Podcasts about american gi

Send us a textHEDWIGBefore we say auf wiedersehen to Season 14 with its eight revamps of the previously covered during the show's first five years, the boys of TGTPTU reveal their unexpected special little packages: 1x1's, wherein each host shall choose a single film by its merits of discussion and unlikelihood to be exposed on a future 4x4, creator, or thematic season. The first of these darlings is Thomas's: HEDWIG AND THE ANGRY INCH (2001). Adapted from the rock musical of the same name that started as the collaboration between frontman of the NYC-based band Cheater (performing on stage as Hedwig's band) Stephen Trask and then actor later turned actor-director with this debut film John Cameron Mitchell. Hedwig's story, on stage told in song and monologue, of male-to-female surgery so as to marry an American GI and leave East Berlin originated from Mitchell's own experiences as a military brat in Germany and Kansas trailer parks while the jealousy and newer betrayal Hedwig expresses toward her protégé and superstar success/successor Tommy Gnosis (also played by Mitchell in the play but embodied by Early Aughts indie film darling and pod-contentious actor Michael Pitt) is elevated by Trask's music and lyrics and is expanded and enriched with animation, locations, and added characters (most notably Andrea Martin as the band's manager) for the silver screen.   Learn more about the progression from stage to screen from Thomas on research; jam out to Rock Facts with Ryan (sorry, mineralogists, but we're talking glam and punk rock here); former host Jack on vibes in the rhythm section wakes up mid-episode to like the film and dig the hand-drawn animation; and Ken lands his rimshot, getting to tell his joke that calls back to TGTPTU's Nolan coverage (Season 12).  Spoiler: You'll be hearing from four Hed heads.  Reminder: You don't put a bra in a dryer!  CONTENT WARNING: At least once during the episode the “f” word (“Ferengi”) is used. For those allergic to Star Trek and nerdom, our sincerest apologies. My you live long and prosper. THEME SONG BY: WEIRD A.I.Email: thegoodthepodandtheugly@gmail.comFacebook: https://m.facebook.com/TGTPTUInstagram: https://instagram.com/thegoodthepodandtheugly?igshid=um92md09kjg0Bluesky: @goodpodugly.bsky.socialYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC6mI2plrgJu-TB95bbJCW-gBuzzsprout: https://thegoodthepodandtheugly.buzzsprout.com/Letterboxd (follow us!): Podcast: goodpoduglyKen: Ken KoralRyan: Ryan Tobias

Love to hear from you; “Send us a Text Message”What happens when a skeptical World War II sergeant decides to "blow a priest out of the confessional" by confessing his extensive list of sins? The result is utterly unexpected and life-changing.Through the compelling true story of Sergeant Columban's encounter with Padre Pio, we witness how a moment of defiance transformed into a profound spiritual awakening. When this stigmatic friar revealed the sergeant's long-forgotten childhood dream of becoming a priest—something he had never shared with anyone—the hardened soldier found himself weeping outside the confessional, his life forever altered.Padre Pio was no ordinary priest. Bearing the wounds of Christ that bled for 50 years, possessing gifts of healing, bilocation, and the ability to read hearts, his extraordinary encounters with American GIs during World War II became legendary. For Sergeant Columban, serving as Padre Pio's altar boy in the weeks that followed his confession allowed him to witness firsthand the priest's suffering during Mass—the bleeding wounds, painful walking, and sweet perfume that sometimes emanated from his stigmata.This story arrives at the perfect moment for those navigating today's increasingly toxic culture, where doubt can easily take root. Are transformative spiritual encounters still possible? Can our hearts truly be changed? Just as Sergeant Columban's forgotten dream became reality after his divine encounter, perhaps your own spiritual journey holds similar potential for awakening and transformation.Download our Claymore battle plan today and discover how to walk this path with others who share your search for authentic faith and purpose. Remember, "If you seek, you will find. If you knock, it will be opened to you." What forgotten dreams might God be waiting to fulfill in your life?Visit jp2renew.org, go to resources, and download the Claymore Battle Plan to begin your journey toward freedom, purpose, and authentic manhood today.Contact Jack: info@jp2renew.orgFollow us and watch on X: John Paul II Renewal @JP2RenewalOn Rumble: JohnPaulIIRCSupport the show

"Why would you care about anyone else's opinion?" The DJ and dancer talks about work ethic, living authentically and the power of lifting each other up. DJ and dancer Patrick Mason emits high vibrations and high-energy dance music. But that wasn't always the case. Before he was playing the world's biggest techno festivals, he grew up in conservative Bavaria, where he claims that he "suppressed his truest self" as a closeted gay Black man. Born to an American GI father and a German mother, he learned the power of visualisation and hard work in order to launch himself to Berlin and the freedom of expression it represented. It was in the capital that he had his first sexual experiences and climbed the ranks of fashion and modelling, spending weekend stints at Berghain and immersing himself in the new world of techno. Career burnout and the Covid-19 lockdowns set Mason down the path of DJing in 2020, and he's since carved out a niche as a party-starter known for flamboyant selections that accompany his elaborate dance routines behind (and even on top of) the decks. In this interview recorded live at ADE 2024, he speaks with Chloe Lula about the obstacles he's overcome to get to the top, personal trauma and struggles with self-acceptance, body dysmorphia, depression, and gay male culture's sometimes unrealistic physical ideals. He also discusses his ambitions to marry the worlds of fashion and music, and his vision for a more authentic music industry. Listen to the episode in full.

"Why would you care about anyone else's opinion?" The DJ and dancer talks about work ethic, living authentically and the power of lifting each other up. DJ and dancer Patrick Mason emits high vibrations and high-energy dance music. But that wasn't always the case. Before he was playing the world's biggest techno festivals, he grew up in conservative Bavaria, where he claims that he "suppressed his truest self" as a closeted gay Black man. Born to an American GI father and a German mother, he learned the power of visualisation and hard work in order to launch himself to Berlin and the freedom of expression it represented. It was in the capital that he had his first sexual experiences and climbed the ranks of fashion and modelling, spending weekend stints at Berghain and immersing himself in the new world of techno. Career burnout and the Covid-19 lockdowns set Mason down the path of DJing in 2020, and he's since carved out a niche as a party-starter known for flamboyant selections that accompany his elaborate dance routines behind (and even on top of) the decks. In this interview recorded live at ADE 2024, he speaks with Chloe Lula about the obstacles he's overcome to get to the top, personal trauma and struggles with self-acceptance, body dysmorphia, depression, and gay male culture's sometimes unrealistic physical ideals. He also discusses his ambitions to marry the worlds of fashion and music, and his vision for a more authentic music industry. Listen to the episode in full.

Join us, along with Ben Gibby from the Chattanooga Scale Modelers, who gives us an insider's look into the much-anticipated Chattanooga ModelCon. Scheduled for January 10th and 11th at the Chattanooga Convention Center, this two-day extravaganza is the perfect post-holiday treat for modeling enthusiasts. With a gold, silver, and bronze open judging system and a bustling array of vendors, the event promises to be a must-attend for anyone looking to kick off the model show season with style and creativity.Switching gears, we welcome Brandon Jacob to discuss the burgeoning WinterBlitz 2025 at the Museum of the American GI in College Station, Texas, on January 25th. Brandon shares how the event has grown with the museum's enthusiastic support, offering a unique blend of model show excitement and cultural exploration in a dynamic setting. We highlight logistics such as registration times and community engagement, urging both locals and visitors to experience the camaraderie and creativity that define these early-year gatherings. Start 2025 on a high note by attending one of these two fantastic events, where passion for scale modeling meets an incredible sense of community.Chattanooga ModelCon 2025WinterBlits 2025Support the Show!PatreonBuy Me a BeerPaypalModel Paint SolutionsYour source for Harder & Steenbeck Airbrushes and David Union Power ToolsSQUADRON Adding to the stash since 1968Model PodcastsPlease check out the other pods in the modelsphere!PMM Merchandise StoreSupport the show with PMM Merchandise!Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you.Bump Riffs Graciously Provided by Ed BarothAd Reads Generously Provided by Bob "The Voice of Bob" BairMike and Kentucky Dave thank each and everyone of you for participating on this journey with us. We are grateful for having you as listeners, and the community that has grown around Plastic Model Mojo makes it all worth while.

