Kurt Kniezpel was born in 1921 in the Sudetenland of what was then Czechoslovakia. He belonged to the German minority there. After the occupation of the region by Hitlers Germany, he took German citizenship and thus, in 1940, joined the German army. He was assigned to the armored weapon, never being
Polish winged hussars trace their origin to Serbian and Hungarian hussars of the late Middle Ages. But in contrast to them, the Polish hussars were heavy shock cavalry. The oldest reference to the winged hussars is from 1500. However, it is believed that their units had been formed earlier. Offic
Armenian historian Suren Manoukian has documented through his research the German complicity in the Genocide of Christian Armenians during the Ottoman Empire period, about a hundred years ago. We are grateful that Germany recognized it, says Manoukian, a researcher at the Genocide Museum in Armenias
The Italian 8th Army was formed by Mussolini to reinforce Germanys ally in the anti-Bolshevik crusade on the Eastern Front. At the beginning of Operation Barbarossa the Italian dictator had reinforced the Germans with an army corps. But in 1942 it was clear that the German war effort in the USSR
On July 28, 1480, 128 Turkish ships anchored before the walls of the city of Otranto (Hydros). 18,000 Turks under the leadership of Gedik Ahmed Pasha disembarked from the ships. Immediately the Turks began a heavy cannonade. The small garrison (about 140 men) and the approximately 17,000 inhabitants
After the death of Tito the mortal formation called Yugoslavia began to creak dangerously. As in the period 1918-41, so now the peoples who had not so voluntarily joined the Yugoslav state, and with foreign encouragement, began to claim their independence. Yugoslavia was a creation of the Treaty
The 18th and 19th centuries were the period when all armies relied on the leiocan frontal musket as their primary infantry weapon. However, a gunsmith in Tyrol saw into the future. Bartholomäus Girandoni lived in Tyrol. Traditionally the area was the source of the best light infantry, the famous
When British prisoner Captain Robert Campbell received, through the Red Cross, a letter informing him that his elderly mother was dying and had expressed a wish to see him one last time, he could not have imagined the turn things would take. Campbell had joined the British Army in 1903. At the o
The Battle of Rimnik was fought on September 22, 1789 in Wallachia, present-day Romania, between an allied army of Russians and Austrians under the famous Russian general Alexander Suvorov and the distinguished Austrian peer Prince Josiah of Saxe-Coburg and a quadrupled Ottoman army. . The confli
The Boeing P-26 Peashooter was the first monoplane, all-metal American fighter to enter service with fighter squadrons. Design began in 1931 as the Model 248. The prototype first flew in 1932. The first production model was the P-26A. Two single P-26Bs with Pratt &Whitney R-1340-33 engines followed,
The Austro-Prussian War of 1866, also known as the Seven Weeks War, was decided on the Bohemian front by the overwhelming victory of the Prussians at the Battle of Sandova. However, large-scale operations were also conducted in Italy, between Prussias Italian and Austrian allies. The conflict on thi
Destiny plays strange games many times and leads a worthy man from utter obscurity to acclaim. Johann von Sporck was such a man. He was born in 1600 on a small farm in Paderborn, Germany. He seems to have received a good education assisted by his three brothers, one of whom worked for the local bish
When the people of Prague woke up on the morning of August 21, 1968, they saw that Warsaw Pact tanks had occupied key parts of the city. It was the end of the socialism with a human face experiment, which began on January 5, 1968, when Alexander Dubcek took over as secretary of the Communist Party
There have been thousands of heroic figures in all peoples on the long road of History. But some nations, due to bad geography, have no other options. Such a nation is also the Polish (as well as the Greek). Poles have been slaves of three empires since the end of the 18th century. However, the larg
Krupa is a small town in todays Bosnia-Herzegovina. In 1565 things were different as the city was a border fortress between the Habsburg Empire and the Ottoman Empire which was still ruled by Suleiman the Magnificent, who was rather petty and dishonorable... The death of Ferdinand of Habsburg, ki
The Knights of Saint John are one of the oldest knightly orders. It was founded around 1120 in Jerusalem and originally maintained a hospital in the Holy City. That is why its members were called Hospitaliers. After the occupation of the Holy Land by the Muslims, the Order fled to Cyprus and then to
The summer of 1566 saw the last attempt of the Turkish sultan Suleiman the so-called magnificent, to neutralize the Habsburgs, also occupying Vienna. On May 1, 1566 Suleiman, at the head of a huge army that according to some sources numbered 300,000 men. Other sources state 100-200,000 men. On Ju
The Ottoman-Persian War of 1821-23 was caused by border disputes between the two powers in present-day Azerbaijan, which Russia incited to put pressure on the Turks. In 1821 the Greek Revolution broke out. The Greeks achieved important victories and liberated important areas. The Turks overwhel
The destroyer was the logical evolution of the discovery of a new, for the time, weapon in sea warfare, the torpedo. Thats why the new ships that took on the mission of destroying enemy torpedo boats were named in Greek anti-torpedo and in English Destroyers. Gradually the torpedo threat expanded an
Adam Friedrich Bishop of Würzburg and Duke of Franconia agreed to raise two infantry regiments to serve with the Austrian army fighting Frederick the Greats Prussians during the Seven Years War (1756-63). The 2nd of these regiments was the so-called Blue Regiment of Würzburg. The regiment began to b
Singhasari , an in east Java resident kingdom in first half of 13th century after the decline of the kingdom Kadiri was born . Singhasaris first king, Ken Angrok (or Ken Arok) defeated the king of Kadiri, Kertajaya, in 1222. The Last King of Singhasari, Kertanagara (r. 1268–92) tem
On January 21, 1924, Lenin, leader of the Russian Revolution, died. Joseph Stalin succeeds him at the head of Soviet Russia. He takes over the administration of Lenin and quickly sets up a reign of terror based on the cult of personality. The 1st December 1934, Sergueï Kirov, an early Bolshevik (Com
The Russian Army of the 16th century did not differ substantially, but only slightly, from its counterparts of the 14th and 15th centuries. Its bulk consisted of cavalry, native and mercenary divisions. The Cavalry was, in principle, divided into heavy and light. The heavy cavalry, in turn, was main
During the days that followed Dunkirk, the Germans, without wasting a minute, rushed straight into the heart of France. By mid-June, the French armies were incapable of any organized resistance, and Mr. Paul Reynaud, Prime Minister, had to seek the consent of the British government to ask the German