a lightweight discussion of WW2 aerial ops and the like

remember the Taksim riots , the Gezi events that started with removal of some trees ? Numbers of trees being debateable between 3 and 20 ? Which really scared the biggies among the newly elites and almost the entire state establishment as a precursor of the Great Alevi Uprising ? Which led to widespread demonstrations and each of the 5 or 6 people who died was an Alevi though among the thousands of the wounded one way or the other , there are enough numbers of Sunnis to make this entire event a non-secterian explosion ; which still has aftershocks of its own with small scale demonstrations taking place every weekend ?

the explosion thing seemed real enough to the decision makers considering the week before it really got going they had named the 3rd bridge across the Bosphorus as Yavuz , the Ottoman Sultan that increased the size of the country 250% or something in 8 years . A person whom the Alevis tend to identify as an oppressor , with German institutions working behind the scenes to increase the number of people who call the troubles in his reign as a genocide . There is a certain phrase in Turkish where you invoke somebody else's mother , say when that somebody steps on your foot ; delivered with a smile it can also be a joke or mockery laced with contempt . There are undoubtedly people who felt it that way when the ever smiling President announced the name and explained it that he and the cabinet members had decided the name in 5 minutes , right there on the field of ceremony ; in that he was almost invoking their mothers , just he wasn't saying but thinking ...

this bridge is being constructed by a South Korean company , at least you would expect solid work in engineering , consideration , preparation and stuff ? Turns out all those detailed preliminary work of years has been laced with mistakes . As soon as the construction began , it was discovered the selected route conflicted with migration paths of birds . An immediate stop , with a new route . It's only 245 000 trees cut down . Media suggests everybody to shut up , those who don't like the bridge shouldn't travel on it . No comment on the timetable when the cleared areas will be utilized with spectacular villas with immediate access to the bridge , easing traffic for those who could afford to buy them . In another spectacle right in my city , a cablecar is to be built for "Green" access to the skiing resort up the mountain , the environmentalists all applaud the wise choice , the Mayor appears on National TVs with an helicopter in the background lifting pylons for the construction , since helicopters will save trees since they fly in the air instead of driven on a road as the trucks would need if there wasn't helilift . Great , just great . Right on the same week , walkers-in-the-woods-as-sport discover helicopters are not flying and there is the road with almost 4000 trees felled .

there is this construction boom which has to go to keep the economy from imploding ; money has to be saved whenever applicable . They haven't yet resorted to forcibly taking over property considered poorly constructed to resist earthquakes for new projects . Currently only some Roman citizens - the official term for Gypsies- complain that they were cheated out of their plots and houses and the compensation as the new houses do not cover what they lost . Such troubles might be more common in the future , that's why any land of any kind is eagerly accepted at the slightest chance . Saying such stuff in Turkey makes you an enemy of Democracy within 10 minutes of a discussion . Since the Goverment is returning Honour to those wronged by the coup plotters and stuff , got to be an enemy of higher ideals of mankind with any opposition ; and there is to be a museum on the island where the trials against the victims of the 1960 murderness , aptly named for Democracy . It started reasonably enough , small island with small pier , visitors might get stuck in storm in small ships , hence a couple of bungalows to weather the weather . Currently it's permitted to have a 65% rate ; which means you could have all sorts of things -mall included- on 65 000 squaremeters of a 100 000 squaremeter island . The descendants of some those who were tried in that abomination of courts have already complained . Tourism experts are dumbfounded , asking where the market is to fill the floorspace . Good thing that they are not aware that those who asked info on the project apparently include one Arabian dude who also sells women , East Europeans mostly . Isle of Love , anyone ?

the work on the PM's mosque fit for Sultans has also started . Which has been mentioned a couple of times in CFC as a dangerous thing to do , with the PM himself declaring it was supposed to have 7 minarets in the beginning . The same number with the Kabe in Mekke , though now probably irrelevant with the space age treatment Saudis are to give to the environs of the "House of God" , the Makkah 2020 with its 63 hotel towers ringing the site . Culled down to 6 minarets , the Istanbul project now matches the Sultanahmet but ı , for starters , don't think it's fit for a PM of this Republic to get into a contest with the Ottomans , whose work lasted 6 centuries and more . While it's quite possible we won't survive 2014 . People who approach the city from Marmara will be stunned by the scene of some skyscraper rising behind the mosques of Ottomans , done against the court orders over some 5 years and yet see there is nothing similar behind the one of the PM , and there might be enemies of Democracy whispering to attentive ears that the guy who built the skyscraper behind Ottomans' turns out to be the owner of the house the PM rents in Istanbul . Does it really fall to me to remind that the political Right in Turkey likes the Ottomans and it might hurt when we actually need National Unity ? For real , not as a ploy to get votes for A-K-P ...

This is now my favorite thread on CFC. Posts of the year.

ı just finished a PDF version of The Winds of War II , Herman Wouk's continuation -better known , actually named as War and Remembrance . Has been instrumental in me finally figuring out the Battle of Leyte though it's mostly unfit for print posting . No , this is not a change in the bellyaching for the Old Republic . ı had always liked the TV production of "WoW I" when it was on in the 80s ; grabbed the copy of the book with haste when ı saw it on the shelves at a shop that sold second-hands , but the rest , the II was not available . Showed real interest when the series of the last appeared on the State Channel ; but that turned out to be a flop , kinda deserving the cancellation it got after a couple of episodes .

the depiction of Izmir grated on my nerves immediately , a bucket of rust with a Captain that robbed the poor Jews with wild abandon ; no mention of 1492 ... ı have always been a propeller head , the death of Warren Henry made it certain that aerial scenes would be hencefort lacking . But more to the core , the Israelis were in a spat with the Palestinians ; can't remember whether it was Gazze 2006 , or Sharon's masterpiece of Intifada II . Almost screamed that somebody forced it on the State Channel , so that Turks would learn about the suffering and hence why Tel Aviv was always right ; going hand-in-hand with the glorious invasion of the Middle East by the US ; to save us all from the horrors of Brown people .

as might be guessable , ı am of the opinion that the Holocaust was the best thing that ever happened to Israel . The suffering in the camps , neverminding what preceded them , was real ; only the numbers are for debate . But that we should never forget what man was capable of doing to man seems hollow when one watches the suffering of people in the 21st Century on evening news . With knowledge that had it been Palestinians or Arabs or Muslims or any other "non-white" group doing the same on others in other geographies , it would have been nukes doing the talking . Muslims doing the same in the Middle East is always welcomed as wonderful PR , even encouraged for final tallying . Good thing the series stopped ...

this was before ı ever got on the web ; ı could never guess this could be part and parcel of the carefully careographed moves to polish the reputation of the Goverment . Fighting Sionizm and its tentacles like lions .

something real , very real . To the extent everybody from the Right to the Left agreed to play ; including those who would later be jailed as prime specimens of tentacles . This brilliant interest in the Middle East and the "Love" we received in return was actually decided by the Old Republic . Me being a parrot , bear with me if you had already seen that but once President , Sezer , the Leftest of them all , spurned any contact with Hatemi , the reformist Iranian President at the time , yet rushed to Syria to Hafız Esad's funeral , to steal Syria from Iran . Ankara was all for it ; in Ankara you survive by being useful to West . Experts will be thundering that it was so only in the past ; "Yeah, right!" is the sole answer they deserve , without being overly rude . Feeling unable to compete with the express majority of the Right who would have no trouble reciting at least a few lines from Kuran , the Left had to improvise to look good in the eyes of Arabs , whom we were supposed to steal from their anti-American Goverments . Even better Anti-Americanism ergo anti-Semitizm -but remember : it was to be faked only ... Yeah , that was the way , and people went as far as they could . Which readily explains the craze of Mein Kampf in my country .

ı have had this a couple of times already . Me , the museum guide held in city-wide contempt , waiting in line at the crowded bookstore with two ladies in front with a bunch of books and at least one had a copy of Mein Kampf , out of 5 or 6 versions available , in stacks and stacks on the ground and tables that would have reached man-high if put together . It was me who started it all , with mentioning there was surely better things to while away time then trying to make sense of Adolf's finest . Museum guide , you are supposed to poke your nose into other peoples' stuff ... It was the reputation of pathetic attempts to deserve the monthly pay at the museum . The two could not really step back , without looking as worse losers than me .

earlier this year , ı was in the same store and a blonde gave her turn at the cashier . Now any reference to her blondness is a rhetorical device to somehow imply that she was /is not one stereotypical Middle Eastern Brownie with expected facilities of automatic hate , irregardless of context ; and ı am not in the business of remembering faces . ı presumed only because she gave the turn and ı automatically complied , the presumption being ı would be insulting if ı refused as if bearing some grudge . As said only a rhetorical device ; the other lady had a dense colour , maybe red-brown , possibly dyed . The girl at the cashier rightfully ignored me anyhow , pricing her purchase .

no real problem then and now . And the urgency of the Premiere cover with Angelina in Lara Croft attire is lost long ago . Neither she insisted , well aware that it would never been an argument a) had ı not been in some rotten situation of being laughed on the street for merely being on the street and b) she too would been laughed at without giving a lesson of where one had to stand ...

well , thinking a bit , ı think the Angelina thing was sometime else , but whatever ...

the tale of Mein Kampf invariably goes on with the tale of some other shop who put signs on the window , declaring they didn't sell the wisdomful tome . They did , after a visit from the police , as ı insist . Even if it's also possible the friends of the shop-owner talked him out , still after a visit from the police .

