Brotherhood of Warriors by Aaron Cohen and Douglas Century 2008

Aaron Cohen speaks on U tube articles about the current situation. He is still promoting this book and I realized that I had already read his book before I started this blog 

25/5/19 Behind enemy lines with a commando in one of the worlds most elite counter terrorist units- 1995 to 1998

This is an autobiography. The book starts with the Dizingoff bombing in Tel Aviv on 4th March 1996. He happened to be at a flat with his mate an officer in Duvduvanim nearby and the 2 of them went and took charge of helping until the ambulance and police took over. (This is moving to me as I knew 2 of the 16 who died that day, they were South African immigrants a mother and her daughter.) He was born in Montreal and his parents divorced and he was moved around to Florida then LA where his mothers career took off as a scriptwriter and she married Abby Mann.

For his bar mitzvah year he returned to his father in Montreal. Abby Mann - Avraham Goodman 1927 to 2008 wrote the script for Judgement in Nuremburg 1961 by Stanley Kramer. In Hollywood he met the actors who came to their house to discuss the scripts. Most Hollywood kids were wealthy spoilt brats like him and when he got into trouble his mother sent him off to military school Canada near Niagara. Here he was able to find himself, as rules were set down. Back home he met an Israeli general who told him if he gets to Israel not to overdo how great he is. He arrived on Kibbutz Hazorea to do an ulpan and worked in the kitchen but met the people in the fish breeding who were officers in the Matkal and managed to work with them in work physically exhausting. In the army he refused to be taken into ordinary infantry, phoned an old lady who knew everyone and got into the gibush at Wingate. He survived this even with a sprained ankle. Matkal would not take him security only wanted born Israeli's of known families but he was sent to training that would be Duvduvan.(undercover, counter terror) During the training they keep working on them physical and phycological to eliminate, and those were sent off to paratroopers or infantry. The volunteers for these elite unites came mostly from secular idealist but as a result of the 73 and 82 wars these types wanted the good life offered abroad and the kippa sruga (knitted skullcaps of general religious) were the one who showed this initiative. There was also a unit of physically strong Sfaredim (Jews of Eastern origin) who were not fighting material but by having then next to high class units had some effect. They were now trained on weapons for urban warfare, everything from handguns to small Uzi's folding F16 and Kalashnikovs. They learn Krav Maga developed by Imi Lichtenfeld to protect Jewish youth against anti-Semitic thugs in Bratislava in the 1930. Then they had lessons on disguise some could grown beards other dressed as women. They had to get cheap Chinese copies of clothes, shoes as certain brands gives one away. A cosmetician taught makeup. Initially he guarded the surrounding while the operation was on later he went in. Once there was shooting from inside so they put an RPG in the wanted person was killed so they could not get him alive to question. Once he had to meet a British educated Hamas organizer and posed as an American reporter in a café till the rest of the team pounced. He says that Fatah and Hamas are more like armed mafia's gangs than political movements and people are left very little free will. They found out that Abu Jihad was to be at a wedding in Nablus and 2 men went in as quests grabbed him and carried him out. This was such a Hamas neighbourhood that the locals felt too secure. After his 3 year stint Aaron returned to LA but was in a state of post traumatic stress back home. Eventually he met Israelis there working in security many without green cards. When word got out that he was available he was in demand and later started training police. He ends the book explaining that America after 9/11 is not mentally equipped to deal with a terrorist problem and Islamic terror had long term goals and has time. Later he took part in war movies.

The Years of Lyndon Johnson by Robert A. Caro.

Robert Cara wrote 4 books on L B Johnson  The part I was interested in was Civil Rights 

1865 Dec The 13th Amendment abolished slavery and involuntary servitude, except as punishment for a crime. This was the first of 3 Reconstruction Amendments.

1868 July, 14th Amendment This gave rights to citizens of every state including voting rights, this would mean that slave states had a bigger population and would get greater representation. Ex-slave states were thus not encouraged to register black voters. 14th Amendment of 1868 The amendment addresses citizenship rights and equal protection of the laws, later used to do with Same sex marriage. Amendment XV 1870 prohibits the federal and state governments from denying a citizen the right to vote. 13, 14, 15 are known as the Reconstructionist amendments. Plessy v. Ferguson, (1896), was a landmark of the US supreme court decision upholding constitutionality of state laws requiring racial segregation in public facilities under the doctrine of "separate but equal".[1] In 1890, the state of Louisiana passed a law (the Separate Car Act) that required separate accommodations for blacks and whites on railroads, including separate railway cars. Homer Plessey was an octeroon but was required to be in the coloured car. The case went to the Louisiana high court and then the US Supreme court. This was the basis of all the Jim Crow Laws till 1954 1948President Truman abolished segregation in the US army. This took till 1963 to achieve. Earl Warren appointed to Supreme Court in 1952 by Eisenhower this led to the1954 April Brown vs Board of education Supreme court declares Segregation unconstitutional/ -------------------------------------------------- Many black soldiers opted to stay in the army after World War II. There were actually more opportunities for them in the service than back in the Southern states of the U.S.A. When the U.S.A. became involved in the Korean war 1950, thousands of African-Americans soldiers returned to the battlefield. Defense Directive 5120.36 1963 by McNamara --------------------------------------------------- 1949 The Felix Longoria Wake. the body of a conscripted soldier who died in the Philippines was returned to his family Three Rivers Southern Texas. The owner of the Funeral Palour refused to have the service at the Funeral Chapel as he said the whites wont like it. This controversy was in the press for 6 weeks till Senator Johnson arranged for him to be buried in Arlington and attended the service. “The enormous power held by each of the southern committee chairmen individually was multiplied by their unity, by what White called a “oneness found nowhere else in politics.” The symbol was the legendary “Southern Caucus,” the meetings of the twenty-two southern senators which were held in the office of their leader, Richard Brevard Russell of Georgia, whenever crisis threatened—meetings that were, White said, “for all the world like reunions of a large and highly individualistic family whose members are nevertheless bound by one bond.” In those meetings, the southern position was agreed upon, its tactics mapped, its front made solid.” The Southern Caucus used other bills against the CR bill

