Free Republic

Historical facts and Comparisons: How many times Muslims invaded Europe vs. Europeans invaded Muslim countries. Islamics Launched their Crusades in 630 A.D. Western Crusades started in 1095 A.D. to Stop Muslim Invasion. Crusades were a defensive action against the forcible expansion of Islam into territories that had been part of Christendom for centuries. The Crusades were started by the Muslims in the year 630 A.D. when Muhammad invaded and conquered Mecca. Later on, Muslims invaded Syria, Iraq, Jerusalem, Iran, Egypt, Africa, Spain, Italy, France, etc. The Western Crusades started around 1095 to try to stop the Islamic aggressive invasions. Islamic...

That Day This has been a work-in-progress and began the day after the attack at the World Trade Center and Pentagon. I survived the attack itself by being late to work that day, but I lost many people who were not so lucky. I created the page to honor those I lost, those that America had lost and all of those dedicated, caring human beings who responded to this wanton cowardly act and who we refer to simply as heroes. To help sustain our nation resolve while we respond to this horrific attack. Images of that day are burnt...

RAF Typhoon fighters have scrambled to intercept Russian long-range bombers flying north of the UK. The incident on Thursday saw jets from RAF Lossiemouth called to the 'Blackjack' bombers flying in international airspace near the UK. Britain has repeatedly called such flights dangerous and provocative because the Russian military aircraft refuse to identify themselves to air traffic controllers.

World War I is often called “the machine gun war” because of the devastating use of automatic weapons such as the Maxim gun. It’s also when some of the drastic developments in machine gun technology occurred. Artillery fire actually killed more men than machine guns, but statistics simply don’t convey the horror of European armies on the Western Front facing automatic fire. For example, during just one day in 1916 at the Battle of the Somme the British lost 21,000 men – many of them killed by Spandau machine guns, the German version of the Maxim.

The grass grows long o'er the graves of the four Americans murdered at Benghazi. It is now three years since they were brutally murdered. Where are the murderers? Are they serving their just punishment? Do we even know where they are? Are we even trying to bring them to justice? There is no effort to catch the murderers. There is no justice. There is no correction. There are lies and evasions and cowardice. The grass grows long o'er the graves of four Americans who were murdered in Benghazi. And the only person in the government who cares is the cemetery...

The A-10 Warthog is the only aircraft built for a close-air-support (CAS) mission. It was literally designed around its distinctive 30mm Gatling gun. The gun is more than 19 feet long and weighs more than 4,000 pounds. The distinctive sound made by the weapon (aka the BRRRRRRRRRT – . . . .

This is how one of the U.S. Navy's biggest war machines celebrated its first time on the seas after almost two years cooped up in a naval yard. The USS Dwight D. Eisenhower, an enormous, nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, blasted out to sea off the coast of Virginia and put its tuned-up systems to the test. Footage of the voyage - its first since fall 2013 - was recorded in late August and shows the vessel's huge engines pushing it through high-speed turns at some 35mph.

I need a little information, folks. I am not knowledgeable about fire arms. But what is NOW the official U.S. Marine side arm. Is it the Beretta 9? Was it the Glock 9 or Glock 18? Was it EVER the Glock? If it used to be the Glock, when did the change come about? Thanks, folks. I'd really appreciate your help. And, by the way, no, I am not asking because I want to buy one. (In Army ROTC, I was still getting uniform demerits by the beginning of the second semester. Do you think a responsible person would sell...

Richard E. Cole On Monday, one of the last two surviving members of the WWII “Doolitte Raiders” will celebrate his 100th birthday. As one of the original Doolittle Raiders, retired Lt. Col. Richard Coledefied all the odds in what was considered a suicide mission to bomb Japan in 1942. Mr. Cole was co-pilot for Lt. Col. Jimmy Doolittle, who led 16 B-25 bombers on the mission that is considered an event that changed the nation’s morale following the devastating attack on Pearl harbor. He was one of 80 fighters who volunteered for the dangerous, top-secret mission. The Raiders planned...

“I wrote a story about it.” It is a phrase Jack Beritzhoff says a lot. And when you consider the San Rafael resident, and former Merchant Mariner, is about to celebrate his 97th birthday, that adds up to a lot of stories. In fact, Beritzhoff compiled many of his favorite one into a book he published in 2012: Sail Away, Journeys Of A Merchant Seaman. Still, there is one story he is most eager to share these days, about an oversight of history he would like to see corrected. “I think it’s an injustice,” said Beritzhoff. Beritzhoff is referring to...