all of which are indeed an insult to the Arabs , as if they are some donkeys without any sense . They played the game , Damascus as a chance to build bridges to the West , Gulf as the means to get us to kill any Syrian who might have stood in their way ; Gulf has enough Sunnis in Iraq to clear Baghdad from the map . Kurds are soooooo generous to us , since we even fund them while they built up their 'stan so that they will crush us into the dust , with some American aircover when the time comes .

experts are of course extolling the human grief in the Middle East , a geography they presumed would be theirs , with them ruling this part or that area in the way Americans once ruled Iraq . So for Democracy , they are all man and women of great wisdom talking passionately how Turkey , no scratch that , Soft Power will prevail in the end . And at times you can see beads of sweat on the foreheads , those with the foreheads never "really" grasping that they were all duped . Instead of ruling the Middle East , they are cornered into a little Turkey that is so out of tune with reality of how great they are . They are telling Eygptians that it's their factories that keep Egyptian bellies full , they are reminding they are now a bigger force than the UK in this new world and they are screaming murder at every thing that comes out of Cairo . Even if they are also fully cognizant that America wants it that way and they are earning their pay by suggesting the Goverment should learn to shut up . Disbelief in the eyes of a participant in a debate on some State Channel at his friends who were all comrades in the good old days when we were winning , at least according to the same experts . Guess he didn't read his e-mails ...

the Goverment can not shut up , they painted themselves into a corner and with regards to their practises they can't really expect any fair trials , if the standarts follow what they have done themselves . Even at kinda open war with the Congregation , Party accusing the teeny weenies of high treason as in secretly managing the Gezi events , attempting to arrest the PM , plotting to steal the country with placing their men in every conceivable office . Congregation hits back by claiming the "Service" is so good , doesn't do any evil thing as claimed by the Party . Yeah , they call themselves the Service ... Though the Turkish world could also be translated as Care . As mentioned , the Taksim riots has had an influence . Party declares the PM would have been a mediator instead of the instigator of larger scale trouble if he hadn't been misled . The mayor of Istanbul denies the charges with how he has info on a meeting in February this year that planned the entire Gezi affair , as followed by a mention of WW I and its original reason that people don't know at all . Don't question why mayors in Turkey have tapes , it's a Turkish thing . ı guess...

have been wondering , just for so little a time , whether he mentions some Congregation acquired tapes from a session when the not Rachel Corrie ( this seperatist MP with a cute belly ) was discussing with the State Intelligence on whether they could steal the Turkish Left with some minor incident , where he would stand , heroically all by himself in front of a tree killing bulldozer to stop it on its tracks . But then am bloody sure ı have been discussed on TVs and overall media in the clear only once . When the anchor of some debate mentioned this fool who thinks who has but one spaceship . Well , Confiscator , the Star Destroyer is proggressing well in the structural construction bay 178 , off Mars . When it appears over Pentagon crewed only by accountants and the like , for we are in for a thousand years of how stinking bean counters in D.C. betrayed the US by refusing the very real petition to the US President Barrack Hussein to build a real Death Star , The CNN and even Will McAvoy will report who has what and the glorious Turkish TVs will have to concur ...

otherwise it still requires a magnifying glass and a pair of tweezers with insane amounts of patience with even greater hope to comb all over the place to find the odd phrase that might be tangentially relevant to this poster , stil with a chance of one in a million . There was this glorious newspaper editorial earlier this year , with a real silly line of thought . Every crisis the Democrats of Turkey started ( or were helped by those who started the crisis under the guise of opposition ) were like balls thrown in the air . In each case exploding somethin' in the air high above , beyond sight ... Yeah , there are really few people in the world dumb enough to referenced with such notions . And you must be real smart or real dumb to get the great simile : Playing dodgeball with the cruisers .

beware , yo infidels and enemies of this new Turkey . The Democrats can place balls in orbit and beyond by hand . On your knees , and start praising the greatness of your future .

the real part of the article was actually understandable . In 2013 , Turkey would have a President . Meaning the laws would be changed to enable the PM to be elected next year with increased powers ; which his opponents describe as a legal basis for his dictatorship . In return for that , in 2013 again , the world would see a new Caliphate of Islam , the guy elected of course being a Turk . On this nobody talks about , but it must be somebody who currently lives in Pennsylvania and the it would be too early for declaration anyhow . Everything revolving around a secret session of the Parliament , which still didn't take place , to revoke the 1924 decision on the abolishment and the Parliament "storing the title in itself" . Which presumably had London's blessing , if you ever come across a couple of posts ( of you know who ) about Eyecandy and her guests on TV . ı think the editorial was just about the time of the "Coup of February 7"

on their falling apart the Party and the Congreagation haven't shied of calling the other all the good names , with grace if you will . They wouldn't want to encourage the opposition to wake up . Even worse than that the voters themselves might even consider other parties , which would be real undesirable . With the pitfalls the Muslim Brotherhood finds itself lately . Our Sunnier Brothers was to be the key to the glory of this new Turkey ; they would topple Esad and we would have new territory under control , by "covert" influence , to trade for the loss of a quarter of the country to the seperatists . Who would behave as the glory of the new Turkey was assured by America , who needed a success story for Moderate Islam to out-wit the Jihadists which were proving to be uneradicatable . And in Egypt the Brotherhood would first paralyze the country and allow expansion into Sudan , whose diplomats had the courage to insult Atatürk in Anıtkabir , whole Africa waited to be saved from the Chinese . And Americans would be grateful for that , too ; considering they didn't have the power to face Beijing anywhere but the Pasific . Why we would be the 4th largest donor country in the world otherwise ? Like we cared for people ?

paralyzing Egypt was of course decided by the hired guns from the Arab world . Seeing the decay in their own countries -according to our own experts , these guys were teaching all the ropes to our own experts . Who , in infinite wisdom that always come to their kind , immediately forgot that they had almost sworn allegiance to the Israeli interests back in the days they were pitchin' their case to Americans , once again forgetting it was the Americans who planned all that in the first place . The old Egypt under Mübarek was a slave of the Jews ; Mursi , a second hand choice when Brotherhood's own leaders were declared to be unacceptable by the West , was to do the heavy work of putting the right people in every right place .

the current events in Egypt and the toll of casualties is an indication of the kinda hopeless situation the Egypt finds itself . They know it better than this poster that their country is the schwerpunkt of the Arab world , without competition . Algeria is yet to recover from the bloody Civil War of the 90s , Iraq had 20 years of American attention , Syria after the victory of Damascus will still be fighting Gulf funded Jihadists . They are all that remains before the sweeping conquest of the Gulf . Something that requires bloody depopulation , for the Gulf bunch are not numerically viable enough to fight any COIN campaign . That's why there is this "incredible" , if you will , bodycount to make hay while the sun shines . The Gulf doesn't want a grass roots movement that depends on the numbers of population succeeding , the Brotherhood is a danger to them . So here we are , Gulf paying Cairo to get it to kill as much people as possible , with Qatar appearing on our side to push us on the other heading . We Turks will be held responsible for everything that happened and we will pay for our sins in a maelstrom of fire , anguish and destruction . Much depends on the timing of the Civil War here .

accordingly Egyptians need to break up the cohesion of the Muslim Brotherhood , without much thinking on the number of people they are radicalizing into Jihadist ranks . If the Turkish Civil War starts early , Cairo can play the Nationalism angle , calling Brotherhood innocent yet honest people of Egypt deceived by the wily foreigners , the former before former Colonialist power and so on ; and we are kinda big enough to be a battlefield for all the Jihadists in the world anyhow . If our War is delayed , Egypt is probably in for a bloodbath , but that would still have been the case if Mursi hadn't been toppled with Salafi ( Hence Saudi ) support . Without the Third of July , their Civil War would have started with Salafis dragging the Brotherhood into the fight . Salafis are already better equipped than the Brotherhood , physically and mentally ... Egypt is kinda fighting on a single front now . Before the Salafis join the fray . The proverbial stick with dung on both ends . Meaning there is no way for Ankara to register with the Egyptians ...

this is why they now have a new phrase something like the Worthy Isolation . According to this all the countries of the world are hypocrites and we alone talk for Democracy and Human Rights . We cry at the huge numbers of people martyred by the Dictatorial forces in the streets of Egypt , our TV news are filled with news from Cairo almost from the start to the end . The 4 open finger and the closed thumb sign of the anti-coup demonstrations can be seen all over in any Party meeting . The number of Rabia squares and avenues are in the rise in Turkey , matching a racing avalanche down the mountains .

of course until the news of the gassing in Syria came in . Almost forgotten , because the news usually implied Damascus was still hanging in there . Which then implied a continueing saga of failures for the both branches of the newlies . We were crying for the "Nation" as it suffered in Cairo , all those kids in their agony allowed some new talking points . A Goverment Minister immediately declared those casualties were of this nation . Now , every single Egyptian has a right to be ruled by the way he / she prefers and all those women and children of Damascus are human beings as much as anybody living in Turkey or else and those responsible for their suffering deserve the things that would happen if the target was something like us . BUT , please forgive the stressing , they are Arabs , subsequently subdivided into Egyptians and Syrians . And we are Turks , hence of different Nations . They will not accept us , certainly not when we fall in the coming battle and certainly not as rulers . As believed by the newly elites . Talk in any way you like , the Shengen like proposal to be realised between us and the Arab Countries , in the happier days before the Arab Spring , will never allow this country to gobble up territory , yet naturally every Sunni in Syria with half a brain knows Gaziantep to Antakya is now Syrian territory . Just don't ask how , if you also find the concepts that define Turkish relations and stuff as random gibberish , such as the premise that promises to Turkey are to be broken with wild abandon and anything from us will be doubled and tripled and corrected into a better deal .


