The Welcome Home Blog posts videos of military personnel coming home after a deployment. You are welcome to browse or even submit yours! This video is called Soldiers Surprising Their Loved Ones: PART ONE, a compilation of returning service members surprising their parents, spouses, children, siblings, or pets. There are several compilations listed under “best of” at the blog. The Welcome Home Blog is not limited to surprise videos, but that’s what most of them are. Link -via Breakfast Links

What happens when a top-secret government project is canceled? The details are not quite clear, but it’s hard to keep a secret when prototype parts are sold for scrap and end up on eBay.

Anyone interested in top secret aircraft will know of the A-12 Avenger II, which was cancelled in 1991 and remains at the centre of ongoing litigation to this day.  The stealth attack aircraft, developed by General Dynamics and McDonnell Douglas, was terminated before the first airframe had been assembled.  But the latest twist in this still-shadowy tale comes in the form of an A-12 canopy appearing on eBay – and it looks like the real thing.

See more pictures at Urban Ghosts Media. Link

Four-year-old Dominic McCracken-Bruce and his 2-year-old brother Tyson only asked for one thing for Christmas -their Mommy. Army Reserve Capt. Dawn McCracken-Bruce was deployed to Iraq and Kuwait for the past nine months. When she came home for the holidays, she and her husband decided to surprise the boys during their visit with Santa Claus at the Mall at Robinson in Pittsburgh. See the video at WTAE. Link -via Fark

While searching for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, US Forces found some pretty interesting things in the desert, like this MiG-25 Foxbat interceptor. It was hidden underground with its wings removed. Military personnel dug it up by hand in 2003 and transported the jet to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio for examination. Eventually, it will go on display to the public. Read the story of this reclamation project, and see more pictures at Urban Ghosts. Link

The Army first introduced a formal fitness test to the troops in 1942. Millions of men were being called up to fight in World War II, and not all of them were prepared for the rigors of combat. To get the men in fighting shape, the Army implemented a systematic physical development program as part of the Combat Basic Training course. And the Army Ground Forces Test was designed to assess whether the program was having its desired effect. The test included squat jumps, sit-ups, pull-ups, push-ups, and a 300 yard run. The emphasis was on functional fitness and giving American GI’s the strength, mobility, and endurance they would need to tackle real tasks on the battlefield.

In 1946, a Physical Training School was created at Fort Bragg with the mission of exploring how to take the goal of functional fitness farther. The training program developed at the school and the fitness test were codified in the 1946 edition of FM 21-20, the Army’s physical training manual.

Basically, Grandpa was doing Cross-Fit before it was cool.

The physical fitness standards for service members has been relaxed since then, and more emphasis is placed on technical skills. Take a look at the fitness testing done in the 1940s, and see how tired you get just reading it. Or -you may want to try and see how well you would do! Link -via Nag on the Lake

Before World War II, cartoons with war themes attempted to use humor or satire to sway public opinion. The spread of military newspapers and the inclusion of cartoons as a feature designed to boost morale changed all that.

UP FRONT

Arguably the most well-known of the World War II cartoonists, Bill Mauldin created the characters Willie and Joe, who were depicted as rank-and-file soldiers dealing with the realities of war without sugarcoating that some leaders, including General George S. Patton, would have preferred to see. Mauldin’s caricatures, which began in 1940 when he was an 18-year-old in the U.S. Army’s 45th Infantry Division, were initially published in the division’s newsletter and soon became hugely popular with the soldiers on the front lines. In 1943 Mauldin’s cartoon was picked up by Stars and Stripes and was then distributed domestically by United Features Syndicate as Up Front, thanks in part to the war correspondent Ernie Pyle, who helped bring the cartoons to the attention of the general public.

Bill Mauldin did not attempt to glorify the fighting in any manner; rather, he used wry humor to demonstrate the absurdities of war. For example, to make an exaggerated commentary on the practice of sending increasingly younger soldiers to the front lines, Mauldin showed Willie and Joe in a bunker, reading a notice handed to them by an adolescent dressed in a soldier’s uniform. One says to the other, “I guess it’s okay. The replacement center says he comes from a long line of infantrymen.”

SAD SACK

At the time that he was drafted in the U.S. Army in June 1941, George Baker was a struggling animator on the verge of losing his job with the Walt Disney Company in Los Angeles. Although the war in Europe had been raging for several years, the possibility of the United States entering the war seemed remote to many at the time. Baker and other soldiers went through the motions of their training with little sense of purpose, waiting for their one-year enlistment to be up so they could get on with their lives.

