Good Morning & God Bless To Every One !
Today is June 11, the 162nd day of 2014 and there are 203 days left this year where it is another Blessed Day in the pleasure of our service for our Lord here at:
For God’s Glory Alone Ministries !!!
Just Thinkin –
While nine million American vets have to make do with 267,000 VA employees — not nearly all of whom are medical professionals — 150 Muslim terrorists at Gitmo have 100 doctors and nurses at their beck and call. It begs the question: What sort of people are we that we treat the creeps trying to kill us better than we treat the men and women who risked their lives and lost their limbs trying to defend us?
So, What Happened Today In 1967?
The Middle East ‘Six Day Way’ comes to an end
The Six-Day War between Israel and its Arab neighbors ends with a United Nations-brokered cease-fire. The outnumbered Israel Defense Forces achieved a swift and decisive victory in the brief war, rolling over the Arab coalition that threatened the Jewish state and more than doubling the amount of territory under Israel’s control. The greatest fruit of victory lay in seizing the Old City of Jerusalem from Jordan; thousands of Jews wept while bent in prayer at the Second Temple’s Western Wall.
Increased tensions and skirmishes along Israel’s northern border with Syria were the immediate cause of the third Arab-Israeli war. In 1967, Syria intensified its bombardment of Israeli settlements across the border, and Israel struck back by shooting down six Syrian MiG fighters. After Syria alleged in May 1967 that Israel was massing troops along the border, Egypt mobilized its forces and demanded the withdrawal of the U.N. Emergency Force from the Israel-Egypt cease-fire lines of the 1956 conflict. The U.N. peacekeepers left on May 19, and three days later Egypt closed the Strait of Tiran to Israeli shipping. On May 30, Jordan signed a mutual-defense treaty with Egypt and Syria, and other Arab states, including Iraq, Kuwait, and Algeria, sent troop contingents to join the Arab coalition against Israel.
With every sign of a pan-Arab attack in the works, Israel’s government on June 4 authorized its armed forces to launch a surprise preemptive strike. On June 5, the Six-Day War began with an Israeli assault against Arab air power. In a brilliant attack, the Israeli air force caught the formidable Egyptian air force on the ground and largely destroyed the Arabs’ most powerful weapon. The Israeli air force then turned against the lesser air forces of Jordan, Syria, and Iraq, and by the end of the day had decisively won air superiority.
Beginning on June 5, Israel focused the main effort of its ground forces against Egypt’s Gaza Strip and the Sinai Peninsula. In a lightning attack, the Israelis burst through the Egyptian lines and across the Sinai. The Egyptians fought resolutely but were outflanked by the Israelis and decimated in lethal air attacks. By June 8, the Egyptian forces were defeated, and Israel held the Gaza Strip and the Sinai to the Suez Canal.
Meanwhile, to the east of Israel, Jordan began shelling its Jewish neighbor on June 5, provoking a rapid and overwhelming response from Israeli forces. Israel overran the West Bank and on June 7 captured the Old City of East Jerusalem. The chief chaplain of the Israel Defense Forces blew a ram’s horn at the Western Wall to announce the reunification of East Jerusalem with the Israeli-administered western sector.
To the north, Israel bombarded Syria’s fortified Golan Heights for two days before launching a tank and infantry assault on June 9. After a day of fierce fighting, the Syrians began a retreat from the Golan Heights on June 10. On June 11, a U.N.-brokered cease-fire took effect throughout the three combat zones, and the Six-Day War was at an end. Israel had more than doubled its size in the six days of fighting.
The U.N. Security Council called for a withdrawal from all the occupied regions, but Israel declined, permanently annexing East Jerusalem and setting up military administrations in the occupied territories. Israel let it be known that Gaza, the West Bank, the Golan Heights, and the Sinai would be returned in exchange for Arab recognition of the right of Israel to exist and guarantees against future attack. Arab leaders, stinging from their defeat, met in August to discuss the future of the Middle East. They decided upon a policy of no peace, no negotiations, and no recognition of Israel, and made plans to zealously defend the rights of Palestinian Arabs in the occupied territories.