soft power is an elusive dream the newly elites chase , but what they think as their letters of marque to run the Middle East is simply the Soft Power of the West , looking well poised to take a quarter of this country away from us , in the way the magician says Abra Kadabra . Nobody is opposing any increased trade , or Arabs watching mindless Turkish soaps but to turn this into an empire is kinda beyond reach and that not because its proponents are fools , even if they are actually fools and worse . Egyptians banned Turkish soaps and what will you do , bomb them sky high ? And here we are , with repeated episodes of a smuggler army clashing with the troops . Latest one ı believe had 250 vehicles and 4000 people throwing stones at the border guards for 9 hours ; they retreated leaving 4 tons of diesel fuel behind . Smuggling is infiltration surely , with weaseling in and out of the country unnoticed ? But then they want to be noticed ; as the Turkish Army is occupying their country since 2011 . Though the best part is of course the cavalry ... This will be the nation building legend of the new kind of Arabs . If only because you need more than videos of ripping internals and chewing flesh for internet distribution .

and of course it's not just our most brilliant that chase dreams . Everybody somehow knows he will end on top after this bloody mess is over , even if Kurds have already forgotten that they are the West's safety valve , to fight Gulf interests if they try to run-away in the way they tried to do a couple of times between 1993-2007or so , most famously and naturally supposedly through Bin Ladin . But then everybody also knows Turkey as a state will not be , with ethnic extinction of the Turk as far as possible ...

how could it ever be possible ? This non-stop plotting against an ally , even if on the basis of "so called Ally" ?

eisenhower was a talking man . Always irritated at the way Churchill sabotaged the entire Allied effort in WW2 -for Winston was simply burning to get us in so that we too would be bleeding- Ike wasn't exactly keen to get us into NATO , as clearly implied during the relevant talks . But , as there is always a but , the way of war had changed .

somebody had implied Russians were planting thousands of sound locators all over the country , from Kola to Kamchatka . Sound locators were a dead end in the WW2 , never comparable to Radar in their poor performance . Crude and unlikely to be improved considering the state of the Russian industry but reportedly maintenance free their projected efficiency stemmed from the very vastness of Mother Russia . Their warnings , however imprecise , over the hours an American bomber would fly over Arctic wastes would cascade into a precise situation report , good enough to get an interceptor into correct area and height , in time . Added to very real risks of over the Pole flying with various meteorological hazards B-36s could have been entirely neutralized ; a probability of 98% have been suggested but ı don't get much of Math . Unbelieveable ? Well , in 1948 the Red Base on the Moon seemed real enough and flying saucers were "only" mildly supersonic ...

as such by the time talks took place , meaning it was now 1949 , the American warplanners had come up with a Southern strategy , concentrating on the Navy Jet coming online , to be the A3D . Ike was offering real partnership in return for a clearence of Nuclear War on Russia , if the situation warranted it . Of course , Capitalism was a menace that one had to endure ; Ike himself referred to the American experience in the Wild West . Sure enough , the rich and the newly rich would rape the country but sometime in the future -when the number of the rich reached a critical mass- law and order would be the only way ; with a millionaire in each neighbourhood even the Ittihad remnants would have to be real democrats . Though it would take time , maybe a generation .

but why ? Why Turkey and not Iran or Pakistan ; locations also in range of Russian industry beyond the Urals ? That has to be explained by the power of state , the very notion of state . Bomber bases in Turkey could be expected to be defended and available ; we would keep our promises , in other locations Americans were themselves bribing everything and everybody . Yeah , no guarantees over there that the incoming American planes wouldn't be met by Russian cavalry , to the principle of highest bidder gets all .

as mentioned this is something different from well known US efforts to secure forward operating locations for B-29/50s . Le May got more than a few of such bases all over the world in a concerted effort by the Washington and the President Elect's first "Black" action in 1952 would be a HQ only exercise using former staff officers and the like from the ETO days on the ways of taking USAF bases from Le May in a real emergency . Le May was for a pre-emptive strike on the Soviet Union all along and Ike knew there were lots of pilots with live nukes onboard waiting for the word , not from him but the USAF General and ı certainly do not mean some USAF procedure that allowed initiative to junior grades in an emergency .

the Navy Way to nuke the Soviets was initially by big carriers , but in 1949 that was a dead end . Yet Washington politics dictated the USN would survive and get a couple of bombers of its own . Miniscule affairs to what might have been possible on board CV-49 but still capable enough to deal an Hiroshima or two . Yet somewhat short on the range , meaning the carriers would have to close in . But , as said somewhere above there is always a but .

1949 was also a year that it was believed the Russians had a working Air Independent Engine and had combined that into Type XXI style hulls . Estimates in 1946 suggested production of 300 such submarines by 1950 , at least with schnorkels . Unbelieveable ? In 2013 certainly . In the last year of the WW2 the Germans had built something like 119 and 93 of them were delivered ... Meaning ? USN would have no seas to sail . Eisenhower was a firm believer in actual superiority of the US military power over the Soviets , but there was no telling who had the better Germans and it was always possible to be surprised and never impossible .

that's where our geography enters the picture . Apart from the Straits bottling the Black Sea Fleet our landmass would also screen the USN carriers in the Med , which had just two other also narrow entrances , meaning it was much easier to hunt down those pesky subs and have a sanitized environment . Yet carrier flying is still dependant on the weather and we still had the landmass . In times of a war , instead of flying weight hence fuel limited from a carrier the USN Bombers would forward deploy to bases in Turkey . Topped with max amount of gas on the ground instead of dicey aerial refuelling , off they would go . And the "ground crews" air transported from the carriers would be busy loading the next wave of bombers that would be in deployment from Morocco and similar rear bases , to be followed by yet another wave of planes coming from CONUS in stages . Those planes which survived their missions over Russia would be sent for consecutive strikes as well . And to protect the bombers on the ground from Russian airstrikes Ike offered every single Marine fighter squadron on the Atlantic Coast , making do in the Marine way . The bomber bases to be concentrated in the West of the country which also took care of defending Istanbul , Ankara and Izmir by the Marines ; we didn't have much cities worth a nuke back in the day .

and what of the sound locators ? Wouldn't they be effective against bombers from Turkey ? First of all , they would have to be in populated areas , and we would be among those who would comprimise them in times of need . Secondly the populated areas thing meant the targets would be closer : Not enough time to build up an air picture . And then the Red Banner Fleet itself with tons of radars . The Battle over the Black Sea would be one of electrons . The USN had already suitable means for such missions and the relative compactness of the area might have lent it well to the presence of Weasels , even if aircraft like F-105F or F-4G were not invented yet .

eisenhower tried his best to give a fair deal . Even if we already knew it was a bad thing . With us in NATO with solemn promises we simply couldn't be like "Oh-kay. So you refuse to give us F-86H with adequate supplies of 'winders. Yeah, gimme some Phantoms with thousands of Sparrows or I'm a Commie by tomorrow noon" . This lack of flexibility was the thing once queried about in this thread some pages back and ı had tried to give an impression of how this country had played one country against another for centuries . And worse , the MiGs were not automatically bad . ı think on some weird Turkish language only forum ı hear it from persons directly involved that the One Fishbed was given a visual check , solid amounts of tape and wax over fuselage panels and some rope and pulley game and it was awesome bliss , so much that the Russkies themselves hated re-possessing it , considering it was awesome bliss . But then Ike had more honour than average politician , be it American or not ...

there is much to comment on Oliver Stone repeatedly showing a Turkish slogan written on a banner during a visit by Eisenhower during the 50s , but ı doubt Mr.Stone chose it with full knowledge for his documentary .

when the Camelot took over , with the often reported Irish Mafia connections of the Kennedy Family , even the pretense disappeared . We were but fools who didn't know their proper place and JFK was an action guy . Ike was a talking man . JFK was not ; he would teach us things as soon as the crises of the World allowed him to do so . Still , he would demand a Turkish girl for his bed , through "official" channels , every week and every week the US "officer" on the case would tear up the paper . Since his Turkish counterpart was reporting to a dude conscripted after the Greeks landed in Izmir ; this dude having bayoneted a couple of people at Sakarya .

the dude is the kind of people who lost an empire in the 20th Century and seems to be a reason for dismay of people of the 21st Century , looking on current attempts to get an empire . By American permission , and so by law and nature regularly failing at the slightest chance given , dragging the country down as well and the bayonet is so passe . Returning to the dude , he was among those who rose up and charged on the early hours of August 26, 1922 . He might have just smiled at the current anniversary of a war centuries back . Yeah , Malazgirt this year is celebrated with gusto ; don't know what Manzikert is . 10 000 youths , showing and teaching that the eternal brotherhood of Turks with the Kurds and Arabs defeating Byzantion . Without our brothers we would have never gained our country ...

had we been anything but a 20th Century construct , ı would be like ı don't remember it that way , but CFC already knows we had a complete AT-AT battalion on a temporary tour of duty ...


