Friday, July 04, 2008

PREPARING FOR WAR

UPDATED SUNDAY - JULY 6, 2008 - AMERICAN POLITICAL NIGHTMARE CONTINUES...

Iran, Syria sign secret new intelligence cooperation accord

DEBKAfile Exclusive Report

July 6, 2008, 1:20 PM (GMT+02:00)

Iranian intelligence insignia

Iranian intelligence insignia

Under the intelligence cooperation agreement Iran and Syria signed secretly in Tehran on June 27, thousands of Syrian intelligence and police officers will receive special training in Iran, DEBKAfile’s intelligence sources report. It was signed at the end of an unpublicized five-day visit to Tehran of Syria’s clandestine and security service chiefs headed by Gen. Fouad Sultan, superintendent of internal security. His opposite number was the director of the Iranian interior ministry’s external affairs department Ahmed Hosseini.

The accord they concluded is a crucial element in the deepening strategic relationship between Tehran and Damascus. It belies the contention by French president Nicolas Sarkozy and prime minister Ehud Olmert, accepted also by Washington, that the Syrian regime is about to desert its close alliance with Tehran and embrace the West. On the strength of this false premise, Olmert is pressing forward along his peace track with Syria, and Sarkozy invited president Bashar Assad to be his guest of honor at the Bastille Day parade of July 14.

While secretly bolstering his partnership with Iran, Assad has no trouble spreading the illusion of his willingness for a turn to the West, especially when his propaganda effort is promoted by none other than former Israel foreign ministry official Alon Liyel.

Liyal, calling himself “an Israeli diplomat” asserted in an interview to the July 6 Sunday Times that Damascus would sever its strategic ties with Tehran, Hizballah and Hamas for substantial American military and economic aid and Israel’s renunciation of the Golan. All this would happen, the ex-official promised, on Assad’s behalf, after the change of presidents in Washington.

DEBKAfile’s sources report that Liyel spoke without authority or factual corroboration about Assad’s intentions. He omitted to mention the fact that the Assad regime would have acquired a facility to produce fuel for Iran’s nuclear weapons program, were it not for Israel’s pre-emptive strike in September 2007. He also forgot that Damascus has for years provided friendly hospitality for the headquarters of the most extremist Palestinian terrorist groups and shown no sign that he means to evict them.

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Isaiah Chapter 17

א מַשָּׂא, דַּמָּשֶׂק: הִנֵּה דַמֶּשֶׂק מוּסָר מֵעִיר, וְהָיְתָה מְעִי מַפָּלָה. 1 The burden of Damascus. Behold, Damascus is taken away from being a city, and it shall be a ruinous heap.


GOP Rep: Bush "Should Stay Home" During...

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Boys punished with detention for refusing to pray to Allah
'If Muslims were asked to go to church on Sunday and take Holy Communion there would be war'

Posted: July 04, 2008
6:15 pm Eastern

© 2008 WorldNetDaily

Two seventh-grade boys were given detention and their classmates forced to miss their scheduled refreshment break when the pair refused to kneel and pray to Allah during a religious studies class.

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Alaska’s Gull Island Oil Fields Could Power U.S. for 200 Years

By Mark Anderson

“Crude oil is the real ‘currency’ of the world,” said Lindsey Williams at a gathering of the Midwest Concerned Citizens group in Kansas City on July 22. But Americans will never hear about huge oil and gas reserves in the United States, which, if ever tapped, would bring today’s fuel prices at least as low as $1.50 per gallon and make America more energy independent.

As a Baptist missionary in the 1970s, Williams said he rubbed elbows with members of the world’s power elite—who boasted of detailed 30-year and 50-year plans to control the flow of oil and information.

A huge quantity of crude oil and natural gas exists under Gull Island, located in the waters of Prudhoe Bay in Alaska, says Williams. He cited key British Petroleum memoranda and related the statements of upper echelon oil officials who told him that Gull Island would be kept under wraps, limiting domestic supplies so Americans would someday see prices hit up to $10 a gallon at the pump.

“Every issue in the world today relates to crude oil,” said Williams. The U.S. occupation of Iraq and the saber rattling about attacking Iran fit into the crude oil matrix.

Iran is being targeted because it’s one of several countries that want to use their own currencies for oil sales, rather than using the U.S. dollar. Williams told AFP that any country that doesn’t want to “play ball” with the U.S. government and the financial and oil interests is, in essence, put on a hit list.

The United States, he said, learned that Iran intended to form its own bourse and not use the dollar for oil sales. Therefore, the notion that Iran is a menacing “almost-nuclear” country was trumped up, presented as fact via the corporate media and Iran is now in the crosshairs.

Other nations wanting more independence from U.S. meddling include Norway, Venezuela, Nigeria, Bolivia, Sweden and Russia.

The 30-year plan, which was first proposed three decades ago and is nearing fruition, included smug assurances from oil officials that the United States will triple its crude-oil usage and alternative fuels will not be allowed to gain enough ground to make a difference. They also noted that all foreign oil production will be scaled back to the United States and that Americans soon will pay $4 to $5 a gallon at the pump and could pay as much as $7 to $10 down the road.

In the early 1960s crude oil was selected as a tool of world control, Williams said, adding, “What we pay at the gas pump is a form of taxation.” The American consumer’s dependence on crude oil thus far has enabled people from foreign oil-producing nations to buy T-bills (U.S. treasury notes) in order to support the U.S. national debt and continued deficit spending. The need to support that debt puts the U.S. government in a bind, forcing Americans to remain dependent on foreign oil.

Williams, as a chaplain in 1970 when the trans-Alaskan oil pipeline was finished, ministered among the pipeline workers. However, as time passed he made a favorable impression with the top brass and was asked to improve worker-company relations. Next thing he knew, he said he was sitting at meetings of the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and various meetings of oil executives over a three-year period.

He told AFP that the IMF-World Bank acts as a middleman between oil producing nations and refineries. In so doing, they set oil prices, he said.

The big event in that three-year period was in 1977 when an Atlantic Richfield oil executive told him, “We have just drilled into the largest pool of oil in North America—[and] in the world!”

That pool was Gull Island. It was said that there was enough natural gas to supply America for 200 years. But to this day, “not one drop” of that oil has been released to American refineries, Williams said.

