NS Military Realism Consultancy Thread Mk X Purps Safe Space

[Triplebaconation]

I gave up making convincing ethnically-Russian dialogue (even though written in English) and just handwaved the terms used.

You can study a language a little bit. For instance, there seems to be a word in Russian that translates to "lads", which you don't get in say, Hindi or Italian. So even if a person's writing in Russian, I think it would be appropriate to have them use the words lads. You can watch videos, especially translated, to see the manner in the way people speak.

Hemingway is particular at this. Just read any Hemingway short story set in Italy or Spain and you can see how he adapts what the people say, even though they were meant to have said it in another language, so that it sounds like that language but in English. Correct translation, perhaps.

Did thee feel the earth move?

Good dialogue doesn't mimic the way people speak exactly.

[Questers]

Obviously, because it would be extremely repetitive. No person is ever going to write:
Hey, um, what happened to the thingy, the um, the pot with the pasta in it?

The what?

The um, thingy with the pasta and that.

Oh, um. Wait a sec. Oh, I think its... no, I dunno.

Etc etc.

I am not claiming some kind of ability to write, but from observation most people get the nuance of dialogue completely wrong.

[Imperializt Russia]

There are literary reasons why someone would choose to imitate such an awkward conversation, but yes, it would be rarely done.

[Allanea]

In my fics, the characters have been clearly speaking in English with English turns of phrase (despite supposedly speaking in Russian), but I've always maintained that for some reason the Russians in my universe loved British culture and continually tried to adapt and imitate it.

This was a movement in pre-Revolutionary Russia. Perhaps it survived and grew.

[Puzikas]

For the most part the goal is to just be generally noncomplacent to the rest of the world.

Trying to assimilate to English still proves difficult for me and ive spoken it daily every day for the last 10 years.
I also tend to write exclusively medical/academic papers so this doesnt help much.
Try throwing in inconsequential or contextually simple, untranslated words in the sentence if you want to emphasize them being of a specific nationality because thats the easymode. I usually use some degree of Mat when trying to depict an East Slavic characters.

Dialogue isn't that hard. The hardest part is always coming up with character names. Especially when you are trying to make up characters from diverse ethnicity and cultures and doubly so if said groups are fictional. Coming up with a Japanese name is hard, coming up with a name for a Dwarf living in an underground country inspired by revolutionary France is pure hell.

Name generators work well enough Ive found.

[The Northernmost Americas]

Any chance on a primer concerning ground based EW? Maybe touch on it's use in Ukraine.

[Imperializt Russia]

Fucking love the name generators.
In my early stuff, I was picking first names at random out of "Top Russian Boys Names 2013" on wiki.

One of them was Kirill, funnily enough. He flew an oversized Mi-24 and did some technically questionable things with his aircraft in flight.

[Chinese Peoples]

Policy on insubordination:

viewtopic.php?f=23&t=387309

Asking for feedback

[Triplebaconation]

Obviously, because it would be extremely repetitive. No person is ever going to write:
Hey, um, what happened to the thingy, the um, the pot with the pasta in it?

The what?

The um, thingy with the pasta and that.

Oh, um. Wait a sec. Oh, I think its... no, I dunno.

Etc etc.

I am not claiming some kind of ability to write, but from observation most people get the nuance of dialogue completely wrong.

That's not what I mean. Transcripts of actual conversations usually seem wooden and awkward like bad NS dialogue, while good written dialogue is subtly exaggerated and more expressive. You would sound like a jackass if you went around speaking like a Hemingway character! It's great and natural-sounding when you read it, though. The trick is not to ham it up too much.

I know you're aware of this since I've read some of your "AARs," but the absolute key to writing dialogue is integrating it into the action. If the action is bad...*fanged hiss*

This is completely unrelated, but work has recently forced me into constant correspondence with a woman who has absolutely mastered the use of passive voice to avoid responsibility for her unrelenting torrent of fuck-ups. "There was a mistake." "There has been a misunderstanding." It's amazing, really.

[The Technocratic Syndicalists]

For what it's worth I either use a random name generator to make names or mix and match first/last names from RL military personnel and for combat dialogue (specifically radio chatter) I watch or read videos/transcripts of engagements from the persian gulf war (mostly) and just switch the names/callsigns/equipment.

[Allanea]

Fucking love the name generators.
In my early stuff, I was picking first names at random out of "Top Russian Boys Names 2013" on wiki.