To break up the monotony of Army life, Baker began to create drawings on his own time, attempting to explain pictorially what life was like in the armed forces. After taking his drawings to several New York publishers and being rejected, a despondent Baker put his cartoons away and tried to forget about them. However, a few months later, the armed forces sponsored a cartoon contest for servicemen. Baker decided to enter one of his drawing into the contest -and won first prize. This caught the attention of the editor of the Army’s Yank magazine, Major Hartzell Spence, who secured Baker a position on the Yank’s staff. Baker worked for Yank for the duration of World War II, moving from one training camp to another as a salesman for the magazine while also being exposed to the many facets of Army life, which he then used for the basis of his cartoons.

Baker’s character, named the Sad Sack, was a stumbling, bumbling soldier trying to fit in an Army comprised of stereotypes: trim and well-dressed men in perfect marching lines, belligerent drill sergeants, and unsympathetic cooks, doctors, and barbers. The Sack represented the common man trying to live up to the perceived ideal of what a soldier should be, and usually without success. Baker tried to show situations that troops in all branches of the service  -situated in any theater or at any training base- would recognize. One famous cartoon, titled “Drill,” showed the Sack in a marching drill, repeatedly bumping into taller, neatly-groomed men lined up in perfect formations, and then getting trampled and carted off in a stretcher. (Neither the Sack nor anyone else in the cartoons spoke a word.) Baker took a more lighthearted approach with his illustrations than did Bill Mauldin, which may be why Baker didn’t get into much trouble with his superiors.

After the war, Baker returned to civilian life and continued to draw Sad Sack until 1958, but Sack the civilian was not as popular as Sack the soldier, in part due to the younger audience for comic books. Baker had to use entirely new settings and use less suggestive material -and in the comic books, the Sack engaged in conversations, which changed the style of the cartoon considerably. Although Sad Sack (illustrated by other artists after 1958 and distributed by Harvey Comics) lasted into the 1990s and produced several spin-offs, it never matched the popularity of the cartoons done by Baker during World War II.

MALE CALL

Prior to World War II, Terry and the Pirates, produced by Milton Caniff, was one of the most popular comic strips in American newspapers. The serial comic followed the exploits of a young boy, Terry, and his adult sidekick, Pat Ryan, in the Far East, and the supporting cast included a beautiful blonde woman named Burma. When war broke out, Caniff, who was unable to enlist due to a childhood illness that damaged his lungs, wanted to contribute in his own way to the war effort. He created a special version of Terry and the Pirates, with Burma as the star, for the military’s newspapers. When civilian newspapers complained about not having access to the “unauthorized” version of the comic strip, Caniff changed it completely (including revising the material from a serial to a stand-alone) and renamed it Male Call. The new star was Miss Lace, a dark-haired woman who visited men on military bases and addressed everyone as “General.” Male Call’s intended audience was comprised exclusively of men in the military, so it was raunchier than what would appear in civilian newspapers, and contained numerous double entendres of a sexual nature. One of the strip’s notable features is that it showed injured soldiers in a genuine manner, including those who had been blinded or had lost a limb. Male Call last appeared in military newspapers in 1947.

Another of Caniff’s creations was the serial comic Steve Canyon, which he began in 1947 and continued until his death in 1988. The title character started out as a civilian pilot but joined the Air Force during the Korean War. Steve Canyon did not reach the heights of popularity seen by Terry and the Pirates and contained less-suggestive material than Male Call to appease the general public, but it achieved a wide circulation and lasted four decades, much longer than a typical comic strip.

G.I. JOE

Before Hasbro created the G.I. Joe action figure in 1964, Dave Breger introduced the original G.I. Joe to his comic strips in 1942. Begun upon Breger’s enlistment in 1941 and originally entitled Private Breger, it was distributed domestically by King Features Syndicate. In order to have the strip published in military newspapers, Breger had to rename his character. Joe was an ordinary private who attempted to be respectful of his superiors but often ended up doing something that was good for a chuckle. By no measure was the boyish-looking Joe even close to being the gruff hero idealized by the more well-known Hasbro action figures. G.I. Joe caught on with the troops so much that it became a name given to the common foot soldier. The 1945 movie  The Story of G.I. Joe was about correspondent Ernie Pyle, and Habro’s action figures simply pirated the name. After the war, Breger -both the cartoonist and the character- returned to civilian life. The new comic, Mister Breger, began to appear in newspaper, and continued until 1969.

TODAY’S MILITARY COMICS

As the World War II-era comic were phased out and others that had a military theme, such as Sgt. Rock, came and went, more comic books focused on the exploits of superheroes, and newspapers tried to make their funny pages, well, funnier. The unpopularity of the Vietnam War was another contributing factor in the decline of military-themed comics in the public eye. One exception was Beetle Bailey, which debuted in 1951 and has continued to this day, seemingly stuck in time and never engaged in combat (which may help explain its long tenure), but still good for a laugh.

