IQBAL - User contributions [en]

Sunday March 6

2018-07-06T20:12:29Z

ArnoldoMuramats:

Today is Sunday, March 6, the 66th day of 2016. There are 300 days left in the year. Highlights in history on this date: 1834 - The city of York in Upper Canada is incorporated as Toronto. 1836 - Alamo mission in San Antonio, Texas, falls to Mexican army after [http://www.vtr.org.vn/cam-nang-du-lich-bac-kinh-5-ngay-4-dem.html tour bắc kinh từ hà nội] 13-day siege in which Davy Crockett and 186 other defenders die. 1853 - Verdi's opera "La Traviata" premieres in Venice, Italy 1857 - In its Dred Scott decision, the U.S. Supreme Court holds that Scott, a slave, could not sue for his freedom in a federal court. 1922 - United States prohibits export of arms to China. 1936 - The British Supermarine Spitfire MKI takes to the air. 1945 - German city of Cologne falls to U.S. First Army in World War II. 1946 - France recognizes Vietnam as free state within Indochina Federation. 1953 - G.M. Malenkov succeeds the late Joseph Stalin as Premier of Soviet Union. 1957 - Two former British colonies of Gold Coast and Togoland form independent West African nation of Ghana; Israeli troops hand over Gaza Strip to U.N. force. 1962 - United States pledges to defend Thailand against direct Communist aggression without waiting for action by Southeast Asia Treaty Organization. 1965 - U. [http://www.vtr.org.vn/cam-nang-du-lich-bac-kinh-5-ngay-4-dem.html vtr.org.vn] S. Defense Department announces that 3,500 Marines are being sent to South Vietnam - the first U.S. ground combat troops committed to fighting against Communist guerrillas. 1970 - Alexander Dubcek, former Czech Communist Party boss, is suspended from party. 1975 - Arab terrorist raid on a Tel Aviv hotel leaves 14 dead. 1988 - Thousands of Tibetans demanding independence set fires throughout their capital city of Lhasa. 1991 - Iraqi troops appear to have crushed a rebellion in Basra and are reported to be moving on other southern cities in revolt. 1994 - Somali warlord Mohammed Farah Aidid rejects a peace agreement reached by 12 other faction leaders in Cairo. 1995 - The dollar plummets to 92.70 yen, its lowest level against the yen anywhere in the world since modern exchange rates were established in the late 1940s. 1999 - Ta Mok, the last leader of the murderous Khmer Rouge, is captured by the Cambodian army and flown to the capital for trial. 2003 - An Algerian passenger jet crashes in the Sahara Desert shortly after takeoff, killing 116 people. 2006 - Several cats test positive for the deadly strain of bird flu in Austria and Poland reports its first outbreak of the disease, as the World Health Organization calls bird flu a greater global challenge than any previous infectious disease. 2008 - Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega announces that he is breaking relations with Colombia because of his opposition to the Colombian raid on a guerrilla base in Ecuador. 2010 - Iran's hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad calls the official version of the Sept. 11, 2011 attacks a "big lie" used by the U.S. as an excuse for [http://Www.paramuspost.com/search.php?query=battling%20terror&type=all&mode=search&results=25 battling terror]. 2011 - The two opposition parties that triumphed in Ireland's election, conservative Fine Gael and left-wing Labour, agree to form the country's next coalition government after compromising on repair of the debt-battered economy. 2012 - The United States, Europe and other world powers announce that bargaining will begin again with Iran over its fiercely disputed nuclear efforts. 2013 - Syria's accelerating humanitarian crisis hits a grim milestone: the number of U.N.-registered refugees tops 1 million, half of them children. 2014 - U.S. President Barack Obama orders the West's first sanctions in response to Russia's military takeover of Crimea, EU more cautious. 2015 - An investigation into what prosecutors call the biggest corruption scandal ever uncovered in Brazil wins Supreme Court approval to expand to dozens of top politicians for alleged ties to a kickback scheme at the state-run energy company, Petrobras. Today's Birthdays: Michelangelo, Italian renaissance artist (1475-1564); Cyrano de Bergerac, French author-duellist (1620-1655); Elizabeth Barrett Browning, English poet (1806-1861); Ed McMahon, U.S. host/announcer (1923--2009); Lorin Maazel, French-born conductor of the NY Philharmonic (1930--2014); Rob Reiner, U.S. director/actor (1947--); Shaquille O'Neal, U.S. basketball player (1972--); Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Colombian novelist (1927--). Thought For Today: Le sens commun n'est pas si commun (Common sense is not so common.) - Voltaire, French author and philosopher (1694-1778). Advertisement

