#artillery plotter

[if-you-fan-a-fire]

"Canadian Army Women to Train As Anti-Aircraft Gun Operators," Toronto Star. April 30, 1943. Page 27. ---- BRITISH WOMEN TERRITORIALS OPERATE "A.A." GUNS ---- Ottawa, April 30 - (CP) - Members of the Canadian Women's Army Corps will be trained as "plotter telephonists" and will eventually take their place with men manning anti-aircraft artillery, defence headquarters has announced.

Women in Britiain's auxiliary territorial service - the British women's army - have been used on similar duty for some months. Some have helped operate London's guns during air raids.

Women selected must have grade 10 in education, have ability at map-reading and mathematics and possess a "keen interest" in artillery, the statement said.

[whencyclopedia]

Dowding System

Britain's integrated air defence system in the Second World War (1939-45), known as the Dowding System after the air chief marshal of that name, included code-breakers, radar stations, observers, searchlights, barrage balloons, anti-aircraft guns, and fighter planes. Working together through a combined operations centre, these various elements ensured that the German Air Force could be better tracked and intercepted, and so, the Dowding System helped win the Battle of Britain.

Air Chief Marshal Hugh Dowding (1882-1970), commander-in-chief of RAF Fighter Command, had been determined to improve Britain's air defences in the interwar years, starting with the idea for a design competition for new fighter planes, the winners being the Hawker Hurricane and Supermarine Spitfire. In 1936, Dowding was appointed head of the RAF's Fighter Command. The position meant that Dowding controlled the operation of fighter planes, Anti-Aircraft Command (which operated flak guns and searchlights), Balloon Command (which handled anti-aircraft barrage balloons), a thousand units of early warning volunteer observers, and over 50 radar stations, a new technology Dowding had supported the development of. All of these elements would combine into what became popularly known as the Dowding System of air defence, which permitted the early detection and reception of enemy aircraft flying over Britain.

Integrated Defence

Britain's integrated air defence system (IADS) was created on 1 May 1936 after German aggression in Europe first became evident with the reoccupation of the Rhineland in March that year. The idea of pooling resources for air defence went back to the First World War (1914-18) when Germany had bombed Britain using such aircraft as Zeppelin airships. The Air Defence of Great Britain (ADGB) had lapsed in the 1920s but was now revived and expanded. The Dowding System eventually consisted of seven parts:

the fighter plane squadrons of RAF Fighter Command

the anti-aircraft artillery of Anti-Aircraft Command

the searchlights of the Royal Engineers

the lookouts of the Royal Observer Corps

static barrage balloons to deter air attacks on important sites

static and mobile radar stations

Ultra military intelligence

The first IADS covered southern England, the north and west of England, and Scotland. Volunteers of the Observer Corps scanned the skies for enemy planes and reported sightings by telephone to a local reporting centre, which in turn contacted the Operations Centre Head Quarters. Spotters at the sites with AA artillery and searchlight units did the same. With Britain's airspace divided into a massive grid, plotters at HQ could track home and enemy aircraft, making updates every five minutes. This was all well and good, but there were two fundamental weaknesses in the system. The first was that enemy aircraft would only be spotted as they approached the coast where the Observer Corps was positioned. The second was that in cloudy weather or at night, enemy planes would be able to enter Britain's air space unobserved. These problems now seemed very important to solve quickly. Britain had declared war on Germany in September 1939 following the latter's invasion of Poland. By 1940, Germany had marched through the Low Countries, British forces had abandoned the Continent in the Dunkirk evacuation, and France had fallen. A German invasion of Britain (Operation Sea Lion) looked imminent, and it would surely be preceded by the Luftwaffe (German Air Force) attacking Britain's airfields and strategically important industries as it tried to gain air superiority. Fortunately for Britain, technology came to the rescue with a new and highly secret 'weapon' that proved decisive in the coming air battle, the Battle of Britain, officially dated as 10 July to 31 October 1940 by the Air Ministry.

Continue reading...

[zenkor123]

Snow's actions in October of 75

Capitol attempts to supply anti rebel insurgents in D2 and D5

Forces deployed in the rocky mountains to provide defense in depth to the capitol

Snow expressed willingness to use nuclear weapons to "restore order and exterminate rebel vermin" Mutts and bombers released to districts delay rebel advance by distrusting rebel reconstruction efforts.

Last minute Attempts to create resupply for Capitol defenders. Snow tells capitol they will preservere just like Ravinstille did. Calls rebels "rabid animals" and states that savagery is endemic to the districts tells the capitol that districts would drink blood if water was avaliable. He states that nuking Panem if it was run by rebels would be an act of mercy

Prepares plan to destroy rebel forces in the rocky mountains and outer blocks.

Orders that defenders take in capitol children in "bases of refuge" in the perimeter of forts. (To use as human shields)

Snow returns to the Capitol rhetoric of the first rebellion In an attempt to rally the capitol states that his spirit of reconciliation blinded the capitol to the real enemy. He Attempts to mobilize the capitol. But the capitol is lukewarm at best apathetic or even hostile.

There is an attempt by old capitol blood to depose Snow and surrender to the rebels the coup is quashed and the plotters are fed to mutts in the avenue of the tributes as a warninf to the capitol.

He claims the rebels want to destroy the capitol warns of rebel retribution.

He deploys drones to strike at civilian targets all over Panem and the train network.

Artillery was placed in the outer blocks. While its a popular misconception that the rebel assualt on the capitol in the first rebellion failed in the rockies.(in Ballad of songbirds and snakes Snow mentions rebel boots in the capitol streets) The rebel assualt took heavy losses but was defeated in the outer blocks.

The outer line was in the Rockies

The 2nd line was the city outskirts

The 3rd line was the outer blocks.

