The Reptilian alien is a fixture of science-fiction, from H.P. Lovecraft’s tales of Valusians to the Cardassians in Star Trek, to the Visitors of the television series V. But could ancient myths about reptilian creatures provide evidence that they are more than just a pop-culture creation? Legends of serpent beings can be found on every continent. The Bible, the Quran and the ancient texts known as the Nag Hammadi codices all describe reptilian entities interacting with humans. In Central and South America people worship the feathered serpent god called Kulkukan or Quetzalcoatl. In India, the Nagas are half-human half-reptile gods who live underground in a place called Patala. And in China and Japan, many emperors claim to be the descendants of dragons. Could these stories represent real Reptilian beings that people all over the world actually encountered in the ancient past?
The Ancient Aliens hair guy is quite unaware of what is going to hit him.
Canadian soldiers playing hockey on a rink they built in Korea, 1952
Canadians’ enthusiasm for hockey was in evidence during the Korean War, in which 27,000 Canadian troops participated in defense of freedom.
The winter of 1952 was bone-chilling enough for the Imjingang River to freeze over, a river in northern Gyeonggi-do Province that flows down and across the middle of the Korean Peninsula. At the time, the peninsula was still at war, as the Korean War had broken out in late June 1950.
Among the U.N. forces defending the South Korean side against the North were many Canadian soldiers. They were stationed along the western front abutting the Imjingang River and they were on their guard against any intrusion from the north. A biting wind howled across the riverside, however, and almost froze the gun-toting soldiers as well as the river. The winter weather turned the river itself into a great field of ice. Even amid the tense situation, with battle happening at any time, the young soldiers felt the urge to take part in their traditional winter sport: ice hockey.
They couldn’t suppress their desire for the sport, so at last members of two Canadian battalions: the Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry (PPCLI) and the Royal 22nd Regiment (R22R) turned the frozen river into an ice rink for a hockey match. The glacial winter air didn’t stop the soldiers’ passion for their sport. The match took place “in the sound of the heavy guns of nearby U.S. Army artillery”, just a short distance from the front lines of the struggle against Communist forces, recalled Korean War veteran Vince Courtenay.
Although the exact origins of ice hockey are much disputed, ice hockey is thought to have first developed in the 19th century in Canada. Scholars agree that the rules for ice hockey were first codified at McGill University in Montreal, in 1879. Since then, Canada has been synonymous with the sport.
During this game, the 3rd Battalion Princess Patricia’s won 4-2 against the 1st Battalion of the Royal 22e Regiment.
Brigadier John Rockingham drops the puck for a match between 1st Battalion, Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry (left) and 2nd Battalion, Royal 22e Regiment “Vandoos” (right) during the Korean War. Playing for the Patricias was Private W. Wolfe. For the Royal 22e Regiment, Private R. Halley.
Many of these troops were surprised to find in Korea a climate not much different from that which they had left in Canada, with cold winters meaning frozen rivers where they could play their favorite sport.
The matches took place “in the sound of the heavy guns of nearby U.S. Army artillery,” just a short distance from the front lines of the struggle against Communist forces, said Korean War veteran Vince Courtenay.
It would have been a startling sight for enemy soldiers from the hills above the Imjin River in the winters of 1952 and 1953 — Canadians fighting for the puck on shimmering ice between deadly battles for precious terrain on the Korean Peninsula at the height of the Cold War conflict.
The Battle of Aleppo is a military confrontation in Aleppo, the largest city in Syria, between the Syrian opposition (including Free Syrian Army, and Sunni fighters, including Levant Front) in partial cooperation with the Army of Conquest, which includes within it Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, formerly al-Qaida’s Syrian branch, against the Syrian Armed Forces of the Syrian Government, supported by Hezbollah and Shiite militias and Russia, and against the Kurdish People’s Protection Units. The battle began on 19 July 2012 and is part of the Syrian Civil War.
