Unrestricted

Unrestricted (pronounced uhn-ri-strik-tid)

(1) Not restricted or confined.

(2) In the classification of documents, having no security classification.

1766: The construct was un-+ restrict + -ed.  The un- prefix was from the Middle English un-, from the Old English un-, from the Proto-West Germanic un-, from the Proto-Germanic un-, from the primitive Indo-European n̥-.  It was cognate with the Scots un- & on-, the North Frisian ün-, the Saterland Frisian uun-, the West Frisian ûn- &  on-, the Dutch on-, the Low German un- & on-, the German un-, the Danish u-, the Swedish o-, the Norwegian u- and the Icelandic ó-.  It was (distantly) related to the Latin in- and the Ancient Greek ἀ- (a-), source of the English a-, the Modern Greek α- (a-) and the Sanskrit अ- (a-).  The verb restrict was in use by at least the 1530s in the sense of “to limit, bound, confine (someone or something), prevent from passing a certain limit in any kind of action” and was from the Latin restrictus, past participle of restringere (bind fast, restrain) and perfect passive participle of restringō (draw back tightly; restrain, restrict), the construct being re- (back, again) + stringō (press, tighten, compress); as an adjective, it was a doublet of ristretto. By the eighteenth century, the word had come to be regarded as a Scotticism but the infection spread quickly to Standard English.  As the past-participle adjective from restrict (in the sense of “limited, confined”), restricted has become associated with the classification of government documents, in the sense of “not for public release”, use seems not to have been routine until 1944 when a system of classification was codified by the US government.  Prior to that, although restrictions of distribution were common, concepts such as “Restricted to [names or designations]”, “Secret”, “Top Secret” etc were used but there was no standardization within departments or even between branches of the military.  When used as a suffix to form possessional adjectives from nouns, -ed was from the Middle English -ed, from the Old English -od (the adjectival suffix), from the Proto-Germanic -ōdaz, from the primitive Indo-European -ehtos.  It was cognate with the Latin -ātus. 

Glory road: A “Derestricted” sign in Australia's Northern Territory from the days of “no speed limits”.

In use, the older adjectival use was simply “restrict” and although “unrestricted” would seem an absolute (ie something either is restricted or it is not), dictionaries confirm the comparative is “more unrestricted” and the superlative “most unrestricted” although at least one style guide notes those forms can be regarded in a similar way as “very unique” (ie technically incorrect but widely used and well-understood.  The related adverb “restrictedly” was and remains rare.  In the US, well into the twentieth century, the appearance of the word “restricted” in advertisements, signage and such was verbal shorthand for (depending on context and location): “No Jews”, “No coloreds” etc.  Although the words “unrestricted” & “derestricted” describe similar states, different histories are implied and that’s a product of the ways in which the absence of restrictions came about.  Unrestricted means literally “no restrictions” (access to something or somewhere; rights to engage in trade etc).  “Derestricted” means that previously restrictions must have been imposed but those have since been removed.  The use applies to document classifications and in the now rare cases of roads with no speed limits (although some of those were something of a linguistic outlier because in many cases they never had any restrictions to be derestricted.  For obvious reasons, in English, “unrestricted” is the more commonly used form.  Unrestricted, unrestrictive & unrestrictable are adjectives, unrestrictedness is a noun and unrestrictedly is an adverb.

1978 Mercedes-Benz 450 SEL 6.9 on the Northern Territory's derestricted roads.  

Although the factory only ever claimed 225 km/h (140 mph), top speed of a UK-delivered “Euro spec” 6.9 (ie one not fitted with the power-sapping anti-emission devices fitted to those built for sale in the US or Australia) turned out to be a verified 237 km/h (147 mph) which reflected the experience of European testers who achieved 238 km/h (148 mph) on the German Autobahns.  Unexceptional now, such pace was in the 1970s a reasonable achievement for a heavy cruiser with pre-modern aerodynamics; at high-speed, the fuel consumption was as awe inspiring as one might expect from a 6.8 litre (417 cubic inch) V8 at full throttle.  The most powerful of the W116 range (1972-1980), technically the 6.9 was a V116 (the "V" denoting the 100 mm (4 inch) longer wheelbase) and was the spiritual successor to the old (W109) 300 SEL 6.3 (1967-1972) which adopted the classic muscle car formula for the 1964 Pontiac GTO by taking the 6.3 litre (386 cubic inch) V8 (M100) from the huge 600s (W100, 1963-1981) and putting it in a mid-sized car previously powered by nothing larger than a 3.0 litre (183 cubic inch) straight-six.  The distinct "hot rod" flavor of the 6.3 made it a more entertaining drive than the 6.9 but the latter was a vastly improved machine and the template on which the factory would build decades of success.  One quirk of the 6.9 was the use of a dry sump; with the lower hood (bonnet) line of the W/V116, the V8 was simply too tall to fit if conventionally lubricated.   

Idealistic lawyers (they do exist) and others have for centuries argued it is the existence of and adherence to laws which makes possible civilized societies, the alternative often expressed as “the law of the jungle”, best understood in the vernacular “kill or be killed” world in which life of man was “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short”, memorably described in Leviathan (1651) by the very clever and deliciously wicked English philosopher Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679).  However, what the lawyers, at least privately, acknowledge is the extent of adherence to laws closely is tied to (1) their enforcement and (2) a layered system of punishments for transgressions.  In domestic legal systems, this is comprehended as the apparatus extending from receiving a fine for overstaying one’s time at a parking meter to being hanged for murder; the existence of laws does not prevent crime but the perception of the chance of detection and the subsequent penalty for many operates as a deterrent and the debates about relationship between certain penalties and their deterrent effect continue.

Mahan's The Influence of Sea Power upon History 1660-1783.  In the last decade of the nineteenth century, probably no book was more read in palaces, chancelleries & admiralties.

