Good Morning & God Bless To Every One !!!
Today is January 21, the 21st day of 2014 and there are 344 days left this year where it is another Blessed day in the work for our Lord at:
For God’s Glory Alone Ministries !!!
Yet another wonderful, but dry, day here on God’s beautiful Earth where it is presently 30 degrees outside here in Albuquerque at 3:08 a.m. A slight wind has our current wind chill at 25 degrees and we have clear skies with His glorious stars shining above us. High today is in the upper 50s with mostly sunny skies. Tomorrow’s weather here is expected to be just about exactly the same as today, but that being a full day from now I’m not giving odds!
So, What Happened Today In 1968 ?
The Battle for Khe Sanh begins in the Vietnam War
One of the most publicized and controversial battles of the war begins at Khe Sanh, 14 miles below the DMZ and six miles from the Laotian border.
Seized and activated by the U.S. Marines a year earlier, the base, which had been an old French outpost, was used as a staging area for forward patrols and was a potential launch point for contemplated future operations to cut the Ho Chi Minh Trail in Laos. The battle began on this date with a brisk firefight involving the 3rd Battalion, 26th Marines and a North Vietnamese battalion entrenched between two hills northwest of the base. The next day North Vietnamese forces overran the village of Khe Sanh and North Vietnamese long-range artillery opened fire on the base itself, hitting its main ammunition dump and detonating 1,500 tons of explosives.
An incessant barrage kept Khe Sanh’s Marine defenders pinned down in their trenches and bunkers. Because the base had to be resupplied by air, the American high command was reluctant to put in any more troops and drafted a battle plan calling for massive artillery and air strikes. During the 66-day siege, U.S. planes, dropping 5,000 bombs daily, exploded the equivalent of five Hiroshima-sized atomic bombs in the area. The relief of Khe Sanh, called Operation Pegasus, began in early April as the 1st Cavalry (Airmobile) and a South Vietnamese battalion approached the base from the east and south, while the Marines pushed westward to reopen Route 9.
The siege was finally lifted on April 6 when the cavalrymen linked up with the 9th Marines south of the Khe Sanh airstrip. In a final clash a week later, the 3rd Battalion, 26th Marines drove enemy forces from Hill 881 North. Gen. William Westmoreland, commander of U.S. Military Assistance Command Vietnam, contended that Khe Sanh played a vital blocking role at the western end of the DMZ, and asserted that if the base had fallen, North Vietnamese forces could have outflanked Marine defenses along the buffer zone. Various statements in the North Vietnamese Communist Party newspaper suggested that Hanoi saw the battle as an opportunity to re-enact its famous victory at Dien Bien Phu, when the communists had defeated the French in a climactic decisive battle that effectively ended the war between France and the Viet Minh.
There has been much controversy over the battle at Khe Sanh, as both sides claimed victory. The North Vietnamese, although they failed to take the base, claimed that they had tied down a lot of U.S. combat assets that could have been used elsewhere in South Vietnam. This is true, but the North Vietnamese failed to achieve the decisive victory at Khe Sanh that they had won against the French. For their part, the Americans claimed victory because they had held the base against the North Vietnamese onslaught. It was a costly battle for both sides. The official casualty count for the Battle of Khe Sanh was 205 Marines killed in action and over 1,600 wounded (this figure did not include the American and South Vietnamese soldiers killed in other battles in the region). The U.S. military headquarters in Saigon estimated that the North Vietnamese lost between 10,000 and 15,000 men in the fighting at Khe Sanh.
Other Memorable Or Interesting Events Occurring On January 21 In History:
1189 – Philip Augustus, Henry II of England and Frederick Barbarossa assemble the troops for the Third Crusade;
1648 – Margaret Brent went before the Maryland colonial assembly to seek two votes in that body, one for herself as a landowner, the other as the legal representative of the absent Lord Baltimore; the assembly turned her down;
1738 – Ethan Allen, future Revolutionary War hero and key founder of the Republic of Vermont, is born in Litchfield, Connecticut;
1785 – Chippewa, Delaware, Ottawa and Wyandot Indians sign the treaty of Fort McIntosh, ceding present-day Ohio to the United States;
1790 – Joseph Guillotine proposes a new, more humane method of execution: a machine designed to cut off the condemned person’s head as painlessly as possible;
1793 – One day after being convicted of conspiracy with foreign powers and sentenced to death by the French National Convention, King Louis XVI is executed by guillotine in the Place de la Revolution in Paris;
1855 – In the ‘Old West’, John Moses Browning, sometimes referred to as the “father of modern firearms,” is born in Ogden, Utah. Many of the guns manufactured by companies whose names evoke the history of the American West-Winchester, Colt, Remington, and Savage-were actually based on John Browning’s designs;
1861 – Jefferson Davis of Mississippi and four other Southerners whose states had seceded from the Union resigned from the U.S. Senate;
1863 – In the American Civil War, two Confederate ships drive away two Union ships as the Rebels recapture Sabine Pass, Texas, and opening an important port along the gulf coast of Texas for the Confederacy;