[this post doesn't have any specific references to current affairs .]

does any of this make any sense ? That the West , hence even the entire world , does anything and everything -well, almost anything and everything to destroy the Turks ? One can understand Winston Churchill pulling all the strings all along to make us an "ally" in a mind numbing variety of schemes in the WW II to come . He was instrumental in final acceptance of the War in 1913 , when the war went awry he wanted to land in Belgium to turn the German flank simply because he was very vocal on it and nobody matched him in pushing the scheme , hence the glory would be of his alone . The operation through Dardanelles , cheap and fast , using old battleships sitting idle otherwise and in the finest tradition of Gun-boat diplomacy and also repairing the misfortune of 1807 came from behind and got the lead , using the race horse simile . Then came a short story published in mid-1890s , a British behind the scenes pressure on the Ottomans in regards to the Armenian troubles whereby a modern fleet would cross a pathetically defended narrow straits to topple a despot . Considering the laurels he could get , being the owner of such foresight , Churchill had no trouble in secretly and of course vocally accepting that he had written that piece under a pen-name . Contributed quite a bit to his decision to cut down on the troops to be embarked as an police force , for he was the Minister of the Navy or whatever , instead of the Army . Since the story didn't mention any landlubbers ... Though had he been the Army Minister there would been a substantial troop component .

then came the intelligence that we still had quite an army in the area . With attendant field artillery . Greek troops were factored in . Apart from the straight Russian objection to any probable Greek claim to the city of Tsars , we Ottomans were such a miserable lot -as proven by the debacles of the Balkan wars . The time lost by the transfer of Greeks to Thrace would be pointless ; if they wanted to fight there was whole of Austro-Hungaria . And their vitals were over there , to be occupied before the Russians . Who would love to expand in Europe and Greeks should have been there , negating the effect of Serbians who were more likely to be pro-Russian , right ? And Churchill was not a moron or something . Massie's Dreadnought , that real good brick of a book has a passage where Churchill shakes a fellow passenger on a yatch , Lady Something , with a detailed discussion of how a battleship would blow up that beautiful seaside villa she had just admired from a distance of miles but certainly no details of the meeting he had with Basil Zaharoff with regards to creative financing . Churchill had thought about all kinds of guns , coastal to field , and was ready for anything ... 1807 was already there , showing the vulnerability of ships travelling through the straits with hostile gunners on the shores and the Minister of Navy or something knew not all British ships were battleships , thickly armoured and all .

now , Osprey has its 30th book in the Commanders series and it's on Kemal . Until reading the relevant thread in some weird forum , ı wasn't aware why he had actually had a right to be remembered on the anniversaries of March 18 , 1915 . Was sure it was some benefit of dictatoriality that it would be his pictures on TV and posters on the walls during the celebrations we would be attending in our high school uniforms in the 1980s , the country under military rule . Even the then history books would be mentioning he simply watched the action and did nothing more . And then last night going through old files ı found a saved page 3 of this thread mentioning that Liman von Sanders was aware that he would serve the Ottoman Empire to the best of his ability , though he could also be a real pain in the belly , and von Sanders' job definition at the time was killing the British , as in as much as possible . So they were there , the politically savvy Colonel whom even Enver could not tame and obviously big in the Ittihad and the German General (who would soon have his German adjutants making the rounds to collect data to make a statistical analysis of the action) . And more to the point they were close in a way , no way to make it disappear . Widespread conspiracies increase the chance that somebody will betray with the expection that others have already betrayed .

turkish artillery fire picked up appreciably after Bouvet got it . The Allies suspected it was torpedoed , many on the shore thought it was a fluke artillery shot ; so everybody started . So that a battleship could be claimed on personal records ... On the other hand , Enver , Cemal and Talat thought it was a fabrication by Kemal and a coup attempt by the Germans , displeased with the loss of an entire army in Sarıkamış without much damage to the Russians . What this meant for the Armenians and Istanbul's desire to satisfy the Germans who didn't like any Orthodox Christians at the moment is just bit out of tune with the current narrative . They ignored the thing , protected their men all around and demoted the Turkish General who commanded the action , for hinting the possibility in a secret telegram ; he was surely a Kemalist or something .

what ? Turkey is always chock-a-block with traitors .

mr.Churchill got an egg on his face . With hindsight , he should have kept to Belgium , give the ships with much opposition as he could muster and played on the invention of landships , later known as tanks , the war winning instrument . Then he could have been the PM 20 years earlier .

he never forgot ; didn't forgive either and his capacity in remembering with hate was as great as his command of the English Language . Up to maybe 1928 , it was straight emnity . As the Soviet Union stabilized and formed the specter of an industrially supported Red Army , with possible domination of Europe in the near future , he once again had to conform . To the smile-in-the-face, stab-in-the-back perfidy that tends to be remarked as a particular British trait . We were needed in the regular game every smart European had tried to emulate since the Romans but none had ever matched the British . To fight somebody else's fight while that somebody just watched .

the recent experience of London against the Germans was not encouraging at all . Apart from the casualties and the financial burden , the illusion had itself had suffered . The illusion that the British were invincible and they killed you with remarkable ease , on their timetable , whenever they felt like it , after you were worn down by all sorts of dirty tricks the mankind had yet invented . It was America that sent 250 000 troops a month across the ocean to "decide" the Great War ; not some Thin Red Line that drowned hordes of savages in a cloud of gunsmoke with some jolly enyojable Victorian panache . Yes , something similar had also happened in the Boer War and the result was the starving girls in concentration camps and their photos in newspapers , since the fathers of the starving girls were helpless against a fully mobilized British Empire . Nobody could mess with a country that owned a quarter of the world . Until the Germans showed they actually could , until the Yanks came . And what that implied , were the Yanks stronger ? Stronger than even the British ?!!

re-stressing . Just as Napoleon had meant the survival of the United States , the Kaiser had had almost shattered the said illusion all around the globe . The British were even in 1922 was in trouble thinking what might have happened . And all London could do about the spectre of the US rising to challenge all was preferential treatment at the Canadian Border to have like minded people richer and hence more influential , by booze smuggling . Definitely a long term project , eh ?

a third conflict of the same type , UK vs the Continent , this time united under the Communists , never minding their potential to brew home trouble in regards to Workers and such notions , could still result in a British victory in a desperate fight . And America could steal all the colonies . Had the roles been reversed , the British would have done exactly so .

that's why it was common knowledge , and agreement as well , in London that the next Continental war had to be engineered . In every detail , with intense care . So that there would be no failures .

for their previous big plan had failed . Apart from the millions of dead and ruined economies , they couldn't even destroy the Turk , whatever he might be or not be . He now had a Republic , with an hatred of the West , which might be or not be a factor in the rate of development of country , the speed he would undoubtedly become a factor in the world once again . The factor meaning power and prowess to influence the things going on ,even if it was only ulcers people got from a viable Turk ... Might be trouble if the Turk tried to come back , to take back the lands he had lost .

for this maybe they were wrong to be concerned and alas ı will have to resort to very this day to offer an argument . So want to be coherent in this thread with stuff following stuff in the order they are supposed to be , but writing in that sense must be a gift , which ı certainly don't have . Anyhow this August 30th is the anniversary of the battle where the Greeks were defeated in 1922 , the Armed Forces Day . Channel surfing to catch the morning news ı chanced upon a Station which loves the PM so much . And My God , they have a clip from the Crazy Turks , a series of popular history that's so much a "propaganda" for the Old Republic . There's an Army Captain in Court Marshall , for he didn't salute a Lt. Miller of the invading Allies in the middle of Istanbul . Take note , am not saying he didn't return the salute of Lt Miller , he was supposed to salute first and the British Officer was likely return the salute if there weren't that many Greeks , Armenians or Turkish Civilians around . Instead of apologising the Captain removes his rank tabs and walks out . Happened in real life too , and Court Marshall Colonels rose up and saluted him departing .

ahha , real easy ! The seperatists have threatened renewed fighting if the reforms aren't worded as they like , and the time ends in two days time , and the Station has discovered how they are proud to be Turks . No , a history proffessor is now the guest ; she has been mentioned in this thread as a balancing act in a "new history" programme in an other channel . Standart glorification of the well run offensive that destroyed the Greeks and she starts the talk . In that it was also a victory of the National Assembly which had all colours of people of Anatolia . Is that it , Kurds must be Kurds in the Assembly as well , instead of Kürtler , a component of the country and all that gibberish nonsense ?

of course no . The President has a celebration as the Commander in Chief and the Opposition parties are naturally boycotting it . This bad , ain't it ? National Unity and all . Am so primed to post today ; the "Commander in Chief" can always be issued with a G-3 and a bandolier and considering his health problems related to hearing , a packet of ear plugs to lead all these newly elites in their conquest of Syria .

hah , me wrong again . The discussion moves into this coming military operation in the Middle East . It's something big . You see , there was a grumbling against honour guards in handover ceremonies and the commanders in question definitely thought they deserved honour guards and published the pictures , too . Them inspecting the honour guards . 4 days after , immediately when the US declared it was bombing right now . Must shut up on any remarks about the remarkable courage , any discussion about courage soon leads everybody into a blind alley .

and came the crunch . A great Historian who passed away recently and a Marxist to boot , Hobswan was referenced . ı have to write the name purely by guess work , since ı didn't read him yet and the gist was the mankind had seen lots of defeats and was trying to get on in the 21st Century by the concepts of the 20th ; people must grow up you know . Well , the common denominator in the all problems of the 21st Century seems to be United States , once that handled you are already halfway there ...

and the morning show ended with the Izmir Marşı , a military band piece that always of evokes the images of Kemal kicking the invasers out and taking that city back . Such is the soft power ; it solves anything and everything . A pat in the back is the best weapon , eh ? Seems ı will have to spare an Excelsior .


