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Post by kaima on Dec 23, 2011 22:44:41 GMT -7
lassification: UNCLASSIFIED Caveats: NONE
Drafting Guys Over 60 This is funny & obviously written by a Former Soldier... New Direction for any war: Send Service Vets over 60! [cid:1.1001812408@web120115.mail.ne1.yahoo.com] I am over 60 and the Armed Forces thinks I'm too old to track down terrorists. You can't be older than 42 to join the military. They've got the whole thing ass-backwards. Instead of sending 18-year olds off to fight, they ought to take us old guys. You shouldn't be able to join a military unit until you're at least 35. For starters, researchers say 18-year-olds think about sex every 10 seconds. Old guys only think about sex a couple of times a day, leaving us more than 28,000 additional seconds per day to concentrate on the enemy. Young guys haven't lived long enough to be cranky, and a cranky soldier is a dangerous soldier. 'My back hurts! I can't sleep, I'm tired and hungry.' We are impatient and maybe letting us kill some not a very nice person that desperately deserves it will make us feel better and shut us up for awhile... An 18-year-old doesn't even like to get up before 10am . Old guys always get up early to pee, so what the hell. Besides, like I said, I'm tired and can't sleep and since I'm already up, I may as well be up killing some fanatical son-of-a-pregnant dog. If captured we couldn't spill the beans because we'd forget where we put them. In fact, name, rank, and serial number would be a real brainteaser. Boot camp would be easier for old guys... We're used to getting screamed and yelled at and we're used to soft food. We've also developed an appreciation for guns. We've been using them for years as an excuse to get out of the house, away from the screaming and yelling. They could lighten up on the obstacle course however... I've been in combat and never saw a single 20-foot wall with rope hanging over the side, nor did I ever do any pushups after completing basic training. Actually, the running part is kind of a waste of energy, too... I've never seen anyone outrun a bullet. An 18-year-old has the whole world ahead of him. He's still learning to shave, to start a conversation with a pretty girl. He still hasn't figured out that a baseball cap has a brim to shade his eyes, not the back of his head. These are all great reasons to keep our kids at home to learn a little more about life before sending them off into harm's way. Let us old guys track down those dirty rotten coward terrorists. The last thing an enemy would want to see is a couple million pissed off old farts with attitudes and automatic weapons, who know that their best years are already behind them. HEY!! How about recruiting Women over 50... in menopause!!! You think MEN have attitudes?? Ohhhhhhhhhhhh my God!!! If nothing else, put them on border patrol. They'll have it secured the first night! Send this to all of your senior friends... it's in big type so they can read it.
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Post by justjohn on Dec 24, 2011 5:06:16 GMT -7
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Post by justjohn on Jan 31, 2012 10:44:25 GMT -7
THIS DAY IN HISTORY: 1865 > House passes the 13th Amendment, abolishing slavery throughout the United States.
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Post by Nictoshek on Jan 31, 2013 3:59:32 GMT -7
The American Empire, RIPJanuary 31, 1968 marked the beginning of the end….Posted By Justin Raimondo On January 31, 2013 When will historians of the future date the beginning of the decline and fall of the American empire? The question may seem presumptuous. The idea that the American Century is a relic of the past, and we are entering a "new world order" of divided rather than hegemonic power, is relatively new, and still controversial. There are those who insist it ain’t necessarily so, primarily neocons of the second mobilization such as Robert Kagan, who are quick to reassure all right-thinking patriotic Americans that we’re still Number One and warn against the fatal lure of committing "superpower suicide." To the rest of us, however – that is, to everyone outside the neocons’ cultic universe – the signs of the Great American Contraction are everywhere, most noticeably in the incomes, productivity, and general economic well-being of ordinary Americans. Our own CIA – never a friend to the neocons, but that’s another story – avers this condition is the single greatest threat to our national security: not Iran, not terrorism, but the very real threat of national bankruptcy. Our national debt is over 100 percent of GDP. I would make the case, however, that the seeds of American decline were planted much earlier, during the cold war era. And if I had to pick a specific date that marked the beginning of the end, I would settle on January 31, 1968 – the day the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese forces began the Tet offensive, which was militarily a setback for them, but politically disastrous for the administration of Lyndon Baines Johnson. Tet was costly for the Viet-Cong and North Vietnamese forces, but their decision to launch an all-sided assault on South Vietnam’s cities wasn’t entirely calculated for its military effect. As General Giap put it years later: "For us, you know, there is no such thing as a single strategy. Ours is always a synthesis, simultaneously military, political and diplomatic – which is why quite clearly, the Tet offensive had multiple objectives." Militarily, their success was uneven and hardly decisive: they did not take any major cities, and those villages they took they couldn’t hold on to. On the diplomatic and political front, however, they came out the clear victors: their goals were to drive a wedge between the South Vietnamese government and Washington, on the one hand, and between Washington and the