Filed under: History |

On this date in 1946, the United States detonated Shot Able, the first of what was to be three tests in Operation Crossroads. It was also the first publicly-announced nuclear test, which was located at Bikini Atoll. It yielded 21 kilotons, was dropped from a B-29 bomber, and detonated at an altitude of 520 feet.
Ultimately, only two tests were conducted. Shot Charlie was called off due to higher radioactive contamination than previously predicted.

Filed under: History |

Now here’s one historial attraction I didn’t get a chance to go to when I was a kid living in Italy:

This would have been such a cool sight to see, but oh well. Anyway, the Italian Government has managed to save this tower from collapsing some time between 2030 and 2040, and actually returned it to its 1838 position, giving it at least another 170 years of life (so to speak).
I found it interesting that Mussolini actually wanted to return the tower to its original vertical position from 1173. Good thing that didn’t occur; it would have lost its beauty and charm...something so lacking these days.

Filed under: History |

Filed under: History |

This is what the brave men of the Allied Forces who stormed the beaches of Normandy saw on June 6, 1944:

And for those who constantly whine, b***h, moan, and lament that we’ve lost so many soldiers in Iraq, eat this:

When it was over, the Allied Forces had suffered nearly 10,000 casualties; more than 4,000 were dead. Yet somehow, due to planning and preparation, and due to the valor, fidelity, and sacrifice of the Allied Forces, Fortress Europe had been breached.

This was just on one day. Now STFD and STFU.

Filed under: History |

Guess who issued Adolf Eichmann‘s passport? Before I answer that, allow me to remind you that he was one of the most virulent Nazis who escaped capture by the Allies, fled to Argentina, and lived for a decade in virtual immunity until the Israelis got wind of his whereabouts, kidnapped him and brought him back to Israel for trial. He was convicted and executed in 1962.
Lo and Behold! It was the International Committee of the Red Cross, known for their past attitudes of anti-Semitism. It wasn’t until last year they admitted Magen David Adom to the organization, along with the parallel acceptance of the Palestine Red Crescent Society, who transport terrorists and their weapons via ambulance. This doesn’t surprise me at all.

Filed under: History |

Today is the day we honor all those who have fallen defending this flag, the republic for which it stands, and our way of life, no matter whether that was during the American Revolution, the Civil War (the original honorees of this holiday), the World Wars of the 20th Century, or the War on Terror...and all the wars in-between...we honor them all.
In case you’re wondering where the flag comes from, it is available from the web site of US Representative Doc Hastings (R-WA, 4th District). I’ve taken the opportunity to create a special banner which I will “fly” during national holidays such as this.

And here’s a special video from LGF Reader Rides A Pale Horse:

Filed under: History |

On this date in 1948, the State of Israel was declared. Click on the thumbnail and see how the New York Times reported the event. You’ll notice the news was a bit more fit to print back then.
From its first breath, Israel has had to fight for its mere existence. And so far, in every major war since then, the Israelis have kicked the Arabs’ a**es each and every time. NO, the undeclared actain against Hezbollah in Lebanon last summer doesn’t count in that category. Anyway, it’s going to be around, because I believe God protects this country with His mighty hand. Even though 2,000 years ago, He sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to save all of us from our sins, the Jewish people are still God’s chosen, and for that reason, He protects them.
So no matter what the other nations of the Earth do, Israel is still here. As I stand for my country, the United States of America, I also stand with Israel. Shalom,

Filed under: History |

I almost fell out of my chair when I read this article which nominally described certain Republicans throwing their support to Senator Barack Hussein Obama (D-IL), who’s giving Shrillary a run for her money in more ways than one. But the following quote from the article pretty much wiped the rest of it all out:

But in an article in the Washington Post, Kagan wrote approvingly that a keynote speech by Obama at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs was “pure John Kennedy”, a neocon hero of the cold war. [Emphasis added by Editor]

I knew the Times of London is a socialist rag, just like lots of European newspapers, but it’s so obvious with this passage, they’re painting JFK...a Democrat, no less...with the same strokes as George W. Bush! I laugh at this: while JFK made his share of mistakes during his Presidency, he was a TRUMAN Democrat who stood up to the Soviets when it came to Crunch Time.
We’ll take him...and y’all can keep Osama Obama!

Filed under: Border Security | History |

So sayeth mayday2007.org, who’s planning schloads of pro-Illegal marches around the country, touting “No Human is Illegal.” Same old claptrap bulls**t from the Communists...and the Socialists...and the Anarchists...and probably a few Muslim groups thrown in.
You folks go do that; meanwhile I’ll continue to actually work and make my life better.