It was fun seeing Fox Butterfield, the first New York Times correspondent in China since 1949, in Portland, Oregon back in July. I last visited Portland in 2022, and you never quite get over the sight of Mount Hood dominating the horizon on a clear summer day in its awesome fashion.Fox welcomed me to his home, perched on a small hill in a modestly upscale suburb. A history enthusiast, he has lived through and witnessed some of the most pivotal moments in modern history: from meeting Harry Truman as a teenager with his grandfather, to studying under John Fairbank, the progenitor of Chinese studies in America, to reporting on the Vietnam War and helping expose the Pentagon Papers, which earned him a Pulitzer Prize. Though trained as a China specialist, he only began his reporting inside China in the late '70s, culminating in his book China: Alive in the Bitter Sea. This bestseller set a benchmark for generations of China correspondents. Later in his career, Fox shifted his focus to domestic issues of race and crime, writing acclaimed works like All God's Children and In My Father's House.Talking to Fox was a breeze. I was pleasantly surprised that his spoken Chinese remains impressively sharp — his tones and pronunciations are still spot-on. Of course, we did most of our chatting in English. This piece will explore his early experiences, particularly his family background, his time at Harvard, and his reporting during the Vietnam War. While the bulk of the piece may not focus directly on China, it offers a glimpse into the intellectual formation of one of America's most prominent China watchers and how both domestic and global forces shape U.S. perceptions of China.Enjoy!LeoIndexSeeing China with Joe Biden and John McCain in the 70sCyrus Eaton, Lenin Prize and family legacy in Cold War“Rice Paddies”, and studying under John Fairbank at HarvardFrom Pentagon Papers to VietnamReporting on the frontlines in Vietnam Seeing China with Joe Biden and John McCain in the 70sCould you talk about your first trip to China?I was the Hong Kong correspondent for The New York Times from 1975 to 1979 because that's where we covered China in those days. I couldn't go to China until 1978, when I attended the Canton Trade Fair. That was my first trip to China; I can barely remember it.My second trip to China was much more memorable. In 1979, when the U.S. and China were about to normalize relations, China invited the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to visit, and I was invited as a New York Times correspondent. In those days, China had a shortage of hotel rooms, at least for foreigners, so they made everybody room with somebody else. The Chinese government assigned me to room with the naval liaison to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, who was a Navy captain named John McCain.For two weeks, John McCain and I were roommates. We had breakfast, lunch, and dinner together and traveled everywhere. McCain's best friend on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee was Joe Biden. So, the three of us did almost everything together for two weeks. That one is easy to remember. What was your impression of Joe Biden?Joe Biden was a nice man, very earnest, but he was a typical career politician that when he approached somebody, he always grabbed them by the hand. He was tall, had a strong handshake, and would give them a big smile and grab their hands. He kept doing this to the Chinese, who didn't really know what was going on because they're not used to being touched that way, especially not somebody almost breaking their hand.So I finally said to him, “Senator.” And he'd say, “No, call me Joe.” I said, “Okay, Joe, please don't grab Chinese by the hand. It's kind of rude and offensive to them, and they don't understand it.” He would say, “Well, why not?” And I said, “Because that's not their custom.” He'd say, “Okay, thank you very much.” And then, five minutes later, he'd do the same thing over and over again.John McCain and I became good friends, especially because I had seen McCain in prison in Hanoi when I first started working for The New York Times, and we bonded over that shared history during our trip to China. They allowed me to go into his prison in 1969, and I was the first reporter to find out that John McCain was still alive when his jet fighter was shot down over Hanoi.I saw him then and as roommates 10 years later in China. We had a great time, and I would take him out and say, “Let's sneak away from our handlers and see how Chinese really live and what they really say.” We just went out and talked to people, and he thought this was a lot of fun.“He said something straightforward and obvious, but I had never thought about it. He said China is the oldest country in the world with by far the largest population. It's a big, important place.”That's a wonderful tale. What made you initially interested in China?When I was a sophomore at Harvard as an undergraduate in 1958, there was a fear that the United States was going to have to go to war with China over those two little islands, which Americans call ‘Quemoy' and ‘Matsu' and Chinese people call ‘Jinmen' and ‘Mazu'.America's leading sinologist and Harvard professor of Chinese studies, John Fairbank, decided to give a public lecture about the danger of the United States going to war for those two little islands.I attended his lecture. He said something straightforward and obvious, but I had never thought about it. He said China is the oldest country in the world with by far the largest population. It's a big, important place. Why would the United States want to go to war with China over those two little islands? It made no sense logically. And we had just finished the war in Korea. As I listened to him, I realized, “Gee, I don't know anything about that place.”So I began to audit his introductory class on the history of East Asia. And in the spring, I decided to take a second class in Chinese history that Fairbank was teaching. As a Harvard undergraduate, I would find out my exam grades at the end of year from a postcard you put in the exam booklet. When I received my postcard back from the final exam, it said: “please come to see me in my office, tomorrow morning at 10.” “Oh no,” I thought I really screwed up my exam. So I went to see John Fairbank. I was nervous, especially because he was a great man, a big figure on campus, and the Dean of Chinese studies in the United States. So I went in, and he said, “Fox, you wrote a wonderful exam. Have you considered majoring in Chinese history?” I went, “oh, no, I had not considered it.” I was so relieved that I had written a good exam.He said, “Well, if you are, you must immediately begin studying Chinese.” At that time, Harvard did not teach spoken Chinese, only classical written Chinese, and there were just about 10 people, all graduate students.So Fairbank said, “here's what you do. Going down to Yale, they have a special program that teaches spoken Chinese in the summer because they have a contract with the Air Force to teach 18-year-old Air Force recruits how to speak Chinese so they can listen to and monitor Chinese air force traffic.”So I spent the summer at Yale studying Chinese with air force recruits. I took classical written Chinese classes when I returned to Harvard that fall. Luckily, I got a Fulbright Fellowship to go to Taiwan after I graduated, so I studied in the best spoken Chinese program at the time run by Cornell University.Cyrus Eaton, Lenin Prize and family legacy in Cold WarI wonder whether there's any family influence on your China journey. Your father was the historian and editor-in-chief of the Adams Papers, and your maternal grandfather, Cyrus Eaton, was one of the most prominent financiers and philanthropists in the Midwest. Could you speak on the impact of family legacy on your China journey?My father certainly instilled a love of history in me. That was always my favourite subject in school and the one I did best in. Eventually, my major at Harvard was Chinese history. My father didn't know anything about China and never went. My mother visited Taiwan and stayed with me for ten days in the 60s.My maternal grandfather, Cyrus Eaton, would fit the Chinese notion of a rags-to-riches success story. He grew up in a small fishing village in Nova Scotia, Canada, and went to college in Toronto with the help of an older cousin. This cousin went on to become a Baptist minister in Cleveland, Ohio, across the lake. Among the people in his parish was a man named John D. Rockefeller — yes, the original John D. Rockefeller.The cousin invited my grandfather and said he had a job for him. So my grandfather started off as a golf caddy for John D. Rockefeller and then a messenger. Ultimately, he founded his own electric power company in Cleveland — Ohio Electric Power — and became quite influential. He had multiple companies but then lost everything in the Great Depression.During World War II, my grandfather heard about a large iron ore under a lake in Ontario through his Canadian connections. By then, he had already formed connections with President Roosevelt and then Truman, so he said, “If you can give me some money and help underwrite this, I can get Canadian permission to drain the lake for the iron ore deposit,” which became the world's richest iron ore mine, Steep Rock Iron Ore. That's how he got back into business. Truman and my grandfather ended up having a close connection, and he used my grandfather's train to campaign for re-election in 1948. My grandfather was an unusual man. He had a real vision about things.He was trading metals with the Soviet Union as well.I don't know the details, but when Khrushchev came to power, my grandfather became interested in trying to work out some arrangement between the United States and Russia, which is where the Pugwash movement came from. He was inviting Russian and American scientists to meet. They couldn't meet in the U.S. because it was against American law, but he arranged for them to meet in his hometown of Pugwash, Nova Scotia. We had American and Russian nuclear physicists meeting to discuss nuclear weapons in this little village. Eventually, he invited some Chinese people to come.At one of these conferences, I met Harrison Salisbury, an editor of The New York Times and the first NYT Moscow Correspondent. I was just starting out as a stringer for The Washington Post, but Salisbury saw something in me and suggested I send him a story. That connection eventually led to my job at The New York Times.He must have known people pretty high up in China too.I don't know the China connections; he didn't know Mao or Zhou Enlai. He did have a close relationship with Khrushchev, to the extent you could. It started with the Pugwash movement.He just sent a telegram to Khrushchev and became friends?Yes. What do you call that, guanxi?I guess so. Do you remember when he won the Lenin Peace Prize?I do. I think I was in Taiwan at the time. I didn't go to the ceremony.How did you feel about his activities growing up?I was never too sure what was going on. My mother had the intelligence of her father—in fact, she looked remarkably like him—but she was skeptical because she always felt that he was making all these big deals but wasn't looking out for his own family.What was your mom like?My mother was a smart woman. She went to Bryn Mawr during the Depression, but my grandfather refused to let her take a scholarship because it would signal he had no money. She worked full-time while in school and graduated near the top of her class. She was angry at him for making her life difficult for his own pride.My mother worked all her life. By the time I reached college, she was working at Harvard University, which was unusual for the time. She started as a secretary but eventually became the registrar in charge of all the records. When she died in 1978, the Harvard Crimson published a tribute saying she had been the most helpful person to many undergraduates.What did you want to become as a teenager?I wanted to be a baseball player. Yes, for a long time my life revolved around baseball. I thought I was pretty serious. Some time in college, I realized I wasn't going to become a major league baseball player, and I became much more interested in the life of the mind.“Rice Paddies”, and studying under John Fairbank at HarvardDid you think of Asia growing up?There was really almost nothing until I mentioned, in my sophomore year, when I was 19, beginning in 1958 as an undergraduate at Harvard studying with John Fairbank. No courses offered at high school that I could have gone to. Even at Harvard, the Chinese history class was almost all graduate students. Harvard undergraduates could take an introduction class to the history of East Asia, which included China, Japan, and Southeast Asia. Harvard students nicknamed this course “Rice Paddies.”That's the famous course by Fairbank and Reischauer. What was it like studying with those two legends?Well, they were both significant people in every way. Fairbank helped start the field of Chinese history in the United States. Reischauer certainly started studying Japanese history.In my first year, they had just finished a textbook for the Rice Patties course. It had not been published as a book yet, just a mimeograph form. They gave us these big books you had to carry around, like carrying one of those old store catalogues with hundreds of pages printed on one side. You would bring these things into class. One was called East Asia: The Great Tradition, and the other East Asia: The Modern Transformation.What was John Fairbank like as a person?Intimidating. He was a tall, bald man, always looking over his glasses at you. But he was charming and friendly, and if he sensed that you were interested in his field, he would do almost anything for you. He reached out to students in a way that few other faculty members did.“He was an academic entrepreneur and missionary for Chinese studies, and was creating the field of Chinese history in the United States. Before him, Chinese history didn't exist for most Americans to study.”And he had regular gatherings at his house.Yes. His house was a little yellow wooden house dating back to the 18th century, right in the middle of the campus. Harvard had given it to him, and every Thursday afternoon, anybody interested in China who was in Cambridge that day was invited. You never knew who you were going to meet. Fairbank was a kind of social secretary. When you walked in, he'd greet you with a handshake and then take you around to introduce you to some people. He did that all the time with people. He was an academic entrepreneur and missionary for Chinese studies and was creating the field of Chinese history in the United States. Before him, Chinese history didn't exist for most Americans to study. I always wanted to major in history. That subject appealed to me and was my strongest area of study. I took some American history and intellectual history classes, but the Chinese history class became the one that I really focused on. I couldn't tell you exactly why, but it was interesting to me. The more I read, the more I liked it. After that first Fairbank class, I signed up for the more intensive modern Chinese history class and whatever else Harvard had. I signed up for a Japanese history class, too. At the end of my senior year, John Kennedy named my professor Edwin Reischauer his ambassador to Tokyo. So, on my way to Taiwan as a Fulbright scholar, I stopped in Tokyo to meet Reischauer at the US Embassy, and two of Reischauer's grown children took me around Tokyo. I reported in Tokyo later in my career.Was Ezra Vogel working on Japan at the time?Yes, Ezra had. Ezra was in my Spanish class in the first year. He hadn't yet decided what he would focus on then. We sat next to each other. We were always personal friends even though he was a bit older. He was a nice man and became a professor later. I sat in the same classroom with several other older people who went on to teach about China, including Dorothy Borg. Even then, she had white hair. She worked for the Council on Foreign Relations in New York but was taking classes at Harvard. When I first went to China, she was still involved with China.So, from that group of Americans studying China at Harvard at that time, many went on to do things related to China, including Orville Schell, Andy Nathan and me. I did not know Perry Link while in Harvard.Many major figures in China studies today were at Harvard with you.Yale had Mary and Arthur Wright, but they were graduate students at Harvard with me and went on to become full professors at Yale. This must be because that was a place where Fairbank was an evangelical figure that people gravitated towards, and he was preaching this new faith of Chinese studies.From Pentagon Papers to VietnamWhat did you do after Harvard?I spent a year in Taiwan when I graduated. I wanted to stay, but Fairbank hurried me up to get back to graduate school.Did you listen to Fairbank?I was going to get my PhD at Harvard and teach Chinese history, but after five years, I became less interested in actually studying Chinese history.During the 1960s, the Vietnam War happened. Vietnam is kind of a cousin of China, so I started reading everything I could about Vietnam. I even started a course on Vietnam so that Harvard undergraduate and graduate students could learn about Vietnam.I got a fellowship to return to Taiwan to work on my dissertation about Hu Hanmin. At that time, many American GIs were coming to Taiwan on what we call R&R — “rest and recreation.” The U.S. government made a deal with the American military that anyone who served in Vietnam for a year had an automatic R&R, a paid week leave to go anywhere in Southeast Asia. Many chose Taiwan to chase pretty young Chinese girls. So, GIs would show up in Taiwan and didn't know what they were doing. I would see them on the street, go up and talk to them.I became more interested in Vietnam over time. A friend told me, “You're spending so much time reading newspapers about Vietnam, you should become a journalist.” It hadn't occurred to me. By chance, I met a correspondent from The Washington Post, Stanley Karnow, who was the Hong Kong correspondent for the Post and covered Vietnam for quite a while. He asked me to be his stringer, a part-time assistant. So I would send my story to him, but he'd never do anything with it.I was discouraged, and that's when I met Harrison Salisbury through my grandfather in Montreal. Salisbury asked me to send stories to The New York Times. I thought I was a traitor to my job with The Washington Post. But it wasn't really a job; it was in my imagination. When I sent Salisbury my first story, I received a cable from the foreign editor of The New York Times saying they had put my story on the front page and given me a byline. My parents at home in Cambridge, Massachusetts saw it that morning, and they wondered, what is Fox doing?” They thought I was working on my PhD dissertation.“Oh, that looked like our son there.”The story was about Chiang Kai-shek's son, Chiang Ching-kuo, who was becoming Chiang Kai-shek's successor. I wrote about how he was going about it. That was a good news story, so The New York Times sent me a message and said, “If you'd like to work for us, we'll be happy to take more stories.”So I started sending them stories once or twice a week, and after four or five months, they gave me a job offer in New York. That was just one of those lucky breaks. I guess The New York Times correspondent who made that initial contact with me, Harrison Salisbury, who had won several Pulitzer Prizes, must have seen something in me.What's your relationship with your editors over the years? Generally pretty good. They certainly intimidated me at the beginning. The person who actually hired me was the foreign editor at The New York Times, James Greenfield. When I returned to New York, it was New Year's Day, the end of 1971. James asked me about my training and asked me to spend the next couple of months sitting at the foreign desk to watch how they do things. I couldn't even write stories for a while; I just handed them the copy that came up. I later got promoted to news assistant and was asked to find something interesting and write one story a week. I wrote some stories about Asia for the newspaper. They wouldn't give me a byline at first as I wasn't a reporter. My first assignment was to Newark, New Jersey, which had gone through a series of terrible race riots in the late 1960s. I was going to be the correspondent in Newark.This was after they hired you and during those two years of training? Yes. One day, I was covering a story. The new mayor of Newark — the first black mayor of a major American city — called a meeting in city hall to see if he could stop the riots.He was trying to bring people together: white, black and Hispanic. Within ten seconds, everybody was having a fistfight. People were knocking each other out with the police and mayor in front of them. The mayor yelled at people to stop, and they still kept punching and hitting each other with big pieces of wood right in City Hall. And I was there. Two very large black men grabbed my arms behind my back. The nasty term for white people in those days was “honky”. They said, “What are you doing here, honky?” They began punching me in the stomach and hitting me in the head. I thought I was going to die right there before I finally broke free. I got to my office to send my story of the city hall by telephone across New York City. And they put that story on the front page.Your second front page at The New York Times. So the editor of The New York Times was a very intimidating man, Abe Rosenthal, a gifted correspondent who'd won several Pulitzer Prizes. He won a Pulitzer Prize in Poland and Germany. I got this message saying, “Mr. Rosenthal wants to see you in his office immediately.”I thought, “oh jeez I'm getting fired.” I just got beaten up in City Hall and they're going to fire me. So I walked in, and he said, “Fox, that was a really nice story.” He said, “you did a really good job on that story. We have another assignment for you. I want you to go over to the New York Hilton Hotel”, which was about ten blocks away.He told me that one of our correspondents, Neil Sheehan, had gotten a secret government document, the Pentagon Papers, which were boxes and boxes of government documents. Neil couldn't read all that by himself, so I had to go and read it with him. Besides, I knew about Asia. By that point, I had read as much as I could about Vietnam. I also knew Neil Sheen because I had helped him come to Harvard to give a talk about Vietnam while I was a graduate student. So we actually had a good relationship. I spent the next two months in Neil's hotel room reading documents, but two of us were not enough, so a third and eventually a fourth correspondent were brought in. Did you understand the risk you were taking working with the classifieds? You could be arrested. Right, yes. I had to tell my parents, “I can't tell you anything about what I'm doing.”When we finally started publishing, I wrote three of the seven installments, which was amazing because I was a junior person. Abe Rosenthal called me back into his office after we finished, and said, “Fox, you did a nice job on this, so we're sending you somewhere. We're sending you to Vietnam.” He said, “I want you to go immediately.” So I went from the Pentagon Papers to Saigon. That was a surprise. That was not where I wanted to go. In fact, what I really wanted was to go to cover China, but that would have meant Hong Kong. But Vietnam turned out to be fascinating. There was always something happening.Reporting on the frontlines in VietnamCan you talk about your Vietnam experience?It was an experience at many levels. Intellectually, it was seductive because there was so much going on, people getting shot every day. The only way to truly understand it was to be there.You could divide the correspondents into those who stayed in Saigon and those who went out to the field. I wanted to be in the field as much as possible. I spent time on Navy ships and even in a fighter plane, hitting what appeared to be factories.The GIs, or “grunts”, wanted to know what we wrote about them, and some would come to our office in Saigon. Sometimes they were angry. A few correspondents received threats, but we mostly had a good relationship. The more you were willing to go out into the field, the more respect you earned. I was out there from the beginning.Vietnam was more complicated than I initially thought. If you were strictly anti-war or pro-government, you missed the full picture.You had been against the war before. How did you feel once you were there?I was part of the anti-war movement and then found myself in the middle of the war. I got to know many ordinary Vietnamese who were actually happy to have Americans there because the communist soldiers would threaten to confiscate their property. Vietnam was more complicated than I initially thought. If you were strictly anti-war or pro-government, you missed the full picture.What was the relevance of the Pentagon Papers then?The Pentagon Papers showed that the U.S. government was deceiving the public, but we were also helping some people. It was more complex than the extreme positions made it seem.Were you at risk of being arrested for the Pentagon Papers?Possibly, yes. My name was on the case, but by that time, I was in Vietnam. I put it out of my mind.How long were you in Vietnam?I was in Vietnam from 1971 to 1975, with breaks in Japan. The New York Times didn't let anyone stay more than two years at a time because of the exhaustion of war. But I kept going back and stayed until the last day of the war in 1975 when I left on a helicopter to a Navy ship.I took the place of a brilliant female correspondent, Gloria Emerson. I inherited her apartment, and Vietnam was as exciting a place as it could be. There was always something to do, something to see, something that you shouldn't see but wanted to see. Vietnam was all that I talked about for four years. I stayed until the last day of the war, April 30th, 1975.Did you get hurt during the war?I was hit by mortar fragments and lost my hearing for almost a month. Once, I was left behind after the unit I accompanied ran into an ambush. I had to walk three hours to get back to safety.Vietnam absorbed all parts of your brain, your mind, your body, and your psyche. It just took over.How did the war experience change you?It depends on the individual. Some correspondents loved Vietnam and never wanted to leave. Others were terrified and left without a word. Even today, I still belong to an online Google group of ex-correspondents in Vietnam, and I still get dozens of messages every day. They always want to discuss Vietnam.Back in the day, some got afraid and just left. I had several friends who would literally just leave a message at their desk saying, “Please pack my belongings and send them back to New York.” It's hard to generalise and have an ironclad rule about. It was different from regular assignments in most other countries.Well, Vietnam was certainly special.Vietnam absorbed all parts of your brain, your mind, your body, and your psyche. It just took over. When the war ended, I came out on a helicopter that landed on a Navy ship. The captain said I could make one phone call. I called my editor in New York and said, “I'm out, I'm safe.” He replied, “Good, because we're sending you to Hong Kong.”Recommended ReadingsFox Butterfield, 1982, China: Alive in the Bitter SeaJohn Fairbank, Edwin Reischauer and Albert Craig, 1965, East Asia: The Modern Transformation, George Allen & UnwinEdwin Reischauer & John Fairbank, 1958, East Asia: The Great Tradition, Houghton MifflinAcknowledgementThis newsletter is edited by Caiwei Chen. The transcription and podcast editing is by Aorui Pi. I thank them for their support!About usPeking Hotel is a bilingual online publication that take you down memory lane of recent history in China and narrate China's reality through the personal tales of China experts. Through biweekly podcasts and newsletters, we present colourful first-person accounts of seasoned China experts. The project grew out of Leo's research at Hoover Institution where he collects oral history of prominent China watchers in the west. Peking Hotel is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.Lastly…We also have a Chinese-language Substack. It has been a privilege to speak to these thoughtful individuals and share their stories with you. The stories they share often remind me of what China used to be and what it is capable of becoming. I hope to publish more conversations like this one, so stay tuned!Correction note: An earlier version of this piece incorrectly referred to sinologists Mary and Henry Wright as "Fords." We thank reader Robert Kapp for bringing this to our attention. Get full access to Peking Hotel at pekinghotel.substack.com/subscribe