[this post adds to the opening sentence of no #125 in this page , in that lots of tweezer work was involved . A reference for the future , people must stick to Ayets from the Kuran .]

speaking of which it's not the threat of orbital bombardment that keeps the West from Righteous Intervention in Syria . Naturally . Am not that foolish , foolish enough to believe it myself . Roddenberry got many things wrong about the Starfleet , even the basic principles . The Prime Directive actually says "Let them rot." There were would have been nothing to concern me , had ı been really up there .

but then since there is no basis for supposing any Turk will be around to 2015 to pathetically attempt to tell what happened and this is some sort of an intention for a time capsule , for anyone unfortunate enough to pull the short stick to read all these , while the rest of Humanity lives on Heaven on Earth , which will surely be , when the seed of the demon are no more , it maybe fits in with a short discussion of what's on the table .

realistically the delayed American "response" is an indirect approach , designed to delay Syrians with a forced relocation of assets and unnerve them a bit . Considering yet another approach has itself extinguished at least in appearance , that of armed dissention within Alawite ranks . There was this "strategic" offensive into the "heartland" of Alawites which strategy sites declare was a surprise tactical success or a feint to decrease the pressure on Humus . Which revolves around buying enough Alawite support so that Damascus will break ; due to general weariness and a realization that even the supposed rear is not safe . Initial efforts could be read online last year or so , with some clans unhappy with the conduct of war and that the casualties are very real and nearly half of the overall casualties , however exaggerated , are within Goverment ranks . Which is somehow caused by the general approach of the Russians to War as developed over time .

ı believe this thread , too , has it that the Russians are conditioned to expect fight a "superior" enemy which they can't defeat head-on , it's the Operational Art that took them from Stalingrad to Berlin . Accordingly they have lots of cannonfodder , cogs in the machine , designed to hold and attrite the enemy a bit , the pawns in chess to shield more valuable units from early threats , and expendable like hell . It's the valuables in the rear ranks that disappear in the confusion of battle to take the enemy from unexpected directions ; their surprise attacks remove enemy superiority -otherwise unmatchable . Meaning the best of what's available tends to concentrated in the valuable units ; creating a disparity in combat effectiveness , which doesn't tend to go well with the underequipped . In the case of countries like Syria reliability has a further twist . During the Cold War Russians could class the conscripts to their hearts' content , all the athletic achievers with evident "integrity" would go on to training for Grade A divisions and in times of war you would be still hunting them in the woods months after their units were smashed . And the all the wimpy scrawny losers with window glasses for spectacles would end in a Motor Rifle Division Category Z ; to be dead on Day One as they were led into slaughterhouse with "reliable" Sergeants and the like bringing up the rear , with submachine guns to handle deserters . Forced ammunition expenditure by such means was certainly a valid tactic in the past . The Commander of Spanish "volunteers" in WW2 , the Blue Division complains about it ; ı would think he had no qualms about fighting the Reds , having fought them in their Civil War . That it "wouldn't" work in the 21st Century is more related to American "wealth" , the Fedayeen of Uday and Kusay would have been kinda more effective in their kinda stupid rushes on the Americans in transit in the desert if the air scene was not that unpermissable . When the US Tactical Aviation starts raining all around them , American tankers and infantry will have an inkling of the feelings of Abe Baum , the hand picked choice of General Patton in a raid behind Wehrmacht lines ... Present during the breakout from Normandy to Germany proper the only time the US Army Captain saw Germans properly deployed was when when they destroyed his command ; as Patton somehow declined the services of hundreds if not thousands of P-47s and 38s and 51s and 26s of all kinds for some reason .

the Middle East Wars have inevitably been an extension of the Cold War with sides conducting attrition on each other through the exchanges between the Arabs and the Israelis and Syria would import the Russian view immediately . The twist then comes with the fact that they were and are not politically stable . Instead of picking the best of what's available they also had to be concerned about loyalty to the regime . Clan connections offer a "stable" basis in such deliberations . Hence the best units of the Syrian Army was closely affiliated with the regime and certain Alawite clans saw themselves as pawns . Delegated to holding the line in isolated outposts where they could be surprised as the fortunes of war dictate or having to use poorer equipment while the news would be full of successes of the elite units . Which in the case of Syrian situation turns out to be a few Armoured Divisions , due to their open terrain and that Damascus is almost right on the border and been targeted twice in 1967 and 73 , they might have been needed for immediate insertion into battle . Which explains the war in Syria as depicted on World TVs , a couple of tanks doing a Thunder Run here and there and get hit by a missile or IED . The lack of infantry with equal determination explains the longevity of the Irresuction in a way and the importance of Hizbullah , which the strategy sites steadfastly ignore if possible and diminish if not possible . The rule is to trumpet the immediate demise of the Syrian Goverment and the State . The long running campaign would finally end when the Syrians couldn't take it anymore and population's yearning for Freedom would win yet another victory .

which was foretold . With this General Tlas , now in "exile" , forming the link between the past and the future where the hardcore Alawites putting a show of a tough fight and making Beşar Esad the scapegoat , with promises of 40 billion $ floating around on an immediate and no questions asked basis , with democracy as practised in the world offering enough examples of continued behind the scenes influence . The inefficiency of so far will no doubt encourage the comparatively "better" Americans to persist with threats of action so that the result will be a success . Even if the rosy projections offered that success two years ago . And the excess in death toll , taking the early plans as the basis and using Western numbers is something like 90 000 . For those Americans who are not comparatively better it's just another day in business , though our lack of presence in the theater as an invasion force means each month a projected 1000 Turkish Soldiers see yet another sunrise every morning , supposed to add up to 15000 by January 2015. Good or bad thing , according to your taste .

me being me , the insanity must be be present as well , apologies in advance . Turkey is normal as usual . On the day this was drafted some guy on TV declared the port of Lazkiye , Latakia for those who speak English , had to be under our control . This kinda implies the ongoing wishful thinking to landlock the emerging 'stan as if anybody would ask us . We are big words for big operations to get rid of the Syrian Goverment yet seem ready to shirk any call to fight . Not because sanity or some revulsion at the butcher's bill , but rather the needs of soft power ; we are always ready to watch shock and awe on TV and (when the bombers return) speak of how intolerant the West is and how great the suffering of the Islamic World . Much talk about the how the airbases , chief among them Incirlik , are available but we will certainly keep to escorting tankers and AWACS type assets when it comes to missions . As mentioned a few times before am old enough to remember the Righteous thing against the Serbians and quite suspicious of those who in 2013 speak as if we didn't fight over Kosova . Am confident all the papers were full of stories about a THK F-16 that flew the longest duration combat mission in a single-seater jet plane or something up to then .

yeah , if America shies away from any mention of boots on the ground , we certainly must avoid any reference to shedding Muslim blood . Which by the way is only for general consumption . At the height of the Gezi events there was a "Would you mind saying that" thing in a strategy site that announced my country was supposed to invade Syria in October 2012 , without any UN decision or whatever , solely because Ankara felt like it , but the goverment generals poured cold water on it . Solely because it looked like they might loose the control of the streets and those elusive opponents or enemies of the Goverment were to be given assurances that there was some sanity left in Ankara ; better that -instead of risking unstability that might lead to worse .

as if it wasn't America who stopped them , or rather didn't order them to start , unsure of Soviet Russian reaction . Everybody knows who will flock to what colours .

and the Russian reaction thing is the thing that muddies all . Russians are so ready to play the capitalist game ; much in the news that the Saudis offered 15 billion arms deal with unspecified long term advantages in Hydrocarbon sales . But then even the comparatively better Americans are in doubt about the Russians . This whole of Arab Awakeing thing comes with the need for a breather for the glorious ongoing feat of arms of America . The Neo-con approach was the Georgian Blitz on Russia , which ended with the Georgian President babbling in front of the TV cameras that a Russian helicopter was out to kill him . With his bodyguards piling plates of kevlar and stuff to make him disappear under some mound . Yeah , people would rush to save the democratically elected lawyer , educated and stuff in America and wearing nice ties . One of which he ate live on public TV and this was the only thing he suffered , since he had woved to do so if he couldn't defeat the Russian bear with his hands tied behind his back . Now that Russians survived the humiliation and the sole superpower status of the US wasn't re-remembered ...

then came the Arab Spring . Accidentally started in Tunisia instead of Jordan , keeping on with Yemen as the seperatists were still fighting the Turkish Army since the hold of Democracy in Turkey was still suspect , toppling of Mübarek just for the pay check , Libya since yet another firepower demonstration would be nice and which greatly satisfied all brands of Americans in the pejorative hand sign involving a finger the West gave to the UN and specifically the Commies .

then came the shooting down of a THK Phantom .

as an indication of our glorious blood-thirsty imperialism which puts quite a shame , everybody in Turkey knows that plane was sent in to create an incident that would perforce push NATO to our defence against the blood thirsty Syrian warmongerers . They have no objection to that RF-4E being shot down by 23 mm fire inside Syrian airspace . Proper Imperialism coming with an ingrained reluctance for own casualties and a yearning for others' blood to run to the sea in the form of rivers , with forked tongue instead of fair fight . Yet as the muddied stuff went on behind the scenes it has grown into something else . Russians decline and refuse to decline at the same time that they have the means . Just like they declare they won't fight for Esad yet also announce they are sending an ASW ship to the area . Real life experts will see the decision as an escalation and descalation at the same time ; ASW is the least of things any Russian ship in the Med fighting the West would be concerned about . But then the Russians are such true friends of Ankara , they have hinted the claimed Russian weapon smuggler ship who did it wouldn't have the space to carry the generating system and it must be a submarine of another country . Within the framework of Gulf pressure on Moscow , the environmental permit for the nuclear power station they are supposed to built in Turkey has been denied for the duration . As such Russians are ready to defend the Western intervention in Syria from submarines -presumably belonging to Israel- without any mention of the idea that the said subs must have been the size of USN Ohios . On the minimum . Doubles the American suspicions after the inglorious Feb 14, 2013 .

