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Post by timothylane on Sept 2, 2019 13:29:56 GMT -8
William Shirer discussed the secret protocol in The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, as well as its modification at the end of September. The original agreement gave Lithuania to Germany and placed the dividing line in Poland along the Narew, Bug, Vistula, and San Rivers. The modified version added some Polish areas already conquered by Germany to their side of the line (basically, up to Brest-Litovsk), but turned over Lithuania to Russia. (Actually, Lithuania had few Germans outside of Memel, which Hitler already seized earlier in 1939. Latvia had a lot more. Most of the Baltic Volksdeutsche were sent back to Germany, though they probably temporarily returned after June 1941.)
A Latvian-born friend at the IUSFC said that she saved her mother's life by being born the same day the NKVD came for them. They got her father, but the mother and daughter survived and eventually got to America.
Germany got a lot of needed supplies of food and raw materials from the Soviets while the trade deal was in operation. Shirer later estimated what they looted during their conquest, and concluded that it was less than they got under the trade deal. In return, they allowed the Soviets to get the incomplete heavy cruiser Luetzow and plans for the Bismarck, as well as other supplies. In early 1941, Soviet officers were allowed to look at German tanks and tank designs and complained that the Army wasn't showing them their best tanks. The Germans wondered if this said something about what the Soviets had. When they encountered the KV-1 and T-34, they got their answer.
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Post by timothylane on Sept 2, 2019 19:56:19 GMT -8
Something I thought of mentioning in my previous posting on this thread is something I recall from Shirer. It seems the Poles didn't want Soviet aid, and when the British and French asked why, the Poles said something to the effect that with the Germans they would lose their body but with Soviet Russia they would lose their soul. Shirer admitted that postwar events made their attitude very understandable.
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Post by timothylane on Sept 27, 2019 7:19:41 GMT -8
On this day in 154o, Ignatius Loyola received Catholic Church permission to found the Society of Jesus. This led to the phenomenon of "Jesuitical reasoning" (i.e., sophistry), which led to Catholic clerics who ignore key Church teachings. Including the Peron Pope (or, more accurately, anti-pope).
On this day in 1825, George Stephenson inaugurated the railroad age on an obscure line in England.
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Post by timothylane on Dec 7, 2019 9:08:33 GMT -8
I assume I don't have to tell anyone here that today is the 78th anniversary of the Japanese surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, "a date that will live in infamy". My interest here is the conspiracy theories that will no doubt turn up somewhere. FDR wanted to get the US into the war without admitting he was doing this, but his first effort (US involvement with ASW efforts in the North Atlantic) had gotten the Reuben James sunk and most of its crew killed without leading to a declaration of war.
Because of this, a lot of people think FDR knew the Japanese would hit Pearl Harbor and let it happen so that he would finally have an excellent reason to declare war on them (and then hope that Nazi Germany would then join it, as Hitler soon very foolishly did). This is certainly reasonable given the errors and intelligence failures involved. Was it stupidity and incompetence, or something more sinister?
Samuel Eliot Morison addressed the issue briefly in The Two-Ocean War, and argued against it on the grounds that FDR was too big a fan of battleships to let them be knocked out. (By December 1941, it was clear that air attacks could do this.) It's a good point, but the devastation wasn't quite as bad as people often think it was. Four battleships were sunk in the attack, but two (California and West Virginia) were raised, repaired, and returned to action. So was the Nevada, which got under way and then was beached rather than risk being sunk in the narrow entrance to the harbor. Even the Oklahoma was raised and sent back, though it was so damaged that they scrapped it instead. But the other 3 battleships present (Maryland, Tennessee, and the drydocked Pennsylvania) were only damaged and were soon available for duty. (Such as it was. They were too slow to keep up with carrier task forces in battle.)
A more interesting point comes from something Morison may have known about but didn't mention (at least there; the full official history may have done so). Kemp Tolley's Cruise of the Lanikai reports an odd and little-known incident. On December 2, FDR had personally ordered the Lanikai (and apparently a few other boats as well) equipped and sent out to scout the Japanese who were expected to attack the British and Dutch shortly. Obviously, he wanted the ship(s) sunk by the Japanese, which would result in retaliation by the nearby US forces in the Philippines, which would finally embroil the US and Japan in war.
FDR fans don't like this and think of it as just a conspiracy theory, even though it's a simple fact that he did in fact issue those orders. Why else would he have done so? But the important thing is that this indicates that (at least as of December 2) he wasn't sure the Japanese would attack the US at all (even in Guam, Wake, and the Philippines), much less hit Pearl Harbor. FDR was willing to throw away a number of small crews to bring the US into the war, but he didn't know what was about to happen.
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Post by kungfuzu on Dec 30, 2019 23:12:55 GMT -8
The link is to an article which I find very compelling. As a child and young man, I always liked talking to older people as I figured that if they had lasted so long, they must have learnt something I didn't know. Old VeteranAlmost all the "old" people in my life have died, and I and others of my generation have replaced them. It may just be me, but I don't know that young people today have much interest in talking to people of an older generation.
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Post by timothylane on Dec 31, 2019 6:59:23 GMT -8
I wouldn't know much about young people today. Hardly anyone I know had any children. I also rarely see any visiting people in the nursing home, but I'm at the end of a corridor so I don't know how much that means.
