Talk:Jean Schramme

Untitled
Jena Schramme in 1969 wrote his memories in "Le bataillon Leopard" (Robert Laffont Edotions).

Bio needed for Schramme
This article does not talk much about the man himself; rather it discusses certain mercenary activities in which he was involved. For a real Wiki bio, it needs biographical data - early life, career, etc - anyone have anything that can be referenced? Engr105th (talk) 00:06, 16 December 2009 (UTC)
 * That's correct. Some other issues need to be addressed as well. Sequence and accuracy are a problem sometimes. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 41.151.82.247 (talk) 13:05, 24 January 2012 (UTC)


 * And also the rambling and incomplete sentences and references. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.184.41.226 (talk) 02:11, 4 May 2013 (UTC)
 * The second paragraph is rather biased and somewhat inaccurate. First thing, it says much about the bias of the author that he or she writes of "several hundred white people" being held hostage in the Congo (which is true). The fact that thousands of the black people were being killed at the same time is evidently not that important to this author. Only the lives of the white people in the Congo count to this editor. This is not a helpful approach to put it mildly. Beyond that, the Belgian intervention is portrayed here as essentially justified as this article states that the Belgians had to intervene to protect their "interests", which are not defined. There is a fine line between explaining why somebody did something and excusing why somebody did something, and this article is very close to crossing it. I suppose if one wants to talk about protecting the lives of Belgian citizens in the Congo, one can say that was a legitimate concern. But dismembering the Congo because some rich Belgian people together with some rich French people and some rich British people wanted to keep getting rich off the mineral wealth of Katanga would not be a legitimate intervention in the opinion of many people. What "interests" is this article talking about?
 * And finally, the sham state of Katanga is being presented here as being real. The so-called État du Katanga was independent of Belgium in the same way that the so-called Empire of Manchukuo was independent of Japan. It would be more correct to write that having granted the Congo independence in 1960 that the Belgians decided to hang on to the really valuable part of the Congo via the spurious state of Katanga while letting the rest go. The part about Katanga being rich in copper, cobalt and diamonds is correct. It is noteworthy that once Moïse Tshombe became the Congolese prime minister in 1964 that the Belgians lost their interest in Katangese independence, which was not important to them once their man had become the prime minister. And likewise, the revenue from the copper mines of Katanga made up 33% of the Congolese budget. And that was just the copper revenue, and I'm not even discussing the revenue from the cobalt and diamond mines. Once Katanga decided to leave the Congo and cut off the central government from the revenue of its mines, the Congolese state was essentially bankrupted and unable to pay the salaries of anyone working for it. That goes a long way to explain why the Congolese state disintegrated in the summer of 1960 as it was unable to pay the wages of its soldiers, policemen, civil servants and so on. The article has the sequence of events out of order. It was the Belgian-sponsored attempt to have Katanga to leave the Congo that caused the Congolese state to disintegrate and fall into anarchy rather than the other way around. And finally, the article does not explain how any of this relates to Schramme at all. This really needs a rewrite. --A.S. Brown (talk) 22:20, 17 April 2022 (UTC)

MERCENARIOS : Y SU INCIDENCIA EN LA POLITICA INTERNACIONAL
LA NATURALEZA MISMA DEL ' SOLDADO DE FORTUNA ' [ MERCENARIO ] HACE QUE SU [ IDENTIDAD ] SEA ' INCIERTA ' ... ' SECUNDANDOLO ' A UN ' PROPOSITO ' Y NO A UNA PARTICULARIDAD [ INDIVIDUAL ] ... SEA COMO ' FUERE ', SU ' INCIDENCIA ' POLITICA ' [ MILITAR ] , NOS DA UNA ' IDEA ' DE LA ' NATURALESA ' MISMA DEL ' INDIVIDUO ' ... PARTICULARMENTE SU ' IDEAL ' , QUE LO SUPEDITA A ' SER LO QUE ES ' : UN ' SOLDADO DE FORTUNA ' " EL INDIVIDUO COMO CATALIZADOR SOCIAL ' , EN LAS " PARADOJAS SOCIALES " [ EINSTEIN ] ... 186.77.205.79 (talk) 16:06, 26 November 2021 (UTC)