The soft belly or underside of an animal's body. It was first used figuratively during World War II, when Sir Winston Churchill described the Allied invasion of Italy as an attack on the soft underbelly of the Axis.

We can all be grateful to Blue Öyster Cult for a couple of things. Sir Winston Spencer Churchill Society, Edmonton, Alberta, in The Heroic Memory (Edmonton: Churchill Statue and Oxford Scholarship Foundation, 2004), 80. The bottom side or part: scraped the car's underbelly going over the curb. If you frequent online horse color discussions with any regularity, you have probably heard this term used to describe dorsal stripes on horses that were not true duns. The most probably source of the expression is a reference to animals like porcupines, which are well protected on their backs but not on their bellies.

It was a difficult confrontation. 1. 2 Geoffrey Best, Churchill and War (London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2006), 315.

There is some back-and-forth, but with the rapid pace of discovery (and the ability of non-technical audiences to talk to one another about the subject, often without direct collaboration with the academic community) there is a certain amount of divergence. Their self-titled album debuted in 1972, says Louder Sound, and they quickly earned a reputation as a sort of thinking person's progressive (except when they weren't) metal (except when they weren't) yet melodic (pretty much always were) group of rockers.

That is because the scientific meaning of the term has not changed; it is still about a lighter underside countering the self-shadow of an object.

“Soft White Underbelly video and portraits of The Whitakers, an inbred family from Odd, West Virginia.

Sometimes survival means changing with the times (Jefferson Airplane or Jefferson Starship? Endure it has, along with BOC. But countershading has a very specific meaning when speaking of animal coloration. Meanwhile the pale undersides of the three ibexes in the second picture help to conceal them.

https://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/soft+underbelly. Let's get the tame, literal stuff out of the way first.

What does “pseudonym” mean in this sentence: “‘I’m afraid that was a pseudonym. The track was cut in 1976, part of the album Agents of Fortune, as member Eric Bloom told the Pittsburgh Post Gazette in October 2019. 1 Averell Harriman to President Roosevelt, Moscow, 12 August 1942, in Winston S. Churchill, Document Volume 17, Testing Times 1942 (Hillsdale College Press, 2013), 152-53. o_O I was curious. If only the pieces of the puzzle were found in order, or if we at least got to glimpse the picture on the puzzle box before proceeding, so we knew what the end result was supposed to look like! Thayer’s Law states that animals display darker coloring along their topline and paler coloring on their undersides as a means of camouflage, because it counters the shadow cast by the sun. Some of that comes from the limits of the English language—there are only so many words for spotted—and some of it comes from the non-linear nature of discoveries. Whether it's ego, artistic differences, or Yoko Ono, there are no guarantees of longevity in the business that is rock and roll. In her book Farben und Farbvererbung beim Pferd, this is the color Henriette Arriens associates with the term countershading, and it is the equine color that most closely fits the scenario described by Thayer. Did he use the term more than once, or in reference to anything else? …the sooty effect is most commonly expressed over the top of the horse so that the back, shoulder, and croup can almost look black, whereas the horse is redder on the lower body, belly, and upper leg.

Blue Öyster Cult — BOC, to fans — got its start as Soft White Underbelly on Long Island back in 1967. “Soft underbelly” comes up many times in the literature; no source we can find confirms Churchill’s first use of the phrase, though it was certainly his.

You can also reach me directly through the Contact page (the little envelope icon on the main menu). This can create inconsistencies that can lead to confusion for the unaware. You can also access his son Gerald’s compilation of his work Concealing-Coloration in the Animal Kingdom (1909) through Google books. lies.

ISBN: 978-1405119504, previous read: The Colors of Mice: A Model Genetic Netword, © 2013 Blackberry Lane.

Finally he said, “We should slit the soft belly of the Mediterranean.” Well, my friends, I assure you, when I landed at Salerno, I found it was a tough old gut!3, General Clark nevertheless confirmed the correctness in his opinion of Churchill’s argument: “I might say that we soon were persuaded that that was the best thing to do.”4, If Churchill didn’t use “soft underbelly” with Stalin, he soon took up the phrase, deploying it widely in the ensuing weeks. The Churchill Project - Hillsdale College. We would call the color in the above painting mealy or pangare.

It is why so many animals, like the wood mouse pictured at the top of this post, have pale undersides. If you are interested in horse colors and patterns, or issues of genetic diversity, you have found the right place. .

The term that may cause confusion is countershading.

In Pearlman's poetry, the "Blue Oyster Cult" was a group of aliens who had assembled secretly to guide Earth's history.

From DNA to Diversity: Molecular Genetics and the Evolution of Animal Design Powered by WordPress.