American people on the other. Their bold attacks on Saigon itself, which underscored the weakness of our South Vietnamese sock puppets, achieved the former, while television footage of American soldiers rushing to stop an enemy that seemed to be everywhere achieved the latter. Public support for the war plummeted. Gen. William Westmoreland, commander of US forces in Vietnam, demanded more troops: his request was denied when the White House concluded the war was unwinnable. A few months later, Johnson announced he would not seek reelection. But of course the war wasn’t unwinnable, as conservatives at the time protested: we could have sent the 200,000 troops Westmoreland requested, and initiated a Vietnamese "surge" which might have pushed the Viet Cong back. Indeed, we could have sent a million men into that carnage, and the reason we didn’t was because it was no longer politically possible. The country had turned against the war and not even a stream of scare-mongering red-baiting invective coming from the neoconservatives of the day could turn the tide. Today, the neocons bitterly denounce what they call the "Vietnam Syndrome," bemoaning its deleterious effect on their various schemes for world conquest, and – from their perspective – they are right to do so. Because if you worship at the altar of the war god, this Syndrome is a dangerous heresy: it means that the default of American foreign policy is caution rather than rollicking recklessness, prudence rather than mindless belligerence, realism rather than utopianism armed. Of course, this did not mean the US would no longer engage in wars of aggression: Reagan’s attack on Grenada, the invasion of Panama, the first Iraq war, the Kosovo adventure, all these and more showed that the Washington crowd had hardly surrendered their global ambitions. Yet you’ll note that none of these wars were all that successful, or popular – and all were over rather quickly, with no permanent expansion of the Empire’s frontiers. George Herbert Walker Bush, you’ll recall, earned the neocons’ eternal enmity when he gave the order for US troops to pull back instead of marching on Baghdad The Vietnam Syndrome was temporarily sidelined in the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, but soon reasserted itself in growing opposition to the Iraq war. Our Afghan adventure has met the same fate, with the Obama administration trying to wind down this wildly unpopular war without giving the impression of a panicked retreat. Everybody remembers those helicopters hurriedly taking off from the roof of the American embassy in Saigon as the Viet-Cong marched in, and our rulers would rather not see a repetition of that edifying scene. The Vietnam Syndrome is here to stay, and this is true for a number of reasons. The big problem for present day advocates of American imperialism is that we no longer have the resources to fight endless wars. Secondly, we don’t have the ideological motivation to engage in such a massive outlay of nonexistent resources: there is no competing ideology, like Communism or fascism, that serves as a credible enough threat. Efforts to replace the commie bogeyman with the specter of an Islamic "global caliphate" – never that convincing to begin with – foundered on the rocks of Al Qaeda’s apparent demise. (It’s alleged reappearance in such a marginal area as Mali only underscores the marginality of the "threat"). Thirdly, I would advance the speculative thesis that modernity is characterized by a turning inward on the part of individuals and nations: that a focus on the self-development of the individual, and his personal relations, is increasingly the trend as living standards rise and technology advances. Of course, this trend is not inevitable: nothing is inevitable when we’re talking about the choices human beings make. Some traumatic event could throw us back into pre-modernity, destroy the economic basis of our growing "isolationism," and embroil us in a series of wars. Nor is there anything necessarily admirable about this inward-turning trend: at its worst, it is simply narcissism, an unhealthy and debilitating obsession that can only end in a kind of cultural madness. Think of Nero fiddling while Rome burned. In any case, the Tet offensive marked the beginning of the end of public support for our post-WWII foreign policy of global interventionism, and although there have been several attempts to roll back the Vietnam Syndrome since then, none have enjoyed anything but temporary success. Political support for grandiose foreign policy adventurism has simply evaporated, and no conjuring of ideological ghosts and demons – fear of "militant Islam," the alleged shame and perils of "declinism," nostalgia for the "American Century" – will raise it from the dead. What this means, in the long term, is that America is slowly but surely retreating from the world stage – not out of any conviction, but out of necessity. The warlords of Washington may wish to conquer the world, but they are constrained from attempting to carry out their desires not only by economics but also by politics. The simple fact of the matter is that, after sixty or so years of global adventurism, America is economically and psychologically exhausted. We have neither the means nor the will to stay on the course set for us by the great internationalists of the 20th century. The 21st century is slated to be the age of a resurgent nationalism – which, in this country, has nearly always been inward-looking rather than outwardly aggressive. In the short term, however, there is no telling what will happen, and before we reach the final stages of imperial senescence it may well be that we’re in for a whole series of bloody and debilitating wars. It’s nice to know, however, that history is on our side. Now if only we can stop ourselves from blowing up the world before the curtain is drawn on the Age of Conquest.