Today, Walt Robillard and I are giving you a sneak peek at a new project we've been working on. Give it a read (below), or a listen (Above), and check it out, and yeah, that's Walt's killer voice doing the narration.Hobo Recon:Hard Luck and TroublebyNick Cole and Walt RobillardChapter OneHobos in the Wind“This is why we can't have nice things, Troubs!” Hardy shouted across the cargo containers in the yard.            It'd been a while since he'd had to draw the heater, much less fire it. This wasn't the gun he'd normally shuck from beneath his worn patchwork “dirty” military jacket when things went south fast and desperate. The dialed-up M4.  This was definitely the shotty he used for tense negotiations with uncertain characters who harbored bad intentions.Bad intentions was everyday and everyone now days. In these times.He pulled that shotgun from under the coat where it dangled on a single point underarm sling as he ate up the miles and rode the rails. A model 870 SPS Marine Magnum he'd rattle-canned to look more used, weathered, subdued. On the road and the kinda gun a desperate man lookin' for work might use to protect himself in these lawless times. He'd save his sidearm for the real intense gunfights up close that needed more rounds on target. Less fiddling with the firearm when he wanted to put a hurt on someone. The double stack mag held enough, “go screw yerself,” forty-five caliber ACP. Usually good to get out of whatever scrape he and Trouble had gotten themselves into this time behind enemy lines and in service to SOCOM and the Heartland that was all that remained of the U.S.             Trouble—because it wasn't a middle name, it was really… who he was—Troubs had his head shoved into the open cargo container in the shipping yard, using his teeth to strip off the casing around a wire he was working. He had a multi-tool with wire strippers too. The ones all those old EOD guys carried back in the day on their rig and chest plate carriers in the wars in other places not the battleground they found themselves in now… America. Still America regardless of what all factions were involved and especially the ChiComs.The sudden appearance of a Chinese security agent had Trouble stripping wires with his teeth for expediency in order to, “get it done in one, son.”It didn't help that Hard Luck had been muttering that same phrase as he got ready to distribute some hate-spray from the barrel of the rattle-canned 870. Rattle-canned old BDU multicam because that was the way the world was now, and the lands they found themselves in, and was the camo of the day when they'd both started out as Eleven Bravo privates in the last days of the Old Cold War.Not the hot one now.            The unlucky and early security agent was currently dead behind where Trouble was kneeling, large caliber holes bleeding over his gray uniform and onto the wet pavement of the yard.            “Brah, that shot was like Mozart on a motorcycle. That's how we do it, my brother in combat arms!” Trouble quietly exclaimed as he twisted the end of the newly exposed wire, pumped his fist, and continued whatever Def Leppard song he was keeping time to, to get his EOD on like he'd always done. Then he pumped his fist again and bit his lip, hearing some searing unheard guitar solo from long ago. “Need me a little cover while I finish this last bit, Hardy.”            Hard Luck.            SFC James C. Hardy. SOCOM. Eighteen Bravo. Shoulda been a Master Sergeant before retirement. But he spent some unrated time doing dark stuff in uncertain places along the way for shadows that didn't want to come out into the light before America got sold out by those shadows and all that was left was SOCOM to defend the Heartland and give the Chinese and the rest a bad time. There was the 82nd too, even though they were stuck in the irradiated remains of Russian-occupied Poland and fighting for their lives living on dead horses and hate. The Marines held Sand Diego and were officially listed as insurrectionists and traitors, allies of Russia.            But that wasn't true. Not at all.            Eighteen Bravo.  The weapons sergeant within the Special Forces career field, employs conventional and unconventional warfare tactics and techniques in individual and small unit infantry operations. Employs individual domestic, foreign small arms, light and heavy crew-served weapons, anti-aircraft and anti-armor weapons. He is… a master of all weapons.            And don't ask about the Rangers and where they are in the mess we find ourselves in called America's Darkest Hours on a good day. All four Battalions were dead. As they say in SOCOM, “Ain't no Rangers here,” and then those that can, point to where they once rolled the scroll and wink. “They just on the fade.”               Hardy leaned into the shadows beside his own container he was covering from. No use standing in the same spot as his partner. The guy was either going to blow himself up or get trounced by the incoming security responding to the shots. Why risk both of them getting schwacked?            “You were supposed to wait,” Hardy muttered as he scanned the misty and wet dark.            “I was supposed to be a rock star,” Trouble responded, humming metal to himself as he cursed the wire he was working with. “Playing the axe at night; beach, beer, fish tacos by day. Maybe even charm my way to seeing a bikini hanging off the end of the bed post, ya know? Life comes at ya fast, Hardy, but don't worry… Trouble's my name and causin' it is my… game,” he whispered almost to himself as he continued to solve the problems in his hands.            SFC Stephen X. Bach. Eighteen Charlie.  SFC when he shoulda retired at least an E8 just a few years ago as things began to get truly weird and surreal and even the Army lost its mind and lowered standards, painted nails and even let some girls wear the Ranger Tab when no one who's actually earned one thinks they even got remotely close to meeting standard without a lotta help along the way.            Eighteen Charlie. Special Force engineer sergeants are specialists across a wide range of disciplines, from demolitions and constructions of field fortifications to topographic survey techniques.            Trouble was his tag with SOCOM, and it wasn't because he was cool. He caused it on mission more than effectively, on behalf of the teams, and didn't stop back behind the wire when it was generally not needed or in his own best interest.            So… Trouble had run his mouth about the general current state of affairs, and if he wasn't so highly decorated that some of his awards were redacted, and so competent at the delicate art of high explosives… then he might have found himself with an even lower rank and very little retirement in light of the various courts martial and articles of offense.            But he knew real bad guys in high places even there at the end of all things. And so, he'd gotten a chance to walk with some retirement and rank for the last six months of America.            “Then get it done, and don't be that guy,” Hardy growled. Trouble liked to talk it up when things were getting thick.And things were getting definitely thick.Like the song lyrics from long ago Trouble always had running… It was distracting. Not to mention, Trouble had a tendency to sip his own cool aid, or so Hardy thought. “Got more coming.”Matter of fact statement. No drama. It was about to be get-it-on-thirty in the midnight yard of bad decisions and insertion behind enemy lines with assets to deny and mayhem to be caused.            The sound of rushing boots thumping across the wet concrete was getting louder, as was the group barking loudly in Mandarin the way the Chinese do as they approached the x they had no idea they were walking onto. It was funny how the Chinese all ran the same way, or at least, that's how it sounded to Hardy. And it… bemused him. He was a thinker, and he'd never have used that ten-cent word on the teams. But in his mind, that and other words like it… they were there. He was a reader, and a thinker. And so, to Hard Luck all the Chinese seemed to have that same mincing pitter-patter run where they never really stepped it out like they were Usain Bolt intent on not just winning… but winning with icing. It was like watching that cartoon Martian run while trying to nab a, “P-32 ulidium space modulator!”            Or whatever it was.            Of course, the newer generation had no clue about good ol' Marvin, but that didn't mean it wasn't funny.            And…            “Sucks to be them,” exhaled Hard Luck and readied the shotty for sudden thunder.            The Chinese shouts changed to whispers as the pitter-patter running soldiers got to the container group close to the two operators. Hardy knew the trick. Direct the guys into the target, then shift to the radios to keep their opponents guessing as to what came next. Only, the two operators had seen this particular Chinese trick before, as this wasn't the first time he and Trouble had gone up against the Puffies.            Of course, their enemy didn't refer to themselves as Puffies because their units always went about with names to make them feel special. Hardy got the intel on these mooks a couple of weeks ago when Trouble blew up that cargo ship down in the gulf. They'd called themselves Thunder of the Gods and gay stuff like that. Because of course they did. And this was a reference to the People's Liberation Army Air Force's Airborne Brigade.            Which was who they were facing today. This was their operation area on the road to New Orleans.            Now, sounding all that out had been a mouthful for the various teams rolling out of the SRC, and instead of just shortening it to PLAAF, it came out like Puff. The few Puffies that Hardy's unit had managed to capture and talk to, got all sorts of mad about the slur. Which was great when they caught and released a few of them to spread the legend of the Special Reconnaissance Companies SOCOM had deployed into Occupied America. Get the rest of the Puffies all nervous about facing an invisible covert military force hiding in plain sight within the subjugated population.            Ghosts in the night in plain sight.            And deadly ghosts at that.            Some of the SRC teams had even conducted massacres that were simply bone-chilling so the Chinese could have their very own boogie men to be afraid of in the night.            What had Colonel Spear said when he created the Special Recon Teams for SOCOM as it waged its war out of what remained of North Carolina and the battle lines down in Georgia… "Now they will know why they are afraid of the dark. Now they learn why they fear the night."            One of the nerdy Green Berets, an 18 Delta, had told everyone that was a line from Conan the Barbarian. No one cared and all agreed it was as cool as it gets. And if there's anything Green Berets love… it's cool stuff that's super deadly. See the tats since ‘Nam for examples. Cobras, skulls, knives… women.            The Puffies had rightly guessed Trouble and Hardy would eventually come after this cargo depot along the gulf after they'd slagged that cargo ship. So, the Chinese high command out of New Orleans had deployed a company of PLAAF airborne forward in the hopes word would get out, and the “American GI special forces terrorists” prowling the Area of Operations North of New Orleans would come and enter the dragnet the PRC had thrown across much of the South and Southwest of what the maps once called the United States of America.They were anything but united.Most of the States that remained were fighting for themselves with what little was left of their veterans and National Guard. What was known as “Caliphistan” centered around the Midwest out of Michigan, was engaged in a brutal no-holds-barred plains war with the Chinese 3rd Army and being supplied and trained by SOCOM with what could be begged, borrowed, or stolen.California was behind enemy lines except for Marine-held San Diego and some warlord in Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, and parts of San Bernardino proclaiming an independent nation called Vanistan and being held by heavily armed and mobile militia.They had vans.            Hardy scanned the angles and shadows of the cargo containers past where Trouble was working.            Their night vision had been a step up from what he'd had when he'd been a regular grunt. The overhead lighting shining down on them from gantries and industrial light towers of the cargo yard situated around the cargo docks didn't even factor in to how these new NODs worked out in the dark. Running next gen night vision based on the ENVG-B—still in use—their gear just factored in the lighting and highlighted anything warmer than the surroundings. Complex motion tracking fed into augmented reality, highlighted potential targets and let the soldier see in complex low light conditions.            “Trubs,” Hardy said quietly into his throat mic. “Hooking out to get an angle on our new friends.”            “Gonna leave me here all by my lonesome,” Trouble joked. “You know… I'm afraid of the dark, right?”            “NODs and that red lens you're working ain't enough?” Hardy asked.            Trouble waved the flashlight in the direction of the incoming Puffies. “Seriously, come over here and hold my hand while I finish this. You know how I get.”            Hardy knew all too well, which is why he left his partner alone to finish his chore.            He slipped past several of the containers, then used a small stack of metal frames to vault himself to the top of the nearest CONEX. The cargo containers were the standard variety, so he had to move cautiously as he jumped, then crept across the top of the ribbed metal box. Walk too fast and he'd sound like he was pounding on a metal drum with each footstep. After jumping across several of the boxes, Hardy had a good line of sight to Trouble and several avenues of approach.            The operator leaned into the shadows against the cargo container stack, then removed his cell phone from the sleeve pocket of his patrol parka. Set to lowlight conditions, the EUD—End User Device—was loaded with the latest and greatest ATAK interface, allowing Hardy to act as a battlefield information hub. The screen was already pinging two angles of approach off the trip sensors Hardy had placed when they'd first snuck into the yard.            The fact they were coming at all worried the veteran operator. He scratched the few days' worth of stubble on his chin, trying to figure where they'd botched the insert and alerted this security detail tasked with holding the yards. The Chinese had their own version of EUDs, and if they ran something like the Android Team Awareness Kit, all it would've taken was for Hardy and Trouble to trip a sensor they'd missed, and the soldier responsible for the zone would have called it in.            Hardy shook his head, internally bashing himself for not being more careful. It's why they'd taken to calling him Hard Luck for his call-sign. Throughout his military career and now out in the Special Recon Companies, he'd never found a stretch of bad luck that didn't stick to him. And that included being partnered with Trouble.            That guy was bad luck personified.            Looking up from his EUD, Hardy saw the Chinese first fire team angling on the objective. A single soldier with three more behind him was trying to pie the corner as though this was the first time he'd done it for real. Hardy had to give the Asian kid credit though, he was sticking his QBZ-191 rifle around the corner, trusting the optic to broadcast whatever was past the CONEX to his night vision, so the soldier didn't have to stick his head in the open and get it blown off.            SOCOM's PsyOps guys had made sure all the illegal social media sites still operational were filled with GoPros of Chinese guys getting their heads blown off. Some of them were even real. AI made the rest.            Hard Luck, that internal monologue, that thinking machine he was, a thinking-killing machine who'd even had profound thoughts while running a belt fed two-forty in a hostile combat zone and laying some serious hate, that thinking machine he was always… wondered…            Warfare had gotten weird when advanced sighting devices operated on wireless link tech and rifles could see around corners.            It wasn't… fair. But when was war ever fair. He'd seen enough kids get talked into it only to end up lying in the tall grass by some road a few days later. Just where he'd left them.            No, there was nothing fair about war.            Now that it wasn't close quarters in the dark, he gently let the shotty slide back under his old “down and out in occupied America” hobo-coat and shucked the heater.            The heater.            It wasn't an issued weapon. There were very few issued-weapons for SOCOM, and all the kids and whoever would show up to get trained on them and sent out to die in any of the seven directions the heartland was being attacked from. Plus… shipping and transport weren't easy.            In the SRTs everything went on your back just like the old LRRP teams in Vietnam. And you looked like a hobo so you could pass with all the refugees, transients, and mad homeless displaced by the war, or just… whatever.            You looked like a hobo because you were… a hobo.            The heater was his own personal truck gun he'd dragged everywhere from Bragg to wherever he got stationed along the way.            Everything on it was his. Paid for by his salary. Just in case it hit the fan. Just in case he got invaded at home one night, wherever home happened to be between deployments. Honestly, he'd never thought he'd need it for what he was using it for now.            A domestic insurgency.            But he sure had built it to do the trick.            It was a Daniel Defense MK18 with a ten-inch threaded barrel he could go quiet with. He had jungle-mags ready to go and one stack in. Along the barrel he had illuminate and IR. He'd added a BCM foregrip and done some work with the internals to get it just where he wanted it to run. He had a match grade flat-trigger because that felt best for the tap. The optic was a basic Aimpoint T-1. It didn't look tactical-cool guy but if you knew you knew. The T1 was a great optic system if you needed to keep both eyes open and see everything while keeping the dot on target.            And in the SRTs, outnumbered, behind lines, running gun fights and using everything and being as aware as possible, wasn't just optimal or maximal… it was vital to continued birthday parties.            Hardy lined up his optic to target and let the heater bark. The first round caught the kid in the neck, splattering a good amount of the kid's blood across the CONEX's side panel. The assault took the trio behind the kid by surprise, forcing them to turn and instantly shoot in all directions except up because they weren't fighting Batman. Hardy covered behind the metal boxes, trusting their contents to bullet sponge enough of the bouncing rounds to keep him from getting accidentally blasted.            Then… leaning from cover, Hardy put a trio of shots that tore off the commie soldier's face, before transitioning to the third trooper in the stack. Then he sent more rounds sailing past the number three paratrooper's chin and behind the space at the top of his chest where the armor didn't cover.            And thinking-killing machine he was… he reflected that it was good “commie” was back in use as the dirty word it really was.            It was the truth.            And it was always good to stack them.                       The fourth Chinese paratrooper decided to run for it when he couldn't find the spot the shooting was coming from. In a show of solidarity, he grabbed the trooper who'd just soaked up rounds behind his chest plate, dragging the downed soldier to cover with him.            Probably thinking he was gonna get a medal someday for this.            Poor Schmoe, thought Hard Luck, guy didn't observe the first rule of combat first aid, and it was going to cost him. Now. Hardy lined up the optic dot to the soldier's hip, having already figured out the sight was probably off because he'd been shooting center mass but hitting high. The thinking but really killing machine part of his mind doing that math too… and then his suspicion got confirmed when the rounds punched into the spot on the Chinese soldier's back right behind and beneath his shoulder, once again where their PLA armor didn't cover.            The round tore into the kid's torso, punching him to the ground next to his friend he was gonna rescue and get a medal for, and twenty years after, they'd drink Tsing Taos and celebrate a ChiCom-dominated world they'd made happen, with their little part, and managed to survive as they watched their loud children shout, and their pretty wives dote over them.Now both PLA troopers gasped for air and coughed out blood-soaked ragged Chinese, definitely drawing all sorts of attention to the hate he'd laid on them.Now we wait, he thought.Killing Machine taking over in the night and the dark and the mist.            Hardy jumped across the space to the next set of containers, allowing him to get a better view of the opposite line of advance. “Trouble, how long, man?”            The radio broke squelch in the small earpiece he wore under his hood. “Hard Luck, this is Trouble, coming at you with all the classic rock your ears can swallow!”            Great, Hardy thought. Could this guy really not take anything seriously?            The operator pushed the toggle for his PTT and growled, “Trubs, how long?”            “Closing it up now,” Trouble said. “Moving to zone two, pushing out at the crane, toward the water.”            “Roger out,” Hardy said, cutting the comms.            They'd sand-tabled this. They'd done it many times without each other in other teams not this one and other days better than this. And together, lately, Hard Luck and Trouble were becoming known for this little act of behind the lines terrorism.            Miss USA on the Nightly Free America Broadcast has even noted them in the scramble codes sent to the military and operators as far behind lines as North Dakota and New Mexico where the Chinese ran their death camps night and day, and hope is just a voice in the night right now. Near the end of the broadcast. Her warm voice coming in clear.            “Chris… sleeps until dawn.”            “The number is forty-two.”            “And to all the patriots listening tonight out there in the dark… Our boys with the Raiders and the Packers thank two particular hobos for their roadside assistance at Route Twenty-Four with the Chinese Column moving in on Nashville that was causing many patriots in the area much Hard Luck and Trouble. The supplies are through, and the children have been evacuated back into the Homeland behind the Green Zone. Thank you, boys.”            Then…            “There's a match in Peterborough. No Slack in effect.”            And finally…            “That's the news for tonight, America. Stay in the fight. We aren't done yet. Good night. And now… The Star Spangled Banner. The lights are still on.”            Both men had listened in that night after a long and very hard day on the hump, sleeping in a wet ditch out near a county road. It was cold. They'd said nothing. In the dark a few minutes later, Trouble spoke. He was gonna take first watch as they faded off the hit, avoiding Chinese Air Cav Hunter killer teams that had been roaming the countryside in HINDs.“She sounds hot, Hardy. Like that girl on the White Snake video back in the day. Remember her?”“Yeah,” said Hard Luck with his poncho pulled over him and the shotty in one hand nearby on his pack. “I do.”Pause.Then…“Do you think she's hot? Miss USA.”Hard Luck was fading. Dreaming that dream he never told anyone about.But just before he'd fallen asleep, he said, “I think she's good, Trouble. And that's what makes her beautiful.”And then Trouble might have grunted or said, “Okay.” But Hard Luck had gone to that other world that didn't exist anymore. Yesterday, some call it.But that wasn't now. Now they were in the fight in the supply yard with the PLA airborne thinking they had them right where they wanted them, barking Mandarin radio chatter and thumping hard heavy too-short-step boots and even untargeted fire at ghosts and phantoms in the mist.They were conscripts after all. They were afraid. Afraid of the PRC. And now, down range and right near the boogie men… they were afraid of the hobos that had come for them.            Another fire team of Chinese paratroopers slowly advanced to the corner of the new row of containers Hardy now faced. They mimicked the first group of soldiers, sticking their rifles around the corner to let the optics assume the risk. When they dropped their field of view on the fire team dying across from them, they retreated from the corner and broke out in a heated conversation of harsh whispers.            Yeah, the operator could smell their fear.            Behind the dying paratroopers on the ground Hard Luck had put rounds on target into, a third fire team slowly advanced, careful not to get too close to the fatal CONEX corner. They fanned out, with the tail man in the stack launching a slick matte-black drone.            Hushing-hushing in the way of Chinese battle-speak.            That was smart of them, Hardy thought. Get some eyes in the air and cover the ground quickly to find their targets. What they didn't count on was Trouble sliding in behind them, running his knife out the front of the drone trooper's neck, starting from somewhere near his ear. The battlefield surgery was grizzly, wet work, but Trouble seemed to be totally cool with it, going so far as to gently lay the soldier down and relieve him of his drone controller even as his buddies, soon to be bodies, were eyes forward and fighting for the Fatherland or whatever the godless b******s believed in these days.            With a few deft taps on the screen, Trouble had a good grip on the flight mechanic and stepped back into the shadows, fading from the fire team of Chinese paratroopers. Hardy watched as his wingman sailed the drone across the cargo yard, dropping it in line with the enemy crew close to him. They froze in place, unsure of what to make of the machine hovering in front of them at eye level.            “Hard Luck, this is Trouble. If you wouldn't mind taking advantage of the little distraction I just created, I'd appreciate it.”            There were times when James “Hard Luck” Hardy really wanted to punch his partner straight up in the grill. They all paled in comparison to those times when Trouble just couldn't be serious about an operation. Times like now.            Hardy reached into his pack, pulling a grenade from where it was taped to the inside. He yanked the pin and let the spoon fly. After mentally ticking off a count of One Mississippi, the operator flicked the weapon over the CONEX boxes to land in the middle of the fire team.            The grenade rolled and then popped, its kinetic fury suddenly and obnoxiously ignoring the Chinese soldiers' armor and planting them onto the pavement in piles of ruined meat and shredded gear.To them it was sudden and brutal, and none of the Chinese propaganda about “a glorious war of liberation” matched their violent deaths. The close proximity to the cargo containers funneled some of the blast and over-pressure across the way, startling the final team of Chinese paratroopers on approach to where they thought their boogie men might be. This group stumbled backward behind the cover of the containers, suddenly shouting in their hushed and harsh speech pattern… only to come face to face with Trouble ready to take advantage of their surprise, as they'd retreated to where they thought they might be safe.Trouble's thoughts were synched to “Breakin' the Law” by Judas Priest as he assessed the funnel they'd been forced into. The funnel and area they'd chosen as… safe.“Ain't nowhere safe in America for you,” hissed the operator.            He muzzle-thumped the first man to see he was there, pushing the suppressed Berretta pistol into the soldier's throat. The paratrooper doubled over, coughing and holding his throat after the hit. Trouble lowered himself at the same time, using the stunned soldier as cover. Angling to the side, the predatory operator sent two rounds into the lower torso of the next guy in the stack, dropping him to the concrete. He lowered the pistol to the man recovering from the throat hit, sent a round through the top of the man's boot, then followed him through a series of pain-soaked hops as he tried to recover his balance.            This was a song.            Just like all the ones he'd learned on his guitar as a kid. And they were his sheet music as he moved them about in a fatal dance of lead and death at twenty-four hundred feet per second.            Seeing how quickly things had devolved into chaos, the last man ran into the intersection, probably hoping the smoke and noise of the grenade going off in the intersection would hide his escape. All it did was bring him into Hardy's sight picture, where the concealed operator put a single round into the soldier's leg, adjusting the aim on the scope he needed to re-zero next chance he got. The paratrooper tumbled into the stack of bodies from the first fire team to get murked, a bloody mess on the ground really, screaming as he pushed himself to his back and frantically whirled his rifle in any and all directions.            In a moment of clarity, the surviving para realized the nature of his injury. He expertly pulled a tourniquet from a pouch on his armor, then slid the contraption over his leg before tightening it down.            “Fàngxià nǐ de wǔqì!” Trouble hissed from around the corner. The man had hugged the shadows until he got in position, then slid from the dark holding a confiscated QBZ-191.            The Chinese soldier held his hands out wide at seeing his own style battle rifle pointed at him. He let the rifle slip from his fingers, while glaring daggers at Trouble coming in. As the dark and dirty man advanced, the paratrooper used his good leg to push himself against the other bodies and prop up to a sitting position.            Trouble looked the part of a hobo riding the rails. He had an old-style military trench coat over a hoodie covering his normally unkempt hair. His beard was wispy, with patches of hair not growing in for some reason or another. His dirty military-style civilian pants seemed to have as many stains as they did pockets, lending credence to looking like someone who slept among the garbage. Trouble advanced on a set of well-worn high-top sneakers, complete with the Velcro strap at the top, a look no kid on either side of the Chinese militarized zone would be caught dead wearing.            He got a few yards from the downed soldier, then repeated, “Move the weapon away,” in Chinese. He spoke with the inflection and tone of someone who knew the language intimately, although he'd never be truly taken as a native speaker.            Trouble hovered over the man, both staring at each other over the sound of the paratrooper breathing rapidly after being badly wounded. The man flinched, and Trouble sent a single round center mass of the downed soldier's face. He immediately brought the carbine in line with the hopping foot injury guy, finishing him off with a series of quick staccato shots administered with cold brutality and efficiency.            Weapon up.            Bang bang bang.            Weapon low and ready, scanning dark eyes for who else wants to die next.            “You good?” Hardy asked over the net in the silence that followed.            “Yeah. Guy on his butt was gonna try for the grenade he had on his kit. No sense in both of us dying.”            “Give me a minute to scoop up their EUDs. Maybe the I&R guys can pull something off them,” Hardy said.            “I'll scoop some of these rifles and this sweet, sweet ammo, my brother-man,” Trouble said, holding the Chinese carbine. “Might as well take their NODs too. Haul like this and we could be into some serious cash if we sell it all at the general store.”            “I'll help you take some of it,” Hardy said as they both fell into the work of battlefield scavenging and asset management. “But hey, I ain't carrying a backpack full of rifles looking like a walking Middle East bazaar.”            Trouble laughed and made a cat's low owwwwwwww like he was some rock singer hamming it up just before the bridge in some long-lost metal anthem.            “Recycled due to lack of motivation,” announced Trouble. Both had been graduates of the Darby Queen and Robert Rogers school for wayward boys.            Hardy had already grabbed several of the soldiers' battle boards when his own piped off from inside his jacket.Hardy checked the sitrep from the observers. Then… “Hey. More troops coming in. Gotta rabbit.”            “But, but, all the gear,” whined Trouble. “I can do some stuff with this, Brother.”            “Fine,” Hardy quipped. “You stay and get all the shwag. I'm avoiding the Chinese infantry platoon and jumping back into the water. Discuss division of assets with them and whatever indirect and air support that's all hot and bothered right now at oh-two hundred.”            Trouble scooped up a few more rifles, then fell in step with his partner, catching up swiftly, eyes roving across all sectors each knew was their own. In moments consumed by fog and shadows, just two down and out tramps on the hump to the next refugee camp, work-gang project, handout, UN FEMA camp for indoc and digital ID assignment.Just two shadows in the night.“Time to get wet,” muttered one. “Well, when you put it like that,” hissed the other, each laboring under a huge pack, stepping it out like they were late for a better tomorrow that might just happen. “I am a bit swampy after all that work we just did. Maybe the right thing here is a nice dip in the ocean to cool a man off. Even if it is late.”Sirens began to sound in the distance. Doomsday and mournful. The music of a fallen America.A gunship could be heard in the swamps to the west. Coming in fast. Its echo thundering and reverberating off the bayous and swampy hills.“Got some blood on my hands.”“Bummer, dude.”And then they were gone.For those that wanna buy us a coffee until the next chapter drops. Thank you.CTRL ALT Revolt! is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. We love the SOCOM M1 “The B*****d” because it sure shoots like one. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit nickcole.substack.com/subscribe

