If you’re going to read one book about the First Nations of Canada and the United States, this is it. I’m not saying this because Thomas King wrote the definitive book on the subject, or that he’s the greatest writer of our time (although he is a fantastic, award winning writer). What makes ‘The Inconvenient … Continue reading Supplemental Reading – The Inconvenient Indian
28-And now…the ITAC!
So we segue now from Alex Gabriel’s musings about Winnipeg and Louis Riel to, naturally, a scene at the Integrated Threat Assessment Centre (ITAC)! Uh…okay… So if you’ve never heard of them, the ITAC[1] is a real life entity made up of representatives from multiple police and intelligence services that can be brought together to … Continue reading 28-And now…the ITAC!
Blog Admin + Louis Riel
Hey everyone! Today's Deconstruction Post is scheduled for this evening, but I wanted to take a moment to update everybody on how things are going here at Putting Down Uprising and what my plans are for the near future. First off, for anyone who may be following along with the novel itself, you're going to … Continue reading Blog Admin + Louis Riel
Warning Order/Frag Order – Or how you can lead without actually making a plan…
So like I discussed earlier, Battle Procedure is the means by which a commander creates a plan for a previous unseen situation in real time. A major part of this involves delegating portions of the plan to subordinates, and having them develop their parts concurrently to you so that a detailed plan can emerge in … Continue reading Warning Order/Frag Order – Or how you can lead without actually making a plan…
27-Winnipeg Map Recce (3): Morale & Motivation!
It’s about time we wrapped up the Winnipeg Map Recce. Alex Gabriel feels he’s ready to return to Stevenson’s HQ, and finally meet his subordinates. He’ll tell them exactly how they’re going to take and hold down town Winnipeg against all comers, and they will no doubt feel privileged to hear it, since he spent … Continue reading 27-Winnipeg Map Recce (3): Morale & Motivation!
Militia Assemble!
The featured image for this post is the Reservists of 1870 by French impressionist painter Pierre-Georges Jeanniot. While he’s most commonly known for paintings of the gilded age of Paris, he began his life as an officer in the French Army and served during the Franco-Prussian War. A lot of his early paintings, which established … Continue reading Militia Assemble!
26-Winnipeg Map Recce(2)-Terrain!
***This post gets into some detail about fighting a war in a Canadian City, which raises certain ethical questions and issues. My post discussing these issues can be found here.*** So like the title says, this post is going to look at the terrain aspects of Alex Gabriel’s Winnipeg battle plan. To this end we’re … Continue reading 26-Winnipeg Map Recce(2)-Terrain!
25-Winnipeg Map Recce(1) – Manpower!
As has been the case before, this post is going to hop back and forth in relation to the chronological order of the novel. This is something that Bland seems to do as well, since Alex Gabriel hops around from one location to another another without a lot of consistency. To counter this, I’ll be … Continue reading 25-Winnipeg Map Recce(1) – Manpower!
So let’s talk about destroying cities…
This next couple posts in the deconstruction left me in a bit of an awkward position, to the point where I’ve really had to think hard about how best to proceed. The main selling point of Douglas Bland’s work is plausibility. His racist nonsense must be taken seriously because it could actually happen. He is … Continue reading So let’s talk about destroying cities…
Putting Down Uprising 