One of them was Kirill, funnily enough. He flew an oversized Mi-24 and did some technically questionable things with his aircraft in flight.

I don't know how good your Russian is, but this is what I immediately thought of!

A Happy Man's Thought.

[Allanea]

Policy on insubordination:

viewtopic.php?f=23&t=387309

Asking for feedback

The IDF divides illegal orders into two items:

1. "Illegal orders" - orders that are illegal but can be carried out. For example it's illegal for officers to order soldiers to shine their boots or use them for personal goals ("clean my house, soldier!"). In these cases you carry out the order and later file a complaint.

2. "Manifestly illegal orders" - orders that result in undue humiliation or suffering of innocents or violation of human rights, or are counter to the relevant provisions of the Spirit of the IDF [an actual document], such as, "Soldier, kill those babies and burn those expectant mothers", at which point the soldier is expected to refuse the order outright.

[Purpelia]

2. "Manifestly illegal orders" - orders that result in undue humiliation or suffering of innocents or violation of human rights, or are counter to the relevant provisions of the Spirit of the IDF [an actual document], such as, "Soldier, kill those babies and burn those expectant mothers", at which point the soldier is expected to refuse the order outright.

How does international law handle these? Like say my policy was for the soldier to go ahead and murder those babies but than go and file a complaint afterward. And as a result my army goes and punishes the officer who ordered it. Who is the one that would get in trouble for the whole thing?

[Allanea]

Unrelatedly, I just bought a version of This on Kindle and it is [i]nothing short of fascinating.

It details the influence of Deep Battle doctrine on US military planning and the hilarious Air Force vs. Army struggle over who would get to control the long-range firepower and fire planning for deep battle.

[Imperializt Russia]

Unrelatedly, I just bought a version of This on Kindle and it is [i]nothing short of fascinating.

It details the influence of Deep Battle doctrine on US military planning and the hilarious Air Force vs. Army struggle over who would get to control the long-range firepower and fire planning for deep battle.

I've not heard of American tactics referred to as "deep battle" before.

In your opinion, how does it compare and contrast with Soviet Deep Battle?

[The Akasha Colony]

2. "Manifestly illegal orders" - orders that result in undue humiliation or suffering of innocents or violation of human rights, or are counter to the relevant provisions of the Spirit of the IDF [an actual document], such as, "Soldier, kill those babies and burn those expectant mothers", at which point the soldier is expected to refuse the order outright.

How does international law handle these? Like say my policy was for the soldier to go ahead and murder those babies but than go and file a complaint afterward. And as a result my army goes and punishes the officer who ordered it. Who is the one that would get in trouble for the whole thing?

IRL, the Nuremberg Trials established the principle of "Superior Orders," which is to say that the orders of a superior do not excuse the actions of a junior soldier from prosecution for that act, it at best lessens the punishment (with the full punishment still falling on the superior that ordered the act, and the lesser punishment falling on all of the others involved in carrying out that act to the extent practicable). This unsurprisingly was the defense of most of the lower-level defendants at Nuremberg, but the London Charter specifically discarded it as a valid defense for acquittal. Otherwise everyone but Hitler and his inner circle and the actual commanders of the concentration camps could have been acquitted under that defense, when there was clearly a good deal of complicity in the whole thing. At the very least, it required the soldiers assigned to the concentration camps to turn a blind eye to what was going on, and most were actively participating in the workings of the camp and system.

Obviously, whether this has ever been fully enforced is wholly dependent on the will and ability to enforce it, like most international laws. Nations have generally been reluctant to enforce it as strictly on themselves but more than willing to enforce it on defeated foes. But in the modern era, even countries that are loathe to prosecute their own soldiers may find their offenders tried in the court of public opinion thanks to the proliferation of the internet and the ability of crowds to gather nearly instantly for some cause celebre.

[Purpelia]

So during wartime I could in theory get away with sidelining the officer responsible and just not bothering to note down which of the units under his command filed the complaint?

[Allanea]

So during wartime I could in theory get away with sidelining the officer responsible and just not bothering to note down which of the units under his command filed the complaint?

Just as long as you don't lose the war and don't care much about public opinion at home.

[The Akasha Colony]

So during wartime I could in theory get away with sidelining the officer responsible and just not bothering to note down which of the units under his command filed the complaint?