does the post above negate the one that precedes it ? Of course not . There is yet another layer down below . It's the Snowden angle that defines all , if you even entertain the notion of accepting my rants rants as true once in every millenia . It must be a month or two that Mr.Snowden got the nod to add the chemicality to general charges that it's all Ankara's fault , this bloodshed in Syria and overall slackening of Democracy in the Middle East . Facilities and expertise , at least accomodation for El Kaide affiliates . Including the ones caught with 2 or 3 kg of Sarin material in Adana , the real life Turkish media news now supressed . Just like the confusion in the post above : Americans think they tricked Moscow and Moscow plays unaware that they were tricked . A really convulated episode where the Russians "play" the game only if they are "allowed" to add the gassing thing into Snowden's resume . One where he , out of duty to mankind , can't take it any more and makes it away from the US .

talking of Snowden and his pinky lips , it also appears this Manning dude , the original hero of this whole affair , wants a sex-change operation . What else to expect from a Lady Gaga fan or whatever ... Fits like a glove . ı can foresee our staunch denials where we claim all those papers to be released in 2014 are fakes and fabrications and Godless lies , to be followed by character attacks on such and such . Sure that we will alienate even the staunchest conspiracy follower with our homophobia . Got nothing ? The world is really confusing and convulated .

if you feel it's public reaction and aversion for yet another Western bloodbath in the Middle East , that stalls the justified military action against the dastardly use of Chemical Weapons on civilians , you might think again , if ı may compel you ... The Knight on the white horse , imagine Obama in full body armour , would already be charging if he hadn't "discovered" his squire , the servant hadn't been involved behind the scenes . Now you can put the image of whatever you think of a Turk and put him on a donkey , riding behind his
master , the knight on the white horse . It's surely not the fear of holes that appear on the radar radome of a fast jet at 2700 degrees of Celsius that the West shunned immediate military action . Well , the "discovery" is in the best traditions of the regular framing business , but whatever . Things become real , when they are in print long enough .

and the background is already there . Am pretty sure the seperatists once opened a court case in Europe claiming the chief of goverment generals was intimately involved with supposed use of Chemical weapons in some place in Turkey , might be Kazan Vadisi but am not exactly sure . And when the time comes , that the West abandons Turkey for good to bomb us to bits and smithereens , the newly elites will not be able to claim it was the fault of the military , the abusive murderers that kill the peaceful Kurds and oppresses the Muslims . For all the newspaper editorials will be there for the whole world to see they were fully behind the chief of goverment generals .

like when in a hurry to loose some inventory for the benefit of the Syrian Irresuction a haste of inventory count was ordered all around , with a resulting explosion that killed some 25 soldiers a few years back . Or a remarkable omission of comments , if you ask me , on how the PM accused Israel of being behind the coup in Eygpt and immediately a day later a gunpowder depot went up in a fire , to be followed some 700 troops getting a food poisoning on the exact anniversary of the 25 killed . This poisoning thing might be truly familiar in 2014 when the media claims Russia was giving a warning shot across the bow , in view of the 1400 killed in an ally of Russia . Russians will certainly remember up to 150 tourists in Turkey were getting food poisoning in the days before . Reality does never count , perception is the single thing that matters . When it begins to rain it will be the mother of all deluges . Even the remarkable news that the Saudis inferred that they are running every Chechen group will be turned on us , Turks , the demon seed ...

mother of all ... ? Turkish experts have been laughing at the news from Syria on how Damascus will resist , with unveiled references to Saddam and Kaddafi with similar boasts before they were toast . We will see if we will have any opportunity to shake the head in disbelief at what they the Turkish experts will come up with .

and the worse part about this post ... Should have been hating it if this became a scoop with imaginary love about country and stuff . Yet , it's going on full speed to be a non-scoop . This morning ı read an editorial that says some 854 000 people in the US work as intel types and analysts and in the age of budget cutting they will come up with all sorts of lies to get by . The risk to Turkey is present ... The guy in question is the leading expert on prostitution in America , information based on personal sampling , must be sayin' somethin' , right ?

r16 said:

( yet another chapter outline in the 20th Century History tome ı will never finish . ı am planning to use this post as a reference in a discussion about present day , so it has a reference to a joke that's on me . And the general leaning of the post takes it beyond WW2 . )

states actually don't have much power to shape things ; they have to convince other actors to act on their behalf to realise their plans . In this context , the plan back in the day was essentially the same as today , a mere proxy state . Then for the Colonial Powers to hold off the Russian Communism away from the ever burgeoning oil fields of the Middle East , hence the coffers of the Seven Sisters . The year was 1944 and Democracy was coming to Turkey .

despite the 2012 presentation that he was a British puppet , it had been necessary to remove Mustafa Kemal after the unsubtantiated claims that we intented to bury the Italian Fascism in Ethiopia . Ankara in 1938 eagerly looked forward to 1942 , when the London-Paris Axis confidently expected that industrial mobilization , economic blockade , attrition and the inevitable Nazi-Commie fight would weaken the "hostiles" enough to allow the good plan of the day work like clockwork . Hovering around Kemal's deathbed , the then elites were looking at maps to decide where we would simply march and grab .

didn't turn out that way . The bug of easy conquests had spread to military from the politicians ; when 1942 came a little extra was needed to keep us out of WW2 , incredibly as an ally to Germany already doomed with the full entry of America to the war . The intentions were no doubt good , people talked of marching to Bakü to save Turkic brethen from the yoke of evil Communism , and certainly not to liberate a few oil wells...

actually the reversal of fortunes for Moscow was a blessing ; it increased Ankara's bargaining chips . The confusion stemmed from America , the new boy on the block as a global military power , instead of the former economic powerhouse that never strayed too far from London's decisions . Though nobody actually believed that it could be done until Hiroshima , America showed sings of challenging the status quo . Intent on replacing the Colonial structures with economic / cultural domination America would have been nice to play off against naked Communist expansion and ever whining yet bloody European Colonialism .

it was not to be . If ı can find it , there will be a picture below showing the discomfort of 1943 discovery that the Tiger had 8 centimeters of armour , proving this country was well below the curve in military tech and overall intel and it certainly didn't bode well for the future . If Russians could defeat the German Panzers , they could prove to be unstoppable for a foot infantry army and the Turkish one was undoubtedly so . The Inönü goverment was uneasy and felt very lonely . Probably not concent with the construction going on on the Moon , with the command post as the first priority , Ankara was relieved to see America had the atomic capability and happily accepted it as the immediate problem solver .

meanwhile across the Atlantic Eisenhower had enough clout ; as the examplary Coalition builder he forced it on a reluctant Anglosaxon thinking that we would be less of a problem if we were fixed into position with legally binding deals . One must remember 1945 was a year when it was obvious that Germany would be finally defeated at huge cost and the European Colonial Powers had been bled white in the process . Despite the shows of defiance like De Gaulle being ready to fight the US Army in Europe or the British for Syria , it was not easy . The so called inventors of this New World Order , the British were hard at work to stop the Indian Subcontinent gaining freedom and short of defeating the US in open battle they didn't know how . In such a vacuum we could just re-establish control in the upper reaches of the Arabian peninsula and secure it with Russian or American cooperation . So there we were , a thorn in the side of people in the pre-planning of NATO in 1947 - even less desirable than a re-militarized Germany . It would take the demonstration of the Russian nuke in 1949 to make NATO a reality , capable of absorbing the evil Turk .

not that widely disseminated in Ankara . While the new elites of the day were busy "bringing back the religion" since we had to be Muslims to rule over the Arabs , they also simply felt that we should take part in Korea , sending a Brigade to battle for the Free World . Unaware Ike had already sealed to deal to get us in into NATO no matter what . Our membership in NATO has always been an hypocracy . We were meant to defend the West from threats while they were already plotting to get us out even before we got in . Military and economic aid were no doubt beneficial to an extent . Yet they were counterbalanced by the invasion of this country by experts and stuff , closing down or neutralizing any kind of industrial effort that wasn't closely controlled by the Western countries . Making this a country a colony in kinda practical terms , again .

the country wasn't exactly heaven on earth and a certain infusion of modernity was necessary . We were behind and it led to some situations . Lack of information breeds excess , the information gap had to be closed . When the first jet aircraft for the Air Force were flown in by Turkish pilots trained abroad , they found the airbase empty with nobody in sight . Believing the jet engines sucked anything in front and burned anything in the back for miles , the troops were kept behind buildings until all the engines were turned down . Yeah , something to catch up with . Yet when the West decided what we needed was just highways and no railroads at all , this country sent students to America to study road building . According to the story they were taught only the "California grade" which then was copied anywhere in Turkey for decades , icing up horribly in winters . American instructors were so busy instructing the world , they had no time to explain that it snowed in the US as well . ( ı guess a winter type road is somehow more angled to let water clear the pavement by gravity , but then this is a story told on TV some 20 years ago ; ı might be wrong about quite a few points of it )

had this country been a neutral , it would still be supported by the West as a bulwark against the Russians and considering it was a NATO member that took the highest percentage of economic aid the Soviets gave , development rate could have been at least similar , if not greater than the real life example . For a protection that did not and does not exist Turkey lost a few options .


edit : the picture finally found . The lighter colour uniforms are ours visiting the Eastern European Front in 1943 , in the meet the Tiger day .

Click to expand...

Coffers of the seven sisters?

Of course the Allies tried to woo Turkey into the war
It was/is in a very central spot! With like 30 or 40 divisions. And important metals.


Glad we hooked Turkey into eventually joining NATO too along with Greece.
Only way to stop Communism from spreading.


If you think we teach road constructors badly, you should see the economists we teach and export around the world.
Surely they weren't all taught the wrong thing and are taking the world into total financial collapse?


