"Why I escaped From Vietnam

 I got this from "VietnamCherries" a website that is dedicated to the experiences from Vietnam.  I used to ask my Dad about a lot of the stuff on it to get his "Take" on it and I would add his "2 cents" to my blogpost to give it more of a backstory as were.  It feels weird putting up a Vietnam post and not asking him about it.  I will get better.  This was written from a South Vietnamese perspective.

 

 

                          I clipped this pic off "Google", I actually remember this cover.

By Nguyen Cong Hoan,

This article originally appeared in Newsweek, October 31, 1977, and was submitted to me for posting consideration by my friend, Bill Laurie. Much has changed since 1977, and the purpose of this post is to show what happened to the people after the South Vietnamese government fell in 1975. This story from one who was lucky to escape and reach freedom.

The government of Vietnam has accepted triumphantly its full United Nations membership, to the cheers of what Hanoi calls “progressive mankind” – the Communist countries, much of the Third World, and those in the West who opposed American Government policies during the war.

To a Vietnamese like myself, who detested the corrupt and repressive Thieu regime and considered the Communist victory a liberation, such an event should bring joy. But after living for nearly two years in Communist Vietnam, I feel precisely the opposite emotion.

I escaped from Vietnam to tell the world the truth about what is happening in my country. Within days after Hanoi’s troops came to my town, such widely proclaimed policies of the Viet Cong’s National Liberation Front as religious freedom, democratic liberties, peace and neutralism went out the window. Even the southern Communists were cast aside by northerners acting as conquerors, seizing all levers of power, inventorying and requisitioning everything.

For those bold enough to question, a vast network of prisons called “re-education camps” was established almost overnight – prisons where inmates were worked to death or starved. The prisoners included not only former Saigon military and civilian officials, but also many who opposed them – advocates of democratic liberties and a compromise peace. Apolitical professional, intellectual and religious leaders were also detained.

Prisoners

In my province, Phu Yen, alone, out of a total population of about 300,000, there were more than 6,000 prisoners in seven camps when I left Vietnam last spring. During the war the population of South Vietnam was estimated at about 17 million and was censused by Hanoi recently at about 24 million. If the Phu Yen prison population is characteristic of all of former South Vietnam, as is likely, from 340,000 to 480,000 could now be detained.

Outside the camps, many are unemployed and those with jobs can barely earn enough to feed one person, let alone a family. Thousands are press-ganged into nonpaying, ostensibly “voluntary” labor brigades working on roads, canals and irrigation ditches. Large numbers are forced to settle in remote, disease-ridden “new economic zones,” a population dispersal aimed more at political control than at economic development.

The economy is in shambles. What agricultural wealth there is in southern Vietnam is siphoned to the north or exported for foreign exchange. Southern people have had their diet deteriorate from rice to yam and manioc.

The new authorities rule by force and terror. What little freedom existed under Thieu is gone. The An Ninh secret police are dreaded – worse than any previous Vietnamese regime. There is no freedom of movement or association, no freedom of the press, or of religion, or of economic enterprise, or even of private personal opinion. Rights of habeas corpus, or of property, are either unknown or flouted even as the government redefines these rights. Fear is everywhere. An indiscreet remark can make one liable to instant arrest and an indefinite prison term.

America is partly responsible for the tragedy befalling the Vietnamese. While the US cannot, and should not, reintervene militarily, it can influence Hanoi to ameliorate the human rights situation, just as it has obliged Hanoi to make some kind of accounting for MIA’s. For example, virtually the entire An Quang Buddhist leadership has been arrested. As a Buddhist, I urge respectfully that Americans – certainly American religious leaders – express their concern publicly.

Many legislators active with me in opposing Thieu – and who were beaten and jailed by the Saigon government – are in prison again. These include democrats like Tran Van Tuyen, chairman of my opposition bloc in Saigon’s lower house, whose case was recently taken up, I understand, by Amnesty International. As a political leader myself, I appeal to American political figures to express their concern to Hanoi and call for the release of Tuyen and many others I could help them list. The three men I escaped with, incidentally, want to come from Japan to America to provide their own eyewitness accounts of the suffering in Vietnam, but they need assistance.

An Appeal

I appeal also for help to the thousands of Vietnamese boat people who perish on the seas in river boats never meant for the severity of ocean passage. At least half who make it to territorial waters reportedly drown as their flimsy boats go under. Who will rescue them if the United States does not participate? President Carter has agreed to accept at least 15,000 more Indochinese refugees, for which we are grateful. But a rescue project to pick  people off those boats on the high seas is also needed.

Let me mention energetically people whom I once opposed during the war: those who worked directly or indirectly for the United States. The US has responsibilities regarding the fate of these people, comparable to the principle that American marines are said to have of not deserting their wounded.

To tell Americans what I have just said, I left my wife and children and risked my life on the seas. I appeal to Americans on behalf of the human rights of my people: please do not mute your voices on this subject. Before I escaped, there was great interest in my country in the human rights stand of President Carter and other Western leaders. Vietnamese listen attentively to the Voice of America and the BBC. The cause of human rights comes up very often in conversations. Where hope is a rare commodity, the news that the world is watching, and cares, provides moral sustenance.

Nguyen Cong Hoan was a member of the Buddhist antiwar opposition bloc in South Vietnam’s lower house and became a member of the unified Vietnamese National Assembly following the Communist victory. He defected from Vietnam earlier this year.--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

Monday Music "Rolling With The Deep" by Adele

 

 I am still taking a break from the "Bugaloo" theme I have been running since 2019.  I will restart that muse in a few weeks.  I wanted to give that poor muse a rest since I have been riding it like a Shetland pony at the fair.   This Theme is if I had a chance to run a segment on Sirius/XM and what songs I could listen to over and over again and this song is one of them.

