alt.hn

6/25/2026 at 7:26:06 AM

The US Army Issued Ocarinas to Soldiers in World War II

 https://www.flutetunes.com/articles/my-flute-goes-to-war/

by tomcam

6/27/2026 at 6:35:49 PM

This reminds me of my very first internet purchase. Back in the late 90's, when Ocarina of Time first came out, there was a website that a friend of mine found (back when you really felt like you found something on the internet) that sold basically perfect replicas of the titular ocarina, it even came with a silk pouch and a booklet that showed you how to play all the songs from the game. I think it was just some rando making clay instruments out of their house and figured they'd try to sell them on this new marketplace. I've still got it somewhere.

It feels like the internet is missing stuff like that now, or it's at least harder to find. Nowadays Nintendo would shut that seller down, or the seller would just be drop shipping them from Alibaba for a 500% markup.

by helterskelter

6/27/2026 at 8:38:21 PM

Hey I remember that site! I bought one from there as well, although I couldn't afford the actual replica so settled on a brown squarish one that came as a necklace.

by crims0n

6/27/2026 at 11:10:33 AM 

  Carter?
  "Yes sir?"
  What is it, Carter?
  "An ocarina, sir"
  Bring it up here!
I've had a really nice, small "English four-hole" unglazed terracotta pendant ocarina since I was a kid. They are actually really fun to play and very visceral, in a sense; the way you can get a chromatic scale from only four hole sizes combinatorially is intellectually satisfying and weirdly easy to learn.

It came with some sheet music that shows each note as a box with four dots in it that can be shown as either open or closed:

https://ocarinasongbook.com/fingering-charts/four-hole/

It sounds unusually sophisticated — perhaps even better after forty-plus years -- and it's actually a relatively new design. The ocarina is ancient but the four hole chromatic design dates from the 1960s, so it's newer than those Gretsch ocarinas in the article.

You can get them in all sorts of shapes and sizes -- Thomann sell hand-painted clay 4H ocarinas in the shapes of strawberries and clownfish.

I wish we'd been taught to play these in school instead of with those Aulos descant recorders that everyone in British schools, particularly teachers I imagine, grew to hate.

by dofm

6/27/2026 at 4:17:52 PM

I understand the intellectual satisfaction you're talking about. Now I'm wondering if we can push the minimalism to using these four holes with only two fingers. It seems doable from the diagram you link, using link fingers, and assuming half holes can be covered from the left side, and two holes can be covered with one finger at the same time. Would that work, or does the physicality of the instrument prevent that ?

by qbonnard

6/27/2026 at 6:16:39 PM

Hi, Ocarina maker here! This is a genuinely interesting idea, and some Ocarina like the Goslings do have a double keying with a single finger.

Sadly with English Vessel Flutes (4/6/8 holes) the holes need to all be roughly equidistant from the center of the chamber, which makes a two finger setup ergonomically complicated while keeping a tangential fipple. It is also very desirable to use the pads of the fingers to cover the holes, making a good air seal is tricky with the middle of the finger. On ergonomics, it is also worth mentioning some Ocs get quite big as well! My largest 6 hole is almost 300mm wide, my fingers are not quite long enough to span this...

by hcrean

6/27/2026 at 4:48:19 PM

From memory — can't find the thing right now! — this would be a little difficult on the one I had because of its shape.

Also because — not sure how to explain it — but in my experience the holes on a four hole ocarina are also sort of finger grips, in a way. That is to say, you support the ocarina against your lips with at least one finger below it and two thumbs behind it, but part of your grip on the instrument is gently transferring from fingertip to fingertip as you play, a bit like a recorder or the pipe of bagpipes. The "open" low note has the loosest grip, and you might even subconsciously tilt your head back slightly to allow the weight of the ocarina to shift more to your thumbs.

It might be possible to design, effectively, a one-handed playable instrument that works the way you are talking about, but I think it would be quite uncomfortable.

by dofm

6/27/2026 at 3:22:52 PM

I did recorder in primary school. One of the things I dimly remember along with certain games and rhymes. (I think in Irish schools they do the tin whistle.)

