We humans really like fighting each other.
You can perhaps say that war has been a part of our genetic make-up since before we were
even human.
Over the years, some of the world’s most powerful civilizations have had the world’s
strongest armies.
But there are a lot of strange facts out there about them.
From a soda company that became one of the world’s largest navies to a Prussian military
unit of Giants – here are some weird things you didn’t know about the world’s greatest
militaries.
In 1942, a Japanese soldier named Hiro Onoda was drafted into the military and trained
in guerilla warfare.
At the time, the Japanese military had what were called the Senjinkun battlefield code
instructions, which told Japanese fighters that, instead of being taken prisoner, they
should take their own lives.
It was the code that encouraged the infamous kamikaze pilots who flew their planes into
Allied ships during the Pacific Theatre.
Onoda, however, was explicitly told not to take his own life.
In 1944 he was sent to the Philippines with orders to destroy an airfield on the island
of Lubang.
When he failed, he and three of his men fled into the jungles of the island…and stayed
there for the next 29 years.
When Japan surrendered in August of 1945, leaflets were dropped across the island to
inform any remaining combatants that the war was over.
Onoda considered them fake news.
He even thought that newspapers dropped on the island were ‘Yankee propaganda’ and
remained in the forest.
For the next three decades he and three of his men waged their own guerilla war on the
citizens of Lubang, filled to the brim with Japanese nationalism and the idea that World
War II was still in full swing.
By 1972, Onoda’s three other fellow combatants had all been killed.
He remained a lone guerilla fighter for two more years, until he met a Japanese explorer
named Norio Suzuki.
Suzuki eventually brought Onoda’s commanding officer during the war, who was by then an
old man working as a bookseller, to meet him.
Onoda was finally convinced, and returned to Japan a hero.
He even wrote a best-selling memoir about his mistaken crusade, which resulted in him
eliminating quite a few innocent Filipino islanders for a cause that had long been abandoned.
It turns out that the Russians really, really liked Pepsi.
In 1959, amidst the heat of the Cold War, then-Vice President Richard Nixon visited
Moscow for the American National Exhibit.
When he and Soviet president Nikita Khrushchev started arguing about the benefits of capitalism
versus communism, Donald Kendall, the head of Pepsi’s international division, cut in
and suggested Khrushchev have a refreshing glass of his brown, sugary soda.
Khrushchev was hooked – and eventually, so were the Soviet people.
But it took a while.
Soviet rubles were worthless outside of Russia, so a barter system was used by the Soviets
to pay for the Pepsi.
First, in 1972, the Soviets traded their ample supplies of state-owned Stolichnaya vodka
for the cola.
Pepsi thus became the first capitalist product sold within the Soviet Union.
In the 1980s, Americans began protesting Soviet products like vodka due to the outbreak of
the Soviet-Afghan War.
With their economy tanking but their sweet tooth still intact, the Soviets had to get
creative.
So, in 1989, they traded 17 old submarines, a frigate, a cruiser, and a destroyer to Pepsi
in exchange for three billion dollars’ worth of Pepsi.
Pepsi thus held the world’s sixth largest navy.
Donald Kendall, who had by then become Pepsi’s CEO, joked to the U.S. national security advisor
that he was “disarming the Soviet Union faster than you are”.
But did Pepsi take that fleet and begin terrorizing the world’s waters…maybe carrying out
missions to sink as many cargo ships carrying Coca-Cola as possible?
No, they ended up selling the fleet for parts to Sweden.
It turns out Coca Cola does have its own military story, though.
During World War II, Coke carried out a massive campaign to keep as many Allied soldiers as
“Coked” up as possible.
They created the “Technical Observer program”, which distributed more than five billion bottles
of Coke to soldiers during the war!
When you see a swastika now, you think of Hitler, concentration camps, and the horrors
of World War II.
But the symbol is ancient.
It has roots going back millennia in India.
Swastika is a Sanskrit word for “well-being”, and the symbol itself has been used by Hindus
and Buddhists as a sign of good luck and health.
In fact, it’s one of the world’s oldest images.
Cave paintings of the symbol have been dated back to more than 6,000 years old.
In the United States, Native Americans have also used the image for thousands of years.
For the Navajo, it represented the sacred image of a whirling log, and it was used in
healing rituals.
In 1920, when the 45th Infantry Division was organized from units of the Oklahoma National
Guard and troops from Arizona, Colorado, and New Mexico, their uniforms initially featured
the swastika on their shoulder sleeves.
This was a nod to the many Native Americans who were serving in the 45th at the time and
came from southwestern tribes like the Navajo.
But then Hitler came along and we all know how that ended.
A few years later, the 45th regiment abandoned the symbol, and in 1939 they adopted the thunderbird
as the official insignia – another powerful Native American symbol.
The king of Prussia had a thing for really tall men.