----------------------------------------- LBJ "No memorial oration or eulogy could more eloquently honor President Kennedy's memory than the earliest possible passage of the civil rights bill for which he fought so long The Republican Party was Lincoln's old party and on the centenary of Lincoln Day LBJ wanted something to show. In LBJs first speech to congress he mentioned Civil Rights for all Americans and 4 days after the assassinations he met Civil Rights leaders, he met each separately and convinced them that he would support them and needed their help. Rowe Kennedy had style but Johnson had substance. Johnson said there are show horses and work horses you have to decide which you are. American liberalism period was from the New Deal until Reagan, that active government should improve American life. Both FDR and LBJ were more interested in accomplishments than principles. Under the New Deal the National Youth Administration was set up under Johnson in Texas where 24% of eligible blacks were enrolled compared to only 24% of eligible white youth. LBJ voted against Civil Rights bill as he depended on support of the oil industry, he always felt that economic growth would solve the race problem. When southern leaders signed a petition against the Brown decision Johnson did not sign it as he knew it would end his chances of becoming president. He felt that the Race question obsessed the south and diverted it from dealing with its economic and education problem. The watered down Civil Rights bill of 1957 was to speed up desegregation in school but it had a symbolic effect. JFK won as Johnson was able to get him the southern votes. One of the roles he worked at under Kennedy was the committee of Equal Employment opportunities.- Federal contracts could only go to companies that made an effort to combat racism. "Lets make it fashionable to end discrimination" by Civil Rights under Kennedy was completely stymied. 1963 a few month before Kennedy's assassination Martin Luther's march on Washington his " I had a dream' failed to move congress. On becoming President ,Johnson announced that he would be the custodian of Kennedys legacy, and he needed Kennedys aids for an image of continuity. He liked Dean Rusk because Bobby disliked him. Walter Heller had assembled the poverty program and made little head way with Kennedy but Johnson immediately said that is my kind of program give it top priority. Johnson decided that the Civil Rights issue was a time when a poker player puts everything on the stack. Some Southerners said they could support a Civil Rights bill without the Public Accommodation clause but Johnson said that was the substance of the bill. The bill passed the house and Hubert Humphrey worked getting it through Congress. When people stopped waiting for someone else to take care of their problem and formed their own movement. Between 1954 and 1965 the movements philosophy was non violence within the American Legal System. 11 years till the militants took over in 1965 mostly in the north.