He was known as ‘the mayor of Rome' – and he was such a great player that later in his career the great Pele would go on to say that he was the best player in the 1982 World Cup. But Bruno Conti had a very humble start – his home village of Nettuno was actually known as the baseball capital of Italy. It was the site of a major US Naval Base during World War 2 – and the Italian boys would watch in fascination as the American GI's would play baseball on the beach. Eventually they started to teach the locals and a small league formed. Bruno was so good as a lefty pitcher that he was scouted by – and offered a trial with the NY Yankees – which would be the right team for an Italian – being the club of: Joe DiMaggio and Yogi Berra. But he chose soccer and became a legend of both club and country. I met him at his AS Roma facility where he could not have been nicer. It was a real honor to sit with the man and hear his storied career. I hope you find it as interesting as I did – SoccerPod #19 – the great Bruno Conti. Thanks for listening! We appreciate your support. If you love SoccerPod, please consider supporting us through our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/soccerpodBy subscribing to our Patreon, you get behind-the-scenes content, discounts on merchandise and the opportunity to submit questions for future guests. Connect with us on social:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/soccer.pod/Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/soccerpodTwitter: https://twitter.com/SoccerPod1YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@soccerPod-go5vx

In this episode of Quickfire, we take a lighthearted look at one of World War II's most bizarre moments: The Battle of Castle Itter. Picture this—a ragtag group featuring Nazis fighting against their fellow Nazis, American GIs, a French tennis champion, and a tank affectionately dubbed Besotted Jenny, all banding together to defend an ancient Austrian castle. Tune in as Alex and I wander through this wild and weird chapter of history. Help support the show on Patreon! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In Japan, they are known as "children of mixed blood": those born after 1945 to an American GI and a Japanese woman and abandoned due to stigma. Eighty years after the end of World War II, we went to meet some of these orphans to understand more about their painful past.

This week on The Bulletin, Russell Moore and Clarissa Moll welcome Michael Wear back to the show to discuss the GOP's response to the guilty verdict for former president Donald Trump. Then, historian Kurt Piehler joins to acknowledge the 80th anniversary of D-Day and how WWII affected the Greatest Generation–who are quickly dwindling. Finally, we turn our eyes to the hunger crisis in Sudan amid a violent internal conflict, and ask Eugene Cho how might Christians respond to the need. Today's Guests: Michael Wear is the Founder, President and CEO of the Center for Christianity and Public Life, a nonpartisan, nonprofit institution based in the nation's capital with the mission to contend for the credibility of Christian resources in public life, for the public good. Michael is the author of The Spirit of Our Politics: Spiritual Formation and the Renovation of Public Life.  Kurt Piehler is a specialist in U.S. History with an emphasis on the Twentieth Century. Piehler is author of A Religious History of the American GI in World War II. As founding director (1994-1998) of the Rutgers Oral History Archives of World War II, Piehler conducted over 200 interviews with veterans of this conflict. His televised lecture, "The War That Transformed a Generation," which drew on the Rutgers Oral History Archives, appeared on the History Channel in 1997. Rev. Eugene Cho is President/CEO of Bread for the World, a Christian advocacy organization urging U.S. decision makers to do all they can to pursue a world without hunger. Eugene is Co-Chair of the U.S. Nutrition CEO Council, the body of leaders from international NGOs encouraging the U.S. government, civil society, corporations, and other stakeholders to make global nutrition expertise into law and policy. Prior to becoming President/CEO of Bread for the World, Eugene pastored a local church for nearly thirty years. He is also founder and visionary of One Day's Wages. “The Bulletin” is a production of Christianity Today Producer: Clarissa Moll Associate Producer: Leslie Thompson Editing and Mix: TJ Hester Music: Dan Phelps Executive Producers: Erik Petrik and Mike Cosper Senior Producer: Matt Stevens Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Please note that this episode contains explicit language.On the 29th of May, 1944, less than a week before D-Day, General George S. Patton gave a rip-roaring speech to the First US Army Group. He spoke of the indomitable American spirit and the fear that his men would inspire in their enemies. He'd given this expletive-riddled address dozens of times, and American GIs loved him for it. But this time, there was a catch; the army he was addressing did not actually exist.Dan is joined by Taylor Downing, a historian, writer and author of 'The Army That Never Was: D-Day and the Great Deception'. Taylor takes us through this remarkable deception operation, without which D-Day may have gone very differently.Produced by James Hickmann and edited by Dougal Patmore.Enjoy unlimited access to award-winning original documentaries that are released weekly and AD-FREE podcasts. Get a subscription for £1 per month for 3 months with code DANSNOW - sign up at https://historyhit.com/subscription/.We'd love to hear from you - what do you want to hear an episode on? You can email the podcast at ds.hh@historyhit.com.You can take part in our listener survey here.

When the Trump administration's policy of separating families at the country's borders was announced, opposition from the public and the legal community was swift. The outcry and judicial decisions led to a reversal of the administration's stated policy. But detention and family separation have a long history in this country, history professor Ana Raquel Minian says. Minian, who immigrated from Mexico to the United States right before the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, has made an academic career studying immigration, incarceration and detention. As a young adult, Minian followed the news of Guantanamo Bay Naval Base being used to detain people who might be connected to those attacks. But in researching their new book, In the Shadow of Liberty: The Invisible History of Immigrant Detention in the United States, Minian discovered the base was first used as a detention center under President George H.W. Bush to hold Haitian refugees. Minian uses the personal experiences of four immigrants to walk readers through the history of immigrant detention in the United States: Fu Chi Hao, a Chinese Christian attempting to escape the Boxer Rebellion in 1901; Holocaust survivor Ellen Knauff, a war bride of an American GI who arrived at Ellis Island in 1948; Gerardo Mansur, a Cuban who joined the Mariel boat lift in 1979; and Fernando Arredondo, a Guatamalan asylum seeker who was separated from his daughter by border officials in 2018.  In this episode of The Modern Law Library, Minian shares details of these stories with the ABA Journal's Lee Rawles. They also discuss the shifting motivations behind changes in the immigration system, parole versus detention, and how attorneys can help immigrants currently in detention.

When the Trump administration's policy of separating families at the country's borders was announced, opposition from the public and the legal community was swift. The outcry and judicial decisions led to a reversal of the administration's stated policy. But detention and family separation have a long history in this country, history professor Ana Raquel Minian says. Minian, who immigrated from Mexico to the United States right before the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, has made an academic career studying immigration, incarceration and detention. As a young adult, Minian followed the news of Guantanamo Bay Naval Base being used to detain people who might be connected to those attacks. But in researching their new book, In the Shadow of Liberty: The Invisible History of Immigrant Detention in the United States, Minian discovered the base was first used as a detention center under President George H.W. Bush to hold Haitian refugees. Minian uses the personal experiences of four immigrants to walk readers through the history of immigrant detention in the United States: Fu Chi Hao, a Chinese Christian attempting to escape the Boxer Rebellion in 1901; Holocaust survivor Ellen Knauff, a war bride of an American GI who arrived at Ellis Island in 1948; Gerardo Mansur, a Cuban who joined the Mariel boat lift in 1979; and Fernando Arredondo, a Guatamalan asylum seeker who was separated from his daughter by border officials in 2018.  In this episode of The Modern Law Library, Minian shares details of these stories with the ABA Journal's Lee Rawles. They also discuss the shifting motivations behind changes in the immigration system, parole versus detention, and how attorneys can help immigrants currently in detention.