Does that mean that military comics are becoming extinct? Not at all -they have simply become modernized via the internet, and continue to be printed in newspapers wherever U.S. troops are stationed. Today’s military comics aren’t just for the soldiers, either -one of the more popular is Julie Negron’s Jenny the Military Spouse, which revolves entirely around the lives of Air Force spouses and makes little mention of the enlisted men and women. Other comic strips focus on a certain service branch, as the ease of distributing a comic through the web means that any artist with a bit of skill and a computer can be successful without the direct support of the armed forces. Reading the funnies has long been a means for soldiers to share a daily laugh, to relieve a bit of the stress that comes with a military lifestyle, and to realize that they are not the only ones who want to roll their eyes when the red tape becomes almost overwhelming.

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The article above is reprinted with permission from Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader Salutes the Armed Forces.

Since 1988, the Bathroom Reader Institute had published a series of popular books containing irresistible bits of trivia and obscure yet fascinating facts.

If you like Neatorama, you’ll love the Bathroom Reader Institute’s books – go ahead and check ‘em out!

Japanese artist Sato created Torigun, a series of magnificent illustrations of birds in military dress uniforms. They're all fantastic (and I had a lot of trouble looking for the one to post here), but I think I like the robin one above the best. Check 'em all out here: Link - via Lustik

These South Korean Honor Guards proudly don Crayola Crayon-inspired outfits, complete with trumpets and peacock feathers, at the Honor Guard Ceremony in the War Memorial of Korea. In the summertime, these ceremonies are held every Friday and Saturday.

You might also notice how the US Army’s technical innovations make soldiers of the future look more and more like characters from a video game. Although the word “silly” is certainly in the eye of the beholder (but really, peacock feathers?) most of these would qualify. Personally, I think the Italian police uniforms are sharp. Link -via the Presurfer

(Image credit: US Army Korea)

Behold, the first military vehicle created via crowdsourced design! Called the FLYPmode, it was developed in part by an ex-marine, who knows what advancements need to be made to help save lives on the modern battlefield. Built to withstand explosive blasts, the likes of which account for most of the recent deaths in the Middle East, FLYPmode was made in less than four months and represents the future of military tech: innovative vehicle designs that can be built quickly with modern combat needs in mind. If you’re interested, you can see the fascinating designs that led to this concept vehicle at the Local Motors link below. Will bloated defense budgets become a thing of the past, when we design the vehicles of the future for ourselves?

Link Image via Local Motors.

WHAT BEGAN WITH LINCOLN…

Two years into the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln instituted the first federal draft, calling for an additional 300,000 Union soldiers. Bad idea. His 1863 Enrollment Act allowed citizens to buy their way out of service, which incensed poor Irish immigrants. After all, they were forced to fight while the privileged paid to sit on the bench. As a result, draft riots broke out in New York City, causing $1.5 million in damage and as many as 100 deaths. Ironically, Lincoln had to deploy troops to quell violence. In the end, his draft conscripted about 150,000 troops -a quarter of which were substitutes paid by wealthier draftees.

…ENDED WITH NIXON

With the Vietnam War in full swing in 1968, Richard Nixon campaigned for president on the promise that he’d end the draft. Once he was in office, Nixon commissioned Thomas Gates, Eisenhower’s former secretary of defense, to study the feasibility of creating an all-volunteer military. In February 1970, the Gates Commission reported that the military could get by without drafting troops, but it took Nixon another three years to end the draft process altogether. During the Vietnam Era, between 1965 and 1973, a total of 1,728,344 men were drafted. There hasn’t been another draft in America since.

IF THERE WAS A DRAFT TOMORROW (5 THINGS TO NOTE)

Hey, fellas, remember when you turned 18 and had to register for the draft? Well, if there ever is one, it would start with the Selective Service System (SSS) holding a lottery to determine who gets drafted and in what order. Basically, your birthday would act as your lottery number. Some standard rules apply:

1. Men who turn 20 during the calendar year are called first.

2. Once all eligible 20-year-olds are called, the process moves up to the 21-year-olds, and then to the 22-year-olds, and so on, until all the 25-year-olds are called.

3. The last to be drafted are 18- and 19-year-olds.

4. If your number is called, you receive a notice telling you where to report for exams. You then undergo physical, psychological, and moral evaluations.

5. Once you are declared fit for service, you must report to the Military Entrance Processing Station within 10 days. You will then be placed in training, which will last three to six months. All told, draftees are expected to serve for two years.

SECOND DRAFT: THE NEW AND REVISED LAWS OF CONSCRIPTION

If there’s ever another draft, it won’t follow the same rules as Vietnam. Some changes in conscription laws have already been made, and several more are in the works.