Williams said the executive had warned him that the Gull Island find was highly classified. Do not repeat any of this, he was told. Obviously, that warning did not stop him.








Preparing for War


June 30, 2008 | From theTrumpet.com

Those who fail to face the truth and prepare accordingly will learn by the sledgehammer of events!

As the Nazi storm brewed in 1936, only one man was forecasting where it was headed. On reading one of Winston Churchill’s speeches, Sir Clive Morrison-Bell wrote to him: “It is quite one of your best I think. You are so right about not being mealy-mouthed just now; the tone everywhere is far too apologetic, and you seem to be almost the only person who ever speaks out” (Martin Gilbert, The Prophet of Truth; emphasis mine throughout).

Isn’t the tone in Britain and America apologetic and “mealy-mouthed” today? Who is there that speaks out with a strong voice in foreign policy?

Churchill wrote on April 9, 1936 (ibid.):

It seems a mad business to confront these dictators without weapons or military force, and at the same time to try to tame and cow the spirit of our people with peace films, anti-recruiting propaganda and resistance to defense measures. Unless the free and law-respecting nations are prepared to organize, arm and combine, they are going to be smashed up. This is going to happen quite soon. But I believe we still have a year to combine and marshal superior forces in defense of the League and its Covenant.

The leaders and people had become their own worst enemy!

On April 13, 1936, he wrote his wife: “We are really in great danger” (ibid.).

Does it make sense to think we can confront dictators without weapons, or, if we have weapons, without the will to use them?

As the danger grew worse, the British Parliament showed more peace films and kept resisting a strong defense! And if it hadn’t been for Churchill, they would have been “smashed up.”

The British leaders lacked the will to even prepare for war. They certainly lacked the will to lead in such dangerous times. Weak men will never face the brutal facts until it’s too late.

A few more people were beginning to see that Churchill was right. Gilbert wrote:

Three months later, at an Independent Labor Party summer school, Eleanor Rathbone declared: “I have described Winston Churchill as a new recruit to pro-League forces. Watch that man carefully. You may feel distrustful. So did I. I’m not certain yet. But I ask you to dispel prejudice and consider facts. Churchill for three years has pointed out extensive German rearmaments. Later facts have justified his estimates.”

Those people who listened closely to Churchill’s message and watched the terrifying events unfold knew he was right about Germany.

Surprise Attack?

Churchill saw that his nation was not mentally and physically prepared for war. He gave this warning in 1936: “Europe is approaching a climax. I believe that that climax will be reached in the lifetime of the present Parliament.”

Gilbert wrote,

At the end of his speech Churchill called for a Ministry of Supply, or a Ministry of Munitions, to provide the necessary armaments in good time. As he told the House of Commons: “Surely the question whether we should be working under peace conditions depends upon whether working under those conditions will give us the necessary deliveries of our munitions—upon whether the gun plants and the shell plants and, above all, the airplane factories, can fulfill the need in time. If they can do so, then peace conditions are no doubt very convenient; but if not, then we must substitute other conditions—not necessarily war conditions, but conditions which would impinge upon the ordinary daily life and business life of this country. There are many conditions apart from war conditions—preparatory conditions, precautionary conditions, emergency conditions—and these must be established in this country if progress is to be made, and if Parliament and the nation are not to find themselves deluded in the future by mere paper programs and promises which in the result will be found to be utterly unfulfilled.”

What a deep lesson in this statement! If only we would so examine every phase of our individual lives and the life of our nation today, we would not be easily deluded. You can tell so much about people by how easily they are deceived. Deceit is our main enemy. The whole world is deceived about true leadership and God (Revelation 12:9). But who really believes that today?

America and Britain are deeply deceived about leadership today. And we are facing a greater crisis now than World War ii! The very same nation—Germany—is going to trigger that crisis—just as it did in World Wars i and ii! (You can learn about this prophecy by reading Germany and the Holy Roman Empire.)

War is ready to explode in Europe and the Middle East. The global economy is on the verge of collapse!

The time for polite words is past. It is time for the blunt truth.

Churchill said, “Something quite extraordinary is afoot. All the signals are set for danger. The red lights flash through the gloom. Let peaceful folk beware. It is a time to pay attention and to be well prepared” (ibid.). And so it is today. The danger signals and the red lights are flashing. But people are prone to ignore their watchmen until it is too late.

Churchill was accused of having a “strong anti-German obsession.” Sometimes we are so accused. But some of our own members are German. We believe in facing the truth. Those who fail to do so are going to learn by the sledgehammer of events!

Churchill continued: “What woke them up was a series of horrible shocks, and intelligence from every quarter streaming in. … If I read the future aright, Hitler’s government will confront Europe with a series of outrageous events and ever-growing military might. It is events which will show our dangers, though for some the lesson will come too late” (ibid.).

He read the future beautifully. But most people still didn’t listen to his words and awaken until it was almost too late!

Prime Minister Baldwin publicly accused Churchill of a serious lack of judgment. But events eventually revealed who had good judgment.

Ezekiel is an end-time prophetic book. God prophesied that He would send a watchman (Ezekiel 33:6-7). That is the good news. But there is also some very bad news. “And when this cometh to pass, (lo, it will come,) then shall they know that a prophet hath been among them” (verse 33). The people don’t recognize the watchman until it is too late physically. They ignore his words until they are in the midst of a nuclear disaster.

Churchill once said, “There is a purpose being worked out here below.” He sensed that God was working out His plan. And so He is.

But there is no Winston Churchill to lead us to safety this time. God is not going to save us again unless we repent (verse 11).

We can’t hide and escape from the series of shocking events that are about to bombard America and Britain!

“Churchill was one of the speakers at a Ralegh Club dinner, telling the assembled students and dons: ‘When I came to Oxford to make a speech, five years ago, I said you must re-arm. I was laughed at. I said we must make ourselves safe in our island home, and then laughter arose. I hope you have learned wisdom now’” (ibid.).

Did Oxford learn a lasting lesson from Winston Churchill? No! Has higher education today learned from Churchill’s World War ii experience? Mostly they scorn his political views today. Would they listen to a Churchill today? The answer is no! They would treat him just as they did in World War ii—only worse! If he were alive he would have some strong views on what is happening today in Germany, and other monstrous problems facing the world.

