tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2745804443775068116.post8509089919235328493..comments2023-10-20T08:05:26.320-07:00Comments on The Accidental Anarchist (or, This Way to the Firing Squad): When 'History' and Eye-Witness Accounts ConflictUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2745804443775068116.post-3589645012664520082009-11-23T05:50:35.241-08:002009-11-23T05:50:35.241-08:00Thanks, Josh. What I don't understand is how t...Thanks, Josh. What I don't understand is how the ice could still support the train's contents alongside the train. How thick would the ice had to have been to handle that much weight, even if it was not all in a single spot?Bryna Kranzlerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12931053322607417100noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2745804443775068116.post-7635241348858375532009-11-20T08:54:09.500-08:002009-11-20T08:54:09.500-08:00Bryna,
I read a National Geographic piece on ...Bryna,<br /> I read a National Geographic piece on Lake Baikal a few years ago which was the major story of this particular issue. It spent some time discussing how in Winter there in Siberia, the lake freezes so solidly and many feet thick that it can be driven across and that in winter, there is much traffic across it when it is strong enough to drive even the heaviest of vehicles over, directly across the lake. I believe that your Grandfather was traveling on temporary winter-time railroad tracks that Russia's "Army Corps of Engineers," as we call our own building experts in our military, who can do such things. Ever since our own Civil War doing such things has been extremely important to military success, and you can even find evidence of such massive construction going back millenia like with the Romans building a ramp at Masada, or Alexander the Great Constructing a land bridge out int the ocean to defeat an island kingdom. The military of Czar Nicholas would have been quite good at laying track over ice or building bridges, usually temporary like pontoon (small boats or barges) bridges with boards for a road laid across perpendicularly over open water. The Czar's army could quickly have laid down the forty miles, probably within a week. Unfortunately when it gets warmer in this case, as Jacob implies, these tracks became so unsafe on the heavily laden troop-train that his army officers rode on "horse drawn sledges" over the ice instead of on the train. Russia rivaled America at this time in its ability to lay down train tracks rapidly, many miles a day if you have enough men, which Russia did. It's Army surely would have been able to do so, as there'd be no impediments to a nice, level surface-the only drawback being the eventual seasonal thaw, which it sounds like was happening about this time. I can't remember what month this was from the book, but it reminds me of History Channel's "Ice Road Truckers" where it seems every Spring the weakened ice eventually causes someone to go through what was absolutely solid prior to the warm weather-and Human Nature seems to make people under pressure cross ice that might not be safe. I'd say you could find in some Russian Military Archive or one of their Army Engineer Instruction Manuals the information about the rapid construction of train tracks right across the frozen lake which would have been many feet thick in the midst of winter. That is where I think the seeming contradiction lies. I'll bet the necessity of war made the Russian Army ignore the risks and build the tracks right across the lake, and use them as long as they could until one of them went right through the thawing ice in warmer months. That's when I think the Generals would have said "Well, I guess we'd better go around now." But I think they'd already been beaten by Japan at that point.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16158290086334612861noreply@blogger.com