Staying in school won’t keep the next round of draftees out of trouble. During Vietnam, many men evaded the draft by remaining in college for a long time (Bill Clinton and Dick Cheney, for example). But in 1971, Congress passed legislation to limit school deferments. Now, students a only defer until the end of the semester, although seniors may defer until the end of the school year.

Women will get lottery numbers, too. Congress hasn’t legislated this yet, but since 1980, the National Organization for Women and other groups have been pressuring lawmakers to include women, claiming that the all-male draft is discriminatory.

If America activates the draft again, it would most likely create a specialized draft that targets linguists, medical personnel, and computer experts. In 2003, the Selective Service System stated in a memo, “While a conventional draft may never be needed, a draft of men and women possessing these critical skills may be warranted in a future crisis.”

REAL EXCUSES YOU CAN USE TO DODGE THE DRAFT

You’re entering the priesthood. Just beginning the long process of divinity school can get you a deferment.

You steal. A lot. And you’ve been convicted for it. While this won’t guarantee an exemption, many convicts are declared “morally unfit” to serve in the military.

You farm. If your family depends on you -and there are no possible replacements (like your dad or brother taking over)- you can claim :hardship.”

You are a state congressman. Congress (and the SSS) figures you’re already doing enough to serve the country.

(Images by Flickr user Joe Mott)

__________________________

The above article by Eric Furman is reprinted with permission from the Scatterbrained section of the September-October 2008 issue of mental_floss magazine.

Be sure to visit mental_floss‘ entertaining website and blog for more fun stuff!

During the Cold War, the US military developed top secret aircraft at the Air Force facilities at Groom Lake, also known as Area 51. Decades after the projects were finished, these designs remained classified. Although these planes were “technology demonstrators” and were never put into service, they were crucial for testing systems and technologies that are part of modern military and civilian aircraft alike. Read the stories and see photographs of three of these projects (one of which only exists in photographs, as the planes are still missing) at UrbanGhosts. Link

It turned out that even laborious hooting and scooting weren’t enough. Spies had learned that the Soviets had a drawing of an OXCART plane—obtained, it was assumed, via an infrared satellite.

As a plane sat in the hot desert, its shadow would create a relatively cool silhouette, visible in infrared even after the plane had been moved inside.

“It’s like a parking lot,” Barnes told National Geographic News. “After all the cars have left you can still see how many were parked there [in infrared] because of the difference in ground temperatures.”

To thwart the infrared satellites, Area 51 crews began constructing fanciful fake planes out of cardboard and other mundane materials, to cast misleading shadows for the Soviets to ponder.

Find out more about the cat-and-mouse game at Area 51 in this article from NatGeo News. Link -Thanks, Marilyn!

(Image credit: Roadrunners Internationale via Pangloss Films)

If you are going to kill people and blow things up, at least you can do it so the rest of the living can have a pollution free Earth. It seems the US military has been developing “green” ammunition for some time now.

In 2007, responding to reports from the field that current rounds weren’t deadly enough, the Army jump-started efforts to make a more lethal round that was also environmentally friendly.

Link

Photos have surfaced that allegedly show the US military tossing kittens out of an airplane. When Gen. G. Rover Barkly was asked about the photos he said, “We wanted to find out if a cat really does always land on its feet. The upside is that if they don’t make it the first time, we have eight more tries per animal. That is a bargain for the American taxpayer.” I made that all up naturally, that photo is one of the more humorous ones from a Slate story titled “Cats of War.” link

I’d like to meet the SEALS that took out Bin Laden some day and buy them all the beer they can swill. Navy SEALS are so badass; they are the only thing Chuck Norris fears. Just look at this SEAL blowing stuff up on the battlefield with a giant gun. That is one of the most awesome photos I have ever seen. This SEAL was testing some new night-vision system, and the photo was snapped way back in 2004. It really makes you wonder what sort of awesome goodies they play with now, don’t it. Link

The US military is making ever more use of unmanned fighters and intelligence
gathering aircraft. The great thing about this type of aircraft is that they can loiter over some far away battlefield for a long time, and if they are shot down, no lives are at risk. The Being Phantom Ray Stealth UAV made its first flight this week and is on its way to becoming the first stealth UAV in the arsenal. The Phantom Ray is the size of a fighter aircraft, and its maiden voyage took it to 7,500 feet and a speed of 178 knots.

“The first flight moves us farther into the next phase of unmanned aircraft,” said Craig Brown, Phantom Ray program manager for Boeing. “Autonomous, fighter-sized unmanned aircraft are real, and the UAS bar has been raised. Now I’m eager to see how high that bar will go.”

Link

I love to create and inspire. Plus, I love kids. So the hobbyist in me started making highly durable and colorful toys for local kids whenever we roll out the FOB. Toys are universal. They bring out happiness and joy on so many levels. Kids here have nothing but rocks and bad habits. I paint on hearts the toys I make for them to associate that with the heart patches sewn on 101st airborne units’ helmets. So when kids who get these toys see the same hearts on US Soldiers, it will click in him ‘these are friends.’