I gather a lot of schools are adopting ukuleles now. Ukes have a bad name, unfairly I think. (Listen to Eddie Vedder's "Ukulele Songs" album, very underrated). The ukulele is more forgiving than the recorder in my opinion.

by nephihaha

6/27/2026 at 4:08:59 PM

Music shops sell a lot of ukuleles. Huge numbers at Christmas, it's a very popular gift.

It's a fabulous instrument, nuanced and subtle, and you can buy beautiful instruments these days for really not much money at all.

But AFAIK its popularity in school as a teaching instrument has as much to do with Spongebob as it does its capability :-)

by dofm

6/27/2026 at 6:28:12 PM

You can also massively improve many inexpensive ukuleles by restringing them.

by amluto

6/27/2026 at 11:00:37 AM

The US military thought a lot about how to entertain its soldiers because there was a lot of downtime during a war and most of them were draftees who didn't necessarily want to be there, Another thing they did was publish pocket paperback editions of books back when paperbacks were less common.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armed_Services_Editions

by jhbadger

6/27/2026 at 2:39:54 PM

My favorite WW2 morale detail: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice_cream_barge

by jeffbee

6/27/2026 at 3:53:57 PM

The British did better

Put beer into drop tanks on Spitfires

https://planehistoria.com/flying-pubs-spitfires-flew-beer-to...

by pasc1878

6/27/2026 at 8:20:05 PM

> When we get over the beachhead drop out of formation and land on the strip. We’re told the Nazis are fouling the drinking water, so it will be appreciated. There’s no trouble finding the strip, the battleship Rodney is firing salvoes on Caen and it’s immediately below.

Oh god. Yeah just follow the path of the 9 x 16" gun salvos from Rodney blowing big-ass holes in the ground, you can't miss it. LOL. Now those are some directions!

by topgrain2

6/27/2026 at 4:26:51 PM

That still happens in America. Hike to a remote place, and get your friend to drop a keg in a mountain lake from his plane.

"Alpine Lake Keg Drop".

by zulux

6/27/2026 at 11:05:18 AM

> most of them were draftees who didn't necessarily want to be there

It is called forced labour or slavery.

by throw93949449

6/27/2026 at 11:23:19 AM

It wasn’t slavery as they were paid and could be expected to be discharged at the cessation of hostilities.

Conscription is as old as society itself.

by multjoy

6/27/2026 at 1:29:59 PM

> It wasn’t slavery as they were paid

Being paid some amount of money doesn't magically make it not slavery. Obvious counterpoint: what if a plantation owner "paid" each slave a single modern-day penny a year, would that make it okay?

> and could be expected to be discharged at the cessation of hostilities

Being let go when you're no longer needed doesn't stop it being slavery either. Would you no longer be a slave if the plantation owner released you after the harvest season? You'd just be re-captured for the next harvest, of course - either by the same owner or a different one.

> Conscription is as old as society itself.

So is slavery. That doesn't make it okay.

Definitions of forced labour, like the ILO Forced Labour Convention of 1930 for example, have to explicitly include "by the way, it's totally okay if it is done as part of mandatory military service" clauses for a reason.

There are obviously differences between traditional slavery and conscription, but conscription is still way closer to forced labour than it is to consensual service. Just look at what happens when you try to leave, for one!

by crote

6/27/2026 at 11:38:38 AM

You're both right. We don't want to water down the term "slavery" by using it for draftees, but it is a form of temporary slavery. Slave's have always been "paid" in the form of room and board (however meager), but it's still slavery.

by freedomben

6/27/2026 at 12:53:39 PM

I mean, to be fair, so is slavery.

I think it's important to acknowledge that conscription is a violation of human rights, and absolutely a violation of human autonomy and dignity.

The reason it exists is because historically, the primary source of military power has been the number of armed humans you can put on the battlefield. That's much less true now, but even in WWII the technology wasn't yet up to that point.