Egypt, however, would eventually negotiate and make peace with Israel, and in 1982 the Sinai Peninsula was returned to Egypt in exchange for full diplomatic recognition of Israel. Egypt and Jordan later gave up their respective claims to the Gaza Strip and the West Bank to the Palestinians, who beginning in the 1990s opened “land for peace” talks with Israel. The East Bank territory has since been returned to Jordan. In 2005, Israel left the Gaza Strip. Still, a permanent Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement remains elusive, as does an agreement with Syria to return the Golan Heights.
Other Memorable Or Interesting Events Occurring On June 11 In History:
631 – Emperor Taizong of Tang, the Emperor of China, sends envoys to the Xueyantuo bearing gold and silk in order to persuade the release of enslaved Chinese prisoners who were captured during the transition from Sui to Tang from the northern frontier; this embassy succeeded in freeing 80,000 Chinese men and women who were then returned to China;
758 – Abbasid Arabs and Uyghur Turks arrive simultaneously at Chang’an, the Tang Chinese capital, in order to offer tribute to the imperial court. The Arabs and Turks bicker and fight over diplomatic prominence at the gate, in order to present tribute before the other. A settlement is reached when both are allowed to enter at the same time, but through two different gates to the palace;
1346 – Charles IV of Luxembourg is elected Holy Roman Emperor;
1509 – King Henry VIII of England marries Catherine of Aragon, the first of six wives he will have in his lifetime. When Catherine failed to produce a male heir, Henry divorced her against the will of the Roman Catholic Church, thus precipitating the Protestant Reformation in England. Henry went on to have five more wives; two of whom–Anne Boleyn and Catherine Howard–he executed for alleged adultery after he grew tired of them. His only surviving child by Catherine of Aragon, Mary, ascended to the throne upon the death of her half-brother, Edward VI, in 1553. In 1558, Mary was succeeded by her half-sister, Elizabeth, the only surviving child of Henry VIII by Anne Boleyn. She was crowned Queen Elizabeth I;
1770 – Captain James Cook, commander of the British ship Endeavour, discovered the Great Barrier Reef off Australia by running onto it;
1776 – During the American Revolution, the Continental Congress selects Thomas Jefferson of Virginia, John Adams of Massachusetts, Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania, Roger Sherman of Connecticut and Robert R. Livingston of New York to draft a declaration of independence. Knowing Jefferson’s prowess with a pen, Adams urged him to author the first draft of the document, which was then carefully revised by Adams and Franklin before being given to Congress for review on June 28. The revolutionary treatise began with reverberating prose: When, in the Course of human Events, it becomes necessary for one People to dissolve the Political Bands which have connected them with another, and to assume, among the Powers of the Earth, the separate and equal Station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent Respect to the Opinions of Mankind requires that they should declare the Causes which impel them to the Separation. We hold these Truths to be self-evident that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed, by their Creator, with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness;
1788 – Searching for sea otter pelts and other furs, the Russian explorer Gerrasim Grigoriev Izmailov reaches the Alaskan coast, setting his ship in at Yakutat Bay. Although most Americans think of the exploration of the Far West as an affair that began in the East and proceeded westward, the opposite was true for Russians. In the far northern Pacific, Russia was separated from the North American continent only by the relatively manageable expanse of the Bering Sea. Czar Peter the Great and his successors commissioned journeys east to the coast of Alaska including the 1741 voyage of Vitus Bering, whose name was given to the narrow strait that separates northern Alaska and Russia. True Russian control over the region was not established until fur trading posts and settlements were constructed over the next few decades. After further exploring the Alaskan coast, Izmailov eventually returned to his homeport of Okhotsk, where he is thought to have died around 1796. Although the Russians continued to consolidate their hold on Alaska during the first half of the 19th century, the claim had become tenuous and expensive to maintain by the 1860s. In 1867, Russia sold the region of Alaska to the United States for $7 million;