Snow appointed commanders for each block and took personal command of the defense of the capitol.

It was argued that rebels would eat the capitol children so they needed protection by peacekeepers.

[torchship-rpg]

Dev Diary 2 - Character Creation Part 1

Torchship has a very involved session zero. You are not just making your characters; you’re making a program (building out a sector of space and your mission there), a rocket (by customising templates), and, indirectly, the state you work for. But characters are where we’ll start.

A Torchship character is fairly mechanically involved, but there’s not a lot of numbers. Instead, you have layers of character-defining mechanics, skills, and identities which will come into play during the campaign. The character creation section also acts to teach new players about the world, asking them right away to dive into questions about societies, politics, and life by using the various building blocks as introductions to setting concepts.

Level & Departments

The first thing you decide is your character’s level. Your level is basically how you start as a character, how powerful you are when you join the game. 

You have the option of playing B-Team, which is your basic crew member. They work a single Department and they either have expertise in a single job, or they’re working on a second team. However, the main purpose of the B-Teamer start is that you can turn your NPC crew into B-Teamers if you want to play as them later, maybe if you’re doing a Lower Decks episode or something like that.

Most starting PCs are the A-Team, the overachieving go-getters who end up on the bridge because they’ve got the most experience, most qualifications, or they’ve been working hardest for it. A-Team means you get to have two Departments and an expertise. The only thing that B-Team has which A-Team doesn’t is that they get more hobbies to invest in, because they actually have a life.

Departments are what colour shirt you wear on the ship, what your job is. Departments are used to sort skills out, and gate some special equipment later on. It’s your role on the team, basically.

There’s 8 departments, so a traditional 4-person RPG group playing A-Teamers can cover all the Departments between themselves (though it’s not a big deal if you have overlap and are missing some; that’s what NPCs are for!). The departments are…

Administration, the diplomats, bureaucrats, leaders, and social scientists which are the closest thing to the commanders. Your most skilled Administrator is probably your Vehicle Commander (that’s the captain). They wear gold. 

Engineering, the damage controllers, mechanics, inventors, and technicians on the rocket, who keep the reactor from blowing up. They wear safety orange.

Astrogation, the flight planners, pilots, drivers, and stellar navigators who fly the ship, plot orbits, and drive shuttles, pods, and rovers. They wear navy blue.

Security, the soldiers, brawlers, field officers, and crisis negotiators who put their bodies between danger and the rest of the crew. They wear red.

Tactical, the artillery officers, drone pilots, missile plotters, and space marshals who operate the weapons and coordinate with other rockets. They wear olive green.

Research, the observers, academics, technologists, and physical scientists who scan, record, and make theories about Weird Space Shit. They wear baby blue.

Medical, the paramedics, surgeons, pharmacists, and life scientists who keep the crew from dying of all the dangerous things in space. They wear teal.

Signals, the programmers, roboticists, telecom operators, and hackers who run the ship’s computers, radios, and other electronics. They wear purple. 

Identity

When you start to make your character, you begin by choosing a few high-level concepts which will guide character creation going forward. These concepts help you narrow down who your character is and provide frameworks and suggestions for the rest of the process.

Your character’s identity is what species they are and what society they are from. These contain a bunch of information for you, from a quick blurb about it to some naming conventions, followed by a list of suggested Traits. We’ll get more into Traits later, but essentially, these are features your character can take which give them unique capabilities. The traits in your Identity are not mandatory, they’re just suggestions, and they’re listed in order of how widespread they are within an identity.

The first thing you’ll notice is that there is not default ‘human’ option; this is not a game where humans are the boring ‘neutral’ choice. There are six kinds of humans you can play, eight if you include sub-categories, all with unique sets of traits, and many of the human identities are more mechanically similar to some aliens than they are to each other. You can easily play an all-human game, and yet have nobody in the group sharing any traits.

For instance, let’s talk your basic, bog-standard Earth human. This should be easy right, you don’t get anything special except maybe a bonus ability to represent human diversity?

Hell no. If you play a Terran in Torchship, you immediately discover one of the setting’s quirks; Earth is a high-gravity world by the standards of humanoid life. 1g can make you a heavyworlder; you get a bonus to physical strength and endurance, you hit harder in melee, and you aren’t well suited to 0g. 

Terrans are then divided into rural and urban sub-identity suggestions, with Urban Terrans speaking many languages and working nearest the IUR’s bureaucracy, while Rural Terrans have a connection to the local biomes and are more likely to be ‘baseliners’ with no genetic modifications. Oh yeah, surprise, genetic engineering is so widespread that not being genetically engineered is a trait you have to opt into.

The other human identities are just as detailed. You might be a tall Lunar, living and working in the underground industrial capital of Armstrong City. You could be a diminutive Martian, genetically engineered to survive the oxygen death zone of Mars and used to working with terraforming machines. You might be a low-grav Spacer, either a habber running human trade from the great spinning stations or an independent deep spacer living in the rings of Saturn or growing up on cargo rockets. Finally, the extrasolar colonies; Proxies from our nearest star with their many genetic augmentations, or the ‘free space’ of the wildcat colonies.

After humans, each of the aliens gets an identity page the same way. Being a classic pulpy space story, most aliens are humanoids with minor differences, because that’s fun! The alien identities covered in this section include nearly all the major alien powers in the setting, so you can play as a defector who has joined Star Patrol. We’ll go more into the various aliens in another diary, but we’ve got five options with a wide variety of recommended traits to cover them.

There’s also the Koath, the sole non-humanoid alien on the list. They’re crow-like aliens who joined the IUR as a peasant republic on a medieval world; what more do you want? Our eventual goal is that every alien identity will have at two sub-identities which represent different cultures or groups for each alien society we present; right now the Aquillians have four.