When the Trump administration's policy of separating families at the country's borders was announced, opposition from the public and the legal community was swift. The outcry and judicial decisions led to a reversal of the administration's stated policy. But detention and family separation have a long history in this country, history professor Ana Raquel Minian says. Minian, who immigrated from Mexico to the United States right before the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, has made an academic career studying immigration, incarceration and detention. As a young adult, Minian followed the news of Guantanamo Bay Naval Base being used to detain people who might be connected to those attacks. But in researching their new book, In the Shadow of Liberty: The Invisible History of Immigrant Detention in the United States, Minian discovered the base was first used as a detention center under President George H.W. Bush to hold Haitian refugees. Minian uses the personal experiences of four immigrants to walk readers through the history of immigrant detention in the United States: Fu Chi Hao, a Chinese Christian attempting to escape the Boxer Rebellion in 1901; Holocaust survivor Ellen Knauff, a war bride of an American GI who arrived at Ellis Island in 1948; Gerardo Mansur, a Cuban who joined the Mariel boat lift in 1979; and Fernando Arredondo, a Guatamalan asylum seeker who was separated from his daughter by border officials in 2018.  In this episode of The Modern Law Library, Minian shares details of these stories with the ABA Journal's Lee Rawles. They also discuss the shifting motivations behind changes in the immigration system, parole versus detention, and how attorneys can help immigrants currently in detention.

Intellectual Honesty comes at a premium.  Our two profiles today prove that a lack thereof can only lead to doom.  Country Joe West let's it be known that there is but one of him, and we learn that this truly is Angel's world, and we are just living in it.  Nissan Rogues, Dusty Rhodes, the American GI, Jesus, and Adrenochrome all on this episode of The Whole Ballgame. Watch Angel's biggest fuckups along with us here: https://youtu.be/hxUlkZYNPgw?si=lD6FmzRtmZQmjDy7Email us: thewholeballgame@mail.comHead to the website: www.thewholeballgame.comFollow on Twitter/X : www.x.com/wholeballgame

“The story of the American GIs' opposing the war was very deeply buried under the mythology of an antiwar movement that hated soldiers–that spat on them when they came home… […] The post David Zeiger on “Sir! No Sir!” appeared first on WORT-FM 89.9.

Today's special Leap Year guest is World War II social historian and oral history advocate G. Kurt Piehler. Kurt is the Director of the Institute on World War II and the Human Experience at Florida State University. He has held academic appointments at the City University of New York and Drew University, and was the founding director of the Rutgers Oral History Archives and served as Director of the Center for the Study of War and Society at the University of Tennessee. He was a Fulbright Lecturer in American Studies at Kobe University and Kyoto University and served as a National Historical Publications and Records Commission Fellow in Historical Editing at the Peale Family Papers in the Smithsonian Institution's National Portrait Gallery (that's a mouthful!). Kurt earned his BA in History at Drew University before taking an MA and PhD at Rutgers. Kurt is the author of A Religious History of the American GI in World War II (Nebraska), Remembering War the American Way (Smithsonian Institution Press) and World War II (Greenwood), which is part of the American Soldiers' Lives series. He edited the Encyclopedia of Military Science (2013) and The United States in World War II: A Documentary Reader (Wiley-Blackwell). He has co-edited at least five volumes, including the Oxford Handbook of World War II. Kurt is the series editor of Fordham University Press' World War II: The Global, Human, Ethical Dimension series and the Legacies of War series at the University of Tennessee Press. He is on the advisory board of the NEH-funded American Soldier Project at Virginia Tech University (Shoutout to GFOP Ed Gitre!) and a member of the editorial board of the Service Newspapers of World War II digital publication. Kurt is an active member of the Society for Military History, and he organized the 2003 annual meeting in Knoxville, Tennessee, and the 2017 conference in Jacksonville, Florida (seriously, he did that TWICE!). Join us for a fun and fascinating chat with the very affable Kurt Piehler. We'll talk fun shirts, Fresh Meadows, congressional internships, Pink Martini, oral history and veterans' stories, and John le Carré novels, among many other topics. This is a good one (as they all are!)! Special Discount for our listeners from the University Press of Kansas - 30% off any book purchase! Use discount code 24MILPEOPLE at the ⁠UPK website⁠! Rec.: 02/29/2024

In this very special Primo episode, Jesse and Katie discuss Aella's very happy birthday party and the self-immolation of an American GI. “U.S. Airman's Winding Path Ended in Self-Immolation to Protest Israel”Aaron Bushnell's RedditShadi Hamid: “How can one suicide protest be heroic and another crazy?”Jesse: “Awareness is Overrated” To hear more, visit www.blockedandreported.org