1864 – German composer Richard Strauss, known for such operas as “Der Rosenkavalier,” ”Salome” and “Elektra” and tone poems like “Also sprach Zarathustra,” was born in Munich;
1864 – In the American Civil War, a Confederate cavalry intercepts General Phillip Sheridan’s Union cavalry as it seeks to destroy a rail line near Trevilian Station, Virginia. A two-day battle ensued in which the Confederates drove off the Yankees with minimal damage to a precious supply line. Shortly after the Battle of Cold Harbor, Virginia, earlier in the month, Union General Ulysses S. Grant dispatched Sheridan, his cavalry commander, to ride towards Charlottesville and cut the Virginia Central Railroad. The line was supplying Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia, which was engaged in a life-or-death struggle with Grant’s Army of the Potomac around Richmond and Petersburg. Sheridan swung north around Richmond and headed toward Charlottesville, 60 miles northwest of Richmond. General Wade Hampton, commander of the Confederate cavalry, heard of Sheridan’s move and set out to intercept the Yankees. Union General George Custer’s men attacked Hampton’s supply train near Trevilian Station. Although they scored an initial success, Custer soon found himself almost completely surrounded by Rebel cavalry. Custer formed his men into a triangle and made several counterattacks before Sheridan came to his rescue in the late afternoon, taking 500 Southern prisoners in the process. The struggle continued the next day. With his ammunition running low and his cavalry dangerously far from its supply line, Sheridan eventually withdrew his force and returned to the Army of the Potomac. The Yankees tore up about five miles of rail line, but the damage was relatively light for the high number of casualties. Sheridan lost 735 men compared with nearly 1,000 for Hampton. But the Confederates had driven off the Yankees and minimized damage to the railroad;
1865 – Major General Henry W. Halleck finds documents and archives of the Confederate government in Richmond, Virginia. This discovery will lead to the publication of the official Civil War records;
1880 – Jeannette Pickering Rankin, the first woman ever elected to Congress, is born on a ranch near Missoula, Montana Territory. Rankin was a social worker in the states of Montana and Washington before joining the women’s suffrage movement in 1910. Two years later, she successfully ran for Congress in Montana on a progressive Republican platform calling for total women’s suffrage, legislation protecting children, and U.S. neutrality in the European war. Following her election as a representative, Rankin’s entrance into Congress was delayed for a month as congressmen discussed whether a woman should be admitted into the House of Representatives. Finally, on April 2, 1917, she was introduced in Congress as its first female member. The same day, President Woodrow Wilson addressed a joint session of Congress and urged a declaration of war against Germany. On April 4, the Senate voted for war by a wide majority, and on April 6 the vote went to the House. Citing public opinion in Montana and her own pacifist beliefs, Jeannette Rankin was one of only 50 representatives who voted against the American declaration of war. In 1918, Rankin unsuccessfully ran for a Senate seat. In 1940, with the U.S. entrance into another world war imminent, she was again elected as a pacifist representative from Montana and, after assuming office, argued vehemently against President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s war preparations. On December 7, 1941, the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, and the next day, at Roosevelt’s urging, Congress passed a formal declaration of war against Japan. Representative Rankin cast the sole dissenting vote. This action created a furor, and Rankin declined to seek reelection. In 1967, she organized the Jeannette Rankin Brigade, an organization that staged a number of highly publicized protests against the Vietnam War. (As a Vietnam Veteran, I’ll reserve comment!!!);
1895 – Charles E. Duryea receives the first United States patent granted to an American inventor for a gasoline-driven automobile;
1918 – In World War I, after several months of an aggressive German offensive on the Western Front during the spring and early summer of 1918, the Allies begin their counterattack, including an assault on June 10, 1918, by four French and two American divisions on German lines near the town of Antheuil-Portes in central France, some 45 miles from Paris. The Germans countered with an even stronger assault, firing 250,000 rounds of poison gas—including mustard, phosgene and diphenyl-chlorarsine—into the French trenches, incapacitating some 4,000 French soldiers and killing 32. After three days of battle, the Germans had forced the French back to Antheuil-Portes. The following day, four French and two American divisions launched a counterattack aided by significant air support as well as over 150 tanks. They successfully pushed the Germans back from Antheuil, taking more than a thousand German prisoners. The Allies continued their push beginning a change of momentum that would gain force throughout the summer of 1918 and the final months of the war;
