Topic: Military history/Military biography (Page 3)

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πŸ”— My Trial as a War Criminal (By Leo Szilard, Inventor of Nuclear Chain Reaction)

πŸ”— Military history πŸ”— Military history/Military biography

"My Trial as a War Criminal" is a 1949 short story by atomic physicist Leo Szilard. Szilard had played a leading role in the Manhattan Project, and in the story he imagines the kind of show trial he might have had if he had been prosecuted in a manner similar to the Nuremberg Trials. Szilard earlier drafted the letter Albert Einstein signed, to Franklin Roosevelt, suggesting the US develop the military uses of nuclear power, and later the petition unsuccessfully advocating against the use of nuclear weapons.

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πŸ”— W. T. Tutte - mathematician and code breaker

πŸ”— Biography πŸ”— Mathematics πŸ”— Military history πŸ”— Military history/Military biography πŸ”— Cryptography πŸ”— Cryptography/Computer science πŸ”— Military history/European military history πŸ”— Military history/British military history

William Thomas "Bill" Tutte OC FRS FRSC (; 14 May 1917 – 2 May 2002) was a British codebreaker and mathematician. During the Second World War, he made a brilliant and fundamental advance in cryptanalysis of the Lorenz cipher, a major Nazi German cipher system which was used for top-secret communications within the Wehrmacht High Command. The high-level, strategic nature of the intelligence obtained from Tutte's crucial breakthrough, in the bulk decrypting of Lorenz-enciphered messages specifically, contributed greatly, and perhaps even decisively, to the defeat of Nazi Germany. He also had a number of significant mathematical accomplishments, including foundation work in the fields of graph theory and matroid theory.

Tutte's research in the field of graph theory proved to be of remarkable importance. At a time when graph theory was still a primitive subject, Tutte commenced the study of matroids and developed them into a theory by expanding from the work that Hassler Whitney had first developed around the mid 1930s. Even though Tutte's contributions to graph theory have been influential to modern graph theory and many of his theorems have been used to keep making advances in the field, most of his terminology was not in agreement with their conventional usage and thus his terminology is not used by graph theorists today. "Tutte advanced graph theory from a subject with one text (D. KΕ‘nig's) toward its present extremely active state."

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πŸ”— 50th anniversary of the first human space flight

πŸ”— Biography πŸ”— Aviation πŸ”— Soviet Union πŸ”— Russia πŸ”— Russia/technology and engineering in Russia πŸ”— Spaceflight πŸ”— Military history πŸ”— Military history/Military aviation πŸ”— Biography/science and academia πŸ”— Military history/Military biography πŸ”— Biography/military biography πŸ”— Aviation/aerospace biography project πŸ”— Military history/Cold War πŸ”— Biography/sports and games πŸ”— Russia/Russian, Soviet, and CIS military history πŸ”— Military history/Russian, Soviet and CIS military history πŸ”— Russia/history of Russia

Yuri Alekseyevich Gagarinβ€Š (9 March 1934 – 27 March 1968) was a Soviet Air Forces pilot and cosmonaut who became the first human to journey into outer space, achieving a major milestone in the Space Race; his capsule Vostok 1 completed one orbit of Earth on 12 April 1961. Gagarin became an international celebrity and was awarded many medals and titles, including Hero of the Soviet Union, his nation's highest honour.

Born in the village of Klushino near Gzhatsk (a town later renamed after him), in his youth Gagarin was a foundryman at a steel plant in Lyubertsy. He later joined the Soviet Air Forces as a pilot and was stationed at the Luostari Air Base, near the Norwegian border, before his selection for the Soviet space programme with five other cosmonauts. Following his spaceflight, Gagarin became deputy training director of the Cosmonaut Training Centre, which was later named after him. He was also elected as a deputy of the Soviet of the Union in 1962 and then to the Soviet of Nationalities, respectively the lower and upper chambers of the Supreme Soviet.

Vostok 1 was Gagarin's only spaceflight but he served as the backup crew to the Soyuz 1 mission, which ended in a fatal crash, killing his friend and fellow cosmonaut Vladimir Komarov. Fearing for his life, Soviet officials permanently banned Gagarin from further spaceflights. After completing training at the Zhukovsky Air Force Engineering Academy on 17 February 1968, he was allowed to fly regular aircraft. Gagarin died five weeks later when the MiG-15 training jet he was piloting with his flight instructor Vladimir Seryogin crashed near the town of Kirzhach.