If you don’t really like any of them, you are free to declare your own identities and make up stuff, of course; the Trait system is very flexible and contains enough options that you should be able to play just about any kind of classic space alien. We’re even looking into making non-embodied characters playable, if you wanted to be an energy being, ghost haunting the rocket, or the ship’s computer which gained sentience (we just haven’t figured it out yet).

After you’ve picked your level, departments, and identities, you get into the meat of character creation, but this diary has already run long. Next time: Personal Information, Impulses, Certifications, and Traits!

[akenoomokoto]

Original doodles made with Photoshop printed with my Artillery Genius (3d printer) , moded as a pen plotter, over Arches Cold Pressed Watercolor paper and later colored with Holbein's whatercolour.

[sgreffenius]

The feds seem determined to embarrass themselves. Five years of fulminations against Mark Zuckerberg culminate in this? I know we are in an age when you can define your loyalties and your positions based on who your heroes and villains are. You don’t need to declare your party, or who you voted for. You just need to declare whether you think Edward Snowden is a good guy or a bad guy - a hero, or a villain.

These dividing lines have become so stark, it ought to suggest we no longer live under rule of law. Those who condemn Snowden as a traitor do so, as they say, because he broke the law. He betrayed his country when he stole classified information and made it public. His supporters say, that’s what civil disobedience means: you break the law to make a larger point, to enlist people in a bigger cause. The habitual criminals in the case - people who actually betrayed their country - are the intelligence officials who for years oversaw clearly illegal surveillance programs that did nothing to protect the country, and deserved to be exposed.

These sharp battles, with their front-line arguments before us all the time, seem to offer a degree of clarity as we try to define who we are as a country. On one side we have the feds, on the other an individual who represents other individuals, the small guy, people who do not normally have a voice. I know, Mark Zuckerberg does not appear to be a champion of the small guy. To start with, he’s too rich. It’s worth remembering what made him rich. All he did was invent a platform where people could say what they like among friends. Facebook was the first large social network after MySpace, and we know what happened to MySpace. It did not make it.

Mr. Mark has tried too hard to please everyone. I don’t think he has the native combativeness and stubbornness of Bill Gates, who fended off the feds for nearly a decade before he retired from the arena. Mark Zuckerberg wanted to figure out a way to make the feds go away, but they did not go away. They want to break up his company. As one commentator observed, the FTC wants a do-over with WhatsApp and Instagram. We may have approved those acquisitions, but we’ve changed our minds. Too bad for you.

These federal antics do not impress. Nor do they wear well. So many people regarded Alfred Dreyfus - accused of treason in handing military secrets to Germany - as a villain and a traitor. He was a Jewish artillery officer who spent twelve years on Devil’s Island because powerful people in the army thought he would make a good patsy and scapegoat. When their plot was exposed, the state granted Dreyfus a new trial, and sent him back to prison for another six years. When Emile Zola rose to denounce the plotters, reaction against him was so strong he had to flee the country. The episode is still so shameful and divisive for the French - the military in particular - that we still talk about it a hundred and twenty-five years later.

The feds behavior during this period of U. S. history will fare no better. The state looks so strong now, so sure of itself, so confident it will prevail. It tries to run down Snowden the way a drunk driver would run down a rabbit. It conducts a show trial for Chelsea Manning that is so secret virtually no one knew about it. Customs and Border Patrol operates concentration camps - complete with cages - in the Southwest middle-of-nowhere, and acts as if they do not exist. The Justice Department tries so hard to run Donald Trump out of the White House, it makes him a folk hero.

FTC’s anti-trust suit against Facebook is lower profile, with the stakes for Mr. Zuckerberg lower as well, yet a century from now historians will say, “What a pathetic, incomprehensible pattern. The state attempts one way after another to exert its power, yet for all its effort to exert authority, it merely breaks the nation into pieces.” It has not learned the simple, Taoist lesson: that to exercise power, you must appear not to have it.

[scopedradstag]

I know its likely that nobody will care, but all my irritation at Gamefreak over their... controversial (to say the least!!!) decision regarding the new gen had me go back and look over my near living dex of pokemon. I’ve listed out any of those bastards here that are over level 80, along with 10 additional pokemon who I also have fond memories of. I can’t move on to the new generation because... I won’t be able to bring many of these with me. Put a cut here so I dont bother y’all with a giga list.

Charizard “Salamander” (Shiny) (6IV) -- Brave -- Transferred from Kalos -- lv100 holder of Five Ribbons.

Blastoise “Cannon” -- Brave -- Transferred from Kalos -- Lv41 Master Of That Water Pressure Cutting Trick from Power Rangers

Butterfree - Careful - Transferred from Kalos -- lv100 Plotter Of Downfalls

Beedrill (6IV) - Calm - Transferred from Kalos - lv100 Executor Of Downfalls

Arbok (Shiny) - Impish - Transferred from Unova - lv94 Spaghetti

Pikachu “Volt” - Naughty - Transferred from Kalos - lv100 Not That Pikachu

Slowbro - Gentle - Transferred from Hoenn - lv100 I’m Calm But…

Gengar (Shiny) - Adamant - Transferred from Kalos - lv100 Holder of 5 Ribbons

Kangaskhan (Ex-Pokerus) - Rash - Transferred from Kalos - lv100 Holder of 3 Ribbons

Lapras (6IV) - Modest - Transferred from Kalos - lv100 Surfing Queen

Kabutops - Sassy - Transferred from Kalos - lv100 Knife Boy

Snorlax - Modest - Transferred from Kalos - lv100 King Of Naps

Dragonite - Modest - Transferred from Hoenn - lv100 Skylord

Mew - Brave - Transferred from Hoenn - lv100 Mew!!!!