And while the US did not end up being materially at risk in WWII (aside from some very small exceptions like Pearl Harbor), that was not a guarantee going in. The Nazis were hellbent on wiping out all opposition to them, and the fear that, if Europe was lost, they would cross the ocean to attack us was not at all crazy. Furthermore, our allies absolutely were under existential threat—and in such a situation, it's frankly irresponsible of a nation not to use conscription if that's actually likely to make a difference.

Either saying "conscription is slavery, therefore it is never justifiable" or "conscription is nothing like slavery, soldiers get treated well" ignores enough of the truth that they're misleading at best. Sometimes you really do have to deal with nuance.

by danaris

6/27/2026 at 5:07:12 PM

Conscription for wars fought for political purposes is qualitatively different from conscription to defend your country. (But this is a continuum rather than two disjoint categories.) The former happens when the ambitions of the leaders exceed the capabilities of the state. The latter is based on the view that a country is a collective of its citizens, and the citizens are therefore personally responsible for defending it.

by jltsiren

6/27/2026 at 1:16:22 PM

You have the option to emigrate as opposed to fight, which is fundamentally what differentiates conscription from slavery (and human rights violations). You're not legally obligated to stay in your country.

by dmbrThnYou

6/27/2026 at 3:57:04 PM

Hello?

Germany introduced law, your are required to notify ministry and get permission, of you leave country for couple of weeks.

Ukraine closed border for men in like 10 seconds.

by throw734848

6/27/2026 at 1:40:00 PM

Um...what?

Desertion has, historically, been a capital crime. Trying to paint conscription as not being a kind of captivity because "you're not legally obligated to stay in your country" is at best wildly disingenuous, and at worst just flat-out wrong.

I think you might need to take quite a bit more time to consider this issue, lest you prove your username much truer than you probably want.

by danaris

6/27/2026 at 2:00:04 PM

> Desertion has, historically, been a capital crime.

And it remained so for the US in WW2, although the sentence was carried out just once.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eddie_Slovik

Major General Norman "Dutch" Cota, who was at the execution, called it "the toughest 15 minutes of his life". For context, Cota was also present at the bloodbath on Omaha Beach, where he famously rallied troops.

by pfdietz

6/27/2026 at 1:46:06 PM

You can absolutely emigrate prior to the conscription coming to fruition. It has to be permanent, or it's draft evasion, but it is perfectly legal.

Sorry for the edits confusing things. I can see earlier how you thought I meant desertion as opposed to emigration.

by dmbrThnYou

6/27/2026 at 4:40:41 PM

Most people do not have the ability to emigrate. Hell, a great many people barely have the economic ability to move across their own state, but emigration requires that the country you're trying to move to is willing to let you live and work there permanently. I don't know if you're familiar with the difficulties involved in this, but I can assure you they are significant.

Dismissing the loss of freedom inherent in conscription by saying you can avoid it by abandoning your entire life, leaving your country, your job, probably your family behind...even if you do have both the money and a legal path to immigrate somewhere else, which, again, most people do not, that's hardly a reasonable alternative.

by danaris

6/27/2026 at 11:32:07 AM

Yeah, they were paid!! Plastic ocarinas!

by throe94944i

6/27/2026 at 11:44:36 AM

> It is called forced labour or slavery.

In war, people who tolerate military conscription and discipline will conquer those who're slaves to pigheaded "you're not the boss of ME!" individualism.

It'd be nice if humans would voluntarily abandon war someday. But a corollary of the First Commandment is to face facts.

by dctoedt

6/27/2026 at 1:36:34 PM

> In war, people who tolerate military conscription and discipline will conquer those who're slaves to pigheaded "you're not the boss of ME!" individualism.