In war, although usually the opposing sides have geo-political objectives, for those doing the fighting, historically the business was about killing each other and in practice that of course quickly and understandably came to imply “by whatever means possible” but for many centuries there have been conventions which form of “rules of war”, the most celebrated the various chivalric codes (codified during of the Middle Ages) which sought to regulate the behaviour of soldiers, particularly towards civilians.  However, as US Navy Captain Alfred Mahan (1840–1914) pointed out in the epoch-making The Influence of Sea Power upon History, 1660–1783 (1890), it’s impossible by mere agreement to outlaw the use of a militarily effective weapon so is it any more plausible for a statute, treaty or agreement to limit “mission creep” in the methods?  Whatever knightly codes may have existed, there seems little doubt that on the battlefield (or the towns subject to rape & pillage) habits do tend towards “unrestricted warfare”, military historians and legal theorists often pondering whether in “existential conflicts”, law reasonably can be expected to retain its intended force.

In what was a rhetorical flourish rather than a substantive legal point, in the dock before the IMT (International Military Tribunal) which in 1945-1946 sat in Nuremberg to try 22 of the surviving senior Nazis, Hermann Göring (1893–1946; leading Nazi 1922-1945, Hitler's designated successor & Reichsmarschall 1940-1945) claimed to be quoting Winston Churchill (1875-1965; UK prime-minister 1940-1945 & 1951-1955) in citing: “In the struggle for life and death there is in the end no legality.”  Like William Shakespeare (1564–1616), a few phrases have been attributed to Churchill on the basis of “sounding Churchillian” and although there’s nothing in the record to support the case those exact words ever passed his lips, Göring’s paraphrase was not unreasonable.  After the fall of France in 1940, Churchill did make clear his view “there could be no justice if, in a mortal struggle, the aggressor tramples humanity while those resisting remain bound by violated conventions” by which he meant if the Nazis ignored international law, it was an absurdity for the Allies fully to remain constrained by it while fighting for their very survival.  Churchill was not advocating the rejection of established law as a principle; he was saying when a state faces the prospect of destruction at the hand of an enemy ignoring the accepted rules of war, strict legalism must not be allowed to prevent an effective defence.  That wasn’t a novel idea Churchill formed upon assuming the premiership.  Months earlier, when serving as First Lord of the Admiralty (minister for the navy), he’d discussed whether the UK should regard itself still restricted by the legal conventions Germany’s forces were ignoring: “The Germans have torn up the conventions and the usages of war.  We cannot allow ourselves to be bound by rules which the enemy does not observe if by doing so we place our country in mortal danger.”  While not exactly the words used by Göring in the dock, he captured the spirit of Churchill’s meaning.

Lindsay Lohan on the cover of Vogue Arabia, March 2026.  Among the topics raised in discussion about her not uneventful life was “…coming of age in the spotlight in a time of unrestricted paparazzi access and near-constant tabloid scrutiny.”

Of course on 15 March 1946, borrowing the thoughts of “…one of our greatest, most important, and toughest opponents…” to support his argument modern, industrial, total war had rendered irrelevant traditional legal restraints, he was still harbouring the (faint) hope he might escape the noose and thus has a good motive in seeking to undermine the moral authority of the tribunal by suggesting even Churchill had acknowledged that in existential war, legal rules collapse.  This was not the construction of legal theory in the abstract, just as Churchill was explaining the pragmatic nature of military necessity because as he pointed out: “without victory there is no survival” and were the UK unilaterally to obey the rules while its opponents did not, the nation might lose the war.  Neither man ever sought to maintain that in war laws vanish, only that as demanded in extraordinary and reprehensible circumstances, they may need to be ignored.  Essentially, Churchill was asserting he wasn’t prepared to behave with the propriety of Caesar’s wife while Göring cavorted with Caesar’s whores; with that the Reichmarshall gleefully would have agreed and although his hopes the tribunal might find his paraphrased defence exculpatory were by then faint indeed, he still had an eye on the figure he hoped to cut in the history books.  

The doctrine of military necessity of course dates from the first time some prehistoric character picked up a stick or rock to gain tactical advantage in an argument and despite the various codes of warfare promulgated over millennia by philosophers, priests and politicians, that doctrine survived into the age of musketry and later, atomic bombs.  It’s the Prussian general and military theorist Carl von Clausewitz (1780–1831) who often is quoted because, with his commendable economy of phrase, succinctly he explained why necessity so often prevails over legality in existential war.  In On War (1832), he observed “War is an act of force, and there is no logical limit to the application of that force” and, anticipating the idealists, added: “Kind-hearted people might of course think there was some ingenious way to disarm or defeat an enemy without too much bloodshed… Pleasant as it sounds, it is a fallacy.”  What Clausewitz called Kriegsräson (necessity in war) meant in practice was (1) war has an inherent tendency toward escalation, because each side must use whatever means are necessary to defeat the other and (2) “arms races” will tend to ensue.

Imperial Chancellor Theobald von Bethmann Hollweg in field uniform including the famous Prussian Pickelhaube (spiked helmet, the construct being Pickel (pimple, pickaxe) +‎ Haube (hood, cap)), Berlin, 1915.  Even when serving as chancellor (prime minister) von Bethmann Hollweg sometimes wore military uniform; Germans adore uniforms (note the jackboots).

Later in the century, German military jurists expressed this logic through the principle Kriegsräson geht vor Kriegsmanier (military necessity overrides the customary rules of war) by which they meant the laws and customs of war could be followed only to the extent adherence did not impose an unacceptable military cost; if survival (and in practice: “immediate advantage”) demanded those rules be violated, necessity prevails.  What was at the time the most outrageous admission of the application of the doctrine came in 1914 after Germany violated Belgium’s neutrality and was delivered by Theobald von Bethmann Hollweg (1856–1921) who between 1909-1917 served as one of a series of inadequate replacements of Otto von Bismarck (1815-1989; chancellor of the German Empire (the “Second Reich”) 1871-1890); imperial chancellor of the German Empire 1909-1917).  In what must remain among the more ill-advised statements delivered by a politician, von Bethmann Hollweg on 4 August 1914 stood in the Reichstag (lower house of the imperial parliament) and explained to assembled members the German war-plan required the army marching Belgium to attack France and that Germany being a signatory to the Treaty of London (1839) which guaranteed Belgium’s neutrality had been rendered irrelevant by military necessity, the always quoted passage being: “We are violating international law, but necessity knows no law.”  Not all historians agree Realpolitik held a greater fascination for Germans than others but for students of the art, the chancellor’s speech appears in just about every text-book on the subject.  Warming to his theme, when the British ambassador to Germany protested the violation, von Bethmann Hollweg responded it would be an absurdity were Britain to go to war “just for a scrap of paper” (that scrap being the treaty the Germans had in 1839 signed as co-guarantors of Belgian neutrality).  That cynical turn of phrase was echoed a generation later when, under cross-examination in the dock at Nuremberg, Göring almost gloatingly admitted he and the other leading Nazis had regarded the many treaties they’d signed as “just so much toilet paper.”