The battle’s scale and importance led combatants to name it the “mother of battles” or “Syria’s Stalingrad”. The battle has been marked by the Syrian army’s indiscriminate use of barrel bombs dropped from helicopters, killing thousands of people, and purposeful targeting of civilians, including hospitals and schools, by the Syrian government, its Russian allies and rebels. Hundreds of thousands have been forced to evacuate. On 6 October 2016, President Bashar al-Assad offered amnesty to militants in the city, offering to evacuate them and their families to safe areas; the militants refused this proposal because they did not trust Assad and feared such an arrangement would lead to a purge of Sunni Muslims in Eastern Aleppo.
Before and after photos
In late September 2016, Russia and Syria began performing nightly air raids on rebel-held parts of the city. Russian and Syrian forces were also accused of conducting “double tap” airstrikes which purposefully targeted rescue workers and first responders at hospitals and other civilian structures that they had already bombed, however this is disputed by government and Russian sources. To prevent civilian casualties, Syrian and Russian forces opened up humanitarian corridors to allow the civilian population of Aleppo to evacuate, away from the fighting. During evacuation, several East Aleppo residents reported that evacuating civilians were shelled by rebels. During the 2016 Syrian government offensive, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights warned that “crimes of historic proportions” were being committed in Aleppo.
Following the re-capture of parts of Aleppo by the Syrian government in December, the United Nations received reports that pro-government forces were carrying out massacres of civilians in Eastern Aleppo. At least 82 civilians were killed, including children, described as ‘war crimes’.
The battle caused catastrophic destruction to the Old City of Aleppo, a UNESCO World Heritage site. With over four years of fighting, it represents one of the longest sieges in modern warfare and one of the bloodiest battles of the Syrian Civil War, which left an estimated 31,000 people dead, almost a tenth of the overall war casualties.
The HX convoys were a series of North Atlantic convoys which ran during the Battle of the Atlantic in the Second World War. They were east-bound convoys and originated in Halifax, Nova Scotia from where they sailed to ports in the United Kingdom. They absorbed the BHX convoys from Bermuda en route. Later, after the United States entered the war, HX convoys began at New York.
A total of 377 convoys ran in the campaign, conveying a total of about 20,000 ships. 38 convoys were attacked (about 10%), resulting in losses of 110 ships in convoy; a further 60 lost straggling, and 36 while detached or after dispersal, with losses from marine accident and other causes, for a total loss of 206 ships, or about 1% of the total.
HX is an abbreviation for Halifax.
Cargo ships gathering in the Bedford Basin, Halifax 1942.
Royal Canadian Navy Flower-class corvettes such as HMCS Regina escorted many of the HX convoys.
The HX designation perpetuated a similar series that ran in First World War Atlantic Campaign in 1917 and 1918. HX convoys were organized at the beginning of the Atlantic campaign and ran without major changes until the end, the longest continuous series of the war. HX 1 sailed on 16 September 1939 and included 18 merchant ships, escorted by the Royal Canadian Navy destroyers HMCS St. Laurent and HMCS Saguenay to a North Atlantic rendezvous with Royal Navy heavy cruisers HMS Berwick and HMS York.
These were initially considered fast convoys made up of ships that could make 9-13 knots. A parallel series of slow convoys, the SC series, was run for ships making 8 knots or less, while ships making more than 13 knots sailed independently, until 14-knot CU convoys were organized in late 1943. The largest convoy of World War II was HX 300 which sailed for the UK via New York on 17 July 1944, with 167 merchant ships. It arrived in the UK, without incident, on 3 August 1944.
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German Heinkel He 111H-6 attacking an Allied convoy.
Nine countries together possess more than 15,000 nuclear weapons. The United States and Russia maintain roughly 1,800 of their nuclear weapons on high-alert status – ready to be launched within minutes of a warning. Most are many times more powerful than the atomic bombs dropped on Japan in 1945. A single nuclear warhead, if detonated on a large city, could kill millions of people, with the effects persisting for decades.
