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This chapter considers other fungi that grow in buildings. Meruliporia incrassata has become a frequent problem in California, where its massive rootlike organs, called rhizomorphs, snake into homes and destroy their timber frames. Serpula lacrymans causes dry rot in Europe and has plagued buildings and wooden ships for hundreds of years. Samuel Pepys was exasperated by the effects of dry rot on the Royal Navy in the 17th century, and Thomas Faraday sought a “cure” for this fungus in the 19th century. Dry rot appeared in the writings of Charles Dickens and Edgar Allen Poe, and is also mentioned in Leviticus. A microbial menace, called the artillery fungus, that uses a miniature cannon to shoot its black spore-filled balls onto new food sources is described. This extraordinary feat of biomechanics causes this fungus to spatter itself onto automobiles, serving as yet another fungal stimulus for lawsuits.

In the forty years between 1520 and 1559, the Habsburg and Valois dynasties were at war for twenty years. This struggle for hegemony in Europe entailed not just recurring warfare along the Franco‐Netherlandish frontier, but also a leapfrogging competition in military technology (artillery, and fortresses built to withstand bombardment) and military organization (building mercenary armies from specialized units recruited in different nations). In the 1540s and especially the 1550s, French attacks came by sea as well as by land, forcing the Netherlands government, for the first time, to think about how to control the North Sea. At sea and on land, commanders who acquired up‐to‐date military skills by fighting for the Habsburgs in the 1550s would in the 1570s fight one another.

This chapter analyses the development of military and fiscal institutions in England and the Netherlands. Their armies were composed of different mixtures of noble retinues, militias, garrison and artillery forces, mercenaries, auxiliaries, and standing companies; their navies likewise a blend of converted merchant ships and purpose-built warships. It was England that developed the more permanent navy in this period, the Netherlands the more permanent army. Their arsenals, navies, and logistics showed some signs of increasing bureaucracy. War drove on fiscal expansion and demesne revenues, taxation, coinage debasement, and borrowing were all exploited as rulers sought to construct a tax state. The process involved tense negotiation with their subjects in representative institutions, and rebellions and showed clear limits to the growth of state power.

This chapter examines the direct contributions made by towns to their princes' wars. Town councils had constantly to manoeuvre between the sometimes exorbitant demands of their princes, the reluctance of the townsfolk to meet the costs of war, and the necessity to keep the town safe from attack. They raised companies of troops for field service, especially in England, as well as defending themselves with their own militias or shooting guilds. Some towns, such as York and 's-Hertogenbosch, were more militarized than others. Some supplied ships or encouraged privateers. Most developed their holdings of artillery and maintained arsenals, and nearly all paid some attention to their fortifications, though those on the coast or military frontiers did so more urgently. The costly bastions of the new trace italienne style appeared with increasing frequency in the Netherlands but not — except perhaps as temporary earthworks — in England.

This chapter examines the resources deployed by the nobility in their participation in warfare. In England, their recruitment of troops became less important over time as retinues raised from their estate tenants and household servants were superseded by drafts from the county militias. In the Netherlands, great nobles led bandes d'ordonnance, permanently waged by the prince but staffed by the captain's clients and other contingents animated by their local influence. Generals there also cultivated entrepreneurs able to raise mercenaries beyond the borders of the Netherlands. Noblemen's private arsenals were better stocked with artillery in the Netherlands than in England, and their private fortifications better maintained and modernized. The English, however, were more likely to own ships that could be turned to war or privateering.

This chapter discusses weapons used in the English civil war. Civil war armies used a transitional mixture of firearms and ‘muscle-powered weapons’ ranging from heavy artillery to clubs. Even the bow and arrow marginally survived this time, although these seem to have been most useful as a means of sending propaganda messages in and out of besieged strongholds. Officers carried pistols and swords, as did the cavalry, and royalist cavalry sometimes added a small pole-axe; dragoons — mounted foot soldiers on inferior horses — usually carried firelock muskets or carbines as well as swords; and foot regiments were composed of musketeers (normally with less advanced matchlock muskets) and pikemen, both of whom also carried swords. Homely weapons played a larger part early in the war than they did after it had settled down and supplies and logistics had improved.

This chapter shows that German Army was torn between advocates of change and champions of the old ways. The former mounted a serious challenge in the late 1880s, as shown by the adoption of the M-88 and new infantry regulations that reflected the reforming principles of Sigismund von Schlichting. By the mid-1890s, however, his enemies regained the ascendancy, forced his retirement, and brought the old company and battalion columns back into vogue. A similar dynamic was at work in the cavalry. Progressives around Bernhardi and Kleist provoked more emphasis on reconnaissance and firepower, only to see their gains undermined by conservatives. The cavalry's tactical dream of deciding battles with muscle and cold, hard steel was still quite potent at mid-decade. Similarly, champions of new field artillery models made proposals in the late 1880s, but were frustrated by C-73 and C-96 enthusiasts who staunchly opposed rival designs.

This chapter discusses the events leading to the Great War. When Russia refused to cancel its mobilization, Germany declared war on Russia and France. On 4 August, units of the German cavalry rode into Belgium. On the same day, England declared war on the violators of Belgian neutrality and Europe's conflagration had begun. Germany's long debate about war in the machine age had ended. The battlefield experience of high summer 1914 adjudicated all prewar disputes.