King Frederick William I more than doubled the Prussian army, from 38,000 to 83,000 men
during his reign, which lasted from 1713 to 1740.
He earned the nickname “the soldier king”, and set the stage for his son, Frederick the
Great, to turn Prussia into a great military power.
But Frederick William I was a weird guy.
He created a regiment of soldiers called the Potsdam Giants.
In order to join the regiment, you just needed to be tall.
Only soldiers over six feet were allowed entry – but that was the only requirement.
They never actually did any fighting.
King Frederick used the regiment as his personal playthings – kind of like a circus sideshow.
If he was feeling sick, he would have them march around his room.
He had them wear hats that were a foot and a half high to make them look even taller.
He would paint portraits of the men from memory.
He was once quoted as saying “the most beautiful girl or woman in the world would be a matter
of indifference to me, but tall soldiers – they are my weakness”.
Oof.
But what started as a seemingly innocent – if creepy – fascination with tall soldiers
quickly turned into a eugenics experiment.
While many of the soldiers joined of their own free will, many were abducted.
King Frederick began scouring Prussia for all the babies who were born to tall parents.
He created a program that paired the tall soldiers with tall women so they would have
tall babies.
As a result, by the beginning of the 1800s, Potsdam had a lot of tall people.
For a while, King Frederick even created a stretching program, where the soldiers were
placed on racks and literally stretched out.
The dangerous practice was eventually ended after too many soldiers died instead of growing
taller.
When King Frederick William I died, his son, Frederick the Great eventually disbanded the
Potsdam Giants, which numbered more than 2,500 men at its peak.
The legacy of the Soldier King’s eugenics experiment is a dark one.
Hitler and the Nazis would eventually use it as model for their own quest for an Aryan
race.
The 10,000 Immortals were an elite military unit that served the Persian Achaemenid Empire
for most of its existence between 550 and 330 BC.
Clad in gold and carrying long spears, they were one of the most feared regiments of soldiers
the world has ever known.
While they were obviously not immortal, they appeared that way to their enemies.
This is because every time a single soldier died, another would immediately replace them.
Keeping the number of soldiers in the unit always to a consistent 10,000.
What’s more, they were very quick to remove their dead from the battlefield, giving the
impression to their enemies that they had suffered no casualties in combat.
They were first mentioned by the Greek historian Herodotus in the middle of the fifth century
BC, who described the lavish lifestyle of these elite, high-class soldiers, writing
that they were easily recognized for the “huge amount of gold they wore” and that they
“brought covered wagons for their concubines, sizeable and well-equipped retinues of slaves,
and their own personal provisions, separate from those of the other soldiers”.
You may also recognize these soldiers from the movie 300, when the god-king Xerxes met
the Spartan soldiers in a spectacularly fictionalized battle to the death.
China has very quickly amassed the world’s largest standing army, beating out even the
military-obsessed United States.
Under Xi Jinping, China’s authoritarian and surveillance-obsessed leader, the country’s
military has grown to a staggering 2 million active personnel, almost double that of the
U.S.
The figure is a bit deceptive, though.
Most of China’s troops are stationed in China, and the global presence of its military
is still far smaller than the global reach of the United States military.
However, China’s growing economic and military presence on the world stage since the 80s
has a lot of Western countries worried.
Which is why it’s weird that Canada made controversial plans to cooperate with China
in military practices.
In January of 2018, the Canadian Armed Forces sent a group to China to observe training
exercises conducted by the Chinese military.
One month later, China sent its own delegation to Canada to see how the Canadians were doing
things.
The move drew a lot of criticism – both within Canada and among other Western nations.
In 2019, Canada withdrew from its agreement with China, and proposed training collaborations
were called off.
Still, Canada sent its own detachment of military personnel to take part in the World Military
Games.
Because, war is apparently…a game.
The World Military Games started in 1995 and were first hosted by Italy.
They have a similar format to the Olympics, with summer games and winter games, each occurring
every four years at staggered two-year intervals.
The last summer games were held in 2019 in Wuhan, China.
Yes, that Wuhan.
More than 9,000 military “athletes” from 109 countries participated in the Summer Games,
competing in events like cycling, archery, judo, and even artistic gymnastics.
Drone attacks and guerilla warfare were conspicuously left out.
Despite its spectacularly massive military presence worldwide, the US military didn’t
do too well at the last Summer Olympics.
Despite ongoing conflict with China, the US did in fact send military “athletes” to
Wuhan in 2019.
However, soldiers from the mightiest military in the world finished a lowly 35th place in
the medal count.
It seems the American military cares more about real war than
military sports.
So
there you have it.
A few facts about some of the most powerful militaries in history.
This list included just a few of the strangest aspects of military history.
What others do you know about?
Let us know in the comments, and don’t forget to like and subscribe for more Nutty History.