Last time we spoke about the fall of Shaggy Ridge, some hardcore patrolling on New Britain and major planning for the invasion of the Marshalls. The Australians seized the Kankeiri saddle, the Prothero's, Crater Hill and countless other features until finally at last the Japanese had been dislodged from the area. Meanwhile over on New Britain, the Americans were expanding their perimeter and unleashing wave after wave of patrols, trying to figure out where the Japanese were concentrating. It was tireless work, without any good maps in a horribly difficult climate with menacing terrain. The commanders of the central, south and southwest pacific all met to finalize big plans, that would now involved the invasion of the Marshall islands. It seems Dougey boy MacArthur was delivered some setbacks for his grand advance to the Philippines, as the Central Pacific was stealing the drivers seat.  This episode is Operation Flintlock: The Invasion of the Marshalls  Welcome to the Pacific War Podcast Week by Week, I am your dutiful host Craig Watson. But, before we start I want to also remind you this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Perhaps you want to learn more about world war two? Kings and Generals have an assortment of episodes on world war two and much more  so go give them a look over on Youtube. So please subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry for some more history related content, over on my channel, the Pacific War Channel you can find a few videos all the way from the Opium Wars of the 1800's until the end of the Pacific War in 1945.  In spite of General Douglas MacArthur's attempted hijacking of the strategic control over the Pacific campaign, by trying to have the US Navy's Central Pacific campaign pretty much aborted, it did not pan out. MacArthur had made multiple arguments against their Central plans, stating Nimitz choice of route was “time consuming and expensive in our naval power and shipping” which was really a self-serving argument flying in the face of actual evidence. MacArthur pointed out all the problems faced during the invasion of Tarawa, such as the high casualty rates. The Marines had jumped 2500 miles from New Zealand to hit Tarawa at the cost of 4 days of fighting. Yet Australian soldiers and American GI's would take nearly a year and a half, through nearly continuously fighting to make the 300 mile journey from Port Moresby to Madang. Operation Cartwheel proved to be extremely laborious, time consuming and costly in terms of materials and men. But from MacArthur's point of view the lives lost were largely Australian and perhaps as some Historians might point out “were politically expendable to a person like MacArthur”. Kind of a hit point to make, that one came from Francis Pike's Hirohito's War, go after him not me folks. It was also self evident the supply lines of ships from the west coast of the US to Nimitz Pacific fleet and their Marines, some 5000 or so miles from San Diego to Kwajalein atoll, was shorter than the long route going from the US west coast to Australia then to New Guinea, a colossal 9108 mile trip. By mid 1943 the supply line to MacArthur was nearly double that of Nimitz in distance with increased dangers of IJN submarines prowling about, though as I have said numerous times, the IJN only really figured out the capability of merchant hitting in the late years of the war.  Well in spite of all of that MacArthur gave Brigadier-General Frederick Osborn and MacArthurs trusty lackey Sutherland going to Washington to fight on his behalf against the Joint Chiefs of Staff, they elected to commit themselves to the Central Pacific thrust. It had been a strategic decision based on logistical and strategy…well logic? The 1943 Cairo conference ended just as Tarawa was captured, thus driving the nail in the coffin so to say. The next target on the way to the Marianas was thus the Marshall islands, way back in the old days they were property of the German empire, that Japan had stolen with ease. Ever since 1938, the Japanese banned any non Japanese ships from the region, thus US intelligence was pretty lax on them. MAGIC intercepts began to give clues as to how the Japanese deployed their troops on the Marshall islands however. This led the allied war planners to leave some “to wither on the vine” like Wotje. It was decided the main target would be Kwajalein. The 380 mile lagoon made it one of the largest in the world, quite beautiful also. Some like Rear Admiral Turner, questioned the risks of going straight into the heart of the Marshall islands, calling the move “too aggressive and dangerous and reckless!” But Nimitz and Spruance were adamant, well this was before Tarawa. The bitter lessons learnt on Tarawa prompted Spruance to determine that “Kwajalein would be struck with violent, overwhelming force and swiftly applied”. For the invasion of the Marshalls, codenamed Operation Flintlock, the first phase was to be the capture of Kwajalein, earmarked by General Corlett's 7th division against the southern group of islands in the atoll that included Kawjalein. General Schmidt's 4th marine division would capture Roi-Namur and the northern islands in the atoll. Furthermore prior to these attacks, Colonel Sheldon's Sundance Landing Force would hit Majuro Atoll. Because of the experiences gained during the invasion of the Gilberts, a far greater quantity and variety of amphibious equipment had been made available to the Central Pacific forces. Now the attack force commanders would not have to rely on the faulty communications systems of battleships to maintain proper radio liaison between ship and shore and ship and air. Two newly constructed headquarters ships, each equipped with the latest developments in radio and radar gear and unburdened by gunfire support duties, were provided for the operation. Several improvements were also made in the techniques of softening up the enemy defenses before the first troops touched shore. The US Navy changed their bombardment tactics based on the experience at Tarawa and now used armor piercing shells and fired from closer ranges. These all added would increase the quantity and accuracy of firepower to be delivered before the invasion. To provide a last-minute saturation of the beaches, two new, or rather modified, forms of older types of amphibious equipment were also introduced. The first of these was the amphibian tank LVT-A, which was just the standard amphibian tractor equipped with extra armor plating and mounting a 37-mm gun housed in a turret. The second was the LCI gunboat, an LCI converted into a gunboat by the addition of three 40-mm guns and banks of 4.5-inch rocket launchers.  Admiral Turner's plan called for extensive pre-landing bombardment both from surface ships and from aircraft. Most of the Marshall's airfields had been successfully neutralized by Admiral Hoover's aircraft over the prior months. To complete preliminary operations, Admiral Mitschers Fast Carrier force launched a heavy strike on January 29 and 30th. On the 30th, eight of Mitschers battleships, accompanied by about a dozen destroyers, were to deliver a dawn bombardment against Kwajalein Island and Roi-Namur. The object was to destroy aircraft, coast defense guns, and personnel, and to render the airfields temporarily useless. At the same time, two advance units of cruisers and destroyers from Turner's task force were to bombard the airfields at Wotje and Maloelap. These dawn bombardments were to be followed by air strikes against each of the objectives. After the strikes were completed the surface ships would again take up the bombardment and maintain a steady fire until about noon. Then on the 31st, initial landings would begin against Carlson (Enubuj), lying  northwest of Kwajalein Island; Ivan (Mellu) and Jacob (Ennuebing) Islands, lying southwest of Roi-Namur. For southern Kwajalein, three other small islands in addition to Carlson were to be captured during the preparatory phase of the operation. These were Carlos (Ennylabegan), Carter (Gea), and Cecil (Ninni) Islands, all lying north of Carlson. On some of these islands artillery could be emplaced for the main assault. On February 1st, battleships, cruisers and destroyers would conduct a monster bombardment in support of the main landings and air strikes would begin 45 minutes before the men hit the beaches. There would be a cease to the carnage 25 minutes before to allow the smaller islands to deploy their artillery to help support the main assault. With this tremendous bombardment by aircraft, surface ships, and artillery, all to be executed before the first troops hit the shore line, it was hoped that the bitter experience of Tarawa would not be repeated. For the attack on Kwajalein Island, Corlett decided to land on a narrow front on the beaches at the western extremity, as the reef and surf conditions were more favorable there. He had at his disposal 79 amphibian tanks and 95 amphibian tractors that would transport the first 4 waves to hit the southern beaches. The first with great secrecy would be a pre-dawn landing against Carter and Cecil islands, by one platoon of the 7th Cavalry Reconnaissance Troop. The reconnaissance troop was embarked on two high-speed transports (APD's), along with two platoons of Company B, 111th Infantry. After this the 17th regiment led by Col. Wayne C. Zimmerman would land on Carlos and Carlson islands. The 1st Battalion, 17th Infantry, would hit Carlos while the 2nd Battalion, 17th Infantry, hit Carlson. The 3rd Battalion, 17th Infantry was to be held in reserve, ready to go to the aid of either landing team. While the capture of Carlson Island was in progress, the division artillery, loaded for the most part on amphibious trucks, was to debark and proceed to a rendezvous area offshore. Upon a signal from the commander of the Carlson landing force, the guns were to be moved ashore and into position. This was all done to secure General Arnold's artillery, whom on the night of the D-day along the 145th field artillery battalions would deliver interdictory fire from Carlson on all the principal fortified areas of Kwajalein Island and place counter-battery fire on any enemy artillery that might be emplaced on Burton. They were also to fire general support missions for the infantry. Finally, the 184th on the left and 32nd Regiment on the right would land abreast and advance up the axis of the island. If things looked like they were going well enough and the reserve 17th regiment would not be necessary, they would instead capture the remaining islands of Beverly (South Gugegwe), Berlin (North Gugegwe), Benson, and Bennett (Bigej) Islands in the eastern chain. There was a hell of a lot of fire power they would face as well. On Kwajalein, 4 12.7-cm, dual-purpose twin-mount guns were divided into batteries of 2, one located at each end of the island. Each battery was protected by 7.7-mm. and 13-mm. machine guns along the nearby beaches. Near each gun were 2 150-cm. searchlights. In addition, the northern end of the island was guarded by a twin-mount dual-purpose 13-mm machine gun on the lagoon shore. Several 7.7-mm. machine guns were in position on the western end and other heavy machine guns were scattered about the center of the island, some mounted on wooden sleds for easy movement to critical points. On the ocean shore were 6 8-cm. dual-purpose guns, divided into 2 batteries of 3 guns each. One battery was east of the tank ditch and the other was opposite the center of the airfield. The first had a 360-degree traverse and could fire either to seaward or landward. The other formed the nucleus of a strongpoint composed of a semicircle of rifle pits facing the beach supported by one heavy and one 13-mm. machine gun, and also included an observation tower, a range finder, and a 110-cm. searchlight. 2 other 8-cm. guns were in position on the lagoon shore, and the blockhouse on the main pier (Nob Pier), which jutted out into the lagoon near the northern tip of the island, had a 13-mm. dual-purpose gun on its roof and firing ports on the ground floor allowing machine guns to fire in all directions. For the attack on Roi-Namur, Schmidt's 1st phase was to capture the 5 islets near Roi-Namur. The Ivan Landing Group was commanded by Brig. General James L. Underhill, consisting of the 25th Marines under Col. Samuel C. Cumming; the 14th Marines Artillery and Company D of the 4th Tank Battalion. They would seize Jacon and Ivan islands to allow the 3rd and 4th Battalions of the 14th Marine Regiment artillery to deploy. Then they would hit Albert, Allen and Abraham islands where the 1st and 2nd Battalions of the 14th Marine Regiment artillery would deploy. For the main landings Schmidt chose to perform a orthodox amphibious maneuver, simply landing two regiments abreast on a broad front over the lagoon shore. The 23rd marines would hit Roi's red beach 2 and 3 and the 24th marines would hit Namur's Green beaches 1 and 2. The 3rd and final phase would see the capture of the remaining islands in the northern Kwajaleins.  Now that was all for the Americans, but what about the defenders? Admiral Akiyama had recently been reinforced with a number of IJA units such as the 3rd South Sea Garrison from Wake; the 1st South Seas detachment from Mille and Jaluit and the 1st Amphibious mobile brigade from Eniwetok. The reinforcements were deployed mostly on the periphery, as Kwajalien, Jaluit, Maloelap and Wotje had sizable naval garrisons already. The hub of the Japanese military in the Marshalls was at Kwajalein and its main air base at Roi. If you pull out a map, which I do hope many of you do during this entire podcast series haha, especially for Burma it gets really confusing, trust me I know your pain. You can see Kwajalein lies far to the west, with Jaluit, Mille, Maloelap and Wotje kind of acting as buffers. If you were a Japanese commander you would most likely assume any invasion attempt would hit outer islands first and leave Kwajalein as the last one. A quote from one commander, Chikataka Nakajima makes this point "There was divided opinion as to whether you would land at Jaluit or Mille. Some thought you would land on Wotje but there were few who thought you would go right to the heart of the Marshalls and take Kwajalein.” The three most heavily defended islands were Roi-Namur, Kwajalein and Burton in that order of strength. The defenses of Roi-Namur were organized around a series of seven strong points, 4 on Roi and 3 on Namur, all on the ocean side. Starting from the southwest tip of Roi, the first was located along the southern shore of the west coast. The second and third were to the south and north of the northwest taxi circle. The fourth was on both sides of the wire and stone barriers next to the northeast taxi circle. The fifth, sixth, and seventh were on the northwest, north, and east tips of Namur, respectively. From the lagoon side the approaches were covered mostly by nothing heavier than 7.7-mm. machine guns. Wire entanglements were found at two points—on the beach around the northeast taxi circle on Roi, and on the narrow bit of land connecting Roi with Namur. The beach around the northeast taxi circle also boasted a tank obstacle in the form of large rocks jutting out of a rock wall. Anti-tank ditches had been dug throughout the two islands. On Kwajalein, there was a concrete sea wall along most of the ocean shore and around the northern and western ends of the island. The section at the northern end had posts set into it, probably to act as a tank barricade. East of the area cleared for the airfield was a tank ditch extending halfway across the island, and three smaller tank ditches ran between the ocean shore and the road in the vicinity of the airfield. The lagoon shore was protected by a two-strand barbed-wire fence at the water's edge. The large tank ditch was supported by trenches, rifle pits, and machine guns. At this point in the war, the Japanese tactical doctrine still stressed beach-line defense that would hinder a proper defense in depth. The Japanese doctrine to fortify beaches would gradually change as a result of the Gilbert-Marshall campaign. IJA General HQ research groups abandoned beach defenses for internal defenses to thwart naval and aerial bombardments, but also to favor concealed positions to thwart flamethrower and grenade attacks. Actually to side track just a bit, there is a book I rather like “The Battle for Okinawa” by Colonel Hiromichi Yahara. If you are interested in how some of the Japanese commanders decided to change to defense in depth, Colonel Yahara was a good case study and the book is interesting. Akiyama had roughly 5000 men on Kwajalein. 930 of these were IJA units, the 1st Company, 3rd Mobile Battalion, plus 2nd and 4th Companies of the 2nd Mobile Battalion of the 1st Amphibious Mobile Brigade. The IJA forces were led by Colonel Asu Tarokichi, commander of the 2nd Mobile Battalion. There also was 250 SNLF of the Yokosuka 4th; 1150 naval troops from the 61st Guard Unit and Akiyama's headquarters. The rest were not considered combat effective, mostly comprising laborers and logistical units. Most of these units were at Kwajalein itself, with some 345 troops and over 2000 air personnel of the 24th Air Flotilla at Roi-Namur. Three lookout stations were also established on Bennett, Carter and Carlos Islands while an air unit of the 952nd and 160 men defended Burton. By January 20th, all the preparations were complete in the Hawaiian islands for the grand invasion of the Marshalls. 2 days later, the task forces departed. At dawn on the 29th, the 4 task groups of Task Force 58 and the Neutralization Group arrived to their first assembly positions Aircraft carriers Enterprise, Yorktown, and Belleau Wood successfully neutralized Taroa while while Essex, Intrepid, and Cabot bombed and strafed Roi-Namur. Aircraft from Essex, Intrepid, and Cabot bucked northeasterly winds to bomb and strafe once more the important airfield at that base. Ninety-two enemy planes were based on Roi airfield when the attack developed. Command of the air was seized by American planes at the outset and after 8am, no enemy planes were seen airborne over Roi-Namur. Numerous hits were made on runways, hangars, fuel dumps, and gun positions. Additionally, carriers Saratoga, Princeton, and Langley sent multiple strikes against Wotje, managing to neutralize its airfield. Finally Admiral Sherman's carriers Cowpens, Monterey, and Bunker Hill launched strikes against Kwajalein. Her airfield and buildings were bombed on the first strike, then she was subjected to strafing and bombing. During the evening Admiral Sherman's group moved northwestward toward Eniwetok to be in position to launch an attack at dawn of D minus 1. It was not just the navy that smashed the Marshalls, the Army also got a taste. At Kwajalein one flight of seven B-24s dropped fifteen tons of bombs on Roi-Namur and three more tons on Kwajalein Island during the morning and early afternoon. As the carrier planes retired at dusk another seven heavy bombers arrived for a night attack, dropping twenty tons of bombs on Kwajalein Island. At Wotje, flying through heavy overcast, one flight of three B-24s dropped seven tons of bombs, causing fires and damaging the runways. A few hours later a flight of nine B-25s dropped three tons of bombs on the island in a low-level attack and strafed and sank a small cargo vessel in the lagoon. During this late attack carrier planes from the task force mistakenly intercepted the B-25s and shot down two before it was realized they were American planes. Maloelap, Jaluit, and Mille also received land-based attacks during the day. At Taroa, two and a half tons of bombs were dropped by B-25s, which then joined carrier planes in strafing the island. At Jaluit, attack bombers and fighters dropped seven tons of bombs and afterwards strafed the island. Mille was covered all day by twenty fighters, flying in flights of four. Planes that had been scheduled to strike these targets but that were unable to get through because of weather or mechanical difficulty flew over Mille on the way back to American bases in the Gilberts and dropped their bomb loads on the islands of that atoll.The Neutralization group shelled Wotje and Maloelap, leaving the last operational airfield on Eniwetok. Sherman's fighters and bombers hit the atoll during the morning of the 30th, destroying nearly all its buildings and runways, though a few aircraft managed to escape. The rest of the day would see more carrier strikes and surface bombardments against the Marshalls' atolls while the landing forces made their final approach towards Kwajalein. Meanwhile, Admiral Hill's attack group detached from the main task force, heading for Majuro Atoll. At 11pm 1st Lt. Harvey C. Weeks led a recon platoon on rubber boats to Calalin island, becoming the first Americans to land on any territory the Japanese had possessed prior to WW2. The rest of the recon company led by Captain James Jones landed on Dalap, Uliga and Darrit Islands. Finally, Majuro Island itself. They would find the Japanese had abandoned the atoll perhaps over a year earlier. At the same time Sheldon's landing force occupied Darrit and Dalop without any opposition and the 1st defense battalion soon arrived to take up garrison duties. To the northwest, the Destroyer transports Overton carrying Troop A and Manley carrying Troop B raced past Turners task force to hit Carter and Cecil islands. Troop B successfully landed on Carter at 6:20am, rapidly securing the island after killing her 20 defenders. Troop A accidently landed on Chauncey Islet at 5:45am and upon realizing they had landed on the wrong island, they left a detachment of 61 infantrymen and then re-embarked at 9:29am. Finally, Troop A landed on Cecil at 12:35pm, finding zero opposition there. On Chauncey, however, the Americans discovered a force of over 100 Japanese hidden in the islet's center. Half of the enemy force was killed but the Americans would eventually have to withdraw after losing two men. The desperate Japanese would continue to resist until eventually being annihilated a few days later. With the lagoon's entrance secured, Colonel Zimmerman transferred his two assault battalions to amphibious tractors and sent them towards Carlos and Carlson Islands.  While Kwajalein, Burton and everly islands were under heavy bombardment, the 1st battalion, 17th regiment landed on Carlos unopposed at 9:10am. From there they quickly attacked the 25 man garrison. To their south, the 2nd battalion landed on the northeastern end of Carlson at 9:12am under some heavy artillery fire coming out of Kwajalein that was quickly suppressed by air and naval bombardment. The men expected fierce resistance, but the Japanese fled, leaving 21 Koreans to be taken prisoner. Honestly pretty good outcome for those poor Koreans. Then General Arnold landed his 5 artillery battalions who got their guns ready by nightfall. Further north, Brigadier Generals James Underhill began operations against Ivan and Jacob islands to secure even more artillery positions. After the preparatory bombardment the marines got aboard their amtracs with a lot of difficulty. Before the operation, landing team commanders had estimated that their debarkation interval would be about sixty minutes, but this did not pan out. Once the troops were loaded in their assigned landing craft they had to make their way through choppy seas to the LST area for transfer to amphibian tractors. At this juncture all semblance of control broke down. Landing craft were about two hours late in reaching the LST area. Choppy seas and a headwind were partly responsible for the delays. Boat control officers left the tractors in frantic search for the landing craft and failed to return in time to lead the LVTs to the line of departure. Tractors were damaged or swamped while milling around their mother LSTs waiting for the troops to show up. Radios in LVTs were drowned out. One LST weighed anchor and shifted position before completing the disembarkation of all its tractors. The elevator on another broke down so that those LVTs loaded on the topside deck could not be disembarked on time. In short, almost every conceivable mishap occurred to delay and foul up what, under even the best of circumstances, was a complicated maneuver. Despite the issues, by 9:17 the amtracs were surging forward while LCI gunboats fired rocket barrages. B Company of the 25th marines hit Jacobs at 9:52, easily overrunning the island within 15 minutes. Ivan island had a much rougher surf alongside bad reef conditions that slowed down the amtracs. Company D, 4th light tank battalion managed to land at 9:55am, with Company C of the 25th marines landing on the opposite side of the shore at 10:15am followed by Company A. They linked up and began advancing inland, rapidly destroying a token defense force and securing the entire island by 11:45. During the early afternoon, the 3rd battalion, 14th marines landed at Jacob Island aboard LVT's, while the 4th battalion landed on Ivan aboard LCMs. At this point the lagoon entrance was secured, so the 2nd and 3rd battalions, 25th marines re-embarked to land on Albert and Allen. Rough seas delayed them, but the marines were once again on the move. LCI gunboats performed rocket barrages as the 3rd battalion landed on Albert at 3:12, while the 2nd battalion hit Allen 3 minutes later. Both islets were quickly cleared, while G Company landed on the unoccupied Andrew island. The 3rd battalion then assaulted Abraham island at 6:24, securing it by 7:15. With that, the Americans had secured a chain surrounding Roi-Namur and the first phase of the operation was done. Now the Americans would perform the main landings. Late during the night, Arnolds artillery and Turner's warships bombarded Kwajalein and Burton while 3 destroyers kept up a barrage upon Roi-Namur. Under the cover of darkness, frogmen of Underwater Demolition Team 1 scouted Roi-Namur and UDT 2 scouted Kwajalein's beaches. These men made sure there were no obstacles or mines in the way of their landing objectives. This was the first use of UDT's during the Pacific War. Early on February 1st Kwajalein was hit with an unprecedented bombardment. During one period two shells per second were hitting specific targets or areas in the path of the assault troops. The 14-inch naval shells of the battleships were most effective in piercing and destroying reinforced concrete structures. From the cruisers and destroyers, 8-inch and 5-inch shells ploughed into bunkers and tore up the thick growth of pandanus and palm trees. All together that day, nearly 7,000 14-inch, 8-inch, and 5-inch shells were fired by supporting naval vessels at Kwajalein Island alone, and the bulk of these were expended against the main beaches before the landing. The field artillery on Carlson also joined in the preparatory fire. Its total ammunition expenditure against Kwajalein was about 29,000 rounds. The results of all this expenditure of explosives were devastating. The damage was so intensive that it is impossible to determine the relative effectiveness of the three types of bombardment. The area inland of Red Beaches was reduced almost completely to rubble. Concrete emplacements were shattered, coconut trees smashed and flattened, the ground pock-marked with large craters, coral ripped to splinters. From the carriers Enterprise, Yorktown, Belleau Wood, Manila Bay, Corregidor, and Coral Sea eighteen dive bombers and fifteen torpedo bombers struck the western part of Kwajalein Island while as many fighters strafed the area with machine guns and rockets. All together ninety-six sorties were flown from the carriers in support of the troop landing on Kwajalein Island. As one observer reported, "The entire island looked as if it had been picked up to 20,000 feet and then dropped.” After 36000 rounds of naval gunfire and artillery, along with sizable air attacks, pummeled the island, LCI gunboats were on the move, tossing rockets into the mix. At 9am, Turner unleashing his landing force. Colonel Curtis O'Sullivans 184th regiment headed towards Beach Red 1, while Colonel Marc Logie's 32nd regiment hit Beach Red 2. Each beach was covered by a strongpoint, though these were mostly obliterated, with only a few pillboxes surviving. Both regiments landed at 9:30am, finding weak opposition, allowing their artillery support to start smashing 200 yards ahead of their positions. The americans were met with light mortars and automatic fire from some surviving pillboxes, but many were able to take shelter behind the wrecked ruins of a seawall. Meanwhile as more Amtracs pulled up they were hampered by wreckage and debris, causing a congestion. The reefs also hindered where they could approach, but by 11:22 the first four waves of both battalions were ashore, all with 15 minutes. They then began to advance inland against light resistance. Logie's 1st battalion managed to reach the western edge of the west area by 11:30. Meanwhile O'Sullivan's 3rd Battalion came face to face with a network of several pillboxes still containing live Japanese in spite of the heavy preliminary bombardment. These were silenced in short order in a series of almost simultaneous actions in which many varieties of weapons were used. Two infantrymen of Company K, Pvt. Parvee Rasberry and Pfc. Paul Roper had landed near the left of Red Beach 1 and had run about 25 yards inland when they came under fire from one of the pillboxes in the area. Quickly taking shelter in a shell hole, they started lobbing grenades at the enemy position about fifteen yards ahead. The Japanese merely threw the grenades back and the volley kept up until a flame thrower was brought forward. That, too, proved ineffective; the flames only hit the box and bounced back. Finally, Private Rasberry got out of his foxhole, crawled to within about five yards of the pillbox and threw in a white phosphorus smoke grenade. This flushed several Japanese from their cover into open positions where they could be taken under rifle fire. Those who weren't hit ran back to the pillbox. Rasberry threw white phosphorous grenades until he had none left, by which time about eight of the enemy had been killed. At this juncture, T. Sgt. Graydon Kickul of Company L was able to crawl up to the pillbox and on top of it. He emptied his M1 rifle into it, killing the remainder of the Japanese inside. To make doubly certain that the job was done, an amphibian tank was then brought forward to fire both its flame thrower and its 37-mm. gun into the aperture. Meanwhile Logie's 1st battalion got within 250 yards of Wilma road by 12:20. An hour later they fell upon a network of pillboxes. To the north O'Sullivan's 3rd battalion ran into tough resistance again, but managed to link up with Logie's men at Wilma Road by 2:50pm. Behind the battalions were follow up battalions who mopped up the area and the reserves secured the beachheads. Logie and O'Sullivans men then fought their way to Kwajaleins airfield. Lucky for them the Japanese had not established a defensive line across the width of the island, instead the bulk of them retired eastward, for their commander Admiral Akiyama had run into an early tragedy. Akiyama had left his bunker to observe the front line and was killed by an artillery shell. At 3:25, the 1st battalion was relieved by the 2nd battalion who began attack against the strongpoint at Canary Some of these positions, which extended along each side of Wallace Road, were defended by Japanese who ducked and crawled through rubble heaps and bunkers in such a way that Lt. John L. Young, commanding Company E, became convinced that they were using connecting tunnels. For an hour the fighting persisted, but not more than ten enemy dead could be counted above ground. Company E continued through a litter of small works, moving so slowly that it was necessary to commit Company F, which undertook a flanking movement at the left. The maneuver was intended to cut the strong point off, but the company promptly ran into fire that slowed its advance to about fifty yards in thirty minutes. It then became clear that the whole movement had been stopped. The attack was consequently broken off at 1800 and defensive positions were organized for the night. To the north, O'Sullivan's 3rd Battalion ran into large underground shelters and defenses. Their advance was temporarily blocked by a fuel dump ignited by artillery fire, but they eventually pushed on another 500 yards before halting at 18:00 for the night.  Meanwhile Logie's 2nd battalion broke off their attack halfway up the length of an unfinished runway and dug in for the night.  By the end of February 1st, approximately 450 of the dead Japanese were counted  in the zone of the 184th, and this regiment also was responsible for the capture of ten of the eleven prisoners taken. A large share of the enemy casualties was attributed to the heavy bombardment from ships and aircraft and from artillery based on Carlson. Estimates made by assault troops and by others, including doctors following the assault, indicated that the preparatory bombardment caused from 50 to 75 percent of all Japanese casualties on Kwajalein Island. It truly was a colossal bombardment. The Americans suffered 21 deaths and 87 wounded. Over on Roi-Namur, Admiral Conolly's LSTs entered the lagoon at first light to provide the amtracs an easier ride. Naval ships, artillery and aircraft began smashing the island. The marines saw some delays, but Colonel Colonel Louis Jones' 23rd Marines began their run to Roi at 11:50. Covering them, amphibian tanks sought hull defilade positions and concentrated their 37mm fire on the Wendy Point blockhouse, which could deliver flanking fire on the assault waves. The 1st and 2nd Battalions hit the beaches at 11:57 landed and immediately began to push 300 yards inland. Meanwhile Colonel Franklin Hart's 24th Marines bound for Namur were assigned the tractors of the 10th Amphibian Tractor Battalion that had participated in the preceding day's actions. The troubles that had beset the 10th Amphibian Tractor Battalion on D-Day were titanic. They had been launched too far from the line of departure in the first place. They had to buck adverse winds and unexpectedly choppy seas. Radio failures had tremendously complicated the problem of control, causing still further delay and much unnecessary travel through the water. All of this spelled excessive fuel consumption and many of the tractors ran out of gas before the day was over. For an LVT to run out of fuel in a choppy sea was usually disastrous. This model, the LVT-2, shipped water easily and its bilge pumps could not be manually operated. Thus, when the gasoline supply was gone the vehicle could not be pumped out and usually sank. In addition, many of the tractors of the 10th Battalion had not been released from their duties on D-Day until after dark, were unable to get back to their mother LSTs for refueling, and had spent the night on various outlying islands. Thus, as the hour for descending on Namur approached, the 24th Marines could muster only 62 of the 110 tractors that had been assigned to them and a hurried call was sent out for LCVPs to make up the difference. After some scrambling, the 2nd and 3rd battalions were reorganized and on their way to Namur. Hart's 2nd battalion hit Beach Green 2 at 11:55. They faced anti-tank ditches across the narrow beach, causing a large congestion. Hart's 3rd battalion made it to Green 1 at 12 and his K and I companies immediately advanced north. Meanwhile Jone's battalions secured Wendy Point facing no opposition. Encourage by the lack of resistance, the Marines began a rather disordered dash across the island. The stormed across the runway without orders and all guns blazing. Tanks and infantry hastily charged in the disorder, successfully driving the surviving and terrified Japanese north. Jones managed to gain control over his units and brought them back to assembly points to coordinate further attacks. The “re-assault” of Roi kicked off at 3:30 against a dazed enemy still trying to recover from the first attack. The 2nd battalion pushed north towards Estelle point while the 3rd battalion hit Nancy point. Enemy resistance was being rapidly annihilated, Estelle point was secure by 5pm, while Nancy Point would be taken by 6pm. After Nancy point was secured, Jones declared Roi secure. Meanwhile Harts F company unknowingly breached a torpedo warhead bunker and began throwing satchel charges into the hole. The structure was obliterated by a massive explosion that would detonate two other ammunition bunkers nearby. Blocks of concrete, palm trees, wood, torpedo warheads, and other debris rained down over the island, covering most of the island with smoke and dust. 20 Marines were killed and 100 were wounded. The enormous explosion disrupted the 2nd battalions assault, causing a delay. Hart's 3rd battalion enjoyed more success, but heavier resistance as the Japanese defenders took advantage of all the rubble and dense brush tossed around to hide behind. By 7:30pm, Hart ordered his men to dig in and during the night the Japanese began their classic infiltration tactics. The green troops amongst the men began indiscriminately firing throughout the night. The next morning, light tanks broke a Japanese counter attack, as the Marines advanced 50 yards. Hart then launched his main attack at 9am,with the 3rd Battalion rapidly securing Nora Point by 11:00am. Tank support for the 2nd Battalion arrived an hour late, but they still managed to push towards Natalie Point by 12:15, where the two battalions linked up. Mop up operations continued in the rear, but the island was declared secure at 2:18. For their first operation, Schmidt's 4th Marine Division suffered 206 killed, 617 wounded and 181 missing. 3472 Japanese would be found dead, with 51 captured and 40 Korean laborers surrendered.  To the south, after aerial, artillery and naval bombardment, Corlett launched a tank supported attack at 7:15am. O'Sullivans 2nd battalion advanced north against weak resistance while Logie's 2nd Battalion continued to fight through the Canary strongpoint. Advancing through destroyed pillboxes with tanks at the forefront, O'Sullivans men were able to reach Carl Road on the eastern end of the airfield by 10:40am. Meanwhile Logie's men reduced the Canary and advanced rapidly until they reached the deadly Cat strongpoint. Here they faced tiers of well-concealed defensive works, taking many lives until they also reached Carl Road at 10:40. The Americans were now facing the main defensive system of the island. In front of it lay a deep tank trap, connected to long rifle trenches. Beyond this was anti-tank ditches and an elaborate organized set of defensive positions called Corn strongpoint. They were in for a hell of a time. I would like to take this time to remind you all that this podcast is only made possible through the efforts of Kings and Generals over at Youtube. Please go subscribe to Kings and Generals over at Youtube and to continue helping us produce this content please check out www.patreon.com/kingsandgenerals. If you are still hungry after that, give my personal channel a look over at The Pacific War Channel at Youtube, it would mean a lot to me. Operation Flintlock went off with a terrifying bang seeing the combined firepower of land, air and sea tossed against the Marshall islands. The Americans had made easy and quick work of the smaller islands, but now we're face to face with a truly formidable defensive position that was sure to cause them real headaches. 