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Post by Jaga on Jan 31, 2013 7:38:20 GMT -7
Thanks for reminding Vietnam. This was a cruel war and not as black and white as it was seen at the time.
January is a month when wars/invasions/contr-offensives starts. Soviets pushed back to the East in January 1945. They liberated Warsaw, Krakow and Auschwitz during a week between January 17 and 24.
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Post by JustJohn or JJ on Feb 3, 2013 4:56:12 GMT -7
Quasi War with France Department of State
In an effort to resolve differences with France that had accumulated between the two nations since the Treaty of Alliance of 1778, President John Adams dispatched a commission of three men to meet with French Minister of Foreign Affairs Talleyrand in 1797. After many delays the American commissioners were approached by three intermediaries of Talleyrand, who demanded apologies for allusions critical of France made by President Adams and payment of a bribe of several million dollars before official negotiations could proceed. Convinced that further negotiations were hopeless the three commissioners returned to the United States, and President Adams released their dispatches to Congress, substituting X, Y, and Z for the names of Talleyrand's agents. "I will never send another minister to France without assurances that he will be received, respected, and honored, as the representative of a great, free, powerful, and independent nation," Adams declared. The American public was outraged at publication of the dispatches, and Congress enacted a series of measures to raise an army and authorize a Navy Department. It also unilaterally abrogated treaties with France, authorizing privateers and public vessels to attack French ships found competing with American commerce. Between 1798 and 1800 the U.S. Navy captured more than 80 French ships, although neither country officially declared war.
The British delighted in the anti-French uproar in America and moved to assist the United States against a common foe, revolutionary France. President Adams wanted to avoid a major war, confident that had France wanted war it would have responded to American attacks on French ships. Talleyrand feared that limited hostilities with the United States might escalate into a fullscale war and let it be known that he would accept a new American diplomatic representative. Adams nominated a new representative to France despite public and Federalist disappointment that there would be no war, but conceded to Federalist demands and expanded the single nomination into a commission of three. Although the Franco-American negotiations were initially deadlocked, France finally agreed to cancel the Treaty of Alliance of 1778 if the United States dropped financial claims resulting from recent seizures of American merchant shipping. The resulting Convention of 1800 terminated the only formal treaty of alliance of the United States. It would be nearly a century and a half before the United States entered into another formal alliance.
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Post by Jaga on Feb 3, 2013 7:09:16 GMT -7
John,
I did not know about this mini-war with France, since france was so positive and helpful in the beginning of the American revolution.
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Post by JustJohn or JJ on Feb 14, 2013 4:06:06 GMT -7
Are we really more civilized, honorable? Read on and think again.
The WWII Dresden Holocaust -
'A Single Column Of Flame' February 13/14 1945
"You guys burnt the place down, turned it into a single column of flame. More people died there in the firestorm, in that one big flame, than died in Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined." --Kurt Vonnegut, Jr
On the evening of February 13, 1945, an orgy of genocide and barbarism began against a defenseless German city, one of the greatest cultural centers of northern Europe. Within less than 14 hours not only was it reduced to flaming ruins, but an estimated one-third of its inhabitants, possibly as many as a half a million, had perished in what was the worst single event massacre of all time.
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Toward the end of World War II, as Allied planes rained death and destruction over Germany, the old Saxon city of Dresden lay like an island of tranquillity amid desolation. Famous as a cultural center and possessing no military value, Dresden had been spared the terror that descended from the skies over the rest of the country.
In fact, little had been done to provide the ancient city of artists and craftsmen with anti-aircraft defenses. One squadron of planes had been stationed in Dresden for awhile, but the Luftwaffe decided to move the aircraft to another area where they would be of use. A gentlemen's agreement seemed to prevail, designating Dresden an "open city."
February 13/14 1945: Holocaust over Dresden, known as the Florence of the North. Dresden was a hospital city for wounded soldiers. Not one military unit, not one anti-aircraft battery was deployed in the city. Together with the 600.000 refugees from Breslau, Dresden was filled with nearly 1.2 million people. Churchill had asked for "suggestions how to blaze 600.000 refugees". He wasn't interested how to target military installations 60 miles outside of Dresden. More than 700.000 phosphorus bombs were dropped on 1.2 million people. One bomb for every 2 people. The temperature in the centre of the city reached 1600 o centigrade. More than 260.000 bodies and residues of bodies were counted. But those who perished in the centre of the city can't be traced. Approximately 500.000 children, women, the elderly, wounded soldiers and the animals of the zoo were slaughtered in one night.
On Shrove Tuesday, February 13, 1945, a flood of refugees fleeing the Red Army 60 miles away had swollen the city's population to well over a million. Each new refugee brought fearful accounts of Soviet atrocities. Little did those refugees retreating from the Red terror imagine that they were about to die in a horror worse than anything Stalin could devise.
