Free Republic

Lectures in Medieval History -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Great Famine (1315-1317) and the Black Death (1346-1351) -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The 14th century was an era of catastrophes. Some of them man-made, such as the Hundred Years' War, the Avignon Papacy, and the Great Schism. These were caused by human beings, and we shall consider them a bit later. There were two more or less natural disasters either of which one would think would have been sufficient to throw medieval Europe into a real "Dark Ages": the Great Famine and the Black Death. Each caused millions of deaths, and each in its way demonstrated in...

The Dutch Supreme Court on Tuesday upheld the war crimes conviction of a businessman for selling chemicals to Saddam Hussein that his regime in Iraq turned into poison gas and unleashed on Kurds and Iranians. ... In May 2007 a Hague appeals court upheld Van Anraat's 2005 conviction for complicity in war crimes and increased his sentence from 15 to 17 years. ... Presiding Judge Leo van Dorst said that from the mid-1980s Van Anraat was Iraq's sole supplier of a chemical called TDG, or thiodiglycol, for its mustard gas production program. "The suspect knew ... the TDG he was...

/begin my translation Big Earthquake to Hit Tokyo in 6 Months Japanese Asahi TV aired 'earthquake prediction' programominous signs: deep-sea creatures surface, and continual earthquakesIn the worst case, 10m-high tsunami could hitTokyo, correspondent Sun Woo-jung su@chosun.com 2005.07.05   Mega Earthquake Definitely Comes ! Uncovering X-day of Direct Hit on Kanto At 7pm, July 2nd, Saturday, Asahi TV, a major commercial TV network, devoted 2 hours of prime time segment to air a shocking program. It was titled, 'Mega Earthquake Definitely Comes! Uncovering X-day of Direct Hit on Kanto'(photo.)  Kanto refers to the area around Tokyo Bay including the capital Tokyo with 12 million residents.   Its conclusion is obvious. In the program, Uda Shinich,...

Saddam, the ATM of Al Qaeda By Christopher S. Carson FrontPageMagazine.com | November 15, 2004 The Report of the 9/11 Commission has been digested, and the news media outlets have seized upon it as confirmation of their view that al Qaeda is a kind of purely stateless entity that never had "operational links" with rogue states like Iraq. Somehow, goes the thrust of the Report, Osama bin Laden was for years able to finance, train and supply an international terrorist corporation that had ongoing jihad operations in fifty countries - by himself, on no more than a $30 million personal...

FAS | Nuke | Guide | Iraq | CW |||| Index | Search | Join FAS Chemical Weapons Programs Iraq started research into the production of chemical weapons agents in the 1970s and started batch production of agents in the early 1980s. At that stage, production was heavily reliant on the import of precursor chemicals from foreign suppliers. In 1982, early in the Iran-Iraq War, the Iraqis used riot control agents to repel Iranian attacks. They progressed to the use of CW agents in mid-1983 with mustard, and in March 1984 with tabun (the first use ever of a nerve...

<p>SAN FRANCISCO, California (CNN) -- Two minor earthquakes shook the Bay area on Sunday, but no damage or injuries were reported.</p> <p>A 3.77-magnitude quake occurred at 7:57 p.m. (10:57 p.m. EST) and was centered two miles southeast of San Ramon in Contra Costa County, said Sheryl Tankersley, spokeswoman for the Governor's Office of Emergency Services.</p>