May. 3, 2012
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Oh Canada
In my column this week for the National Post, I explain some of Canada's outstanding military achievements:
You could learn a lot about Canada’s national psyche from the country’s enduring fascination with the battle of Vimy Ridge, fought 95 years ago this past week.
Canadians fought dozens of major battles during the First World War. Yes, Vimy was the most tactically spectacular: One of the best-planned, best-executed Allied operations of the whole war. Vimy fully deserves the honour it carries in the national memory.
But the exclusive attention to Vimy obscures other Canadian achievements even more deserving of honour.
Who remembers now the Battle of Amiens in August, 1918? Yet it was this battle that broke the spirit of the German Army in the West. German troops broke and ran before a Canadian and Australian-led assault: the first German rout of the war. Between August and November, Canadians spearheaded a sequence of attacks that destroyed the German army’s will to fight.
Tags: Canada
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Davy on -
If you know what our colonial masters thought of the colonial fighting spirit and ability you will understand what I mean when I say "We colonials showed them that us colonials were just as good as them and had what it took to be a fighting force"
Thank you Canucks.
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Permalink Reply by Michel on -
The Canadian forces fought alongside an Australian/New Zealand contingent. The three Dominions together engaged some 40% of the German army.
Canadians have always been very fond of Aussies.
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Permalink Reply by doone on -
Mysterious hum in Canada coming from U.S.
(4) |||Published: April 21, 2012 at 5:53 PMWINDSOR, Ontario, April 21 (UPI) -- A mysterious humming sound that has drawn hundreds of complaints in Windsor, Canada, for more than a year is emanating from Michigan, testing has determined.
The low-frequency, rumbling noise dubbed the Windsor hum is coming from the area of Zug Island, an industrial site, the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. reported.
But officials in River Rogue, Mich., where Zug Island is located, have said they don't have the money to find the precise source of the noise.
"The government of Canada takes this issue seriously," Bob Dechert, a conservative member of Canadian Parliament, said in a news release. "It is important that we find a solution that works for the people of Windsor."
Jim Bradley, Ontario's environment minister, said the ministry has received nearly 500 complaints about the noise, and about 22,000 residents took part in a telephone forum in February about the hum.
Bradley has sent letters to municipal, state and federal officials in the United States asking them to take action, while Dechert has met with representatives of the Great Lakes Commission, the Council of Great Lakes Industries, the Southeast Michigan Council of Governments and the Regional Office of the International Joint Commission to discuss the hum.
Gary Gross said he's had his fill of the hum.
"I was in bed, it was about 2:30 a.m. and I could just hear this pulsing noise," he told CBC News. "I decided to get up. It disturbed my sleep and I couldn't get back to sleep."
Read more: http://www.upi.com/Odd_News/2012/04/21/Mysterious-hum-in-Canada-com... -
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Permalink Reply by doone on
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And Americans have the reputation of not trying to learn about other counties - Canadian Bird Man raps up the meme
Are There Birds In Canada?I did not know this; but then, Canada has always been a mystery. Yahoo Answers to the rescue. postedabout 3 hours ago
Via: reddit.com -
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Permalink Reply by Michel on
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Well it's in full swing in Montreal and has been so for the past 2 months. There have been ten straight nights of student protests. A few thousands marching downtown streets, every night and mostly peaceful now after the initial few days when there was violence and vandalism with lots of arrests - an agitator group called the Black Block, dressed in black, masked, with their own agenda.
The opposition party is calling for new elections by reasons of crisis mismanagement. The police is doing tons of overtime hours and it's costing a fortune.
The government won't budge and the students are more than a little upset, they won't budge either.
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Permalink Reply by Marianne on -
By the way, I hear the demonstrators every evening marching down rue St-Jean in Quebec city; in my opinion, it's not over...
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Permalink Reply by doone on
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497 - Nazis Up the Mississippi, And Other Axis Invasion Scenarios
It's early 1942, and the future looks bright for Nazi Germany. What parts of mainland Europe the Wehrmacht hasn't conquered outright, are held in thrall to Germany in uneven alliances or uneasy neutrality. Out east, German armies are gobbling up big chunks of Soviet Russia in a seemingly unstoppable race towards Leningrad, Moscow and the oilfields of the Caucasus.
So confident are the Nazis of the war's outcome that they've declared war on the US on 11 December of the previous year, four days after their Japanese allies obliterated America's Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor.
The Japanese Empire itself is also near the acme of its power, making giant inroads into British, Dutch and American holdings in the Far East, adding to the Empire's conquests in China.
