π§ Blitzkrieg: How Britain Invented, Then Ignored It
π§ Warfare • 37m
Hereβs a special episode of Cautionary Tales, a podcast from our friends at Pushkin Industries.
On Cautionary Tales, bestselling author Tim Harford shares stories of human error, natural disasters, and tragic catastrophes from history that contain important lessons for today. In 1917, a brilliant British officer developed a way to use an emerging military technology: the tank. The
British army promptly squandered the idea β but the Germans did not. Blitzkrieg, the devastating advance of German tanks across Europe in 1940, was invented by the British.
This is a common story: Sony invented the forerunner of the iPod, Xerox the personal computer, and Kodak the digital camera. In each case they failed to capitalize on the idea. Why? Find out on Cautionary Tales. You can hear more episodes at Cautionary Tales with Tim Harford.
Up Next in π§ Warfare
-
π§ Origins of Modern Iran
As protests continued across Iran last week, a number of Iranian-made kamikaze drones were fired by Russian forces at targets thousands of miles away in Kyiv, Ukraine.
It marks the first time that these Iranian weapons have been used against a European capital, as well as a new low for relations...
-
π§ First Indochina War: Dien Bien Phu
The siege of Dien Bien Phu took place in 1954 and was a definitive victory for Vietnam. Although the battle brought an end to French colonial rule, the separation of the countryβs north and south created a volatile political environment between capitalism and communism, eventually leading to Amer...
-
Battle of Midway: Decoded
The Battle of Midway has gone down in history as a key turning point in the Pacific Campaign of the Second World War. In June 1942, the US Navy outthought, outflanked and overwhelmed the formidable Imperial Japanese forces thanks largely to the work of pioneering codebreakers.
Japan's first-line...