Free Republic

...Vladimir Putin... has again exhibited his contempt for democratic rule and his tin ear for the angry opposition in the world's democracies.... Ukraine was starved into submission by Stalin 72 years ago, but when the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, the Ukrainians voted overwhelmingly for independence. It was not, however, an independence willingly accepted by Russian hardliners.... The massive outpouring of demonstrators in what they call the "Orange Revolution" is an attempt to replicate the "Rose Revolution" in Georgia... Serbia... the Berlin Wall, the "Velvet Revolution" in Czechoslovakia and the Solidarity victory in Poland. There was one significant failure too,...

...In Iraq, John Kerry — who used to say that Saddam Hussein posed a genuine threat to America because he surely possessed weapons of mass destruction — would have imposed a "global test" before committing forces to protect U.S. security... [H]e would not be prepared to act until nations like France and Germany gave the go-ahead. Indeed, he stresses the infinite value of conversation — calling for "a summit of all our allies," much as he once begged the first President Bush to send someone to Baghdad in the firm belief that Saddam Hussein could be talked out of Kuwait....

Lord, Keep our Troops forever in Your care Give them victory over the enemy... Grant them a safe and swift return... Bless those who mourn the lost. . FReepers from the Foxhole join in prayer for all those serving their country at this time. ...................................................................................... ........................................... U.S. Military History, Current Events and Veterans Issues Where Duty, Honor and Countryare acknowledged, affirmed and commemorated. Our Mission: The FReeper Foxhole is dedicated to Veterans of our Nation's military forces and to others who are affected in their relationships with Veterans. In the FReeper Foxhole, Veterans or their family members should feel...

Vaclav Havel has opened an international conference in Prague on promoting democracy in Cuba. He told delegates that Cuba's situation would change soon and that opponents to Fidel Castro's 45-year rule should prepare for the end of "dictatorship". The meeting is also attended by former Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar and former Latin American leaders. A Cuban diplomat told the BBC that the US was behind the event, which she called an unwanted meddling. In the 1970s and 1980s Mr Havel was one of the most prominent dissidents within Europe's communist bloc. He was in office for 12 years...

Dozens of people have been killed in a massive military clampdown in Czechoslovakia by five Warsaw Pact countries. Several members of the liberal Czechoslovak leadership have been arrested, including Prime Minister Alexander Dubcek. The Soviet news agency, Tass, claims "assistance" was requested by members of the Czechoslovak Government and Communist party leaders to fight "counter-revolutionary forces". But in a secret radio address, Czechoslovak President Ludvik Svoboda condemned the occupation by Warsaw Pact allies as illegal and committed without the government's consent. US President Lyndon Johnson said the invasion was a clear violation of the United Nations Charter and that the...

Holocaust survivor Sol Rosner leads those who attended the Holocaust remembrance service Wednesday on Fort Huachuca in the Mourner's Kaddish. The traditional Jewish prayer was recited to honor the more than 6 million Jews who were killed by the Nazis during World War II. (Mark Levy-Herald/Review) FORT HUACHUCA - For Sol Rosner, leading a group of people in the Mourner's Kaddish was difficult. Standing on the stage of the post's Cochise Theater Wednesday, he spoke the traditional Jewish prayer in honor of the more than 6 million Jews who were murdered by Nazis during World War II. "It is...

SOVIET TERROR LINKS FOUND IN LEBANON Our major media have long ignored or downplayed evidence linking the Soviet Union and its satellites to international terrorism. When Robert Moss, co- author of The Spike, told an international conference on terrorism held in Jerusalem in 1981 that the PLO had become a Soviet surrogate in the Middle East, the reaction of the representatives of the press was one of cynicism mixed with hostility. Wall Street Journal correspondent Susan Weaver explained the negative reaction to Moss's statement, saying that linking the KGB with world terrorism through the PLO "cast a dark shadow on...