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πŸ”— Iannis Xenakis - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

πŸ”— Biography πŸ”— Military history πŸ”— Architecture πŸ”— Greece πŸ”— Military history/Military biography πŸ”— Biography/military biography πŸ”— Military history/World War II πŸ”— Military history/Cold War πŸ”— Dance πŸ”— Composers πŸ”— Dance/Ballet πŸ”— Classical music πŸ”— Military history/Balkan military history πŸ”— Biography/Musicians πŸ”— Military history/European military history

Iannis Xenakis (also spelt as Yannis Xenakis) (Greek: Γιάννης (Ιάννης) ΞžΞ΅Ξ½Ξ¬ΞΊΞ·Ο‚ [ˈʝanis kseˈnacis]; 29 May 1922 – 4 February 2001) was a Greek-French composer, music theorist, architect, performance director and engineer. After 1947, he fled Greece, becoming a naturalized citizen of France. He is considered an important post-World War II composer whose works helped revolutionize 20th-century classical music.

Xenakis pioneered the use of mathematical models in music such as applications of set theory, stochastic processes and game theory and was also an important influence on the development of electronic and computer music. He integrated music with architecture, designing music for pre-existing spaces, and designing spaces to be integrated with specific music compositions and performances.

Among his most important works are Metastaseis (1953–54) for orchestra, which introduced independent parts for every musician of the orchestra; percussion works such as Psappha (1975) and Pléïades (1979); compositions that introduced spatialization by dispersing musicians among the audience, such as Terretektorh (1966); electronic works created using Xenakis's UPIC system; and the massive multimedia performances Xenakis called polytopes, that were a summa of his interests and skills. Among the numerous theoretical writings he authored, the book Formalized Music: Thought and Mathematics in Composition (French edition 1963, English translation 1971) is regarded as one of his most important. As an architect, Xenakis is primarily known for his early work under Le Corbusier: the Sainte Marie de La Tourette, on which the two architects collaborated, and the Philips Pavilion at Expo 58, which Xenakis designed by himself.

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πŸ”— John von Neumann

πŸ”— Biography πŸ”— Computing πŸ”— Mathematics πŸ”— Military history πŸ”— Military history/North American military history πŸ”— Military history/United States military history πŸ”— Military history/Military science, technology, and theory πŸ”— Physics πŸ”— Economics πŸ”— Philosophy πŸ”— Philosophy/Logic πŸ”— Biography/science and academia πŸ”— Philosophy/Philosophy of science πŸ”— Philosophy/Contemporary philosophy πŸ”— Military history/Military biography πŸ”— Biography/military biography πŸ”— History of Science πŸ”— Computing/Computer science πŸ”— Philosophy/Philosophers πŸ”— Education πŸ”— Hungary πŸ”— Military history/World War II πŸ”— Military history/Cold War πŸ”— Physics/History πŸ”— Physics/Biographies πŸ”— Game theory πŸ”— Eastern Europe

John von Neumann (; Hungarian: Neumann JΓ‘nos Lajos, pronouncedΒ [ˈnΙ’jmΙ’n ˈjaːnoΚƒ ˈlΙ’joΚƒ]; December 28, 1903 – FebruaryΒ 8, 1957) was a Hungarian-American mathematician, physicist, computer scientist, engineer and polymath. Von Neumann was generally regarded as the foremost mathematician of his time and said to be "the last representative of the great mathematicians"; who integrated both pure and applied sciences.

He made major contributions to a number of fields, including mathematics (foundations of mathematics, functional analysis, ergodic theory, representation theory, operator algebras, geometry, topology, and numerical analysis), physics (quantum mechanics, hydrodynamics, and quantum statistical mechanics), economics (game theory), computing (Von Neumann architecture, linear programming, self-replicating machines, stochastic computing), and statistics.

He was a pioneer of the application of operator theory to quantum mechanics in the development of functional analysis, and a key figure in the development of game theory and the concepts of cellular automata, the universal constructor and the digital computer.

He published over 150 papers in his life: about 60 in pure mathematics, 60 in applied mathematics, 20 in physics, and the remainder on special mathematical subjects or non-mathematical ones. His last work, an unfinished manuscript written while he was in hospital, was later published in book form as The Computer and the Brain.

His analysis of the structure of self-replication preceded the discovery of the structure of DNA. In a short list of facts about his life he submitted to the National Academy of Sciences, he stated, "The part of my work I consider most essential is that on quantum mechanics, which developed in GΓΆttingen in 1926, and subsequently in Berlin in 1927–1929. Also, my work on various forms of operator theory, Berlin 1930 and Princeton 1935–1939; on the ergodic theorem, Princeton, 1931–1932."

During World War II, von Neumann worked on the Manhattan Project with theoretical physicist Edward Teller, mathematician StanisΕ‚aw Ulam and others, problem solving key steps in the nuclear physics involved in thermonuclear reactions and the hydrogen bomb. He developed the mathematical models behind the explosive lenses used in the implosion-type nuclear weapon, and coined the term "kiloton" (of TNT), as a measure of the explosive force generated.