     I normally  post music from the 80's Which I personally consider my favorite decade, the 70's usually from my rock favorites from when I was a young kid listening to the superbands on AFN, and some music from the 90's that I like. I don't  usually use music from this century.  I as a whole consider the present genre of music that is commercially released to be crap.  I don't listen to it.  When I see what the talent that was coming out of Motown and other places with Rock and Soul with some R&B in the from the last half of the last century that was awesome in its breath of talent and display to the garbage that is listened to now...I am not impressed and I am not a music snob...far from it...I like a wide range of music from country to disco to R&B to soul and of course my 80's music:)  I see what is coming out today as lacking in substance, to me music tells a story and also I like it as background for it surrounds me when I am working or doing something and it makes it more pleasant. 
     Now some background,  I decided to go with this song because I heard it for the first time at six flags at the water park a  quite a few years ago and the song was catchy, but I ignored it but heard it a few more times here and there usually at places where they pipe in music like stores and other places.  I heard it a few more times and the more I heard it, I liked it it showed depth and range and it actually didn't sound vapid and canned like a lot of what I call "current music".    A couple of years later I heard a couple of my black scouts singing it and they were doing a good job with it at cub day camp.  I finally heard the song playing somewhere and I pulled out my "Shazam" app on my phone and it told me who the artist was.   

"Rolling in the Deep" is a song recorded by British recording artist Adele for her second studio album, 21. The song was written by Adele and Paul Epworth. The singer herself describes it as a "dark blues-y gospel disco tune". The largest crossover hit in the United States from the past 25 years, "Rolling in the Deep" gained radio airplay from many different radio formats. It was first released on 29 November 2010 as the lead single from 21 in digital download format. The lyrics describe the emotions of a scorned lover.
"Rolling in the Deep" was acclaimed by music critics and represented a commercial breakthrough for Adele, propelling her to international success. The song reached number one in 11 countries and the top five in many more regions. It was Adele's first number-one song in the United States, reaching the top spot on many Billboard charts, including the Billboard Hot 100 where it was number one for seven weeks. By February 2012, "Rolling in the Deep" had sold over 7.6 million copies in the United States, making it the highest-selling digital song by a female artist in the US, the second-best-selling digital song in the US and Adele's best-selling single outside her native country, topping her previous best-selling "Chasing Pavements". Worldwide, it was the fifth-best-selling digital single of 2011 with sales of 8.2 million copies, later going on to sell over 14 million copies.The song spent 65 weeks on the chart, making the song at that time the fourth-most weeks spent on the chart, tying the place with Jewel with her double single "Foolish Games"/"You Were Meant for Me".

 

The song was reportedly inspired by a Nashville-schooled US tour bus driver, and composed by Epworth and Adele in a single afternoon following Adele's breakup with her boyfriend. It was "her reaction to, 'being told that my life was going to be boring and lonely and rubbish, and that I was a weak person if I didn't stay in the relationship. I was very insulted, and wrote that as a sort of "fuck you".

The music video for "Rolling in the Deep," directed by Sam Brown, premiered on Channel 4 on 3 December 2010. The video begins in an abandoned house, where Adele is sitting in a chair singing. During the video, the scenes show hundreds of glasses filled with water that vibrate to the beat of a drum, a mysterious person (played by Jennifer White, who also choreographed the sequence) dancing in a room with white flour and dust, the drummer playing the drums behind the stairs, china being thrown and breaking on the wall in front of the staircase, and a white model of a city which is set on fire by five bursting light bulbs at the end of the song.
On 20 July 2011, the music video was nominated for seven MTV Video Music Awards, including Video of the Year, Best Female Video, Best Pop Video and Best Direction, and won three for Best Editing, Best Cinematography and Best Art Direction. The video won the Grammy Award for Best Short Form Music Video on 12 February 2012. As of December 2015, the music video has received over 770 million views on YouTube.

     She is really Good.

   I get emails from gab.com, I have a gab account there also, you can find me under bob@mrgarabaldi at gab.com.    I saw this one and thought it was a really good email from the CEO of gab.com.  He gave his permission to "Spread it far and wide".

What Does A Parallel Society Look Like?

• Post author By Andrew Torba
• Post date September 12, 2021

Many of the people who received either one or two shots are beginning to wake up. They were told by the “experts” that they just needed to get the shot and things would get back to normal. Things are far from normal, and now they are being told that they will likely need to get multiple booster shots and even a pill to treat Covid-19.

Thankfully, many of them are starting to take a stand and fight back.

On September 10th it was reported that a New York hospital is going to pause baby deliveries after a “spate of resignations” by maternity unit workers who refused to inject an experimental substance into their bodies.

Over the weekend I received a direct message from a NASA engineer who informed me that “almost all the engineers here have all banded together and are forcing NASA admin to fire them (both vaccinated and unvaccinated alike). NASA is on a hiring freeze, so firing all these folks would essentially kill the Artemis mission.”

Many people believed they were “fully vaccinated” after two shots. They trusted the system. They believed things would get “back to normal.” They took the shots, often reluctantly, with these things in mind and they are quickly finding out that they’ve been lied to.

Now they are preparing to be labeled “unvaccinated” again if they refuse to get yet another shot. Look on the bright side: Moderna’s shares jumped 5% on news that they revealed a new single shot booster.

Meanwhile tens of millions of Americans face being fired, kicked out of school, removed from our Military, refused medical care, and more for having faith in the immune system God gave them to overcome a virus with a 99%+ survival rate for the overwhelming majority of the population.

This all comes after Pseudo-President Joe Biden declared war on 80 million (or likely way more) Americans who refused to participate in the biggest lab rat experiment in human history.

I’ve been writing about concepts like the need for a parallel economy, a parallel internet, and a parallel society throughout all of 2021. But what does that actually look like?

We are about to find out.

If you’ve already been vaccinated you can join those of us who have not been by refusing to get any of these booster shots. At some point enough of us need to say enough is enough. The way this is going to work is even if you’ve received two shots already they are going to group you in with us “unvaccinated” people because without the booster you will no longer be “fully vaccinated.” So you might as well unite with the rest of us and start building something new.

All of the best, most talented, and smartest people are critical thinkers. They are builders. Doers. They are quickly leaving the existing system. What will be left is low quality talent. The “yes” men people who will shut up, do what they are told, and get their 15th booster shot to keep their job. My heart goes out to these people, but you all know exactly the type I’m talking about.