PRAGUE, Nov. 6 - Czech police said on Thursday they were holding three men who had attempted to smuggle 2.5 kg (5.5 lb) of the plastic explosive Semtex, a gun and other items into neighbouring Austria. Experts said the amount of Semtex -- a highly potent Czech-made explosive with a record of being used by guerrilla groups -- was enough to bring down an aircraft. A police spokeswoman said the group tried to cross the border in a car late on Wednesday evening. All were carrying Czech passports. "The behaviour of the driver was very unusual during customs clearance and...

BAMBERG, Germany — A new training area provided new opportunities to soldiers of the 1st Battalion, 33rd Field Artillery Regiment. The unit, which normally holds exercises at the Grafenwöhr Training Area in Germany, began training April 30 in Czech Republic. The exercise, which ends Wednesday, involved about two weeks of preparatory training before the soldiers got the opportunity for some live-fire exercises, according to Lt. Col. Michael Miklos, 1st Battalion commander. The exercise at the Hradiste complex allowed the unit to expand its training, Miklos said. “With the live fire on [Saturday], we were able to mass the entire...

WASHINGTON - Somewhere in the United States live a few former spies from the communist government of Czechoslovakia, which passed into history in 1989. When officials of the new Czech Republic tried to recall them, they simply refused. They had grown accustomed to their lives in America, they said, and did not want to abandon their families. The Czech government decided to leave them alone. The spies were sleeper agents who had never been activated. The communist government, a hard-line treaty ally of the Soviet Union, had planned to order them to duty in the event of a crisis or...

Czech television has marked the May Day holiday, international workers’ day, by broadcasting 24 hours of communist television in a mocking and nostalgic retrospective on the country’s years of Marxist-Leninist rule.The holiday coincided with the 50th anniversary of the establishment of television in the former Czechoslovakia.While 10,000 diehard communists rallied under the red flag at one of Prague’s parks - where they were pelted with eggs by opponents - the absurdities of communist-era propaganda were pilloried on television.Uncut film of the 1989 demonstrations which toppled the communist government was followed by the censored version shown to television viewers in the...

Toogood Reports [Weekender, February 23, 2003; 12:01 a.m. EST]URL: http://ToogoodReports.com/ When I lived in then-West Germany from 1980-1985, my German girlfriend's father, Alois, was a (conservative) Christian Democrat and union man who had originally been a farmer in Bohemia. After centuries as a German province, after The War Bohemia (Boehmen) was awarded to Czechoslovakia, a nation which had itself been slapped together out of parts of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, which the Allies dismantled after World War I. My girlfriend's mother, Ingrid, was a farm girl from Upper Silesia (Oberschlesien), which likewise after the war was awarded, after centuries as a...

http://ToogoodReports.com/ Call me a Cold War sentimentalist — but smile when you say it. I never felt so alive, as when I was passing through Checkpoint Charlie at the Berlin Wall, my heart in my throat, between free, West Berlin, and its garrisoned sister city in the East.And how I lived, with a few American dollars in my pocket, on the other side of The Wall. Two weeks ago, on Joe Millionaire, I saw golddiggers and the ditchdigger spend nights in the sort of four-star hotels I once stayed in. In June, 1989, just months before The Wall fell, I...

While discussing an upcoming article in the December 2002 Vanity Fair, David Rose (senior editor/VF) tells Katie "The Affable One" Couric that a New York Times article from October 2002 about Czech President Havel's remarks on Iraq and hijacker Mohammed Atta is a "fabrication".

Bush urges NATO to stand against Iraq President says it's possible to avoid war 11/20/2002 By G. ROBERT HILLMAN / The Dallas Morning News PRAGUE, Czech Republic - In this locked-down Bohemian capital patrolled by U.S. F-16 jets, President Bush exhorted NATO allies to stand with him in a "coalition of the willing" against Iraq's Saddam Hussein so that war might be averted. During a news conference with Czech President Vaclav Havel, Bush said it is possible to avoid war. "If the collective will of the world is strong, we can achieve disarmament peacefully," the president said. But, Bush...