Johnson knew that symbolism was important and took on a black secretary Gerri Whittington and arranged for her to appear on a TV program. 1964 On New Years Eve LBJ was invited to the University of Austin faculty club which was segregated and walked in with Gerri Whittington on his arm and after that the club declared it was no longer segregated. When Gerri had asked him if he knew what he was doing he said "sure half the people will think you are my wife and that is fine by me" Walter Lipman -In the senate debate and discussion were replaced by delay and stultification Till he became president he had voted against all Civil Rights bills including that under Truman. Johnson had never been a segregationist and had quietly made efforts on behalf of poor blacks and Latinos but supporting Civil Rights in Texas was political suicide After the Brown case southern members sign a petition against the implementation , Johnson did not sign it as this southern manifesto would end his chances for the presidency. Mc Pherson – Johnson felt that the race question obsessed the South and diverted its attention from economic and education problems. UNDER Kennedy he said "let's make it fashionable to end discrimination" Soon after coming to office Johnson met the civil rights leaders and explained the challenge. He got George Meany of the trade Union to give support as well as the steel, electrical workers and auto workers unions. He knew that a new president could get legislation through while the momentum lasts. --------------------------------- LBJ said that Dickson the head of the Republicans is a man who thinks of the country before he thinks of his party. Dirksen the Civil Rights Act would pass because it was an idea whose time had come. The National Interreligious Convocation was taking place and Washington and they supported civil rights. Senators who wanted aid for sparkly populated states wanted aid for dams irrigation projects and the earthquake that struck Alaska were prepared to vote for cloture. Elections were coming up for the Senate and they wanted to start campaigning. Johnson But the times also called for a leader who could subdue the vast political and administrative forces arrayed against change. “We have talked long enough in this country about equal rights. We have talked for 100 years or more. It is time now to write the next chapter, and to write it in the books of law.” The best hope of moving the civil-rights bill from the House Rules Committee—whose segregationist chairman, Howard Smith of Virginia, had no intention of relinquishing it—was a procedure called a “discharge petition.” If a majority of House members sign a discharge petition, a bill is taken from the committee, to the chagrin of its chairman. Johnson made the petition his own personal crusade. Even Risen credits his zeal, noting that after receiving a list of 22 House members vulnerable to pressure on the petition, the president immediately ordered the White House switchboard to get them on the phone, wherever they could be found. Johnson engaged an army of lieutenants—businessmen, civil-rights leaders, labor officials, journalists, and allies on the Hill—to go out and find votes for the discharge petition. He cut a deal that secured half a dozen votes from the Texas delegation. He showed Martin Luther King Jr. a list of uncommitted Republicans and, as Caro writes, “told King to work on them.” He directed one labor leader to “talk to every human you could,” saying, “if we fail on this, then we fail in everything.” As a leading southern senator put it, “You know, we could have beaten John Kennedy on civil rights, but not Lyndon Johnson.” The pressure worked. On December 4—not two weeks into Johnson’s presidency—the implacable Chairman Smith began to give way. Rather than have the bill taken from his committee, he privately agreed to begin hearings that would conclude before the end of January, and then release the bill. Smith looked set to renege on his agreement in the new year, but reluctantly kept his word, allowing the bill to be sent to the full House on January 30, 1964. Risen credits others with this development, suggesting that it was Representative Clarence Brown of Ohio, a Republican member of the Rules Committee, among others, who got Smith to move. Risen is particularly sharp on the evolution of the Republicans during these tumultuous years, but here he accords them too much clout. Brown had to answer to House Republican Leader Charles Halleck of Indiana, whose support Johnson likely bought by proposing, and then personally securing, a NASA research facility at Purdue University, Indiana in Halleck’s district. And the entire Republican caucus in the House was wilting under Johnson’s relentless and very public campaign to portray “the party of Lincoln” as obstructing civil rights by opposing the discharge petition. Johnson kept the bill moving in the Senate by dislodging President Kennedy’s tax-cut bill from the Finance Committee. As vice president, Johnson had advised Kennedy not to introduce civil-rights legislation until the tax cut had cleared Congress. Kennedy didn’t listen, and now both bills were stuck. (Like House Rules, Senate Finance had a wily segregationist for a chairman: Harry Byrd of Virginia.) Risen minimizes the significance of this problem, writing that the tax bill “presented no procedural obstacle to the civil rights bill, only a political one.” (And when does politics ever derail legislation?!) As Caro explains, the tax bill was a hostage. By holding it in committee, the South pressured the administration to give up on civil-rights legislation, with the implication that the withdrawal of the latter might produce movement on the former. But Johnson and Byrd were old friends, and during an elaborate White House lunch they came to an understanding: if Johnson submitted a budget below $100 billion, Byrd would release the tax bill. Johnson then personally bullied department heads to reduce their appropriations requests, and delivered a budget of $97.9 billion. The Finance Committee passed the tax bill on January 23, 1964, with Byrd casting the deciding vote to allow a vote, then weighing in against the measure itself. The Senate passed the tax bill on February 7, mere days before the civil-rights bill cleared the House. Finally, Johnson helped usher the bill to passage in the Senate by working to break the southern filibuster, which was led by his political patron, the formidable Richard Russell of Georgia. In light of the Senate’s fiercely guarded independence, the president could not operate in the open; he had to use proxies like Humphrey, who was his protégé and future vice president, as well as the bill’s floor manager. Johnson impressed upon Humphrey that the vain and flamboyant Senate Republican Leader Everett Dirksen of Illinois was the key to delivering the Republican votes needed for cloture: “You and I are going to get Ev. It’s going to take time. We’re going to get him. You make up your mind now that you’ve got to spend time with Ev Dirksen. You’ve got to let him have a piece of the action. He’s got to look good all the time. Don’t let those [liberal] bomb throwers, now, talk you out of seeing Dirksen. You get in there to see Dirksen. You drink with Dirksen! You talk with Dirksen! You listen to Dirksen!” Johnson demanded constant updates from Humphrey and Majority Leader Mike Mansfield, and always urged more-aggressive tactics. (“The president grabbed me by my shoulder and damn near broke my arm,” said Humphrey.) Even though Senate Democrats did not deploy all those tactics, Johnson’s intensity nevertheless set the tone and supplied its own momentum. He kept up a steady stream of speeches and public appearances demanding Senate passage of the strong House bill, undiluted by horse-trading. And he personally lobbied senators to vote for cloture and end the filibuster. Risen contends that Johnson “persuaded exactly one senator” to change his vote on cloture. Given that it is of course impossible to know what motivated each senator’s final decision, this lowball figure is expressed with too much certitude. Evidence presented by Purdum and Caro suggests that Johnson’s importuning, bribing, and threatening may have made an impact on closer to a dozen. The Senate invoked cloture on June 10, breaking the longest filibuster in the institution’s history. The full Senate soon passed the bill. Johnson signed it into law on July 2, 1964, ). The provisions of this civil rights act forbade discrimination on the basis of sex as well as race in hiring, promoting, and firing. The word "sex" was added at the last moment Representative Howard W. Smith (D-VA) added the word. His critics argued that Smith, a conservative Southern opponent of federal civil rights, did so to kill the entire bill. The Bill was passed 8 days before the Republican Convention. and immediately turned his energies to what would become another landmark statute: the Voting Rights Act of 1965. LBJ understood that the desegregation would not happen until blacks became voters, in the south any black who applied to register would be beaten. LBJ needed this bill because there was no way that the Civil Rights could be a reality in the South until the Negro population could vote and finally change the statue quo. The march on Selma Alabama was declared illegal by Governor George Wallace, at the Edmund Pettus Bridge was the incident called "Bloody Sunday" Johnson wanted to send Federal troops to deal with this but that can only be done at the request of the State. However Wallace ask for a meeting with the president to get into the limelight, and saying he needed Federal funds to handle the situation. This was sufficient excuse for LBJ to send troops to protect the marchers. Johnson convened a prime time joint session of Congress and gave the American Promise Speech to introduce an immediate voting rights bill " no delay no hesitation and no compromise "and we shall overcome. He totally aligned himself with the civil rights cause and dispatched Federal inspectors to offending counties.----------------- A march from Selma to Montgomery organized by King for the right to register as voters was declared Illegal by the state governor George Wallace. The marchers were attacked at the Petrus bridge and this was all shown live on TV What became known as "Bloody Sunday.. Johnson wanted to send Federal troops but to do this needed the request of the governor. Wallace wanted to get into the limelight and requested a meeting with LBJ suggesting that Georgia could not handle this alone and wanted federal funds for help. Wallace's request was the excuse Johnson needed to send Federal troop to protect the marchers. Johnson convened a Prime Time joint session of the Congress and gave The American Promise speech to introduce an immediate voting rights bill, "no delays no hesitation no compromise " and we shall overcome. Federal inspectors would be dispatch to offending counties. the Voting Rights Act of 1965. came with the Selma struggle at the Edmond Petrus Bridge that followed Johnson speech "We shall overcome" Voting rights bill of 1965 Other general provisions specifically outlaw literacy tests. In 1968 when King was assassinated this was used to pass the "Open House Law" ---------------- 5 Days later the Black Rioting started at Watts California. "Abraham Lincoln struck off the chains of black Americans, but it was Lyndon Johnson who led them into voting booths, closed democracy’s sacred curtain behind them, placed their hands upon the lever that gave them a hold on their own destiny, made them, at last and forever, a true part of American political life.” ------------------ Walter Heller had assembled a poverty program and he presented it to Johnson who said "that is my kind of program, give it the highest priority. Unconditional war on poverty led to the 1964 Equal opportunity act. In the 1964 election Johnson won by 61.1% better than FDR had done and he now tried to bring about the Great Society. But the war in Vietnam and the Great Society could not be pursued at the same time. Just like Wilson and FDR domestic reform had to be abandoned to lead the nation to war. "" shall overcome" the other tune that plague Johnson's presidency was Hey hey LBJ. How many We kids have you killed today." When a Besides person has enough power to do what they want to then "power reveals" ------------------------------------------ Other bills included ending discrimination in public accommodation , education employment even in private housing . A century after Lincoln, LBJ became the most important codifier of compassion.. During his final years, Wallace recanted his racist views and asked for forgiveness from African Americans.

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Sweet Sunday by John Lawton 2002  351 pgs.   10/12/24

This is a novel about the 1960s with a mystery.

The author was in  High school with Buddy Holly in class of 55 in Lubbock, West Texas. He shook hand with LBJ and met Norman Mailer twice.

1954 Dien Blen Fhu the Vietnamese brought heavy weapons in pieces on bicycles and completely surprised the French by destroying their garrison there and resulted in the French leaving Vietnam.

1969 Norman Mailer ran for Mayor unsuccessfully and wanted to make the city a separate State. Mailer had fought in WW2 so was not part of this generation. This was the year Apollo 10 landed on the moon. "Moon Summer" The moon walk followed with Apollo 11. At a talk to be given by Norman Mailer a Viet Cong flag was up and said if it is not removed he won't speak. He did not like beards and was against dope.