The existing system will begin to collapse under a sea of “vaccinated” talent shortages, incompetence, and woke political nonsense.

Hospitals won’t (and already can’t) find much needed nursing talent. NASA missions will be aborted. Schools won’t be able to find teachers. Businesses who are already having trouble filling open positions will be forced to compete with businesses who don’t pry into your healthcare privacy.

The society of obedient regime sheep will chug along for a while, but inevitably it will succumb under the weight of market forces from a growing new parallel society.

Companies without mandates will perform better and get all of the best talent. Doctors will start private practices. Families will begin to homeschool their children. Blue states and major cities will see a mass exodus unlike anything in American history.

All we have to do is say no and start building a new society for ourselves. We need to take control of our own destiny here and do what needs to be done to protect our families and preserve our values and indeed our own humanity.

I believe that God has a plan, as He always does, for what is unfolding on a global scale today. Now more than ever we must keep the faith and do as Christians have always done: survive and thrive. Do you think it was “easy” for the Pilgrims to set out for a new land and start building from scratch? Of course not, but they did it and ended up building the greatest country in the history of the world. Do you think it was “easy” for first century Christians to spread the Gospel? Of course not, but today billions of Christians know that Christ is on the throne because of their work and sacrifice.

In a lot of ways we are the modern Pilgrims of our time, seeking religious freedom and sovereignty to escape the rule of a tyrannical elite who hate us. Their blood runs in our veins, the spirit of their plight is in our hearts, and most importantly their God is our God.

We can and must do this. Force their hand. Band together with other like minded people at your school and work to say: no, we will not comply. Then start your pilgrimage to a new parallel society where Jesus is King, family values matter, and freedom rings.

To God Be The Glory,

Andrew Torba
CEO, Gab.com
Only Jesus Saves

"Which Weapons Are Most Commonly Used in a Homicide?"

 This is compliments of "JPFO" and the Joslyn Law Firm.  I snagged this from JPFO, they sent it to my email and I thought it was very informative.   I have been super busy, My spologies for not posting something after Monday I have another rant perculating, I will try to get it posted in a few days.

 

With the renewed push by the federal government for an assault weapons ban, we couldn’t help but wonder, just how often are assault rifles really to blame for crimes? More specifically, how often are they used as murder weapons when compared to all of the other types of weapons available?

Using FBI homicide statistics from the 2019 Crime in the United States report, the insights team at the Joslyn Law Firm charted out how often different types of weapons were used in homicides in the U.S.. Of the 16,425 homicides that occurred in 2019, the FBI was able to collect supplemental data for 13,922 of them, which is what our data is based on. The weapon types are broken down into the different types of firearms: handguns, rifles, shotguns, and a category for homicides in which the type of firearm was unknown. It also compares the number of homicides that were committed by non-firearm weapons such as knives or cutting instruments as well as bodily weapons, which include people’s hands, fists, and feet. Non-firearm weapons were used for one-quarter of all homicides in the United States.

Would a ban on assault rifles actually help to curb the violence? With rifles being a relatively uncommon type of weapon used in homicides in the United States, an assault rifle ban may not make much difference when it comes to the number of murders that occur. Homicides are overwhelmingly committed using handguns; they were found to be the most common murder weapon for nearly half of all homicides in the United States in 2019. Even hands, fists, and feet are used to commit homicide almost twice as often as a rifle is. An NIH study that investigated the levels of criminal activity committed with assault weapons or other high-capacity semiautomatics also found that these types of weapons are only being used in a small percentage of crimes: “Assault weapons (primarily assault-type rifles) account for 2–12% of guns used in crime in general (most estimates suggest less than 7%).” Wouldn’t all of the time, money, and resources being used to push for an assault rifle ban be better used elsewhere, such as creating a better mental health-care system that is accessible to those that need it most?

 

Monday Music "Run To You" by Bryan Adams

 I am still taking a break from the "Bugaloo" theme I have been running since 2019.  I will restart that muse in a few weeks.  I wanted to give that poor muse a rest since I have been riding it like a Shetland pony at the fair.   This Theme is if I had a chance to run a segment on Sirius/XM and what songs I could listen to over and over again and this song is one of them.

"Run to You" is a song by Canadian singer and songwriter Bryan Adams. It was released in October 1984 as the lead single from his fourth studio album, Reckless (1984). The track deals with the subject of infidelity, and is sung from the perspective of a man who declares that he will continue to "run to" his seductive mistress over his faithful partner; critic Ira Robbins for CMJ called it a "cheating classic". In the accompanying music video, however, Adams portrays his guitar as the object of desire.
The song topped the Billboard Top Rock Tracks chart and peaked at number 6 on the Billboard Hot 100. It has appeared on all of his compilation albums. The single was certified Gold in Canada in 1985.

After a tour in Asia, Adams started the recording for Reckless.The recording for "Run to You" started on March 27, 1984 at Little Mountain Sound, Vancouver, Canada and continued through the summer. It was mixed on September 21 in New York by Jim Vallance. The song, written January 10, 1983, became the last song written for Reckless. Adams and Vallance originally wrote the song for Blue Öyster Cult, but the group turned it down.

"Run to You" was released in October 1984 and became one of the most successful songs from Reckless on the American rock charts and arguably one of Bryan Adams's most recognizable and popular songs. "Run to You" was released worldwide on October 18, 1984. It was his first number one on the Billboard Top Rock Tracks chart and reached #6 on the Billboard Hot 100. "Run to You" reached the top twenty on the Canadian singles chart and remained there for seven weeks. It held the highest Canadian chart position Adams had attained at the time of release and became his second top twenty single in Canada. "Run to You" was released the following month in Ireland and peaked at #8 and reached #11 on the UK Singles Chart. It was his second single to chart in Europe.
Stewart Mason from Allmusic said "Run to You" was the first of the album's six Top 30 hits, and in retrospect, "one of the weakest of the lot. Although the song has a thundering chorus, the kind that sounds truly excellent blasting through FM speakers, there is quite literally not much else to the song: of the song's nearly four-minute length, over half of the song is devoted to repeats of the chorus and an unimaginative instrumental breakdown that leads into a seemingly endless vamp on the chorus to fade." The long instrumental is indicative of the theme of the music video where the protagonist is serenading his guitar as the object of his affection.

