Random News and Notes 28 June
George Meade doesn’t get the credit he deserves. On this date in 1863, he takes command of the Army of the Potomac, mere days before the clash at Gettysburg. Later in the war, Lincoln would get frustrated by Meade and appoint US Grant as overall commander, but Meade would stay on as Army Commander for much of the war.
According to Grant’s own memoirs, he trusted Meade to do what was needful with a minimum amount of instruction. The same could not be said for some of Grant’s other commanders.
Today in 1902, the US Congress passes the Spooner Act. It authorized President Theodore Roosevelt to purchase the French-owned New Panama Canal Company’s assets for $40 million and build a canal through the Isthmus of Panama. The act is remembered for shaping the route of the Panama Canal and defining early 20th-century American foreign policy in Latin America.
Franz Ferdinand was the Arch-Duke of Austria and the heir-presumptive to the Austro-Hungarian throne. On this date in 1914, he was on an inspection tour in the Serbian city of Sarajevo when he and his wife, Sophie, were shot and killed by Serbian separatist Gavrilo Princip.
The assassination set off a rapid chain of events, as Austria-Hungary immediately blamed the Serbian government for the attack. As large and powerful Russia supported Serbia, Austria asked for assurances that Germany would step in on its side against Russia and its allies, including France and possibly Great Britain. On July 28, Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia, and the fragile peace between Europe’s great powers collapsed, beginning the devastating conflict now known as the First World War.
.
.
.
.
5 years to the day, in 1919, Germany was forced to sign the Treaty of Versailles. The conditions of the treaty were humiliating for Germany. Among the clauses were a ‘war guilt’ provision that forced Germany to take sole responsibility for the war and reparations totalling some $32 billion.
Many historians – including this one – lay the blame for the rise of National Socialism in Germany and WWII at the feet of this treaty.
In what I personally consider one of Churchill’s biggest diplomatic blunders, the British recognized Charles de Gaulle as the leader of the Free French on this day in 1940. Prior to the war, de Gaulle was an over age Colonel without an actual command. When the war broke out, he was promoted to brigadier and given command of a tank brigade. Over-proud and highly vainglorious, de Gaulle had aspirations for free French forces far beyond their actual capabilities and achievements. de Gaulle would go on to be a thorn in the side of all Allied commanders for the rest of the war.
I need to preface our first news items today with this: Vigilantism is bad m’kay?
Anyway, down Jalisco way, someone has taken crime fighting into their own hands. Over the past 10 days starting around June 13 in Lagos de Moreno, Jalisco, at least five men have been found beaten, duct-taped in public, marked as ‘ratero’ thieves, with stolen motorcycles placed beside them.
Locals frustrated by 54 reported motorcycle thefts this year hail the vigilante as a folk hero patrolling where police fall short, while officials investigate the assaults, treat the men as victims, and search for the unidentified figure.
I told you of the unusual weather across the US yesterday. Well, here’s some more odd weather for you. These videos are out of Boise Idaho where severe storms dropped as much as eight inches of hail in a couple of hours.
Yikes. . .
Secretary of State Marco Rubio just pulled off one hell of a move. He got Lebanon to sign a peace agreement with Israel. The trilateral agreement, announced Friday, sets a performance-based process for Lebanon to restore sovereignty by removing Hezbollah’s military from the south, dismantling its infrastructure, and deploying its army to the border, in line with UN Resolution 1701. Israeli withdrawal would follow once conditions are met.
Hezbollah, of course, rejected it as surrender, sparking protests in Beirut with road blockades and tire burnings, while the army dispersed crowds to maintain order.
Meanwhile, the Vance brokered ceasefire/MOU with Iran is not going so well. The Iranians attacked at least two ships transiting the Strait of Hormuz and launched a drone and missile attack at Bahrain and Kuwait. The US struck back. Hard.
There is no way this is over given Iranian state media says it has now “no choice but to obtain the atomic bomb” to remove “the military option for the occupation and partitioning of Iran” from the table, arguing Iran must “absolutely reach nuclear deterrence” before current negotiations can be conducted “from a correct position,”.
I’m going to get political for a second here, Vance and the fucking retards around him need to be cut out of anything having to do with Iran going forward. He is responsible for negotiating and pushing this stupid and frankly naive MOU in the first place. Did I say it was dumb and retarded? Why Vance – and the retards he has advising him – think he is any different than any other negotiator that has dealt with the perfidious Iranians I don’t know. The Ayatollahs and IRGC cannot be trusted. Rubio knows this. Trump knows it, but doesn’t want to admit he knows it. Vance and his merry band of retards do not.
I did not think this war should have started, but the second Trump opened his mouth and told the Iranian protesters to take to the streets, he created a moral imperative for it. It needs to be finished the way wars usually are – not at the negotiating table JD you retard – by ending the enemy’s ability to fight back.
A quick Venezuela update. US troops – USAF RED HORSE I believe – repaired the runway and control tower at Maquieta airport just outside of Caracas. The only operational runway had been damaged during the quake. Before the repairs were made, all aid flights were landing some 200 miles away at a military air field.
Casualty numbers are changing rapidly. Reports range from at least 920 (earlier official statements by National Assembly leader Jorge Rodríguez) to over 1,400–1,430 in more recent updates. The toll has been rising quickly as rescue efforts continue and more bodies are recovered. There are more than 60,000 still missing.
Search and rescue teams are coming in from around the world.
Normally, I’d extract what gets cut off, but the flags make that impossible. Click through if you want the full list. It’s long.
I said I was going to research what orgs were actively providing aid to the victims in Venezuela and I did some preliminary research. Your best bet if you want to donate is to contact Samaritan’s Purse. The usual suspects are on the ground, but getting your donation to go where you want it is difficult with most of them. Not so with Samaritan’s Purse.