Read the rest at Infinite Hollywood. Link -via Metafilter

See more of Valero’s works in his Flickr stream. Link

Last year, one Chinese-language newspaper reported that an Alhambra taxi driver was arrested near Los Angeles International Airport after producing counterfeit military identification while trying to get out of a traffic stop.

Investigators learned that the recruits were told that the military IDs could be used to avoid getting traffic tickets and to receive certain types of military benefits and discounts, Eimiller said.

Some of the recruits were so convinced that they were part of the U.S. military that they actually visited real Army recruiting centers and tried to pay their monthly dues directly to the U.S. government, Eimiller said. That was another tipoff when investigators began looking into the group.

Local Chinese American leaders on Wednesday said they were shocked that a group that was such a familiar presence in the community is now being accused of being a fraud.

If convicted of all charges, Daniel Deng could face 11 years in prison. Link -via Metafilter

(Image credit: FBI)

Trained dogs are smart enough to find bombs, drugs, people, and the safest way to cross the street — but only with a capable handler nearby. Now a new system developed at Auburn University could turn canines into remotely guided "super dogs" that can take on risky tasks.

"With our system you don’t have to be in eyesight, versus human guides that do have to be within sight," said David M. Bevly, an associate professor of mechanical engineering at Auburn University who worked on the research.

In the past, remote guidance research focused on other animals or relied on invasive implanted electrodes to give commands. Instead, Bevly and his team created an external, real-time navigation system for trained dogs.

They designed a custom harness equipped with GPS, sensors, a processor and a radio modem that connects wirelessly to a computer system. The pack vibrates slightly on the left or right side and emits different tones to direct the dog.

Link (Photo: Samuel Ginn/Auburn University College of Engineering) – via Holy Kaw

The Liljenquist family collected thousands of photographs of Civil War soldiers over the years. Brandon Liljenquist saw a collection of war photographs from Iraq and Afghanistan and was inspired to make the Civil War photos public. This year, the family donated 400 of those pictures to the Library of Congress for a collection called The Last Full Measure.

Laying out the photographs at home for the last time, and thinking about the collection in a whole new light, I couldn’t help but notice how similar the faces of these boys were to those we’d seen in The Washington Post. Here were the young men who did most of the fighting and dying. In their eyes and the eyes of their loved ones, I could see the full range of human emotion. It was all here: the bravado, the fear, the readiness, the weariness, the pride and the anguish. The loneliness in their long, distant stares overwhelmed me.

The original photographs will be on display next year in Washington, but are available now online. Link to story. Link to photographs. -via Metafilter

A tribute to our Armed Forces for Veteran’s Day from PostSecret, featuring postcards from military personnel and their families. -via Urlesque

Johnston Atoll is a US territory covering about 50 square miles of islands in the remote Pacific Ocean. From 1934 to 2003, it was under the control of the US Navy and was used as launch site for nuclear testing and super-secret experimental aircraft and who knows what else. The base was abandoned when the atoll was turned over to the US Fish and Wildlife Service. See photographs from various phases of the base’s history at Urban Ghost Media. Link

(Image credit: Google Earth)

A donation of 2p from every pot sold will be made to the RAF Association’s Wings appeal to support the Miles More Minutes project, which gives troops posted overseas more time to telephone their loved ones over the Christmas period.

The flavour was developed and trialled last year for personnel serving on 27 Squadron after member Sergeant Ian Hobbs said troops regarded the brand as a home comfort.

Squadron Leader Stuart Balfour, head of RAF licensing, said: “The snack is enjoyed by so many of the troops and it’s great to know that every pot sold will help them keep in touch with loved ones at what is a really important time of the year.”

The Christmas-dinner-flavored noodles will sell for £1.10 a package. Link -via Arbroath

(Image credit: Martin Argles for the Guardian)

“Hey!” said Christopher, “could you call my mom, tell her there’s an emergency and she needs to come home immediately?”

Officer Martin said, no, he couldn’t do that.

He is a police officer, after all.

Instead, he asked for Christopher’s mom’s phone number and called with nothing but the truth.

“Mrs. Martha Sternickle?”

“Uh, huh.”

“This is Officer Martin of Bloomington Police. We’ve had a report of somebody trying to enter your home. It was unsuccessful but you might want to come home to make sure there’s no problem.”

When Sternickle arrived, Officer Martin led her to the police car to identify the “suspect” in the back seat. A joyful reunion followed. Link

(Image credit: Officer Fred Martin/Bloomington Police)

A secret corps of photographers and filmmakers documented US nuclear testing in the 1940s through the ’60s. The “atomic moviemakers”, officially known as the Lookout Mountain Laboratory, established in 1947, made at least 6,500 films for the government.