Filed under: History | Religion |

Now here is a significant landmark for our country: the founding of Jamestown, Virginia, the first true colonial settlement from England:

The settlers’ mission was not an easy one, as they faced opposition from the beginning of their expedition. Unexpected storms, delayed their departure from the English Channel. Shortly, after arriving in Virginia, they suffered an immediate attack from the natives. Consequently, Robert Hunt, a humble clergyman from England, instructed that three days of prayer and fasting be observed in repentance for sins and in preparation for the dedication of the land!
On April 29th, crew members took timbers from their ship to construct a makeshift cross. Dragging it ashore, they planted the cross firmly in the sand. Kneeling in humility, Pastor Robert Hunt prayed to dedicate the new world to God. His prayer that the Gospel would be preached from these shores to the uttermost parts of the earth established a monumental covenant with God that laid the foundation for the birth of a nation founded on Christ!

Read it all here. So Say We All.

Filed under: History |

Seeing as I’ve viewed this documentary film many times for almost ten years (first on VHS and, as of yesterday, DVD, and also in light of my recent visit to the Trinity Site, it’s high time to let you know what I think of Trinity and Beyond: The Atomic Bomb Movie, which is directed by Peter Kuran and narrated by William Shatner, and originally released in 1995, the 50th Anniversary year of the Trinity test. It follows the path from the beginnings of the Manhattan Project, all the way to Trinity...and Beyond...with archival footage of numerous nuclear weapons tests by the United States, Soviet Union, and even China.
This is not, I repeat, NOT a movie you want to watch by yourself; try as hard as you can to watch it with someone you care about. The stuff they portray on OMGWAGD movies such as The Day After and Threads doesn’t hold a candle to this movie.
THIS. IS. THE. REAL. THING! The images of the explosions (especially the H-bombs) are simultaneously beautiful and horrifying. If you don’t have the stomach to see frakked-up animals, houses getting blown away, and vegetation set ablaze with blast waves, then DO NOT WATCH THIS FILM! Got that? Good.

This film, at least in my book, also scores highly for not passing judgment, one way or the other, on the morality of these tests. It merely presents what we and the Soviets did during the Cold War. The director leaves that judgement up to you, where it should be, and sadly, that is a lost art today. It is a film meant to provoke deep reflection upon ourselves as individuals, and we as a race: the Human Race: capable of fantastic achievments and also terrible acts of destruction.
The Alamogordo Chamber of Commerce ran this film for a free viewing at the Clyde W. Tombaugh IMAX Theater on the same evening as the Site tour. The small domed screen (which normally functions as a planetarium) didn’t show a true IMAX experience, but you can’t have everything. The vast majority of the audience was silent, except for a small group of women who made a lot of “tsk tsks”...and they were of a different cultural upbringing, if you know what I mean. I almost wanted to say STFU, but thought better of it. I will leave this up to you as to who those women were.
Trinity and Beyond: The Atomic Bomb Movie is Not Rated by the MPAA. Stunningly powerful, it’s the stuff which gives one nightmares. I would have liked to have seen footage from the UK and French tests, but you can’t have everything. My rating: 8

Filed under: History | РУССКИЕ ДЕЛА |

This man, holding the papers and standing on the tank to defy the attempted coup against Gorbachev back in August 1991, is one thing I will remember Boris Yeltsin for. He stood for Russia’s freedom from the scourge of Communism!
But like all other human beings, he had flaws. Two years later, he opened fire on the Russian parliament building (which just happens to be named the White House) when the Duma stood against his reforms. He took a lot of flak for that.
These are but two things I will remember Бори́с Никола́евич Е́льцин for. Now, he is gone. I think he would have been a fun guy to meet and drink some tater juice with.
So it is, in his memory, I dedicate this mp3 file, from the Tom Clancy game Politika, which happened to predate this event by about a decade. Still an appropriate theme for Gospodin Yeltsin. Farewell.

Filed under: History |

If you haven’t figured it out, I’ll give you a few hints here. First, he was born in 1889. Second, he tried his hand at art in his younger days.
Now the hints get more interesting. Shortly after it first aired in 1995, the vast majority of a certain cable network‘s programming was devoted to this person, and from time to time, I still refer to it by this nickname. In one alternate universe, he survived into the 1950s and wrote a Hugo Award-winning science fiction novel. In yet another, he survived World War II and the invasion by The Race.
And in our present-day, even the mere mention of his name causes the Russians to lock down their foreign students.
Still don’t know? Simply click on the thumbnail to find out who it is...one of the most EVIL sons of bitches ever to walk the face of this planet.

Filed under: History | Personal |

I just returned to Phoenix an hour ago after driving back from Alamogordo, New Mexico, not too far from the Trinity Site. Here I am, actually standing at the REAL Ground Zero. Most of the time I was there, I was at a loss for words.