Not sure why, but I saw the movie Skyfall and they are racing motorcycles on the roofs of Istanbul.
Then I see the movie Taken 2 a month later, and once again, Istanbul
Must be some kind of coincidence that all movies are taking place in Istanbul (not Constantinople) lately.

r16 said:

does the post above negate the one that precedes it ? Of course not . There is yet another layer down below . It's the Snowden angle that defines all , if you even entertain the notion of accepting my rants rants as true once in every millenia . It must be a month or two that Mr.Snowden got the nod to add the chemicality to general charges that it's all Ankara's fault , this bloodshed in Syria and overall slackening of Democracy in the Middle East . Facilities and expertise , at least accomodation for El Kaide affiliates . Including the ones caught with 2 or 3 kg of Sarin material in Adana , the real life Turkish media news now supressed . Just like the confusion in the post above : Americans think they tricked Moscow and Moscow plays unaware that they were tricked . A really convulated episode where the Russians "play" the game only if they are "allowed" to add the gassing thing into Snowden's resume . One where he , out of duty to mankind , can't take it any more and makes it away from the US .

talking of Snowden and his pinky lips , it also appears this Manning dude , the original hero of this whole affair , wants a sex-change operation . What else to expect from a Lady Gaga fan or whatever ... Fits like a glove . ı can foresee our staunch denials where we claim all those papers to be released in 2014 are fakes and fabrications and Godless lies , to be followed by character attacks on such and such . Sure that we will alienate even the staunchest conspiracy follower with our homophobia . Got nothing ? The world is really confusing and convulated .

if you feel it's public reaction and aversion for yet another Western bloodbath in the Middle East , that stalls the justified military action against the dastardly use of Chemical Weapons on civilians , you might think again , if ı may compel you ... The Knight on the white horse , imagine Obama in full body armour , would already be charging if he hadn't "discovered" his squire , the servant hadn't been involved behind the scenes . Now you can put the image of whatever you think of a Turk and put him on a donkey , riding behind his
master , the knight on the white horse . It's surely not the fear of holes that appear on the radar radome of a fast jet at 2700 degrees of Celsius that the West shunned immediate military action . Well , the "discovery" is in the best traditions of the regular framing business , but whatever . Things become real , when they are in print long enough .

and the background is already there . Am pretty sure the seperatists once opened a court case in Europe claiming the chief of goverment generals was intimately involved with supposed use of Chemical weapons in some place in Turkey , might be Kazan Vadisi but am not exactly sure . And when the time comes , that the West abandons Turkey for good to bomb us to bits and smithereens , the newly elites will not be able to claim it was the fault of the military , the abusive murderers that kill the peaceful Kurds and oppresses the Muslims . For all the newspaper editorials will be there for the whole world to see they were fully behind the chief of goverment generals .

like when in a hurry to loose some inventory for the benefit of the Syrian Irresuction a haste of inventory count was ordered all around , with a resulting explosion that killed some 25 soldiers a few years back . Or a remarkable omission of comments , if you ask me , on how the PM accused Israel of being behind the coup in Eygpt and immediately a day later a gunpowder depot went up in a fire , to be followed some 700 troops getting a food poisoning on the exact anniversary of the 25 killed . This poisoning thing might be truly familiar in 2014 when the media claims Russia was giving a warning shot across the bow , in view of the 1400 killed in an ally of Russia . Russians will certainly remember up to 150 tourists in Turkey were getting food poisoning in the days before . Reality does never count , perception is the single thing that matters . When it begins to rain it will be the mother of all deluges . Even the remarkable news that the Saudis inferred that they are running every Chechen group will be turned on us , Turks , the demon seed ...

mother of all ... ? Turkish experts have been laughing at the news from Syria on how Damascus will resist , with unveiled references to Saddam and Kaddafi with similar boasts before they were toast . We will see if we will have any opportunity to shake the head in disbelief at what they the Turkish experts will come up with .

and the worse part about this post ... Should have been hating it if this became a scoop with imaginary love about country and stuff . Yet , it's going on full speed to be a non-scoop . This morning ı read an editorial that says some 854 000 people in the US work as intel types and analysts and in the age of budget cutting they will come up with all sorts of lies to get by . The risk to Turkey is present ... The guy in question is the leading expert on prostitution in America , information based on personal sampling , must be sayin' somethin' , right ?

Click to expand...

Yes, Saudi Arabia admitted controlling terrorists.

“I can give you a guarantee to protect the Winter Olympics next year. The Chechen groups that threaten the security of the games are controlled by us,”

Click to expand...

I'm frankly shocked they waved a stick at the Russian bear.


The entire bombing of Syria idea is unlikely to topple its government, unlike Saddam or Gadahffi.
A few dozen cruise missiles won't be enough unless they land on the leaders' heads.
It won't be anything like an enraged flattening of the capital by bombers flying rooftop height after the defenses are swept away.
Operation Punishment being an example of such: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Retribution_(1941)


Congratulations on Turkish security forces for capturing that 2kg of Sarin gas from the terrorist/rebels!
I wonder where the rebels got it though?


I'm surprised we didn't cut off military aid to Egypt after the military coup there.
By law, it should have been cut.
Also, having the Muslim Brotherhood in charge was doing wonders against their popularity.
Why did the military feel like they had to be overthrown violently instead of waiting until the next election?


I will press my thumbs that Turkey doesn't have a civil war (over Kurdistan?)


Sorry for the questions that might be offtopic, but you are a font of knowledge

r16 said:

...

returning to Petraus affair , it has been reported that the FBI agent on the case was also involved with one of the women . This -sort of- proves the resignation of Petraus is not about an extramarital affair but involves something else , possibly the troubles the US or rather the proxies of US have found themselves in . Probably doing it straight would have meant prestige for a third party not mentioned in this post . Experts of the State Channel harped on this a lot , reminding that the CIA has much dirt on everybody including Obama -not surprisingly at all , they being the experts of the State Channel- and Mr.Petraus is interested in politics and he will do extremely well considering he has been in a moral scandal and be so fit for Family Values of the Republicans ; had he simply resigned he would have still been tainted with his connections to Obama Administration . Yes, these are the people who get unfortunates like me but obviously not like me -being real sometime or the other- into spasms of jealousy at their splendid brightness and smartiness : with stuff like Esad will fail so he wants to bring Turkey into war so that we can kill him so that he will have his Alawite rump state -as the Mr.President Zombie- instead of "entire" Syria and this narrative after this two years he has succeeded in blunting covert Turkish moves , neverminding the whole bunch of the West ... Expect the newly elites deciding within the week that actually they hated Mr. Petraus and as such hacked his mail to bring him down !

Click to expand...

By all accounts Petraeus is an honorable man and genuine leader/general.

I'm not surprised at all the politicians took him out the second they found some dirt.


It might also have been some underling.
As head of the CIA, he was in a position to say no to the targeted killings overseas if they were too outrageous.
Much like when he soothed the Ambassador to Pakistan's feathers when it was revealed Munter couldn't veto CIA drone strikes. (CIA outranks the local ambassador? Ugh, what a screwup Mr. President)

Decent human beings are not meant to live or work in Washington D.C.
Only sociopaths need apply.

thank you . ı always like people showing attention to my ramblings . In honour of that let's make up a story , shall we ?

it's late 1990s and Peace has broken out in the Aegean . Somebody is in a London bookstore , buying the latest in military history and he bumps into this chap , former death merchant ( as in overseas representative for a defence company ) and current author with a few books to his name . After an exchange of pleasantries (for there are Turks who can speak to Foreign Nationals without foaming in the mouth and incredible that really is , ain't it ?) the chap comes up with the idea . Now that it's no longer "wartime" out there , he could himself do the interviews and overall editing . Yeah , why not a book telling what "we" did to Greeks in the 1960s ? No justification for the Turkish Reflex , it would be really unfair for this generally decent chap to be fished out of the Thames next week .

yet the chap's offer has to be parried and by God he can be really persistent ; back in the day he even had the temerity to say the Jaguar is a good plane , when our hearts were on the F-16 . With the intent declared and the chap didn't shut up when told so ... Yeah , it's time for somebody to bring up someone -who in his youth was quite a fast kid . You know , he had more Blondes than Greeks , until cured out of it by -uhm- advice . ı hear the effects of a rifle butt can be scary . Stability being really desireable in some lines of business . So somebody asks why does the chap think someone will talking about the stuff he did to Blondes -and "his" Greeks for that matter- , is the chap a pervert or something ? And he would really know what the upper shelves are for , right ?