After the war, he served on the General Advisory Committee of the United States Atomic Energy Commission, and consulted for a number of organizations, including the United States Air Force, the Army's Ballistic Research Laboratory, the Armed Forces Special Weapons Project, and the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. As a Hungarian Γ©migrΓ©, concerned that the Soviets would achieve nuclear superiority, he designed and promoted the policy of mutually assured destruction to limit the arms race.

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πŸ”— John Boyd

πŸ”— Biography πŸ”— Aviation πŸ”— Military history πŸ”— Military history/Military aviation πŸ”— Military history/North American military history πŸ”— Military history/United States military history πŸ”— Military history/Military biography πŸ”— Biography/military biography πŸ”— Aviation/aerospace biography project πŸ”— Military history/World War II πŸ”— Military history/Cold War πŸ”— Pennsylvania

John Richard Boyd (January 23, 1927 – March 9, 1997) was a United States Air Force fighter pilot and Pentagon consultant during the second half of the 20th century. His theories have been highly influential in military, sports, business, and litigation strategies and planning.

As part of the Fighter Mafia, Boyd inspired the Lightweight Fighter program (LWF), which produced the successful General Dynamics F-16 Fighting Falcon and McDonnell Douglas F/A-18 Hornet, which are still in use by the United States and by several other military powers into the 21st century. Boyd, together with Thomas Christie, created the Energy–Maneuverability theory of aerial combat, which became the world standard for the design of fighter aircraft. He also developed the decision cycle known as the OODA loop, the process by which an entity reacts to an event.

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πŸ”— JosΓ© Mujica

πŸ”— Biography πŸ”— Military history πŸ”— Politics πŸ”— Military history/Military biography πŸ”— Biography/military biography πŸ”— Military history/Cold War πŸ”— Biography/politics and government πŸ”— Military history/South American military history πŸ”— Uruguay

José Alberto "Pepe" Mujica Cordano (Spanish: [xoˈse muˈxika]; born 20 May 1935) is a Uruguayan politician and farmer who served as the 40th President of Uruguay from 2010 to 2015. A former guerrilla with the Tupamaros, he was tortured and imprisoned for 14 years during the military dictatorship in the 1970s and 1980s. A member of the Broad Front coalition of left-wing parties, Mujica was Minister of Livestock, Agriculture, and Fisheries from 2005 to 2008 and a Senator afterwards. As the candidate of the Broad Front, he won the 2009 presidential election and took office as President on 1 March 2010.

He has been described as "the world's humblest head of state" due to his austere lifestyle and his donation of around 90 percent of his $12,000 monthly salary to charities that benefit poor people and small entrepreneurs. An outspoken critic of capitalism’s focus on stockpiling material possessions which do not contribute to human happiness, Pepe is often seen riding his 60-year-old bicycle. The Times Higher Education called him the "philosopher president" in 2015, a play on words of Plato's conception of the philosopher king.

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πŸ”— Bruno Pontecorvo

πŸ”— Biography πŸ”— Soviet Union πŸ”— Military history πŸ”— Physics πŸ”— Italy πŸ”— Socialism πŸ”— Biography/science and academia πŸ”— Military history/Military biography πŸ”— Biography/military biography πŸ”— Physics/Biographies πŸ”— Military history/Russian, Soviet and CIS military history πŸ”— Soviet Union/Russian, Soviet and CIS military history

Bruno Pontecorvo (Italian:Β [ponteˈkΙ”rvo]; Russian: Бру́но ΠœΠ°ΠΊΡΠΈΜΠΌΠΎΠ²ΠΈΡ‡ ΠŸΠΎΠ½Ρ‚Π΅ΠΊΠΎΜΡ€Π²ΠΎ, Bruno Maksimovich Pontecorvo; 22 August 1913 – 24 September 1993) was an Italian and Soviet nuclear physicist, an early assistant of Enrico Fermi and the author of numerous studies in high energy physics, especially on neutrinos. A convinced communist, he defected to the Soviet Union in 1950, where he continued his research on the decay of the muon and on neutrinos. The prestigious Pontecorvo Prize was instituted in his memory in 1995.

The fourth of eight children of a wealthy Jewish-Italian family, Pontecorvo studied physics at the University of Rome La Sapienza, under Fermi, becoming the youngest of his Via Panisperna boys. In 1934 he participated in Fermi's famous experiment showing the properties of slow neutrons that led the way to the discovery of nuclear fission. He moved to Paris in 1934, where he conducted research under Irène and Frédéric Joliot-Curie. Influenced by his cousin, Emilio Sereni, he joined the French Communist Party, as did his sisters Giuliana and Laura and brother Gillo. The Italian Fascist regime's 1938 racial laws against Jews caused his family members to leave Italy for Britain, France and the United States.