Sure, right up until it leads to fragging. During the Vietnam War about a thousand superiors were killed by their subjects. You can't give someone weapons, try to force them into a suicidal mission, and not expect them to use it to stop the mission. Give someone only a hammer and everything looks like a nail...

by crote

6/27/2026 at 5:43:17 PM

Yes, that's an edge case — my comment to which you responded was not meant as a complete statement of Reality.

by dctoedt

6/27/2026 at 12:24:10 PM

That doesn't make it not forced though.

Most of this sub thread people who are unwilling to say "yeah it's forced labor and that's fine considering the details" doing mental gymnastics to make it not forced.

by cucumber3732842

6/27/2026 at 12:34:12 PM

Just because something is forced, doesn’t make it slavery. I’m forced to pay taxes; that doesn’t make me a slave. Nor was a tenant farmer in the Middle Ages when required to provide corvée. I think the primary objection in this thread is to the use of the word slavery, which is simply not the same thing.

by derektank

6/27/2026 at 12:45:05 PM

I agree with your account, the problem is how many perceive slavery. Here in the south (USA) many still think the slaves before the Civil War were "happy". They obviously weren't slaves. Until ALL mankind looks slavery fully in the eye for understanding, we will continue to undervalue those other then ourselves.

by bloomingeek

6/27/2026 at 1:11:14 PM

I don’t think there can be a bright line between acceptable and unacceptable coercion of liberties.

by cwmoore

6/27/2026 at 4:01:17 PM

I remember story how Irish migrants were used to digg deep holes. Walls could collapse any moment, and bury the crew alive. Slaves were deemed too valuable to risk in such jobs!

by throw734848

6/27/2026 at 2:01:09 PM

> Nor was a tenant farmer in the Middle Ages when required to provide corvée.

Many historians now concede that there is little to no meaningful difference between various forms of feudal servitude and slavery.

Slaves in the later Roman Empire also had certain rights, including the right to buy their own freedom in many cases. That doesn’t mean they weren’t slaves.

by p-e-w

6/27/2026 at 4:37:26 PM

I will have to disagree with these historians. There is a fundamental difference between having legal personhood and being chattel. To be bound is not the same thing as to be owned.

by derektank

6/27/2026 at 5:15:33 PM

Many, if not most, historical institutions that are universally recognized as slavery didn’t permit slave owners to dispose of their slaves like arbitrary property they owned. If that’s the definition of slavery, it’s an unusually restrictive one.

by p-e-w

6/27/2026 at 8:32:01 PM

Not sure why this is being downvoted.

A draft is by definition forced labor and a form of slavery. If you are drafted, you are being forced to do something you did not volunteer for.

If enough people volunteered there would be no need for a draft in the first place.

People can argue whether they think its "correct" or not all day, its still forced labor.

by Jcampuzano2

6/27/2026 at 12:40:38 PM

In peacetimes, yes, but if it's defensive war I don't see many arguments against a draft, it can't be generalized though.

by TomK32

6/27/2026 at 8:29:22 PM

There certainly are arguments against a draft at the individual level - Example being if the people being drafted do not believe in their own governments ability to lead.

A draft is by definition forced labor either way - because if enough people volunteered there would be no need for a draft in the first place.

But usually it doesn't matter either way. Either the people believe in their own government/territory and see it as worth defending, or alternatively they don't believe in it, but their government is authoritarian and will force you at risk of punishment or death into being drafted.

In both cases a draft is still forced labor for those who did not volunteer to participate.

by Jcampuzano2

6/27/2026 at 5:18:40 PM

States have a legitimate right to taxation. Taxes can be used to pay volunteers. While there are still people owning wealth above the poverty level, there is no excuse to force people into military slavery. And even if literally everybody has been taxed into poverty, there are more ethical alternatives than slavery, e.g. tying the right to vote to military service like in Starship Troopers. Freedom from slavery is extremely high on the scale of ethical importance, even more important than democracy.

by mrob

6/27/2026 at 1:30:56 PM

If there's anything worth defending, people will volunteer to defend it.

by crote

6/27/2026 at 5:47:38 PM

> If there's anything worth defending, people will volunteer to defend it.