Some people also laugh at our warning today. But God prophesies that the laughter is about to be totally silenced!

Only fools laugh at God’s warning message! Gilbert continued in his book:

Also on June 12, Ralph Wigram sent Churchill copies of three further Foreign Office dispatches dealing with different aspects of Nazism. “Will you kindly destroy them when you have read them,” he added. “I have marked the important passages.” Six days later the Duchess of Atholl sent Churchill the transcript of a speech Hitler had made to the League of German Maidens. One paragraph, she pointed out, had been deleted in the broadcast version. In it Hitler had said that if war came, “I should fall upon my enemy suddenly, like lightning striking out of the night.”

These words had a great impact on Churchill’s mind. He also remembered Germany’s history in warfare. Gilbert continued:

Churchill … was convinced about the possibilities of surprise in the German organizational framework. Commenting on the 1,200 machines and 1,114 pilots for whom the Air Staff had located no specific squadron and only non-first-line duties, he wrote, “This would be amply sufficient to duplicate every one of the 88 squadrons now believed to have been identified. When we remember the fondness evinced by Germany in history for this particular form of surprise, and note the large number of machines and pilots which seem to have vanished into thin air and the hundred-odd aerodromes which have been constructed, this possibility cannot be excluded.”

He understood Germanys history of surprise attacks! The Air Staff fully agreed with him. Germany had been fond of such attacks. And this is the method of warfare it followed throughout World War ii! This happened repeatedly to Hitler’s enemy nations and even those who thought they were his friends! Daniel 8:23-25 state that deceit and surprise attacks by Germany will be even worse in World War iii! History keeps repeating itself.

Still, the British government rejected what “might come as a great shock to the country and result in an upheaval of industry.” They refused to do what the crisis demanded! Time was running out.

A Thankless Service

“At any rate my conscience is clear,” Churchill said.

I have done my best during the last three years and more to give timely warning of what was happening abroad, and of the dangerous plight into which we were being led or lulled. It has not been a pleasant task. It has certainly been a very thankless task. It has brought me into conflict with many former friends and colleagues. I have been mocked and censured as a scare-monger and even as a warmonger, by those whose complacency and inertia have brought us all nearer to war and war nearer to us all.

But I have the comfort of knowing that I have spoken the truth and done my duty, and as long as I have your unflinching support I am content with that. Indeed I am more proud of the long series of speeches which I have made on defense and foreign policy in the last four years than of anything I have ever been able to do in all my 40 years of public life. …

Through our own folly and refusal to face realities and deal with evil tendencies while they were yet controllable, we have allowed brutal and intolerant forces to gain almost unchallenged supremacy in Europe and have placed ourselves in a position of weakness and peril, the like of which our history does not record for 2½ centuries. …

We are going away on our holidays. Jaded ministers, anxious but impotent members of Parliament, a public whose opinion is more bewildered and more expressionless than anything I can recall in my life—all will seek the illusion of rest and peace.

Many authorities agree that the Western world probably would not have survived without the warning and leadership of Winston Churchill. It is hard to imagine a greater service than that. Yet he was castigated even by many of his friends and party members as a scare-monger and warmonger. A thankless service indeed.

Yet I perceive that Churchill’s warning is being pushed aside more and more by some journalists and scholars today. It is to their shame and our terrifying danger that they do so.

We must work hard to avoid making this same mistake. Instead of pushing aside reality we must accept it, and prepare accordingly. This is why the Trumpet exists: We not only strive to explain the dark realities of the present, but we explain the thrilling realities of the future, and what you can do to see them come to fruition in your life. Don’t hesitate—click here to subscribe to the free print edition of the Philadelphia Trumpet.

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FROM www.survivalblog.com

Letter Re: The Reactive Culture, or 20 Years of Greater Depression

Dear Jim,
America, and modern industrial democracy, is a reactive culture. We wait for disaster to strike, then we talk about it, vote, and throw money at it until it goes away. That's what we've been doing since the deficit spending initiated by FDR, socialist that he was. Now we've reached the end of deficit spending, having exported our jobs, currency, and control of our economy overseas and become a great big lazy balloon floating over the glass recycling bin at the local dump. Gasoline, food, and other essentials are in a tight 18% inflationary spiral and the public is only just now starting to complain, to shift their behaviors. Carpooling is becoming more common and accepted. Smaller cars are replacing SUVs and large pickups for solo commuting needs.

The trouble is, this is too little, too late. The disaster is already upon us. Oil prices are $140/bbl. Financial opportunists claim "oil price correction next week" then exploit the delusional optimism for profit. Gasoline is $4.50/gal, diesel $5.30/gal. Thieves (most of them methamphetamine junkies) are stealing the copper wiring running irrigation pumps, gutting houses abandoned by foreclosure (an irony if ever there was one), taking the farm diesel from unguarded tanks and equipment. Farmers are angry, but basically helpless to stop this. The Chinese pay top dollar for "salvage copper" and ship it back to mainland China to grow their own economy, meanwhile gutting US infrastructure. And its probably even worse in the Third World. Then again, lose enough infrastructure and the USA will be the Third World (again).

As a Republic, we are ill-positioned to deal with proactive efforts. There's no percentage in the risk associated with planning out a solution you may not be in office to reap the political capital for. Instead, our representatives vote for pork that benefits their constituents and wins votes now or in the next few months. Stuff that people remember at the polling station.

Trouble is, Peak Oil isn't going away. It's getting worse. And solutions need to be developed 5 years ago to have any value today, to help with this situation. What can be done today is grassroots carpooling, use of mass transit (often slow, smelly, and expensive, as well as impractical), and eventually the highly unpopular but inevitable: fuel rationing. I know that's terrible, but that's inevitable too. If you don't ration, you get hoarding and the US economy collapses faster. What's worse, it's terribly unpopular politically and no Rep who wants re-election will vote for a national fuel rationing plan. We, as citizens, are going to have to beg for fuel rationing just to make sure we get some fuel as things get more dire. Even with that, America only produces 7 million barrels per day of oil, and our demand is 21 million barrels. Libya and much of OPEC is responding to the threat to seize assets of terrorist sponsoring nations by cutting production to the world, which then pressures the world to squeeze the USA to back off. So expect trade tariffs, first as warnings, then as punitive measures. That means our inflation rate will worsen.