Like many a defendant, the defrocked Reichmarshall was at times evasive or dissembling but on the matter of the regime’s attitude to treaties, he was truthful.  A highlight of the 50^th birthday celebration for Joachim von Ribbentrop (1893–1946; Minister of Foreign Affairs of Nazi Germany 1938-1945) had been the presentation to the minister of a diamond-studded casket containing facsimiles of all the treaties he had signed during (his admittedly busy if not productive) tenure.  When one of his aides remarked that there were only “a few treaties we had not broken”, Ribbentrop was briefly uncertain how to react until he saw “…Hitler’s eyes filled with tears of laughter.”  It was said to be a good party which must have been welcome because by 1943 there wasn't much to celebrate in Berlin.  Like Göring, Ribbentrop, was convicted on all four counts (planning aggressive war, waging aggressive war, war crimes & crimes against humanity) and sentenced to be hanged; his life did end on the gallows, unlike Göring who, in circumstances never explained, cheated the hangman by taking poison.

Periscope cam: Footage of USN submarine strike on the Iranian Navy’s frigate IRIS Dena (released by the Pentagon (unclassified)).

One of the intriguing legal matters explored before the IMT was the matter of the lawfulness of “unrestricted submarine warfare” and those discussions were recalled when, early in March, 2026, the Pentagon announced a USN (US Navy) submarine had torpedoed and sunk the Iranian Navy’s IRIS Dena (a Moudge-class frigate) with the loss of more than half the ship’s compliment of 130-odd.  Pete Hegseth (b 1980; US Secretary of Defense (and War) since 2025) described the act as one of “quiet death” although that was a reference to the torpedo’s stealthy approach rather than the explosions which doomed ship and crew.  It was the USN’s first sinking of an enemy warship by torpedo since World War II (1939-1945) and because (1) the US and Iran undeniably are in a “state of armed conflict” (any legal distinction between that and “war” as traditionally defined ceasing decades earlier much to matter), (2) the Dena was a warship and (3) the action took place in international waters, the attack doubtlessly was within the rules of war and the reaction of Tehran in branding it an “atrocity at sea” was a political rather than legal claim.

Defendants in the dock, Nuremberg, 1946.  All were guilty of something and a dozen were sentenced to be hanged (including one in absentia) but the IMT acquitted three who subsequently were prosecuted by German courts.

What however remains of interest is the recent change in tactics by the US which now uses military-level missiles to target and sink what appear to be civilian vessels from Central America, the White House claiming the boats are being used to smuggle narcotics.  When considering the lawfulness of “unrestricted submarine warfare”, the IMT in 1946 held that while international law did limit the conduct of navies in their interactions with non-military (ie merchant craft, fishing boats etc) vessels, because the British merchantmen were from the beginning of the war armed and captains had been ordered by the Admiralty to if possible ram U-boats, they were not entitled to the warning provisions of the protocol.  Beyond that, with reference to the failure on the part of German U-boat (submarine) commanders to rescue their shipwrecked victims, the tribunal observed:

“The evidence further shows that the rescue provisions [of the Protocol] were not carried out and that the defendant [Großadmiral Karl Dönitz (1891–1980; head of the German Navy 1943-1945, German head of state 1945)] ordered that they not be carried out.  The argument of the defense is that the security of the submarine is, as the first rule of the sea, paramount to rescue and that the development of aircraft made rescue impossible.  This may be so, but the Protocol is explicit.  If the commander cannot rescue, then under its terms he cannot sink a merchant vessel and should allow it to pass harmless before his periscope.  These orders, then, prove Doenitz is guilty of a violation of the Protocol.”  Had the judgement at that point ended the legal position would have been clear in that having at least tacitly conceded the defense’s point that rescue was no longer practicable in light of the limitations of the submarine and modern technological developments, the use of submarines as commerce destroyers would have been deemed against international law.  However Doenitz’s counsel introduced evidence (including affidavits from Allied admirals) that the USN & Royal Navy had from the outbreak of hostilities also practiced the “unrestricted submarine warfare” of which the Germans were being accused and this was not a classic Tu quoque gambit (in international law, a justification of action based on an assertion that the act with which the accused is charged was also committed by the accusing parties.  It was from the Latin Tū quoque (translated literally as “thou also” and latterly as “you also”; the translation in the vernacular is something like “you did it too”, thus the legal slang “youtooism” & “whataboutyouism”)).  What counsel argued was that in practicing “unrestricted submarine warfare”, all navies were acting in accordance with international law because such law makes sense only if it is cognizant of the prevailing circumstances (ie reality).  The IMT’s judgement in the Doenitz case was difficult to read (it was only later it was revealed to have been written by a judge who voted for his acquittal) but what it said was (1) the defendant had violated the protocols which were the rules of international law as they at the time stood but (2) the nature of total war had so changed the reality of war at sea that those protocols were no longer law, rendered obsolete and thus defunct.  That was as close as the tribunal came to allowing a tu quoque defense.

Unclassified footage released by the Pentagon of one of dozens of strikes on alleged “narco-terrorist” boats by US Southern Command.  The video included a message from Secretary of War Pete Hegseth: “TO ALL NARCO-TERRORISTS WHO THREATEN OUT HOMELAND - IF YOU WANT TO STAY ALIVE, STOP TRAFFICKING DRUGS.”  As far as is known, in all cases of these strikes, all on board the boats were killed.