Size comparison of nuclear explosions
The failure of the nuclear powers to disarm has heightened the risk that other countries will acquire nuclear weapons. The only guarantee against the spread and use of nuclear weapons is to eliminate them without delay. Although the leaders of some nuclear-armed nations have expressed their vision for a nuclear-weapon-free world, they have failed to develop any detailed plans to eliminate their arsenals and are modernizing them.
COUNTRY
NUCLEAR PROGRAMME
SIZE OF ARSENAL
United States
The first country to develop nuclear weapons and the only country to have used them in war. It spends more on its nuclear arsenal than all other countries combined.
6,970 warheads
Russia
The second country to develop nuclear weapons. It has the largest arsenal of any country and is investing heavily in the modernization of its warheads and delivery systems.
7,300 warheads
United Kingdom
It maintains a fleet of four nuclear-armed submarines in Scotland, each carrying 16 Trident missiles. It is considering whether to overhaul its nuclear forces or disarm.
215 warheads
France
Most of its nuclear warheads are deployed on submarines equipped with M45 and M51 missiles. One boat is on patrol at all times. Some warheads are also deliverable by aircraft.
300 warheads
China
It has a much smaller arsenal than the US and Russia. Its warheads are deliverable by air, land and sea. It appears to be increasing the size of its arsenal at a slow pace.
260 warheads
India
It developed nuclear weapons in breach of non-proliferation commitments. It is increasing the size of its nuclear arsenal and enhancing its delivery capabilities.
100–120 warheads
Pakistan
It is making substantial improvements to its nuclear arsenal and associated infrastructure. It has increased the size of its nuclear arsenal in recent years.
110–130 warheads
Israel
It has a policy of ambiguity in relation to its nuclear arsenal, neither confirming nor denying its existence. As a result, there is little public information or debate about it.
80 warheads
North Korea
It has a fledgling nuclear weapons programme. Its arsenal probably comprises fewer than 10 warheads. It is not clear whether it has the capability to deliver them.
<10 warheads
Total
15,350 warheads
I came across a British tabloid site that had an article on where is the best places on the planet to survive a nuclear war. The list is funny, to say the least.
Kansas City! Kansas City is a major American population center. It undoubtedly would be targeted by the Russians.
The island of Guam in the eastern Pacific is a United States territory. It hosts a major American nuclear submarine base and thousands of Marines. Without a doubt, it is targeted.
Cape Town and Antarctica would possibly be safe places. But after the world economy and infrastructure is destroyed. Who do the residents of these places deal with? Tristan Da Cunha would be the safest place on the list.
Isle of Lewis, Iceland, Bern and the Yukon: These places wouldn’t be targets, but they would have to contend with a 5 year nuclear winter of 24 hour dark skies and intense fallout radiation. Not good places.
The key here is that these horrible weapons are built for deterrent. Nobody wants to use them, there would be no winner. And with the safeguards in place it is highly unlikely responsible nations would accidently launch a nuclear attack. However, there is rogue countries with the bomb like North Korea, and to a lesser extent Pakistan. Kim Jong-Um is a very deranged and scary individual. He could do anything. Another concern is if terrorists would get their hands on a weapon. There would not be any second thoughts by those radical extremists to try and use a bomb.
Crystal ball: Hillary Clinton wins the 2016 presidential election by a sliver. Donald Trump immediately says the election was rigged by a combination of the anti-Trump liberal bias media, the Bilderbergers, Goldman Sachs, the NSA, the British Secret Service, the Vatican, the Rosicrucian’s, Bill Maher, Bill Nye the Science Guy, the Mexican embassy in Washington, the producers of Sesame Street and the Illuminati, to name a few. “It was all fixed by bad, awful, terrible, evil people.” Trump trumpeted from his ostentatious gold plated New York City penthouse. He continued, “the NSA, which is in the back pocket of Crooked Hillary, hacked the touch screen voting machines and erased my votes, and put in, she should be in jail, Hillary’s votes!”