  The music video was shot in London, England and later Los Angeles. Directed by Steve Barron, it was nominated for the 1985 MTV Video Music Awards in five different categories: Best Direction, Best Special Effects, Best Art Direction, Best Editing, and Best Cinematography. While the song didn't win any of the awards, it has received more MTV Video Music Award nominations than any other of Adams's songs. The English actress Lysette Anthony appears in the video.

 

"U.S Troops Rage at their Leaders will grow unless there is deep reform"

This ties in with my rant that posted Thursday evening.  I saw this on the "New York Post" I'm kinda shocked actually.  The images are from my collection of pics on my laptop. 

 

Our military’s civilian leadership is corrupt and incompetent. The brass commands respect neither among the citizenry nor the forces it commands. Mid-level officers are in a rage — a dangerous phenomenon that in many other nations triggers insurrections and coups.

Blessedly, our institutions retain enough strength to prevent such outcomes here. That said, we need to tend to those institutions more carefully, if we want them to continue to work.

According to Rasmussen, more than half of Americans rate President Biden’s handling of Afghanistan as “poor.” His approval numbers have plummeted, and a majority of voters don’t trust administration reports on Afghanistan.

The Taliban and their Chinese allies have been mocking the United States on social media, while Beijing also openly threatens Taiwan, gloating that after the military humiliation of Afghanistan, Washington wouldn’t dare defend that island nation against invasion.

Biden’s stilted, disjointed speeches and clumsily scripted meetings with the families of dead service members haven’t helped. Nor has Vice President Kamala Harris impressed, with an awkward mission to Southeast Asia that merely underscored her unfitness to take over as president, if needed.

Meanwhile, the military command has failed miserably. Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has become the butt of jokes. A group of retired senior officers has called on him, and on Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, to resign. Milley, who found time to lecture us on the dangers of “white rage” last summer, has lately vanished from sight.

Dem senator slams Biden for delay in freeing Americans

Meanwhile, the officers who actually do things are furious. A series of encrypted messages leaked to the media shows officers on the ground in Kabul blasting their orders, complaining that they were being forced to leave Americans behind. “We are f–king abandoning American citizens,” wrote a colonel with the 82d Airborne detachment there. Regular troops were reportedly apoplectic that they weren’t allowed to go rescue US citizens, as British and French forces did.

As this debacle unfolds, the field- and company-grade officers — captains through colonels — are complaining about a double standard in military management: If they screw up even a little, their careers are over. But when the generals screw up, there are no consequences, even when lives or billions of dollars are wasted; then they retire to fat contractor paychecks.

Marine Lt. Col. Stuart Scheller resigned his commission after Kabul to demand accountability from his superiors. He couldn’t stay, he said, because he had lost trust and confidence in them. His words have been echoed, publicly and in private, by many others of similar rank. (I received an email from a serving general making the same points.)

This is against the background of endless loose talk by our high political leaders about “coups,” “insurrections” and “sedition.” The laughable Capitol “riot” certainly didn’t rise to that level, but in a show of insecurity, the Capitol was ringed by 25,000 troops, several times as many as were sent to rescue Americans from Kabul. Banana republic stuff.

Generally speaking, a nation where the civilian leadership fears its citizens and has lost the nation’s confidence, and where the senior military leadership has lost the confidence of those down the chain of command, is a nation in trouble.  

Elsewhere, such circumstances would supply the dry tinder for a military coup. Fortunately, the United States is a bit more resistant. With so much of our government, and even our domestic military force, divided up among the states, a coup is much harder to pull off. And with our institutions, weakened as they are, still comparatively strong, we aren’t likely to see a “Seven Days in May” scenario in the near future.

But while unlikely, that scenario is now more likely than it used to be. And that’s because the people responsible for our great institutions, civilian and military, aren’t doing their jobs. In particular, they aren’t keeping faith with the people they are supposed to serve.

Afghanistan collapsed overnight, because its people lacked faith in its institutions and in those who led them. And no nation is immune to that collapse, if run badly enough for long enough.

 

The 20th Anniversary of 9-11-01

 I set to post this on the scheduler thingie to drop on Sept 11, 2021.  I wrote this post back in November of 2018,  I have blogged before about Rick Rescorla, to me he went to Valhalla on the wings of Valkyries.  To use a phrase that isn't used much anymore, "He died Well".  Everyone dies, that is the truth of our existence, but some choose to run forward despite the almost certainty of death to make a difference.

 

 

 

The Battle of la Drang Valley was the first major battle in the Vietnam War. 36 years later, the first major battle of the War on Terror was the bombing of the Twin Towers.

There are many people who remember both events, but Rick Rescorla is the only person who was at the heart of both.
Rick Rescorla was born in Cornwall, United Kingdom, but was one of the most distinguished heroes in the initial battle of Vietnam. He gave his life on September 11, 2001.
 

 

Just before the collapse of WTC 2. You can see all floors fully involved with fire and         structural failure is imminent

Rescorla’s career in the military started at the age of 17 when he joined the British military. There he trained as a paratrooper and would later serve in Cyprus. At the end of his Short-Service Commission, he joined the Northern Rhodesia police before returning to London to join the Metropolitan Police Service.
Rescorla’s tenure with the Met police was short-lived and he soon emigrated to the United States where he lived in a hostel in Brooklyn. He stayed there until he was able to enlist in the United States Army. He completed basic training at Fort Dix.

After basic training, he completed Officer Candidate School and airborne training, graduating with the assignment of platoon leader.
He became infantry leader of Company B, 2nd Battalion, 7th Cavalry Regiment, 1st Cavalry Division. Rescorla and his men were one of the first combat units on the ground in Vietnam.
In November 1965, he and his unit were involved in the battles in the la Drang Valley. One of the moments from these battles was captured by a war correspondent and appears on the cover of We Were Soldiers Once And Young. This iconic image is of Rick Rescorla holding his rifle with bayonet attached and marching forward into battle.