Two new atomic documentaries, “Countdown to Zero” and “Nuclear Tipping Point,”  feature archival images of the blasts. Both argue that the threat of atomic terrorism is on the rise and call for the strengthening of nuclear safeguards and, ultimately, the elimination of global arsenals.

As for the atomic cameramen, there aren’t that many left. “Quite a few have died from cancer,” George Yoshitake, 82, one of the survivors, said of his peers in an interview. “No doubt it was related to the testing.”

Link -via the Presurfer

Murphy’s unit was down to 19 men out of 128. They couldn’t fight, they needed to rearm, and they needed somebody to hold the line. So Murphy stayed behind, shooting Germans until he ran out of ammo. Then, deciding he wasn’t done killing Germans, he jumped onto a burning tank and starting using its .50 caliber machine gun. He even killed an entire squad of Germans trying to sneak up on him. Oh, and he did this for almost an hour, while wounded in the leg. And then his men showed up, and Murphy led them on a forward action. Translation: after spending an hour in the freezing cold on a burning tank spraying Germans with machine gun fire, he decided that wasn’t enough and decided to get close and personal.

And he is just one of ten soldiers from all over the world listed as the most badass. Link -via Unique Daily

Here’s an interesting and surprising list of celebrities who were leathernecks, including Bozo the Clown, Pat Robertson, and even Captain Kangaroo!

Prior to being Clarabell the Clown on The Howdy Doody Show and then the kindly Captain Kangaroo, Bob Keeshan was a trained killer. An urban legend claiming that he fought alongside actor Lee Marvin on Iwo Jima is false. Keeshan never saw combat because the war was over by the time he was of enlistment age (Lee Marvin was indeed a leatherneck who was wounded during the Battle of Saipan, but was not at Iwo Jima).

Link

From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by Treliske.

Toward the end of World War II, the Air Force was looking for a better way to burn Japanese cities to the ground. A dental surgeon contacted the White House, and suggested strapping small incendiary devices to bats, loading them into cages shaped like bombshells and dropping them over a wide area.

According to the plan, millions of bats would escape from the bombshells as they parachuted toward earth, and the flying mammals would find their way into the attics of barns and factories, where they would rest until the charges they were carrying exploded. In the early 1940s, a test with some armed bats went awry, and they set fire to a small Air Force base in Carlsbad, New Mexico.

The bats eventually had a successful test, although the bats themselves wouldn’t consider it so. Link -via Digg

(Image credit: Flickr user Furryscaly)

For more than a century, “Taps” has been the bugle call to mark the day’s end and evening rest in the U.S. military. Its soothing 24 notes have comforted many when played as a final farewell to a former soldier laid to rest. Given its long history, it’s not surprising that it is the subject of many legends.

Birth of “Taps”

By the Civil War, bugle calls existed for all types of commands-from “Time to get up!” to “Wear your overcoat today!” or “If you’re sick, now’s the time for sick call!” But it was during the Civil War’s Peninsula Campaign in July 1862 that “Taps” became the bugle call command to extinguish all lights and fires and prepare for sleep. Historians agree on when and where “Taps” was first played, but there’s more than one version of the story surrounding its origin and composer. (Image credit: Flickr user yark64)

Believe It Or Not

One popular story says that the man who first ordered “Taps” played was Union Captain Robert Ellicombe. While encamped with the Army of the Potomac at Harrison’s Landing, Virginia, Ellicombe risked enemy fire to rescue a wounded soldier. When the captain lit a lantern, he realized that the young man was dead, and a Confederate soldier, but even more shocking-the young man was his own son. Inside the soldier’s pocket was a musical score. Ellicombe requested that a bugler play his son’s composition at the burial, and that was when the Army of the Potomac first heard the somber music of “Taps”.

The country’s foremost authority on the tune as well as the former curator of Arlington National Cemetery’s “Taps” Bugle Exhibit, Jari A. Villanueva, researched the story and found no record of any Captain Ellicombe in the Union Army or at Harrison’s Landing. What Villanueva did find was an episode of Ripley’s Believe It Or Not television show where the tragic tale of a Union father and a Confederate son first aired.

Butterfield’s Lullaby

The true history of the birth of “Taps” was told by bugler Oliver Norton in an 1898 letter he wrote in response to a Century Magazine article that claimed the origin of the tune was unknown. Norton explained that he knew how “Taps” originated because he’d been the first to play it.