Meganium - Quirky - Transferred from Kalos - lv100 Flower

Typhlosion - Impish - Transferred from Kalos - lv100 Monster Truck Tire

Umbreon “Trip” - Sassy - Transferred from Kalos - lv100 Tripping Block For Shove Manuever

Scizor “Warden” (Shiny) - Brave - Transferred from Unova - lv92 Safety Scissors

Tyranitar “Flavor” (6IV) - Lax - Transferred from Kalos - lv100 Handles The Heat And Is The Kitchen

Celebi - Brave - Transferred from Hoenn - lv100 I’m A Healer But…

Gardevoir “Seras” (Shiny) - Modest - Transferred from Unova - lv100 Siren

Breloom - Hasty - Transferred from Kalos - lv100 Mean Boxer

Sableye - Hardy - Transferred from Hoenn - lv100 “Proud of it's owner”. Fuck.

Aggron (6IV) - Impish - Transferred from Kalos - lv100 Heavy Armor Unit

Wailord - Brave - Transferred from Kalos - lv100 This One Has A Max HP IV but low Defense. Pops like a Balloon.

Salamence “Goliath” (Shiny) (6IV) - Rash - Transferred from Kalos - lv100 Air Wing

Metagross “Bulwark” (Shiny) (6IV) - Relaxed - Transferred from Kalos - lv100 Supercomputer

Deoxys - Jolly - Transferred from Hoenn - lv80 Frustrated Me Into Using Master Ball

Gastrodon - Docile - Transferred from Unova - lv94 PINK SLIME BABY

Drifblim (6IV) - Hasty - Transferred from Kalos - lv100 Hot Air Phantom

Skuntank (6IV) - Jolly - Transferred from Kalos - lv100 Toxic Artillery

Garchomp (6IV) (Pokerus) - Mild - Transferred from Kalos - lv100 Landshark

Lumineon - Naive - Transferred from Unova - lv86 Sweet Girl

Magnezone - Mild - Transferred from Unova - lv93 How Do They Even Work?

Tangrowth - Sassy - Transferred from Unova - lv91 A Girl Scared of Combs And Brushes

Magmortar (Pokerus) - Sassy - Transferred from Kalos - lv100 Wicked Pyromaniac

Porygon-Z “Jigsaw) (Shiny) (6IV) (Pokerus) - Modest - Transferred from Unova - lv100 Mad Lad

Gallade (6IV) - Serious - Transferred from Kalos - lv100 Duelist

Azelf - Lonely - Transferred from Unova - lv80 Taught Me Patience

Dialga - Impish - Transferred from Unova - lv81 Toxic Attitude

Palkia - Sassy - Transferred from Unova - lv80 Hungry

Giratina - Relaxed - Transferred from Unova - lv80 Sin Of Couch Potato

Manaphy - Quirky - Transferred from Hoenn - lv100 Little Man

Darkrai - Naughty - Transferred from Hoenn - lv100 Goth Prep

Shaymin - Timid - Transferred from Hoenn - lv100 Gardener

Arceus - Gentle - Transferred from Hoenn - lv100 !

Victini - Serious - Transferred from Hoenn - lv100 Mascot

Swoobat - Jolly - Transferred from Unova - lv95 Precious

Scolipede - Sassy - Transferred from Kalos - lv100 Centaur-ipede!!!!

Crustle - Jolly - Transferred from Unova - lv89 Minecraft

Escavalier “Ser Lamorak” (Shiny) - Brave - Transferred from Unova - lv100 Lance Boy

Alomomola - Lax - Transferred from Unova - lv83 Pink Fishhy

Beheeyem - Impish - Transferred from Unova - lv96 Alien

Keldeo - Lonely - Transferred from Hoenn - lv100 Hero Complex

Meloetta - Bold - Transferred from Hoenn - lv100 Composer

Genesect - Quiet - Transferred from Hoenn - lv100 Oh Wow

Malamar “Alhoon” (Shiny) (Pokerus) - Careful - Transferred from Hoenn - lv100 Mind Flayer

Noivern “Poppet” (6IV) (Pokerus) - Gentle - Transferred from Kalos - lv100 Heavy Metal Lover

Xerneas (Shiny) - Impish - Transferred from Hoenn - lv100 Frostbite

Yveltal (Shiny) - Calm - Transferred from Hoenn - lv100 Raw Steak

Incineroar “Samuel” - Modest - Iki Town, lv5 - lv100 Starter

Miltank “Blue Whitney” (Shiny) - Bashful - Egg Hatched 12/1/2016 - lv100 Revenge of the Rollout

Smeargle - Naive - Route 2, lv7 - lv100 Capture Professional

Gengar “Warlock” - Timid - Transferred from Kanto “in the good old days” - lv100 DnD Party

Honorable Mentions: Bedazzle, the 5 IV Shiny Salazzle (lv52)

Brynhild, the 5 IV Shiny Haxorus (lv56)

Rose Winder, the 4 IV Shiny Ribombee (lv60)

Slipstream, the 3 IV Shiny Vikavolt (lv64)

Jack, the 4 IV Shiny Lycanroc (lv66)

Chamerion, the 6 IV Shiny Typhlosion (lv61)

Lemon, the 5 IV Shiny Lucario (lv56)

Fury, the 5 IV Kingdra (lv52)

Symbi, the 5 IV Shiny Reuniclus (lv50)

Plug, the 5 IV Jolteon (lv50)

I could probably talk a lot about a fucking ton of these guys, and I know nobody cares... but Pokemon was always about the experiences you could have and the memories you would make. These are... some of my bigger ones. I’ll be here in Alola, content with what I’ve had.