We've seen protests and riots over fuel prices in Portugal, France, Italy, Spain, Belgium, and the UK over the last few weeks. This is only the beginning of troubles. As the prices rise thanks to production falling, the blame game will continue, and further irrational public behavior will worsen. The public have resolutely refused to grasp that oil is ancient energy and it will run out. Right now, our leaders here in the USA point fingers to delay tactics, like offshore drilling, domestic discoveries (which would have already been exploited if they were remotely as big or easy as these non-geologists like to claim). The oil under the ANWR? That's 45 days of [global] oil supply. That's it. If you saved it for US-only consumption, you can stretch it to around 6 months of oil supply. Better than nothing--only it takes five years to reach the marketplace. All those pipelines and wells and sideways drilling takes time, and by five years from now, the price of oil will be around $500/bbl. and gasoline something like $20/gal, well beyond the means of humble lower and middle class users to buy. Only the rich will be burning $500 per barrel oil.

And at some point, your fuel ration and carpool won't get you to work, or it won't get most of your co-workers to work so your operation/job ends. It doesn't have to be your fault, it just happens. Some few businesses will relocate, but they may leave your area and offer you a job if you follow--if you can sell your house and convince your family to join a company town somewhere in the Midwest (assuming that's where they go, not overseas). Rinse and repeat and the conservative estimate for job loss due to Peak Oil is around 20%. Public works programs, hiring the unemployed on contract for physical labor is very likely, a return of the WPA. Roads must be maintained. Railroads need to be rebuilt, with spurs reaching every town in the USA (and other nations would be wise to do this too). That's a high demand for steel, so all those useless SUVs can be turned into 3 feet of heavy rail apiece. Rail is cheap transportation, very cheap with energy. Frugal. We like that.

Smarter and wealthier towns will also install streetcar railing and overhead wiring for electric operation. And then police that wiring for thieves looking to steal it or the power generated. That returns mobility to the local population so they can get to school, get to work, get from their neighborhood to the job on the other side of town instead of bicycling. But it may take 5 or 10 years before the economy can support that. It's cheap to do it now, but nobody cares enough to make it happen while they can still afford it on Chinese-supported bonds. And that's the real tragedy of Democracy.

None of this happens until after the disaster, after people can't buy gasoline, after they've lost their jobs and the unemployment rate jumps 20% in a week. Only after disaster will things change. And when you proactively Hurry Up And Wait and Just In Time, you get slow improvements, shortages of critical infrastructure supplies so you can't rebuild fast enough to save all those businesses. Unlike the Great Depression, your gasoline, the fuel that runs the recovery, isn't going to cost four cents a gallon. Its going to be "out of reach", "can't buy it here", and "sorry Mister, we're out." With no interim solution, those jobs are going away for good. And the general public is going to shift from Middle Class to Poverty with no way around it.

Both candidates for US President are funding a contest to invent a new car battery for all electric cars. Good move. Doubt we'll see it anytime soon, as the laws of physics and chemistry are laws for a reason, but maybe we'll get lucky. It would be nice. Even with a crash program like the Manhattan Project, you're still looking at years before a product hits the shelf, years with a collapsed economy is decades of Greater Depression and generations of mistrust and sore memories of our suffering. You don't recover from that easily or quickly. Children today are going to have to grow up in a time that's worse than the Great Depression was, and it will last longer, too.

We still need to face facts that the Saudis have promised us $200 oil this year, and that's $6.30/gal. gasoline. Think about how you're going to operate your life on $6 gasoline. My commute is now two miles. I could walk if I had to. How many people can do this? Not many. If you own a house, or are leasing one from a bank, you probably don't have the option to just move closer to work. If you take a job you hate or aren't suited for to have a commute, your pay will decline and your job security too. Not a good move for most people. And businesses won't move to keep their employees until after they stop showing up for work and they realize they have to close their doors. It only pays to be Proactive if you're smart enough to look ahead. The fact that you're here reading this means you're smart enough. But are your neighbors? Your coworkers? Your boss? Your congressional representative? Probably not. And we get to live with their mistakes and ignorance as a consequence. Best, - InyoKern

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FROM "GLOBAL RESEARCH"

State-Sponsored Terror: British and American Black Ops in Iraq
- by Andrew G. Marshall - 2008-06-25
Giving the CIA the broadest and most lethal authority in its history
The Coming Catastrophe?
- by David DeBatto - 2008-06-23
The finishing touches on several contingency plans for attacking Iran
Unfolding Financial Meltdown on Wall Street
- by Dr. Ellen Brown - 2008-06-15
What’s The Difference Between Lehman Brothers & Bear Stearns? Lehman’s CEO Sits On the Board Of The NY Fed
The Global Crisis: Food, Water and Fuel. Three Fundamental Necessities of Life in Jeopardy
- by Michel Chossudovsky - 2008-06-05
The provision of food, water and fuel is a precondition of civilized society: they are necessary factors for the survival of the human species
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http://www.z-medica.com/quikclot/index.asp

www.thetrumpet.com

www.staceydean.org


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Thursday, July 03, 2008

REMEMBERING THE PAST


Adolf Hitler

AKA 'Der Führer' (The Leader).

Country: Germany.

Kill tally: Directly responsible for the deaths of over 46 million Europeans as a result of the Second World War.

Background: Following the First World War, the Treaty of Versailles penalises the defeated Germany, annexing land, imposing large war reparations, limiting the size of the German Army and blaming Germany and Austria-Hungary for starting the conflict. The new German Government, a coalition of left-leaning and centrist parties, attempts to rebuild the country but faces opposition from the right and extreme left. The instability is exacerbated by the failure of the domestic and global economies.

Mini biography: Born on 20 April 1889 in Braunau am Inn, Austria, into a lower middle-class family of peasant origins. His father, a customs official, is 23 years older than his mother, a domestic servant.

Hitler is dominated by his father and spoilt by his mother. His father dies in 1903, his mother in 1907. He has one half-brother, one half-sister, and one full-sister. In his youth, Hitler dreams of becoming an artist.

1903 - Following his father's death, Hitler leaves school.

1907 - He goes to Vienna, the capital of Austria, where he attempts to pursue his dream of becoming an artist. However, he has only limited talent and is unable to gain admission to the Academy of Fine Arts, failing the entrance examination twice. In 1908, following the death of his mother, he moves to Vienna to live.

