By Hammerhead In a recent blog post in the Times of Israel, Ron Kampeas, the Washington Bureau Chief for the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, writes about how Israel stays so well armed and protected as a country but yet has no Second Amendment or gun violence to speak of. The reason? Only 4% of the weapons in Israel…
Category: American History
Military History: The Barbary Wars and the USMC
By John Farnam George Washington, even before he was president, lobbied heavily for a full-time, standing, Federal Army. In 1792, a distrustful Congress gave him and his successors, instead, the Uniform Militia Act, which involuntarily inducts every able-bodied male, in all states, between the ages of eighteen and forty-five, into his State’s “Militia,” which can…
Military History: 8 Unbelievable Stories from the Second Battle of Fallujah
Veterans from 3rd Battalion, 1st Marines share their incredible stories from the Second Battle of Fallujah. This time of year marks the anniversary of one of the most storied battles in recent Marine Corps history: the Second Battle of Fallujah. The city became the scene of brutal urban combat when American, Iraqi, and British forces…
Bad-Ass Files: John Coffee Hays, The Original Bad-Ass Texan!
19th century badass gunslinging Texas Ranger John Coffee Hays is the ultimate rea-life asskicker whose story bizarrely ties together the more well-known tales of Sam Houston, Andrew Jackson, Chuck Norris, Clint Eastwood, Zachary Taylor, Wyatt Earp, and the dude with the shotgun who smokes all those fucking buffalo when you go hunting in The Oregon…
American History: How Ayatollah Khomeini Suckered Jimmy Carter (And How Obama Got Suckered Too)
The Ayatollah Khomeini was using taqiyya in its classic sense. The concept of taqiyya as such is specifically Shi’ite, developed during the time of the sixth Imam, Jafar al-Sadiq, in middle of the eighth century, when the Shi’ites were being persecuted by the Sunni caliph al-Mansur. Taqiyya allowed Shi’ites to pretend to be Sunnis in…
On This Day in History: Remembering D-Day
Today take a moment to Remember the Military Men and Women who participated and gave their Lives in D-Day. And let General Patton’s words ring true: “It is foolish and wrong to mourn the men who died. Rather we should thank God that such men lived.” Seventy-two years ago, on June 6, 1944, Allied troops…
Brush-Up On Your History: The Myths of “American” Slavery
As construction of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture progresses toward its September opening, Museum Director Lonnie Bunch joined CBS “60 Minutes”’ Scott Pelley on a visit to Mozambique in search of a ship that carried hundreds of African slaves to the bottom of the Indian Ocean when it foundered 220…
Dose of Truth: The United States Has No War Strategy
It is About time Somebody laid it Out Plain with no Bullshit, and no better person to do it than Retired Army Colonel Andrew J. Bacevich. His latest book, Americas War For The Greater Middle East: A Military History is a must read. -SF A multi-trillion-dollar bridge to nowhere in the Greater Middle East By Andrew…
Profiles in Courage: “He Was One Of Us”
Not sure if any of you caught this story last night on ABC News, but it was a good’un. It is stories like this that as a historian and veteran, I absolutely love to learn about, mostly because you won’t find it in any official history books. I did some digging and found this amazing…
A “What If” Memorial Day
As a Veteran and Historian, I appreciate Post like this, I hope you do too. Happy Memorial Day Weekend to all my readers and subscribers. -SF The news could not have been worse. Starvation, malnutrition, diseases such as typhoid, smallpox, dysentery, and pneumonia, along with freezing temperatures that assaulted thousands of shoeless feet bloodying…