Pause for thought differences in education.

[HuskerNlincoln]

First of all, let me say, what a great topic. It is interesting the motivations why we play this game.

I was born in 1962 to a captian in the US Army, 30 year man.
My earliest memories are of my home growing up on base while he was in Tialand during the Vietnam war.

He served in all three WWII, Korea, and Vietnam, as a demolitions expert.

He didn't speak of his experiences, at all, I have no reference as to his career. My mother has shared portions of their time in Germany after the war, but very little.

I have always been fascinated with the machinery of war, but as a kid growing up didnt care for history that much.

As I got into my 20s and 30s the ETO became almost an obsession, and will watch read, study everything I can get my hands on.

I wonder if its me trying to in some way share my fathers experiences and to know him better.

[sharkbit]

Born in 1964 in Denver, Colorado.
I've had an interest in WWII since I was probably 8 or so. I lean towards the European theater more but I have quite a few books on the PTO as well.
I have an interest in the land war, air, and sea war with probably a leaning toward the land war more than the others, although for the past 5 months, I've been totally immersed in the Battle of the Atlantic, thanks to SH3. I've bought a ton of books on the subject, much to the dismay of my wife.

My dad served in the Army Air Corps during WWII as a gunner aboard B-17's flying out of Bury St. Edmunds, England. Unfortuneately, he passed away when I was 7. I never had a chance to talk to him about his experiences.
My step-dad was a mechanic on B-17's in England during the war and my father-in-law served in the Navy in the Pacific on a Net Tender. (Glamorous-no, but he does have some cool stories.)

[XLjedi]

I was born in 1970 in the US and to me it's very simple...

War in the Atlantic = U-Boat
War in the Pacific = AC Carrier

It's probably just a natural tendency for a sub sim enthusiast to favor the theater in which the submarine was a more prominent strategic focus.

Another thing... There's not really a US equivalent to the German Type VII.
The US subs were all like the Type IX's. Wasn't really any good short to medium range sub in the US fleet.

There's a post at Uboat.net that I think sums up the differences between the Gato and VIIC very nicely.
http://www.uboat.net/forums/read.php?20,59236,59248


And purely from a gaming perspective...

I think if you like to exploit radar and gadgets, and prefer the stealthy single target ambush at distance. You'd probably prefer the US simulation.

If you're more of a "shoot-from-the-hip" type captain and like to get up close and personal with your targets then the German boats are going to be more fun.

I think it's more fun to play with a Gato in the Pacific than a Type IX in the Atlantic for instance. The real challenge, I think, is getting to the point where you enjoy both sims equally because you've learned to play to the advantages of each.

[Pisces]

I was born in 1976 in the Netherlands, so well after the events of both sides of the war. However, they still had noticable effects on my early life. The pacific more than the european.

My dad was born halve a year after the Dutch East-Indies surrendered to the Japanese invasion. Shortly thereafter he and his mother and older brother (and more distant relatives) were put into concentration camps by the Japs ('Tjihapit' Bandung and later prison facility 'Struiswijk' in Batavia/Jakarta). Before that my granddad was already at sea fighting the Japs in the Java Sea, where I understand he got shipwrecked. I don't know which ship he was on, just that it was a dutch navy vessel. I only know he later had to work at the Burma railroad (so must have been taken captive as POW at some point) but managed to escape there eventually. Then enlisted himself in the Chinese Army to fight the Japs there, as he couldn't return to Java yet. And eventually also was assigned with Australian forces until the war was over and he returned to Holland. It's mindblowing considering what this man must have gone through and still survive. My dad, grandmother and his brother where the first to be repatriated to Holland, skin and bones. My granddad was later joined with them again there, skin and bones aswell but held together with metal plates. They returned back to Jakarta not long after, but then had to endure the following years as Indonesia fought for their own independance from the Dutch. Pretty scarry events aswel for a small kid of 5-10 years old.

I am slowly getting the desire to do some research into war-records of what happend to my paternal granddad. Very much a mistery-man to me. I only know him as a man on a photo. And stories from my dad and uncle's are sketchy at best as they were only a kid, atleast in those early days. And grandma didn't want to talk about that time later on because of the pain it caused. Well, granddad too no doubt considering. Unfortuneatly I never got to know the man as he died a year before my parents maried and a couple more before I was born.

On the european side my maternal grandmother lived in Arnhem (as in 'Market Garden') and was a nurse. She never talked about her experiences either. My somewhat younger maternal granddad (they hadn't met yet) was old enough to be put to forced labour in Germany so he went into hiding. As the Netherlands was liberated from Germany and the Indonesian indepence war started he was sent there as enlisted soldier to keep order. I don't remember what he may have told about what he experienced there, but I remember seeing the pain in his eyes when he tried to talk about it. My mother was born after the war so she didn't have any direct experiences from it.

