Posted on 05/05/2011 2:11:32 PM PDT by FoxPro
Love the P-38.
It is indeed - and I've always thought the P-51 just looked like a bad-@ss
Snipers target enemy officers all the time, and it’s not called assassination. Assassination is the killing of a political leader, not a military commander.
I saw an hour long story on “The History Channel” about the event. I thought “Lanphier” if that is the correct spelling, did not sound like a credible person.
On the other hand you never can tell. Sometimes a totally honest person sounds like they are lying.
It really was an incredible story of precision flying, good luck, extraordinary timing and brilliant intelligence.
We really were good back then.
Gawd, I hate to be defending zero on this, but I believe the operative word would be "probable" location.
Yes it turned out to be the location, but I do not believe they ever had 100% certainty, even up to the moment they launched the attack that OBL was there.
What they had was the first indicators in August that this was likely his hide out, after that they built their case.
This is the plane that got Yamamoto
P-38 Lightning
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ITRLk9b9AcY
DOGFIGHTS, P38 LIGHTNING VS ME 109
FDR (Roosevelt) unlike POTUS Obama, wanted to win WWII and....in doing so realized you must kill the enemy, both military and civilian. This was done, in both Japan & Germany and with all the Axis support countries. Obama does not care for America, so Pakistan, Syria, Libya, Yemen, the Sudan, Iran go untouched. Facts and truth will show that Obama was forced into a yes or no on Bin Laden by both CIA Director Panetta and Secretary Of the DOD, Gates. Valerie Jarrett, an Osama Bin Laden adoree was urging Obama not to pull the trigger. Obama did of course, throw Bin Laden under the bus, but for his own political survival which will not happen. Obama is protecting and shielding Gaddafi, his soul brother and with direction from Farrakhan & Rev. Wright whom both adore Gaddafi. One day the American public and voters will come to realize what a low-life, dirt bag POTUS Obama really is. Shame the fools have not figured this anti-American, un-American empty suit out!!! As for Yamamoto, he was a brilliant Admiral, he loved his country, he knew, that in a prolonged war with theUSA, Japan would be badly defeated. He detested the Japanese military leadership, because he knew Americans would come back at Japan with a hate and determination to destroy the nation of Japan which they did. It was probably better that he was not around to see his beloved Japan on her knees and bleeding to death. Roosevelt, Doolittle, Halsey, Nimitz, Arnold, Patton, Eisenhower, Churchill, and....on and on and on!!! Dirt Bag, POTUS Obama does belong in the same room with these heroes that saved the world, freedom and our nations!!!
Folks, there was a Declaration of War between Japan and the United States. It addition, Yamamoto was a uniformed combatant carrying an ID card. There is no comparison with this case and bin Laden. He was not a uniformed combatant and there is no Declaration of War. Note that the Geneva Convention generally does not cover non uniformed combatants. Traditionally, they were questioned, awarded a non judicial punishment, and subsequently shot.
“I seem to recall from my history lessons in high school that there was a quaint old document created called a “Declaration of War”, passed by the Congress on December 8, 1941. After that declaration, any member of Japan’s military was a legitimate target for attack.”
All a Declaration of War accomplishes it the notification of another power that a state of war exists. A state of war existed the moment the first bomb was dropped on Pearl Harbor and from that moment on all members of Japan’s military became legitimate targets for attack. The Declaration of War was a mere formality.
By the same token, when the first plane crashed into the WTC, a state of war existed between the US and Al-Qaeda and from that moment all members of Al-Qaeda became legitimate targets for attack.
I don’t see the Yamamoto and bin Laden as comparable (apples and apples) situations.
Had the capability, and opportunity, existed in 1943 to conduct a snatch-n-grab of Yamamoto the US certainly would have tried to take him alive.
However, they didn’t. So the next best alternative (killing him during his tour) was taken.
In the case of bin Laden there was definitely capability, and an opportunity, to capture him alive.
That doesn’t mean that he shouldn’t have been killed, it just means that the situation is somewhat more complicated. With tradoffs between any intelligence take that could be pulled out of him (after Eric Holder’s DoJ read him his rights and allowed him to lawyer up, of course), the threat he posed to the SEALs by potentially having a weapon or suicide vest, and the potential for a demoralizing circus-like atmosphere if he were to go on trial (including the potential for him to continue to act as the spiritual leader of AQ while behind bars).
I don’t know what potential intel could have been dragged out of him, since he doesn’t seem to have been in any sort of operational control of AQ. So setting that part aside, I don’t think that he was worth the life of a single SEAL, and that allowing him to live and be tried would be extremely damaging to the nation and the War on Terror. So I think the decision to exterminate him using 5.56 insect repellent was the right one.
No link? What’s the source for this article?
Absent a vote from Congress a state of war would not be authorized under our Constitution.
While I wouldn't disagree that from the moment the first plane crashed into the WTC any killing of any Al Queda member would be perfectly justified - our otherwise Imperial Presidency cannot conduct war unilaterally without authorization from Congress (except apparently in Libya).
(Later Justice) John Paul Stevens was one of the Navy cryptographers who helped decode the original message about Yamamoto’s tour.
Thank you for telling the truth. So many Americans seem to have lost the hunger for it.
I’m really worried the white house is using the media to socially engineer Americans into thinking political assassinations at the order of a dictatorial white house is acceptable.
I've always found it fascinating to read about Yamamoto's close ties to the U.S. in the decades before World War II. He attended Harvard from 1919-21 and was assigned to work in Washington D.C. for a while as a young naval officer. He also seemed to have a pretty keen sense of Japan's limitations in fighting the U.S. in the Pacific.
It is the wikipedia article, which I feel is quite good.
FR wont let us post a wiki with attribution, which I think is a shame. Most of Wikipedia is quite good, really a world treasure, in many respects. Yes there are parts of it that you can throw rocks at, but that is a distinct minority of it.
When you have 7 million articles, there is going to be something to hate and disparage.
As a history buff, I dont know what I would do without wikipedia. I think the folks at FR should embrace it, and pitch in to make it better.
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