Rick Rescorla during the war, 1965

Rescorla and his unit fought at Landing Zone X-Ray before being extracted and provided with a brief rest. They were then instructed to return to the valley and reinforce another unit. The battles lasted three days, during which time the companies faced superior numbers but were able to hold off and drive the enemy forces back.
For his part in the war, Rescorla was honored with the Vietnamese Cross of Gallantry, a Purple Heart, a Silver Star, and the Bronze Star with Oak Leaf Cluster.

Some U.S. Army soldiers air-lifted into LZ X-Ray.

After leaving active duty, Rescorla remained a reserve, retiring with the rank of colonel. He used his military benefits to study creative writing and eventually earned a law degree from the Oklahoma City University School of Law.
He would go on to teach criminal justice for three years and publish a textbook on the subject.
His teaching career was short-lived and he moved on to the world of corporate security, joining Dean Witter Reynolds at their office in the World Trade Center.
It was during his time there that Rescorla became concerned with the security of the towers. This was prompted by the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie in Scotland.

The remains of the forward section from Clipper Maid of the Seas (Pan Am Flight 103) on Tundergarth Hill, Lockerbie Scotland, 21 December 1988

The bombing pushed Rescorla to invite his old friend, Daniel Hill, to assess the security of the World Trade Center. Hill was trained in counterterrorism and determined that the basement would be the easiest target for a terror attack.
The two of them used the findings to write a report to the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey insisting that more security be added to the parking garage. Their recommendations were ignored due to the costs, leaving the building open to the 1993 terrorist attack.
During the 1993 attack, Rescorla was upset by the poor evacuation of the building and vowed that it would never happen again. In 1997, he became the director of security for Dean Witter/Morgan Stanley and was able to make some of the changes he wanted.

Procession of emergency vehicles at the World Trade Center bombing on February 26, 1993. The Tower is on the far right of the frame. Photo taken by Eric Ascalon from an adjacent pedestrian walkway. 

Rescorla did recommend that the company find different office space due to the vulnerability of the building, but lease obligations made this impossible. This left Rescorla to create an emergency evacuation plan that all employees had to practice again and again.
The emergency plan ensured that Morgan Stanley employees were ready for any attacks. On the morning of September 11, 2001, Rescorla heard the explosion from the North Tower and saw it burning from his office window on the 44th floor of the South Tower.
An announcement from Port Authority came over the PA system telling people to remain at their desks. Rescorla ignored the announcement, grabbed his bullhorn and ordered Morgan Stanley employees to start evacuating.

The north face of Two World Trade Center (south tower) immediately after being struck by United Airlines Flight 175

He directed the employees down the staircase and continued to encourage them when the building lurched as the second plane hit. To keep everyone calm, Rescorla started to sing as he had done for his platoon in Vietnam.

 Rick pushing people out of the building in Sept 11, 2001 saving their lives, this was the last pic that was taken of that man.

2,687 employees of Morgan Stanley owe their lives to Rick Rescorla as they were successfully evacuated. After seeing to this, Rescorla returned to the South Tower to ensure that everyone was out.
He was last seen on the 10th floor heading up shortly before the tower collapsed. His remains were never found and he was declared dead three weeks later.

The exterior support columns from the lower level of the South Tower remain standing after the collapse of the building.

Rick Rescorla was a man who saw battle with two armies and the start of the War on Terror. All but 13 employees of Morgan Stanley were able to exit the South Tower safely because of his leadership and foresight.

 Rescorla's name is located on Panel S-46 of the National September 11 Memorial’s South Pool

One of my favorite pics, it shows the indomitable spirit of the American People.

9-11-2002

Musings and Rants

 

 I have calmed down from the debacle called "The Afganistan Withdrawal".  My emotions are no longer hot, they are cold furious at the total ineptness of the Xiden Whitehouse.  Hell even kids know to take their toys home with them.  Instead we leave Americans over there trapped and the Xiden State Department are playing games with the private flights trying to get the rest of the Americans and any Afgani allies that haven't been killed by the Taliban, you know the ones that American Military left because they were under orders by Xiden and Milley not to go get them and then had them interfere with the Polish, French, British and anybody else that was trying to get any westerners out because it was making the Xiden administration look bad after Xiden went on Television and said that "there will not be no Saigon".  Funny that having Kabul fall in a weekend and now that the Taliban are in charge of Afghanistan, and there was a few provinces that were holdouts that were captured with the overt help of the Pakistan ISI and their Helicopters....You know the same Pakistan that sheltered OBL and we just conveniently "glossed" over that fact for the past 15 years. WTF?!!.  And what is Xiden administration "Deeply concerned about? "Lack Of Diversity" from the Taliban in Afghanistan ....Really?   What kind of make believe dreamland are these people living in?  The Taliban follow the edicts of a 7th century century death cult where women are chattel.  Jeez.

 

         Meanwhile all that equipment that the ineptness of the Xiden administration allowed to fall into the hands of the Taliban have allowed their sponsors, the Pakistani's, the Iranians, and the Chinese to allow the latest in western technology with is a boon to their R&D efforts to develop counter measures to our ways of war.  The Same administration that has issues with us American citizens owning firearms but yet have no problems turning over 600,000 actual assault rifles, millions of rounds of ammo, machine guns, MRAPS, Helicopters, airplanes, Drones, night vision gear and a myriad of other items of a modern Army but yet they talk tough to American citizen and act like pussies on the world stage.

 

  It is the same thing when Barky Lightbringer was in charge, he was a wimp to the world, but to the GOP and to conservatives he was confrontational, and the complicit Mainstream media would cover for him and sing his praises.  

    Meanwhile the Xiden ardent supporters a trying to blame the debacle on the former President Trump's administration saying "We were following his plan, so it is his fault" Well there is a couple of things wrong with that assertion...

   1. As soon as Xiden came into office, he immediately reversed as many of "Orange Man Bad" policies as he could, to somehow stick with this one thing kinda flies in the face of that.  