For me this didn't create a desire for me to take history classes or anything (.. yet anyway). There wasn't given much attention to the pacific events during my school years (as far as Dutch East-Indies were concerned) anyway. Mostly the focus was on the european theater, and holocaust events. Ofcourse Hiroshima and Nagasaki because of the A-bomb, maybe Pearl Harbor to proof it had become a 'world war', ... but the rest mostly ignored. I just tried to pay as much attention as I could when those old stories were talked about in my (dad's) family. Asking about those experiences was like walking a minefield. Never sure how they would react. And the last thing a kid wants is to make his parent(s) cry, so better not bring it up anyway. Besides, all my dad had was vague images and erratic feelings he couldn't handle so cropped up inside. (triggered by things like Gulfwar '91/violence on the news, and glorification of Japanese culture like that 'ninja'-hype late 80s) He couldn't explain what he felt even if he wanted to. And I know he did.

So my experience of the war(s) was more like a funny (not so funny!!!) unexplainable tension in the family. Ofwhich I never thought that it had any real effect on me, ... until recent years. Realising much of how I behaved as a child was based on my dad's emotions. And indirectly mom's too. Those were more important than what I felt or needed. So these are the things that run through the back of my mind whenever I watch a war-movie, play a wargame or subsim.

Getting SH1 was I guess my (feeble) way to deal with this herritage. Sinking digital Japs. (seeking revenge, yet abstaining from violence --> no harm done to your karma ) I wish I understood more of the navigation and tracking techniques at that time to really enjoy the 'payback'. All I did was mostly portraiding, never convoys. Pretty much skipped Sh2 and was a late Sh3-er because I didn't have a good pc. And also I felt weird placing myself in German shoes/raincoat. Only last year did I have a good gfx card to play Sh3. Ofcourse, I would rather play Sh4 and 'do it right' this time. But again my pc is not up to specs for that.

I'm sorry if this message sounds more like a therapy session than a discussion on education. I guess I needed to get that of my chest.

I was born in 1977 in a US Navy Hospital to two sailors. As much as I would like to glorify their "service" they were just two poor Americans with no options so they joined the military. For all you Europen and non American subsimers let me just say in America if you are not born into money you are screwed. Poor American's get a worthless high school diploma and we can join the military or pump gas. I did both actually. I joined the infantry on my 17th birthday thinking it was the proudest moment of my life. My last day in the service ended in South Carolina in a Navy brig. Let's just say I didn't fit in well with the "kindler gentler" army. I almost joined the French Foreign Legion, but then I decided I should grow a brain as it would be less painful.

My study about World War 2 history and other wars is the unpopular aspects. I study how America instigated Pearl Harbor as en excuse to enter world war 2, because at the time America wanted no part in it. Then there is of course the Lusitania. The gulf of Tonkin lie and many more. I study how America tested it's A-bombs on American troops to see what radiation did. I suggest you read up on the USS Liberty. Israel napalmed and torpedoed it to blame it on another middle eastern country to drag America into war in the middle east. Israel also at least allowed the Marine barracks to be blown up to drag us into a full blown war, they may have even helped the bad guys out. This stuff is important to study because it continues today. 9-11 anyone? I was a demo man in the army, I had to use a half pound of C4 just to blow up four strands of concertina wire, they want me to believe jet fuel caused sky scrapers to collapse? If history tells us anything, there is a lot more to things than the "official" version.

I also like to follow the money trails that start these wars. Hitler could not rise to power without the powerful banks behind him. What is shocking is to learn that Hitler had some powerful jewish bankers funding him. Ok, well you all get the drift. There is an old movie in America called the Wizard of Oz. There is a line in the end. "pay no attention to the man behind the curtain". Well, you better!

I play SH3 and SH4 because I like the chess like aspect of the fighting. It's the right amount of action and it requires brains as well. It's not as boring and slow as Steel Panthers nor is it a Arcade shoot em up.

Originally Posted by Pisces

I am slowly getting the desire to do some research into war-records of what happend to my paternal granddad. Very much a mistery-man to me. I only know him as a man on a photo.

Daddy's flown across the ocean
Leaving just a memory
Snapshot in the family album
Daddy what else did you leave for me?
Daddy, what'd'ja leave behind for me?!?
All in all it was just a brick in the wall.
All in all it was all just bricks in the wall.

Pink Floyd lyrics, "Another Brick in the Wall"

[Pisces]

Originally Posted by Flamingboat

Daddy's flown across the ocean
Leaving just a memory
Snapshot in the family album
Daddy what else did you leave for me?
Daddy, what'd'ja leave behind for me?!?
All in all it was just a brick in the wall.
All in all it was all just bricks in the wall.

