive, Never Forget”, “No More Regrets”) and stunning example of what’s possible in the future (“Down to Nothing”, “Time is Black”). But if there’s a standout track—a spearhead—it’s the title song. Unveiled to the world on Youtube, “War Eternal” marches defiantly against the mundane, two raised fists to the constraints of society and the cage it desperately tries to put on us all. In it, White-Gluz proves she’s the next generation of great, while Amott and the rest of ARCH ENEMY play as if ”War Eternal” is their last song. That ”War Eternal” amassed an astonishing 1.5 million views the first 10 days is telling of its conviction and power. “There are a lot of details in this album that excite me as a songwriter and guitarist,” Amott grins. “Personally, I’ve pushed myself harder as player on War Eternal and feel I’ve gone to another level this time, which is very rewarding. I actually think the whole band has kicked everything up a notch or two.”
Produced by the band and mixed and mastered by Jens Bogren (Opeth, Paradise Lost) at Fascination Street Studio, the Swedes’ 10th full-length is unrelentingly brutal yet remarkably polished. “We could afford any big name producer at this stage in the game,” says Amott. “Having the band produce the album was a natural and logical way of working for us at this point. It was critical that we bring out the true ARCH ENEMY sound, the essence of the band on this record and who knows that better than us? Jens Bogren did an outstanding mixing and mastering the album. It was my first time working with him and I am more than impressed with his talent.”
The album was hailed as “Album Of The Month” in Terrorizer (UK), Powerplay (UK), Metal Hammer (Germany), Rock Hard (France), Metallian (France), Scream (Norway), Sweden Rock (Sweden) and got more than positive reviews all over the world; additionally, War Eternal achieved career-best chart positions for the band in the USA (#44), Germany (#9), Finland (#5), France (#56), and The Netherlands (#36), plus the best UK chart entry (#85) since Doomsday Machine (#81). ARCH ENEMY were also honored to appear on the front covers of Revolver (USA), Legacy (Germany), Rock Hard (France), Inferno (Finland), Up (Netherlands), Aardschok (Netherlands), Metal Maniac (Italy),Pro Rock (Bulgaria), Into The Pit (Thailand) and many more magazines.
Right after the release of War Eternal, the band kicked off their eternal touring with sublime festival shows at Wacken, Sweden Rock and many more, followed by a world tour with Kreator (with whom they released a split 7” single later in October 2014).
During the USA headline tour with Kreator, the band decided to part ways with guitarist Nick Cordle.
Christopher Amott (the brother of ARCH ENEMY founder/bandleader Michael Amott) joined the band for the remainder of their American headlining tour and Jeff Loomis (ex-Nevermore) stepped in for the following European dates with Kreator. Jeff will continue for another busy year in 2015 and beyond.
Jeff Loomis states: "I'm very excited to be playing with ARCH ENEMY. Michael Amott and I have stayed in contact over the years since we toured together when I was playing in Nevermore. Not only do I admire his guitar playing and songwriting, but I also consider him a close friend. To be able to share the stage with Michael, Sharlee, Daniel and Alissa is something I'm really looking forward to. 2015 is going to be a great year... See you all on tour!"
Michael Amott (guitars) comments: "The prospect of working with Jeff Loomis moving forward is truly awesome! Jeff Loomis is one of the best guitar players in the metal world in my opinion, as well as being a long time friend. I look forward to tearing it up on stages around the world together as we continue on the ‘War Eternal' touring cycle throughout all next year and beyond!"
There is no doubt that ARCH ENEMY are stronger than ever before. And the war is not over yet.
Photo's from the concert Arch Enemy gave at the Alcatraz Metal Festival in Belgium 2014
© Robin Looy Fotografie
Concert, music, festival, band photographer. Popfotograaf
Instagram: @bandphotographer
Facebook: facebook.com/robinlooyphotography
+++ DISCLAIMER +++
Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based on historical facts. BEWARE!
Some background:
As the Luftwaffe (German Air Force) lost control over the skies over Germany in the second half of the Second World War, it could no longer provide sufficient protection against Allied aircraft. Panzer divisions were especially affected by the lack of cover from fighter aircraft because they were always at the center of the most intense fighting.
