Iron kingdom
"Iron Kingdom traces Prussia's involvement in the continent's foundational religious and political conflagrations: from the devastations of the Thirty Years War through centuries of political machinations to the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire, from the enlightenment of Frederick the Great to the destructive conquests of Napoleon, and from the "iron and blood" policies of Bismarck to the creation of the German Empire in 1871, with all that implied for the tumultuous twentieth century."--Jacket.
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What Hacker News says
- While Prussian culture and the unification of Germany has been done to death in regards to the origin of Nazism (my personal favorite detailing of that history and how Nazism may have its roots in that culture is Iron Kingdom) I’m not sure I’ve read a similar account irt Italy, it is just my pet theory.
Further, I’d argue that Portugal and Spain can play a role to help further this theory. While Italy and Germany spent the years developing a national identity at war to enlarge their nations (and form this outright) Spain and Portugal spent that same time period developing into a single culture while fending off newcomers and trying to keep their nations intact. For this reason their form a fascism was less expansionist (or to be correct, was less able to be convinced that expansion was their only hope.)
- >The EU has banned many Russian and Belarussian news sources since the invasion of Ukraine.
I read Clark's Iron Kingdom: The Rise and Downfall of Prussia (<https://www.amazon.com/dp/B002RI9PMM/>) right after hearing about YouTube shutting down Russian state media channels. I was surprised to learn in the book of the extent of the freedom of the press in late 18th-century Prussia. A British visitor wrote that people were as free to speak as back home, citing a work that was very critical of the king in the context of Poland. During the Napoleonic wars, despite the existential threat to Prussia from France, at least four newspapers that celebrated Revolutionary France as the next step in human freedom were allowed to publish.
It's always preferable to counter propaganda with free speech. Even liars deserve the opportunity to speak. This is especially true when there is no formally declared war between US/Europe outside Ukraine and Russia.
- Reading:
Craig, The Fall of Japan
Price, Battle of Britain Day: 15 September 1940
Pratchett, Discworld series (finished four volumes)
Recently finished:
Craig, Enemy at the Gates
MacGregor, Checkpoint Charlie
Jones, Colossus (Incredibly prescient 1966 novel predicting ASI; the 1970 film adaptation is better, but the novel has more insights into the AI's similarity with LLMs)
Suarez, Daemon
Moss, Nineteen Weeks: America, Britain, and the Fateful Summer of 1940
Clark, Iron Kingdom: The Rise and Downfall of Prussia, 1600-1947
Pascal, Showstopper: The Breakneck Race to Create Windows NT
- Currently actively reading:
The Sleepwalkers: How Europe Went to War by Clark
The Napoleonic Wars: A Global History by Mikaberidze
An Introduction to Programming in Emacs Lisp by Chassell
The Girl from the Channel Islands by Lecoat
Recently completed:
Leviathan Falls by Corey
Iron Kingdom: The Rise and Downfall of Prussia, 1600-1947 by Clark
Showstopper! the Breakneck Race to Create Windows NT and the Next Generation at Microsoft by Zachary
Mercury Rising: John Glenn, John Kennedy, and the New Battleground of the Cold War by Shesol
Seeking Love in Modern Britain: Gender, Dating and the Rise of 'the Single' by Strimpel
The Club: Johnson, Boswell, and the Friends Who Shaped an Age by Damrosch
Come Fly with Us: NASA's Payload Specialist Program by Croft
Aerial Warfare: The Battle for the Skies by Ledwidge
De Gaulle by Jackson
1913: The Year Before the Storm by Illies
Vichy France by Paxton
Year Zero by Reid
And the Show Went On: Cultural Life in Nazi-occupied Paris by Riding
The Kinsman Saga by Bova
The Triumph of William McKinley: Why the Election of 1896 Still Matters by Rove
La Place De La Concorde Suisse by McPhee
End of a Berlin Diary by Shirer
Seizing the Enigma: The Race to Break the German U-Boat Codes, 1933-1945 by Kahn
Hell and Good Company: The Spanish Civil War and the World it Made by Rhodes
The Forgotten Depression: 1921 : The Crash that Cured Itself by Grant
Bernard Baruch by Grant
Wool by Howey
Project Hail Mary by Weir
- >Whenever I read any history of European democracies, I always get the impression that political oppression was a lot worse in the past than it is now, despite how bad it may appear.
I am reading Clark's Iron Kingdom: The Rise and Downfall of Prussia (<https://www.amazon.com/dp/B002RI9PMM/>, and was surprised to learn of the extent of the freedom of the press in late 18th-century Prussia. A British visitor wrote that people were as free to speak as back home, citing a work that was very critical of the king in the context of Poland. During the Napoleonic wars, despite the existential threat to Prussia from France, at least four newspapers that celebrated Revolutionary France as the next step in human freedom were allowed to publish.
(I read that last part almost immediately after hearing of YouTube shutting down Russian state media channels. It's always preferable to counter propaganda with free speech. Even liars deserve the opportunity to speak. This is especially true when there is no formally declared war between the US and Russia.)
- I am reading Clark's Iron Kingdom: The Rise and Downfall of Prussia (<https://www.amazon.com/dp/B002RI9PMM/>). Right after hearing about YouTube shutting down Russian state media channels, I was surprised to learn in the book of the extent of the freedom of the press in late 18th-century Prussia. A British visitor wrote that people were as free to speak as back home, citing a work that was very critical of the king in the context of Poland. During the Napoleonic wars, despite the existential threat to Prussia from France, at least four newspapers that celebrated Revolutionary France as the next step in human freedom were allowed to publish.
It's always preferable to counter propaganda with free speech. Even liars deserve the opportunity to speak. This is especially true when there is no formally declared war between the US and Russia.