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Post by artraveler on Dec 31, 2019 7:31:09 GMT -8
Almost all the "old" people in my life have died, and I and others of my generation have replaced them. It may just be me, but I don't know that young people today have much interest in talking to people of an older generation. My daughter called me this morning, 02:00. My first wife died yesterday. Since we have been divorced for almost 50 years it was not a great loss for me. However she was the last contact, of a close personal nature, to the 60s and early 70s. She came to Arkansas about 4 years ago to visit our daughter. We had lunch without a food fight. So, slowly but surely, I am the only one left to remember the good and the bad.
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Post by kungfuzu on Dec 31, 2019 10:42:35 GMT -8
What a jumble of past, present and future we all are.
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Post by artraveler on Dec 31, 2019 18:19:01 GMT -8
As long as we live, those who have died are not truly dead. They still live in our memories. We have talked about this before, truly I suggest write it down for your children and their children. They may not value it now but when we are gone it will be our only voice into the future.
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Post by kungfuzu on Dec 31, 2019 18:24:41 GMT -8
I have written some of my stories down and Brad was good enough to publish them on ST. I could probably write as much as I have already done without getting too boring for a reader.
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Post by kungfuzu on Apr 12, 2020 5:46:27 GMT -8
Today is a sad one for motor-sport fans. Stirling Moss DeadMoss was one of the greatest drivers in history. He was something of a madman. One of my favorite stories about him has to do with him many trophies. He had so many that one day he had them melted down (the were sterling silver) and made into a table top for his mother.
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Post by artraveler on Apr 12, 2020 9:41:30 GMT -8
I recall seeing the Monte Carlo formula one races on TV, damn those were exciting. He will. surely be missed by anyone who knows how to drive. A smaller number every day.
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Post by kungfuzu on Apr 21, 2020 11:32:14 GMT -8
Today, April 21st, is a day which should be celebrated across the USA. It is San Jacinto Day, the day that the Texian forces under General Sam Houston crushed the forces of the tyrant, Santa Anna and paid back the debt owed the defenders of the Alamo and Goliad. San Jacinto Monument
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Post by timothylane on Apr 21, 2020 11:58:52 GMT -8
Elizabeth and I went to the top when we visited it. Good thing they have an elevator. We also watched the televised history narrated by Charlton Heston.
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Brad Nelson
Administrator
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Post by Brad Nelson on Apr 21, 2020 12:45:40 GMT -8
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Post by kungfuzu on Apr 21, 2020 14:43:13 GMT -8
Nice photo of Stirling Moss driving a beautiful old race car.
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Post by kungfuzu on May 8, 2020 14:33:58 GMT -8
I thought Timothy might mention this, but it is getting late in the day, so I thought it appropriate to remind people that today is the 75th anniversary of V.E. Day. For those who have been living under a rock, or Gen Xers (sorry the same thing) that stands for Victory in Europe. After almost five years of war, the Brits could finally lay down their arms and declare victory against Nazi Germany. Of course, they had a little help from the U.S.A. and U.S.S.R., but the Brits stood alone for over a year thus saved the world from Nazism.
That's the May 1945 version in the U.K.
In a little more than three months, we will be celebrating V.J. Day. Victory against Japan for you mis-educated yutes of today.
That's the American August 1945 version.
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Post by timothylane on May 8, 2020 15:18:12 GMT -8
The actual surrender (by General Jodl to Eisenhower) came on May 7, but the Soviets insisted on holding a separate surrender in Berlin the following day. For some reason (I suspect appeasement) that was counted as the official day of surrender.
In fact, the surrender was initially to be kept secret, but a skeptical reporter (who wondered why they had to wait until the Soviets could hold their ceremony) reported it early. (Shirer discussed this in End of a Berlin Diary, and I later read the reporter's defense in an old Reader's Digest I got from my grandmother.)
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Post by timothylane on May 20, 2020 8:46:16 GMT -8
On May 20, 1940, one of Heinz Guderian's divisions, advancing something like 50 miles that day, captured the French city of Abbeville, a seaport on the Somme estuary. This effectively cut the Allied forces to the north (their main army group) from France, ultimately setting up Operation Dynamo (the evacuation of 335,000 British and French troops from the Dunkirk-Nieuport perimeter.
Also, as our daily newsletter pointed, today is Eliza Doolittle Day. During her fantasy of becoming a famous lady in the song "Just You Wait", Eliza has the king saying, "Eliza, old thing, I want all of England your praises to sing. Next week on the twentieth of May, I proclaim Eliza Doolittle Day." (In the movie they actually have the king -- or her vision of the king, anyway -- making the announcement and the actual firing squad executing Henry Higgins at her behest.)
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Post by kungfuzu on Jun 19, 2020 15:04:39 GMT -8
Today is Juneteenth a day which I had never heard of until I returned to Texas after living abroad for almost 25 years.
Lately, one is hearing demands for the USA to make June 19th a national holiday, but I do not see why this should be the case. The story which I have heard over the last 15 or so years is that June 19th was special to blacks in Texas as it was the first they had heard that they had been officially freed after the CSA was defeated. Of course, the end of the War Between the States was in April, but it took until June for word to get to Texas. A yankee general officially declared slaves free on June 19, 1865 in Galveston. Therefore, Juneteenth only has meaning in Texas, not elsewhere.
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