Free Republic

When back in June 2015 Donald Trump announced he was running for president, he said during his speech, “I will find the General Patton or I will find General MacArthur. I will find the right guy. I will find the guy that’s going to take that military and make it really work.” Since then, Trump has frequently mentioned Douglas MacArthur in his speeches. It is worth discussing his importance in American history, especially as we are approaching the 66th anniversary of Battle of Inchon. While MacArthur’s greatest achievement was the creation of modern Japan, the Inchon landing on September 15,...

On Saturday August 6, I was privileged to attend the unveiling of the memorial to American airmen who fought in World War II at the Wings Over the Rockies aviation museum in Denver, Colorado. Created by Major Frederic Arnold (ret.), an artist who flew P-38 Lightnings in the Mediterranean theater of the war, the monumental sculpture depicts a pre-flight briefing, with the squadron leader at the mapboard explaining the mission plan, while the men of the squadron and the pale ghosts of their fallen comrades listen on. American airmen suffered a horrific casualty rate during World War II, with over...

U.S. Vice President Joe Biden on Monday criticized Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump’s proposal to allow Japan to obtain nuclear weapons, stressing that Japan’s pacifist Constitution was written by the United States. “Does he not understand we wrote Japan’s constitution to say they could not be a nuclear power?” Biden said in a speech he delivered in Scranton, Pa., for Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton. “Where was he when in school?” Biden asked. “Someone who lacks this judgment cannot be trusted,” he said. “He’s not qualified to know the [nuclear] codes,” the U.S. vice president said. Trump has suggested that...

Raw video: Group of students from Wartburg College sing 'Battle Hymn of the Republic' after pilot announced remains of WWII soldier were being escorted off plane

Once upon a time during WWII a lethal dart gun code name “Bigot” was created to be used by commandos to covertly eliminate sentries, this dart gun was constructed from a M1911 .45 caliber pistol. The Office of Strategic Services predecessors of the CIA developed this clandestine weapon, its unknown as to what advantage this has over a silenced pistol. The weapon never made it out of the research and development department, but this didn't stop Ian McCollum from Forgotten Weapons to get his hands on one to check out, see the video and Ian's observation.

Seventy-five years ago, the world blew up in just six months. World War II ostensibly started two years earlier, when Germany invaded Poland. In truth, after the rapid German defeat of Poland in September 1939, the conflict was mostly confined to Western Europe for nearly the next two years. By summer of 1940, only Britain had survived Hitler's European victories. The dormant European war only went global on June 22, 1941, when Germany suddenly surprise-attacked the Soviet Union, its former partner. America and Asia were still not directly involved in the 1941 expansion of the war until the Japanese attacked...

SIERRA VISTA — A representative from the Army Corps of Engineers revealed the findings Wednesday of a four-year munitions study of more than 1,500 acres in the San Pedro Riparian Conservation Area (SPRNCA), southeast of the San Pedro House. The study was looking for live munitions or other environmental factors from World War II Army use that would impact the acreage. Two live explosives and fragments of explosives in the dense, thorny acreage were discovered. A third live explosive was carried out by a hiker and turned over to local authorities. “It is not a hospitable site,” said 1st Lt....

We cannot understand the resistance unless we first accept “that German conservatives and nationalists might be moral and religious men who were appalled at the lawlessness, brutality, and inhumanity of the Nazis.” The vital point running through all these questions is the totalitarian claim of the state over the citizen to the exclusion of his religious and moral obligation towards God.— First Lieutenant Graf Yorck von Wartenburg, Valkyrie conspirator One of the most intriguing fields of World War II history deals with the German Resistance—a clandestine network of disillusioned military officers and civil servants who began actively plotting against Hitler’s...

A terminally ill former World War Two Spitfire engineer's 'last wish' to be reunited with the iconic plane was granted after top brass saw him looking forlornly through a fence at one from his wheelchair. Ken Farlow, 95, was an electrical engineer during the war, carrying out vital work to keep Spitfires and Hurricanes in the air in Syria and Palestine. But after being diagnosed with terminal colon cancer, the father-of-three asked daughter Helen if he 'could see a Spitfire - one last time'. Helen, 52, took him to Gloucestershire Airport where the vintage planes were being maintained by the...

“Any officer who goes into action without his sword is improperly dressed.” – Mad Jack ChurchillPHOTO: Wikimedia World War II swept down onto Europe. The nights were filled with bomber fire, the days with the rata-tata of machine guns. The last thing any German soldier would have expected was to hear the call of a bagpipe and see an arrow whistling through the smoke-filled air to cut down one of his buddies. The last thing anyone would expect would be to see a British soldier charging through no-man’s land, slashing left and right through the fray with a sword.The British soldier’s name was...