WW2 we had won the good fight and owned the 20th Century, and wanted to make a kinder gentler place.

Pentagon march of 1967. Jerry Rubin was head of the Yippies, he was not the Brightest but was born to lead. Yippie a Hippie who has his head busted by a cop.

1934 to 2020 Gloria Steinem is an American journalist and social-political activist who emerged as a nationally recognized leader of second-wave feminism.

His family had settled in Texas high plains soon after  the Comanches last rout 1877. His mother died the day Japan surrendered Sept 7 1945. 

1967 He got a licensee as a Private Eye PI, and got a gun license with the job but never carried a gun. He helped blue collar people who could not get out of the draft and fled to Canada. Many a parent felt their sons were cowards and some hardly knew their sons. Wealthier kids could avoid the  draft by studying.

His father hated lawyers - to breed one of his own seemed the obvious solution. This Vietnam vet had died of "natural causes"  Cancer induced by Agent Orange.

His brother Huey got drafted and so fell out with his father a WW2 vet. There was a war between the generations. The draft board saw so many faking to be weird they couldn't tell who was faking.

"War makes men" that's crap all it does is make dead boys.  This colonel Feaver arrived and wanted 10 volunteer and this group all went and they committed a massacre's at the village afterwards the lieutenant shot himself in the head from what he saw. Welcome to Nam I finally killed somebody. Later on we discover that Colonel Feaver was without orders from Saigon and doing this on his own. The 9 soldiers were unwitting renegades and he had chosen them as they were greenhorns and there was no paramedic. (fictional part perhaps the My Lai was the real example) The 5 left of the group of 9 were given honorable discharges purple hearts and full pension. This was the first television war, but it was not live. The book The Quiet American by Graham Green 1955 already understood American in Vietnam.  Feaver was could not be discharged from the army as then they could no longer charge him.

William Wyler's The Best Years of Our Lives (1946) tells the story of three veterans returning from World War II

They return from Vietnam to a segregated America even Washington was clearing blacks out under the guise of urban renewal. "Vietnam was getting colored folk to kill colored folk"

1776 was no a revolution it was a change of ownership. HG Wells gave The Men in the Moon - if you don't like the world change it.

1950 Interstate travel was officially desegregated. Schools were desegregated in 1954 but in 1957 troops had to be sent to Little Rock to enforce it. 1957 the Supreme court desegregated bus terminals. The Freedom Riders the first bus in Aniston, Alabama was firebombed. LB Johnson was the greatest horse trader in Washington.

Howard was a University in Washington for blacks established in 1867 after the Civil War initially as a school of Divinity.

1962 with the Cuban missile crises the world changed forever. Cuba is only 90 miles from Florida. MAD stand for Mutually Assured Destruction. No one can win. To get to Cuba from America you had to fly to Austria cross into Hungary to get your flight.

Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee SNCC had a badge of a white and black hand holding each other.

1963 Paul Simon song about counting the cars on the New Jersey Turnpike, a quarter million people coming to look for America. Civil Rights March on Washington.   Peyote cap a hallucinating  mushroom.

Alice Babette Toklas 1877 to 1967 was Gertrude Steins companion in Paris and wrote a biography of Gertrude she is also famous for a cooking book.

1969 Woodstock is described in the book with free love, Many came to see Bob Dylan but he had, had a motorbike accident. This was part of the Civil Rights and the anti Vietnam war protest mood.

1974 Trick Dicky( Richard Nixon) told thousands of lies and got kicked out of office.

1936 to 1989 Abbie Hoffman died of drug overdose suicide.

1938 to 1994 Jerry Rubin Died in LA after being struck by a motorist. He had studied for a while at the Hebrew University, Jerusalem.

1977 Under Carter the draft dodgers were given an amnesty.

Colonialism: A moral reckoning 2023 by Nigal Bigger 2023 480pg

This book high light  some of the better aspects of British Colonialism which is a very controversial subject. 17/11/24

From the early 1800s the Empire was committed to abolishing the slave trade in the name of a Christian conviction of the basic equality of all human beings. It ended endemic inter-tribal warfare, opened local economies to the opportunities of global trade, moderated the impact of inescapable modernization, established the rule of law and liberal institutions such as a free press, While the British Empire was not without fault, its crimes have been greatly exaggerated and its virtues have been almost wholly ignored.  the Comanche extended their imperial sway over much of what is now Texas, while the Asante were expanding their control in West Africa. And in the 1820s King Shaka led the highly militarized Zulus in scattering other South African peoples. Anglo-American liberal world order that has prevailed since 1945.and they are the target at present  human societies all over the world have had slaves since prehistory. 

 In 1784  the prodigiously polyglot Sir William Jones in founding the Calcutta Asiatic Society .Rhodesia outperformed Ethiopia dramatically in terms of modern development[.]”

1950s and 1960s several million Chinese voted with their feet, fled the lawless mainland and found refuge in the colony of Hong Kong.

The whole campaign Rhodes must fall started in Cape  Town University in 2015 . This was build on land donated by Rhodes. The protests moved to Stellenbosch University the Rhodes University, Grahamstown. Later 2016 Pretoria and the  Orange Free State University and the issues of Afrikaans as a language medium came up also. At Oxford Oriel Collage where Rhodes scholars get bursaries. There many felt that they should be proud of British Colonialism.  This is what encouraged Nigel Bigger to write this book.

Rhodes was a moral mixture, he supported a franchise in the Cape Colony that gave Black African in the Cape Colony the same franchise as Whites based on education and property. He financed a black newspaper. The first black man was a beneficiary of  Rhodes a scholarship 5 years after his death.

In history there were many empires that came and went including in 1820 Shake's militarized empire that scattered other native South African peoples. The British was one of the biggest empires and gave birth the the USA , Canada Australia and New Zealand. 

The British were involved in the slave trade but later became the leading navy in patrolling to destroy the trade.  The beginning of Britain in S. Africa was when in 1814 the Dutch surrendered the Cape to them. Hong Kong was the last big colony given up in 1997.

The British Empire was not from its inception a coherent project and not the fruit of a single motive. The European Empire of the Nazi Regime that lasted 7 years from the Anschluss of Austria 1938 till the surrender to the Allies 1945 was the fruit of a single mind, Hitler's  Nazi project. Initially Wessex over England and England over Wales was the desire of a state of security. The Tudor colonies in north America were to secure England against Spanish Catholic domination of Phillip who wanted to wipe out Protestantism. Some overseas colonies were taken as a consequence of international rivalry. Later it was part of rivalry with France and the Napoleonic Wars. Later Russia became a rival for India. Then in WW1 Germany became a threat and Britain acquired more territory in Africa the Americas and the Middle East.