Today in History April 21

2018-07-06T09:27:11Z

ArnoldoMuramats:

HIGHLIGHTS IN HISTORY ON THIS DATE 753 BC - According to legend, the city of Rome is founded by Romulus. 1526 - Babur, an Uzbek prince, defeats Sultan Ibrahim Lodi at the Battle of Panipat north of Delhi, leading to Mughal rule over India. 1809 - Napoleon's army defeats the Austrians at the Battle of Landshut in Germany. 1856 - Stonemasons in Melbourne strike and march on state parliament, demanding an eight-hour day. They soon win their claim. 1861 - Australian explorers Robert Burke, William Wills and John King arrive back at Cooper Creek to find only a few provisions and tree marked "Dig, 21st April, 1861". Base camp party had left seven hours before. Burke and Wills died; King was saved by Aborigines. 1910 - Death of US author Mark Twain. 1918 - Baron Manfred von Richthofen, the German ace known as the Red Baron, is killed in action during World War I, apparently shot down by Australian troops. 1945 - Last German troops leave Bologna, Italy, in World War II; on the same day Russian troops reach suburbs of Berlin. 1954 - US flies a French battalion to Indochina to defend Dien Bien Phu. 1960 - Brazil's capital moves from Rio de Janeiro to Brasilia. 1961 - A French army revolt led by General Maurice Challe begins in Algeria. 1967 - Military coup in Athens establishes the regime of the Greek colonels. 1975 - South Vietnam's President Nguyen van Thieu resigns and names successor to seek negotiations with Communist forces sweeping across country. 1979 - Queensland National Party-dominated Government demolishes Brisbane's historic [http://www.vtr.org.vn/cam-nang-du-lich-bac-kinh-5-ngay-4-dem.html du lịch Bắc Kinh 5 ngày 4 đêm từ Hà Nội] Belle Vue Hotel. 1989 - Thousands of students, shouting for democracy and human rights, march from campuses to converge on Beijing's Tiananmen Square. 1991 - Soviet hardliners launch a petition drive for a Parliament session to impose a national state of emergency and take President Mikhail Gorbachev to task over worsening ethnic and economic troubles. 1993 - The Supreme Court in La Paz, Bolivia, sentences former dictator Luis Garcia Meza to 30 years in jail without parole for murder, theft, fraud and violating the constitution. 1995 - FBI arrests former soldier Timothy McVeigh in connection with the deadly Oklahoma City bombing two days earlier. 1995 - Australian Rugby League launches Federal Court damages claim against Super League for interference in the game. 1997 - The first Chinese Army soldiers march into Hong Kong, in preparation for the handover of the British colony to China on July 1. 1997 - The ashes of 1960s LSD guru Timothy Leary and Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry are blasted into space in the world's first space funeral. 1998 - France announces an accord on the future of New Caledonia, easing more than a decade of tension between pro and anti-independence forces. 