"I owe much to the time in which I had learned to become hard (in Vienna)," Hitler later writes, "I praise it even more for having rescued me from the emptiness of an easy life, that it took the milksop out of his downy nest and gave him Dame Sorrow for a foster mother."

1913 - He moves to Munich, the capital of Bavaria, where he ekes out a living as a painter and technical draftsman.

1914 - When the First World War breaks out Hitler volunteers for service with the German Army, joining the 16th Bavarian Reserve Infantry Regiment. He serves with some distinction and is awarded the Iron Cross, Second Class, in December 1914, and the Iron Cross, First Class, in August 1918. However, he never rises beyond the rank of corporal. By the end of the war he has developed shell-shock and is admitted to military hospital.

After the war, Hitler returns to Munich and begins to become involved in politics. He believes that Jews and Marxists are responsible for Germany's defeat.

1919 - He joins the German Workers' Party in September. A gifted and inspiring public speaker, he is soon placed in charge of the party's propaganda.

1920 - Under Hitler's direction, the party adopts the swastika as its emblem and changes its name to the National Socialist (Nazi) Party. Its platform calls for the removal of civil rights for Jews and for their expulsion from Germany.

As the German economy begins to buckle under the weight of the enormous war reparations demanded by the Treaty of Versailles and debts incurred during the war, popular support for the Nazis begins to increase. Inflation and unemployment climb. The German Government loses its majority in the elections of 1920, introducing a decade long period of political instability. Nazi Party membership increases to about 3,000.

1921 - The Nazi Party's "storm troopers" are formally organised into a private army. Called the Sturmabteilung (SA) - the 'Brownshirts' - the army is used to protect party meetings and to attack opponents. Hitler becomes leader of the Nazi Party in July. Party faithful begin to refer to him as the Führer (Leader). Meanwhile, in April, the Allies present Germany with a bill of US$33 billion for war reparations.

1923 - When the German Government defaults on its reparation payments, the French Army occupies the Ruhr. Inflation skyrockets and is fuelled when the government begins printing more and more money in a desperate attempt to solve the crisis. The value of the Deutschmark plummets.

In mid-1920 US$1 is worth 40 marks. By July 1923 the exchange rate has blown out to 160,000 marks to US$1. By August 1923 the rate is 10 million marks to the dollar. By November 1923 the figure is 4.2 trillion marks to the dollar. Almost overnight, Germans have lost their life savings. Social unrest begins to escalate.

Hitler exploits the situation, advocating national pride, blaming the left and Jews for the political turmoil and claiming to have a solution to the economic crisis. Many Germans come to see the party as a credible alternative.

On 8 November Hitler and 600 armed members of the SA stage an abortive attempt to seize power in Munich. Hitler is arrested and tried for treason. The Nazi Party is outlawed.

Hitler's trial receives media coverage in and outside of Germany and his courtroom attacks against the government are widely quoted. He is found guilty and sentenced to five years jail, but is allowed to receive visitors when he likes and to employ Rudolph Hess as his private secretary. His imprisonment begins on 1 April 1924, however, he will only serve nine months of his term.

While in prison he begins to write 'Mein Kampf' (My Struggle), his political autobiography and treatise on the superiority of the "Aryan race" and the "menace" of the Jew. The book is published in 1927. When the Nazis come to power it will be set as school textbook and presented to all German newlyweds.

1924 - Hitler is released a few days before Christmas. He finds there is now a different economic and political climate in Germany. A new government has succeeded in containing the crisis and achieving stability. Hitler is forbidden from making public speeches across much of the country but works to further entrench his hold over the Nazi Party.

1927 - The Nazi Party holds its first Nuremberg congress, a mass political rally that will become the party's signature propaganda event.

1928 - Nazi Party membership now exceeds 100,000, though the grassroots support is not reflected in the polls, with the Nazis winning only 2.6% of the vote in a general election held in May. The party will become better known the following year when an alliance with the conservative German National People's Party lends it some respectability within the antirepublican right.

Hitler, meanwhile, writes a sequel to 'Mein Kampf'. However, the book is never published during his lifetime.

1929 - The German Government is crippled when the Wall Street stock market crash of October ushers in the Great Depression. Unemployment rises from 8.5% in 1929 to 29.9% in 1932.

Hitler again exploits the situation, spreading his propaganda nationally through newspapers, securing support from magnates of business and industry, and establishing a national party structure. He promises something for all - work for the unemployed, profits to industry and small businesses, and expansion of the army and restoration of German pride. Public support blossoms.

In 1928 the Nazis hold 12 seats in the Reichstag (parliament). By 1932 they will have 230 seats and be the largest party in the government. Joseph Goebbels begins to create the Führer myth around Hitler and to organise the ritualistic and highly choreographed party rallies that help convert the masses to Nazism and provide a platform for Hitler's accession to power in January 1933.

Meanwhile, Hitler meets Eva Braun during 1929. Braun will become Hitler's lover in 1931 after his previous mistress, Geli Raubal, who is also his niece, commits suicide to escape his attentions.

1933 - The Nazis reach a position from which they can seize power on 30 January when Hitler is appointed chancellor. Following the Reichstag fire on 27 February basic civil rights are suspended and the Nazis are given the right to quash political opposition.

Germany's last election until after the Second World War is held on 5 March. Though the Nazis win only 44% of the vote Hitler persuades the Reichstag to pass the Enabling Law, allowing him to govern independently of the parliament for four years. The Nazis now take full control of the state apparatus.

All Nazis in prison are issued with full pardons; critics of the government and the Nazi Party are subject to arrest; special courts are established for the trial of political detainees. Regional governments are dissolved and then reconstituted with governors handpicked by Hitler. Leftist political parties are banned; Germany is declared a one-party state; Jews and leftists are purged from the bureaucracy; and trade unions are dissolved and replaced with Nazi organisations.

The Gestapo, or secret state police, is established in April. Concentration camps are set up for the interment of opponents. A program of public works, rearmament and forced labour helps bring the economy under control. Inflation comes down, the currency is stabilised and full employment achieved. Support for Hitler increases.

On 10 May Hitler stages the "burning of the books" in Berlin. Works by Jewish, Marxist and other "subversive" authors are publicly burned in huge bonfires. On 14 October Germany withdraws from the League of Nations.