Rival Indian leaders enlisted British military expertise and the British trained their troops.  The often paid in land and allowed the British to tax, Warren Hasting in 1875 became the first governor  general and the East India Company just developed as commercial opportunities came up. Warren Hasting became fascinated by India's Hindu and Buddhist past mastered Bengali and pioneered the revival of Sanskrit. He and other rendered a service to Indian nationalism that few natives could have done. There was never a widespread  European immigration to India and in 1900 there were only 154,691 British to 300 million Indians.

Between 1815 and 1924 25 million continental Europeans migrated.  Till 1783 when the USA became independent convicted Britons were transported there to serve out their sentences.  After 1788 their destination became Australia till this ceased in 1868.

The reasons for migration differed in 1620 the Pilgrim Fathers sought to escape the Church of England and for religious freedom. 1783 British loyalists left the USA to Nova Scotia. Emigrants from Lowland Scotland and Ireland fled poverty, like the famine of the 1840s In the 1860s Livingstone lobbied the British government to suppress slavery and Nyasaland (Malawi today) was set up for agriculture to be an alternative to slavery.. 

Between 1895 and 1902 it is estimated that a million firearms entered British and German east Africa. The British realized that they must be wary conflict with Germany over colonies. 

Britain in 1880s had a strategic interest in the region between the lakes Victoria ,Kyoga , Albert , Edward and Tanganyika. Briain had taken over running Egypt who had gone bankrupt and these lakes were the source of the Nile. Egypt  had borrowed money for his economic expansion at the same time as cotton from the southern USA returned to the market to compete with Egypt after the civil war. The British Controller General was Lord Cromer who at heart felt he was responsible for the Egyptian peasant and so increased the tax burden on the landlords. He also did away with the corvee and substituted paid labour to clear the canals. Egypt was made up of Muslim peasants , landowners, clerics, but  also Armenians , Syrians and Coptic Christians and for the government to transcend ethnic biases you needed the British. British administration had brought prosperity to Egypt. Cromer left Egypt in 1907 but it took till 1956 for the last British troops to leave Egypt. Many Egyptians had welcomed the British in the 1890s but after WW1 with Egyptian nationalism the British had restored Egypt to an independent Kingdom.

In 1919 General Sir Henry Wilson chief of staff had warned the government that holding Palestine would bring similar problems to that of Ireland. The benefits would be outweighed by the military liability.

After WW1 Widrow Wilson promoted  the principle of self determination. Before this time all British Colonies with a majority white population had become self ruling  Dominions Canada , Australia , New Zealand.

The motives  for building the Empire were many and various and differed between the trader, migrant, soldier, missionary entrepreneur, financier, government official and statesmen. Of course good motives get corrupted by vices.

Slavery and the slave trade were well established in Africa long before the Europeans arrived, the Portuguese were the first to seeks slaves in the 1440s. It is estimated that a total of 12,508,351 slaves were exported. The British came into this trade in 1707 and exported 3,259,443.

 1787 in London the Society for the Abolition of the Slave Trade was inaugurated. The 1791 rebellion of slaves in Saint Dominque could not be suppressed by either the French or the British and it led to Haiti independence in 1804 and helped the way towards abolition. With the influence of William Wilberforce in 1834 throughout the British Empire slaves were emancipated and the British taxpayer contributed £20 million towards it to pay out slave owners rather than coerce them.

1814-1815 At the Congress of Vienna the British attempted to get all the nations to a general abolition treaty.  Between 1833 and 1865 the British navy had ships stopping the transport of slaves from Africa at one time they had as many as 36 ships on this duty. The British government leant on the Khedive of Egypt to stop slavery with general Charles Gordon going into the Sudan where the British were suppressing slavery against the Mahdi.In Zanzibar the consul general did away with slavery in stages and finally did in 1907.

Sir Stanford Raffles after 1807 applied this law to Penang and banned the importation of slaves into Java 1818, and established a school for their Children in Bencoolen.

On the subject of race at a time the Anglo Saxon race was considered superior. When Rhodes arrived in South Africa in 1870 and saw the Bantu Africans it was obvious to him that British civilization was way ahead in natural science, technology and finance, communications. naval power. Later on Rhodes never sought to overturn the colour blind franchise that existed in the Cape Colony since 1853 based on property and education and works.. He fought against the proposal to disenfranchise the Cape Blacks in 1899.Rhodes is  considered patronizing.  Is it patronizing when others need help?  King Faizal of Iraq in 1922 did not want Churchill to withdraw British troops.. In 1896 Rhodes parlayed with the Ndebele at great risk he learned of the humiliations that the blacks had suffered and  the white settlers had brought down this retribution on themselves. He allocated part of the land to be kept in perpetuity for the blacks .He  stipulated that the scholarships at Oriel Collage would be awarded without regard to race.

1857 The Indian Mutiny had effects on racial relations and Queen Victoria rebuked Her PM Lord Salisbury when he referred to the first Indian MP Dadabhai Naoroji as a black man.  The British attempts to stop customs like childhood marriage and female infanticide's antagonized. Indians who lived in England including Mohandas Ghandi did not experience British  racism until they returned to India or South Africa.

Train to Pakistan by Khushwant Singh 1956 181pg.

This is a novel that tries to show the social effect of partition of the average Indian. 18/11/24

movie of this book was released in 1998  

India before partition had a population of 400 million with an annual increase of 4 million.

Mano Majra, the fictional Indian village on the border of Pakistan, here people from all religions and sects once lived in harmony, but outside there are Moslem and Sikhs killing each other.

“Freedom is for the educated people who fought for it. We were slaves of the English, now we will be slaves of the educated Indians—or the Pakistanis” 

The District magistrate is a man in moral conflict who has probably used his power over the years with much corruption. He is washing himself like Pontius Pilate and drinking alcohol to flee guilt.  

 Iqbal is a Sikh a political agitator for workers rights but when it comes to action he does nothing. Jugga is described as a budmash, a bad man, by others but ultimately becomes a hero. 

1947 The cataclysmic events of the partition of India and creation of  Pakistan. This is a  social document on the upheaval, by a Punjabi whose family was uprooted.  Summer of 1947 was a long hot one. Riots broke out in  Calcutta and spread to Noakhali in East Bengal, Bihar and the Punjab. By the time the monsoons came a million people were dead. Rivers change their courses and moods without warning. The bridge has 18 enormous spans and a single track , express trains don't stop only the slow passenger  trains one in the morning from Lahore to Delhi and one in the evening to Lahore. The trains coming through set the times like prayers in the morning or  that of the evening meal.

