Of 87,000 U.S. military personnel stationed on Oahu Island on Dec. 7, 1941, it’s believed 16 are still alive. “Chuck” Kohler, a 17-year-old enlistee from Minnesota, says he disobeyed orders to shelter in a ditch and ran to join the fight. “I had learned early in life that you nev[...]
Posts Tagged ‘war’
October 21st, 2024 - 11:34 pm § in China
U.S. revives Tinian airfields for conflict with China
During the closing stages of World War 2, American B-29s based on Tinian bombed Japan, culminating in the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. (Read that history here.) Now the U.S. is reclaiming the abandoned runways from jungle overgrowth, to use as a backup in case U.S. planes must be dispe[...]
July 15th, 2024 - 5:17 pm § in Israel/Palestine
A swing and a miss
“Hamas said Sunday [its] military commander was in good health, a day after the Israeli military targeted Mohammed Deif with a massive airstrike that local health officials said killed at least 90 people, including children,” Huffington Post reported on Monday, July 15, 2024 (photo b[...]
June 12th, 2024 - 6:35 pm § in News Media, Republicans
Inflated valor
Rep. Troy Nehls (R-TX; bio here) was an Army reservist who served as a civil affairs officer in Afghanistan with the 101st Airborne Division. The Pentagon just revoked his Combat Infantryman Badge (CIB), which he’d been wearing on his civilian suit jacket, because he wasn’t an infantryma[...]
Tomorrow marks D-Day, and we’ve learned nothing
June 6, 2024, marks the 80th anniversary of the D-Day landings. We’re now four generations removed from that fateful day, and only a handful of its veterans are still alive to remind us of the lessons America should learn from that war. Before World War 2, America was isolationist, and caught [...]
June 3rd, 2024 - 11:54 pm § in Misc.
Why this WW2 medic didn’t get a Medal of Honor
Denied admission to artillery officer candidate school because of his race, Waverly Woodson (photo, left), who died at age 83 in 2005, was trained to be a combat medic, given the rank of corporal, and landed with Omaha Beach’s third wave on D-Day. Woodson was wounded before getting ashore; a G[...]
June 2nd, 2024 - 2:16 pm § in Misc.
The reality of D-Day parachute drops
Before dawn on June 6, 1944, the 82nd and 101st Airborne Divisions were dropped behind invasion beaches. First on the ground were 300 “Pathfinders” whose job was to mark the drop zones, followed by 13,100 paratroopers jumping from C-47 aircraft, and a small number of glider troops bringi[...]
Nikki Haley has no soul
Nikki Haley spent Memorial Day in Israel, writing graffiti on artillery shells, not honoring America’s fallen. She wrote, “Finish them! America ♥ Israel! Always, Nikki Haley.” These shells aren’t destined for Normandy beaches or Iwo Jima pillboxes. In Gaza, Hamas mingles w[...]
March 15th, 2023 - 5:11 pm § in America, Biden, Donald Trump, Europe, Foreign Affairs, Politics, Republicans, Russia, Schools & Colleges
Foreign policy …
… is the most important task a president does. It’s literally about war and peace. But this poses a conundrum, because presidential campaigns are waged and won or lost on domestic issues; politics is very much a “what will you do for me” affair. (The softer and more polite wa[...]
It sucks to be a Russian soldier
“Advance at any cost.” Those are the marching orders being given to Russian soldiers fighting in eastern Ukraine; and by some accounts, the cost is very high. Ukraine claims it’s killing over a thousand Russians a day. While that can’t be verified, outside expert observers sa[...]