So, while the US military (and for this purpose that includes the Coast Guard, National Guard etc) have a free hand to attack on the high seas warships of a hostile combatant, does the doctrine of “unrestricted warfare” extend to civilian vessels allegedly being used for unlawful activities?  Legal scholars have explored this novel development (something genuinely new and introduced during the second administration of Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021 and since 2025)) and the consensus seems to be sinking manned civilian vessel with missiles as an instance in peacetime law enforcement is of dubious legality unless strict conditions are met.  The first thing to consider is whether it’s a matter of (1) peacetime law enforcement in international waters (something governed by the UNCLOS (United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea)), customary international law and any bilateral interdiction agreements and thus a criminal matter rather than an act of war or (2) armed conflict at sea (and thus coming under the laws of naval warfare) which depends of a “state of armed conflict” existing between sovereign states.

However, whichever is held to be operative, as a general principle, civilian vessels are protected from missile attacks and enjoy freedom of navigation (certainly on the high seas); forces from warships may board, inspect, and arrest, but not arbitrarily destroy and under the UNCLOS there are explicit provisions under which a warship can stop a vessel suspected of statelessness or certain crimes but use of force must be necessary and proportionate.  Conceptionally, the notion of “proportionality” is little different from what is the domestic law of many states concerning matters such as self-defense: (1) there is no reasonable alternative and (2) force must not exceed what is needed to achieve a lawful objective.  Because these are events happening “on the water” there are also “graduations” in the use of force which are unique to the nautical environment including signals and warnings, maneuvering to compel a stop, warning shots (the classic “shot across the bows”) and disabling fire.  When civilian vessels are involved, historically, only in extremis (presenting a clear & present threat) would lethal force be deemed appropriate.  In other words, using missiles, without warning, to sink a civilian vessel would, in the context of law enforcement, be thought “disproportionate” especially if the crew’s lives are put at serious risk (inherent in missile attacks).  That’s all based on the precept that whether on land or at sea, states are expected to respect the right to life under international human rights law.  Because the adoption of this technique was so sudden, legal theorists are still working through the implications but it would appear an extension of the concept of “unrestricted warfare” beyond military targets.

Equiluminant

Equiluminant (pronounced ee-kwuh-loom-uh-nuhnt)

(1) In optics, the quality of two or more objects or phenomenon being equally luminant.

(2) Figuratively, two or more people being judged equally illustrious, attractive, talented etc.

1860s: The construct was equi- +‎ luminant.  As an adjective, luminant means "that which illuminates; that which is luminous" while as a noun it describes "an illuminating agent".  Luminant was from the Latin verb lūminant, the third-person plural present active indicative of lūminō, the construct being lūmen, from the Proto-Italic louksmən, from the primitive Indo-European léwk-s-mn̥, from the root lewk- (bright) +‎ -ō (appended to form agent nouns).  The accepted synonym is isoluminant and equiluminescent is the alternative form.  When used figuratively, although it would make no sense in science, the comparative is “more equiluminant” and the superlative most “equiluminant”.  Equiluminant & equiluminescent are adjectives and equiluminance is a noun; the noun plural is equiluminances (which some list as non-standard).

The prefixes: equi-, homo-, peri- & iso-

The prefixes “equi-”, “homo-”, “peri-” & “iso-” are all used to in same way suggest a concept of sameness or equality, but by tradition and convention, are used in different contexts to produce different meanings or emphasis:  Equi- is used to indicate equality, evenness, or uniformity and is often seen in mathematical, scientific & technical publications to describe something is equal in measure or evenly distributed such as equilateral (a shape having all sides of equal length, equidistant (being at equal distances from two or more points) & equilibrium (a state of balance where opposing forces or influences are equal).  Homo- is used to imply “same” or “alike” and thus sameness or (sometimes by degree) similarity.  In technical use it is a standard form in biology, chemistry & the social sciences to indicate sameness in kind, structure, or composition and by far the most common modern use is in the now familiar “homosexual” which in many jurisdictions is now a proscribed (or at least discouraged) term because of negative associations (“homo” as a stand-alone word also having evolved as a slur used of, about or against homosexual men).

The uses of the prefix are illustrated by homogeneous (composed of parts or elements that are all of the same kind, homologous (having the same relation, relative position, or structure) & homonym (in linguistics words which sound the same or are spelled the same but have different meanings).  Iso- is used to denote equality, uniformity, or constancy in terms of specific characteristics like size, number, or configuration and is most used in scientific and mathematical publications.  Examples of use include isometric (having equal dimensions or measurements, isothermal (having constant temperature) & isosceles (having two sides of equal length).  Peri- is used to denote “surrounding or enclosing”, or “something near or around a specific area or object”, examples including perimeter (the continuous line forming the boundary of a closed geometric figure), periscope (an optical instrument for viewing objects that are above the level of direct sight, using mirrors or prisms to reflect the view & peripheral (relating to or situated on the edge or periphery of something.  So equi-focuses on equality in measure, distance, or value, homo- focuses on sameness in kind, structure, or composition, iso- focuses on equality or uniformity in specific characteristics or conditions while peri- :focuses on surrounding or enclosing, or being near or around something.  For most purposes equi- & iso- can be used interchangeably and which is used tends to be a function of tradition & convention.

Equiluminant colors

An example the equiluminant in blue & orange.  In color the text appears at the edges to "shimmer" or "vibrate".  When re-rendered in grayscale, because the value of the luminance is so close, the two shades become almost indistinguishable.

In optics, “equiluminant” is a technical term used to colors with the same (or very similar) luminance (brightness) but which differ in hue (color) or saturation (intensity).  The standard test for the quality is to convert a two-color image to grayscale and, if equiluminant, the colors would appear nearly indistinguishable because they share the same level of “lightness”.  It’s of some importance in fields as diverse as military camouflage, interior decorating, fashion, astronomy and cognitive psychology.  In the study of visual perception, when colors are equiluminant, the human visual system relies primarily on the differences in hue and saturation (rather than brightness) to distinguish between them and this can create challenges in perception; in many cases, the brain will struggle to segregate colors based solely on luminance; essentially, there is a lack of information.