Normally, a carnival atmosphere prevailed in Dresden on Shrove Tuesday. In 1945, however, the outlook was rather dismal. Houses everywhere overflowed with refugees, and thousands were forced to camp out in the streets shivering in the bitter cold.
However, the people felt relatively safe; and although the mood was grim, the circus played to a full house that night as thousands came to forget for a moment the horrors of war. Bands of little girls paraded about in carnival dress in an effort to bolster warning spirits. Half-sad smiles greeted the laughing girls, but spirits were lifted.
No one realized that in less than 24 hours those same innocent children would die screaming in Churchill's firestorms. But, of course, no one could know that then. The Russians, to be sure, were savages, but at least the Americans and British were "honorable."
So, when those first alarms signaled the start of 14 hours of hell, Dresden's people streamed dutifully into their shelters. But they did so without much enthusiasm, believing the alarms to be false, since their city had never been threatened from the air. Many would never come out alive, for that "great democratic statesman," Winston Churchill--in collusion with that other "great democratic statesman," Franklin Delano Roosevelt--had decided that the city of Dresden was to be obliterated by saturation bombing.
What where Churchill's motives? They appear to have been political, rather than military. Historians unanimously agree that Dresden had no military value. What industry it did have produced only cigarettes and china.
But the Yalta Conference was coming up, in which the Soviets and their Western allies would sit down like ghouls to carve up the shattered corpse of Europe. Churchill wanted a trump card--a devastating "thunderclap of Anglo-American annihilation"--with which to "impress" Stalin.
That card, however, was never played at Yalta, because bad weather delayed the originally scheduled raid. Yet Churchill insisted that the raid be carried out--to "disrupt and confuse" the German civilian population behind the lines.
Dresden's citizens barely had time to reach their shelters. The first bomb fell at 10:09 p.m. The attack lasted 24 minutes, leaving the inner city a raging sea of fire. "Precision saturation bombing" had created the desired firestorm.
A firestorm is caused when hundreds of smaller fires join in one vast conflagration. Huge masses of air are sucked in to feed the inferno, causing an artificial tornado. Those persons unlucky enough to be caught in the rush of wind are hurled down entire streets into the flames. Those who seek refuge underground often suffocate as oxygen is pulled from the air to feed the blaze, or they perish in a blast of white heat--heat intense enough to melt human flesh.
One eyewitness who survived told of seeing "young women carrying babies running up and down the streets, their dresses and hair on fire, screaming until they fell down, or the collapsing buildings fell on top of them."
There was a three-hour pause between the first and second raids. The lull had been calculated to lure civilians from their shelters into the open again. To escape the flames, tens of thousands of civilians had crowded into the Grosser Garten, a magnificent park nearly one and a half miles square.
The second raid came at 1:22 a.m. with no warning. Twice as many bombers returned with a massive load of incendiary bombs. The second wave was designed to spread the raging firestorm into the Grosser Garten.
It was a complete "success." Within a few minutes a sheet of flame ripped across the grass, uprooting trees and littering the branches of others with everything from bicycles to human limbs. For days afterward, they remained bizarrely strewn about as grim reminders of Allied sadism.
At the start of the second air assault, many were still huddled in tunnels and cellars, waiting for the fires of the first attack to die down. At 1:30 a.m. an ominous rumble reached the ears of the commander of a Labor Service convoy sent into the city on a rescue mission. He described it this way:
"The detonation shook the cellar walls. The sound of the explosions mingled with a new, stranger sound which seemed to come closer and closer, the sound of a thundering waterfall; it was the sound of the mighty tornado howling in the inner city."
MELTING HUMAN FLESH
Others hiding below ground died. But they died painlessly--they simply glowed bright orange and blue in the darkness. As the heat intensified, they either disintegrated into cinders or melted into a thick liquid--often three or four feet deep in spots.
Shortly after 10:30 on the morning of February 14, the last raid swept over the city. American bombers pounded the rubble that had been Dresden for a steady 38 minutes. But this attack was not nearly as heavy as the first two.
However, what distinguished this raid was the cold-blooded ruthlessness with which it was carried out. U.S. Mustangs appeared low over the city, strafing anything that moved, including a column of rescue vehicles rushing to the city to evacuate survivors. One assault was aimed at the banks of the Elbe River, where refugees had huddled during the horrible night.
In the last year of the war, Dresden had become a hospital town. During the previous night's massacre, heroic nurses had dragged thousands of crippled patients to the Elbe. The low-flying Mustangs machine-gunned those helpless patients, as well as thousands of old men, women and children who had escaped the city.