Though rigorously oppressive, Hitler's regime is popular with average Germans, who benefit from tax relief and strategic social investments. Taxes on working people will never be raised during the Nazi reign. Soldiers and their families will receive more than double the income offered to their Western counterparts. The Nazis will commission large infrastructure projects, including the building of the autobahn road system running across Germany.

However, the expenditure is unsustainable. It will be financed by growing debt and the spoils of conquest.

1934 - Hitler organises the 'Night of the Long Knives' massacre of rebellious leaders of the SA on the night of 30 June. In August he becomes president and chancellor, giving him supreme command of the German armed forces. Hitler is now the Führer, the dictator of the fascist Third Reich, an empire where the individual belongs to the state.

1935 - On 16 March the Nazis introduce conscription. A new German Army (Wehrmacht) is being created. Hitler formally announced that Germany has begun to rearm and rebuild its army and airforce, in contravention of the terms of the Treaty of Versailles. The 'Nuremberg Laws', meanwhile, strip Jews of the right to citizenship and restrict their relations with Gentiles.

1936 - Hitler joins with Italian fascist dictator Benito Mussolini in the 'Rome-Berlin Axis' and signs the 'Anti-Comintern Pact' with Japan, an agreement to fight the spread of communism. Italy joins the pact in 1937.

At the same time, Hitler confirms his intention to take Germany into war, telling his cohorts that the country must be ready to fight by 1940.

The military soon get an opportunity for battle experience when Germany enters the Spanish Civil War in support of Spanish Nationalists led by Francisco Franco. The German contribution is vital at the very beginning of the war when German aircraft fly Franco's troops from Morocco to Spain. Germany's ongoing support will also be a critical factor behind Franco's eventual victory.

1938 - Support for Hitler is further buoyed by his policy of foreign expansion. Austria is annexed on 13 March. The Sudetenland, the German-speaking area in the north of Czechoslovakia, is ceded to Germany on 29 September under the terms of the 'Munich Agreement' between Britain, France, Germany and Italy.

At the end of the year the persecution of the Jews intensifies. Over the days of 9-10 November the Nazis orchestrate the Kristallnacht (Crystal Night) pogrom. Jewish shops, houses and synagogues across Germany are burnt by both the Schutz-Staffel (SS) - the 'Blackshirts', Hitler's personal guard - and the general population. Ninety-one Jews are killed. Thirty thousand are arrested and deported.

Hitler is named 'Time' magazine's man of the year. Commenting on the rise of the Nazi Party and Hitler, the magazine says, "The situation which gave rise to this demagogic, ignorant, desperate movement was inherent in the German republic's birth and in the craving of large sections of the politically immature German people for strong, masterful leadership ... Meanwhile, Germany has become a nation of uniforms, goose-stepping to Hitler's tune, where boys of ten are taught to throw hand grenades, where women are regarded as breeding machines."

1939 - On 30 January Hitler declares in the Reichstag that a new world war will lead to the destruction of the Jewish race in Europe. Bohemia and Moravia are occupied in March, while Slovakia is made a puppet state. In May, as Germany prepares for war, Hitler agrees to a formal military alliance with Italy, the 'Pact of Steel'.

On 22 August Hitler briefs his senior military commanders on his plans for the invasion of Poland.

According to one report of the meeting, Hitler says, "Our strength lies in our quickness and in our brutality.

"Genghis Khan has sent millions of women and children into death knowingly and with a light heart. History sees in him only the great founder of states. As to what the weak Western European civilisation asserts about me, that is of no account.

"I have given the command and I shall shoot everyone who utters one word of criticism, for the goal to be obtained in the war is not that of reaching certain lines but of physically demolishing the opponent.

"And so for the present only in the East I have put my death-head formations in place with the command relentlessly and without compassion to send into death many women and children of Polish origin and language.

"Only thus we can gain the living space that we need. Who after all is today speaking about the destruction of the Armenians?"

The next day, 23 August, he signs a nonaggression pact with the Soviet Union, carving up Eastern Europe into German and Soviet spheres of influence, with the Soviets claiming Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Finland, part of the Balkans and half of Poland.

German troops invade Poland on 1 September. Britain and France declare war on Germany two days later. The Second World War has begun.

Poland is overrun within a month, with Germany taking the west of the country and the Soviets occupying the east. Denmark and Norway fall in April 1940. The Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg and France are invaded the following month. By June 1940 France has surrendered.

As the invasion progresses Jews and other "undesirables" in the occupied territories are dispossessed and interned in work camps.

In Germany the physically handicapped, mentally ill, and others with so-called "worthless lives" are rounded up and sent to designated hospitals, where they are killed. Referred to by the Nazis as mercy killing and planned by Hitler's office and the Reich Interior Ministry, the "euthanasia" program will claim up to 275,000 lives when it goes into full swing.

1940 - Beginning from 10 July, the 'Battle of Britain' rages in the skies as the British Royal Air Force (RAF) desperately combats wave after wave of aerial attacks and bombing raids by the Luftwaffe while launching counteroffensive bombing missions into Germany.

Though outnumbered by four to one the RAF is able to inflict enough damage to the German forces to cause Hitler to suspend 'Operation Sealion', the proposed invasion of Britain by sea. By the end of September the 'Battle of Britain' is effectively over. Germany has suffered its first major defeat of the war.

Meanwhile, Germany, Italy and Japan sign the 'Tripartite Pact', an agreement to carve up the world following victory in the war.

At the end of the year, Hitler meets with Romanian leader Ion Antonescu. Under Antonescu's direction Romania will become one of Germany's staunchest allies. Hitler and Antonescu will meet again in January and May 1941.

Hitler meets Spanish fascist dictator Francisco Franco on 23 October at French-Spanish border to try to persuade Spain to enter the war, but Franco is reluctant to become directly involved and only provides token support.

1941 - On 6 June Hitler meets Croatian fascist leader Ante Pavelic to discuss a plan to expel much of the Serbian population of the so-called 'Independent State of Croatia' and replace them with Croats and Slovenes from lands annexed by the Germans. Pavelic's regime will be responsible for the genocide of 600,000 to one million within its area of control, including 30,000 Jews, 29,000 Gipsies, and 600,000 Serbs. Hitler will meet with Pavelic again in November 1942.