The Italian government proved soft enough but the Italian terrain not at all….”2.

Goode was peering at the ivory inlay on the underbelly of the stock.

In my previous post, I said that I would be following up with a post about dun. There is no way I w

“Democrat” vs. “Republican”: Where Did The Parties Get Their Names? Harness the goddess Athena’s intelligence as you embark on this quest through the vocabulary of “The Lightning Thief” by Rick Riordan.

By 1971 the key personnel were in place, as was the now more familiar name. We could not even get across without the British showing us the way and taking us by the hand. John Grigg, identifying the southern strategy as that of Alan Brooke, referred to it as “Churchill’s phrase but Brooke’s notion.”5. I think a rework of the police officers bill of rights will go a long way towards accountability for all parties involved. There was confusion, however, that term did not appear in either the paper on the new discovery or the dissertation that described the research involved. © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins This blog takes its name from a series of books on horse breeds, their histories and their colors. That is why the term is conspicuously absent in the scientific literature on dun. Soft White Underbelly interviews and portraits of the human condition by photographer, Mark Laita. Abbott Thayer was quite enthusiastic about his theory, and he tended to overstate just how pervasive this type of coloration was in the animal kingdom.

He explained the decision regarding ‘Torch’ [the invasion of North Africa, which began on 2 November 1942] and its tactics, emphasizing the need for secrecy….About this time the Prime Minister drew a picture of a crocodile and pointed out that it was as well to strike the belly as the snout.1, Neither Harriman nor any other source quotes Churchill as using the words “soft underbelly” at that time—as noted by the historian Geoffrey Best: “Note that Churchill did not say, ‘soft underbelly of the Axis.’ What he did say was ill-judged. The conversation surrounding the new discoveries about dun have highlighted an instance of that kind of situation for those interested in horse color. ​With regard to this phrase, repeatedly used to describe Hitler’s barricaded France in the months before D-Day, we can say with assurance that it was not invented by Churchill, who deplored it.

"Initially, the band was not happy with the name, but set…

By 1971 the key personnel were in place, as was the now more familiar name.

This makes sense since the overlay of black hairs on sooty horses often reflects that same dark-on-top, light-on-bottom configuration.

“Soft underbelly” (of Europe, the Axis Powers, or the Mediterranean) was a famous Churchill expression, conveying his idea of attacking Germany through Italy, before the invasion of Normandy. I agree.

The scout ship responded like a nervous horse and fluttered away as the rocket burned and arced beneath the underbelly. . The most probably source of the expression is a reference to animals like porcupines, which are well protected on their backs but not on their bellies. "I was thinking about the concept of an eternal love, one that transcends the borders of death," he said.

(Yes, the world was in color, but just barely.)

There are a over eighty appearances of “soft underbelly” in the Churchill canon, but none in his writings or speeches. The name "Blue Öyster Cult" came from a 1960s poem written by manager Sandy Pearlman.

Imaginos is the eleventh studio album by the American hard rock band Blue Öyster Cult (commonly shortened as BÖC). Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2020, Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition Roeser explained to Louder Sound that he drew the words from a very inspiring well: Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. Were “Soft Underbelly” and “Fortress Europe” Churchill Phrases? He also said there’s a lack of discipline in the police force. If the idea is to counteract the shadow cast by the mass of the body, a thin line of darker color along the back of a non-dun horse is not likely to provide much camouflage. —R.C., Naples, Fla. “Fortress Europe” was not Churchill’s phrase—emphatically so (read on). I’d be grateful if you can point out the usage(s) by reference to specific speech or speeches, if possible.​ ​Also, who initiated the phrase “Fortress Europe” in relation to Hitler’s conquests?

Writers have noted that strong countershading is not really a feature of horse coloration.

Outside of some of the heavy draft horse and rustic pony breeds, this type of pronounced mealy pattern is rather rare. Learn more. The whole thing "just came to me," he said, but when he sat and thought about it, he realized he'd been sort of channeling the band Jethro Tull — "I wanted it to be so much more than a pop hit.

Hello! Sean B. Carroll, et al My mar... Horses in Byzantium and medieval europe. But Field Marshal the Earl Alexander (among those who remembered Churchill’s use of “soft underbelly”) deplored likening Europe to a fortress: ​Once when I used the term “Hitler’s European Fortress,”​ ​he turned on me in anger and said, “Never use that term again. And for those that have an interest in Abbott Thayer and his work on animal camouflage, check out “A Painter of Angels Became the Father of Camouflage.” I have a soft spot for him as another artist whose obsessive nature drew him into science (and the science of animal coloration, no less), but by any measure his work was incredibly influential.