In the 18th century the British army fought a brutal series of battles with the rebel Jacobites (they were mostly Highland Scots). The Jacobites had much less tech than the but were very good in close combat, meaning that if the J's survived to get up close they usually won..

.. How outmatched were the Jacobites? It was the 1740s and they were commonly armed with a sword and a shield. Anyway a British general worked out a way to defeat them up close, he realised that most people are righthanded, so their shields were on the same side across the line..

.. so he gave the order for his men to stab not the man in front of him but diagonally, under the sword arm of the man attacking the next soldier. You did not want to be the guy on the very end of the line.

This strategy relied on the men defending each other without a thought for their own safety and it worked. The one area the Jacobites totally outclassed the British army was fucked.

This thread was inspired by people's reaction to mask wearing, how a lot of people cant seem to get their mind around the idea that sometimes you can only protect each other.

Anyway this isn't an apologetic for the army, they were cunts. The mask thing just reminded me of this.

In the wake of the Jacobite defeat the British army basically ethnically cleaned the highland civilisation, their culture, clothing, language, music, customs were outlawed, most of them were executed, transported to the colonies or forced off their homelands

One of the few times they unleashed full colonial brutality on white people.

About a hundred years later enough time had passed that the Highlanders weren't a threat anymore and so a half-remembered, picturebook version of their culture and clothing etc was recreated, which evolved steadily into what we think of as modern Scotland.

The Highlanders clan system was basically tribal, the head of the clan/ family was the Laird/ Lord. After the army had executed and transported tens of thousands, the Lairds were convinced it was much more profitable to use the clan lands for sheep than people.

So the Lairds cleared their own extended familys from their homelands, meaning mass movements to the cities and yet more emigration to the colonies. This is why rural Scotland is so empty.

Like I said, full colonial brutality. They made a desert and called it peace.

Anyway this thread kind of evolved. The moral is: sometimes you can only protect each other and colonial violence is very bad.