Decoits killed the village money lender. Father and grandfather were decoits but they never robbed in their own village. With the monsoon Sutlej River is a grand and terrifying sight. No body in the villages knew of the British and the partition of Hindustan -Pakistan or about Gandhi or Jinna.

The police had heard of several young well to do men in peasant garb doing uplift work , some communist agents, all capable of making a lot of trouble. He claimed to be a social worker. He was asked why the English left. Everyone is welcome to his religion.

In Punjab the young men were all alike they wanted wives who were virgins' and women good at household chores. The match had to correspond to the horoscope. The press had an article on Indian ballet , movies and movie stars and  Tagore, Bengali poet, writer1861 to 1941. Rabindranath

In India the subject of sex always came up and you saw it on the billboards advertising aphrodisiacs' and cures for the bad effect of masturbation's, remedies and quacks against bareness, no people used some must incestuous  insults as here.

September things started going wrong trains were no longer punctual and ran through the night., the changed driver before going into Pakistan. A ghost train arrived from Pakistan nobody on the roof and a stench of death. People were kept away. The villages were paid for firewood and paraffin and the army burned the bodies.

Monsoon is another word for rain the Arabic means season. The winter is simple cold rain but the summer is proceeded by drought, hot and thirsty, rivers and everything dries up till the monsoon that lasts for 2 or more months is welcomes.

Hijras (Hermaphrodites')   are not Moslem or Hindu. They  were dancers singer and entertainers. Sikhs who objected to them heard their joke "Are you worried that you will stop having children because of our presence"

The Moslems were rounded up and put in a camp for their own protection but they asked "What have we got to do with Pakistan?" We have lived all our life in this village. Where on earth would a man's life depend on whether on not his foreskin was removed ?

India is constipated with a lot of Humbug. Take religion. For the  Hindu it means little besides cast and cow protection. For the Muslim circumcision's and kosher meat. Parsi  fire worship and feeding vultures. The ethics that should be the kernel of a religious code has been carefully removed.

When people go about with guns and spears you can only talk back with guns and spears.

Nooran was  pregnant with Jugga's daughter and his mother said what does a Moslem weavers daughter want with my  Sikh's peasant. son.   Malli's gang were let loose and took all goods left by the Moslems.

Now the topic of conversation was that the Sutlej river kept on going up and there were villages that had been flooded. Dead bodies were floating down that were not drowned but murdered.

With light they saw a ghost train that had arrived from Pakistan but there was no wood to burn and it was too wet. A bulldozer appeared and dug a trench that was filled with bodies. 

Do you know how many trainloads of Sikhs and Hindus have come over ?How many massacres' have taken place in Rawalpindi , Gujranwala and Sheikhupura. This young army officer organized that they kill the Moslems on the train to Pakistan and they must show that they are men

A rope had been put across the rail line on the bridge it would have been like a knife cutting people on to of the train.  The young tall man(Jugga ?) started cutting it and some one shot at him to stop him, just as the train arrived he cut though the last strand and fell down with the rope under the train.

Who by Fire by Matti Friedman 196 pg 2022

  How Leonard Cohens music developed as a result of his experience in the 1973 Yom Kippur War in Israel.   27/10/24

Leonard Cohen had played at the Wight Festival which  had an audience greater than that of Woodstock.  He was 39 and the press had reported news of his retirement as he saw himself as a has-been. He also saw himself as a great pacifist but his songs So Long Marianne and Suzanne were well known.

It is not necessary to know about Spain's civil war to know about Picasso's Guernica.  People don't realize that Beethoven 5th Symphony was composed amid the Napoleonic Wars. Leonard Cohen concert tour of Israel during the 1973 war, left hardly any recordings, but has lived on in history by word of mouth.  That terrible month of October 1973 has become linked with Leonard Cohen. The war is sometimes referred to as the War Of Atonement.

Israel Airforce that was supposed to win the war, was instead crippled by new Soviet missiles. There were 2,600 fatalities and Israel became a different country afterwards. The country became less confident , less united and more introspective after the war.  One of the oddest aspect about this tour was that Leonard never mentioned it afterwards. What made this tour exceptional was the audiences. He played for them knowing his music might be the last thing they heard. Most of the soldiers did not speak English but poetry can communicate before it is understood.

Many Israelis at the time, if asked where are your parents from replied the "holocaust."

The work of the poetess Rachel of the old pioneers of the 1920 and died of tuberculosis. Her poetry was much loved even though it was sad and cynical.

Yom Kippur fell on October 5th in 1973 on that day a prayer  is said "who by water and who by fire" The symbolism is violent and memorable and we remember the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem in 70 CE. Nobody  heard the Na'ila service of the story of Jonah that concluded the service as if it lasted for another 3 weeks.

At Sharm el Sheik there were reports that the radar station and its soldiers had been captured by Egyptian commandoes. The Egyptians had rocketed the base but no enemy soldiers had arrived only Israeli soldiers sent to recapture it had fought with Israeli's there till they realized. Nobody talked about this for the next 30 years.

  Aged 13 Leonard a Cohen had his barmitvah under the Hebrew name of the priest Eliezer. (in Hebrew = God Helps)

 Leonard Cohen had been living on the island of Hydra. He had learned Greek and had written a novel there. He had escaped Montreal then London. He had been busy escaping and was attracted to the cheap living and warm weather and had a girlfriend Suzanne and his first kid a son Adam. Another  Suzanne was a dancer in Montreal. He had spent years in a Buddist Monestary at Mt Baldy in California.  "He though that the only culture worth anything came from loyalty to a language , group , place. Only Nationalism produces art" 

 When the war broke out it was not easy to reach Israel as many Israelis were trying to get home to their reserve units. There were priority list to serve in tanks and hospitals.  Leonard had thought he would volunteer to work on a kibbutz where help was needed. Many volunteers had done so in 1967 when soldiers were called to the front.

He considered Israel his myth home and arrived in Tel Aviv a small Mediterranean City founded in 1909. Almost everybody over 30 had escaped Europe or the Arab world. Writers and artist hung out at the Cafes Casit , California or Pinati. 

1972  he had played in Israel after a troubled touring year and it hadn't gone well for him.

Now in Tel Aviv he met Matti Kaspi considered one of Israel's best musicians at the time who wanted him to come and sing to the troops but Leonard felt his songs were too melancholy and would get soldiers depressed.

