Ask a Poster Party (Q1:suggest a better name)

[phonics]

Everyone here has their weird quirks that they're very specifically educated on. This is the thread to ask for interesting posts from specific users on a subject.

First up @Lewis:

I like that Napoleon is still the second top Russian villain after Hitler. I doubt he barely even registers in the popular British imagination these days the poor little bastard.

Care to explain/have a good place I can get a description of how Napoleon got to Russia? Specifically in reference to the two states between them. My Swiss history curriculum had a conspicuous lack of Prussian and Austro-Hungary context much like American/UK education systems on the bad shit their ancestors did.

Where/When/Why did the two collapse as well if you have that?

[Offshore Toon]

@Pleb how's it going bro?

[Pleb]

I'm alive how about you?

[Disco]

Prussia was basically a client state and were obliged to give the French access, Napoleon put the rest of Germany into a sort of confederation after he dissolved the HRE so they were in his pocket too.

[Magic]

@phonics when are you going to get a life

[phonics]

When are you going to regain yours?

[Lofty]

What about Genghis Khan lolling his way into Moscow along frozen rivers for a rapeathon, old Bony was too busy trying to look taller.

[Lewis]

Prussia was basically a client state and were obliged to give the French access, Napoleon put the rest of Germany into a sort of confederation after he dissolved the HRE so they were in his pocket too.

There isn't really much to add to that that Wikipedia can't tell you. Half the Grand Armee was Austrian/German/Polish as well, so they just picked them up from local duties on the way.

I don't think we ever did any Napoleonic Wars at school. We did the French Revolution in sixth form, but only up to it all eating itself, and it was largely taught in that crappy school way that put it all down to people not liking the monarchy. It's a shame because the British Empire literally waged the perfect war[s] against Napoleon, which might be why we don't have him on the villain list these days.

[Offshore Toon]

I'm alive how about you?

Same, mate.

[phonics]

There isn't really much to add to that that Wikipedia can't tell you. Half the Grand Armee was Austrian/German/Polish as well, so they just picked them up from local duties on the way.

I don't think we ever did any Napoleonic Wars at school. We did the French Revolution in sixth form, but only up to it all eating itself, and it was largely taught in that crappy school way that put it all down to people not liking the monarchy. It's a shame because the British Empire literally waged the perfect war[s] against Napoleon, which might be why we don't have him on the villain list these days.

Related: why is Russia obsessed with chipping bits off Ukraine? I understand the whole USSR thing but they seem to care more about annexing some farmland in Crimea than like Belarus.

[Lewis]

The whole area was really just Russia centuries ago, but 'national' boundaries were still reasonably well defined, and that area was not necessarily part of the Ukraine until the Soviet Union just randomly said it was in the fifties. To keep the peace post-fall to bits they agreed to let Russia keep half of its navy there, which is why they want it back now Ukraine has seemingly made a decisive turn westwards, but they need certain areas around it as well to keep it open in the longer-term. They'll get away with it as well because who cares?