[implexis]

1964

Jan 8  President Johnson declares "War on Poverty."

Jan 9  US high school students in the Panama Canal Zone violate an order banning the flying of any flag. A scuffle between US and Panamanian students ensues and escalates. Anti-US rioting erupts in the zone. Twenty-one Panamanians and four US soldiers are killed.

Jan 10  Panama severs relations with the US and demands revision of the Canal Treaty.

Jan 17  A loose confederation of fourteen Arab countries – the Arab League – meets in Egypt and creates the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO). Its charter claims that Israel is an illegal state and pledges "the elimination of Zionism in Palestine."

Jan 30  In a bloodless coup, General Nguyen Khanh takes over as Saigon's ruler. He had been a military officer with the French, fighting for French colonialism against his countrymen's desire for independence.

Feb 1  President Johnson says that he sees no chance of negotiating peace for Southeast Asia as proposed by President de Gaulle.

Feb 7  The Beatles land in New York, making their debut in the United States. Their record, I Want to Hold Your Hand" is a best seller.

Feb 10  The US House of Representatives votes on and passes the Civil Rights Act that had been sent to Congress by President Kennedy in June 1963.

Feb 26  Saigon's forces (ARVN) surround the Viet Cong and keep their distance, hitting the Viet Cong instead with air strikes and artillery. The Viet Cong slips away. General Khanh is displeased and sacks five of his division commanders.

Mar 8  Malcolm X has broken with Elijah Mohammad's Nation of Islam. He believes in the separation of races and announces that he is forming a Black Nationalist Party.

Mar 13  In Queens, New York, residents fail to respond to the cries of Kitty Genovese, 28, as she is being stabbed to death.

Mar --  This month's issue of Playboy publishes an interview with Ayn Rand, who says, "I consider the Birch Society futile, because they are not for capitalism but merely against communism ... I gather they believe that the disastrous state of today's world is caused by a communist conspiracy. This is childishly naive and superficial. No country can be destroyed by a mere conspiracy, it can be destroyed only by ideas."

Apr 3  The US and Panama agree to resume diplomatic relations

Apr 4  In Brazil, landowners and industrialists have been unhappy with reformist President Joao Goulart. He is driven from power in a bloodless military coup, ending reforms called for by the Alliance for Progress and starting 21 years of dictatorship. US. Ambassador Lincoln Gordon will admit US encouragement to the plotters and that during the coup the US Navy stood off the coast. Aid will flow to the new government of Brazil that was denied to Goulart's government.

Apr 19  Malcolm X is in Mecca meeting devout Muslims of different races. He has softened, believing that racial barriers can be overcome and that Islam is the religion that can do it.

May 2  Four hundred to 1,000 students march through Times Square, New York, and another 700 in San Francisco, in the first major student demonstration against the Vietnam War. Smaller marches also occur in Boston, Seattle, and in Madison, Wisconsin.

May 14  In Egypt, Nikita Khrushchev joins President Nasser in setting off charges, diverting the Nile River from the site of the Aswan High Dam project.

May 22  President Johnson speaks to a graduating class and presents his idea for a "Great Society."

May 25  The Supreme Court rules that closing schools to avoid desegregation is unconstitutional.

May 27  The US has 16,000 military people in Vietnam, and so far 266 of its forces there have been killed. In a taped conversation, President Lyndon Johnson says to his national security advisor, McGeorge Bundy: "I don't think it's worth fighting for, and I don't think we can get out ... What in the hell is Vietnam worth to me? What is Laos worth to me? What is it worth to this country?"

Jun 2  Governor Nelson Rockefeller has been considered the front runner among Republicans for the presidency. In the California primary he has been attacking Goldwater as too dangerous, and Goldwater has attacked Rockefeller's morality. Social conservatives have been offended by Rockefeller's divorce and remarriage in 1963. Republican voters choose Goldwater by a margin of less than 3 percent, ensuring Goldwater's nomination at the upcoming Republican convention.

Jun 3  In Seoul, Korea, an estimated 10,000 student demonstrators over-power the police. President Park Chung Hee declares martial law.

Jun 5  In Seoul, student demonstrations continue, and demonstrations erupt in eleven other cities. The students, it is said, are impatient and frustrated concerning the country's economic misery. President Chung Hee Park accepts the resignation of his right-hand man, Kim Chong Pil, to placate student opinion.

Jun 12  President Chung Hee Park's ruling Democratic Republican party and opposition politicians agree to form a 24-man committee to solve problems resulting from student demonstrations.

Jun 12  In South Africa, Nelson Mandela and seven others are sentenced to life imprisonment and sent to Robben Island prison.

Jun 15  The last of France's military leaves Algeria.

Jun 19  The Senate votes on and passes the Civil Rights Act. Senator Goldwater is one of only six Republican senators who votes against the bill.

Jun 20  General Westmoreland succeeds General Paul Harkins as head of the US forces in Vietnam.

Jun 21  A summer of civil rights activities are underway in the South. Three civil rights workers, Michael Schwerner, Andrew Goodman and James Chaney are murdered near Philadelphia, Mississippi, by law enforcement officials. The governor of Mississippi, Paul Johnson, offers little help and dismisses fears that the three have been murdered. He says, "Maybe they went to Cuba," suggesting the Communist tie that was commonly used to discredit the civil rights movement in the South. Johnson is moderate for a white Mississippian regarding race, but conformism involved in appealing to voters led him in a 1963 to criticize advocacy of civil rights for blacks and to indentify the NAACP as standing for: "Niggers, alligators, apes, coons, and possums." (Time, August 16, 1963)

Jun 25  The Vatican condemns use of the contraceptive pill for females.

Jul 2  President Johnson signs the Civil Rights Act into Law.