An enigmatic abstraction (2024) by an unknown creator.  This is an example of the use of non-equiluminant shades of orange & blue, the original to the left, copy rendered in gray-scale to the right.

In art and design, the quality of equiluminance can be exploited to create visual effects, the perception of some “shimmering” or “vibrating” at the edges where colors meet actually a product of the way the different hues are perceived by the brain to be “less defined” (a process not dissimilar to the “grayscaling”) and thus “dynamic”, lending the impression of movement even in a static image, especially if seen with one’s peripheral vision.  While a handy device for visual artists, it can be something of some significance because the close conjunction of equiluminant colors can make certain visual tasks more difficult, most obviously reading text or distinguishing shapes and objects.  All that happens is the extent of the luminance contrast can create a perception of fuzziness at the edges of shapes which means some people can suffer a diminished ability to distinguish fine details and the smaller the object (text, numerals or geometric shape), the more acute the problem.  The phenomenon has been well researched, scientists using the properties in equiluminant colors to study how the brain processes color and the findings have been important in fields like instrumentation and the production of warning signs.

Richard Petty's 1974 NASCAR (National Association of Stock Car Auto Racing) Dodge Charger (left) and 3 ton Super-Duty Jack, produced under licence by the Northern Tool Company (right).

1974 was the last year in which the big-block engines were allowed to run in NASCAR and the big-block era (1962-1973) was NASCAR's golden age.  Richard Petty (b 1937) used a "reddish orange" to augment his traditional blue when he switched from Plymouth to Dodge as the supplier of his NASCAR stockers in the early 1970s.  His team was actually sponsored by STP rather than Gulf and STP wanted their corporate red to be used but in the end a "reddish orange" compromise was negotiated.  However, when he licenced the Northern Tool Company to sell a "Richard Petty" jack, the shade used appeared to be closer to the classic "Gulf orange".

Sexy Lamborghinis in a not quite equiluminant color combination following those of the Gulf Western racing teams: 1964 1C TL tractor (top) and 1968 1R tractor (bottom).

Lamborghini had been making tractors and other farm equipment since 1948 when first its track-drive models appeared in 1955, the 1C-TL produced between 1962-1966.  Unrelated to that model cycle, it was in 1966 Lamborghini unveiled the sensational Miura (1966-1973), powered by a transversely located, mid-mounted, 3,929 cm³ (240 cubic inch) V12 engine which sucked prodigious quantities of gas (petrol) through four triple throat downdraft Weber carburetors, each of which was needed to satiate the thirst.  The power was sent to the road via a five-speed transaxle which shared it's lubrication with the engine (shades of the BMC Mini (1959-2000) which turned out to be a bad idea and one not corrected until the final run as the Miura SV (1971-1973).  To achieve the stunning lines, mounting the V12 transversely was the only way to make things fit and the engineering was a masterpiece of packaging efficiency but it resulted in the car displaying some curious characteristics at high speed.  The specification of the 1C TL Tractor was more modest although quite appropriate for its purpose; it was powered by an air-cooled 1,462 cm³ (89 cubic inch) which delivered power to the rear portal axle and drive sprockets via a dual-range, three-speed manual transmission.  However, being a diesel, there was of course fuel-injection (by Bosch), an advance Lamborghini's V12s didn’t receive until 1985 when US emission-control regulations compelled the change.  This version of 1R tractor is known as the cofano squadrato (squared hood (bonnet)); produced between 1966-1969, it replaced the earlier 1R (1961-1965) which featured a rounded hood.  The earlier model seems not retrospectively to have been christened but presumably it would have been the cofano arrotondato (rounded hood), proving everything sounds better in Italian.  An Italian could read from a lawnmower repair manual and it would sound poetic.

Not all agreed all Italians sounded so mellifluous.  In the entry for 10 January 1927 detailing a journey on the Brindisi-Rome train, the novelist Evelyn Waugh (1903-1966) noted in his diary (edited by Michael Davie (1924-2005) and published in 1976): “…a woman with the smile of a Gioconda and the voice of a parrot.  We seem to have stopped at every station in Italy, all decorated with grubby stencilled pictures of Il Duce [Benito Mussolini (1883-1945; Duce (leader) & Prime-Minister of Italy 1922-1943)] looking as if they were advertising Hassals[?] Press Art School.  All common Italian women have voices like parrots.”  By then, maybe the Duce had “made the trains run on time” so there would have been that.  The mention of “Giocondo” was an allusion to the Italian noblewoman Lisa del Giocondo (1479–1542); her name was given to the Mona Lisa, her portrait commissioned by her husband and painted by Leonardo.

A most uncommon Italian: The Mona Lisa (circa 1503), oil on white poplar panel by Leonardo da Vinci (1452–1519).

The John Hassall Correspondence Art School was a London art education institution established early in the 20^th century by the illustrator John Hassall (1868–1948) and Waugh, thinking himself both and “artist” and connoisseur of fine art, had little regard for “commercial art”.  In those years however, there was something of a boom in “poster art” and, with growing demand for graphic artists, the school filled a niche and its popularity (and profitability) increased as correspondence courses, were added, permitting students to learn via mail; conceptually, it was the same idea as “on-line education”.  What came to be called the “Hassall method” (characterized by the flat colors enclosed by thick black lines) would become an identifiable motif in early art deco.  Being quintessentially “upper middle class”, Waugh had to resort to terms like “common”, “lower class” or “lower middle class” to disparage those he thought socially beneath him; unlike members of the upper class (aristocrats, gentry, the genuinely rich etc), he couldn’t hardly use “middle class” as a slur as they could.  On 16 July 1956 he expressed his pleasure the woman buying his house was willing also “…to take over cows and peasants if required.”  Seldom did he miss an opportunity to make some mention of his superior tastes, his entry of 12 February, 1961 recording with obvious glee the “…great pleasure resulting from being rid of servants – one can throw away all the presents they have given one.”  Confident in the discernment of his readers, he didn’t bother to write “ghastly presents”.