If you lose the war, unlikely. Even without a complaint or conscientious objector system, the Allies were quite effective at figuring out which German soldiers were assigned to which units at which time when atrocities happened to occur. Likewise with hunting down Japanese war criminals. And a prosecuting victor really has no reason to give more than lip service to "innocent until proven guilty" if they're really looking for people to punish, so if there's any doubt, they may well just hang them anyway. What are you going to do to stop them?

If you win the war, it hardly matters, really. If you committed war crimes, it doesn't really matter to other nations who the officers were that ordered it, what matters is that they occurred. If they were small and isolated and clearly the work of a few particular officers rather than a broad policy, then they might care that the officers involved are brought to justice, if you want to retain normalized relations with some of the more liberal countries. If it's a broad policy of war crimes, then it honestly doesn't matter who exactly carried it out, what matters is that it was a policy, and nations will take action at higher levels against your nation or government as a whole.

At the end of the day, you can't really cover up who committed the war crimes. There are always witnesses, if only the soldiers who happened to commit the act. There's almost always some kind of documentation, if only because militaries like to know where their resources are being spent and where their units are. And then of course there's almost always evidence as well, since it's actually rather hard to hide a large massacre. If a private walks into a forest alone and happens to shoot a young local boy, yeah, that might go unnoticed or be harder to trace, but anything worth prosecuting will not be that hard to find.

[Purpelia]

So during wartime I could in theory get away with sidelining the officer responsible and just not bothering to note down which of the units under his command filed the complaint?

Just as long as you don't lose the war and don't care much about public opinion at home.

Does it really matter that much if I win though? I mean sure, if I lose I can't protect anyone but that hardly matters when faced with the fact that the victors will want to stage a kangaroo court to condemn me and dismantle my general staff and officer corps anyway. The days of honorable victory where you don't rape the defeated afterward have been dead for a century.

If you win the war, it hardly matters, really. If you committed war crimes, it doesn't really matter to other nations who the officers were that ordered it, what matters is that they occurred. If they were small and isolated and clearly the work of a few particular officers rather than a broad policy, then they might care that the officers involved are brought to justice, if you want to retain normalized relations with some of the more liberal countries. If it's a broad policy of war crimes, then it honestly doesn't matter who exactly carried it out, what matters is that it was a policy, and nations will take action at higher levels against your nation or government as a whole.

I am mostly focused on the scenario where a rogue officer starts ordering atrocities for some reason. Not really anything systematic from the top down because my army is way too civilized to do anything like that.

Basically the situation I have in Purpelia is that the culture is xenophobic by nature, about as much as say modern day Japan but they are also far too civilized to go on a campaign of genocide or anything insane like that. So the potential exists that an officer, especially junior ones will, when faced with unsportsmanlike behavior from a conquered populace (like say guerrilla resistance) snap and decide to show those savages a lesson. These things happen in real wars all the time after all.

And in such a case popular opinion back home in Purpelia would be against the officer (of course), for he is insane but also very much opposed to even the thought of punishing the poor soldiers who committed the act, let alone taking any nation level responsibility. And the only response I could get away with in terms of popular opinion would be to declare that officer "Unpurpelian" effectively excommunicating him from the national identity (He clearly is not a real Purpelian. Real Purpelians would newer do that!) and than consider the issue settled as far as morality is concerned.

Basically, Purpelians would consider it a bad deed, but really not that bad. Like, shoplifting. It's not a nice thing to do. But you don't go around starting massive investigations, punishing dozens of people and shaking up the chain of command over shoplifting. Just make an example of one guy and wash your hands of the subject.

And I am not sure how well this would work out.

At the end of the day, you can't really cover up who committed the war crimes. There are always witnesses, if only the soldiers who happened to commit the act. There's almost always some kind of documentation, if only because militaries like to know where their resources are being spent and where their units are. And then of course there's almost always evidence as well, since it's actually rather hard to hide a large massacre. If a private walks into a forest alone and happens to shoot a young local boy, yeah, that might go unnoticed or be harder to trace, but anything worth prosecuting will not be that hard to find.

We are talking only about small scale stuff really. Like say a company of soldiers massacres a particularly troublesome enemy village. Nothing major, organized or larger than a couple dozen, maybe a hundred victims.

[Allanea]

Does it really matter that much if I win though? I mean sure, if I lose I can't protect anyone but that hardly matters when faced with the fact that the victors will want to stage a kangaroo court to condemn me and dismantle my general staff and officer corps anyway. The days of honorable victory where you don't rape the defeated afterward have been dead for a century.