SummaryBrandon Jacob discusses the Winter Blitz model show, which is held annually at the Museum of the American GI in College Station, Texas. The show has been successful due to its timing in January, the unique location, and the focus on armor models. The show has experienced growth over the years and has expanded its categories. The judging format follows a gold, silver, bronze system, and the show is unaffiliated with any modeling societies. More information about the show can be found on the Winter Blitz website.Takeaways- The Winter Blitz model show is held annually at the Museum of the American GI in College Station, Texas.- The show's success is attributed to its timing in January, the unique location, and the focus on armor models.- The show has experienced growth over the years and has expanded its categories.-The judging format follows modified IPMS judging format, however the show is unaffiliated with any modeling societies. Instead it is hosted by armor modeling friends from across the Texas hill country, with both AMPS and IPMS affiliations.Support the Show with any of these options!PatreonBuy Me a BeerPaypalSupport the showMike and Kentucky Dave thank each and everyone of you for participating on this journey with us. We are grateful for having you as listeners, and the community that has grown around Plastic Model Mojo makes it all worth while.

In this episode, Sean and James review the 1970 World War II comedy-drama heist film Kelly's Heroes which tells the story of a motley crew of American GIs who go AWOL in order to rob a French bank, located behind German lines, of its stored Nazi gold bars.This show is part of the Spreaker Prime Network, if you are interested in advertising on this podcast, contact us at https://www.spreaker.com/show/4747725/advertisement

Today, I'm talking to Richard “Jet” Vertz. He's a retired aviation business executive who spent 40 years in the aerospace business, a U.S. Navy service officer who served in Vietnam, and a teacher at the University of Rhode Island's Osher Lifelong Learning Institute. His latest book is Purpose Driven Retirement, in which he shares a process designed to help readers create their Purpose Driven Retirement Bucket List–goals based on hobbies, passions, strengths, limitations, and aspirations to achieve in this far-reaching phase of life.  In our conversation, Jet shares life lessons from growing up in an orphanage in war-torn Korea before being adopted by an American GI at the age of 11, why a life of leisure in retirement isn't always as fulfilling as we think it's going to be, and how to chart a new course for the decades to come–no matter what life stage you're in right now.  GET A FREE COPY OF JET'S BOOK, PURPOSE DRIVEN RETIREMENT: GENERATING A PURPOSE DRIVEN BUCKET LIST Here's all you have to do... Step 1.) Subscribe to the podcast and leave an honest rating & review over on iTunes. Step 2.) Text BOOK, that's BOOK to 866-482-9559 for a link to our book request page, complete the form and we will ship you the book for free. It's that simple! In this podcast interview, you'll learn: Why it's easy to start feeling like a “taker” after the honeymoon of early retirement wears off.  How Jet started his first purpose-driven retirement group–and how finding and defining purpose in this stage of life gave him the structure and support he needed. How to do a “purpose checkup” to make sure your life is moving in alignment with what you want–and want to give.  The difference between dreams and goals–and how to make the big things you want from life specific and achievable.  How (and why) to create a lifeline to tell the story of your life on a graph–and find your passion (and so much more) along the way.  Show Notes: RetireWithPurpose.com/390 Rate & Review the Podcast: RetireWithPurpose.com/review Sign Up to Casey's Weekend Reading Email! Sifting through the copious amount of conflicting financial advice and retirement information can be daunting - but it doesn't have to be! Each week, Casey makes it super easy. He hand-picks 4 of the most important articles you need to read, that are beneficial to you whether you're at, near, or in retirement! If you want them sent straight to your inbox, sign up by visiting RetireWithPurpose.com/weekend-reading

To learn more, please visit the website for the #lastseen project. SHOW NOTES:0:00 Katharina Menschick on the response to #lastseen project3:00 Menschick – research associate in Arolsen Archives' historical research department dealing with digital memory projects, digital archival projects and archival theory3:20 Dr. Christoph Kreutzmüller – historian with Arolsen Archives and House of the Wannsee Conference in Berlin3:45 mission of the #lastseen initiative5:00 missing deportation photographs 6:00 deportation photographs found by American GI and returned during Nuremberg trials7:00 request for deportation photographs7:20 types of deportation photographs 8:30 Eisenach deportation – Magda Katz 9:00 U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum research – donor identified uncle in photograph 11:15 deportation from Dr. Kreutzmüller's hometown12:30 questions about why photographers took the deportation photos13:00 spectatorship / audience of the photographs14:20 importance of photographs as a historical source14:45 virtual interactive educational resource16:45 German high school pupils' assistance in developing educational resource18:10 difficulty of discussing bystanders 19:30 photographs invite reflection 22:00 historical transparency by telling what they don't know 25:00 giving context to photographs 28:30 gaze of those photographed29:15 propaganda film in Warsaw Ghetto30:20 legacy of their work 32:15 definition of justice – striving for fairness33:00 real restoration cannot be achieved34:00 doing justice to the photographs and to those in the photographs34:45 restitution through archives Please share your comments and/or questions at stephanie@warfareofartandlaw.comTo hear more episodes, please visit Warfare of Art and Law podcast's website.To view rewards for supporting the podcast, please visit Warfare's Patreon page.To leave questions or comments about this or other episodes of the podcast and/or for information about joining the 2ND Saturday discussion on art, culture and justice, please message me at stephanie@warfareofartandlaw.com. Thanks so much for listening!© Stephanie Drawdy [2023]

Interview with Eddie Shaw bassist of The Monks and Author of the book Black Monk Time.  The Monks, referred to by the name monks on record sleeves, were an American rock band formed in Gelnhausen, West Germany in 1964. Assembled by five American GIs stationed in the country, the group grew tired of the traditional format of rock, which motivated them to forge a highly experimental style characterized by an emphasis on hypnotic rhythms that minimized the role of melody, augmented by the use of sound manipulation techniques. The band's unconventional blend of shrill vocals confrontational lyrics, feedback, and  guitarist David Day's six-string banjo baffled audiences, but music historians have since identified the Monks as a pioneering force in avant-garde musicThe band's lyrics often voiced objection to the Vietnam War and the dehumanized state of society, while prefiguring the harsh and blunt commentary of the punk rock movement of the 1970s and 1980s. The band's appearance was considered as shocking as its music, as they attempted to mimic the look of Catholic monks by wearing black habits with cinctures symbolically tied around their necks, and hair worn in partially shaved tonsures.   The Monks Info  https://www.the-monks.com

Paul and Chris take a listen to Ian Punnett's interview with Mark Anthony, the Psychic Lawyer, discussing the wild tale of the Red Light Demons of Vietnam. The US military, in it's war against the Viet Cong, develops a new infrared night vision goggle and start giving it to the American GIs. Hijinks begin immediately and end up with soldier opening fire at what they call demons. Grab your 50-caliber machine guns and some holy water for this episode of Coast to Coast PM.    Support:  C2CPM's Patreon Twitter: https://twitter.com/c2cpmpod  Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/coasttocoastpm/  Contact: c2cpmpod@gmail.com   Weekly Reading Series: https://www.coasttocoastam.com/article/hoping-to-become-spider-man-bolivian-boy-lets-black-widow-bite-him/    Mark Anthony's Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/MarkAnthonyThePsychicLawyer/    Intro Shout-Out:  Karl Casey @ White Bat Audio

Postwar Germany was occupied, in ruins, with an economy in chaos. Germans were reduced to using cigarettes supplied by American GIs as money. Original Article: "To Smoke or Not to Smoke: The Cigarette Economy in Postwar Germany, 1945–48"

Postwar Germany was occupied, in ruins, with an economy in chaos. Germans were reduced to using cigarettes supplied by American GIs as money. Original Article: "To Smoke or Not to Smoke: The Cigarette Economy in Postwar Germany, 1945–48"

Vanessa and Ethan: "We didn't like this episode!"Also Vanessa and Ethan: "We LOVE this episode!" Speaking of love, love is in the air! Or at least partially, when an American GI wants to marry a Korean girl for all the wrong reasons. But the good news is, Hawkeye and Trapper reunify a Korean draftee with his pregnant wife. Music credit: “Feel Good Rock” by Jason Shaw, https://audionautix.com/ Contact the show: mashmouthpod@gmail.comSocials: @valiantlyoffbalance on Instagram @OfficialVOB on Twitter @mashmouthpod on Instagram @EthanWasCool on Instagram and Twitter @unvanesscessary on Instagram

Cindy McQuay co-founded Hiraeth, Hope and Healing https://www.hiraethhopeandhealing.com/?fbclid=IwAR1mKu4WhmEl8U7Vcy5r_Pd_Qqa7drS1AtU_Usl6QaN6Tvdg0Z_Vjef75CQCindy was adopted at 3 months and has always known. She always had the desire to know her story and identity Her adoptive parents fully supported her. Cindy trying to get her records and original birth certificate, at the legally allowed age of 18, led to the discovery of the difficulty adoptees face in doing so. The hurdles that challenge adoptees drove Cindy to become an advocate for all her fellow “cribmates”; an endearing term that we've coined ourselves. Her advocacy includes educating the public on separation trauma, family preservation, and abolishing adoption. When DNA testing became available, she became obsessed with helping others find their biological roots as a search angel, specifically now helping Amerasian “kids” identify their American GI birth fathers. Cindy has been married to her amazing husband, Mark, for 30 years. Together, they've raised 3 awesome adult children. She enjoys genealogy, reading, beaches, pools, shopping, and of course, spending time with my 3 beautiful grandchildren. Music by Corey Quinn

Danny and Derek welcome to the program Zach Fredman, assistant professor of history at Duke Kunshan University, to discuss his book The Tormented Alliance: American Servicemen and the Occupation of China, 1941–1949. They get into the background of the US military presence in China at the end of “the century of humiliation”, the US-China relationship prior to WWII, General Joseph Stilwell, the day-to-day interactions between American GIs and both Chinese military and civilians, the occupation's place in the broader American imperial history in East Asia, and more.Dr. Fredman will be speaking at the Harvard International and Global History Seminar (HIGHS) tomorrow, Wednesday, May 3, which will have a remote option to participate as well. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.americanprestigepod.com/subscribe

How do we heal is one of those inevitable questions that come up after we come out of the fog. Listen in as Cindy and I explore practical steps to heal and principles to help us along that journey. The distinction between healing physical v emotional wounds is particularly beneficial.Here's a bit about Cindy from her website:“I was adopted at 3 months and have always known. I have always had the desire to know my story and my identity, and my parents fully supported me. Trying to get my records and original birth certificate, at the legally allowed age of 18, led me to discover the difficulty adoptees face in doing so. The hurdles that challenge adoptees drove me to become an advocate for all my fellow “cribmates,” an endearing term that we've coined ourselves. My advocacy includes educating the public on separation trauma, family preservation, and abolishing adoption. When DNA testing became available, I became obsessed with helping others find their biological roots as a search angel, specifically now helping Amerasian “kids” identify their American GI birth fathers. I have been married to my amazing husband, Mark, for 30 years. Together, we've raised 3 awesome adult children. I enjoy genealogy, reading, beaches and pools, shopping, and of course, spending time with my 3 beautiful grandchildren.”https://www.hiraethhopeandhealing.com/https://twitter.com/HHHRetreatshttps://www.instagram.com/hiraethhopeandhealing/https://www.facebook.com/hiraethhopehealinghttps://www.pinterest.com/hiraethhopeandhealing/

A French monument to an American GI latrine --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/rocky-seale7/message

