Politics & Army Men

Recently I read about several people who said they would not play miniature wargames with the WWII German SS or the American Civil War Confederate States because of political reasons.  They thought the two groups were so terrible they could not play those soldiers.

With the exception of 5 years of Civil War, The South and the USA share the same heritage. Slavery was legal in the USA from the birth of the republic until after the ACW when the 14th Amendment was passed. Several slave states did not join the Confederacy. Some Blacks, both slave and free fought for the Confederates, some American Indian tribes fought for the South and owned slaves.

No one ever cares about playing ancient Rome, or ancient Egypt and they owned slaves, participated in infanticide and did all kinds of things we would never do here.

It's history, it does not exist anymore. If we play it, we can learn from it. If we ignore it we may not learn about it.

The Soviet Union killed 40 million of it's own people yet no one says they won't play the NKVD or Soviet Armies because of political reasons. Stalin was probably the worst dictator ever, everyone feared him and he personally murdered people.

I grew up in the Viet Nam War era and was in the Army Reserve in the Cold War. I have collections of North Vietnamese, Viet Kong, and the Soviet Union from the Cold War and WWII. It's army men. I don't do it to glorify the enemy, but to learn from them.  Learning about the history of the world is one of the best things about playing with toy soldiers.

Bug War

Robotoid reports all wounded are stable and ready for transfer back to base hospital.

Okay, we will begin taking them back right away.

Intel reports more bug signs...

The war never seems to end.

Bugs Lose

The men move the dead bugs into a pile.  Some infantry guard them, just in case.

The human wounded are tended by the robotiod and the medics.  The dead are lined up for removal.

When they leave, the humans will burn the dead bugs.  No reason to leave their bodies for other bugs to use as food.

The damaged walker will be picked up by a transport ship and repaired back at base.

The battle was hard fought and we lost some good men, but it was a victory.

Assault on a Queen

The hive queen!

One lone trooper is close enough to hurl a grenade and kill her.

The grenade explodes and the hive queen is killed.

The walking warrior mops up the last of the soldier bugs.

The cost in soldiers was high, the dead, dying and wounded litter the field.