   2. And this is the most important part, he is the President, his handlers stole the election, he wanted the job, so as President Truman said whom is a fellow democrat(although I'm sure that he wouldn't recognize the current crop of donks as being anywhere near "his" party of democrats back in the day.) "The Buck Stops Here".  You saw that the situation was going pear shaped and did nothing, YOU OWN IT.

     My rant isn't done, Not only am I pissed at the Xiden Whitehouse, I am really pissed at the Military, what General thought this was a good idea? First off to Give up Bagram?  That huge base 1 hour outside of Kabul?  What genius thought it was smart to sneak away in the middle of the night and leave a bunch of equipment for the Taliban?   It was all over social media the supplies and munitions that were left when we snuck out of there?  Somebody wasn't verifying stock or rendering it inert? WTF, but this was a portent of the bigger goatrope when the government fell and Taliban just walked into Kabul over a weekend 

     What I am really angry about is the sheer arrogance, it is like the 5 sided Puzzle palace forgot the lessons of Vietnam, Oh Yeah, the Officers and men that were around and experienced that loss and swore that we wouldn't EVER do it again.  They rebuilt the Military from the bad days of the Carter White House, Revamped doctrine, developed AirLand Battle, and totally changed our way of war, they saw what had happened in Vietnam and didn't want to have it happen again. So we had "Desert Storm" which was a war like no other, and I was part of that and I am proud to be part of that, we liberated a country that was attacked and seized by a bully so to speak and we went in and freed Kuwait and kicked their asses and now Kuwait is doing really well and I am proud of that, but it was built on the lessons of Vietnam by the guys that were there before me.  

    But the new breed of Officers all they had was the hubris of "We won" and that was it....Really?  Only a fool forgets the lessons of the past.  Hell us enlisted and lower grade officers officers knew what the hell was going one, but for some reason once you got those stars, you got a partial lobotomy and forgot everything that they taught at those service schools except "CRT" and "White Fragility" instead of warfighting. You saw a piece of it a few years ago when the Navy had a couple of ships damaged in collisions, and the root cause was that they had people unqualified running the bridge.  Apparently Diversity and inclusion are more important than learning how to crew a ship.  I blame some of this on President Obama, but the rot had started before then during the Clinton administration. But what really gets me..there were no resignations from the 5 sided Puzzle palace, no resignations from the clowns from foggy bottom.  the only person that has resigned was a Lt Colonel from the Marines who resigned because he demanded accountability from his chain of command for this and they are all cowards and stayed silent in their shame.  They knew it was a bad idea, they knew it was a bad call and nobody was man enough to throw their stars on the table and tell the "National Command Authority" that he is fucked in the head.  No they stayed silent to preserve their position and power and consulting gigs after they hang up their suits,  what the hell happened to integrity? what happened to Honor? what happened to Duty?   like craven chicken shits they stayed silent and let the United States get humiliated like nothing in recent history.  The Officers of Old would have resigned, or ate a bullet for the shame that they brought on this country, but these clowns?  Jeez I am still pissed.  

      North Vietnamese Tank driving through the gate of the Presidential palace in Saigon in April 1975
 

     I remember as a kid watching my Dad glued to the TV in April of 1975 and I couldn't understand why he was so angry, hey I was a kid you know.  When I got older I better understood the significance of that date.  I later asked him and he told me that he was ashamed that all their sacrifice and loss was for nothing.  Granted the South Vietnamese stood for 2 more years but after their supplies and support was cut by the democratic congress what was full of supporters for North Vietnam and they enjoyed shanking South Vietnam and President Ford had no political capital left after pardoning Nixon.  Granted it was the right thing to do, and it probably cost him the presidency in 1976 and gave us the now 3rd worst president in modern history.

      Besides that circus, we have America splitting up into "Vaxxed" and Unvaxxed" camps and the liberals are in the "vaxxed camp and they believed that anybody that doesn't accept the holy sacraments of "The Jab" .are subhuman and should be treated like vermin,, herded into camps and ostracized from society as a threat to society.   I recall version 1.0 of this circus and 6 millions Jews plus other "Undesirables" were herded into camps because they were viewed as a "threat to Order, threat to Society, Threat to Health", and other reasons and a  certain modern  20 century European country after stripping them of their rights including firearms via the "Nuremberg Laws" and stripped them of their citizenship  then herded them into ghetto's after seizing all their property for "the Good of the State".  Now there is a new generation of the same kind statist trying the same thing here, they have already starting the ball rolling by segregating people in their houses, isolation certain groups and if you think your neighbor won't fink on you...Guess again,  once your status comes out that you refuse to accept the "Holy Jab", you will be considered a "NonBeliever" and cast out of Mainstream society. 

 You doubt me? Go check on Twitter and see what the average liberal thinks of you.  People wondered how Anne Franks wound up dead in a Nazi Death Camp?  Her family neighbors may have squealed on them, Your neighbors may be encouraged to squeal on you.  in East Germany, 1out of 7 "Osters" were informants for the "Stasi" whom helped the German Communist Party remain in power.  The Stasi were better secret policeman than the KGB.

  

     I don't know what the next 3.5 years will bring, I am not sure if we can vote our way out of it, the Donks stole the 2020 election and I believe that they will try even more crap in 2024.  They will use the excuse of another variant to keep scaring the crap out of people and when people are scared, they use emotions and emotions are a bad things and their media sycophants will keep  the fear drummed up so they can use the emergency power to keep themselves in power and they will push it as long as they can until the country implodes or explodes. 