Organizing your work, home, and life is critical to success. However, disorganization can cost you more time and money than anything else. We often hold onto things out of sentimentality or fear that we might need them in the future. Focusing on sentimental value or hypothetical needs only adds clutter to our identity and intensifies our fear of letting go.In this episode, Dr. Regina Lark, a professional organizing and productivity expert, shares her journey into the organization space and how she helps people declutter their lives. She emphasizes the importance of being mindful of what you bring into your home. Learn from Dr. Lark how to declutter not only from a physical perspective but also through a cognitive lens to achieve desired results that will improve your overall well-being!Key Learnings from the Episode:[06:30] The tangible and intangible benefits of being organized.[08:46] Three practical tips that can put you on a more mindful path of being organized. [11:58] Why do you need to be mindful of what you bring to your front door?[20:20] A challenge that Dr. Lark has faced and how she worked through it.[23:33] What does working from your happy place mean to Dr. Lark?[27:47] Dr. Lark's advice to someone desiring to be an entrepreneur. About Dr. Regina Lark - In 2008, Dr. Regina Lark founded A Clear Path: Professional Organizing and Productivity. She is a featured speaker and educator on issues ranging from productivity, hoarding, and women's leadership. This past October, She published her third book, Emotional Labor: Why A Woman's Work is Never Done and What To Do About It.As a Certified Professional Organizer CPO®, Dr. Lark is a specialist in boomer and senior downsizing, residential organizing, and life transitions. With an additional Certification in Chronic Disorganization, she works with clients who are challenged by ADHD and other brain-based conditions.Dr. Lark is a current Board member of Opica Adult Day Care Center. She earned her Ph.D. in history from the University of Southern California, writing a dissertation on interracial marriages between Japanese women and American GIs after World War 2.How to connect with Dr. Regina Lark:Websites - http://www.speakingofclutter.comhttp://www.emotional-labor.comhttp://www.aclearpath.comFacebook - https://www.facebook.com/AClearPathInstagram - https://www.instagram.com/aclearpath/LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/reginalarkAbout the Host -Belinda Ellsworth is a Speaker, Trainer, Best-Selling Author, and PodcasterShe has been a professional speaker, mover, and shaker for more than 25 years. Having built three successful companies, she has helped thousands of entrepreneurs make better decisions, create successful systems, and build business strategies using her "Four Pillars of Success" system.Belinda has always had a passion and zest for life with the skill for turning dreams into reality. How to Connect with Belinda:Facebook -https://www.facebook.com/workfromyourhappyplaceLinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/belindaellsworthInstagram -https://www.instagram.com/workfromyourhappyplace/Website - www.workfromyourhappyplace.comJoin my membership program and discover the art of creating and sharing amazing experiences with like-minded people, all from the comfort of your own home. You get to connect with others online, learn new skills and techniques, and grow your network without ever having to leave your computer screen. To know more, click on the link https://workfromyourhappyplace.com/vip/Quotes:“Most people with clutter don't have a good relationship with time, so coming to terms with your relationship with time will help you work on your clutter.”“De-cluttering has little to do with the physical doing, and a lot to do with looking at the clutter through the lens of our cognitive abilities.”

The legacy of the Vietnam War is on their faces. The children of the American GI's stationed in Vietnam during the war and the local women who bore them – left behind and overwhelmingly rejected. Author Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai braids together the stories of a young mother hoping for a life in America, an adult son searching for the father he never knew, and an American Vietnam war veteran looking for redemption. “Dust Child” is at once empathetic, devastating, and upbeat burnished with Quế Mai's stunning signature prose. "I think we are blessed with a life on this Earth so that we can uplift each other, and I really think every one of us has so much power inside of us that we can use for a good purpose," said Quế Mai when asked what she wants her readers to take away from her novel. Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai is the author of twelve books of fiction, poetry and non-fiction written in Vietnamese and English. Her work has been translated into twenty languages. Her first novel “The Mountains Sing”, the first written in English, was a runner up for the 2021 Dayton Literary Peace Prize and other awards including the 2021 Pen Oakland Josephine Miles Literary Award, and the 2021 International Book Award. “Dust Child” is her second historical novel, and it's our April selection for “Bookmarked: The Under the Radar Book Club".

We're re-presenting host Nate Wilcox's first 2021 interview with Frank Sinatra biographer James Kaplan as part of a new series focused on Crosby, Frank Sinatra and Elvis Presley. This discussion focuses on Frank Sinatra's reign as king of the bobby soxers and bane of the red-blooded American GI in the 1940s. Buy the book and support the show. Have a question or a suggestion for a topic or person for Nate to interview? Email letitrollpodcast@gmail.com Follow us on Twitter. Follow us on Facebook. YOU HAVE SAVED THE LET IT ROLL PODCAST!!!!! Thanks to the incredible outpouring of support for the show we have raised more than our $6000 goal which will pay Steph for a year's worth of recording and production work on the show. Thanks to everyone who contributed and thanks to all of you for listening! Let It Roll is proud to be part of Pantheon Podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

An interview with Dominic Frisby. The Kisses on a Postcard musical charts the true story of two young British evacuees during WW2. Features mystery postcard messages, the bombing of Plymouth, American GI's and crashing German bombers. Dominic's work is full to bursting with Dunkirk spirit, steam trains and all the best of WW2 Britishness.  And never ever was an episode better timed to coincide with world events. Buy the book, the CD's, hear the musical as a podcast. All links and pod players at: www.kissesonapostcard.com Reviews on main website:https://www.fightingthroughpodcast.co.uk/reviews/new/ Apple reviews: https://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/ww2-fighting-through-from-dunkirk-to-hamburg-war-diary/id624581457?mt=2 Follow me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/PaulCheall Follow me on Facebook:https://www.facebook.com/FightingThroughPodcast YouTube Channel:https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCnlqRO9MdFBUrKM6ExEOzVQ?view_as=subscriber    

In 2008, Dr. Regina Lark founded A Clear Path: Professional Organizing and Productivity. Regina is a featured speaker and educator on issues ranging from productivity, hoarding, and women's leadership. As a Certified Professional Organizer (CPO®), Regina is a specialist in boomer and senior downsizing, residential organizing, and life transitions. With an additional Certification in Chronic Disorganization, she works with clients who are challenged by ADHD, hoarding, procrastination, and time management. Regina is the author of 3 books: Before the Big O: Professional Organizers Talk About Life Before Organizing (2014); Psychic Debris, Crowded Closets: The Relationship between the Stuff in your Head and What's Under your Bed (3rd ed, and now available on Audible); Emotional Labor: Why A Woman's Work is Never Done and What To Do About It (2021) Since 2018, she is identified as one of “20 Best” Professional Organizers by Expertise.com. In 2016, she was named one of LA's Top 10 Organizers by CBS/KCAL Channel 2. Dr. Lark is a current Board member of OPICA Adult Day Care Center. She earned her Ph.D. in history from the University of Southern California, writing a dissertation on interracial marriages between Japanese women and American GIs after World War 2. For fun she plays golf and tennis, and writes goofy songs about clutter. www.AClearPath.net 818-400-9592 regina@aclearpath.net

American GI's in the Vietnamese jungle told stories about a 6 foot tall humanoid primate that would stalk and attack them, then disappear into the night. Who or what were the rock apes of Vietnam? Submit your stories: popmediaagency@gmail.com Visit betterhelp.com/redditexplains to talk to a professional about stress, grief, and other mental health needs.Our Instagram page: @reddit_explains

Eddie Huff was born to a single German mother and a black American (GI) father, in post World War 2 Germany. He grew up between 2 worlds, at first in a small German village speaking only German. From this world, at the age of 7, he was transplanted to a completely different world, that of the projects of Philadelphia. Growing up as a Black American child in the 60s Eddie would move back and forthfrom predominantly black environments to very integrated ones. He has, however, always considered himself Black and counts it as a supreme privilege to share in that rich history.   In HIs book, “Y'all Have Sinned: How Blaming Others Is Not A Winning Strategy,” Eddie tackles some current event hot-button topics such as racism and reparations just to name a few. Eddie says, “it is the lack of forgiveness for those past sins which holds the descendants of African slaves in bondage today.” He encourages us to face the truth about our own sins and forgiveness is the key to true freedom and prosperity for all of mankind, and especially those in America, black, white, brown and anyone else.   You can connect with Eddie Here: freshblackcoffee@gmail.com  Purchase His book on Amazon here:   http://www.amazon.com/dp/1633021742/ref=nosim?tag=da2he-20   D2H_Hearing from God classes started last night, but there is still time to register for: Dare2Hear: Part 1: Realsing God's Heart through Hearing His VOice online zoom class is NOW Open. I invite you to journey with me for the next 8-weeks. You can register at the link below.    Class begins September 20th for 8-weeks. https://debbiekitterman.com/shop/ You can order a copy of Debbie's workbook “Releasing God's Heart through Hearing His Voice here on Amazon: https://amzn.to/2NGqohC     You can purchase Debbie's NEWEST Book: Legacy: The Lost are of Blessing Here: http://www.amazon.com/dp/0984012362/ref=nosim?tag=da2he-20

WWII veteran Reikichi ghostwrites letters for Japanese prostitutes to send to their American GI boyfriends. One of those women happens to be Michiko, Reikichi's lifelong flame – and, as a staunch nationalist and traumatized veteran, he doesn't approve of her consorting with Japan's former enemy. Can he suppress his loyalist purism long enough to recognize the humanity of the person he claims to love? THE PRECISE COMPOSITIONS OF KINUYO TANAKA (Sept 2022 at the Trylon): https://www.trylon.org/films/category/the-precise-compositions-of-kinuyo-tanaka/ CRACKING OPEN THE DISNEY VAULT (Sept at the Trylon): https://www.trylon.org/films/category/cracking-open-the-disney-vault/ Follow us on Twitter at https://twitter.com/trylovepodcast and email us at trylovepodcast@gmail.com to get in touch! Buy tickets and support the Trylon at https://www.trylon.org/. Theme: "Raindrops" by Huma-Huma/"No Smoking" PSA by John Waters. Outro music by Ichirô Saitô from LOVE LETTER. Timestamps 0:00 - Episode 192: LOVE LETTER (1953) 5:05 - Who will atone? 17:08 - ​​This movie in context of postwar Japan 27:45 - Individual culpability for national sins 37:24 - The ending 50:26 - The Junk Drawer 57:33 - Cody's Noteys: First Film Fever

Deborah Prior was one of more than 2000 mixed-race babies born to white British women and black American GI's during WWII (R) 

Deborah Prior was one of more than 2000 mixed-race babies born to white British women and black American GI's during WWII (R) 

Conspiracy 420 Episode 86 Rock Apes The Vietnam war changed those who experienced it forever. American GIs, trained for conventional warfare, were left scarred by an enemy who refused to engage on normal terms. Then as now, the jungles of Vietnam are dense and mysterious, and many United States soldiers returned shaken, with stories that it was not just the enemy Viet Cong who were attacking them out there. Some soldiers reported that they had been attacked by something else out there, humanoid creatures dubbed “rock apes” who left hardened combat troops frightened. Some even claim that the rock apes of Vietnam changed the course of the war. Many believe in unknown large land animals which have yet to be discovered. Generally called “cryptids” these are usually fanciful tales of hidden alien visitors or a remnant population of dinosaurs. However, some, like these rock apes are more plausible. Conspiracy 420 the only show that breakdown every conspiracy outta there. From UFO to out of body experience. Conspiracy 420 is here cause the truth is only the beginning. Park Dental Care 12419 101st Ave South Richmond Hill Queens (718) 847-3800 https://www.718DENTISTS.com Please follow us on Youtube,Facebook,Instagram,Twitter,Patreon and at www.gettinglumpedup.com https://linktr.ee/RobRossi Get your T-shirt at https://www.prowrestlingtees.com/gettinglumpedup And https://www.bonfire.com/store/getting-lumped-up/ Subscribe to the channel and hit the like button This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/rob-rossi/support https://www.patreon.com/Gettinglumpedup #conspiracyrealist #conspiracytheory #conspiracytheorist #conspiracyfiles #conspiracytheories #conspiracyfact #conspiracy #conspiracythread #conspiracypalette @Conspiracy @420 #Rockapes --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/rob-rossi/support

During the Second World War, locals in Australia and Britain described American GIs as “overpaid, oversexed, and over here.” But this conflict between civilians and the military didn't only take place abroad. Civil-military tensions could be seen at ‘home' too. Nearly three-quarters of servicemen in the months leading up to D-Day were stationed domestically, while one in four never went abroad at all. In other words, a lot of GIs spent a lot of time in the continental United States. Their presence, combined with the anti-civilian culture that the US military cultivated during the war, made places like Times Square, Hollywood Boulevard, and Coney Island look like occupation zones. A new book tells this important yet overlooked history of the Second World War. In Taking Leave, Taking Liberties: American Troops on the World War II Home Front (U Chicago Press, 2020), Aaron Hiltner follows GIs as they traveled through transport hubs, trained at domestic military bases, and took leave in ‘liberty ports,” such as Boston and San Francisco. By doing so, Hiltner, a lecturer at University College London, shows how theft, assault, catcalling, murder, rape, drunkenness, harassment, rackets, and fist fights were a part of the everyday domestic wartime experience. The book, therefore, challenges our tendency to isolate the home front from the war and makes us rethink where US foreign relations take place. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

During the Second World War, locals in Australia and Britain described American GIs as “overpaid, oversexed, and over here.” But this conflict between civilians and the military didn't only take place abroad. Civil-military tensions could be seen at ‘home' too. Nearly three-quarters of servicemen in the months leading up to D-Day were stationed domestically, while one in four never went abroad at all. In other words, a lot of GIs spent a lot of time in the continental United States. Their presence, combined with the anti-civilian culture that the US military cultivated during the war, made places like Times Square, Hollywood Boulevard, and Coney Island look like occupation zones. A new book tells this important yet overlooked history of the Second World War. In Taking Leave, Taking Liberties: American Troops on the World War II Home Front (U Chicago Press, 2020), Aaron Hiltner follows GIs as they traveled through transport hubs, trained at domestic military bases, and took leave in ‘liberty ports,” such as Boston and San Francisco. By doing so, Hiltner, a lecturer at University College London, shows how theft, assault, catcalling, murder, rape, drunkenness, harassment, rackets, and fist fights were a part of the everyday domestic wartime experience. The book, therefore, challenges our tendency to isolate the home front from the war and makes us rethink where US foreign relations take place. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/history

Ed leads a discussion and semi-rant about a persistent myth regarding the history of prostitution in Thailand that was recently perpetuated by a YouTube video by Thaiger. The myth goes like this: prostitution wasn't much of a thing in Thailand until the Vietnam War era, when the demand created by American GIs on rest and relaxation resulted in a booming sex industry.  Ugh. Where to start? Well, first of all, prostitution is called the oldest profession in the world for a reason, and there's clear evidence of the industry existing in Thailand many hundreds of years before the Vietnam War. Second, many studies have revealed the well-known fact that the bulk of prostitution in Thailand has Thai men as the clientele, not foreigners. And last but not least, what about the Thai women (and men) who populate the sex industry, the bar owners, and the landowners? Are they not Thai?  The guys discuss the Thaiger video and praise it for what it gets right, namely the Thai government's promotion of condom use in the 1980s and the serious steps to eradicate sex trafficking that occurred in the 1990s. But alas, no matter how many times certain myths are debunked, the one that says foreigners are the major driver behind the sex industry in Thailand never seems to die. :( Don't forget that Patrons get the ad-free version of the show as well as swag and other perks. And we'll keep our Facebook, Twitter, and LINE accounts active so you can send us comments, questions, or whatever you want to share.

The Grateful Dead truck into West Germany, film a session for the Beat-Club, get thrown out of their hotel, jam in a planetarium, meet Naked Frankfurt Dude & many American GIs, are pranked by their light crew, influence the course of German psychedelia, & play 3 legendary shows.Guests: Sam Cutler, Steve Parish, Donna Jean Godchaux-MacKay, Mountain Girl, Rosie McGee, Alan Trist, Candace Brightman, Ben Haller, Janet Furman, René Tinner, Jim Sullivan, Uli Teute, Hagen Glas, Eric Alden, Uli Dohrmann, David Lemieux, Graeme Boone, Chris JonesSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Mildred Gillars, known to American GIs as "Axis Sally", was one of Nazi Germany's most notorious radio propagandists. Hired by German State Radio because of her American accent and seductive voice, she finally achieved her own version of stardom after years of pursuing a failed acting career in the United States. My guest is Richard Lucas, author of "Axis Sally: The American Voice of Nazi Germany". In his book he tells the story of the rise and fall of Mildred Gillars, including her capture and trial for treason. Casemate Publishers: https://www.casematepublishers.com/axis-sally.htmlAudio clips are from the National Archives and Records Administration.

AJ Steel talks about the ascendency of globalism and authoritarianism in America and its parallels to the Nazi Holocaust. Join us for a heartfelt episode in which he tells the never before told story of his Holocaust surviving grandmother and how she was rescued by American soldiers. You won't want to miss this very special program!This is the famous AJ Steel Show that was censored by YouTube for no reason other than they wanted to do it.