The name was terrible, but the “K Disease” was not a lethal virus. It was actually the clever invention of Professor Giovanni Borromeo and a religious of the Hospital of the Brothers Hospitallers of Saint John of God, to save the lives of dozens of Jews persecuted by the Nazis during World War II.When the SS entered the Fatebenefratelli hospital located on the Tiber Island in Rome, medical personnel and religious explained to the Germans that behind the doors of two special wards, there were patients suffering from this terrible K Disease, some of whom were terminally ill. The...

Italy (Ammoland.com) Pope Francis spoke with a group of young people at a rally of thousands at the end of the first day of his trip to the Italian city of Turin. Francis started by attacking the Right to Keep and Bear Arms as well as accusing the allies during World War Two of being complicit in the killing of Jews, Christians and homosexuals. Francis issued his toughest condemnation to date of the weapons industry, saying. “If you trust only men you have lost,” he told the young people in a long, rambling talk about war, trust and politics after...

The Marine Corps admitted Thursday that it misidentified one of the six men in the World War II photograph of a flag-raising in Iwo Jima — one of the most iconic images in American history. For more than 70 years, history said John Bradley, a Navy hospital corpsman, was one of the six men seen in the legendary photo from one of the war’s bloodiest battles. But the Marines now say Bradley is nowhere in the photo — and the man believed to be Bradley is in fact Harold Schultz, a private first class.

Retired Col. Steve Pisanos, a World War II ace who was decorated by four nations, has died, his family confirmed through the San Diego Air and Space Museum on June 9. Pisanos was 96. Born in Athens, Greece, Pisanos [sometimes spelled Pissanos] came to the United States in 1938. He joined the British Royal Air Force in 1941 and served with an Eagle Squadron until American members were absorbed by the US Army Air Forces 4th Fighter Group. Pisanos was then commissioned a USAAF lieutenant. On May 3, 1942, Pisanos became an American citizen during a ceremony in London, England,...

More than 70 years after dying on a beach in World War II, Queens-bred Marine John F. Prince is finally coming home. His remains were excavated from a nondescript parking lot on Betio Island in the central Pacific, identified through dental records and due to arrive in New York next week for a burial with full military honors at Calverton National Cemetery, the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency said Friday.

It is surely the last time, my friends, that the world will see this vast company of American vets assembled in Normandy on June 6. There are thousands still who dream dreams of those beaches, who, in silent moments, still see the faces of the fallen. They live among us, shoulder to shoulder, the old warriors of World War II. But these are quiet men. In dark corners of their closets, in boxes in attics, lay things they can touch to bring it all back. Battered boots. Khaki blankets. Medals in a velvet case. A frayed packet of letters. Handfuls...

A 91-year-old man lifts off in a commercial airliner bound for France and for a moment can imagine himself in the cabin of a Douglas C-47, preparing to leap into moonlit darkness. Norwood Thomas was just a boy, really, the first time he arrived in Normandy. Now he is returning for the last time, once again mindful of his own mortality. More than 100,000 Americans were there at the start of the campaign to retake Europe from Hitler. Only a few hundred are expected to return this week. Thousands more, many too frail to travel, will mark the 70th anniversary...

When allied forces landed on the Normandy beaches on D-Day, they did so alongside a fleet of bizarre tanks with very special roles – brought into life by an eccentric British commander. On 19 August 1942, Allied armies put their plan for an invasion of Occupied Europe to the ultimate test – by landing troops on the beaches and trying to capture a French port.

~ D-DAY, June 6, 1944 ~ NORMANDY INVASION May 1944 had been chosen at the conference in Washington in May 1943 as the time for the invasion. Difficulties in assembling landing craft forced a postponement until June, but June 5 was fixed as the unalterable date by Eisenhower on May 17. As the day approached and troops began to embark for the crossing, bad weather set in, threatening dangerous landing conditions. After tense debate, Eisenhower and his subordinates decided on a 24-hour delay, requiring the recall of some ships already at sea. Eventually, on the morning of June 5,...

With the conclusion of WW II the years of bloodshed and mind-numbing violence finally ended. But a massive demobilization of servicemen began, the purpose to slash military spending. Liberal Democrats supported an effort to completely abolish the Marine Corps, first established under Presidents John Adams and Thomas Jefferson. Language of Liberty This effort was supported by the Doolittle Board, created by the Truman Administration and headed by none other than Army General Jimmy Doolittle himself. The Board called for the Marine Corps to be disbanded as a separate military outfit and unified with Army units. As you can imagine, this...