The Germans already had copious amounts of half-tracked Self-Propelled Anti-Aircraft Guns (SPAAG) of different calibers and weights (Sd.Kfz.10/4, Sd.Kfz.6/2, Sd.Kfz.7/1, etc.). As these vehicles had very limited or no armor, they were vulnerable to enemy fire either from ground or air. The crew needed better protection from small arms fire and artillery/mortar high explosive fragmentation shell shrapnel. A tank-based anti-aircraft vehicle (Flakpanzer) could solve this problem, as it would have sufficient armor to resist most ground attacks with the exception of larger caliber guns. They would also provide some protection against air attacks, but even tanks could be destroyed by air ground-attack fire.
Many designs based on different Panzer chassis and weapons were tested and built during the war. The most successful early ones were based on the Panzer IV chassis (Möbelwagen, Wirbelwind and Ostwind), but one of the major shortcomings of all German Flakpanzers was the lack of a fully enclosed fighting compartment. As all were open-topped (because of easier construction, easier exhaust of gun fumes and the need to produce them as fast as possible), the gun crews were exposed to air attacks and the weather.
As the war progressed, German engineers tried to solve this problem by designing and building new Flakpanzers with fully enclosed turrets, based on later and bigger tank chassis’. One of these was the Flakpanzer based on the Panther tank, best known today as the ‘Coelian’, which was a new turret that could take various gun armaments.
The path to the Coelian SPAAG was not straight. In May 1943, Oberleutnant Dipl. Ing von Glatter-Götz, responding to the orders of Inspectorate 6, initiated the development of a new series of Flakpanzers based on already existing chassis. The Panzer I and II were outdated or used for other purposes. The Panzer III tank chassis was earmarked for the production of the StuG III and thus not available. The Panzer IV and the Panzer V Panther were considered next. The Panzer IV tank chassis was already in use for several German modifications, so it was decided to use it for the Flakpanzer program, eventually leading to the light “Kugelblitz” SPAAG. The Panzer V Panther was considered in case even the Panzer IV chassis proved to be inadequate for the task. Furthermore, the development of a whole new tank generation, the “Einheitspanzer” or “E-Serie”, had just been initiated.
The Germans formed a commission for the analysis of the effectiveness of enemy ground attack planes. The report (dated 31st June 1943) stated that, in the case of dive-bombing, the lowest point that the enemy plane reached was 1.200 to 1.500 m at an angle of 45-80°. Planes using larger caliber machine guns or cannons attacked at an altitude of around 150 to 300 m. The committee suggested that the best way to bring down enemy planes was using direct fire autocannons. To effectively fight the enemy planes, the future Flakpanzer would have to have a fully rotating turret with a high angle of fire and the caliber used should not be lower than 2 cm, with the more powerful 3.7 cm being preferred.
To give the crew the best protection possible and to meet any future Allied developments, the Panther-based Flakpanzer had to have a fully enclosed turret that could be armed with several different proposed weapon configurations. These included the 2 cm Flakvierling, 3.7 cm Flak either in twin or triple configuration, a newly developed 5.5 cm Gerät 58 Flakzwilling and even the powerful 88 mm caliber heavy anti-aircraft gun. The new turret design was to be ready for frontline service by the middle of 1944.
The first proposed design drawings were completed by Rheinmetall under the internal project number H-SkA 82827 in late May 1943 with the title “Turm Panther II mit Vierling MG 151/20”. This turret was heavily based on the Panther’s standard turret that it would simply replace. The new turret had to fulfill several set criteria like armor thickness and having an effective traversing mechanism. The armor protection of the turret was impressive, with 80 mm frontal armor and 40 mm on the sides. The turret was to be moved by using a hydraulic drive which was powered by the tank’s own engine. The maximum traverse speed was around 36° per second. Hydraulic power was used to raise the weapons, too, but a manual drive option was included as a fallback option.
The H-SkA 82827’s armament consisted of four 20 mm MG 151/20, mounted in staggered pairs, the same armament carried by the contemporary Panver IV-based “Möbelwagen” and “Wirbelwind” SPAAGs, too, but now under full armor protection. The elevation of the four guns was -5° to +75° and they had a combined practical rate of fire of 800 RPM, even though a maximum ROF of 1680 to 1920 RPM was theoretically possible. The weapons had a muzzle velocity of 900 m/s, a range of 4.800 m (15,720 ft) and an effective ceiling of 3.700 m (12,120 ft). They were belt-fed and separated from the turret crew, the gunner and the commander, which were seated in the left of the turret, weapons and ammunition were placed on the right side. The commander sat behind the gunner in an elevated position under a cupola, adapted from the Panther battle tank, for a good all-round view. Thanks to the belt-fed guns, no dedicated loader was necessary anymore, saving internal weight and space. The rest of the crew, driver and radio/machine gun operator, were seated in the Panzer V hull’s front in their standard positions.
