
Dreadnought hoax - playhard
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dreadnought_hoax
======
androidb
"During the visit to Dreadnought, the visitors had repeatedly shown amazement
or appreciation by exclaiming "Bunga! Bunga!".[7] In 1915 during the First
World War, HMS Dreadnought rammed and sank a German submarine—the only
battleship ever to do so. Among the telegrams of congratulation was one that
read "BUNGA BUNGA"."

~~~
lclarkmichalek
Berlusconi does seem to have rather ruined (or improved!) that phrase for the
rest of us, judging by the Bunga Bunga wikipedia page.

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davedx
Dreadnought by Robert K. Massie is a sprawling, fascinating read of the run up
to the First World War from a naval/arms race perspective (it has a sequel
too, covering the outbreak of war onwards). I highly recommend it.

[http://www.amazon.com/Dreadnought-Robert-K-
Massie/dp/0345375...](http://www.amazon.com/Dreadnought-Robert-K-
Massie/dp/0345375564)

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avian
> Stephen wanted to take command of a platoon of German soldiers and lead them
> across the French frontier to cause an incident.

I imagine the possible consequences if they went with that plan. That was the
decade that eventually led to the first world war. Relations between France
and Germany weren't at their best.

~~~
ethagknight
Alternatively, it could have served as a pressure relief valve.

~~~
hga
Probably neither; critically, by then France on its own wasn't a match for
Germany, no matter how much they lusted for revenge for the 1870 Franco-
Prussian war and recapture of the provinces of Alsace and Lorraine.

As one book I'm reading notes, of the great powers, only France and Russia has
a desire to upset the status quo (Russia was motivated, as always, by a desire
for a secure warm water port, and this time, by Pan-Slavism WRT to the
Balkans, recently freed from Ottoman bondage).

~~~
smacktoward
_> of the great powers, only France and Russia has a desire to upset the
status quo_

That wasn't really the case, though; during this period Germany was very busy
upsetting the status quo by expanding their navy, which directly challenged
the UK's position as the world's pre-eminent naval power.

~~~
hga
I count these differently. It comes down to intent vs. capability: was Germany
intending anything more than becoming a greater power (I'm still reading up on
this)? As a serious nation the UK of course had to react to the increased
capability, but I view this as qualitatively different than France's crystal
clear intent of taking back Alsace and Lorraine, which also was backed up by
some serious capability.

Russia intended to help the Balkan nations stay out of the non-Slavic (in
terms of rule) Austrian-Hungarian empire, however their capability to directly
affect this was limited by geography (again, something I'm in the process of
reading up on).

(There's also the forward looking detail: France was a declining nation (e.g.
declining birthrate), Germany a growing nation. That put a time limit on their
capability to carry out their intent.)

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omegant
If you think that's impossible to do now a days see this: a Modernd day Hoax
of a 20 y/o disguissed as a powerful politician, for months.
[http://elpais.com/m/elpais/2014/10/23/inenglish/1414066819_4...](http://elpais.com/m/elpais/2014/10/23/inenglish/1414066819_431453.html)

This was discovered this October.

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jstalin
Of course, such a stunt today would result in criminal charges of "terrorism"
and lengthy prison sentences, all the while politicians would excoriate the
hoaxers as enemies of the state.

~~~
potatolicious
Probably not - or rather, such a stunt by anyone else would've resulted in
criminal charges and lengthy prison sentences back then also.

Note that this stunt was performed by a group of young aristocrats who went to
Cambridge. At least one of the participants was nobility, another whose father
was a well-known politician.

Imagine the same happening in the US today - a group of wealthy Harvard kids
execute an embarrassing prank, one of whom comes from a famous industrialist
family and the other the son of a major Washington figure.

The whole thing would be declared "youthful indiscretions" and no punishment
of any substance would be handed out.

The more things change the more they stay the same. If you are wealthy and
well-connected you can get away with damn well anything, and everyone else
gets screwed.

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JacobAldridge
If you haven't seen this before, I highly recommend the 8 minutes of video
involved as a group of Australian comedians pretend to be the Canadian
motorcade (carrying a special guest) during the 2007 APEC forum in Sydney.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ieb8QSpKhog](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ieb8QSpKhog)

[Edit: I had misremembered and thought that Canada didn't have a delegation at
APEC...Turns out they just didn't have a delegation that was taxiing bin
Laden.]

~~~
mig39
Canada is part of APEC.

Canada hosted the APEC meeting in 1997. The highlight of the meeting was the
RCMP pepper-spraying students who were protesting Indonesia's government:

[http://www.cbc.ca/archives/categories/politics/civil-
unrest/...](http://www.cbc.ca/archives/categories/politics/civil-
unrest/general-27/1997-protest-and-pepper-spray-at-apec-conference.html)

------
zackmorris
Reminds me of the Yes Men:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9L9xPU_kJc0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9L9xPU_kJc0)

[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1352852/](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1352852/)

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javajosh
If people didn't lie the world would be a much simpler place. Lies for
material gain we are mostly prepared for; lies for amusement, much less so.
The _reaction_ to this sort of thing is less trust, more verification, less
flexibility, and generally more difficulty for everyone, even those with
legitimate call for resources (because now _everyone_ must verify that they
need a VIP car, and the systems used for verification can fail).

Of course, lamenting the cost of lying is similar to lamenting gravity's
affect on the impulse to fly - it doesn't really do any good. FWIW I think a
modest fine and a brief (overnight) jail term was in order for the prank.
Think of it as a small reminder that a hoax is not complete unless _you don 't
get caught_.

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kelvin0
I don't get it, why is this on HN? I would like to understand how some
irrelevant posts get traction? Please explain? Is it that the poster has 2K+
Karma?

~~~
StavrosK
It's an interesting post that appeals to our inquisitive nature.

~~~
louhike
Interesting in which sense? Even if I liked it, it is only humor and does not
have nothing to do with "hackers". I'm not a better developper or I do not
know what will help to launch a startup after reading this. Hacker News is not
the Huffington Post.

~~~
Robin_Message
It's an excellent example of hacking a social system, merely as a prank and
with no damage to any individual, and follows a long history that goes back to
MIT hacking ([http://hacks.mit.edu/](http://hacks.mit.edu/) and
[http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/meaning-of-
hack.html](http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/meaning-of-hack.html)).

In other words, it has a lot to do with "hackers" and is a very interesting
and relevant piece of history. I agree it won't help you start your startup
though; get back to building things and talking to people! :-)

~~~
omegant
Precisely I think that it shows you in a funny way, how far talking to people
can take you.

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mail2vks
Interesting. Saw this on Reddit few mins back.