When the last plane left the sky, Dresden was a scorched ruin, its blackened streets filled with corpses. The city was spared no horror. A flock of vultures escaped from the zoo and fattened on the carnage. Rats swarmed over the piles of corpses.
A Swiss citizen described his visit to Dresden two weeks after the raid: "I could see torn-off arms and legs, mutilated torsos and heads which had been wrenched from their bodies and rolled away. In places the corpses were still lying so densely that I had to clear a path through them in order not to tread on arms and legs."
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Kurt Vonnegut was in Dresden when it was bombed in 1945, and wrote a famous anti-war novel, Slaughterhouse Five, in 1969.
In February 1945, Vonnegut was witness to another pretty good imitation of Mt Vesuvius; the firebombing by Allied forces of Dresden, the town in eastern Germany, during the last months of the Second World War. More than 600,000 incen-diary bombs later, the city looked more like the surface of the moon. Returning home to India-napolis after the war, Vonnegut began writing short stories for magazines such as Collier's and The Saturday Evening Post, and, seven years later, published his first novel, Player Piano. ...
Finally, in 1969, he tackled the subject of war, recounting his experiences as a POW in Dresden, forced to dig corpses from the rubble. The resulting novel was Slaughterhouse Five. Banned in several US states - and branded a "tool of the devil" in North Dakota - it carried the snappy alternative title: "The Children's Crusade: A Duly Dance with Death, by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr, a fourth-generation German-American now living in easy circumstances on Cape Cod (and smoking too much) who, as an American infantry scout hors de combat, as a prisoner of war, witnessed the fire bombing of Dresden, Germany - the Florence of the Elbe - a long time ago, and survived to tell the tale: this is a novel somewhat in the telegraphic schizopfrenic manner of tales of the planet Tralfamodre, where the flying saucers come from, Peace." ....
In December 1944, Vonnegut was captured by the German army and became a prisoner of war. In Slaughterhouse Five, he describes how he narrowly escaped death a few months later in the firebombing of Dresden. "Yes, by your people [the English], may I say," he insists. "You guys burnt the place down, turned it into a single column of flame. More people died there in the firestorm, in that one big flame, than died in Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined. I'm fond of your people, on occasion, but I was just thinking about 'Bomber Harris, who believed in attacks on civilian populations to make them give up. A hell of a lot of Royal Air Force guys were ashamed of what Harris had made them do. And that's really sportsmanship and, of course, the Brits are famous for being good sports," he concedes.
The Independent, London, 20 December 2001, p. 19
***************
The death toll was staggering. The full extent of the Dresden Holocaust can be more readily grasped if one considers that well over 250,000 -- possibly as many as a half a million -- persons died within a 14-hour period, whereas estimates of those who died at Hiroshima range from 90,000 to 140,000.*
Allied apologists for the massacre have often "twinned" Dresden with the English city of Coventry. But the 380 killed in Coventry during the entire war cannot begin to compare with over 1,000 times that number who were slaughtered in 14 hours at Dresden. Moreover, Coventry was a munitions center, a legitimate military target. Dresden, on the other hand, produced only china--and cups and saucers can hardly be considered military hardware!
It is interesting to further compare the respective damage to London and Dresden, especially when we recall all the Hollywood schmaltz about the "London blitz." In one night, 1,600 acres of land were destroyed in the Dresden massacre. London escaped with damage to only 600 acres during the entire war.
In one ironic note, Dresden's only conceivable military target -- its railroad yards -- was ignored by Allied bombers. They were too busy concentrating on helpless old men, women and children.
If ever there was a war crime, then certainly the Dresden Holocaust ranks as the most sordid one of all time. Yet there are no movies made today condemning this fiendish slaughter; nor did any Allied airman--or Sir Winston--sit in the dock at Nuremberg. In fact, the Dresden airmen were actually awarded medals for their role in this mass murder. But, of course, they could not have been tried, because there were "only following orders."
This is not to say that the mountains of corpses left in Dresden were ignored by the Nuremberg Tribunal. In one final irony, the prosecution presented photographs of the Dresden dead as "evidence" of alleged National Socialist atrocities against Jewish concentration-camp inmates!
Churchill, the monster who ordered the Dresden slaughter, was knighted, and the rest is history. The cold-blooded sadism of the massacre, however, is brushed aside by his biographers, who still cannot bring themselves to tell how the desire of one madman to "impress" another one let to the mass murder of up to a half million men, women and children.
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Post by Jaga on Feb 14, 2013 11:04:27 GMT -7
John,
thanks for a reminder of Dresden bobling. This was a tragid decision. I did not realize that this was Churchill decision.
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Post by karl on Feb 14, 2013 13:31:26 GMT -7
J.J.
It takes a bit of thought to present this day in history.. As a person, I do not know any person of that time from the war years living though that burning hell that was a fine city.