According to Norton, one July evening he was called to the tent of Major General Daniel Adam Butterfield, the chief of staff for the Army of the Potomac. Encamped at Harrison’s Landing, recovering from a defeat at the hands of General Robert E. Lee’s army, Butterfield’s exhausted and wounded soldiers suffered from heat, mosquitos, dysentery, and typhoid. The standard bugle call for lights-out had a harsh military cadence, and Butterfield thought a more soothing bugle call might help his men rest. (Image credit: Civil War Librarian)

The general handed Norton an envelope with musical notes written on the back and asked the bugler to play them. The bugler lengthened some notes and shortened others until the sound was melodious and slow enough to suit Butterfield, who ordered the melody played every evening at the final bugle call. Century’s editors wrote to Butterfield, who confirmed the incident.

Last Call, Boys!

General Butterfield didn’t actually compose the tune, sometimes called “Butterfield’s Lullaby”, but had simply revised an early French version of the “Scott Tattoo”. (A tattoo was a bugle call used to order soldiers to leave a tavern and return to their quarters for the night.) The name “Taps” probably came from an obsolete drum roll command called “Taptoe” that ordered tavern keepers to turn off their keg spigots at the end of an evening.

A Smash Hit

From the first night he played it, Norton knew that “Taps” would be a hit. In his letter to the magazine he wrote, “The music was beautiful on that still summer night, and was heard far beyond the limits of our Brigade. The next day I was visited by several buglers from neighboring Brigades, asking for copies of the music, which I gladly furnished.”

“Taps” wasn’t just a Union favorite. Confederates heard the tune in their nearby camps and liked it so much that by 1863 the Confederate army’s mounted artillery drill manual contained the order that “‘Taps’ will be blown at 9:00 at which time all officers will be in quarters.”

The Last Goodbye

(Image credit: Mass Communication Specialist 1st Class Chad J. McNeeley, from the Flickr stream of Beverly & Pack)

“Taps” was first used for military funeral services out of necessity. In 1862 Captain John Tidball presided over the burial of one of his fallen men. Tradition ordered that three rifle volleys would be fired at the ceremony, but Tidball’s troops were hidden in the woods, and he feared that any nearby enemy would hear the gunshots, figure out their location, and then attack them in the belief that there was a resumption of hostilities. To substitute for the rifle volley, the captain ordered the bugler to sound “Taps”.

Playing “Taps” became an unofficial custom at Union army funerals. The rebels also played the call to honor fallen soldiers-most notably at the 1863 funeral of General Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson after his death by friendly fire in the Battle of Chancellorsville.

After the Civil War, “Taps” became an official bugle call of the U.S. Army, and by 1891 an official order in the U.S. Army Infantry Drill Regulations made the bugle call mandatory at formal military funerals and memorial ceremonies.

A Fallen President

Possibly the most memorable rendition of “Taps” was played on November 25th, 1963, at the funeral of President John F. Kennedy. A World War II veteran, Kennedy was buried with full military honors at Arlington National Cemetery. At the ceremony, the command for present arms was given, and the traditional three volleys were fired. Then Sergeant Keith Clark of the U.S. Army Band played “Taps”-not on a bugle but on a B-flat trumpet.

Clark had played the call perfectly hundreds of times at hundreds of ceremonies. In fact, he’d played it in President Kennedy’s presence only two weeks earlier at the Tomb of the Unknowns on Veteran’s Day. But this time, as he played, he “cracked” the sixth note so that it sounded shortened and off-key. Clark admitted that nervousness was the cause, but the media immediately assumed that the cracked note was intentional, and they found it especially poignant.

Newsweek described the broken note as “a tear”. William manchester, author of Death of a President, described it as a “cactch in your voice or a swiftly stifled sob.” For about two weeks following the presidential burial, other Arlington buglers missed that same sixth note.

(YouTube link)

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The article above is reprinted with permission from Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader Salutes the Armed Forces.

Since 1988, the Bathroom Reader Institute had published a series of popular books containing irresistible bits of trivia and obscure yet fascinating facts.

If you like Neatorama, you’ll love the Bathroom Reader Institute’s books – go ahead and check ‘em out!

undermine: If your colleagues constantly undermine you, just be glad they aren’t doing so in the traditional sense. Undermine, a word that dates back to the 14th century, was once a military term for digging a clandestine passage under a building to sneak up on the enemy. The term quickly turned metaphorical, but in Shakespeare’s day, its literal meaning was still commonly known. He even playe with it in All’s Well That Ends Well , when the maiden Helena asks a soldier if there’s a way to safeguard her virginity. He replies, “There is none: man, sitting down before you, will undermine you, and blow you up.”

fleabag: Starting in the 1830s, a fleabag was a soldier’s bed. Although the word fleabag now seems wedded to hotel, it can be applied more broadly, as in the 1958 example for the Oxford English Dictionary, “God, how I hated Paris! Paris was one big flea-bag.”

basket case: Today, a basket case is simply a neurotic person, but during WWII, it meant a living soldier who had lost all his limbs and was brought home in a basket. The United States military denies that real baskets were ever used to carry soldiers. Regardless, the original meaning of the word is still gruesome.

