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Today In History
11 years 1 month ago - 11 years 1 month ago #121
by Nikita
Replied by Nikita on topic Today In History
March 23, 1943
In application of Hitler's directive of October 18, 1942, also known as " Commando Order " and relative to the execution of any allied commando captured in operation, four English commandos of the Operation Frankton , Lieutenant John MacKinnon, Corporal Albert Laver, Marine James Conway and Marine Henry Mills of the Boom Patrol Detachment ( SBS, Special Boat Service ), are executed in Paris after having been questioned and tortured in vain. Note that MacKinnon and Conway were arrested by the French Gendarmerie and handed over to the Germans.
From left to right: Lieutenant John MacKinnon, Corporal Albert Laver, Marine James Conway and Marine Henry Mills.
At the Nuremberg trial of 1946, the German Admiral Raeder will have to answer about this war crime.
In application of Hitler's directive of October 18, 1942, also known as " Commando Order " and relative to the execution of any allied commando captured in operation, four English commandos of the Operation Frankton , Lieutenant John MacKinnon, Corporal Albert Laver, Marine James Conway and Marine Henry Mills of the Boom Patrol Detachment ( SBS, Special Boat Service ), are executed in Paris after having been questioned and tortured in vain. Note that MacKinnon and Conway were arrested by the French Gendarmerie and handed over to the Germans.
At the Nuremberg trial of 1946, the German Admiral Raeder will have to answer about this war crime.
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11 years 1 month ago - 11 years 1 month ago #122
by Nikita
Replied by Nikita on topic Today In History
March 26, 1944
At the Maquis des Glières , Upper Savoy, take place the first pitched battle of the French Resistance against the occupier and the collaborationist government of Vichy. Since January, the Vichy regime placed the Upper Savoy under state of siege. After almost two months of skirmishes, ambushes and guerrilla, about 450 Resistance fighters of Upper Savoy are going to begin the main battle, one against eleven. They have for them sub-machine guns, rifles, some light machine guns, a handful of grenades and their knowledge of the battlefield. Facing them, more than 1300 riot policemen of the Vichy regime, 700 men of the Vichy milice and 3000 German soldiers of the mountain troops of the Wehrmacht, supported by artillery and aviation, and the rage of the occupier against this handful of men who dare stand up to him. The fight is going to last all day long. At night, submerged by the number, bombarded by the artillery and the aviation and deprived of heavy weapons, the last defenders of Glières evacuate their positions. In the morning of March 27, the German mountain troops give the assault but discover only the abandoned camp. Nevertheless, during the hunt which will follow, the Resistance fighters will undergo heavy losses. Two thirds will be captured, approximately hundred and twenty fighters and twenty home-bodies will die, killed in action, under the torture, shot or deported as franc-tireurs and "terrorists". The wounded found on the spot will be shot without mercy.
This battle marked a psychological turning point in the action of the French Resistance. Until then, Resistance actions were clandestine, underground. At the Glières, the fight is different. For the first time, the Resistance is fighting openly, showing to the Allies that it's a force capable of conducting large-scale operations and finishing to convince them to accelerate their material aid by more airdrops of weapons and ammunition. The Glières fight was analyzed so by the historian Jean-Louis Cremieux, aka Cremieux-Brilhac : "A defeat of the weapons can be a victory of the opinion. Fighters of Upper Savoy have defined and projected outward the image they wanted to give themselves, they were able to listen to the BBC and follow the building of their own legend. This legend, who knows if they would have experienced the same way until the end, as they did, if they didn't had known - or believed - that the entire France was looking at them ?"
"The word "No", firmly opposed to the force, has a mysterious power that comes from the depths of centuries. All the highest spiritual figures of humanity have said No to Caesar. Prometheus reigns over tragedy and our memory for having said No to the Gods. Resistance escaped the scatter only by orbiting the No of 18 June. Unknown shadows jostling at the Glières in a night of the Last Judgment were nothing more than the men of No, but this No by the obscure maquisard glued to the ground for his first night of death is enough to make this poor fellow the companion of Jeanne and Antigone... The slave always says yes."
At the Maquis des Glières , Upper Savoy, take place the first pitched battle of the French Resistance against the occupier and the collaborationist government of Vichy. Since January, the Vichy regime placed the Upper Savoy under state of siege. After almost two months of skirmishes, ambushes and guerrilla, about 450 Resistance fighters of Upper Savoy are going to begin the main battle, one against eleven. They have for them sub-machine guns, rifles, some light machine guns, a handful of grenades and their knowledge of the battlefield. Facing them, more than 1300 riot policemen of the Vichy regime, 700 men of the Vichy milice and 3000 German soldiers of the mountain troops of the Wehrmacht, supported by artillery and aviation, and the rage of the occupier against this handful of men who dare stand up to him. The fight is going to last all day long. At night, submerged by the number, bombarded by the artillery and the aviation and deprived of heavy weapons, the last defenders of Glières evacuate their positions. In the morning of March 27, the German mountain troops give the assault but discover only the abandoned camp. Nevertheless, during the hunt which will follow, the Resistance fighters will undergo heavy losses. Two thirds will be captured, approximately hundred and twenty fighters and twenty home-bodies will die, killed in action, under the torture, shot or deported as franc-tireurs and "terrorists". The wounded found on the spot will be shot without mercy.