Rather it was morally correct to fire bomb the city to the pain of the inhabitants or not..For then the question will be if there is morality in war?
This occurrence was so many years in the past as to be simply history. We must see the light of the future and follow this light as a goal to begin again the business of living..
For it is not only not good to be looking back,,,but to look back, we may not like what is following us..
Karl
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Post by JustJohn or JJ on Feb 15, 2013 8:34:23 GMT -7
Feb 15, 1898: The Maine explodesA massive explosion of unknown origin sinks the battleship USS Maine in Cuba's Havana harbor, killing 260 of the fewer than 400 American crew members aboard. One of the first American battleships, the Maine weighed more than 6,000 tons and was built at a cost of more than $2 million. Ostensibly on a friendly visit, the Maine had been sent to Cuba to protect the interests of Americans there after a rebellion against Spanish rule broke out in Havana in January. An official U.S. Naval Court of Inquiry ruled in March that the ship was blown up by a mine, without directly placing the blame on Spain. Much of Congress and a majority of the American public expressed little doubt that Spain was responsible and called for a declaration of war. Subsequent diplomatic failures to resolve the Maine matter, coupled with United States indignation over Spain's brutal suppression of the Cuban rebellion and continued losses to American investment, led to the outbreak of the Spanish-American War in April 1898. Within three months, the United States had decisively defeated Spanish forces on land and sea, and in August an armistice halted the fighting. On December 12, 1898, the Treaty of Paris was signed between the United States and Spain, officially ending the Spanish-American War and granting the United States its first overseas empire with the ceding of such former Spanish possessions as Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippines. In 1976, a team of American naval investigators concluded that the Maine explosion was likely caused by a fire that ignited its ammunition stocks, not by a Spanish mine or act of sabotage. www.history.com/videos/this-day-in-history-02151898---the-maine-explodes
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Post by JustJohn or JJ on May 22, 2013 7:27:39 GMT -7
Today in History May 22 1246 Henry Raspe is elected anti-king by the Rhenish prelates in France. 1455 King Henry VI is taken prisoner by the Yorkists at the Battle of St. Albans, during the War of the Roses. 1804 The Lewis and Clark Expedition officially begins as the Corps of Discovery departs from St. Charles, Missouri. 1856 U.S. Congressman Preston Brooks of South Carolina beats Senator Charles Sumner with a cane for Sumner's earlier condemnation of slavery, which included an insult to Brooks' cousin, Senator Andrew Butler. 1863 Union General Ulysses S. Grant's second attack on Vicksburg fails and a siege begins. 1868 The "Great Train Robbery" takes place as seven members of the Reno Gang make off with $98,000 in cash from a train's safe in Indiana. 1872 The Amnesty Act restores civil rights to Southerners. 1882 The United States formally recognizes Korea. 1908 The Wright brothers register their flying machine for a U.S. patent. 1939 Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini sign a "Pact of Steel" forming the Axis powers. 1947 The Truman Doctrine brings aid to Turkey and Greece. 1967 The children's program Mister Rogers' Neighborhood premiers. 1972 Ceylon becomes the Republic of Sri Lanka as its constitution is ratified. 1985 Baseball player Pete Rose passes Hank Aaron as National League run scoring leader with 2,108. 1987 An Iraqi missile hits the American frigate USS Stark in the Persian Gulf. 1990 In the Middle East, North and South Yemen merge to become a single state. - See more at: www.historynet.com/today-in-history#sthash.JCdp6Scw.dpuf
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Post by JustJohn or JJ on May 28, 2013 3:59:16 GMT -7
J.J. For it is not only not good to be looking back,,,but to look back, we may not like what is following us.. Karl THIS MONTH IN HISTORY (MAY 1944) . Italian actress Sophia Loren starred in "Two Women". A mother and daughter are raped by Moroccans. MONTE CASSINO A Forgotten World War II Atrocity 4000 Italian Women Gang Raped By Morrocan Soldiers Under Allied French Command In May ’44, the Allies finally succeed in taking Monte Cassino (in Central Italy) from German control, after bombing the town’s 6th century abbey into ruins. The Allies have French-Moroccan troops fighting for them. The Moroccans are allowed to run wild. They slit the throats of prisoners, loot homes, and rape every Italian woman they can get their hands on. The Moroccans even rape local boys and a Catholic Priest! . Two Italian sisters, ages 16 & 18, are raped by more than 200 Moroccans. One dies from the abuse, and the other will spend the rest of her life in a mental hospital. An estimated 3000 women aged 11-86 are raped, some so violently that 100 of them die. About 800 village men who try to protect them are also killed. The Moroccans will not be punished by their Allied French Commanders. They will later rape and kill again when they occupy western Germany. Humanity can be very ugly !!!! .