Pink Floyd lyrics, "Another Brick in the Wall"

Thanks for quoting that! I appreciate it.

[Brag]

Here comes my bit. Since I just copied and pasted from my webbie, it is skeewed a bit toward writing.

One of my early childhood memories is the pre-dawn roar of lions in Chile’s Santiago Zoo. It marked me for a life of adventure. My first fear had been of the moon. It terrified me when it rose out of the darkness. My second fear was growing up and having to get a job. At least this last fear showed hints of intelligent life inside my head.
I grew up speaking Russian and Spanish. I listened to everything and stored it for future use. My parents called me the Sponge. When they didn’t want me to know what they were saying, they spoke in French. It took them some time to conclude I had learned French from them.

My first chance at writing came with a homework assignment at age eight. Write a one page free composition. I presented a four page unfinished novelette complete with ink spots, in German. It got me an F.

When I reached 18, I was no longer listening to anyone. My mother considered my epistles sent from various Far Eastern ports as masterpieces. She copied them and embarrassed me to all her relatives.

By my late twenties, I had been fairly successful in avoiding my childhood fear, work. After a hitch in the USMC, I packed a gun for a security outfit at night, went to flight school during the day. Aviation led me to Vietnam and Laos. Secretly, I wrote some explosive stuff for our pilot’s labor union. It is reported the American ambassador went livid after reading an inflammatory tract, and wanted to know who wrote this ****. Many years later, this little incident became part of the concept for a thriller.

After the Vietnam War, I wrote my first novel. It was so awful that I limited myself to writing brochures. Europe, Asia, South America, Africa, I flew, sailed, got married, survived a shipwreck. In Kenya started my own safari outfit, and learned my seventh language, Swahili. Since I was one of the few outfitters operating in poacher’s country and had excellent contacts, I got roped to work undercover for Kenya’s Anti-poaching Unit This resulted in the poachers, and their protectors (my employers) going after me. At the dinner table, my revolver sat neatly next to the fish knife.

In Kenya I wrote a series of novels, all left unfinished, and a few articles that got published. Back in Chile, I ran horseback trips into the Andes, and trained horses off-season. Trying to recoup my fortune, in the States, I sold boats and taught navigation. Sands of Maraviti, was my first attempt at thrillers and the beginning of serious writing. By the time I finished, I had lost my friends and my job that was too much like work. Free of encumbrances, I wrote Temple Drums. This novel brought patronage that allowed me to extend writing full time. Part of my writing life is coordinating online workshops, chat and critique groups for the writers' community on AOL.
I have conquered my fear of the moon, but still prefer the nights when the moon is hiding and friendly stars show me the way.

A number of Subsimers have read my novel Kingmaker.

[Ping Panther]

I just made it to my big 40 this past January. So that means I was an early vintage '68 kid.

I developed a very significant interest in world/military history from my early teenage years. I have always had an immediate appreciation for attempting to comprehend the enormous scope of how history, cultures, geopraphy, technology, diplomacy (often not having the best of possitive effects), attributes to the way one interprets the past and the present times. So this may have boiled down into an odly-combined life interest of architectural/cultural matters & military tactics/technologies & historic roles.

I would agree that the European/Atlantic campaigns of this era is more self-identifiable to Americans in their world history education (or lack of it). Since most Americans tend to have a strong majority of their ancestory linked to some landmark from Europe/U.K./Africa. While I would consider based only on my post-WW2 birth comprehension allows, was that the most immediate call to arms fury was was more stronly rooted in the U.S. to the military threat presented by the Japanese forces at the time as being perceived as more immediately urgent, despite the ongoing strife that the German forces had pressed for a considerable amount of years previously, yet it was determined at that time to be blurred from the American perception or direct policies to engage such a direct action. Once this has aged a couple generations of time, my experiences of the highschool education program did lean a certain 75% to the educational matters of the Atlantic war more than the Pacific.

My Grandmother had a brother serve in the U.S. Sub Fleet in the Pacific (he was involved more directly in the '43-'44 patrols, stationed at that time at Midway Naval Base. He attended submariners training school at the U.S. Sub base in New London, CT. (I recently made a visit to this base and viewed the USS-Nautilus sub & museum.) My Grandfather was in the Army (he had preferred to serve in the Navy; however, he was sorted 1-2-1-2... at the last minute in the enlistment offices, 1's were sent to the Navy... he drew a 2... Army you go!),and was deployed into the occupational forces in Japan after the bombing of Hiroshima. He contiuned from his Army career to join the U.S. Merchant Service in the Great Lakes. My Grandfather quite often took me, my brother & my folks for sails around Lake Erie when I was a kid, and I love sailing and the sea ever since. My Dad served in the U.S. Navy, and served on board the destroyer fleets in the Atlantic/Mediterranean Sea in the early '60's. So Silent Hunter has given me some immediate link back to some of my family naval heritage. (I took all 6 years of my highschool German as a second language courses, again, as a link to my Germanic family roots, and then along comes SH3 with the awesome German audio voice option.)