The Germans "People's Storm Rifle" of WWII fame

 Some background, I have blogged quite a bit about WWII and Germans and the Prewar and postwar era of Germany, I was stationed there in the mid 80's for 5 years and returned "Back to the World in 1991" after the Gulf War.  Germany at the point of WWII was losing and losing badly, they had suffered reverses on all battlefields and they had lost a lot of resources that was recaptured or flat out captured by the various allies and raw material was getting more difficult to get.  Manpower was also an issue, by this stage of the war, Germany was scraping the bottom of the manpower barrel, they had lost millions of their men in war, plus they had a huge number of their men captured by the allies and with the case of the Soviets, few would ever return from the Gulag system in the mid 50's.  The Nazi government decided to form the "Volksturm" or Peoples Army as a last ditch effort to fight off the Allies closing in on the homeland, it also goes in with the Nazi belief in "Gotterdammerung" the end of the world according to Nordic belief.  Remember the Volksturm was formed by the Nazi Party, not the German Military and this ties in their mythos and belief system. I snagged the following article off "American Rifleman", it is a damm good article and it had some good info in it,

 The Iconic picture of the "Volksturm" or German Militia going to defend Berlin as the Soviets approach, You notice at this point, most of them wore "Civilian Clothes" and all they got was an "Armband" to signify that they were in the "Volksturm" that was worn on the coat of their left arm on the lower part of the sleeve a few inches above the cuff.

The military firearms produced for the government of the Third Reich are generally recognized as being some of the finest of World War II. On the one hand, that is certainly true when you consider German innovations like the general-purpose machine gun, the intermediate cartridge, and the roller-delayed blowback operating system. But when the demand for resources began to outpace the available supply, Germany eventually had to cut corners like everybody else.

The ongoing development of small arms over the course of the conflict therefore became a process of not just building better guns, but also building them as economically as possible. By late 1944, the Third Reich had to confront certain emerging realities about manpower as well. After staggering battlefield setbacks in North Africa and the Soviet Union in 1943, and the retreat on all fronts that began during the summer of 1944, the time had come to mobilize the element of Germany’s male population that was not already in uniform.

Left-side view of Gustloff-Werke VG1-5 Th 8895. Photograph by Jeff Hallinan of Collectors Firearms in Houston, Tex.

Accordingly, in September 1944, Adolf Hitler authorized the establishment of a national militia called the Volkssturm, and he did it just as the U.S. 12th Army Group began its attack on the Siegfried Line. German boys and men between the ages of 16 and 60 years were conscripted into the Volkssturm–some of them having been previously rejected for military service, and many of them being convalescent veterans. They were organized into battalions and lightly armed with the infamous Panzerfaust to fight Allied armor and an assortment of substitute standard small arms to fight Allied infantry.

A closer left-side view of Gustloff-Werke VG1-5 Th 8895. Photograph by Jeff Hallinan of Collectors Firearms in Houston, Tex.

Although Germany maintained a significant stockpile of older service rifles like the Gew 98, as well as battlefield-captured foreign rifles, a need still existed to arm Volkssturm troops, so the Primitiv-Waffen-Programm was created. This program developed the kind of simplified firearms needed at this late stage of the war, including a German copy of the STEN submachine gun designated MP3008 Volksmaschinenpistole. In addition to conventional “last ditch” type bolt-action rifles, the Primitiv-Waffen-Programm also introduced a decidedly unconventional self-loading rifle designated the VG1-5. 

Right-side view of Gustloff-Werke VG1-5 Th 8895. Photograph by Jeff Hallinan of Collectors Firearms in Houston, Tex.

Designed by Karl Barnitzke of Gustloff-Werke in Suhl, Thuringia, the Volkssturmgewehr 1-5 was assembled using just 39 metal parts, only 12 of which required milling. Aside from a few rivets and screws, everything else on the gun was either sheet metal or springs, and that made it comparatively inexpensive and simple for a self-loading rifle. What makes Barnitzke’s design unconventional though is the use of a delayed-blowback action, whereby gas pressure vented into the operating slide briefly delays its rearward movement just long enough for the bullet to leave the 14.9" barrel.

A closer right-side view of Gustloff-Werke VG1-5 Th 8895. Photograph by Jeff Hallinan of Collectors Firearms in Houston, Tex.

Once that has happened, residual gas pressure eventually overcomes the mass of the slide, sending it rearward into an operating cycle that extracts the spent cartridge case, ejects it and then feeds a fresh cartridge out of the magazine. The gun’s chamber is fluted to assist with extraction. This system only works in the VG1-5, because it is chambered for the intermediate 7.92x33 mm Kurz cartridge – the same cartridge used in the MP44 Sturmgewehr. Such an operating system would never work with the 7.92x57 mm Mauser cartridge, but with the less powerful 7.92 mm Kurz, everything is in balance. 

Top view of Gustloff-Werke VG1-5 Th 8895. Photograph by Jeff Hallinan of Collectors Firearms in Houston, Tex.

A further economizing practicality of the Volkssturmgewehr design is that it uses the same detachable box magazine as the MKb42, MP43 and MP44 – an important part of the weapon system already in operational use when VG1-5 production began in late 1944. With a mass of just over 10 lbs., its weight is about the same as the Sturmgewehr, but the similarities end there. The two guns produce totally different recoil impulses because of their different operating systems, and they feature very different sighting systems.

Bottom view of Gustloff-Werke VG1-5 Th 8895. Photograph by Jeff Hallinan of Collectors Firearms in Houston, Tex.

While the MP44 is equipped with a rear sight assembly adjustable out to 800 meters and a drift-adjustable front sight, the VG1-5 is equipped with a fixed U-notch rear sight set for 100 meters and a simple post front sight. Another big difference is that the Sturmgewehr is select-fire, while the Volkssturmgewehr is capable of semi-automatic fire only. Anyone with an interest in German small arms from World War II will stop and take notice if they ever encounter a VG1-5, but they will also quickly observe that something is conspicuously missing.

View of the serial number markings of Gustloff-Werke VG1-5 Th 8895. Photograph by Jeff Hallinan of Collectors Firearms in Houston, Tex.

Since the German military did not adopt the Volkssturmgewehr, there are no Waffenamt acceptance marks on it. For that matter, there is not even a model designation roll stamped on the receiver. In fact, the only markings to be seen on the gun will be a serial number on the left side of the beechwood buttstock with the letters “Th” as a prefix. Since the Gauleiter of the state of Thüringia ordered the guns, not the Wehrmacht, the “Th” constitutes the only indication that the government of the Third Reich had anything to do with them. 