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Post by JustJohn or JJ on Jun 6, 2013 5:32:57 GMT -7
Something is brewing. Keep June 5th in your mind as this will lead to a major event. Remember the role of the US Marine Corps is "First to Fight"!!!.
Large US Marine force lands in Aqaba to deploy on Jordanian-Syrian border
DEBKAfile Exclusive Report June 5, 2013, 8:06 AM (GMT+02:00)
Tags: US Marines Jordan Syrian war
US Marines landing in Aqaba
A large American military force disembarked Tuesday, June 4, at the southern Jordanian port of Aqaba - ready for deployment on the kingdom’s Syrian border, debkafile’s exclusive military sources report. The force made its way north along the Aqaba-Jerash-Ajilon mountain road bisecting Jordan from south to north, under heavy Jordanian military escort. Our sources disclose that this American force numbers 1,000 troops, the largest to land in Jordan since the Syrian civil war erupted in March 2012. They are members of the 24th Marine Expeditionary Force carried aboard the USS Kearsage amphibious assault ship, which has been anchored off neighboring Israeli Eilat since mid-May. Upon landing, the marines took to the road in a convoy of armored vehicles including Hummers.
Washington and Amman have imposed a blackout on their arrival. The Pentagon has only let it be known that the annual joint US-Jordanian “Eager Lion 2013” military exercise is due to begin later in June and last two months, with the participation of US F-16 fighter jets and Patriot missile defense systems. According to our US sources, the arrival of the US force in Jordan was not directly related to the regular exercise but decided on at an emergency meeting at the Pentagon on May 31, which was attended by top military and civilian Defense Department officials. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, who is away from Washington, took part by video conference.
The meeting decided that the military situation evolving in Syria and threats it posed to Jordan – including widening evidence of chemical weapons use in Syria - were urgent enough to warrant the dispatch of extra American military strength to Jordan, over and above the contingents participating in the joint exercise. The Israeli Air Force will provide air cover for the force until the F-16 jets are in place for the drill.
The US Central Command spokesman Lt. Col. T.G. Taylor in a statement to the US media said only: “In order to enhance the defensive posture and capacity of Jordan, some of these assets may remain beyond the exercise at the request of the government of Jordan.”
That request, according to our sources, was for the US to leave behind when the exercise ended and the troops departed - not just some of the weapons systems but all of the equipment which arrived with the marines Wednesday, as well as the F-16 fighters and Patriot missiles.
There is no official word about Washington’s response to this request. However, the Obama administration is not expected to turn it down.
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Post by JustJohn or JJ on Jun 7, 2013 6:53:05 GMT -7
Something is brewing. Keep June 5th in your mind as this will lead to a major event. Remember the role of the US Marine Corps is "First to Fight"!!!. Large US Marine force lands in Aqaba to deploy on Jordanian-Syrian borderDEBKAfile Exclusive Report June 5, 2013, 8:06 AM (GMT+02:00) Tags: US Marines Jordan Syrian war US Marines landing in AqabaA large American military force disembarked Tuesday, June 4, at the southern Jordanian port of Aqaba - ready for deployment on the kingdom’s Syrian border, debkafile’s exclusive military sources report. The force made its way north along the Aqaba-Jerash-Ajilon mountain road bisecting Jordan from south to north, under heavy Jordanian military escort. Our sources disclose that this American force numbers 1,000 troops, the largest to land in Jordan since the Syrian civil war erupted in March 2012. They are members of the 24th Marine Expeditionary Force carried aboard the USS Kearsage amphibious assault ship, which has been anchored off neighboring Israeli Eilat since mid-May. Upon landing, the marines took to the road in a convoy of armored vehicles including Hummers. Washington and Amman have imposed a blackout on their arrival. The Pentagon has only let it be known that the annual joint US-Jordanian “Eager Lion 2013” military exercise is due to begin later in June and last two months, with the participation of US F-16 fighter jets and Patriot missile defense systems. According to our US sources, the arrival of the US force in Jordan was not directly related to the regular exercise but decided on at an emergency meeting at the Pentagon on May 31, which was attended by top military and civilian Defense Department officials. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, who is away from Washington, took part by video conference. The meeting decided that the military situation evolving in Syria and threats it posed to Jordan – including widening evidence of chemical weapons use in Syria - were urgent enough to warrant the dispatch of extra American military strength to Jordan, over and above the contingents participating in the joint exercise. The Israeli Air Force will provide air cover for the force until the F-16 jets are in place for the drill. The US Central Command spokesman Lt. Col. T.G. Taylor in a statement to the US media said only: “In order to enhance the defensive posture and capacity of Jordan, some of these assets may remain beyond the exercise at the request of the government of Jordan.” That request, according to our sources, was for the US to leave behind when the exercise ended and the troops departed - not just some of the weapons systems but all of the equipment which arrived with the marines