1867 – French Gen. Maxime Weygand is born in Belgium. He was one of the commanders who accepted the German surrender at the close of World War I only to advise the French government to surrender to the Germans early in World War II;
1908 – New York City adopts a regulation making it illegal for a woman to smoke in public;
1921 – J.D. Rockefeller pledges $1 million for the relief of Europe’s destitute;
1924 – Vladimir Lenin, the architect of the Bolshevik Revolution and the first leader of the Soviet Union, dies of a brain hemorrhage at the age of 54;
1950 – In the conclusion to one of the most spectacular trials in U.S. history, former State Department official Alger Hiss is convicted of perjury. He was convicted of having perjured himself in regards to testimony about his alleged involvement in a Soviet spy ring before and during World War II;
1957 – Patsy Cline, one of the most important figures in country music history, first gains national attention with her winning appearance on Arthur Godfrey‘s Talent Scouts on January 21, 1957;
1959 – Carl Dean Switzer, the actor who as a child played “Alfalfa” in the Our Gang comedy film series, dies at age 31 in a fight, allegedly about money, in a Mission Hills, California, home. Alfalfa, the freckle-faced boy with a warbling singing voice and a cowlick protruding from the top of his head, was Switzer’s best-known role;
1976 – From London’s Heathrow Airport and Orly Airport outside Paris, the first Concordes with commercial passengers simultaneously take flight on January 21, 1976. The London flight was headed to Bahrain in the Persian Gulf, and the Paris to Rio de Janeiro via Senegal in West Africa. At their cruising speeds, the innovative Concordes flew well over the sound barrier at 1,350 miles an hour, cutting air travel time by more than half;
1977 – Italy legalizes abortion;
1977 – Following the Vietnam War U.S. President Jimmy Carter grants an unconditional pardon to hundreds of thousands of men who evaded the draft during the War.In total, some 100,000 young Americans went abroad in the late 1960s and early 70s to avoid serving in the war. Ninety percent went to Canada, where after some initial controversy they were eventually welcomed as immigrants. Still others hid inside the United States. In addition to those who avoided the draft, a relatively small number–about 1,000–of deserters from the U.S. armed forces also headed to Canada. While the Canadian government technically reserved the right to prosecute deserters, in practice they left them alone, even instructing border guards not to ask too many questions;
1994 – A jury in Manassas, Va., found Lorena Bobbitt not guilty by reason of temporary insanity of maliciously wounding her husband John, whom she’d accused of sexually assaulting her;
2009 – Toyota officially passes General Motors as the world’s biggest car manufacturer;
2013 – It was one year ago TODAY !
Now Off To The Fun Stuff:
Today’s Patriotic Quote:
“An intellectual is a man who takes more words than necessary to tell more than he knows.”
– President Dwight D. Eisenhower
Today’s “This Is What Camera’s Are Made For’ Picture:
Today’s Funny Animal Video:
A Husky & a baby hold quite a conversation; (and they probably understand each other better than most ‘grown-ups’) – https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=Nupfxo2ihQc
Today’s ‘Oops Construction Site’ Picture:
Today’s Crazy Law:
In Evanston, Illinois – It is unlawful to change clothes in an automobile with the curtains drawn, except in case of fire.
Today’s Crazy ?/Thought:
Why does caregiver and caretaker mean the same thing?
Today’s Thought/Quote:
“It is a thousand times better to have common sense without education than to have education without common sense.”
– Robert Green Ingersoll
Today’s ‘The AWE Of GOD Picture’:
Today’s Inspirational Thought For The Day:
“Don’t be afraid of death, so much as an inadequate life.”
– Bertolt Brecht
Today’s Inspirational Music Video:
Jesus, Friend Of Sinners – https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=rJXIugwiN7Q
Today’s ‘Moment That Makes You Happy’ Picture:
Today’s Job Issue:
I attempted to work as a Deli Worker, but any way I sliced it … I couldn’t cut the mustard.
Today’s ‘From Mom’s Dictionary’:
Energy – Element of vitality kids always have an oversupply of until asked to do something.
Today’s ‘How The Heck Did That Happen’ Picture:
Today’s ‘A Sign For Every Profession’:
In a Veterinarian’s waiting room – “Be back in 5 minutes … SIT! … STAY!
Today’s Joke Of The Day:
Little Johnny watched, fascinated, as his mother gently rubbed cold cream on her face.
“Why are you rubbing cold cream on your face, Mommy?” he asked.
“To make myself beautiful,” his mother replied.
A few minutes later, she began removing the cream with a tissue.
“What’s the matter?” asked Little Johnny.
“Giving up?”
(Ouch!)
Today’s Funny Sign:
Today’s Verse & Prayer:
Those who are taught the word of God should provide for their teachers, sharing all good things with them. Don’t be misled – you can not mock the justice of God. You will always harvest what you plant.
Eternal God, who lived before time began and who will be the Great I AM when time is no more, bless the seeds I sow that they may bear fruit to you and bless those I love. Through Jesus, the grain of wheat who died and was buried so that true life may flower forth. Amen.
Today’s Funny Church Sign:
Until Tomorrow – God Bless To Every One !!!