It's unclear - in fact, highly unlikely - that either Germany or Japan had any concrete plans beyond continental hegemony. For one thing, no contemporary maps illustrating global ambitions of the German-Japanese Axis survive (1). But if there ever was a time the Axis might have thought it had a shot at conquering the entire world, this was it.
That terrifying momentum was felt most keenly in the United States, which until recently was half convinced it could sit out this world war on the sidelines. Now a reluctant belligerent, America saw itself caught between two hostile, agressive powers, one over each coastal horizon.
In those early days after its involuntary entry into the war, panic must have been a palpable feature of the nation's mood. While it mobilised for the best, America feared for the worst. In its March 2, 1942 issue, Life magazine distilled that national anxiety into six maps, each portraying a different scenario for Axis invasion.
Plan One detailed a combined Japanese-German invasion, each hostile power invading via the most opportune shore. Plans Two and Three showed how a solo Japanese invasion might play out, while Plans Four through Six demonstrated various options for a solely German operation.
Below is each scenario, with the original legend in italics.
Plan One (…) attack on U.S. base at Dutch Harbor with all Jap aircraft carriers and the Fleet reinforced by German battleships, presumably giving naval superiority. Japs capture air bases, much as they advanced through the East Indies. Then their land-based planes help the carrier planes to protect the next sea advance down the West Coast. An American fleet flings itself into the fight. U.S. fifth column, heretofore held in reserve, blows up the country. The Japs take the West Coast aviation industry, shipyards and oil wells. Then Germans stab at East Coast.
Plan Two calls for a frontal attack on the West Coast via Pearl Harbor. This is the hard way. Japs supported by carriers first land on the outer Hawaiian Islands, set up air bases and close in on Oahu. More difficult is the big water jump, protected only by carrier-borne planes, to San Francisco.
Plan Three calls for a southern Pacific crossing by Japan. Again the Jap Fleet, reinforced by the Germans, presumably has naval superiority over the U.S. Fleet. Probably first gun would be surprise bombing of Panama Canal, instantly followed by landings in Ecuador.
Plan Four is the much-discussed invasion by way of Gibraltar-Dakar-Natal-Trinidad, which President Roosevelt’s Good Neighbour policy has tried to defend against. It is based on combining the Jap, German, Italian and Vichy navies, freed by the capture of Gibraltar and Suez. They must fight the Allied fleets somewhere. Invasion pours up the Mississippi Valley.
Plan Five is hard way to cross the Atlantic. Combined Axis navies reduce Atlantic islands, then take big water jumps from Azores to Bermuda to Norfolk. Their biggest headache is reported U.S. superiority in carriers. Twenty-five Nazi ships could transport four divisions.
Plan Six is classic invasion down St. Lawrence and Hudson valleys. Germans could readily bomb Chicago, Detroit, Akron and rampage through Midwest. Big catch is getting past British Fleet. On all maps, black arrow alone means a feint; when combined with gray band, it means full invasion.
Maybe it's the benefit of hindsight, but each of these scenarios now looks highly improbable, and more reflective of the acute necessity, for the benefit of the war effort, to transform American angst into American anger. The Japanese taking the Galapagos Archipelago, establishing air bases in Ecuador? Really? A Nazi armada taking New Orleans and trundling up north through the Mississippi valley?Really? A fifth column, supposedly composed of German-Americans and/or Japanese-Americans, aiding the enemy? Really?
Many thanks to Graham Clayton, John O'Brien, and Mark Whybird, who all sent in this map. Its original context is here on Ptak Science Books.
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(1) Not to my knowledge, at least. I would gladly be proved wrong.
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Permalink Reply by Michel on
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There were actual German subs in the St-Lawrence river (1942 onward).
The plan was to disrupt shipping convoys headed for the UK.
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Permalink Reply by doone on
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Canadian $20 Bill Has Naked Ladies Atop The Twin Towers
At least that's what focus groups saw. It's in fact the Vimy Memorial in France, dedicated to Canadian soldiers who lost their lives in World War I. Certain participants in focus groups said the new bill contained imagery too reminiscent of the World Trade Center and was too pornographic.posted about an hour ago
The New Bill
The Twin Towers With Naked Ladies In Question
Not Actually The Twin Towers With Naked Ladies
Young Canadian students stand in front of the Canadian memorial as they participate on April 09, 2012 in Vimy, northern France, in the commemoration ceremony marking the 95th anniversary of the Crete de Vimy battle during World War I. A total of 3,598 Canadian Corps troops were killed and 7,004 were wounded over four days of fighting as they seized control of the ridge from German soldiers.
(Getty Images / PHILIPPE HUGUEN) -
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