1998 - South Korea drops efforts to get compensation from Japan for women held as sex slaves during World War II, and says it will pay surviving women. 1999 - NATO warplanes attack Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic's party headquarters in Belgrade. 2002 - French far-right leader Jean-Marie Le Pen shocks France and the world by coming second in the first round of a presidential election, qualifying for the run-off with the incumbent Jacques Chirac. 2004 - Nuclear whistleblower Mordechai Vanunu is freed from prison in Israel after 18 years, saying he is proud of revealing secrets that exposed Israel as an atomic power. 2006 - Australian soldier Jake Kovco dies in Iraq after his gun accidentally discharges. The wrong body is sent back to Australia. 2009 - European researchers say they not only found the smallest exoplanet ever, Gliese 581 e, but also realised that a neighbouring planet discovered earlier, Gliese 581 d, was in the prime habital zone for potential life. 2010 - Airlines tote up losses topping $2 billion and struggle to get hundreds of thousands of travellers back home after a week of crippled travel as [http://Dict.Leo.org/?search=recriminations recriminations] erupt over Europe's response to the volcanic ash cloud. 2011 - Japan seals off a wide area around the radiation-spewing Fukushima nuclear power plant to prevent thousands of residents from sneaking back to the homes they had been forced to evacuate. 2012 - An [http://www.vtr.org.vn/cam-nang-du-lich-bac-kinh-5-ngay-4-dem.html vtr.org.vn] infusion of hundreds of billions of dollars will give the International Monetary Fund a badly needed boost to tackle Europe's prolonged debt crisis. 2013 - Australian singer and Divinyls frontwoman Chrissy Amphlett dies in New York, aged 53, after battling cancer. 2014 - Syria calls for a presidential election June 3 to give President Bashar Assad a veneer of electoral legitimacy in the midst of a civil war that has killed more than 150,000 people and driven a third of the population from their homes. 2015 - As the worst storms in a decade hit NSW, three people die as water surges through the Hunter Valley town of Dungog. 2016 - US singer-songwriter Prince dies at his Paisley Park recording studio and home in Minnesota, aged 57. TODAY'S BIRTHDAYS Charlotte Bronte, English novelist (1816-1855); Anthony Quinn, Mexican actor (1915-2001); Queen Elizabeth II (1926-); Russell Boyd, Australian cinematographer (1944-); Iggy Pop, US singer (1947-); Tony Danza, US actor (1951-); Andie MacDowell, US actor (1958-); Michael Franti, US [https://Www.behance.net/search?content=projects&sort=appreciations&time=week&search=rap%20singer rap singer] (1966-); James McAvoy, Scottish actor (1979-); Princess Isabella of Denmark, daughter of Crown Prince Frederik and Crown Princess Mary (2007-). THOUGHT FOR TODAY I am a great believer in luck, and I find the harder I work the more I have of it. - Stephen Leacock, Canadian economist and humourist (1869-1944). Advertisement