Wednesday, as well as the F-16 fighters and Patriot missiles. There is no official word about Washington’s response to this request. However, the Obama administration is not expected to turn it down. Must Read / Syria | By Shoshana McCrimmon US Marines Deployed To Syria, Perhaps — Intel Blackout Breaking news today: US marines deployed to Syria, perhaps, as they were seen heading north toward Syria from the assault ship just off Jordan’s shore. US Marines Deploy in Aqaba Jordan June 2013 A thousand soldiers from the 24th US Marine Expeditionary Force deploy north from Aqaba, Jordan. Debkafile, in an exclusive report Wednesday, revealed that 1,000 members of the 24th Marine Expeditionary Force disembarked from the USS Kearsage amphibious assault ship in the Jordanian port of Aqaba and were seen heading north towards the Syrian border, under heavy Jordanian escort: Washington and Amman have imposed a blackout on their arrival. The Pentagon has only let it be known that the annual joint US-Jordanian “Eager Lion 2013” military exercise is due to begin later in June and last two months, with the participation of US F-16 fighter jets and Patriot missile defense systems. According to our US sources, the arrival of the US force in Jordan was not directly related to the regular exercise but decided on at an emergency meeting at the Pentagon on May 31, which was attended by top military and civilian Defense Department officials. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, who is away from Washington, took part by video conference… The meeting decided that the military situation evolving in Syria and the threats it posed to Jordan were urgent enough to warrant the dispatch of extra American military strength to Jordan, over and above the contingents participating in the joint exercise. The US Central Command spokesman Lt. Col. T.G. Taylor in a statement to the US media put it this way: “In order to enhance the defensive posture and capacity of Jordan, some of these assets may remain beyond the exercise at the request of the government of Jordan.” That request, according to our sources, was for the US to leave behind when the exercise ended and the troops departed – not just some of the weapons systems but all of the equipment which arrived with the marines Wednesday, as well as the F-16 fighters and Patriot missiles.” The arrival of US troops has coincided with reports that Hezballah, an Iranian proxy in the region recently recognized as a terrorist group by the [Persian] Gulf Cooperation Council, transferred over 1200 of their own ‘fighters’ from Lebanon to Syria in mid-May to support the Syrian regime of Bashar al Assad, which is having trouble drumming up support among the populace: “The armed members who arrived from Lebanon to Syria committed “a hideous crime” in the town of Talkalkh, the [Saudi al-Watan] daily said, adding that tens of thousands of fighters entered from Iraq to aid the Syrian regime… The daily quoted sources as saying that the Damascus regime “is resorting to the aid of fighters from Iraq, Pakistan and Afghanistan, which implies that the Syrian recruits’ desire to fight alongside the regime is decreasing.” The source added that reservists are also not complying with the army command’s repeated calls to join the regime troops in their fighting. The regime has also been arresting men in their forties and forcing them to join recruitment camps so they join the fighting between regime troops and the rebels, the daily added.” The buildup of forces in the region is thought to be related to Iran nearing completion of its nuclear weaponization capabilities. Israel has promised to destroy such a capability, given public threats by the Iranian regime to destroy the Jewish state. The Iranians have positioned Hezballah along Israel’s northern border with an estimated 200,000 rockets and missiles pointed at Israeli civilian populations and may once again resume active hostilities if Israel strikes the Iranian nuclear program. The Islamic republic has close ties with the Syrian regime and has been sanctioned by the US State Department for funneling weapons and money to Hezballah through Syrian territory. The current positioning of international players in the Mideast is reminiscent of the Cold War, when the Soviet Union and United States squared off in the region using Arab countries and Israel, respectively, as proxies. Russia, which exports mainly weapons systems these days, is set to deliver an S-300 air defense system to Syria, but Israel has threatened to destroy the system if delivery is attempted out of concern the system would provide the Assad regime a military advantage preventing the effective defense of Israel. Such concern is not unfounded, as during the Cold War the Russian SA-6 system employed by Syria destroyed nearly 100 Israeli fighter jets in the 1973 Yom Kippur War. Complicating matters are reports that the Syrian regime and/or rebel forces may be deploying chemical weapons, further escalating the 2-year conflict and prompting Israel to conduct homeland defense drills. The weapons were allegedly developed with Russian assistance, an allegation Moscow has vehemently denied. However, there are breaking reports from Britain and France, confirming the presence of sarin gas in samples taken from Syria. Russian President Vladimir Putin has also allied with Iran, and in fact has provided much of the nuclear technology being implemented in the Islamic republic. There is real concern that either success or destruction of the air defense system in Syria, or the nuclear infrastructure in Iran, could spark a regional conflict with the potential to grow into global conflict, a catch-22 that will be difficult for the Obama Administration to navigate.
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