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Showing results for tags 'Military History'.
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ah, 1902! I remember it well. Wasn't that the year that the Cuban republic was formed, after the US beat poor little Spain to a bloody, whimpering pulp? The year the Charron, Girardot et Voigt , the first fully armoured "tank", was introduced at the Salon de l'Automobile et du cycle in Brussels? Even looks fun to drive! (q.v.). The year that miserable old wretch Cecil Rhodes, the worst figure in the whole of European colonization of Africa, finally did the long-suffering universe a good turn by shoving off into eternal damnation? -
The name G.I. Joe just popped into my mind. (Train of thought: 1. Monkfruit in the Raw 2. Dextrose 3. Glycemic Index 4. G.I. 5. "Hey, I don't know what G.I. stands for!") Well, I didn't! I thought about it for a moment, and the best I could come up with was "General Infantry," but that's wrong - G.I. (and by extension, the 1964 Hasbro action figure / doll) stands for either "Government Issue" or "General Issue." "Doughboy," I knew; "G.I." I didn't - weird, considering my dad was one. -
A series of posts here in dr.com ( TV piece on Con Thien and a discussion about My Lai with researched comments by Brian R (that I appreciated) about the Vietnam conflict and a recent series of articles in the NYTimes has reawakened me to the Vietnam period: The most recent article in the NYTimes: The Grunts War by Kyle Longley a Professor of History and Political Science at Arizona State University Longley has studied and published extensively on the Vietnam period. I turned draft eligible during the conflict, received a student deferment and by the time the US involvement in the war ended my college years ended. I didn't serve. I was around and affected by the tremendous level of political acrimony attached to that period. In many ways the political environment of that time mirrored the politicization of this period. On top of the politicization around the Vietnam War there were also tremendously violent Urban Race Riots in the 1960's and later. The period was rife with political strife and politicization as it is today. I find similarities between then and now. While currently we are involved in military engagements overseas they are clearly less involving than earlier in the past 15+ years. Our military involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan are far less involved than during the 2000's. Far fewer American soldiers involved and far fewer American soldiers dying in conflict. Going back to the Grunts War, Longley references that almost 300,000 American's entered military service in 1967. He references that they were all drafted. But records from the selective service state that about 220-230,000 were drafted. (I haven't found data to work through that discrepancy.) Additionally Longley refers to the fact at that time that soldiers entered military service with a 1 year or 13 month commitment (Marines). Once their term was up they left service. Clearly some re upped but most didn't. One year of service. One astounding difference between then and now or in the 2000's when the US was fighting in both Iraq and Afghanistan was that during Vietnam a drafted soldier or enlistee has a definitive discreet period of service. During Iraq and Afghanistan and to this day, soldiers and members of the reserves are called up for multiple periods of duty. This could and does go on for years. Prior to Vietnam there were drafts associated with Korea, WWII and WWI and enormous numbers of young men fought overseas. Huge numbers. We live in different times.
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- U.S. History
- Military History
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I'm sorry I didn't get this up yesterday, but people may had noticed that our flags were at half-staff. President Obama ordered this to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor, Dec 7, 1941 ("a day which will live in infamy") - the attack killed 2,403 Americans, and directly led to America entering World War II Within one hour of Roosevelt's "Day of Infamy" speech on Dec 8, 1941, America issued a formal declaration of war against Japan (as I write this, today is the 75th anniversary of America's entry into World War II - something which was entirely justified, and has not been repeated since (and I say this with *full respect* for the victims of 9/11 - both events killed about 3,000 people). The reason I said it "has not been repeated" is because Pearl Harbor was an act of war; 9/11 was an act of terrorism (there is a fine line between the two, but 9/11 changed how we must think going forward; WWII was much "cleaner" in terms of defining the job which needed to be done). This post is written in honor of our military personnel, with an emphasis on those with relatives who died at Pearl Harbor, and a strong emphasis on all those who died that day. God bless all of you. and thank you for saving my life by giving up yours. (I apologize for my awkward writing in the previous sentence, but I'm a bit addled right now, as I've been up since 3:30 AM, and am getting very sleepy.)
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I remember Shannon Faulkner very well - it was only 21 years ago when she had half the country wanting her to die. I also remember having very strong feelings that The Citadel (and the military) should remain all-male, and I was very anti-Shannon Faulkner while at the same time feeling very sorry for her, and the abuse that she took. Now that I'm older, and now that The Citadel has hundreds of male and female graduates, I look back and realize my "anti-Shannonism" was based very much on prejudice and preconceived notions - I justified it by saying something that I still think: Institutions (in this case, The Citadel) should have the right to be all-male and all-female. Yeah, I guess I still think that's true - I don't think boys should be allowed in the girl scouts, and I could probably name numerous other examples, although, granted, The Citadel was a government-supported institution. I also felt, fairly strongly, that the military shouldn't be used as a proving ground for civil rights (I'm not saying I was right or wrong; I'm just saying how I felt at the time). But Shannon Faulkner was different - she was made a scapegoat because quite frankly, she was never *physically* cut out to get through The Citadel's rigorous hazing and boot camp-like treatment of freshmen. When Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier in Major League Baseball in 1947, it was all *extremely* carefully planned out - Robinson was hand-picked by Branch Rickey because Rickey knew what type of abuse was coming to be coming Robinson's way, and knew that Robinson could take it, both mentally and physically. Rickey also knew that whoever was first needed to be as-good-or-better than just about every other player; there could be no .213 batting average for Jackie Robinson. Faulkner, on the other hand, was a lone wolf, having almost no support, and she was the wrong person to be "the first." But I think people need to take another look at her, and cut her some slack. This needed to have been an organized, coordinated effort, and the person selected needed to have been a physical bad-ass; Faulkner wasn't that person. But in terms of civil rights? I think she needs to be looked back upon as something of a hero, quite frankly, and I think it should be done now rather than later. And I think a lot of people owe her an apology - not for wanting to exclude her, but for the abuse they gave her - and even though I didn't dole out any abuse, I'll start by being the first.
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Although the man who killed bin Laden is now known, if you haven't seen any actual interviews with him, this animated compilation of interviews is an absolutely fascinating 18-minute film. This film is being presented without judgment, and is done so for the purposes of historical education only.
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