Germany invades the Soviet Union on 22 June 1941. The Germans advance swiftly but are halted on 6 December by a Russian counterattack just short of Moscow.

The 'Battle for Moscow' will be the biggest of the Second World War, involving seven million participants and an area of operations the size of France. The Germans' failure to capture the city will be their first military defeat of the war.

The United States enters the war when the Japanese airforce bombs the US naval base at Pearl Harbour in Hawaii on 7 December. Hitler declares war on the US on 11 December. With the offensive in the Soviet Union stalled, he appoints himself commander-in-chief.

"St Petersburg must disappear utterly from the Earth's surface. Moscow too. Then the Russians will retire into Siberia," Hitler declares.

"As for the ridiculous 100 million Slavs, we will mould the best of them to the shape that suits us, and we will isolate the rest of them in their own pig-styes; and anyone who talks about cherishing the local inhabitant and civilising him goes straight off into a concentration camp," he says.

On 18 December Hitler orders his troops in Russia to stand fast at their present positions.

1942 - On 20 January the Nazis complete the planning for the Endlosung (Final Solution), the extermination of the Jews, Gipsies, Slavs, homosexuals, communists, and other "undesirables" and "decadents" in death camps run by the SS and controlled by the Gestapo. About six million European Jews die in the following 'Holocaust'. Most (about 4.5 million) of those killed come from Poland and the Soviet Union. About 125,000 are German Jews.

The Holocaust also claims about 500,000 Gipsies, between 10,000 and 25,000 homosexuals, 2,000 Jehovah's Witnesses, up to 3.5 million non-Jewish Poles, between 3.5 million and six million other Slavic civilians, as many as four million Soviet prisoners of war, and up to 1.5 million political dissidents.

1943 - The war turns against Germany in the winter of 1942-43 when the Soviets win victory at Stalingrad (now Volgograd). When the German forces laying siege to the city are encircled and trapped by a Soviet counteroffensive, Hitler refuses to allow them to attempt an escape. They surrender on 2 February 1943.

The German Sixth Army has been effectively destroyed in what is at the time the most catastrophic military defeat in German history. Over 500,000 of the German-led troops are dead. By the end of 1943, the Soviets have broken through the German siege of Leningrad (now Saint Petersburg) and recaptured much of the Ukrainian Republic.

Hitler orders his retreating forces to adopt a scorched-earth policy and destroy everything that may be of use to the advancing Soviets.

The German offensive in North Africa is stopped at the beginning of November 1942 when Allied troops led by General Bernard Law Montgomery force the German Afrika Korps led by General Erwin Rommel into a retreat. By 13 May 1943 275,000 Germans and Italians have surrendered. The war in North Africa is over, leaving the Allies free to land in Sicily and Italy.

To the west, the US and British navies gain control of the Atlantic shipping lanes, clearing the way for the 'D-Day' landings on the Normandy beaches in France on 6 June 1944 and the invasion of Germany six months later. Soviet troops, meanwhile, advance from the east.

In the skies over Germany the Allied air forces intensify their bombing raids. The strategy of indiscriminate area bombing will kill an estimated 600,000 civilians, including about 75,000 children.

The Nazis call for "total war" against the Allies.

At the end of 1943 Hitler's personality comes under scrutiny in a profile written by Dr Henry Murray of the Harvard Psychological Clinic and commissioned by the US Office of Strategic Services, a precursor of the Central Intelligence Agency.

Titled 'Analysis of the Personality of Adolph Hitler - With Predictions of His Future Behaviour and Suggestions for Dealing with Him Now and After Germany's Surrender', the profile states:

"There is little disagreement among professional, or even among amateur, psychologists that Hitler's personality is an example of the counteractive type, a type that is marked by intense and stubborn efforts (i) to overcome early disabilities, weaknesses and humiliations (wounds to self-esteem), and sometimes also by efforts (ii) to revenge injuries and insults to pride."

Hitler is "possessed by what amounts to a homicidal compulsion which has no vent in a 'weak piping time of peace' (unless he becomes an outright criminal), and therefore he has constantly pushed events toward war, or scapegoating," the analysis says.

"As a result of the fact that resentment is the mainspring of Hitler's career, it is forever impossible to hope for any mercy or humane treatment from him. His revengefulness can be satisfied only by the extermination of his countless enemies. ...

"He is a hive of secret neurotic compunctions and feminine sentimentalities which have had to be stubbornly repressed ever since he embarked on his career of ruthless dominance and revenge (instigated by real or supposed insults). ...

"Hitler wants nothing so much as to arrive at the state where he can commit crimes without guilt feelings; but despite his boasts of having transcended Good and Evil this had not been possible. The suicidal trend in his personality is eloquent testimony of a repressed self-condemning tendency. ...

"As soon as the time comes when repeated offensive actions end in failure, Hitler will lose faith in himself and in his destiny, and become the helpless victim of his repressed conscience, with suicide or mental breakdown as the most likely outcome."

The analysis predicts that if Hitler does choose suicide "he will do it at the last moment and in the most dramatic possible manner."

Link to a copy of the analysis at the Cornell Law Library Archives.

1944 - Following an unsuccessful assassination attempt on Hitler on 20 July by a group of conspirators led by Wehrmacht Colonel Count Claus Von Stauffenberg and including one field marshal and 22 generals, Nazi political officers are appointed to all military headquarters. Several thousand people will be killed in reprisal for the attempt on Hitler's life.

Though Hitler is not mortally injured by the bomb used in the assassination bid he is lightly paralysed on his left side and develops a serious tremor in his left arm. He is also psychologically affected, becoming more paranoid and suspicious.

1945 - On 30 January advanced Soviet troops reach the Oder River, less than 70 km away from the centre of Berlin. The same day, Hitler makes his last radio broadcast to the German people. Six weeks later, on 13 March, he makes his last journey outside Berlin, travelling to the east to inspect the Oder front.

By March, as the Western forces reach the Rhine River, Soviet armies have overrun most of Eastern Europe and are converging on Berlin, where Hitler waits in his bunker. The Soviets march under the slogan, "There will be no pity. They have sown the wind and now they are harvesting the whirlwind."

Few are spared. As the Soviets move through Germany they rape at least two million German women in an undisciplined advance that is now acknowledged as the largest case of mass rape in history.