THere's still things like maintaining good relations with the world community. The fact I am not capable of - or perhaps uninterested in - defeating you and burning your capital doesn't mean I won't lay down sanctions on you with my comrades.

[Purpelia]

Does it really matter that much if I win though? I mean sure, if I lose I can't protect anyone but that hardly matters when faced with the fact that the victors will want to stage a kangaroo court to condemn me and dismantle my general staff and officer corps anyway. The days of honorable victory where you don't rape the defeated afterward have been dead for a century.

THere's still things like maintaining good relations with the world community. The fact I am not capable of - or perhaps uninterested in - defeating you and burning your capital doesn't mean I won't lay down sanctions on you with my comrades.

Yea, but like does it really matter what you intend to do if the one in war with me does want to conquer my lands, burn my capital to the ground and dismantle my nation? For some context (that I just realized was lacking) Purpelia is a landlocked nation that does not engage in colonial adventures. The only time my army would be deployed is if someone was to attack me or if I was to start a proper war of conquest against a neighbor. Either way we are talking about wars with parity opponents who if I lose would want to make sure I can't ever try again.

[Militia of the Free]

So during wartime I could in theory get away with sidelining the officer responsible and just not bothering to note down which of the units under his command filed the complaint?

In theory, yes. You would atleast get a lower punishment, IIRC.

[Crookfur]

Just as long as you don't lose the war and don't care much about public opinion at home.

Does it really matter that much if I win though? I mean sure, if I lose I can't protect anyone but that hardly matters when faced with the fact that the victors will want to stage a kangaroo court to condemn me and dismantle my general staff and officer corps anyway. The days of honorable victory where you don't rape the defeated afterward have been dead for a century.

If you win the war, it hardly matters, really. If you committed war crimes, it doesn't really matter to other nations who the officers were that ordered it, what matters is that they occurred. If they were small and isolated and clearly the work of a few particular officers rather than a broad policy, then they might care that the officers involved are brought to justice, if you want to retain normalized relations with some of the more liberal countries. If it's a broad policy of war crimes, then it honestly doesn't matter who exactly carried it out, what matters is that it was a policy, and nations will take action at higher levels against your nation or government as a whole.

I am mostly focused on the scenario where a rogue officer starts ordering atrocities for some reason. Not really anything systematic from the top down because my army is way too civilized to do anything like that.

Basically the situation I have in Purpelia is that the culture is xenophobic by nature, about as much as say modern day Japan but they are also far too civilized to go on a campaign of genocide or anything insane like that. So the potential exists that an officer, especially junior ones will, when faced with unsportsmanlike behavior from a conquered populace (like say guerrilla resistance) snap and decide to show those savages a lesson. These things happen in real wars all the time after all.

And in such a case popular opinion back home in Purpelia would be against the officer (of course), for he is insane but also very much opposed to even the thought of punishing the poor soldiers who committed the act, let alone taking any nation level responsibility. And the only response I could get away with in terms of popular opinion would be to declare that officer "Unpurpelian" effectively excommunicating him from the national identity (He clearly is not a real Purpelian. Real Purpelians would newer do that!) and than consider the issue settled as far as morality is concerned.

Basically, Purpelians would consider it a bad deed, but really not that bad. Like, shoplifting. It's not a nice thing to do. But you don't go around starting massive investigations, punishing dozens of people and shaking up the chain of command over shoplifting. Just make an example of one guy and wash your hands of the subject.

And I am not sure how well this would work out.

At the end of the day, you can't really cover up who committed the war crimes. There are always witnesses, if only the soldiers who happened to commit the act. There's almost always some kind of documentation, if only because militaries like to know where their resources are being spent and where their units are. And then of course there's almost always evidence as well, since it's actually rather hard to hide a large massacre. If a private walks into a forest alone and happens to shoot a young local boy, yeah, that might go unnoticed or be harder to trace, but anything worth prosecuting will not be that hard to find.

We are talking only about small scale stuff really. Like say a company of soldiers massacres a particularly troublesome enemy village. Nothing major, organized or larger than a couple dozen, maybe a hundred victims.

Does purpelian culture push the idea that superiors should be obeyed without question or is it more individual with each expecting to hold themselves and be held responsible for thier own actions?

If it's the later then yeah everybody who took part gets done for it as they knew what was happening was wrong and still did it. Obviously the source of the order likely suffers worst.

[Allanea]

It's worth noting that the exact effect of all this stuff depends on the quality of your foreign explanation/propaganda service.