Kenny Dalglish and Emma Thompson lead honours list as Mark Carne´s...

2018-06-20T15:13:19Z

ArnoldoMuramats:

Liverpool football great Kenny Dalglish has been knighted and Oscar-winning actress Emma Thompson made a dame in the Queen�s Birthday Honours - while Network Rail boss Mark [http://www.vtr.org.vn/cam-nang-du-lich-bac-kinh-5-ngay-4-dem.html vtr.org.vn] Carne has attracted criticism for his recognition. Mr Carne received a CBE against a backdrop of huge disruption for train passengers in recent weeks, with politicians and rail groups describing the award as a �slap in the face� for commuters. Labour MP Lisa Nandy called for his honour to be withdrawn, saying there was �absolutely no way that the Government should press ahead with this award�. (PA Graphics) She told The World Tonight on BBC Radio 4 that the decision was �just another kick in the teeth� for rail travellers. �It�s the most astonishing thing to have happened in a week when commuters have been suffering from rail chaos�, she added. Former Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron said the award �brought the honours system into disrepute�. He told BBC�s Newsnight: �We have the most dysfunctional rail system in the western world, I would argue, certainly when it comes to local and commuter trains, so anybody amongst the rail industry leadership - whether it be Network Rail or the Department for Transport - to be given an honour of this kind�is an insult, a slap in the face to millions of travellers up and down the country who are suffering because of the failure of that leadership.� The Department for Transport admitted the timing of the announcement of the outgoing chief executive�s award for services to the rail industry following timetabling issues was �unfortunate� but added that recent problems should not detract from his overall service. Network Rail chairman Sir Peter Hendy also defended his �tremendous contribution to our railways�. He added: �It is right he is honoured just before he retires from one of the biggest and most challenging jobs in UK industry.� My comment on Mark Carne receiving a CBE in the Queen�s Birthday Honours pic.twitter.com/wXMjiAQ2mT - Sir Peter Hendy (@SirPeterHendy) June 8, 2018 But one union boss likened the timing of the honour to �rewarding the captain of the Titanic for jumping ship�. Manuel Cortes, general secretary of the Transport Salaried Staffs Association, said: �Frustrated passengers will see no honour in that at all.� Network Rail launches digital rail strategy And Emily Yates, of the Association of British Commuters, said: �It is a sign that the rail industry is badly out of touch with the real pain and suffering that people are going through - it is a pantomime.� Meanwhile, also among the honours list in this 100th anniversary year of women�s suffrage are remarkable females including a nun fighting modern slavery and a businesswoman who made her fortune in fake tan - although men outnumber women on the list. As the NHS celebrates 70 years since its foundation, medics are recognised for their dedication, with health sector workers making up 12% of the 1,057 people honoured. Helen Bamber Foundation funding Dame Emma, 59, who is described in the official citation of the honours committee as one of the UK�s most versatile and celebrated actresses, receives her honour for services to drama. The Remains Of The Day and Nanny McPhee star is joined on the list by fellow actor Tom Hardy, who is also recognised for services to drama, receiving a CBE, while Keira Knightley is made an OBE for services to drama and charity. Sir Kenny, who managed Liverpool at the time of the Hillsborough disaster and remained a steadfast support of the families in their lengthy quest for justice, said he was �hugely proud to have accepted the accolade� for services to football, charity and the City of Liverpool. The 67-year-old Glaswegian and his wife Marina have also helped raise millions of pounds for cancer treatment through the Marina Dalglish Appeal after she successfully battled breast cancer. `The Justice Collective: He Ain�t Heavy...� launch - Liverpool Joking that he thought the letter informing him of the knighthood had been from the taxman, he added of the achievement: �We only set out to do the best we possibly could, even through all the other stuff - the charity or Hillsborough, it was to help people because somebody helped us.� Following a wave of terror attacks which struck the UK in 2017, former assistant commissioner of the Metropolitan Police Mark Rowley, who led the national response, is honoured with a knighthood. On his retirement in March after 31 years in policing, Sir Mark was praised by Prime Minister Theresa May for his �dedication to protecting public safety and tackling the evils of terrorism�. Salisbury incident While there are no honours for local heroes involved in the response to the Grenfell Tower fire, the Cabinet has said it expects �acts of bravery and extraordinary community spirit� which emerged from the tragedy to feature on future lists, adding that its approach will be �time-appropriate�. The brother of aid worker David Haines, who was murdered by Islamic State extremists, is made [http://www.vtr.org.vn/cam-nang-du-lich-bac-kinh-5-ngay-4-dem.html tour bắc kinh từ hà nội] an OBE for his work against terrorism. Mike Haines dedicated the honour, for voluntary service to tolerance and [http://mommysavers.com/?s=education education] in the UK and abroad, to his younger sibling, who was beheaded by Islamic State extremists in 2014 after being taken hostage in Syria. Billionaire Jim Ratcliffe, the boss of chemical company Ineos who this year topped the Sunday Times rich list with �21.05 billion, receives a knighthood for services to business and investment. Projekt Grenadier Sporting stars are well represented among the recipients, with Premier League and England striker Jermain Defoe describing himself as �blessed and humbled� to be recognised with an OBE for his services to the charitable foundation set up in his name. The honour comes almost a year after the death of six-year-old football mascot Bradley Lowery, with whom the player struck up a strong friendship as the little boy battled a rare childhood cancer. Defoe said it was the �proudest moment of my life� and added: �But it isn�t for me or about me. It�s for Bradley and those he loved.� The proudest moment of my life to be awarded an OBE. I�m blessed to have received the honour, but it isn�t for me or about me. It�s for Bradley and those he loved. I�d trade it all for him to be back in our lives, forget the goals and awards, it�s the memories I�ll cherish...💙 pic.twitter.com/Dcxua0t7bC - Jermain Defoe (@IAmJermainDefoe) June 8, 2018 World heavyweight champion boxer Anthony Joshua is made an OBE for services to sport, while 20-year-old alpine skier Menna Fitzpatrick, Britain�s most successful winter Paralympian, is the youngest on this year�s list, picking up an MBE for services to Paralympic sport. In the musical world, rapper and singer Ms Dynamite is honoured with an MBE, under her real name Niomi McLean-Daley, for services to music, while Mobo Awards founder Kanya King receives a CBE for services to music and culture. Japan-born Nobel prize-winning author Kazuo Ishiguro, knighted for his services to literature, said he was �deeply touched to receive this honour from the nation that welcomed me as a small foreign boy�. British Nobel Prize for Literature winner Former Second World War nurse Rosemary Powell, who at 103 is the oldest on the list, is made an MBE for voluntary service to the Royal British Legion Poppy Appeal, having spent 97 years collecting for the charity. Renowned war correspondent Kate Adie is made a CBE for services to media, while Stacey Dooley, known for her BBC Three investigative series covering topics ranging from the fight against Isis to the abortion debate, receives an MBE for services to broadcasting. Among the politicians honoured are Conservative MPs Eleanor Laing and Bernard Jenkin, awarded a damehood and a knighthood respectively for their political and public service, while Labour�s Louise Ellman has also been made a dame for parliamentary and political services. Holocaust survivor Ber Helfgott, also known as Ben, is knighted for services to Holocaust remembrance and education, one of nearly three-quarters of those on the honours list deemed to have undertaken outstanding work in or for their local community. Stacey Dooley Investigates: Young Sex for Sale in Japan In healthcare, Chief Scientific Officer for NHS England Professor Susan Hill is made a dame for services to the 100,000 Genome Project and to NHS Genomic Medicine, while surgeon Nadine Hachach-Haram is awarded a BEM for services to surgery and innovation, having co-founded a company pioneering virtual access to surgery for people in remote areas. Veronica Donovan, a consultant midwife at Birmingham Women and Children�s NHS Foundation Trust, is made an OBE for services to midwifery, while palliative cancer care specialist Debra Smith receives a BEM for services to nursing. In the business sphere, Judy Naake, who made [http://www.vtr.org.vn/cam-nang-du-lich-bac-kinh-5-ngay-4-dem.html tour bắc kinh từ hà nội] millions selling St Tropez self-tanning products, initially from the back of her car, receives an MBE for services to entrepreneurship, the community and philanthropy. Women: Inspiration & Enterprise Jo Malone, creator of the self-titled luxury perfumery brand who has since started the fragrance-centred Jo Loves business, is awarded a CBE for services to the British economy and the GREAT Britain campaign, which encourages people to visit and invest in the UK. Sister Imelda Poole, president of European anti-trafficking network Renate, receives an MBE for services to combating modern slavery. Howard Tucker is awarded a CBE for services to international justice for his past work as a member of the UN International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia. A former policeman in South Wales, he went to work in Bosnia to help bring people to trial for war crimes committed during the conflicts there in the 1990s. Of the total number recognised in the Queen�s Birthday Honours list this year, 210 have been made an OBE, 392 an MBE, and 318 awarded a BEM. Forty-nine percent of the honourees are women, while 10% of all those on the list are from black and minority ethnic (BAME) backgrounds. Advertisement