ı hear he offer still stands as a hardcover 256 page Osprey title , divided 50% 50% between the sides of the conflict , rightly centered on Cyprus between 1878 to 1974 . And "we" are still on how to fill 100 pages with the Blondes . Incidentally there are people who feel it can be done ; if the details on the achievements and hence the respect commanded by the said Blondes are kept sparse .

forward to mid 2000s where ı try to work and fail miserably and one of the said Blondes or a friend of hers , ı don't really know , visits the museum and overhears the fun about me . By about the end of the decade that will mean ı am made a restricted member of an especially strange , like totally weird forum . You know the phrase she who must be obeyed , right ? Where people see it as a duty to fix me . They spare no punches , too . Out of an introduction thread , where ı knew ı was expected to be honest and a question which Hollywood star ı liked most a second thread was started to grow into a 10 page affair . All libel ı hasten to add -and ı did an honourable job of refutation without crying once .

in this case this ever leads to a search for clues in CFC , back then ı hadn't seen the relevant South Park episode with Mayflower pilgrims in Space . If ı had ı think ı would be mentioning ı certainly wouldn't know what colour Nathalie Portman was down there . Besides she wasn't involved in that Turkish language stuff . Nor in the third thread which started with me being in the same city within a mile radius of Nicole Kidman , and no ı didn't end up anywhere near her either . Ms Kidman stems from a forum rule that says all members are to vilify Tom Cruise on cue and my attempt at it was lamenting on how she wasted herself with him . ı was something like 20 when she was a Red or something , and really something too . In the end ı offered since we were all Commies we should all like Reds , halfway through the 22 page thread . Oh no , the Tom Cruise thread is not a sticky .

otherwise in real life ı look so funny that people remember me . Enough to get the owner of a shop that sold secondhand books asked me , a week after the purchase and only because he wasn't there on the day of purchase , whether it was me who bought those 4 issues of Esquire . Why not , one had a nice article on the most modern weapons on the day ... ı really look that funny ; and as a 40 year old virgin ı have learned not to bother .

which must be explanation enough that ı have no influence , nor any reason to suppose that we might do , in Hollywood . If ı had or we had , ı wouldn't have to look up in the Wikipedia to learn Aleph's name .

as such ı can only offer it's a fad amongst the producers ever on the search for an exotic locale that led them to Turkey . ı don't think there are any international productions in the country right now . And of course it's not a new thing . My years as a museum guide etches a certain movie of the 1960s to my mind where a group of thieves arrive in Turkey to steal a very big diamond from the Topkapı Palace . And naturally no film is ever "pro-Turkish" . ı remember a scene involving the "oiled wrestling" and the strange expression on the face of some guy playing a Turk . This form of wrestling of course is kinda tricky with all that olive oil on the contestants who are actually allowed to grab certain places . There is a reason why a 5 to 600 years old tournament is such a favourite spot for Gay tourism , it seems .

yeah , my thing is more into ranting . On pointless things like how the chief of goverment generals visited politicians with the 4 Force commanders in tow , the chief in a car and the Force commanders in a van . Of the kind that carries students between home and school . The chief is a great man now , he deserves the car . And despite the muted howls of disapproval (as the Media hints) it shouldn't be a big deal for the commanders as the history is likely ro refer them all as collaborators anyhow . Rightly or wrongly doesn't matter much , it seems ...

even more incredibly the former Air Force commander has been reported as retired . Yeah , former commander , right ? What would he be anything but retired ?!! Can't tell whether this bears any relation to any probable claim that it was him , all alone and by himself , who sent that RF-4E to be shot down ; and it's now in the past ...

yet ı don't think ı will ever get into any discussion on whether the bombing of Belgrade led to a reversal and it meant

Man, horse and wagon,
the Turk -by Grace of God- struck it down

the basic premise is that the Germans were by then unused to the abuse by Foreigners in Vaterland and Liman von Sanders was the man who advised calling "Turkish expertise" , considering we had centuries of quite bad memories related to such alien influence . And that von Seeckt and his status of being untainted with service on the Western Front was somehow a factor with Ludendorff and the coup he was organising . You know , under the guise of German Army being stabbed in the back . The Turks were the enemy of Nazis , before Nazis discovered Jews .

to the extent that it was already known in Ankara that we would follow the Jews and the Slavs to the gas chambers after they were done with , the original planning talking about initial action in 1948 , later amended to be carried out during 1950-55 . Holocaust was a war emergency , if you will , and we were to be dealt with in the "slackened" conditions of peace after German victory . Yeah , that even before Berlin posted the Wannsee documents to any capital in the world worth posting .

what ?

what what ? It wasn't the 20s and Adolph was walking on the water , at the times he wasn't levitating in the air .

which might maye then relate to Petraus and whether dirt about him was dug up . 'Cause in Turkey we hate him since 2003 for he ordered the attack on the Turkish Consulate and the subsequent treatment of Military Personnel as terrorists . Well , any American general would have done the same when ordered so . And in the final analysis what came out of it could have been a lot worse . What would happen if America had decided to play another angle and the fools who were around then "dared" to support the Türkmen cause ? Wehrmacht used to shoot 10 civilians for every soldier killed in Partizan warfare ; Americans tend to fill entire cities with Depleted Uranium . One must really fear the Judgement Day and His Questions about "Colleteral Damage" ; this pointless if you will thing has been quite instrumental in considerations regarding Force Preservation .

even when in this case it was Condoleeza Rice who preferred sacks over Turkish heads instead of sacks from Turkey with contraband weapons to Iraq . Washington considerate of Human life , opposed to unnecesary casualties , a Neo-con with an heart ? Well , the world has seen stranger things in the last 5 billion years .

yet ı think even before the thing exploded , the only one who could blackmail Mr. Petraus was the Federal Goverment . And it would be only nonsense to remark playing Musical Chairs with women is not the way the said Blondes would understand life . As previously mentioned , am a 40 year old virgin , won't even begin to understand what the hell this even means .

while at it maybe ı could expand on those two guys Somebody and Someone .

someone is the dude who came up with the whole notion that we should have a Starfleet (1) [The number here implies had this gone into some kind of printing it would have been the first footnote ; instead it will be at post #147 . ]

anyhow back in the day Someone was involved with the Starfighter in matters of Life and Death at the level of National stakes , meaning he knew people who went to war in the F-104 . So unlike me , they played the game (some game which is not Civ III ) with serious intent and risky outcomes , and were able exaggerators . One day coming up with an haphazard play on the name of the jet plane . Though ı can surely say it's not that creative but anyways ...

the Lockheed machine , the widow making missile with a man in it was an eye watering "sports plane" in its day and made a lot of money for the American company . Though in the 1990s the terribly long lists of accidents were softly hush-hushed as Lockheed took over the American Aviation Industry company by company in the celebrated "Norman Conquest" , named after the CEO at the time . To be fair , the backroom deals were backed by solid capability -perhaps to be signified in the person of Ben Rich . Any web search on the name will certainly bring up references that he was intimately involved with the whole concept of Stealth . To the extent that when diagnosed with terminal cancer Mr.Rich asked for a favour and the US Department of Defence granted it : An unfettered access to every single Black World aviation project going on at the time .

now it may be known that seclusion from oversight can provide spectacular breakthroughs , it can also be the perfect cover for incredible graft ; every company would have a black department and be extremely wary about any outsider , let alone the chief of Lockheed's celebrated Skunk Works . In ordinary circumstances he would surely be hounded out of any rival company premises by a pack of attack dogs , but this was a special occasion . Ben Rich simply wanted to see what he had achieved and where he was at the end of his life , an account of a life-long toil and effort . A wow on secrecy for everybody concerned . Rich wouldn't talk about Lockheed and he wouldn't tell Lockheed what he saw .

after he had the tour , his colleagues were naturally curious about what was going on over there . Were McDonnell Douglas or Nothrop good enough to spring nasty surprises in regards to the forthcoming Lockheed domination for a thousand years ? Rich couldn't , so he joked : People down there in the desert were actually assembling a real starship !

the joke immediately spread . At the time McDonnell Douglas was working on a new kind of Space Shuttle which was to prove its all-American credentials by blowing up in a critical phase of Congressional investigation about the performance of the company with regards to the "robbery" of the American taxpayer . Still it was interesting enough to get the attention of foreign intelligence . Including a severely emasculated Russia showing an intent of further curiosity with a mere shadow of the once prestigious KGB ...

what followed involves Somebody and Someone in a supporting role . Peripherally related to an over the top and kinda daft report that arose . Used as a means to offer a deal to Russians , but in fact quite the finest scientific trolling ever seen ...

for this we must go back to the Golden Age of Science where people could discover something on their own ; without being a cog in a vast establishment . Something like to the beginning of the 20th Century . Just after Roentgen discovered X-rays , Becquerel had found a similar effect which was named after him for a while until Madame Curie called the entire field as Radioactivity .

now ı have never been into real science , but spent lots of money on Science magazines over the years . To while away the time wasting money , or something . Now there is a Turkish monthly which is so serious , ı wouldn't get half the sentences and as such would quit reading any article after the first paragraph . There was one piece that ı enjoyed actually about the frenzy the French scientists found themselves at the time . Can't find the magazine at home , can't find the article on-line , but ı have tried a bit and see there are few web references to Becquerel looking for other new rays working with various salts and failing . What ı am to delve into might involve Becquerel or it might not . In any case the French came up with something ı remember as N-Beams . Some form of radioactivity , apparently working like X-rays or maybe not . It's years since ı read the article but the problem is nobody else can observe the effects . It's just a couple of French Scientists who claim something happens and no one else can confirm . Calling the Frenchmen as Frenchmen doesn't work either , these men are risking distinguished careers and reputations . It has got to be something related to the build up of people involved . Frenchmen living in sunny France have their eyes conditioned to notice incredibly hard to discern light effects , Germans raised in the gloomy Germany can't . Meaning the British from the always raining island of theirs can never hope to . Between you and me they are British anyhow , they would never allow Frenchmen any honour if the French didn't take it by their own hands .

with Tesla proving himself right time after time the French put up a valiant effort ; but they will have to give up . It's not a media thing , integrity of science demands repeat performance and they can't . Will form a basis for which is to come . Even including Tesla himself .

harping on with the same theme people can fool themselves into thinking stuff that they are fools to think . Tesla shows of electricity flying around in orbs convinced very scientifically oriented people to think it was a piece of cake to build a Death Ray . To shoot down enemy bombers and immediately later burn down entire enemy cities in response for the temerity of sending up bombers . Radar , which helped quite a lot to decide the outcome of the WW2 despite the whole range of Churchillian foul-ups , was afterall a byproduct of the search for the Death Ray . An after-thought , a trivial suggestion as a footnote by a British scientist assigned to examine the feasibility of one single offer amongst the hundreds of the proposals authorities in London seeked and received over the years . And they were hardly alone ...

a corollary of the fact that computers weren't invented yet . Otherwise it would have been crystal clear ; if you want the Death Ray , you go to Orion and take it from the Guardian ...