1919 – Sir Barton won the Belmont Stakes, becoming horse racing’s first Triple Crown winner;
1940 – During World War II, Britain demonstrates that it will not remain on the defensive, by bombing Italian targets in response to Mussolini’s declaration of war on England and France. Having already marked out an offensive strategy in the event of Italian aggression, Britain bombed targets within the cities of Genoa and Turin. Africa was also another theater of conflict, as Italy and Britain were imperial neighbors. Italy had just bombed targets in the British-controlled Suez Canal territory, as well as the British-controlled island of Malta, in the Mediterranean. Britain retaliated with a raid on the Italian military installation in Eritrea. Even before the beginning of WWII in the Pacific theater, the Pacific would see fallout from this new conflict, with an Australian merchant cruiser giving chase to an Italian vessel, which ended up scuttling itself rather than surrendering;
1943 – In the Second World War, after 10 days of bombing runs, Britain lands troops on the Italian island of Pantelleria, off the southern coast of Sicily, in Operation Corkscrew. The Italian garrisons surrenders upon orders from Mussolini, who would later deny the order when the Germans express outrage. This defeat shakes the confidence of many in Mussolini’s cabinet, since they had been assured that Pantelleria was impregnable. Britain would continue its collection of Italian islands over the next two days, with the occupation of Lampedusa and Linosa—all in preparation for the Allied invasion of Sicily itself in July;
1943 – Mobster-turned-FBI-informant Henry Hill, whose life of crime was chronicled in the 1986 book “Wiseguy: Life in a Mafia Family” and the 1990 film “Goodfellas,” is born in New York City. Hill’s underworld exploits included participating in the headline-making $5.8-million heist at the Lufthansa cargo terminal at New York City’s JFK International Airport in 1978. It was the largest recorded cash robbery in American history at the time. Along with his wife and two children, Hill spent time in the federal witness protection program during the 1980s but he was eventually kicked out for drug offenses. While he was in the witness protection program, Hill gave a series of interviews to journalist Nicholas Pileggi, who went on to write a bestselling 1986 book about Hill entitled “Wiseguy: Life in a Mafia Family.” The book was adapted into the critically acclaimed film “Goodfellas.” Even as he grew older, Hill never fully reformed his ways. He was arrested for drug possession and other charges during the last decade of his life. After suffering from various health issues including heart disease, Hill died at age 69 in a Los Angeles hospital on June 12, 2012;
1944 – During World War II, five days after the D-Day landing, the five Allied landing groups, made up of some 330,000 troops, link up in Normandy to form a single solid front across northwestern France. On June 6, 1944, after a year of meticulous planning conducted in secrecy by a joint Anglo-American staff, the largest combined sea, air, and land military operation in history began on the French coast at Normandy. The Allied invasion force included 3 million men, 13,000 aircraft, 1,200 warships, 2,700 merchant ships, and 2,500 landing craft. At one of the five amphibious landing sites–Omaha Beach–German resistance was especially strong, and the Allied position was only secured after hours of bloody fighting by the Americans assigned to it. By the evening, some 150,000 American, British, and Canadian troops were ashore, and the Allies held about 80 square miles. During the next five days, Allied forces in Normandy moved steadily forward in all sectors against fierce German resistance. On June 11, the five landing groups met up, and Operation Overlord–the code name for the Allied invasion of northwestern Europe–proceeded as planned;
1944 – In World War II, in a combined effort, United States aircraft carrier based planes simultaneously attack Japanese airfields on Guam , Rota, Saipan and Tinian islands, preparing for the invasion of Saipan;