Trump’s supporters, colloquially known as the Trumplodytes, they are given this name because they are gullible morons who have disdain for facts and true reality, started to hit the streets and attack the “Establishment Insiders”. The Insiders include any government employee, including law enforcement and the military. It also includes Wall Street manipulators, the evil media, the pharma companies and especially FEMA.
This could get very ugly!
Trumplodytes in a back lane in Denver moving toward a U.S. Postal Service office.
A few Trumplodytes in Fargo, North Dakota stop for a selfie before attacking a U.S. Marine Corps recruiting office.
Trumplodytes moving on after destroying a school division’s bus depot.
Deplorables moving down Wall Street. A lone officer named MacLeod holding back the mob.
It has been reported Trump is preparing to move to a 3 million dollar mansion in the Colorado Rockies and muster up a Trumplodyte army. It has been noted that his first target will be Fort Knox.
The Russians regard war as a no-holds barred savage battle to the death. Pound the enemy with all you can throw at him. If civilians get in the way, tough luck. So far in Syria’s biggest city Aleppo, thousands of civilians have been killed by Russian bombing. The Russians and Syrian government forces are bombing the rebel held areas so extensively and ruthlessly that they hope the rebels just give up.
An AV-8B Harrier II from the 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit (MEU) takes off from the flight deck of the amphibious assault ship USS Wasp (LHD 1) Aug. 18, 2016. The 22nd MEU, embarked on Wasp, is conducting precision air strikes in support of the Libyan Government of National Accord-aligned forces against Daesh targets in Sirte, Libya, in support of Operation Odyssey Lightning. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Zhiwei Tan)
USMC Harriers aboard USS Wasp launch “frequent” airstrikes against ISIS in Libya.
Operation Odyssey Lightning kicked off on Aug. 1, when the U.S. launched a new round of air strikes against Islamic State positions in northern Libya following a request by the Libyan Government of National Accord (GNA) to support GNA-affiliated forces seeking to defeat Daesh in Sirte.
Although the first raids were conducted by U.S. Air Force MQ-9 Reaper drones as well as by AH-1W helicopters operating from the U.S. amphibious assault ship USS Wasp, since then, the majority of the attacks were launched by the AV-8B and AV-8B+ Harriers with the Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron 264 (Reinforced) – VMM-264, the composite squadron that constitute the Aviation Combat Element of the 22nd MEU (Marine Expeditionary Unit).
From the beginning of Operation Odyssey Lightning to Aug. 29, the U.S. aircraft have completed 92 airstrikes.
The STOVL (Short Take Off Vertical Landing) aircraft have carried out Precision Guided Munition attacks on a wide variety of targets, including Vehicle-Borne Improvised Explosive Device, trucks with mounted heavy artillery, supply trucks and many “enemy fighting positions.”
Based on the images released by AFRICOM so far, the Jump Jets (both AV-8B and AV-8B+ variants) have almost always carried 500-pound GBU-38 Joint Direct Attack Munitions (JDAMs) along with two drop tanks (with the AV-8B+ carrying also the Litening targeting pod) during day and night missions.
The following videos show some interesting footage filmed on the flight deck of USS Wasp during the Libya air campaign.
I have an interest in following wars – as the military historian John Keegan once said, “war is hell, but it does make for riveting good history” – that break out around the planet. Never have I seen such a convoluted can of worms such as the war in Syria. There are so many groups, which in turn are made up of many sub-groups, that are fighting each other that it is mind-boggling. Turkey, Russia, the United States, Islamic freak militants, the Free Syrian Army, the Kurds, Syrian government forces, Al Qaeda linked Al Nusra Front to name a few of the combatants. The civilian casualties and deaths are beyond horrific. What a messy out-of-control bloodbath.
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