After a wooden mock-up had been built, inspected and approved by the Heeresinspektorat 6, the go-ahead for the construction of five prototype turrets was given in September 1943, to be mounted and tested on refurbished Panther hulls. The new vehicle received the official designation Sd.Kfz. 171/1 “Flakpanzer V/20 mm”. On the 21st of December 1943, however, a Panzerkommision was formed to examine the further development of a Flakpanzer based on the Panther tank chassis. It was decided that the main armament should consist of at least two 3.7 cm caliber anti-aircraft guns, for more range and firepower, and this requirement was later revised to two even heavier 5.5 cm Gerät 58 guns. The Luftwaffe’s 30 mm MK 103 machine cannon was considered, too, since it had outstanding range, accuracy and penetration.
The problem was now that the Sd.Kfz. 171/1’s turret did not offer enough space or development potential to accommodate these heavier and bigger weapons, so that a completely new turret had to be designed from scratch around them. Daimler-Benz was chosen for this follow-up project, which was internally called “Flakpanzer 341” – after the SPAAG’s planned main armament with an experimental 3.7 cm (L/77) Flak 341 twin gun, also known as “Gerät 341”. In mid-1944 it would evolve into the Panther-based Coelian SPAAG family, but even this more sophisticated design with several armament variants became just a stopgap solution, bridging the delay of the anti-aircraft tanks based on the new Einheitspanzer chassis family.
Serial production of the Sd.Kfz. 171/1 was consequently dropped, only three fully operational prototypes were completed by March 1944, plus two armed turrets for static test. One of these turrets was later mounted onto another Panther hull, for a fourth operational vehicle. Rheinmetall kept on working with these vehicles and components until late 1945, and the four SPAAGs were also employed by the company’s Werksverteidigung unit (manned by the Rheinmetall staff, not by Wehrmacht soldiers) at the Apolda factory in central Thuringia.
The Sd.Kfz. 171/1s and the separate turrets were also used in the development programs for Rheinmetall’s so-called “Einheits-Flakturm” for the upcoming E-50/75 SPAAGs, primarily for targeting and rangefinding systems, weapon mounts and simplified turret movement mechanisms. One of these developments was the Kommandogerät 44, a much more compact analogue rangefinder, effectively an analogue fire control calculator that translated target and ambient data into electronic signals that could control weapon drives and trigger a weapon at an ideal moment. This innovative device eventually became part of the later E-50/75 SPAAGs that entered service in 1946.
The fate of these four unique vehicles after the factory’s invasion through Soviet troops is uncertain, though. They were probably destroyed by retreating German troops to prevent their experimental technologies from falling into enemy hands.
Specifications:
Crew: Four (commander, gunner, driver, radio-operator/hull machine gunner)
Weight: 40.5 tonnes (39.9 long tons; 44.7 short tons)
Length (hull only): 6.87 m (22 ft 6 in)
Width: 3.42 m (11 ft 3 in)
Height: 3.06 m (10 ft 2/3 in)
Suspension: Double torsion bar, interleaved road wheels
Fuel capacity: 720 litres (160 imp gal; 190 US gal)
Armor:
15–80 mm (0.6 – 3.15 in)
Performance:
Maximum road speed: 55 km/h (34 mph)
Operational range: 250 km (160 mi)
Power/weight: 15.39 PS (11.5 kW)/tonne (13.77 hp/ton)
Engine:
Maybach HL230 P30 V-12 petrol engine with 700 PS (690 hp, 515 kW)
ZF AK 7-200 gear; 7 forward 1 reverse
Armament:
4× 20 mm (0.787 in) MG 151/29 machine cannon in two twin mounts with a total of 3.200 rounds
1× 7.92 mm MG 34 machine gun in the front glacis plate with 2.500 rounds
The kit and its assembly:
This is an OOB what-if model, the prototype of the “Panther 20mm Flakvierling MG 151/20” from Dragon. The kit is actually mislabeled as “Flakpanzer 341”, but this designation had been allocated to the later prototype of the “Coelian” turret for the Panther chassis, just as described in the background. AFAIK, the “Panther 20mm Flakvierling MG 151/20” was not produced at all, there was just a wooden mock-up. And the whole project was quickly cancelled because it did not offer sufficient firepower and development potential. The only “official” designation I could find is the title of a project paper that describes the turret’s layout and construction, and it was called “H-SkA 82827.
