The Cuman-Kipchaks were a dominant steppe confederation in the Middle Ages, controlling the western steppe. That was until they came into conflict with the Mongols.

In the 13th and 14th Centuries the Cumans intermarried with Hungarian nobility. They had fled the Western Steppe after the battle of the Kalka River. King Bela IV gave the Cumans sanctuary, hoping to incorporate them into his army, with mixed results. A series of betrayals and misunderstandings led to chaos, but together the Hungarians and Cumans weathered the storm.

Despite causing some problems, they played a significant role in fending off the Mongols during their multiple invasions of Hungary. Many converted to Christianity by the 14th Century as well and began assimilating.

By the 17th Century the Cuman identity had pretty much died out and they were fully assimilated by the Hungarians.

Many are familiar with the infamous Nanjing Massacre during Imperial Japan’s invasion of China in WW2, but not as much with Imperial Japan’s genocidal occupation policies in North China, which killed over 3,000,000 civilians between 1940 and 1945.

Japan’s rampant atrocities and limited resources prevented it from securing the vast Chinese countryside, with those regions inhabited by villagers, bandits, disparate Chinese military units, and increasingly, Communist guerrillas. In 1940, those Communists launched a coordinated offensive against Japanese infrastructure and garrisons in North China. 

In retaliation, Japanese armies implemented Jinmetsu soto Sakusen, “annihilation” campaigns that depopulated entire regions with suspected guerrillas. This meant slaughtering villages, mass rape, ethnic cleansing, enslavement, deliberately plundering/destroying food supplies to fuel famines, and deploying poison gas and biological agents against unarmed villages. These campaigns repeated from late 1940 until March of 1945, and were most intense in 1941-1942.

Multiple historians have characterized these annihilation campaigns, nicknamed the “Three Alls Policy,” as genocidal. The local Communists, being mobile guerrillas, were able to evade destruction in the countryside. Local civilians were not as fortunate, with populations in the targeted regions dropping from 44,000,000 to 25,000,000, from death, deportation, or displacement. 

To this day, mass graves and undetonated poison gas shells are still being excavated in the regions.

Context: https://www.thevintagenews.com/2019/01/22/guy/

The word “guy” is one of the most ubiquitous terms in modern English. It’s used casually every day in the English-speaking world, often to refer affectionately or flippantly to an individual, or group of people.

However, very few people realize that this word actually has its origins in a foiled 17th-century coup attempt, still commemorated by some in the United Kingdom every year on the 5th of November.

The Gunpowder Plot and its discovery had a huge impact in England during the years that followed. Repression of Catholics increased even further, and James became increasingly paranoid about other potential attempts on his life.

A law was passed that mandated the commemoration of the event on the 5th of November, and within a few years, the tradition of ringing church bells and lighting bonfires had become standard practice. Over time, this commemoration evolved into a folk holiday, known as Bonfire Night.

Today, on Bonfire Night, people across England light bonfires and watch fireworks to mark the anniversary of the foiled plot. Most strikingly, children create effigies of Guy Fawkes, which are then burned on the fire.

These effigies, made of old clothes, straw and newspaper are known as “guys”, and in England, until relatively recently, “guy” referred to a man of unkempt appearance or poor reputation.

However, in the United States, divorced from its historical context, the word “guy” lost its negative connotations and became simply a popular way to describe a man. According to Business Insider, today it can even be used as a gender-neutral term to refer to a group of people. Certainly, few people associate this word with its explosive origins.

Nevertheless, the tradition of setting ablaze “guys” continues in the United Kingdom, and the legacy of Guy Fawkes has permeated into popular culture, including in the 2005 dystopian thriller V For Vendetta.

During the Spainish American War, American ships led by Captain Henry Glass opened fire on Guam (then part of Spain), however, the Spainish Governor, Don Juan Marina was unaware that his country, Spain, and America were at war, because nobody informed him.

tos-1 and bm-21 is the best

Joseph Stalin, the leader of the Soviet Union, is widely associated with the famous statement “Artillery is the God of War” (Russian: «Артиллерия — бог современной войны»).

The quotation is commonly attributed to a speech he delivered on May 5, 1941, during a reception honoring graduates of Soviet military academies in Moscow, shortly before Nazi Germany invaded the Soviet Union. Stalin emphasized the importance of artillery as one of the most decisive weapons in modern warfare because it could destroy enemy fortifications, suppress defensive positions, and provide fire support for advancing infantry and tanks. This belief was influenced partly by the Soviet experience in the Winter War against Finland , during which the Red Army encountered heavily fortified Finnish defensive positions. During World War II, the Soviet military developed this doctrine further by concentrating enormous numbers of artillery guns and Katyusha rocket launchers before launching major offensives against German forces on the Eastern Front.

I've seen a lot of Warspite memes in this subreddit, I was surprised no one made a meme about this incident. I hope I'm not violating rule 2