1955 – A racing car in Le Mans, France, goes out of control and crashes into stands filled with spectators, killing 82 people. The tragedy in the famous 24-hour race leads to a ban on racing in several nations. The Le Mans race, organized by France’s Automobile Club de L’Ouest, was first held in May 1923 and has since been held nearly every June. The winner is the racer who covers the greatest distance in that time. Before 1970, each car could only have two drivers. Only a single driver was allowed in the early years of the race. Three are required today. Prior to the race, Levegh complained that the course was too narrow near the pit-stop area and the grandstand. This observation proved prescient. As Levegh was racing for the lead near the pit-stop area, he swerved to avoid fellow racer Mike Hawthorn’s Jaguar as it moved toward the pits. Levegh’s car, going about 150 miles per hour, came up too fast on Lance Macklin’s Austin-Healey and was catapulted upward. The car crashed into the grandstand and its exploding parts went straight into the crowd. Levegh and more than 80 spectators, packed into the grandstand, lost their lives in the fiery crash. Grand Prix races in Germany and Switzerland scheduled for later that year were cancelled, and a complete ban on racing in Switzerland remains to this day. Both Spain and Mexico also temporarily banned motor racing;
1962 – Three prisoners at Alcatraz in San Francisco Bay staged an escape, leaving the island on a makeshift raft; they were never found or heard from again;
1963 – Facing federalized Alabama National Guard troops, Alabama Governor George Wallace ends his blockade of the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa and allows two African American students to enroll. George Wallace, one of the most controversial politicians in U.S. history, was elected governor of Alabama in 1962 under an ultra-segregationist platform. In his 1963 inaugural address, he promised his white followers: “Segregation now! Segregation tomorrow! Segregation forever!” When African American students attempted to desegregate the University of Alabama in June 1963, Alabama’s new governor, flanked by state troopers, literally blocked the door of the enrollment office. The U.S. Supreme Court, however, had declared segregation unconstitutional in 1954’s Brown v. Board of Education, and the executive branch undertook aggressive tactics to enforce the ruling. On June 10, 1963, President John F. Kennedy federalized National Guard troops and deployed them to the University of Alabama to force its desegregation. The next day, Governor Wallace yielded to the federal pressure, and two African American students–Vivian Malone and James A. Hood–successfully enrolled;
1963 – During the Vietnam War, Buddhist monk Quang Duc publicly burns himself to death in a plea for President Ngo Dinh Diem to show “charity and compassion” to all religions. Diem, a Catholic who had been oppressing the Buddhist majority, remained stubborn despite continued Buddhist protests and repeated U.S. requests to liberalize his government’s policies. More Buddhist monks immolated themselves during ensuing weeks. Madame Nhu, the president’s sister-in-law, referred to the burnings as “barbecues” and offered to supply matches. In November 1963, South Vietnamese military officers assassinated Diem and his brother during a coup;
1970 – In the Vietnam War, a force of 4,000 South Vietnamese and 2,000 Cambodian soldiers battle 1,400 communist troops for control of the provincial capital of Kompong Speu, 30 miles southwest of Phnom Penh, Cambodia. At 50 miles inside the border, it was the deepest penetration that South Vietnamese forces had made into Cambodia since the incursion began on April 29. The town was captured by the communists on June 13, but retaken by Allied forces on June 16. South Vietnamese officials reported that 183 enemy soldiers were killed, while 4 of their own died and 22 were wounded during the fighting. Civilian casualties in Kompong Speu were estimated at 40 to 50 killed;
1979 – John Wayne, an iconic American film actor famous for starring in countless westerns, dies at age 72 after battling cancer for more than a decade. The actor was born Marion Morrison on May 26, 1907, in Winterset, Iowa, and moved as a child to Glendale, California. After finding work as a movie studio laborer, Wayne befriended director John Ford, then a rising talent. His first acting jobs were bit parts in which he was credited as Duke Morrison, a childhood nickname derived from the name of his beloved pet dog. Wayne’s first starring role came in 1930 with The Big Trail, a film directed by his college buddy Raoul Walsh. It was during this time that Marion Morrison became “John Wayne.” Throughout the 1930s Wayne made dozens of mediocre westerns, sometimes churning out two movies a week. In 1939, Wayne finally had his breakthrough when John Ford cast him as Ringo Kid in the Oscar-winning Stagecoach. Wayne went on to play larger-than-life heroes in