The music in Israel at the time was accordion heave and the 1973 war killed that genre. In 1948 Shoshana Damari's "Last Battle" was a hit it was about the Faluja Pocket and was the last battle for 7 soldiers who were killed.

The airforce was hemorrhaging planes and pilots at a shocking rate and this was hidden from the public.  None of the artists knew how bad things were and what they were getting themselves into.

Israeli songs had come from the same source as her weapons. So when weapons came from the Czechs the inspiration of communist and Russian tunes came. Later all the artist that mattered were visiting Paris and Piaf and Moustaki songs came while Israel got French Mirages. The French chose the Arabs over the Jews and weapons started coming from America with Rock and Roll. Chocolate Menta , Mastic was a 3 women group in very prominent at this time.

"I asked my father to change my name"  Leonard just wrote this song and was trying it out on an audience, many of whom had changed Jewish names associated with the Diaspora and helplessness to new Hebrew ones.  Matti Caspi's father from Serbia's name was Agrentero (silver) "Lover lover lover come back to me"  is more like a prayer or in Song of Songs. "And Shield against the enemy" is also like a prayer invoking a shield is what a Cohen does.

Leonard's mother was a native Russian speaker, and must have sung to him some Russian songs.

A year of 2 later when this song was released the words were changed and the part identifying with Israel was gone. On stage he would tell the audience that the song was for both sides.

 In the Vietnam war the songs the  American troops loved were about loneliness and yearning.  Johnny Cash and his wife were in Vietnam in 1969 even though the war was so unpopular.

Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach was attracting  Jews to Judaism in the 70s from hippy, drug  taking types. Was Leonard coming back to his tribe?

Troops were being taken to the Sinai on DC 3 Dakotas and the entertainers went with them. Where even though the public had not been informed of the army's failure it was clear from here. None of Leonard's notes indicate if he knew where he was, just "the dessert".  Raising  morale to soldiers that had seen true and awful things about the world.

The song Susanne was played the most as  everyone  knew it, as it was circulating in Hebrew by Gidi Koren, but later on the Hebrew version was forgotten. That Leonard slept on the floor and ate  combat rations with everyone else meant a lot to the troops.

Some soldiers after the war felt a sort of emptiness went back to old time religion including Uri Zohar a very famous actor, singer , comedian. Yom Kippur day is the only day of the year that Israel roads are empty and it allowed the army to deploy quickly.

Leonard said I sing serious songs on stage because I couldn't do it any other way. Now a serious person who has seen war.  

In 1948 at Israel's birth when soldiers fought they thought there would  be one war only  and that's it. Soldiers in war don't want to hear songs about war or battle anthem. Leonard's songs were precisely what was called for under the circumstances, and it came across in a language they didn't understand. Soldiers aren't mental patients but sometimes are not far from that. Sleep is the only way to block out what is going on.

Danny Kaye and the French Jewish singer Enrico Marcias were far more famous than Leonard.

Father and son's were both fighting. Some who fought in 1948 were still fighting. They crossed the Suez into Africa and were near a base called Fa'id.  Yaffa Yarkoni famous for ballads from 1948 was there on the front line.

An Egyptian plane was shot down and the pilot was handed over to the interrogators and the parachute was taken to be used as a tent. The band was now flown across to Africa in a helicopter. Nobody remember that he arrived but he was just there. The guitar case had chalked on it Matti as it was Matti Caspi's. Leonard arrived in Israel without a guitar.

Israel was feeling isolated as Europe would not allow over flights of weapons. Leonard arrived in Sharm el Sheik on 20 Oct mentioned in a postcard sent by Ruti.

 Lu Yehi (would that it were)by Noami Shemer an anthem and loved song of the war , almost a prayer. This song gave people the right to cry. It was based on Let it be a song by Paul McCartney.

Leonard Cohens songs were an acquired taste in America almost to the end of his life however in France they were popular.

Once the fighting ended and the politicians took over Leonard said "I'm out" and he rarely mentioned the war afterwards. Attitudes to Israel were changing. Winning which Israel had done at great cost makes people less sympathetic. A year later Leonard  had a 2nd son with Suzanne name Lorca.

Nathan Cohen fought in the Great War and was one of the first Jews to become an officer he died when his son Leonard was 9

After  1973 Israel's music seen went in Leonard's direction away from the collective to the individual soul.  Leonard wrote other albums inspired by his experience in 1974  New Skin for old Ceremomy. Later Halaluyah became one of the most widely song songs. The Yom Kippur War is a turning point and a major event in the life of Leonard Cohen.

2009 Leonard found that his manager had stolen his saving and did a tour where he found he had reached fame and filled stadiums around the world. By then Israel had abandoned the kibbutz and collective ideal and were more like Cohen. They had always considered him a kind of Israeli. Tickets for his show in Tel Aviv were sold out on line in minutes and the stadium of 50, 000 was filled. To be politically correct he announced a concert in Ramallah but this fell away when there were calls to boycott it.

This concert went down as one of the best ever held. Many of the audience remembered him from the war. In the encore he raised his hands parted his finger and said the 15 words in  Hebrew of Birkat ha Cohanim. (A prayer that only Cohens "priests" say)

Today sometimes the prayer "Who by Water" is sang in synagogues to Leonard's Tune.

1934 to 2016. Died aged 82 and was buried with his family in Montreal. In retrospect he was considered a writer of Religious songs.

The Siege: by Ben Macintyre 2024 379pg

A six- Day hostage Crisis and the Daring Special Forces operation that shocked the world.  30/10/24

The Iranian Embassy is a building on Princess Gate, Kensington. London overlooking Hyde Park build in 1849. former residents include Joseph Chamberlain and Field Marshal Douglas Haig.

1979 with the Islamic Revolution and the Pahlavi Dynasty was replaced by Khomeini. So Ambassador Radji followed the king into exile and Dr Gholam Ali Afrouz took over. He made the Embassy Islamic austere, no parties, no alcohol, the Rolls was replaced by a ordinary vehicle etc. 

1980 May  PC Lock  a armed policeman stood outside the Iranian embassy but had just moved in to drink his coffee. Thinking it was an middle eastern student till he saw the rifle. He pressed his emergency button and Scotland Yard was alerted.  31 people were in the embassy. Afrouz jumped out the window was badly hurt and the gunmen pulled him back in.

 Rebecca West the famous author aged 88 lived opposite and was watching and started making notes on what was happening. Later was evacuated till the siege was over. In the end she wrote an article on her birds eye view of what she saw and this was the last article she published before she died in 1983.