Jul 6  Malawi declares its independence from Britain.

Jul 13  In San Francisco, the Republican Convention's party platform reads: "Humanity is tormented once again by an age-old issue – is man to live in dignity and freedom under God or be enslaved -- are men in government to serve, or are they to master their fellow men?" The platform accuses the Johnson Administration of seeking "accommodation with Communism without adequate safeguards and compensating gains for freedom." It describes the Democrats of having "collaborated with Indonesian imperialism by helping it to acquire territory belonging to the Netherlands and control over the Papuan people."  And it states that "This Administration has refused to take practical free enterprise measures to help the poor."

Jul 14  At the podium at the Republican convention, Governor Nelson Rockefeller of New York is booed extensively when he denounces extremism.

Jul 16  Senator Barry Goldwater wins the nomination for president on the first ballot.

Jul 18  In Harlem, New York, six days of rioting begins. According to the New York Times, thousands of blacks "race through the center of Harlem shouting at policemen and white people, pulling fire alarms, breaking windows and looting stores." Whites had moved out of Harlem by 1950 and by 1960 middle class blacks had followed.

Jul 19  In Harlem, Jesse Gray, leader of a rent strike, calls for "100 skilled black revolutionaries who are ready to die" to correct "the police brutality situation in Harlem."

Jul 21  Five days of race riots erupt in Singapore. It begins with Malays commemorating the Prophet Mohammad's birthday with a march.  A few marchers respond in anger to a policeman ordering some to return to the ranks of the marchers. Marchers attack Chinese passersby and spectators.  Retaliations against Muslims follow.

Jul 27  From the US, 5,000 more military "advisers" are sent to South Vietnam, bringing their total in Vietnam to 21,000.

Aug 1  The Republic of the Congo, formerly the Belgian Congo, changes its name to the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Aug 2  North Vietnamese torpedo boats retaliate against ships involved in attacks on a radio transmitter on the island of Hon Ngu off the coast of North Vietnam, in the Tonkin Gulf. The torpedo boats approach the US destroyer Maddox, which sinks two of the torpedo boats and damages a third.

Aug 4  On the USS Maddox, in the dark of night, an "overeager sonar man," to be described as such by the ship's captain, mistakenly believes that his ship is under attack again. For two hours the Maddox and another destroyer, the USS Turner Joy, fire at imaginary targets. Air support from two US aircraft carriers are sent on a retaliatory mission against targets on Vietnam's coast. President Johnson speaks to the American public about "deliberate attacks on US naval vessels" and his retaliation and adds that "we must and shall honor our commitments."

Aug 6  In a meeting with US legislators, Defense Secretary McNamara gives a distorted description of  US naval activities in the Tonkin Gulf.  

Aug 7  US congressmen and senators vote in favor of the Tonkin Gulf Resolution, giving President Johnson powers in lieu of a declaration of war. The vote in the House of Representatives is 416 to 0, in the Senate 88 to 2.

Aug 11  Since the rioting in Harlem, trouble has been expected in Paterson, New Jersey. According to one report "carousing teenagers in the slum Fourth Ward began pelting passing police cars with bottles and rocks. Soon hundreds of Negroes were racing through the streets, smashing windows and hurling debris at police."

Aug 12  Twenty miles south of Paterson, in Elizabeth, New Jersey, rioting erupts. People pitch Molotov cocktails into three taverns, and soon, a report says, "hundreds of Negroes were flinging bottles and bricks from rooftops and street corners."

Aug 21  In Saigon, students and Buddhist militants begin a series of escalating protests against the General Khanh's regime. General Khan brings in others to share power. People unhappy with the US backed regime are encouraged, and mob violence erupts.  

Aug 22   At the Democratic Party's convention, Fannie Lou Hammer, representing the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, challenges the all-white Mississippi delegation. Johnson hurridly calls a press conference to tell reporters things they already know, to get the television cameras off Ms Hamer, and this succeeds, but the networks will rebroadcast her speech repeatedly, with Hamer in an electrifying speech, asking that her delegation be seated to represent MIssissippi. Johnson calls Hamer an "ignorant woman." He needs to compromise with southern whites in order to get civil rights and other legislation passed. Humphrey and labor leader Walther Reuther help sway the Democrats to side with Johnson. There will be no seating of the Mississippi Freedom delegation.

Aug 28-30  In predominately black neighborhoods on the north side of Philadelphia, well-publicized allegations of police brutality have created unrest. Two policemen, one white, one black, try to remove a black woman from her car after she refuses to cooperate with them. Rumors spread that a pregnant black woman has been beaten to death by white cops. Three days of rioting follow, with mobs looting and burning mostly white-owned stores. 341 are injured and 774 arrested.

Sep 1  "Freedom Summer" in Mississippi is drawing to a close. White Mississippians fear what will happen if civil rights including the right to vote are extended to blacks. They remain opposed to the freedom schools that have advanced literacy and delighted blacks. There have been 35 shootings incidents, 6 murders of activists, 80 beatings and 65 houses and chuches burned.

Sep 4  At the University of California at Berkeley, students have returned from summer vacation, some of them from civil rights activities in the South. US Senator William Knowland's newspaper, the Oakland Tribune, is picketed by a civil rights group that organizes on campus.

Sep 14  On the Berkeley campus, Dean Katherine Towle bans posters, easels and tables on campus and reminds student groups of prohibitions against collecting funds or using university facilities in planning or implementing off-campus political and social action.

Sep 17  Some twenty student activist organizations form a coalition to oppose the regulations announced by Dean Towle. The "Free Speech Movement" is born.

Sep 21  Malta becomes independent from Britain.

Sep 27  The Warren Commission Report is released. It concludes that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone in the assassination of President Kennedy.