French Foreign Legion soldiers were the toughest in the world

2018-06-20T04:59:51Z

ArnoldoMuramats:

BOOK OF THE WEEK AT THE EDGE OF THE WORLD by Jean-Vincent Blanchard (Bloomsbury �20) As a boy, I�d always more than half-wondered if the French Foreign Legion was an invention of Hollywood. Cary Grant and Gary Cooper capered about in the desert wearing those distinctive hats with the white hankies dangling down the backs of their necks. Laurel and Hardy ran away to join the Foreign Legion, as did Jim Dale in Carry On . . . Follow That Camel, which was filmed in exotic Camber Sands. Marty Feldman directed, co-wrote and starred in The Last Remake Of Beau Geste, with Peter Ustinov as the sadistic sergeant. A new book by Jean-Vincent Blanchard examines the legendary, vicious (and racist) French Foreign Legion, whose soldiers marched in 50C heat till their boots filled with blood Edith Piaf had a famous song about a night of hectic passion with a tattooed recruit, which she compared to (and I translate) �a thunderstorm through the sky�. [http://www.vtr.org.vn/cam-nang-du-lich-bac-kinh-5-ngay-4-dem.html tour bắc kinh từ hà nội] And it is her image of the moody and uncompromising Legionnaire, attracted by the promise of �blood, bullets, bayonets and women in an Arab land�, that gets closest to the historical and psychological truth, as laid before us in this gripping, disturbing and controversial account of the Legion�s first century. For the all-volunteer corps of the French Army, founded in [http://www.vtr.org.vn/cam-nang-du-lich-bac-kinh-5-ngay-4-dem.html du lịch Bắc Kinh 5 ngày 4 đêm] 1831, was neither comical, nor an excuse for high-spirited larks. It was brutal and often monstrous. Created to participate in France�s colonial expansion to Algeria, Morocco, Madagascar, Indochina and Mexico, �we scare people, we inspire fear and perhaps admiration, which is a little too thin a reward sometimes; but love, never�. RELATED ARTICLES Previous 1 Next Sex, soldiers and a very special relationship: Pals were... He was a doctor to royalty and collector supreme who created... Share this article Share Even the unique right to hire men regardless of their nationality was a cynical move. Since Napoleon and his casualties were still a living memory, the French government wanted an army �that could face danger and human losses without drawing the political backlash that French-born victims would elicit�. Out of this came the Legion�s legendary appeal to ne�er-do-wells, broken-hearted lovers, criminals, political refugees and �scions of aristocratic families leaving behind gambling debts�. Anyone physically fit was accepted, especially if they had teeth strong enough to bite the biscuit rations. No questions were asked at the headquarters in Sidi Bel Abbes, Algeria. The band of outcasts were fearless and had 'no families, no ideals' and 'no loves� �You can choose a new name if you like,� recruits were told. �We don�t ask for documents.� As mercenaries, the men fought for the Legion itself, united against everyone else. �Legio Patria Nostra,� ran the motto - the Legion is our country. �We don�t give a damn what we fight for. It�s our job. We�ve nothing else in life. No families, no ideals, no loves.� By 1900, there were 11,500 men in this band of scary outcasts. Blanchard calculates that between 1831 and 1962, when Algeria was grudgingly granted independence and the French left North Africa, approximately 600,000 people had joined up. It is chilling to discover that Jean-Marie Le Pen spent a formative three years in the Legion, and that recently a retired commander was arrested for making anti-Islam protests at Calais �The [http://www.purevolume.com/search?keyword=substantial%20majority substantial majority] of them were Germans or Northern Europeans,� we are informed. The rest were Belgians, Spaniards and Britons. There was one Turk, one New Zealander and lots of Americans during the Great Depression of the Thirties. Exhausting route-marches in [http://www.vtr.org.vn/cam-nang-du-lich-bac-kinh-5-ngay-4-dem.html vtr.org.vn] Saharan temperatures of 50c with heavy backpacks, where �acid sweat burned your skin� and �you march with your shoes full of blood�, would not be my cup of tea. But, according to Blanchard, the typical Legionnaire was a man who found �redemption and an existential purpose through camaraderie and abnegation�. �Excessive revelry� was condoned by the generals, who believed �one did not build empires with virgins� A Legionnaire who was shot in the stomach and lying on the ground with his intestines escaping was heard to murmur to his captain: �Are you happy with me?