...Israel needs to impart a powerful, disorganizing shock to the Iranian regime that accomplishes realistic military objectives: digging out its expensive underground enrichment plants, destroying its Arak plutonium reactor and maybe Bushehr in the bargain, killing its bomb and missile professionals, scientists and technicians, IRGC bases, its oil production sites, oil export terminals and the leaders of the regime where they can be found. ...its initial strike must move very fast and be conclusive within 1-2 hours, like the Israeli air attack opening the 1967 Six-Day War. The goal is to so stun the regime that Israel controls the first...

McChrystal and a few other key figures converted JSOC from a Ferrari in the garage to the long-haul truck of the war on terror. The targeting of low-level insurgents continued when JSOC shifted resources from Iraq to Afghanistan in 2009. But the enemy’s continual replacement of losses with recruits from Pakistan and unpacified eastern Afghanistan eventually eroded JSOC’s morale. One Ranger officer tells Mr. Naylor that, by 2011, morale had sunk to the point that he had to yell at his noncommissioned officers just to go out on operations.

In the wake of Hurricane Katrina's calamitous effects, an image of U.S. Air Force Staff Sgt. Mike Maroney locked in a heartwarming embrace with a young girl he encountered during rescue operations became a symbol of hope and optimism. For the last decade, Maroney has been determined to meet the child he hugged in the iconic photo. In March, the Air Force Times launched the "Find Katrina Kid" campaign to help Maroney reconnect with the little girl.

In 1972 my great uncle sat down and wrote an 80 pg. handwritten personal history of his time in World War II as a prisoner of war of the Japanese. From May of 1942 until August 15th of 1945, 1200 days as a POW, he survived one day at a time. He surrendered with his group on the island of Corregidor, and spent time in Bilibid prison, Cabanatuan, Palawan, and a journey to Japan on the horrible Oyoku Maru near the end of the war. Uncle Bob was a true American hero. A few years ago my father James Blair...

National Archives and Records Administration - ARC 39081, LI 208-UN-173 - JAPANESE SURRENDER MORE TERRITORY [ETC.] - DVD Copied by Thomas Gideon. Series: Motion Picture Films from "United News" Newsreels, compiled 1942 - 1945. Part 1, Japanese surrender documents arrive at the National Archives in Washington, D.C. Japanese surrender to the Chinese at Chingkiang. American prisoners of war leave Japanese prison camps. Shows the surrenders of Marcus Island aboard the destroyer and of the last Japanese holdings in the Philippines to Gen. Wainwright and Brit. Gen. Percival by Gen. Yamashita. Part 2, traitor Vidkun Quisling is sentenced at Oslo, Norway....

Once in a while something great comes along… Share it. If you liked the Four Seasons, you’ll like these five Navy guys! It is not Anchors Away!!! Say what you will about our Navy ‘brothers’, they can entertain. This is good, very good. Turn up your speakers, bump your video to full screen, and roll back in time. Not bad for a group of sailors. This is the best 10 minutes you've spent this week -- I guarantee.

One man from Bishop's Cleeve has a very good and personal reason to be thankful that it's VJ Day today. Seventy years ago, Ken Blake was on a troop ship sailing from India bound for Singapore as part of preparations for an invasion when the Japanese government surrendered to the Allies after atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Ken, now 88 said: "There was a bloody big cheer on the ship when we heard. We didn't know what was going to happen. But I think if we'd been in any invasion of Japan, every man, woman and child...

We have all seen the different accounts of the two P-40's that got off the ground on Dec. 7th 1941...here's their story.. Enjoy

"The Japanese surrender at the end of WWII allowed U.S. troops to peacefully enter as an occupation force. What they found and how they transformed their former enemy is told through the work of a team of cameramen who recorded it all on color film. They were among the first to witness the devastation wrought by the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. They also captured on film the first free elections and the birth of Japanese democracy. It was a remarkable journey." History Channel (2006?)

(Phys.org)—Due to quantum effects, it's possible to build a quantum computer that computes without running—or as the scientists explain, "the result of a computation may be learned without actually running the computer." So far, however, the efficiency of this process, which is called counterfactual computation (CFC), has had an upper limit of 50%, limiting its practical applications. Now in a new paper, scientists have experimentally demonstrated a slightly different version called a "generalized CFC" that has an efficiency of 85% with the potential to reach 100%. This improvement opens the doors to realizing a much greater variety of applications, such...