Oct 1  Campaigning for the presidency in Hammond, Indiana, Senator Goldwater promises his audience that he will liberate Eastern Europe, and he tells them that only victory can end Communism.

Oct 1  A  Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) volunteer, Jack Weinberg, sitting at a table on the Berkeley campus, is put into a police car by campus police. A crowd growing to about 3,000 surround the police car.  Mario Savio, fresh from civil rights activities in the South, climbs on top the police car after respectfully removing his shoes, and he makes a speech.

Oct 2  Approximately 450 policemen rescue the police car, book and then release Jack Weinberg. Student activists take up a collection to repair the police car's dented roof.

Oct 13  Nikita Khrushchev returns from a vacation and finds that members of the Presidium (formerly the Politburo) have called a special meeting. Its members vote to send him into retirement. Khrushchev will be given a pension and watched closely by the KGB. His successor as Premier will be Alexei Kosygin and as Communist Party First Secretary will be Leonid Brezhnev.

Oct 13  The Soviet Union has spectacular success launching a three-man spacecraft that returns after 24 hours. N

Oct 15  President Johnson says if he is elected he will take important new steps to reduce world tensions.

Oct 16  China explodes an atomic bomb in Sinkiang province.

Oct 16  In his first major campaign speech on civil rights, Goldwater declares that "forced integration is just as wrong as forced segregation."

Oct 16  Former Vice President Richard M. Nixon says that a Johnson administration would be "a sitting duck" for the ruthless and tough-minded leaders who have replaced Nikita Khrushchev.

Oct. 20  Goldwater describes Johnson's foreign policy as a "policy of drift, deception and defeat."

Oct 21  Campaigning for re-election in Akron, Ohio, President Johnson says "[We] are not about to send American boys nine to ten thousand miles away from home to do what Asian boys ought to be doing for themselves."

Oct 22  Jean Paul Sartre, French philosopher and novelist, declines the Nobel Prize for Literature.

Oct 23  The Republic National Chairman, Dean Burch, says that a private Republican poll shows that Senator Goldwater leads President Johnson in electoral votes, 261 to 258.

Oct 24  Goldwater repudiates his campaign film, "Choice," which contends that social "rot" is undermining American society.

Oct 27 A speech by Ronald Reagan is broadcast on television for the Goldwater campaign. Reagan tells of switching from Democrat to "another course." He complains about tax burdens and he asks whether a "little intellectual elite in a far-distant capital can plan our lives for us better than we can plan them ourselves." The speech enhances his standing in the Republican Party.

Nov 1  A pre-dawn mortar assault by the Viet Cong at the Vien Hoa air base, 12 miles north of Saigon, kills five Americans, two South Vietnamese and wounds nearly one hundred others. President Johnson dismisses recommendations for a retaliatory air strike against North Vietnam.

Nov. 1  Senator Barry Goldwater says that the attack on Bienhoa airbase shows that the United States is involved in an undeclared war. He adds that it is "high time" for the president to speak frankly about it to the people.

Nov 2  A radio program titled "Goldwater's New World," creates a minor panic among listeners in the Netherlands.

Nov 3  It is election day. Goldwater carries only Arizona and five segregated states of the deep South,  from Louisiana east to South Carolina, excluding Florida. Johnson is re-elected with 61 percent of the vote. The Democrats win both the Senate and the House of Representatives. Robert Kennedy wins the race for US Senator from New York.  

Nov 4  Lenny Bruce, stand up comic, is arrested in New York City for using "bad language" in one of his routines.

Nov 9  In Britain, the House Commons abolishes the death penalty for murder.

Nov 18  Martin Luther King has accused FBI agents in Georgia of failing to act on complaints filed by blacks. FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover retaliates, describing King as "the most notorious liar in the country."

Nov 24  In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Belgian paratroopers liberate around 1,600 Europeans who had been taken hostage by a rebel army in early August.

Nov 29  In the US, the Catholic Church changes its liturgy, including the use of English rather than Latin.

Dec 2-3  The chancellor at U.C. Berkeley has refused to drop plans to discipline "Free Speech Movement" leaders. More than 500 students stage an overnight sit-in takeover of the campus administration building. California's governor, Pat Brown, a liberal Democrat, gives a deputy Alameda district attorney permission to bring in off-campus police: sheriff's deputies and officers from the Highway Patrol. Removing the students is a job made harder by the students refusing to cooperate and made easier by dragging them down flights of stairs, bumpety bumpety bump, to waiting police vans. Students on their way to class that next morning are appalled by the site of fellow students being manhandled, and liberal faculty members are also appalled.

Dec 18  The University of California Regents affirm that university rules should follow the US Supreme Court decisions on free speech.

Dec 20-21  Another military coup occurs in Saigon, led by Nguyen Cao Ky and Nguyen Van Thieu, which keeps General Khanh as part of the new government. US Ambassador Taylor reacts with anger, summons the young officers to the US embassy and tells them he is "tired of coups." General Khanh retaliates, saying that the US is reverting to "colonialism" in its treatment of South Vietnam.

to 1963 | to 1965

[doubletamponne]

Paul-Louis Courier and the Malet Conspiracy, Part 4

Not surprisingly, Viollet-Le-Duc’s intervention greatly helped Courier’s case, as Réal sent orders for his release on the day Malet and the others were executed.

And now, for the report summing up the whole thing... (most likely addressed to Marshal Moncey)

3 November 1812

Report to His Excellency

One Paul Louis Courier, former commandant in the imperial artillery, was arrested in Blois and appeared suspicious due to his lack of papers. He claimed he had lost them. M. Le Duc, secretary of the Palace, immediately asked for his release and vouched for him, requesting that his former schoolmate and comrade be allowed to continue his journey to Touraine. M. Courier is said to concern himself only with science and literary research. He is known for being careless and absent-minded. The guarantees M. Le Duc offered left little room for hesitation. The Prefect of Loir-et-Cher was invited to hand him a passport so that he may resume his journey.

