TOP 10 SHOCKING HISTORICAL FACTS:
THE SHORTEST WAR[1]
The Anglo-Zanzibar War of 1896, fought between the United Kingdom and the Zanzibar Sultanate, lasted for 38 minutes. Overall, this was caused due to the fact that the UK was much more powerful military-wise – or perhaps they didn't know how small this conflict would be. In fact, the Sultanate's forces sustained roughly 500 casualties, while only one British sailor was injured.
(The caption says: “Marines after seizing the Palace, with broken Zanzibari Gun”).
THE LONGEST WAR[2]
Lasting a shocking amount of 335 years, the Three Hundred and Thirty Five Years' War (convenient name) fought between the Netherlands and the Isles of Scilly is considered to be the largest conflict to have ever existed. Due to a lack of a treaty advocating peace, for more than 300 years the relation between these two states remained in a state of war. In theory, although this was a bloodless conflict, the theoretical war setting remained there for all those years. In spite of that, if humanity is not careful, other current events such as the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict can extend to many more years than it has now.
NEW HOLOCAUST RESEARCH[3]
Researchers Geoffrey Megargee and Martin Dean from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum have conducted a thirteen-year long investigation which recently publicly concluded that an “estimate [of] 15 million to 20 million people died or were imprisoned in the sites that they have identified as part of a multivolume encyclopedia,” which is a much larger quantity than many historians believed to be so. Also, it was documented that in reality there were “30,000 slave labor camps; 1,150 Jewish ghettos; 980 concentration camps; 1,000 prisoner-of-war camps; 500 brothels filled with sex slaves; and thousands of other camps used for euthanizing the elderly and infirm, performing forced abortions, ‘Germanizing’ prisoners or transporting victims to killing centers.” In sum, the cruelty surrounding the events of the Holocaust were actually much more brutal than what we bargained for.
(“A propaganda photograph showing Hitler speaking to followers in the canteen of a Munich hostel for SA men. You may think that they look quite decent people”).[4]
THE KHMER ROUGE BRAINWASHED CHILDREN[5]
The Cambodian group of followers of the Communist Party of Kampuchea – the Khmer Rouge – strived to brainwash thousands of Cambodian children into becoming soldiers who committed mass murders (based on Pol Pot's ideals). As explained by a former Cambodian citizen which lived through the genocide, “they told us we were VOID. We were less than a grain of rice in a large pile. The Khmer Rouge said that the Communist revolution could be successful with only two people. Our lives had no significance to their great Communist nation, and they told us, ‘To keep you is no benefit, to destroy you is no loss.’ ”
(Pol Pot leading Khmer Rouge troops).
CHINA'S STRANGE ONE-CHILD POLICY [6]
Although I am always receptive to any opinions that may diverge from mine, I believe that is it irrefutable that China's one-child policy established cruel results throughout the 36 years that it was imposed. Since boys were considered to be more “useful” than girls, as a 2001 article from BBC says, “on the garbage dumps that surround Beijing, scavengers from time to time will find a newborn baby girl amid the stinking refuge,” many of which were still alive.
At that time, “perhaps a million girl fetuses [were] aborted and tens of thousands of girl babies [were] abandoned,” and “for every 100 girls registered at birth, there [were then] 118 little boys - in other words, nearly one seventh of Chinese girl babies [were] going missing.” The most shocking aspect might just be that this law was only suspended in 2015. I was actually trembling while typing this due to the anger building up inside me. What an absurd. There are other ways to solve overpopulation:
SULTAN IBRAHIM I OF THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE WAS MENTALLY INSANE
Being mentally unstable and unfit to rule, Ibrahim the First gave his authoritarian rule to this mother, although he still kept the label of Emperor. One day, in a rush of madness, he demanded 280 concubines to be drowned in the narrows of what is nowadays the country of Turkey.
THE AMERICAN CIVIL WAR'S REAL DEATH TOLL[9]
As this NYTimes articles explains, “for 110 years, the numbers stood as gospel: 618,222 men died in the Civil War, 360,222 from the North and 258,000 from the South — by far the greatest toll of any war in American history.” However, recent research defies all of these well-known facts – an increase of 20% of deaths from the original death toll was calculated, which equates to a total of 750,000 individuals who died during the American Civil War. Further investigation concluded that this new total death toll corresponded to more than 2.5% of the entire population of the United States at that time which died as a result of this conflict.
THE U.S. ALREADY HAD A GAY PRESIDENT BEFORE[10]
His name was James Buchanan – the 15th American president. As a reporter from a Salon article says, “I know no historian who has studied the matter and thinks Buchanan was heterosexual.” As a matter of fact, when Mr. Buchanan fell in love with the Vice-President, William R. King, he wrote a letter which expressed:
“I am now ‘solitary and alone,’ having no companion in the house with me. I have gone a wooing to several gentlemen, but have not succeeded with any one of them. I feel that it is not good for man to be alone; and should not be astonished to find myself married to some old maid who can nurse me when I am sick, provide good dinners for me when I am well, and not expect from me any very ardent or romantic affection.” Poor man.
Now take a moment to analyze this:
This is interesting. To be honest, I wish I could be in the Editorial Board Meeting of Newsweek Magazine that die just to laugh and sarcastically clap at the exact moment they decided that this would be their cover for the week. Marketing is essential for profit, albeit it should demonstrate cleverness and not cheap sentimentality and obvious desperation. The only reason I say this, by the way, is that I like Newsweek. I don't want them to ruin their reputation, although this was five year ago already.
(James Buchanan in his later years).
THE TOWER OF PISA HAS NEVER BEEN STRAIGHT [11]
It's true. Once the construction started in 1173, the base of the tower started to subtly lean to its side. For that reason, further construction was stopped. After 100 years, it was finally continued, leaving the Tower of Pisa permanently inclined to its conclusion. “After the bell tower of the Cathedral of Pavia collapsed in 1989, the Consorzio Progetto Torre di Pisa (Tower of Pisa Project Consortium) commissioned engineers to stabilize the Leaning Tower. Because the Tower tilted in different directions in its first years, it is slightly curved, like a banana,” as an article I read described.
ADOLF HITLER WAS AN ANIMAL ACTIVIST[12]
Being a devout vegetarian and supporter of animal rights, many historians labeled him as an activist for the animal kingdom. Hitler took numerous measures which ensured protection to the animals in Germany. Heinrich Himmler, one of the leading figures of the Nazi Party, strived to abolish hunting throughout the country. They went as far as to create a Nazi Animal Protection Movement (and an Animal Welfare Act[13] ), which conceived certain plans that Hitler would execute – like the eradication of slaughterhouses after World War II. Paradoxically, it is excruciatingly interesting that this authoritarian dictator murdered millions of Jews simply because they existed.
Well, I hope you learned something interesting today.
Cheers
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