As everybody knows, in Mean Girls (2004), there's an example or reference point for just about every known sociological, zoological, linguistic, political, scientific, botanical, geological or cosmological phenomenon yet observed.  Here, Lindsay Lohan in baby pink and powder blue illustrates an instance of equiluminance.

At scale, equiluminance doesn’t have to be obvious for it still to have desirable “side effects” and while it’s often noted two specific hues ((1) the blue Llewellyn Rylands pigments 3707 (Zenith Blue, replicated by Dulux as “Powder Blue”) & (2) the orange Rylands pigments 3957 (Tangerine, replicated by Dulux as “Marigold”)), that their use in combination appears so often on cars, motor-cycles and other stuff with wheels is due less to the claim the shades seem at the edge to “vibrate” that the striking combination appearing on some of the Gulf Oil sponsored Ford GT40s and Porsche 917s during sports car racing’s golden era (1950-1972).  Given the surface area involved, the effect is probably imperceptible when viewed at close range but the science does suggest that at speed (and these were fast machines), at the typical viewing range found on racetracks, there was what the optical analysts call “visual pop”, something which heightens the brain’s perception of motion.

Ford GT40 chassis# 1075, winner of the 1968 & 1969 Mans 24 hour endurance classic in Gulf racing livery.

Gulf's colors were not equiluminescent.  The company's original "corporate color scheme" had been a dark blue & orange combo but Gulf was an acquisitive conglomerate and in late 1967 it took over the Wilshire Oil Company of California, the signature colors of which were powder blue and orange, something which Gulf’s management thought “more exciting” and better suited to a racing car.  The change was made for the 1968 season with the Fords now running as five-litre (305 cubic inch) sports cars, governing body having banned the seven-litre engines the cars previously had used (under a variety of names, motorsport has for decades been governed by some of world sport’s dopiest regulatory bodies).  In the Gulf colors, fitted with 302 cubic inch (4.9 litre) engines, Ford GT40 Mark I (chassis #1075) won the Le Mans 24 hour endurance classic in 1968 & 1969 (repeating the brace Ford had achieved with the 7.0 litre (427 cubic inch) Mark II & Mark IV versions in 1966-1967), the first time the same car had achieved victory twice.  In 1968, #1075 won the BOAC International 500, the Spa 1000-kilometer race, and the Watkins Glen 6-hour endurance race, while in 1969 it also took the Sebring 12-hour race, a remarkable achievement for a race car thought obsolescent.  The livery has since been much replicated, including on many machines which have never been near a race track.

1971 Porsche 917K in Gulf Racing livery.  The fins were added to improve straight-line stability and were strikingly similar to those which appeared on some late 1950s US Chryslers although the aerodynamic properties of those were dubious, despite corporate claims.

Interestingly, the team painting the GT40s were aware of the issue created by equiluminant colors and knew that when photographed in certain conditions, the shades could tend thus.  As a matter of professional pride, they didn’t want it thought they’d created something with “fuzzy edges” so deliberately was added a dark blue hairline-border around the orange, reducing the optical illusion to ensure that when photographed, everything looked painted with precision.  When the Gulf team in 1970 switched to using Porsche 917s for the World Sports Car championship, they adopted the expedient of a black line of definition between the blue & orange so the whole enduring appeal of the combination lies just in the striking contrast and relies not at all on any tendency to the equiluminant.

Ford GT Heritage Edition First Generation (left) and Second Generation (right). 

Little more than 100 GT40s were built but Ford noted with interest the ongoing buoyancy of the replica market, as many as 2,000 thought to have been built in a number of countries (although that's dwarfed by number of replica Shelby American Cobras; it's believed there are 50-60,000-odd of them, a remarkable tribute to the 998 originals).  In the twenty-first century, the company decided to reprise the design but the new GT (2004-2006) was hardly a clone and although it shared the basic mechanical layout and the shape (though larger) was close, it was a modern machine.  The car wasn’t called GT40 because the rights to the name had ended up with another company and Ford declined to pay the demanded price.  Over 4000 were built and one special run was a tribute to the 1968-1969 cars in Gulf livery, 343 of the “Heritage Editions” produced.  A second generation of GTs was produced between 2016-2022 and was very modern, the demands of the wind-tunnel this time allowed to prevail over paying tribute to the classic lines of the 1960s.  Although the supercharged 5.4 litre V8 didn’t return and the new car used a turbocharged 3.5 litre (214 cubic inch) V6, it outperformed all its predecessors over the last 60-odd years (all the original GT40 chassis built between 1964-1969) including the 427 cubic inch monsters that won at Le Mans in 1966 & 1967 so it took decades, but eventually there really was a "replacement for displacement".  The V6 also was used also in pick-up trucks which doesn't sound encouraging but versions of the small & big block V8s used in the GT40s also saw similar service, the latter even first appearing in the doomed Edsel.  Production of the second generation was limited to 1350 units, 50 of which were “Heritage Editions” in the Gulf colors, one of several “limited editions”.

Dazzle

Dazzle (pronounced daz-uhl)

(1) To overpower or dim the vision of by intense light.

(2) Deeply to impress, to astonish with delight

(3) To awe, overwhelm, overpower, stupefy.

(4) To shine or brilliantly reflect.

(5) To excite admiration by a display of brilliance.

(6)To be overpowered by light.

(7) Something that dazzles.

(8) A form of camouflage used on early-mid twentieth century warships.

(9) The collective noun to describe zebras.

