Word: prussians
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...petticoat-a device that was considered highly original when it cropped up again during World War I.) Characteristically, however, it was Prussia that introduced Europe to mass espionage. Wilhelm Stieber, spymaster to Bismarck, boasted that he had some 40,000 agents in France at the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War in 1870. Stieber was almost surely exaggerating, but his vacuum-cleaner espionage technique did supply the Prussian army not only with military information but with accurate estimates of the finances of leading citizens in occupied French towns...
...Goose Is Roman." The Fascist leaders were painfully anxious not to lose face with the Germans. "Pay attention to uniforms," Ciano cued himself for a visit to Germany. "We must be more Prussian than the Prussians." Mussolini repeatedly lectured Ciano on "the necessity for redeeming Italy's reputation as a faithless nation. Bismark used to say that you can't have a policy with Italy when she is faithless both as friend and foe." Yet no one took a more contemptuous view of the Italian people than Mussolini himself. One incident or another kept him boiling. "The Duce...
...turn the army, at least, into a Prussian facsimile, Mussolini introduced the "passo Romano," a copy of the goose-step. When old soldiers and short-legged King Victor Emmanuel complained, the Duce's comment was: "People say the goose-step is Prussian. Nonsense. The goose is a Roman animal. ... It is not my fault if the King is half-size. Naturally he won't be able to do the parade step without making himself ridiculous. He will hate it for the same reason that he has always hated horses-he has to use a ladder to climb...
...Grand Prix, at France's Le Mans, the most grueling (24-hour) road race of all, and at Mexico's Pan American. At each, they arrived weeks in advance, inspected every mile of road, noted curves and other obstacles, planned their race as carefully as a Prussian general his campaign...
...committee's meetings. Ulrich meets a variety of "important personages" undoubtedly intended to reappear in the later pages of the novel: a befuddled aristocrat; a Prussian millionaire with a vast amount of useless erudition; a general who insists that the Collateral Campaign must recognize the military glories of the Empire ; and the female inspiration behind the whole campaign, a statuesque middle-class beauty given to high-minded speeches about Kultur. As might be expected the meetings of the committee end merely with decisions to set up still more committees...