Cautionary Tales, podcast

Proud to learn that my first book, ‘The If Man’, a biography of the splendidly rascally Dr Jameson, was used as the primary source material for this podcast: https://timharford.com/2023/07/the-coup-the-poet/ (and, yes: I know he...

The Donkey and the Tiger

A friend recently made me aware of a story with perfectly sums up the attitude of Defenders of the Myth: The donkey told the tiger: “The grass is blue”. The tiger replied: “No, the grass is green”​. The discussion became...

Counter Offensives: 1900 and 2023

All the talk from Ukraine at the moment is of the much anticipated ‘Counter Offensive’. Back in 1900, the Boers found themselves in a similar position to that of Putin’s invading Russians today; a few months earlier, the Boer republics (with...

Playing the victim

I have a deep, and entirely rational, hatred of soccer, and of play-acting, Alice-band-wearing, prima-donna soccer players. Imagine my snort of derision, therefore, when I read an article in the Telegraph, about some Argentinian player who was so...

Observation Post Idiots

A fellow called Peter Dickens writes an excellent blog called ‘The Observation Post’, which is well worth taking a look at: www.samilhistory.com. Mr Dickens writes on a variety of conflicts, but I find his articles about the Boer War especially...

Texas and the Transvaal

Though separated by many thousands of miles, there are some remarkable parallels between the history of Texas, and that of the Transvaal. The vast territory of Texas had been tentatively settled during the long period of the Spanish Imperial rule...