1475-1485: A frequentative of daze, the construct being daze + le, from the Middle English dasen, from the Old Norse dasa (as in dasask (to become weary)) and related to the Danish dase (to doze, mope).  1475-1485: Daze was a Middle English, back-formation from the Middle English dazed, from the Old Norse dasaðr (weary) & dasask (to become weary), from the Proto-Germanic dasōjan-, from the adjective daza-, which may have been a variant of the primitive Indo-European der- (to hold, support) and related to the Armenian դադարել (dadarel) (to settle, stop, end).  The -le suffix was a frequentative form from the Middle English -elen, -len & -lien, from the Old English -lian (the frequentative verbal suffix), from the Proto-Germanic -lōną (the frequentative verbal suffix) and was cognate with the West Frisian -elje, the Dutch -elen, the German -eln, the Danish -le, the Swedish -la and the Icelandic -la.  It was used as a frequentative suffix of verbs, indicating repetition or continuousness.

The original, fifteenth century, meaning was “be stupefied, be confused” which many dictionaries list as obsolete but there are certainly at least echoes of that sense in the modern use.  Originally intransitive; the transitive sense of “overpower with strong or excessive light” dates from the 1530s while the figurative sense of “overpower or excite admiration by brilliancy or showy display” is from the 1560s.  As a noun in the sense of “brightness, splendour”, it’s been known since the 1650s.  The verb bedazzle (to blind by excess of light) emerged in the 1590s but is now far more common in figurative use.  The late nineteenth century coining of “razzle-dazzle” originally suggested “bewilderment or confusion, rapid stir and bustle, riotous jollity or intoxication etc but came soon to be used of “deception, fraud; extravagant or misleading claims”.  At the turn of the twentieth century it was used also to mean “a state of confusion” but the modern trend is to use “razzle-dazzle” to mean anything flashy, especially unstructured, inventive performances on the sporting field.  Forms such as overdazzle, outdazzle, outdazzling, overdazzle, overdazzled, overdazzling, redazzle & undazzled have been coined as required.  The adjective antidazzle is commonly used in commerce (often as anti-dazzle).  Dazzle is a noun & verb, endazzlement, dazzlement & dazzler are nouns, bedazzle & (the archaic) endazzle are verbs, adazzle is an adjective, dazzling & dazzled are verbs & adjectives and dazzlingly is an adverb; the noun plural is dazzles.

Dazzling: Lindsay Lohan in zebra-print dress from Balmain's autumn-winter 2013 collection, GQ Men Of The Year Awards, London, September 2014.  Cohort, crossing, harem, herd and zeal have all been cited as the collective noun for zebras but most zoologists seem to prefer dazzle.

Developed first by the Royal Navy during World War I (1914-1918) to counter the German U-Boat (submarine) threat, dazzle camouflage for ships was a counterintuitive adaptation of techniques known to have been used during antiquity, the fleets of both the Greeks and Romans having been painted in shades of green and blue to blend with the surface and horizon.  The modern approach however was rather than concealment, the vessel would be exposed to the enemy and the British Admiralty adopted the scheme as an experiment.  It had been suggested in 1917 by a Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve (RNVR) lieutenant commander with a pre-war background in painting, his argument being that while it wasn’t possible actually to conceal a ship, a suitable paint scheme should make difficult the task of a submarine captain trying to estimate a vessel’s speed and direction while viewing through a periscope for a limited time and that was no easy task in 1917.  A U-Boat captain, while maintaining a distance from his target between around a quarter mile (400m) and a mile (1600m), had to predict the speed and direction of the target’s travel while factoring in ocean currents which could affect a torpedo’s travel, all within the short time he could risk his periscope being visible above the surface.  The dazzle concept of camouflage differed from traditional methods of concealment in that it sometimes made the target easier to see; the object was to make it harder to sink; it's thus better thought of as "subterfuge" rather than "camouflage".  A U-Boat carried very few torpedoes and they couldn't be wasted.  The captain had to hit a moving target, often in a rolling sea and to maximize the chance of success, needed the torpedo to hit the ship in her most vulnerable spots and this was done by aiming not at where the target was, but where the target would be more than half a minute later.  The idea of the dazzle was not to hide the ship but to make it even harder for a U-Boat commander to estimate variables like direction and speed of travel.    

View through periscope, with and without dazzle.

After encouraging findings in small-scale tests, the admiralty authorised trials and artists experimented with both colours and shapes, intending usually to distort the perception of the shape of the bow and stern, disrupting perspective and falsely suggesting a ship’s smokestacks or superstructure pointed in a different direction than truly it sat on the water.  Many of the ideas were shamelessly borrowed from modernist art, especially the concepts of cubism, a theft so blatant that Pablo Picasso (1881–1973), in conversation with the US poet and novelist Gertrude Stein (1874–1946), observed the Cubist movement deserved some credit from the Admiralty.  It's believed admiralties everywhere ignore the artists' claims.

French light cruiser Gloire (laid down 1933, launched 1935, commissioned 1937, scrapped 1958) in dazzle camouflage, off the North African coast, 1944.

The programme spread to merchant vessels and then across the Atlantic.  Soon thousands of ships were painted in lurid colour schemes but unfortunately, the extensive archive of photographs from this era are mostly monochrome which not only fail fully to capture the vivid variety of the artists’ work but also don’t convey the contrasts created by the blues, reds, greens, purples and greys light & dark which created the optical illusions.  Both navies undertook analysis of the losses in shipping to evaluate the effectiveness of dazzle but the results, so impressive in laboratory conditions, were inconclusive, it being statistically impossible to account for external factors but U-Boat captains interviewed after the war attested to the problems dazzle created for them.

RMS Olympic (RMS Titanic's sister ship) in in dazzle, Pier 2 in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, 1918, oil on canvas by Arthur Lismer (1885–1969).

Despite there being no consensus about the advantage of dazzle, allied naval authorities continued to employ it on both some warships and merchant fleets in World War II (1939-1945).  The Imperial German Navy had shown little interest in camouflaging ships during the Great War but did adopt a variation of dazzle early in World War II although OKM’s ((Oberkommando der Marine, high command of the Kriegsmarine (Navy)) designs were intended to disguise the identity of a ship from surface and air observation rather than raise doubts about speed or direction.  It’s not documented why this was abandoned by OKM (which is surprising given most of the navy's records survived the war) but, after 1941, all naval assets were repainted in regulation shades of grey.