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Report Continues....
I got to Alamogordo, New Mexico at about 3:30 PM MDT on Friday. It’s a small military town (DUHHHHHH!), home to Holloman AFB and White Sands Missile Range, and also very close to White Sands National Monument. The vast majority of businesses are located along White Sands Boulevard (US 70 North). It also has an offshoot campus of New Mexico State University in the foothills of the Sacramento Mountains, as well as the New Mexico Museum of Space History and Clyde W. Tombaugh IMAX Theater.
There is a small mall across the main drag from the motel where I stayed. And it sure sucked to be Cingular, because my cell phone had no service from WSMR northward! Sprint was there and so was Verizon, but not Cingular. Oh well.
The tour assembled at 0630 hours at the parking lot of Tularosa High School, about 12 miles north of Alamogordo. I got the last reserved seat on the Tour bus which was first in line of the caravan. Breakfast was served by the Alamogordo Lions. As we pulled away at 0800 with WSMR Police escort, I turned back and saw well over a hundred vehicles, ready to pull away.
The trip to the Site took an hour and a half, and no pictures were allowed because we were on the Missile Range. The first place we pulled into (actually, after the driver missed the turnoff, then had to double back from the parking lot) was the McDonald Ranch House, two miles southeast of Ground Zero, where the plutonium core was assembled. While the windows shattered and the roof was torn off, the main structure of the house survived the test, and was restored to its prior condition in 1984.
Jumbo, or what’s left of it, sat in the parking lot, just outside the main gate. This was to have been used if The Gadget fizzled, preventing the wide dispersal of plutonium over the area. As the calculations became more accurate, the decision was made not to use it, and it was placed 800 yards away, held by a steel tower which was vaporized by the test. Jumbo itself survived.
It was a quarter-mile walk in near-freezing temperatures (I later found out from one of the police officers there that the day I got there, it was 80 degrees!) and blustery skies. The obelisk was there, a twelve-foot-high silent reminder of what humankind is capable of given the impetus. Adjacent to the obelisk was the one remaining tower remnant which survived the blast.
Along the perimeter were photos of what the scientists and military personnel stationed there did to pass the time (these will be shown later in the gallery). There was a group of Japanese visitors from Tokyo who were taking photographs of these, as I was; one of them even had a 35mm panoramic camera...so that had to have been old!
They also had the Fat Man bomb casing there, a replica of the device used on Nagasaki. One guy (NOT me!) actually got up on top of the thing and whooped it up. In a macabre fashion I couldn’t resist so I yelled out “Look! It’s Major Kong!”
Finally, in the northwest corner near the perimeter, there was a covering of the original crater, with trinitite, where I had hoped to peek into. Unfortunately, sand has covered the trinitite, making it no longer visible. But it’s still there.
I went back to the obelisk one more time and prayed a simple prayer; that which Jesus Christ first taught to His disciples. And then I went back to the bus. All told, I spent a little over two hours at the site, the rest of the time warming up back in the bus. At 1230 hours we started back along the route we entered the site; on the return trip, they showed a DVD of the 1954 sci-fi classic ”Them!”...which supposedly took place in Alamogordo. Those of us sitting near the front gave it the MST3K treatment for its sexism and corny dialogue. We reached the parking lot at 1400, just as the US Army went into the LA drains, so we were “spared” of the result.
And that was it.
The Trinity Site stands as a silent reminder of what Humanity is capable of. No matter how one feels about the subject, this event must always be remembered. It is open to the public two days a year: the first Saturday in April, and the first Saturday in October (next date: October 6). There is no charge for the tour, but if you want to ride in style like I did, call the Alamogordo Chamber of Commerce at (505) 437-6120 or (800) 826-0294. The $35 price is well worth it.

NOTE: More pictures from this visit will be posted in the Gallery section later in the week. Watch for them!

Filed under: History |

Two years ago I stated ”One Day, I Will Go.” Today I am fulfilling that pledge:

By the time you read this, I will be driving to Alamogordo, New Mexico, and stay for two days while I visit the Trinity Site during its semiannual open house on the first Saturday in April (the other being the first Saturday in October). I have my room reserved. I also snared the last seat on the Tour Motorcoach, which is first in line of a long caravan of approximately 200 vehicles, so I don’t have to bust my truck any more than I have to. The tour will be at the site for approximately three hours, during which I will see not only the obelisk which marks the REAL Ground Zero, but also Jumbo, the McDonald Ranch House, and a corner of the original crater still preserved and loaded with trinitite.
And of course I’m taking the Official Camera with me, so stay tuned for some good pix and an extensive report when I return.