� This is the kind of stoicism that was expected. �Excessive revelry� was condoned by the generals, who believed �one did not build empires with virgins�. Sex with prostitutes was encouraged, despite the risk of venereal disease, as were heavy drinking and brawling. How hilarious it must have been to terrorise the natives - the Legionnaires �can hardly keep beating, so hard they laugh�, ran a report. The French government maintained that this imperial experiment was to bring �reason, progress, science, culture and freedom� to backward jungle regions and wildernesses' The French government maintained that this imperial experiment was to bring �reason, progress, science, culture and freedom� to backward jungle regions and wildernesses. The Legionnaires were expected to fight �in the professed name of civilisation and� - here comes the catch - �in the name of racial superiority�. While we can applaud their achievements as engineers - digging and building roads, constructing forts and laying telephone lines - the fact remains that, for these mercenaries, �the gift of French civilisation� in practice meant the opportunity for the savage conquest of African tribes and, in Indochina, the Vietnamese patriotic resistance. Legionnaires went about �civilising the barbarians of this world with cannonballs�. Villages were pillaged and burned, the women raped, the men [https://Www.academia.edu/people/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=decapitated decapitated]. �We were allowed to kill and plunder everything,� recalled a soldier. �We went to the villages and surprised the people in bed.� One Legionnaire received no censure when he made a tobacco pouch from cured human skin. Nevertheless, killing civilians must have taken its toll - indeed, Legionnaires were among the most screwed-up soldiers in history. In a group of 350 men, 11 deaths were put down to suicide, but there may have been many more, disguised in the record as death from disease. The belief was: �It is better to be dead than go through hell.� The Legionnaires were expected to fight �in the professed name of civilisation and� - here comes the catch - �in the name of racial superiority� There was alcoholism and much illness - typhoid, tropical fever, dysentery, malaria. In Legionnaires� hospitals, a coffin, slathered with quicklime, was placed in readiness under a patient�s bed. It was said of a soldier about to die that he was off to �eat bananas by the roots� - i.e. be buried in soft soil. The deliberate hardship was not unlike that of a religious order, with its renunciation of worldly comforts - though entertainment involved lots of drag shows. Legionnaires made �splendid female impersonators�. Homosexual activity was commonplace, as you�d expect with �5,000 young solid males, boiling with vigour and vitality� at a loose end in the fort. When Kaiser Wilhelm tried to discourage Germans from joining up by publishing articles warning against sexual abuse in the desert, men with Heidelberg duelling scars raced to enlist. As 43 per cent of the corps was German, perhaps it is no surprise the Foreign Legion didn�t rescue France when the country was occupied by Nazis during World War II. The French government maintained that this imperial experiment was to bring �reason, progress, science, culture and freedom� to backward jungle regions and wildernesses Blanchard�s story concludes with the centenary of the corps in 1931, the parades and so forth. I am keen to read a further volume about post-colonial activities, particularly because, since 1962 when Sidi Bel Abbes was abandoned for a new HQ in Marseille, 50,000 men have felt the need to run away and join the Legion. It is chilling to discover that Jean-Marie Le Pen spent a formative three years in the Legion, and that recently a retired commander was arrested for making anti-Islam protests at Calais. Advertisement

User:ArnoldoMuramats

2018-06-20T04:59:39Z

ArnoldoMuramats: Created page with "I am 18 years old and my name is Arnoldo Muramats. I life in Antonimina (Italy). Here is my web-site ... [http://www.vtr.org.vn/cam-nang-du-lich-bac-kinh-5-ngay-4-dem.h..."

I am 18 years old and my name is Arnoldo Muramats. I life in Antonimina (Italy). Here is my web-site ... [http://www.vtr.org.vn/cam-nang-du-lich-bac-kinh-5-ngay-4-dem.html tour bắc kinh từ hà nội]