When the German Army closed in on Paris during the Second World War, Pontecorvo, his brother Gillo, cousin Emilio Sereni and Salvador Luria fled the city on bicycles. He eventually made his way to Tulsa, Oklahoma, where he applied his knowledge of nuclear physics to prospecting for oil and minerals. In 1943, he joined the British Tube Alloys team at the Montreal Laboratory in Canada. This became part of the Manhattan Project to develop the first atomic bombs. At Chalk River Laboratories, he worked on the design of the nuclear reactor ZEEP, the first reactor outside of the United States that went critical in 1945, followed by the NRX reactor in 1947. He also looked into cosmic rays, the decay of muons, and what would become his obsession, neutrinos. He moved to Britain in 1949, where he worked for the Atomic Energy Research Establishment at Harwell.

After his defection to the Soviet Union in 1950, he worked at the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JINR) in Dubna. He had proposed using chlorine to detect neutrinos. In a 1959 paper, he argued that the electron neutrino (
Ξ½
e) and the muon neutrino (
Ξ½
ΞΌ) were different particles. Solar neutrinos were detected by the Homestake Experiment, but only between one third and one half of the predicted number were found. In response to this solar neutrino problem, he proposed a phenomenon known as neutrino oscillation, whereby electron neutrinos became muon neutrinos. The existence of the oscillations was finally established by the Super-Kamiokande experiment in 1998. He also predicted in 1958 that supernovae would produce intense bursts of neutrinos, which was confirmed in 1987 when Supernova SN1987A was detected by neutrino detectors.

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πŸ”— Audie Murphy

πŸ”— United States πŸ”— Biography πŸ”— Military history πŸ”— Military history/North American military history πŸ”— Military history/United States military history πŸ”— United States/Military history - U.S. military history πŸ”— Military history/Military biography πŸ”— Biography/military biography πŸ”— Military history/World War II πŸ”— Military history/Cold War πŸ”— United States/Texas πŸ”— Biography/Actors and Filmmakers πŸ”— Biography/Musicians πŸ”— Westerns πŸ”— Westerns/Biography

Audie Leon Murphy (20 June 1925 – 28 May 1971) was an American soldier, actor, and songwriter. He was widely celebrated as the most decorated American combat soldier of World War II, and has been described as the most highly decorated soldier in U.S. history. He received every military combat award for valor available from the United States Army, as well as French and Belgian awards for heroism. Murphy received the Medal of Honor for valor that he demonstrated at the age of 19 for single-handedly holding off a company of German soldiers for an hour at the Colmar Pocket in France in January 1945, before leading a successful counterattack while wounded and out of ammunition.

Murphy was born into a large family of sharecroppers in Hunt County, Texas. After his father abandoned them, his mother died when he was a teenager. Murphy left school in fifth grade to pick cotton and find other work to help support his family; his skill with a hunting rifle helped feed his family.

After the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, Murphy's older sister helped him to falsify documentation about his birthdate in order to meet the minimum age requirement for enlisting in the military. Turned down initially for being underweight by the Army, Navy, and the Marine Corps, he eventually was able to enlist in the Army. He first saw action in the 1943 Allied invasion of Sicily; then in 1944 he participated in the Battle of Anzio, the liberation of Rome, and the invasion of southern France. Murphy fought at MontΓ©limar and led his men on a successful assault at L'Omet quarry near Cleurie in northeastern France in October. Despite suffering from multiple illnesses and wounds throughout his service, Murphy became one of the most praised and decorated soldiers of World War II. He is credited with killing 241 enemy soldiers.

After the war, Murphy embarked on a 21-year acting career. He played himself in the 1955 autobiographical film To Hell and Back, based on his 1949 memoirs of the same name, but most of his roles were in Westerns. He made guest appearances on celebrity television shows and starred in the series Whispering Smith. Murphy was a fairly accomplished songwriter. He bred quarter horses in California and Arizona, and became a regular participant in horse racing.

Because Murphy had what would today be described as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), then known as "battle fatigue", he slept with a loaded handgun under his pillow. He looked for solace in addictive sleeping pills. In his last few years, he was plagued by money problems but refused offers to appear in alcohol and cigarette commercials because he did not want to set a bad example. Murphy died in a plane crash in Virginia in 1971, shortly before his 46th birthday. He was interred with military honors at Arlington National Cemetery, where his grave is one of the most visited.

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πŸ”— International Committee of the Red Cross rules of engagement for civilian hacker

πŸ”— International relations πŸ”— Human rights πŸ”— Military history πŸ”— Law πŸ”— Computer Security πŸ”— Computer Security/Computing πŸ”— Military history/Military biography πŸ”— International relations/International law πŸ”— Organizations πŸ”— Crime and Criminal Biography

On 4 October 2023 the International Committee of the Red Cross published rules of engagement for civilian hackers involved in conflicts. The rules had been described as a "Geneva Code of cyber-war".

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