That's a pretty binary view of the situation. It's not enough for something to be worth defending: People have to recognize that it's worth defending — and that might not happen instantaneously, because "people" come to appreciate things at very different rates.

by dctoedt

6/27/2026 at 4:25:44 PM

Seems like there's a clear free-rider problem, the volunteers make the sacrifice and the non-volunteers reap the benefits.

by mitthrowaway2

6/27/2026 at 3:43:00 PM

What if people do but not in enough numbers? Farewell, sweet country!

by esafak

6/27/2026 at 4:24:46 PM

If the country doesn't have enough people to defend it, perhaps it's good and just that some other community gets to control the territory? A country isn't really anything except for its people, after all.

by WJW

6/27/2026 at 5:16:52 PM

The occupying power may be interested in your country's resources rather than its people.

by esafak

6/27/2026 at 5:54:44 PM

How does that change matters? If anything that makes it even worse. If not enough of your people can't be bothered to join the military even when an enemy army is invading, perhaps the country in question should draw the conclusion it's not viable as an independent nation.

by WJW

6/27/2026 at 8:37:02 PM

What happens in those cases is that the majority vote to force everyone to defend the country. Its just easier that way since it means you wont be defending alone, if everyone defends together then its very unlikely the country will fall while if just volunteers does it then almost any country will fall.

Thinking you can defend a country just via volunteers is like thinking you can pay for a country just via charity, we vote to tax everyone for a reason. And people do that voluntarily afterwards, they are fine paying taxes as long as everyone is required to pay, same with defending the country.

by Jensson

6/27/2026 at 2:06:11 PM

Indeed, and there are many historical examples of this.

Today’s average Western nation-state tends to be a rathole that spits into the faces of its citizens every single day, until the moment the state is under attack, at which point everyone is told that they owe their lives to their sacred motherland that has done so much for them.

by p-e-w

6/27/2026 at 3:58:09 PM

There is shit ton of opposition, people are literally defending themselves with guns from kidnappers !

by throw734848

6/27/2026 at 5:26:53 PM

Ocarinas have the great advantage over recorders that you can safely play them without hearing protection. I have personally measured the loud notes on both a soprano recorder and an alto recorder and the SPL meter measured over 100dB(A) at the ear (indoors, so this includes reverberation too, but most recorders are played indoors). Note that standard recorder fingering allows for almost no control over dynamics; each note has a single set volume that it must be played at to sound in tune. (Advanced technique allows slight control over dynamics with alternative fingerings.) For this reason I do not think recorders should be used in schools.

by mrob

6/27/2026 at 6:23:20 PM

Hello, Ocarina maker and long time player here! Ocs are unfortunately almost always significantly louder than recorders...

by hcrean

6/27/2026 at 6:35:58 PM

Thanks for correcting. I haven't actually played an ocarina, so I was relying on reports from people saying they are quiet instruments. It's very difficult to find objective SPL comparisons for musical instruments. But lots of people think recorders are quiet too, so I should have suspected that complaints about ocarinas being too quiet could be inaccurate too.

by mrob

6/27/2026 at 1:28:02 PM

Interesting that they don't seem to have had much cultural impact. I've never heard of these, never seen them in war films. You don't hear songs wistfully using a wartime ocarina or referring to them.

by stevage

6/27/2026 at 2:11:26 PM

Same. I was just able to order an original kit on eBay for $40, so demand isn’t high.

by tomcam

6/26/2026 at 7:14:56 PM

That explains the Joey's ocarina in the movie Stalag 17.

by brudgers

6/27/2026 at 2:11:18 PM

An old favorite. "How stupid can you get, animal?"

by jrop

6/27/2026 at 5:35:26 PM

My first thought

by cholmdomsky

6/27/2026 at 12:24:35 PM

Good movie, time to rewatch

by warmedcookie

6/27/2026 at 11:13:09 AM

Back in the day in elementary school we were each issued a tonette

by snorkel

6/27/2026 at 12:00:51 PM

[dead]

by microgpt