From: Fiona Moore nydersdyner@yahoo.co.uk
(though I'd overlooked the Zulus - mind you, look what happened to them
as
well).
Not fair-- they were fighting with spears, knobkerries and what rifles
they
could obtain against an enemy armed with the best weapons technology the British Empire could muster. At that, the fact that they managed to *win* against the British most of the time (including the brill battle of Isandlhwana, which I probably can't spell) despite these limitations, is pretty darn stunning.
The Zulus didn't win at Isandhlwana (I can't spell it either). The British threw away an easy victory. They left gaps in the ranks where companies out on patrol should have been, and they put the quartermaster wagons in the wrong places so the QMs (with typical jobswurf pigheadedness) refused to hand out ammunition to soldiers from the 'wrong' regiments. Until the ammunition ran crucially short, it was not so much a battle as a massacre. A few years later, at Ulundi (not that many people have even heard of that battle), the British got it right and the Zulus hadn't a prayer. Despite being braver, better drilled and better motivated (take the legendary story where Cetsewayo marched a unit of troops off a cliff, then invited the British commander to match that).
The British also won at Rorke's Drift, and won lots of gongs as a result, but then they were up against a surplus force from Isandhlwana who had marched two days with hardly a break and were very tired, very hungry, and perhaps not that desperate to seize what was after all a pretty minor objective.
ObB7: I seem to be in a minority that actually liked Cally's red Saurian Major outfit. It makes her look chunky.
I'd have to say I prefer it to some of the airy-fairy things she wore
later
on, which tended to make her look a bit stick-insecty.
I like the stick insect look as well, though:)
Neil