The Khomeini's regime had taken 91 Arabs in Iranian Arabstan prisoners  and this  Martyr Muhylddin Al Nassar group had taken the Embassy to get them released. The British  police didn't understand the issue. To them there was the pro Shah or pro Khomeini protesters.

1925 Resa Shah Palavi took power with British backing tried replacing  Persian in the minority areas of Arabic, Turkic and other languages. This province was Arabstan or Ahwas but was renamed Khuzestan the Persian term. Independent it could have been a gulf state like Kuwait or Qatar and it posseted most of Iran's oil. Arabs thought that the end of the Shah and the Khomeini's promise would get Arabstan it rights.  Many from Arabstan fled to Iraq where they were trained to undermine the Khomeini regime. The Islamic State ignored the 4,500,000 Arabs.

1975  Ramirez Sanchez or Carlos the Jackal led a group of pro- Palestinians militants in an assault on the OPED meeting in Vienna. With a large ransom for the Palestinian cause were flown out to Libya. Carlos organized this London attack but did not take part in it.

General Abdul Razzaq al-Naif who was the former Iraqi PM  and was deposed by Saddam Hussein. He was assassinated  in London as he left the Intercontinental Hotel in 1978.

1979 In Teheran the US embassy was taken hostage and this gave President Carter a problem. The American attempt with Delta Force to liberate these hostages had failed as 3 of the 8 helicopter were crippled before reaching the rendezvous.

In 1972 the Black September had seized the Israeli athletes in Munich and a disaster followed resulting in all the hostages and most of the terrorists killed. This resulted in the  British SAS training on how to deal with this type of thing.

With the siege the police now put a negotiator to help try gather information of the personalities motivation and intention as well as weapons' hopes and fear of the hostage takers. 3 Iranian captives were press officers and 2 British journalist as well. The terrorist wanted recognition of free Arabstan. Though they claimed to be suicidal fanatics they had invested in expensive watches and bracelets and that contradicted this.

Douglas Hurd was foreign minister. Thatcher had left little to  negotiate with. Professor John Gunn of forensic psychiatry was an expert on criminal behavior.

The Ayatollah government in Iran had declared that the Iranian diplomats were prepared to become martyrs for the Islamic State cause.

Being held hostage can cause or exacerbate and number of health issues.

The police set up in the School of Needlework a museum where to protect the object smoking is forbidden . It is  difficult to control a siege with fidgety, nicotine deprived people nipping out for a smoke, so they moved to the Montessori Centre. They now had to obtain recent photos and build up a file of the terrorists as well as the hostages.  By chance this embassy was the most defensible building in London as it had been given bullet proof glass and had been reinforced..

M16 and the Foreign Office had concluded correctly that Saddam Hussein was behind this attack and openly supported the Arab Liberation Movement in Iran. The weapons smuggled in to kill General Abdu Razzag wl Naif in 1978 had come in under diplomatic cover. Hussein thugs with Palestinian Allies. The terrorists demand was that 91 Arab political  prisoners in Iran's jails be released.

One death of a hostage leave room for a relatively peaceful solution 2 shows a dangerous trend.

Margret Thatcher stated that if things go horribly wrong then she  would take the blame and not the soldiers.

300 Khomeini supporter protested in London, shouting " Death to President Carter"

The Iranian government declared that their London  embassy staff were prepared to die as martyr and go directly to heaven for Iran and would not negotiate with the terrorists.  Martyrdom is central to Shia Islam. Kurt Waldheim was secretary general of UN and called for restraint.  

The SAS had been based in Ireland and had fought the IRA there and Lord Louis Mountbatten the Queens cousin was assassinated  there in 1979 in the period of troubles 1968 to 1998.

 Stockholm Syndrome where the hostages empathize with their captors and goals. Lima Syndrome where the abductors form warm feeling for those they have captured and begun to question their own aims. The gunmen wanted to write slogans on the walls of the rooms and it led to an argument with the Embassy staff. This siege was a proxy war between Iraq and Iran and no Arab countries wanted to get embroiled in it.

Under the Khomeini Regime the embassy women had to wear scarves by now they had removed them.

The police thought that if women police were used they could get a better deal if they had to drive  the terrorist ta an airport, women have a softer and gentler approach.  Women had not been used since WW2 under Churchills Special Operations that deployed women in Nazi occupied Europe.

1970  El Al flight Leila Khaled tried to highjack was arrested on landing in London and put in jail but released in a hostage  exchange.

Planes flying to Heathrow were rerouted over this Kensington embassy so that the could drill listening devises into the walls during the noise. Before they attacked the SAS had plans of the embassy building and almost knew  where each hostage  and the terrorists were. BBC kept reporting that a diplomatic solution was still being sought. Some of the terrorists' were keen to give up as they had made their point and if nobody was killed were told they would hardly spend time in jail. 

1980 Josip Broz Tito   the President of Yugoslavia died while this was on.

This saw the largest gathering of news reporters since the Queens coronation in 1953

Three TV stations viewed what looked like a catastrophe unfolding. The building was rocked by an explosion. The first breaking news event broadcast alive on every British TV channel.  After the hostages arrived at the back it was unclear how many survived some were injured. 2 hostages had died. One killed by the terrorists. The SAS operation had been a complete and dramatic success and Margaret Thatcher breathed a sign of relief. William Whitelaw realized that Margaret had taken on an immense burden and responsibility. Operation Nimrod had lasted just 11 minutes. Named after the biblical warlike hunter.

The embassy siege changed the way the world saw the SAS , Margaret Thatcher and terrorism. She was iron willed , uncompromising and decisive and had sent a signal every where that they could not expect deals. This was a crime committed on British soil.  The SAS moved away behind the building and were taken away in a closed vehicle and not interviewed by the press. The 19mm parabellum bullet comes from the Latin saying Si vis pacem para bellum." If you seek peace prepare for war". Some of the soldiers, paratroopers had seen service in Cyprus , Borneo, Libya, Malta and Middle East.

1982 The Argentine junta invaded the Falklands.  The SAS was now part of  Mrs. Thatcher's Army  and sent to fight against Argentina.

The Iranian Government thanked Britain for liberating its diplomats but refused to release the American hostages, in Teheran. The attack on the embassy was an attempt by Sandam Hussein to destabilize Iran and the Iran, Iraq war erupted in Sept 1980.

1982 one of Abu Nidal group attempted to assassinator Israeli Ambassador Shlomo  Argov and this led to the Israeli invasion of Lebanon to root out PLO terrorists.