But what if a small batch of these vehicles had been manufactured/completed and used by factory defense units like the Luftwaffe’s Werkschutzstaffeln?
That’s the basic idea/story behind this build, and it was kept OOB. The Dragon Panther is a simple affair and goes together well, but the instructions are weak, if not confusing. Good thing, though, is that the kit contains an extra sprue from a Jagdpanther kit that contains many optional parts for early and late Panther variants, as well as hull equipment, so that you get a good number of surplus parts for the spares box. The only downer is the fact that the soft vinyl tracks were molded in a bright sand tone, so that these delicate parts had to be completely painted.
Painting and markings:
The Panther 20mm Flakvierling is – even though it never “existed” – frequently depicted in a weird two-color scheme, probably consisting of Dunkelgelb (RAL 7028) over a red primer coat. But the depicted colors frequently appear much too garish and strong, like bright sunflower yellow over wine red! WTF? However, I liked the concept and adopted it for the model, just with more realistic tones and some personal twists.
The hull received an overall coat with RAL 3009 (Oxidrot), while the turret was painted with a paler shade of red (Humbrol 70, Brick red). On top of that, thinned Tamiya XF-57 (Buff) was used to add a fragmented meander pattern to break up the tank’s outlines. The result is quite attractive, and it might have worked well in an urban/factory environment – hence the idea of allocating the vehicle to a Werksschutz unit – several aircraft companies, e. g. Heinkel or Focke Wulf, also used prototypes for local defense, organized outside of Luftwaffe units.
To emphasize the prototype nature of this vehicle, the wheels and the armor skirts were, for some variety, painted in standard Hinterhalt camouflage colors, in Dunkelgelb (Tamiya XF-60), Olivgrün (RAL 6003, Humbrol 86) and Rotbraun (RAL 8017, Humbrol 160). The latter was also used for the engine bay cover, which I simply forgot to paint on Oxidrot in the first place. But the slightly darker Rotbraun blends well into the rest of the hull. The wheels were painted uniformly, and I added a wheel in Brick Red on each side as an un-camouflaged replacement. The armor skirts’ camouflage pattern consists of dark circles over a Dunkelgelb background, created with a stamp (self-made from fine sponge rubber) and mimicking the original “factory design” of the Hinterhalt paint scheme.
As mentioned above, the tracks had to be painted, and this time I tried a base with acrylic black paint from the rattle can, plus some grey and re brown wet-in-wet acrylic paint on top of that. Worked quite well and might become a new standard for this field of work.
The tactical markings became minimal, as the vehicle would be factory-operated and also a test article – hence it just received small Balkenkreuz insignia (on the hull ,mostly obscured by tools), and a large black “3”, edged in white for more contrast, on the turret sides, with smaller numbers at front and back of the turret for quick identification from every side.
The model received an overall washing with thinned dark brown acrylic paint and dry-brushing with light grey and beige, before it was sealed with matt acrylic varnish. Once the vinyl tracks had been mounted, the model’s lower areas and the running gear were dusted with grey-brown mineral pigments.
Well, another simple build, thanks to an OOB kit of this exotic SPAAG prototype. The result looks quite good and was completed in just two days, another member in my growing collection of real, semi-fictional and whiffy German SPAAG vehicles – turning this mock-up into an of an operational prototype of a Werksverteidigung unit certainly works and could actually have been, even though the Panther 20mm Flakvierling MG 151/20 just remained a stillborn proposal.
National Defense- Enemy Demon Fighter by Agglo
Holy stereotype Batman !
Is he supposed to be the Jihad shouting Arab aggressor ?
The O- ring curse carried over to Agglo figures too.
The infamous broken off crotch !
Oil and water mixed together are natural enemies. I do love them.
Taken with a sigma 105mm macro
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