This battle marked a psychological turning point in the action of the French Resistance. Until then, Resistance actions were clandestine, underground. At the Glières, the fight is different. For the first time, the Resistance is fighting openly, showing to the Allies that it's a force capable of conducting large-scale operations and finishing to convince them to accelerate their material aid by more airdrops of weapons and ammunition. The Glières fight was analyzed so by the historian Jean-Louis Cremieux, aka Cremieux-Brilhac : "A defeat of the weapons can be a victory of the opinion. Fighters of Upper Savoy have defined and projected outward the image they wanted to give themselves, they were able to listen to the BBC and follow the building of their own legend. This legend, who knows if they would have experienced the same way until the end, as they did, if they didn't had known - or believed - that the entire France was looking at them ?"
"The word "No", firmly opposed to the force, has a mysterious power that comes from the depths of centuries. All the highest spiritual figures of humanity have said No to Caesar. Prometheus reigns over tragedy and our memory for having said No to the Gods. Resistance escaped the scatter only by orbiting the No of 18 June. Unknown shadows jostling at the Glières in a night of the Last Judgment were nothing more than the men of No, but this No by the obscure maquisard glued to the ground for his first night of death is enough to make this poor fellow the companion of Jeanne and Antigone... The slave always says yes."
André Malraux
Inaugural speech of the Glières monument
September 2, 1973
Inaugural speech of the Glières monument
September 2, 1973
"When one didn't give everything, one gave nothing."
Lieutenant Tom Morel
Commander in chief of the maquis des Glières
Killed in action on March 10, 1944
Lieutenant Tom Morel
Commander in chief of the maquis des Glières
Killed in action on March 10, 1944
"The honor of a people belongs to the dead and the living have only the usufruct."
Georges Bernanos
Bulletin of Free France
Bulletin of Free France
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11 years 1 month ago #123
by snowman
"Straight and narrow is the path."
Replied by snowman on topic Today In History
Battle of Iwo Jima
The Battle of Iwo Jima (19 February – 26 March 1945), or Operation Detachment, was a major battle in which the United States Armed Forces fought for and captured the island of Iwo Jima from the Japanese Empire. The American invasion had the goal of capturing the entire island, including its three airfields, to provide a staging area for attacks on the Japanese main islands. This month-long battle included some of the fiercest and bloodiest fighting of the War in the Pacific of World War II. Read more on Wiki .
Maybe you remember this photo:
Some more photos:
Kitteh was there too :smile:
A video from The Pacific series on Iwo Jima:
The Battle of Iwo Jima (19 February – 26 March 1945), or Operation Detachment, was a major battle in which the United States Armed Forces fought for and captured the island of Iwo Jima from the Japanese Empire. The American invasion had the goal of capturing the entire island, including its three airfields, to provide a staging area for attacks on the Japanese main islands. This month-long battle included some of the fiercest and bloodiest fighting of the War in the Pacific of World War II. Read more on Wiki .
Maybe you remember this photo:
Some more photos:
Kitteh was there too :smile:
A video from The Pacific series on Iwo Jima:
"Straight and narrow is the path."
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11 years 1 month ago - 11 years 1 month ago #124
by Nikita
Replied by Nikita on topic Today In History
Well done Snow, thanks for this topic about this key event of the Pacific war.
Also this interesting picture showing the surrender of Japanese soldiers, which was not often, given their fanaticism and the rules of Bushido , the samurai code of honor they were trying to follow... We, players of H&D2, know something about that when we meet on this bloody moutain in our favorite game, no surrender with these guys...
Well, speaking about this famous picture by Joe Rosenthal, " Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima ", it's in fact the scene showing the raising of the second flag. The real first one was raised on February 23, 1945, by a team of Marines leaded by Lieutenant Harold G. Schrier. But when the U.S. Secretary of the Navy, James Forrestal, landed on Iwo Jima, he decided, looking at this flag, to keep it for himself, saying to General Holland Smith : "Holland, the raising of that flag on Suribachi means a Marine Corps for the next five hundred years." So it was decided to raise a second flag, much bigger, and it's this second flag that Joe Rosenthal captured with his camera.