German Tirpitz Bismarck-class battleship Tirpitz, anchored in the Kåfjord, Norway, March 1943.  Launched in April 1939 and commissioned in February 1941, she was sunk by RAF (Royal Air Force) bombers in an attack on 12 November 1944 (left).  US Fletcher-class destroyer USS Bush (DD-529) in Measure 32 Camouflage Scheme, off mare Island Naval Shipyard, California June 1944.  Launched in October 1942 and commissioned in May 1943, she was sunk in a Kamikazes attack off Okinawa on 6 April 1945, one of 47 allied ships listed as “sunk by Kamikaze attack”.

Although never as widely used as in 1917-1918, allied navies retained faith in the subterfuge throughout the war although this time it was the Americans who were much more systematic and it wasn’t until late in 1942 the Admiralty released their Intermediate Disruptive Pattern and not until 1944 was a Standard Scheme promulgated.  Wartime developments in radar were already reducing the effectiveness of dazzle and this was accelerated by post-war advances in range-finding which rendered dazzle wholly obsolete.  For decades after 1946, no dazzle schemes were commissioned but (much toned-down) aspects of the idea have in recent years been interpolated into modern "stealth" naval architecture.

Materiel

Materiel (pronounced muh-teer-ee-el)

(1) In military use, arms, ammunition, and military equipment in general.

(2) The aggregate of things used or needed in any business, undertaking, or operation as distinguished from personnel (rare).

1814: A borrowing from the French matériel (equipment; hardware), from the Old French, from the Late Latin māteriālis (material, made of matter), from the Classical Latin māteria (wood, material, substance) from māter (mother).  Ultimate source was the primitive Indo-European méhtēr (mother).  Technically, materiel refers to supplies, equipment, and weapons in military supply chain management, and typically supplies and equipment only in a commercial context but it tends most to be used to describe military hardware and then to items specific to military use (ie not the office supplies etc used by armed forces personnel).  Materiel is a noun; the noun plural is materiels.

Illustrating military materiel: Lindsay Lohan does Top Gun by BlueWolfRanger95 on Deviant Art.  An aircraft is materiel as is a pilot's flight kit.  Just about every piece of equipment in this photo would be classed as materiel except perhaps the aviator sunglasses (may be a gray area).  Even non-combat, formal attire like dress shirts and ties are regarded by most military supply systems as materiel so materiel can be made from material.

Materiel is sometime notoriously, scandalously and even fraudulently expensive, tales of the Pentagon's purchase of US$1000 screwdrivers, toilet seats and such legion.  Of late though, there have been some well-publicized economies, the US Navy's latest Virgina-class submarine using an Xbox controller for the operation of its periscope rather than the traditional photonic mast system and imaging control panel.  The cost saving is approximately US$38,000 and there's the advantages (1) replacements are available over-the-counter at video game stores world-wide, (2) the young sailors operating the controller are almost all familiar with its feel and behavior and (3) the users report its much better to use than the heavy, clunky and less responsive standard device.  In the military context, materiel refers either to the specific needs (excluding manpower) of a force to complete a specific mission, or the general sense of the needs (excluding personnel) of a functioning force.  Materiel management is an all-encompassing term covering planning, organizing, directing, coordinating, controlling, and evaluating the application of resources to ensure the effective and economical support of military forces. It includes provisioning, storing, requirements determination, acquisition, distribution, maintenance, and disposal.  In the military, the terms "materiel management", "materiel control", "inventory control", "inventory management", and "supply management" are synonymous.

DPRK personnel: DPRK female soldiers stepping out, seventieth anniversary military parade, Pyongyang, September 2018.  Note the sensible shoes, an indication of the Supreme Leader’s thoughtfulness.

The French origins of materiel and personnel are usefully illustrative.  The French matériel (the totality of things used in the carrying out of any complex art or technique (as distinguished from the people involved in the process(es))) is a noun use of the adjectival matériel and a later borrowing of the same word that became the more familiar noun material. By 1819, the specific sense of "articles, supplies, machinery etc. used in the military" had become established.  The 1837 personnel (body of persons engaged in any service) is from the French personnel and was originally specific to the military, a contrastive term to materiel and a noun use of the adjectival personnel (personal), from the Old French personel.

DPRK materiel: Mock ups of the Pukguksong-5 SLBM displayed at military parade Thursday to mark the conclusion of the North Korea’s Workers’ Party congress (the first since 2016), Pyongyang, January 2021.

In January 2021, the DPRK (North Korea) included in a military parade, what appeared to be mock-ups of what’s described as the Supreme Leader’s latest submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM), the supposedly new Pukguksong-5.  Apparently, and predictably, an evolution of the Pukguksong-4 paraded a few months earlier, although retaining a similar 6 foot (1.8m) diameter, the payload shroud appeared about 28 inches (700mm) longer, suggesting the new SLBM’s estimated length is circa 35 feet (10.6m).  Given the constraints of submarine launch systems, the dimensions are broadly in line with expectations but do hint the DPRK has yet to finalise a design for its next-generation SLBM.  Nor have there been recent reports of the regime testing any big solid-rocket motors, this thought to confirm the views of Western analysts that development is in the early stages.

Pukguksong-4, October 2020.

As a brute force device, with performance measured merely by explosive force, based on the dimensions, it’s possible the DPRK could match similarly sized Western SLBMs.  However, the US Navy’s Poseidon multiple-warhead SLBM, which uses two solid-fuel stages and has a range of over 2800 miles (4800 km), uses very high-energy propellants and a light-weight structure, directed by sophisticated navigation, guidance and control systems.  It features also some very expensive engineering tricks such as rocket exhaust nozzles submerged within the rocket stages, reducing the length, thereby allowing it to be deployed in the confined launch tube.  Lacking the US’s technological and industrial capacity, the Pukguksong-5 is expected to be more rudimentary in design, construction, and propellant technology, range therefore likely not to exceed 1900 miles (3000 km) and almost certainly it won’t be capable of achieving the same precision in accuracy.