On September 4, 1914, Charles Summerall reported to the War Department as assistant to the chief of the Militia Bureau in charge of the field artillery of the national guard. The War Department budget was being completed, but he managed to have it include $600,000 for horses for the national guard field artillery. The war in Europe caused much interest, and requests poured in for the organization of new militia batteries. While everyone expected the United States to enter the war, there were many who felt that it was not their war and that they would suffer for people who never had been and never would be their friends. Charles' duty was to prepare for war and to respond to any order. When the Lusitania was sunk, war was inevitable. In preparation for mobilization, Charles was appointed as a member of the board to locate and recommend training and mobilization camps.

As much as it had suffered, the First Division had little rest. Beginning July 23, French trucks conveyed the foot troops as rapidly as possible to the Saizerais sector in Lorraine on the left of the Moselle River, where they relieved the Second Moroccan Division during the last days of July and the early part of August. The artillery followed. The sector covered a front of eight kilometers and had successive rows of wire and trenches. The division took up the elastic system of defense. At Vaucouleurs, the attack on the St. Mihiel Salient was rehearsed on similar terrain during the week of training and equipping. Charles Summerall met the Colonel Clark Williams for the first time, who became his closest friend and did much for the division. Charles asked him to ensure Red Cross help to care for the wounded. Williams' accomplishments were all that could have been desired.

The reception of Machiavellian thought in the Three Kingdoms exercised a powerful influence on the concept of a civic militia. Only in the British Isles did politically articulate people still seriously view a militia as an alternative to a standing army in the latter part of the 17th century. Despite the widespread hatred and mistrust of standing armies as instruments of absolutism and tyranny, the county militias of England were in decline as effective military forces for the defence of the realm, while the militias of Ireland and Scotland were only sporadically activated and lacked continuity. As the militia ceased to be a tactical military arm, it continued to function as a kind of constabulary and was employed for breaking conventicles, disarming papists, and keeping order in urban areas. Despite the general decay of the militia, the later Stuart monarchs thought that it was important to control the trained bands of London and the Honourable Artillery Company. The Irish militia was full of Old Cromwellians and nonconformists, and James II regarded it as disloyal. The Scottish militia served the Presbyterian interest in riding down religious dissidents.

This chapter examines in detail the British army's reactions to the South African War (1899–1902) and the Russo‐Japanese War (1904–5) and how they influenced training and the development of doctrine. It argues that the British army debated the meanings of these conflicts intensively but ultimately failed to develop a cohesive response. It explores the reasons behind this failure, including its concentration on imperial policing duties, small size, and limited vision, and inability to communicate ideas clearly across all ranks, particularly at a regimental level. It argues that although the top ranks of the army achieved a high degree of professionalism, the extent to which this permeated the whole army is much less certain.

This chapter aims to assist those who seek to apply the weapons law rules outlined in the book to particular weapons systems. It takes those weapons in turn and explains which legal rules would appear to be most relevant. Factors to bear in mind when evaluating the application of those rules are clarified and source materials that may be of assistance in considering a particular class of weapon are referenced. While the discussion will be of particular assistance to weapons reviewers, others whose task is to consider the legality of particular technologies will derive benefit from it. The weapons systems considered include missiles, bombs, artillery; unmanned vehicles including unmanned combat vehicles; blast weapons, lasers and directed energy weapons, computer network attack, herbicides, flechettes, depleted uranium, white phosphorus, and non-lethal weapons.

Returning to the eve of the first day of Field Artillery Officer Candidate School (FA-OCS) at Fort Sill, Oklahoma on January 1958, the chapter explains how John Shalikashvili, strategic by nature and aware of his poor academic and civilian job performances (Bradley University and Hyster Lift Company, respectively), decides to stick it out at OCS. It also overviews the impact that Donna Bechtold’s betrayal—leaving Peoria without a word—had on him, as well as the blow struck by another woman, someone back in Germany he’d turned to courting after Bechtold left.

This introductory chapter summarizes the topics that will be discussed in the next chapters of the book. The main focus of the book is the differences and commonalities of interest that were fundamental in shaping the nuclear policies and institutional interactions within the Alliance. Also, a brief history on how nuclear weapons entered warfare is presented. In the first stage, nuclear weapons were perceived only as a more powerful form of artillery. The second phase became known as the ‘revolution in military affairs’. This phase started when the Soviet Union and the United States started to realise the enormous explosive power of nuclear weapons. ‘Mutual assured destruction’ seemed to exist as both the Unites States and the Soviet Union perceived to posses enough nuclear weapons to destroy each other.

This chapter talks about the time when war fever spread throughout the city of Selma, Dallas County, and Alabama. The Jeff Davis Mounted Artillery played a big role during the course of the war in those cities by providing weapons, uniforms, and men. Travels of the artillery are documented to give an insight into the places where they supplied their weapons and who they supported in the war. Diseases arose in various military camps, infecting most of the soldiers during the war due to insanitary matters, and this became a major setback for the group. This chapter also narrates how the group slowly evolved as an institution.

This chapter is divided into three parts. Part one talks about what prompted General Lee to direct Brigadier General Pendleton to start his artillery for the front and the advances Hooker made to outbalance the Confederates. Lee's army had threats from both front and rear, but in spite of these he still had no accurate information as to the extent or direction of the Union Force to the west, and so delayed the shifting of troops. For some time, Lee only had a small portion of his men available. Fortunately though, Hooker was not applying pressure against his lines. Part two talks about the journey of the artillery back to the front lines. Canons from both sides were fired when they took position in the Southern works and the battery came out of the heated event without a single casualty. Part three talks about the offensive strike of the Confederates.