This story is told here on Wikipedia and also in the Clint Eastwood movie " Flags of Our Fathers ".
EDIT :
This is an example that shows well all the power of the still image. Everything is in this photo by Joe Rosenthal: The design, the composition, the symbolism... The decisive instant "par excellence"... Even if the picture by Lowery is much authentic on the historical aspect, it's very far from having the force of the picture by Rosenthal... Lowery was a soldier, Rosenthal was a war correspondent and photography is also an art...
Also this interesting picture showing the surrender of Japanese soldiers, which was not often, given their fanaticism and the rules of Bushido , the samurai code of honor they were trying to follow... We, players of H&D2, know something about that when we meet on this bloody moutain in our favorite game, no surrender with these guys...
Well, speaking about this famous picture by Joe Rosenthal, " Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima ", it's in fact the scene showing the raising of the second flag. The real first one was raised on February 23, 1945, by a team of Marines leaded by Lieutenant Harold G. Schrier. But when the U.S. Secretary of the Navy, James Forrestal, landed on Iwo Jima, he decided, looking at this flag, to keep it for himself, saying to General Holland Smith : "Holland, the raising of that flag on Suribachi means a Marine Corps for the next five hundred years." So it was decided to raise a second flag, much bigger, and it's this second flag that Joe Rosenthal captured with his camera.
The real first flag atop Mount Suribachi
This photography was taken by Staff Sergeant Louis R. Lowery
This photography was taken by Staff Sergeant Louis R. Lowery
This story is told here on Wikipedia and also in the Clint Eastwood movie " Flags of Our Fathers ".
EDIT :
This is an example that shows well all the power of the still image. Everything is in this photo by Joe Rosenthal: The design, the composition, the symbolism... The decisive instant "par excellence"... Even if the picture by Lowery is much authentic on the historical aspect, it's very far from having the force of the picture by Rosenthal... Lowery was a soldier, Rosenthal was a war correspondent and photography is also an art...
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11 years 1 month ago - 11 years 1 month ago #125
by Nikita
Replied by Nikita on topic Today In History
March 27, 1942
The English commandos of the Combined Operations of Lord Mountbatten start the Operation Chariot , "the greatest raid of all". The day after, at 01:30 AM, by destroying the vital parts of the Joubert lock in the French port of Saint-Nazaire, the 611 braves condemn its use by the Germans. The Tirpitz, sister ship of Bismarck, has no more any shipyard capable of accommodate her on the Atlantic facade of Europe and is going to rot in a Norwegian fjord till the end of the war. The English losses will be heavy but the mission will be a success and remains today as the archetype of the naval commando raid.
As every year, a ceremony will take place at Saint-Nazaire these days, to commemorate the sacrifice of the men of Operation Chariot.
HMS Campbeltown, embedded in the door of the Joubert lock: We do not pass any more...
Commemoration in 2012 at the monument of Operation Chariot in Saint-Nazaire
The plaque on the Operation Chariot monument
EDIT : Note that, on this plaque, the English term "dared" was translated in French as "hasardé". It's a detail but, in French language, the term "hasardé" has a connotation as something as "you are taking risks maybe without analysing the situation enough". For my part, i would rather have used the word "osé", pretty much closer to the sense of the English term "dared",
just as in the French translation of the SAS motto "Who dares wins" : Qui ose gagne...
The English commandos of the Combined Operations of Lord Mountbatten start the Operation Chariot , "the greatest raid of all". The day after, at 01:30 AM, by destroying the vital parts of the Joubert lock in the French port of Saint-Nazaire, the 611 braves condemn its use by the Germans. The Tirpitz, sister ship of Bismarck, has no more any shipyard capable of accommodate her on the Atlantic facade of Europe and is going to rot in a Norwegian fjord till the end of the war. The English losses will be heavy but the mission will be a success and remains today as the archetype of the naval commando raid.
As every year, a ceremony will take place at Saint-Nazaire these days, to commemorate the sacrifice of the men of Operation Chariot.
HMS Campbeltown, embedded in the door of the Joubert lock: We do not pass any more...
Commemoration in 2012 at the monument of Operation Chariot in Saint-Nazaire
The plaque on the Operation Chariot monument
EDIT : Note that, on this plaque, the English term "dared" was translated in French as "hasardé". It's a detail but, in French language, the term "hasardé" has a connotation as something as "you are taking risks maybe without analysing the situation enough". For my part, i would rather have used the word "osé", pretty much closer to the sense of the English term "dared",
just as in the French translation of the SAS motto "Who dares wins" : Qui ose gagne...
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11 years 1 month ago #126
by Morty
Always be yourself unless you can be a unicorn, then always be a unicorn.
Replied by Morty on topic Today In History
Always be yourself unless you can be a unicorn, then always be a unicorn.
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