By 25 April the Soviet forces have encircled Berlin. The city now becomes the "Reichssheiterhaufen" - the "Reich's funeral pyre".

A street by street battle to capture Berlin begins. The infantry attack is accompanied by an unrelenting artillery barrage, with 1.8 million shells being fired on the city between 21 April and 2 May. Tanks are also sent in, although at first the losses are extremely high, with over 800 tanks being destroyed.

The three and a half million civilians that remain in the city are caught in crossfire. Nearly 110,000 German soldiers and civilians die during the battle. A further 134,000 are taken prisoner. About 130,000 women are raped.

On 28 April Hitler marries his mistress, Eva Braun. On the afternoon of 30 April he shoots himself in the head. Braun also suicides, taking poison. In accordance with his instructions, Hitler's body is burned. Braun's body is burned next to his.

"You must never allow my corpse to fall into the hands of the Russians," Hitler tells his valet prior to his suicide. "They would make a spectacle in Moscow out of my body and put it in waxworks."

In his final will and testament, written just before his suicide, he calls on the German Government and people "to uphold the race laws to the limit and to resist mercilessly the poisoner of all nations, international Jewry".

Berlin falls to the Soviet forces on 2 May. The assault on the city has cost the Red Army 78,291 killed and 274,184 wounded.

On 7 May Germany surrenders unconditionally. The Second World War officially ends on 2 September when Japan formally signs documents of unconditional surrender.

Hitler's charred body is discovered by the Soviet forces occupying Berlin shortly after the city falls. It is smuggled back to the Soviet Union, where its upper and lower jaws and the cranium are said to still exist in official archives. The rest of the body is hidden under a parade ground at Magdeburg, in what is to become Eastern Germany. In 1970 these remains are secretly dug up, cremated and flushed down a sewer.

Postscript

Over 46 million Europeans have died as a result of the war, including:

  • Over 26 million Soviets,
  • Over seven million Germans,
  • About 6.8 million Poles,
  • Between one million and 1.7 million Yugoslavs,
  • 985,000 Romanians,
  • 810,000 French,
  • 750,000 Hungarians,
  • 525,000 Austrians,
  • 520,000 Greeks,
  • 410,000 Italians,
  • 400,000 Czechs,
  • 388,000 British,
  • 250,000 Dutch,
  • 88,000 Belgians,
  • 84,000 Fins,
  • 22,000 Spaniards,
  • 21,000 Bulgarians,
  • 10,000 Norwegians, and
  • 4,000 Danes.

The war has also claimed over 13 million people from other lands, including:

  • About 11.3 million Chinese,
  • Almost two million Japanese,
  • 298,000 Americans,
  • 118,000 Filipinos,
  • 42,000 Canadians,
  • 36,000 Indians,
  • 29,000 Australians,
  • 12,000 New Zealanders, and
  • 9,000 South Africans.

Beginning in November 1945, 22 surviving Nazi leaders considered responsible for the crimes committed by Germany during the war are tried before an international military tribunal sitting in Nuremberg. Among those brought before the tribunal are Hermann Göring, Wilhelm Keitel, Joachim von Ribbentrop, Rudolf Hess, and Albert Speer. Twelve of the accused are sentenced to death, seven receive prison sentences, and three are acquitted.

Following the high-profile Nuremberg trials, lower-ranking Nazi war criminals are also brought to justice.

2005 - On 10 May a national memorial to the Holocaust is opened in Berlin. The 'Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe' is located near the Brandenburg Gate in the centre of the city. It includes a museum with exhibits on the Nazi's campaign to wipe out European Jews.

Comment: Adolf Hitler, the undisputed, all-time, world champion of killers. Directly responsible for the deaths of over 46 million Europeans and the destruction of much of Europe. But he never would have got there without the support of the people. After the abortive attempt to take power by force in 1923 and his subsequent arrest, trial and imprisonment, Hitler realised that the way to top was through the democratic process. But soon after he was elected democracy was violated so he could secure his grip. I guess you had to be there to understand his appeal. The gloss is all gone today, although there are still plenty out there who think he was just "misunderstood". Personally I think if it looks like evil, sounds like evil and behaves like evil, it's evil.

More information

Links are to external sites.

Germany - A Country Study (Library of Congress Country Studies Series)

Analysis of the Personality of Adolph Hitler by Henry A. Murray (The Cornell Law Library Archives)

The Nizkor Project - Adolf Hitler

BBC - History - Genocide Under the Nazis

Auschwitz: Inside the Nazi State | PBS

Eurodocs: Germany: National Socialism and World War II

Guardian Unlimited | Special Reports | Second World War: Archived Articles

Guardian Unlimited | Special Reports | Focus: The Holocaust

Holocaust Educational Resource (The Nizkor Project)

The Holocaust History Project

Nazi and East German Propaganda Guide

Simon Wiesenthal Centre - Online Multimedia Learning Centre

Page created on 30 April 2001. Reviewed June 2002. Updated 10 July 2007.

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www.thetrumpet.com

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Fed-Up Families Turn To Barbed Wire, Shotguns To Police Neighborhood

Homeowners: 'Someone Is Going To Get Hurt'

POSTED: 8:17 am EDT July 1, 2008
UPDATED: 9:16 am EDT July 1, 2008

Families in a crime-ridden Central Florida neighborhood are arming themselves with shotguns and talking about adding electric barbed wire to stop thieves targeting their homes."Somebody is going to end up getting hurt," resident Andrea Fine said. "The homeowners are tense. We are all on edge. For the first time in my life I'm really scared to live in my home."Homeowners living near and on Sanford Avenue in Sanford said crime is so bad that some of them have been robbed three times.

"We were told they would come back and they came back," homeowner Pat Doughty said.She is one of several residents who have armed themselves and plan to go to extremes to protect their property."My next thing is to put electric and probably some barbed wire or something," Doughty said. "I'm shooting the next person who comes in. Don't come on my property anymore."Doughty said she is moving because of the crime."My kids call every day to make sure we are safe," Doughty said. "They want us to move and we are going to move because we can't put up with the crime."Families said they want more police patrolling. But plans to add 10 more Sanford police officers could be in jeopardy because of budget cuts, Local 6's Erik von Ancken reported.The city's police chief said he is working on a solution.