My first sub-simulator experiences were with Silent Service on a Commodore-128. I missed out on SH1, I then came across SH2 for a while, then took a big pause and have steadily wrapped myself even more, into an ever-continuing fascination/appreciation/dedication to exploring the many aspects of this era brought to a technological wonder inside of SH3. I hope to get my now dusty almost 2 year old disk of SH4 off the shelf and give it a spin, maybe.

[XLjedi]

Originally Posted by Flamingboat

I was born in 1977 in a US Navy Hospital to two sailors. As much as I would like to glorify their "service" they were just two poor Americans with no options so they joined the military. For all you Europen and non American subsimers let me just say in America if you are not born into money you are screwed. Poor American's get a worthless high school diploma and we can join the military or pump gas. I did both actually. I joined the infantry on my 17th birthday thinking it was the proudest moment of my life. My last day in the service ended in South Carolina in a Navy brig. Let's just say I didn't fit in well with the "kindler gentler" army. I almost joined the French Foreign Legion, but then I decided I should grow a brain as it would be less painful.

Sounds like you've got issues beyond being born to "poor" Americans. I know of people who grew up in mobile homes, got by with C's in high school, put themselves thru basic college classes and now earn respectable salaries. You don't necessarily have to be rich or a genius to be successful in America. ...but there is something to be said for perseverence and common sense.

If anything, poor Americans are the least disadvantaged class of poor in the world. ...and to many foreign countries poor Americans are anything but poor.

Originally Posted by aaronblood

If anything, poor Americans are the least disadvantaged class of poor in the world. ...and to many foreign countries poor Americans are anything but poor.

So what you are really trying to say is "there are starving people in China!" ha ha. I know poor American's don't have it as bad as say a poor Peruvian or Burmese, but go tell that to the kid in a one traffic light town working at McDonald's in Nowhereville West Virginia. His country only needs him when they need to have someone do the dieing in a war. After that it's back to the fry cooker. Go look at the state of the VA hospitals even as I write this. After the war machine is "finished" with you, you're on your own.

As for having issues, well my mom and many ex's would agree, however that doesn't go very far in defending the lack of any real opportunity in America. My story ends well, I'm married to money, but if it wasn't for that I would be mopping a cargo ship loaded with rubber dog **** out of Hong Kong.

[Pisces]

Originally Posted by Ping Panther

I would agree that the European/Atlantic campaigns of this era is more self-identifiable to Americans in their world history education (or lack of it). Since most Americans tend to have a strong majority of their ancestory linked to some landmark from Europe/U.K./Africa. While I would consider based only on my post-WW2 birth comprehension allows, was that the most immediate call to arms fury was was more stronly rooted in the U.S. to the military threat presented by the Japanese forces at the time as being perceived as more immediately urgent, despite the ongoing strife that the German forces had pressed for a considerable amount of years previously, yet it was determined at that time to be blurred from the American perception or direct policies to engage such a direct action. Once this has aged a couple generations of time, my experiences of the highschool education program did lean a certain 75% to the educational matters of the Atlantic war more than the Pacific.

Have you noticed how long one of those sentences became? Please get scissors.

[onelifecrisis]

Originally Posted by Flamingboat

So what you are really trying to say is "there are starving people in China!" ha ha. I know poor American's don't have it as bad as say a poor Peruvian or Burmese, but go tell that to the kid in a one traffic light town working at McDonald's in Nowhereville West Virginia.

Perhaps as a non-American I should stay out of this but I really feel the need to say that I think Flamingboat touched on a very good point: everything is relative.

Originally Posted by Brag

My first chance at writing came with a homework assignment at age eight. Write a one page free composition. I presented a four page unfinished novelette complete with ink spots, in German. It got me an F.

That reminds me of an uncle of mine who flunked out of art school. He has been an artist his whole life and has never had to work a day in his life for "the man". He isn't famous or rich but he did well for himself.

I was told my life was "over" because I got a bad conduct discharge. I got hired by a top military contractor for Iraq even with that. I declined the offer as I had no intention of going, I just wanted to see if I could pull it off.

Originally Posted by onelifecrisis

Perhaps as a non-American I should stay out of this but I really feel the need to say that I think Flamingboat touched on a very good point: everything is relative.

By all means jump on in. One big reason I like this forum is to hear from people around the globe.