We hereby request Your Excellency’s approval.

And let’s leave the last word to Courier, in a letter to Clavier (which an early edition dates from 6 November 1812):

I received your package along with the printer’s sheet. Please tell him that I will be in Paris next week, and that this is why I am not sending back the corrected sheet. My friends got me removed from the list of the plotters faster than I expected. I left the policemen’s grasp after paying five or six francs, and I am glad I could get away at that price. Everything was well with my estate. I will finish my business soon, and then I can return to Paris. I could have spent a long time in the alguazils’ clutches, had others not intervened on my behalf, and God knows how it might have ended. This conspiracy was the work of unemployed officers; as an officer who has resigned, only recently arrived in Paris, and left on the day of the coup, I might have fit in with them.

[handeaux]

1917: Cincinnati Learns To Hate Anything German

One morning in May 1917, jeweler Fred “Fritz” Hartmann was arrested at the corner of Twelfth and Main streets by Cincinnati Police Officer Elmer Young. In court, the police officer told Judge Arthur Spiegel that Hartmann had “created excitement” by shouting loudly that he was a German soldier. Just one month after the United States declared war on Germany, Judge Spiegel had no patience whatever for Hartmann’s outburst and fined him $5 and costs. The judge said:

“If you want to be a German soldier, return to Germany, but if you want to be an American, be a real one.”

Herr Hartmann was lucky to be let off with a fine and warning. Many Cincinnati Germans, such as Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra Music Director Ernst Kunwald, were arrested and imprisoned at Fort Oglethorpe, Georgia, for the duration of the war.

Overnight, anti-German animosity consumed Cincinnati in 1917. Gemütlichkeit was verboten and every German Cincinnatian was suspected of spying for “The Hun.” The city’s attitude is reflected in the Cincinnati Post [28 September 1918]:

“All Huns look alike. They are savage, brutal, contemptible and evil-looking and they are all numbskulls and flat-heads.”

The Post gave front-page coverage to a rally convened by the Rev. I. Cochrane Hunt, pastor of Covington’s Madison Avenue Presbyterian Church, where the following resolution was approved by acclamation:

“Resolved: That the citizens of Covington petition Congress to pass laws interning all German aliens for the duration of the war and then sending them back to Germany, and enact more stringent legislation governing all seditious and traitorous acts.”

Sedition could mean almost anything supporting Germany, such as an heirloom painting hanging on your wall. John Bloom, a Hungarian living on Central Avenue, was rousted from his bed at 4:20 a.m. one Monday to discover that his apartment was on fire. He hustled his family outside, but the firefighters discovered something shocking as they battled the blaze – a “large painting of the Kaiser.” Bloom was arrested and turned over to federal authorities.

When 278 horses died in Covington in March 1918, local Germans feared lynching as the anti-immigrant hysteria reached fever pitch. The horses were on their way to artillery units on the European front lines and began dying as soon as they were let out from freight cars for water and forage. It was obvious, the Cincinnati Post thundered [18 March 1918], that the horses were poisoned by some traitor in our very midst:

“The beast is here. It is useless to keep on coddling ourselves into the comfortable feeling that it is 5000 miles away. Today it strikes at animals. What will it do tomorrow? We must find it.”

Although scientists who investigated the deaths believed that fungus-invested hay had caused the deaths, the Cincinnati Post continued to hammer away at the idea that German agents lurked in the Cincinnati underworld.

Those German spies and saboteurs, the Post claimed, were offered comfort by the daily indoctrination of Cincinnati schoolchildren through the nefarious “kultur” of the “Potsdam poison plotters.” The Post [10 September 1917] devoted much of its front page to a review of a poem, “Heil dir, Germania” (Hail to you, Germania”) that appeared in a Cincinnati schoolbook.

“The ‘glory’ of Germany which the poem sings is now tarnished with the blood of murdered women and children and stained by the hands of men, who, for the sakes of their ambitious schemes, tear treaties into scraps of paper.”

In an editorial, the Post [5 September 1917] asked Cincinnati parents to look into their consciences:

“Do I want my child to assimilate at school the alien thought and tradition against which most of the civilized world is now fighting?”

The Cincinnati Post fanned the flames of anti-German hatred, demanding the schools cease German instruction and encouraging the city to rename “Hunnish” streets. Among the streets renamed to reflect pure American values were Bremen (now Republic), Berlin (now Woodrow), Hapsburg (now Merrimac) and Hamburg (now Stonewall).

Today, Cincinnati’s German pride is found abundantly in our Teutonic foods including goetta, bratwurst and beer. During World War I, such “Hunnish” food was a sign of shame. Even the city Workhouse had to change its menu. No more sauerkraut! Prisoners ate patriotic “liberty cabbage.”

If there was one voice of sanity in this tide of disdain, it belonged to Rene deSilz, who worked as a translator for Cincinnati manufacturers. Retired because of injuries from the French Army, deSilz was asked if he objected to working with Cincinnati Germans. He replied:

“Have ill feeling toward one another? I should say not! That is not the way civilized folk feel.”

[historythroughpictures]

Color picture. Auxiliary Territorial Service (ATS) plotters at work at Coastal Artillery Headquarters in Dover, December 1942. Photograph: Ted Dearberg/IWM/PA (4059x4056)

Color picture. Auxiliary Territorial Service (ATS) plotters at work at Coastal Artillery Headquarters in Dover, December 1942. Photograph: Ted Dearberg/IWM/PA (4059×4056) was originally published on AJ Hydell