Volkssturm soldiers in an emplacement along the Oder River on Feb. 12, 1945. The man on the left is armed with a Gustloff Volkssturmgewehr. Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-J28787 / CC-BY-SA.

With a dull phosphate finish on its metallic parts and an overall crude appearance, the VG1-5 is not an elegant-looking firearm, but it was never intended to be that. It was intended to be functional, and that is well-illustrated by several of its design features: the forward handguard and buttstock are permanently riveted to the receiver, a webbed gas-mask canister strap attached to them functions as a sling, the gun’s safety selector also serves as one of its two disassembly pins, the cocking handle is a strip of sheet metal bent into the shape of a hook, and the trigger group’s stamped dust cover also secures the rear end of the operating slide to the receiver.

It is utilitarianism in its purest form, and it is the culmination of the same industrial design considerations that also produced the U.S. M3 "Grease Gun." In the end, Gustloff-Werke produced only 10,000 examples of the Volkssturmgewehr and, although it was a clever design for its time, it did not meaningfully influence the outcome of the war. Neither did the battalions of Volkssturm militiamen who carried it in combat during the closing months of the "thousand-year Reich."

Monday Music "Allentown" by Billy Joel a Labor Day Special

 

I am continuing to give the "Bugaloo" meme a break for a few more weeks. Now because it is a Major Holiday. Labor Day,  On this  Monday Music. I am going with "Allentown" from Billy Joel, I remember a line from the song, "The jobs went away and the union people crawled away" this happened when in the video it showed a worker getting his pink slip while in the shower.  I thought about this when my job went away at Ford Motor Company. it still gives me bad feelings to see that.

 Inside the door of my toolbox at home now, I kept my

Old Ford Toolbox and modified it for work until I had to take it home 

because we have tool control now*Mutter,spit*

 

The pictures were inside the lid that was featured in the beginning of the article.

   This is what it looked like after I modded it and repaired the toolbox and built a Sidebox

Don't get me wrong, I understand why Ford did what they did and they treated us good in a really bad situation.  I was the only republican to hold union office, I was a heck of a good shop steward.  The rank and file knew it, I didn't hide it, and half of them voted for the GOP despite the union recommending anybody democrat.  I had my own issues with the democratic party, even back then, they treated the UAW as an ATM, mention "worker platitudes" and they would take our money, but they were beholding to the environmental movement.  and I knew if the environmental groups had their way, my job would be gone.  Well it went away anyway. but it was for different reasons.

Stickers on my old gun safe.

 

        I got lucky, I got hired by a local airline and am a chemtrail technician now and doing very well, unlike many of my Ford peeps who didn't transfer to another Ford plant,  they didn't do so well.  It was difficult making the adjustments.  Even now I am sensitive to the subject of "Outsourcing". 

.

"Allentown" is a song by American singer Billy Joel, which first appeared on Joel's The Nylon Curtain (1982) album, accompanied by a conceptual music video. It later appeared on Joel's Greatest Hits: Volume II (1985), 2000 Years: The Millennium Concert (2000), The Essential Billy Joel (2001), and 12 Gardens Live (2006) albums. Also, it was featured in Hangover II (2011) "Allentown" is the lead track on The Nylon Curtain, which was the seventh best-selling album of the year in 1982. The song reached #17 on the Billboard Hot 100, spending six consecutive weeks at that position and certified gold. Despite the song placing no higher than #17 on the weekly Billboard Hot 100 chart, it was popular enough to place at #43 on the Billboard year-end Hot 100 chart for 1982.
Upon its release, and especially in subsequent years, "Allentown" has emerged as an anthem of blue collar America, representing both the aspirations and frustrations of America's working class in the late 20th century.

The song's theme is of the resolve of those coping with the demise of the American manufacturing industry in the latter part of the 20th century. More specifically, it depicts the depressed, blue-collar livelihood of residents of Allentown, Pennsylvania and Bethlehem, Pennsylvania in the wake of Bethlehem Steel's decline and eventual closure. Joel witnessed this first-hand while performing at the Lehigh Valley's numerous music venues and colleges at the start of his career in the late 1960s and early 1970s.
The introductory rhythm of the song is reminiscent of the sound of a rolling mill converting steel ingots into I-beams or other shapes. Such a sound was commonly heard throughout South Bethlehem when the Bethlehem Steel plant was in operation from 1857 through 1995.
     When Joel first started writing the song, it was originally named "Levittown", after the Long Island town right next to Hicksville, the town in which Joel had grown up. He had originally written a chord progression and lyrics for the song, but struggled for a topic for the song. Joel remembered reading about the decline of the steel industry in the Lehigh Valley, which included the small cities of both Bethlehem and Allentown. While the steel industry was based in Bethlehem with none of it in Allentown, Joel named the song "Allentown" because it sounded better and it was easier to find other words to rhyme with "Allentown." Although Joel started writing the song in the late 1970s, it wasn't finished until 1982.

A year after the song was released, the mayor of Allentown sent a letter to Joel about giving some of his royalties to the town. Mayor Joseph Daddona, who sent the letter, said it would help for scholarships for future musicians. On January 20, 1983, the letter was mailed to Joel, and a local paper published an article on the subject the next day, quoting Daddona as saying: "Not only would this fund be a great way to share a tiny part of your good fortune to others in Allentown, it would also help keep alive the 'Allentown' song and the Billy Joel legend (which you've already become here)."
When Joel performed the song in Leningrad during the concert recorded and later released as Концерт, he introduced the song by analogizing the situation to that faced by Soviet youths: "This song is about young people living in the Northeast of America. Their lives are miserable because the steel factories are closing down. They desperately want to leave... but they stay because they were brought up to believe that things were going to get better. Maybe that sounds familiar."

The video, directed by Russell Mulcahy and featuring choreography by Kenny Ortega, was in heavy rotation on MTV during 1982 and 1983. The original version of the video features partial male nudity when male coal workers are taking a shower at the beginning, but that part was edited when it aired on MTV. (Although it has aired uncut on both VH1 Classic and MTV Classic in recent years.)