HAPPY BIRTHDAY AMERICA!!!!!

[kipper]

 

Edited July 5, 2020 by kipper

[apantherfrommd]

 

[hummingbird69]

[redrum]

👍

[Strider]

Edited July 6, 2020 by Strider

[Walter]

Happy Birthday USA!!!

 

 

 

Edited July 5, 2020 by Walter

[hummingbird69]

4 hours ago, Strider said:

Nice!

[kipper]

On 7/4/2020 at 10:14 PM, apantherfrommd said:

 

Let FREEDOM ring!

 

[kipper]

10 hours ago, redrum said:

👍

Hoorah! For our side!!!

Freedom isn't free, it was paid for in blood.

 

[kipper]

6 hours ago, Walter said:

Happy Birthday USA!!!

 

 

 

Happy Independence day Walter!

7 hours ago, Strider said:

Thank you for posting this Strider. Very touching memorial.

We should never forget our history. Not the good, or the not so good. 

 

[redrum]

Ira Hayes sitting down on far left. My old landlord's brother fought on Iwo and brought back a hand carved pipe with Japanese writing on it.

[kipper]

7 hours ago, redrum said:

Ira Hayes sitting down on far left. My old landlord's brother fought on Iwo and brought back a hand carved pipe with Japanese writing on it.

Ira was a real hero.  How cool to have  a Japanese pipe.  I had an uncle who had a Japanese battle flag he took off a dead Japanese soldier on Okinawa. My cousin still has it. Some people believe they should return those items to Japan, I disagree.

Many if not most of the men in that photo were dead before the end of that very day after taking Mount Suribachi on Iwo Jima to plant the American Flag.

I remember the day when they said on the news that President Johnson had agreed to return Iwo Jima to the Japanese and my father who rarely used a bad word said "the F word" at the TV set and then a few more choice words about Johnson.  I don't think we should have given back that island. It should have remained a monument to all the Americans who died in the Pacific and a testament to future generations in Japan that the consequences of Pear Harbor meant that had we wanted to keep it all after the war, we could have-- but we were gracious enough not to. Russia BTW never returned on inch of capture Japanese territory.  Not that I'm saying we shouldn't have returned most of Japan to Japan. But just that one single rock in the middle of the Pacific should have remained US Territory forever the same way the U.K. has kept the rock of Gibraltar. A reminder....

Edited July 7, 2020 by kipper

[redrum]

5 hours ago, kipper said:

Ira was a real hero.  How cool to have  a Japanese pipe.  I had an uncle who had a Japanese battle flag he took off a dead Japanese soldier on Okinawa. My cousin still has it. Some people believe they should return those items to Japan, I disagree.

Many if not most of the men in that photo were dead before the end of that very day after taking Mount Suribachi on Iwo Jima to plant the American Flag.

I remember the day when they said on the news that President Johnson had agreed to return Iwo Jima to the Japanese and my father who rarely used a bad word said "the F word" at the TV set and then a few more choice words about Johnson.  I don't think we should have given back that island. It should have remained a monument to all the Americans who died in the Pacific and a testament to future generations in Japan that the consequences of Pear Harbor meant that had we wanted to keep it all after the war, we could have-- but we were gracious enough not to. Russia BTW never returned on inch of capture Japanese territory.  Not that I'm saying we shouldn't have returned most of Japan to Japan. But just that one single rock in the middle of the Pacific should have remained US Territory forever the same way the U.K. has kept the rock of Gibraltar. A reminder....

After the flag raising it was off to the meat grinder for them. Though it's been proven that Bradley really wasn't one of the flag raisers, I believe he kept quiet about it just so he could get off that damned island. You would have thought that LBJ would have snubbed the Japanese on that one. Still can't believe his cop out from Vietnam.

LBJ Military Service. On June 21, 1940, Lyndon Johnson was appointed Lieutenant Commander in the U.S. Naval Reserve (USNR). Reporting for active duty on Dec. 10, 1941, three days after Pearl Harbor, he was ordered to the Office of the Chief of Naval Operations, Navy Department, Washington, D.C., for instruction.