dozens of movies and came to symbolize a type of rugged, strong, straight-shooting American man. John Ford directed Wayne in some of his best-known films, including Fort Apache (1948), She Wore a Yellow Ribbon (1949), Rio Grande (1950), The Quiet Man (1952) and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence (1962). Off-screen, Wayne came to be known for his conservative political views. He produced, directed and starred in The Alamo (1960) and The Green Berets (1968), both of which reflected his patriotic, conservative leanings. In 1969, he won an Oscar for his role as a drunken, one-eyed federal marshal named Rooster Cogburn in True Grit. Wayne’s last film was The Shootist (1976), in which he played a legendary gunslinger dying of cancer. The role had particular meaning, as the actor was fighting the disease in real life;
1987 – Margaret Thatcher, the first female British Prime Minister, became the first British Prime Minister in 160 years to win a third consecutive term of office as her Conservatives held onto a reduced majority in Parliament;
1989 – In the wake of the Tiananmen Square massacre on June 4, China issues a warrant for a leading Chinese dissident who had taken refuge in the U.S. embassy in Beijing. The diplomatic standoff lasted for a year, and the refusal of the United States to hand the dissident over to Chinese officials was further evidence of American disapproval of China’s crackdown on political protesters. In the June arrest warrant, Fang and his wife, Li Shuxian, were charged with “committing crimes of counter-revolutionary propaganda and instigation.” Fang and Li immediately took refuge in the U.S. embassy. Chinese officials demanded that the American government hand over the pair, but the U.S. refused. Almost exactly one year later, Fang and Li were given free passage out of the country and they left the U.S. embassy for the first time since June 1989. The action was part of a wider effort by the Chinese government to repair some of the international damage done to its reputation in the wake of the Tiananmen Square incident. The issue of human rights in China continued to be a major issue in relations between the U.S. and China throughout the 1990s and into the 21st century;
1993 – The United States Supreme Court ruled that people who commit “hate crimes” motivated by bigotry may be sentenced to extra punishment. The court also ruled religious groups had a constitutional right to sacrifice animals in worship services;
2001 – Timothy McVeigh, 33, was executed by injection at the federal prison in Terre Haute, Indiana, for the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing that killed 168 people;
2004 – The nation bade a lingering goodbye to former President Ronald Reagan at a stately funeral service in Washington, D.C. followed hours later by a hilltop burial ceremony in his beloved California;
2009 – A Texas mother was hit by lightning while standing in her kitchen inside her Texas home. Witnesses say the lightning came through a light fixture and struck her chest and exited her foot. Her 9-year-old son franticly called 9-1-1 to save her life. She had to spend three days in the hospital;
2009 – With swine flu reported in more than 70 nations, the World Health Organization declared the first global flu pandemic in 41 years;
2011 – Ancient Korean royal books looted by French troops in 1866 are returned to South Korea; 1,000 officials and locals celebrate the return of the 297-volume ‘Oegyujanggak’ books;
2013 – A parade of FBI and intelligence officials briefed the entire House on the government’s years-long collection of phone records and Internet usage, saying it was necessary for protecting Americans — and did not trample on their privacy rights. The American Civil Liberties Union and its New York chapter sued the federal government, asking a court to demand that the Obama administration end the program and purge the records it had collected;
2013 – It was one year ago TODAY!!!
Another reason I still enjoy reading the newspaper!
(I’d call for a special election if I were them!!!)
Number 36 of 50 beautiful pictures from 50 beautiful states:
Wichita Mountains Wildlife Refuge, Lawton, Oklahoma
As I
A verse
Be still, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth.
– Psalm 46:10
Brings a thought
History tells me it has been true! Faith trusts it will be true eternally! Reverent silences, a pause in the hectic rush of our lives, reminds us that it is true today.
That leads to a prayer
Our Father in heaven, may your name be revered and held holy in my life and my world today. Your will be done, your reign on earth come with power and might and finality, just as it has already come in heaven. Through Jesus I pray. Amen
Until the next time – America, Bless GOD!!!