[PeaceFrogYum]

On 7/7/2020 at 12:58 AM, redrum said:

After the flag raising it was off to the meat grinder for them. Though it's been proven that Bradley really wasn't one of the flag raisers, I believe he kept quiet about it just so he could get off that damned island. You would have thought that LBJ would have snubbed the Japanese on that one. Still can't believe his cop out from Vietnam.

LBJ Military Service. On June 21, 1940, Lyndon Johnson was appointed Lieutenant Commander in the U.S. Naval Reserve (USNR). Reporting for active duty on Dec. 10, 1941, three days after Pearl Harbor, he was ordered to the Office of the Chief of Naval Operations, Navy Department, Washington, D.C., for instruction.

We pretty much F'ed the Japanese psyche in toto by wars end and followed that up by what was considered by most Japanese to be a disgraceful occupation of their country. Now we (Americans) did nothing I am aware of which would be considered disgraceful, but to the Japanese all honor was lost and rightfully so. They embraced the whole empire building BS after they beat the shit out of the Russians in the 1905 war and it went right to their heads (BTW the Japanese started the war with a surprise attack on the Russian naval base at Port Arthur). The Japanese always considered themselves superior to everyone else so to them what they did was justifiable, no atrocities because the people they went after were not Japanese.  This was 100% the fault of the Japanese military as by the 1920's they had completely bastardized the code of Bushido to suit their own needs and consistently went against the Emperor himself to the point they were contemplating overthrowing the Emperor and installing a military dictatorship with the Emperor as a captive figurehead.

So as far as I am concerned the Japanese got what they deserved and we should have given Iwo Jima to the Koreans for compensation for centuries of oppression which continues to this day for Koreans born and raised in Japan.

[kipper]

10 hours ago, PeaceFrogYum said:

We pretty much F'ed the Japanese psyche in toto by wars end and followed that up by what was considered by most Japanese to be a disgraceful occupation of their country. Now we (Americans) did nothing I am aware of which would be considered disgraceful, but to the Japanese all honor was lost and rightfully so. They embraced the whole empire building BS after they beat the shit out of the Russians in the 1905 war and it went right to their heads (BTW the Japanese started the war with a surprise attack on the Russian naval base at Port Arthur). The Japanese always considered themselves superior to everyone else so to them what they did was justifiable, no atrocities because the people they went after were not Japanese.  This was 100% the fault of the Japanese military as by the 1920's they had completely bastardized the code of Bushido to suit their own needs and consistently went against the Emperor himself to the point they were contemplating overthrowing the Emperor and installing a military dictatorship with the Emperor as a captive figurehead.

So as far as I am concerned the Japanese got what they deserved and we should have given Iwo Jima to the Koreans for compensation for centuries of oppression which continues to this day for Koreans born and raised in Japan.

My Pop was really pissed off that we gave them back Iwo Jima, should have kept it to prove a point. Then they went and changed the name to something else other than Iwo Jima I suppose to take the sting away from the defeat.

Dad always said we should have just given Japan to the Russians in exchange for Eastern Europe back in '45.  I wonder how that would reshaped things in the world?

[redrum]

12 hours ago, PeaceFrogYum said:

So as far as I am concerned the Japanese got what they deserved and we should have given Iwo Jima to the Koreans for compensation for centuries of oppression which continues to this day for Koreans born and raised in Japan.

The Koreans would most likely have told us to shove it. I can just imagine all the unexploded ordnance that's still there.

[PeaceFrogYum]

7 hours ago, redrum said:

The Koreans would most likely have told us to shove it. I can just imagine all the unexploded ordnance that's still there.

Well, how about the North Koreans then 🙂

[redrum]

3 hours ago, PeaceFrogYum said:

Well, how about the North Koreans then 🙂

I think they'd pass too.

[kipper]

THIS is the America that many of us here remember, and could still be if only some would just embrace it make it this way AGAIN.

[PeaceFrogYum]

2 hours ago, kipper said:

THIS is the America that many of us here remember, and could still be if only some would just embrace it make it this way AGAIN.

Exact-o-mundo! Just make it all inclusive and perfection. Sometimes I think every time we try and fix a problem, three more pop up in it's place while not really fixing the original problem.

My biggest issues are loss of community, loss of the familial bond, and the transient nature of American society in general. If we don't have these, fixing the rest is near impossible.