(Image credit: Flickr user drakegoodman)

flak:Celebrities catch a lot of flak for idiotic behavior, but contemporary flak isn’t what it used to be. When the term originated in the 1930s, it was short for fliegerabwehrkanone, the German word for anti-aircraft guns. After a generation, the meaning shifted so that catching flak now means absorbing criticism instead of cannonfire.

gung ho: You may be gung ho about collecting stamps, playing solitaire, or other individual pursuits, but originally the term was more applicable to teams. The U.S. Marines first used it a as a slogan during World War II, after general Evans Carlson adapted the Chinese kung ho, which means “work in harmony”. While the teamwork element of the definition has faded, the enthusiasm bit has certainly remained.

fobbit, hillbilly armor, and IED: The war in Iraq is contributing its own expressions. A popular word on the rise is fobbit, a term that combines FOB (forward operating base) with hobbit. The word is a derogatory term for soldiers who stay too close to base and help themselves to three square meals a day. Another expression gaining steam is hillbilly armor, a term for scraps used to bulletproof vehicles.

Some words have already entered civilian life. IEDS, or improvised explosive devices, refer to the homemade bombs created by terrorists and insurgents. A recent GQ article about inappropriate office-party behavior uses it like this: “The workplace minefield is hard enough to negotiate without planting your own IEDs.” So, what are the chances any of these new words will stick around? Who knows? The only thing that’s certain is that as long as there are new wars, new words will crop up, too.

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How Violence Increases Our Vocabulary was written by Mark Peters. It is reprinted with permission from the Scatterbrained section of the May/June 2008 issue of mental_floss magazine.

Be sure to visit mental_floss‘ entertaining website and blog for more fun stuff!

The Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASPs) were volunteers who learned to fly during World War II to supplement the US military, which was suffering from a shortage of pilots.

A few more than 1,100 young women, all civilian volunteers, flew almost every type of military aircraft — including the B-26 and B-29 bombers — as part of the WASP program. They ferried new planes long distances from factories to military bases and departure points across the country. They tested newly overhauled planes. And they towed targets to give ground and air gunners training shooting — with live ammunition. The WASP expected to become part of the military during their service. Instead, the program was canceled after just two years.

They weren’t granted military status until the 1970s. And now, 65 years after their service, they will receive the highest civilian honor given by the U.S. Congress. Last July, President Obama signed a bill awarding the WASP the Congressional Gold Medal. The ceremony will take place on Wednesday on Capitol Hill.

Fewer than 300 WASPs are still alive to receive the honor today. Read the story of the program and a few of the pilots at NPR. Link -via Digg

(image credit: Texas Woman’s University)

The results highlight the importance of wording on the issue. In a test, half of the poll’s respondents were asked their opinion on permitting “gay men and lesbians” to serve, and the other half were asked about permitting “homosexuals” to serve.

The wording of the question proved to make a difference. Seven in 10 respondents said they favor allowing “gay men and lesbians” to serve in the military, including nearly 6 in 10 who said they should be allowed to serve openly. But support was somewhat lower among those who were asked about allowing “homosexuals” to serve, with 59 percent in favor, including 44 percent who support allowing them to serve openly.

The poll was taken by telephone and included responses from 1,084 adults. Link -via Fark

(image credit: Flickr user splorp)

One of the most glorious sites in France is the Les Invalides, a complex of buildings featuring a hospital, museum, and mausoleum where the spirits of soldiers and the turbulent past of France make this site a memorable experience.

The Église St. Louis des Invalides was the grand initiative of Bruant and his successor Mansart. On display within the walls of this masterpiece are the many flags captured by the French army. Soon after, Louis XIV constructed the Eglise du Dome, built in the vision of Saint Peter’s Basilica in Rome. A section was cleared from the north of the central building to the River Seine and the Pont Alexandre III. It was here that the most recognizable and influential leaders of the military were laid to rest, including Napoleon Bonaparte.

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From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by lannaxe96.

Can you distinguish whether a name belongs to a cat litter brand or an actual military operation? That’s the challenge in today’s Lunchtime Quiz at mental_floss. I didn’t know any of the answers, because they all sounded like military operations to me, but I managed to score 70%. Link

Army Reservist Staff Sgt. Brett Bennethum was ordered to Iraq in July. His four-year-old daughter Paige had a hard time letting go, so much that she held onto his hand in formation. No one, including the commanding officer, had the heart to pull her away. The picture of the incident, taken by Paige’s mother, has gone viral and touched people all over the country. Link -via Buzzfeed

(image credit: Abby Bennethum)

Slate has an interesting piece up on the current state of that Marine Corps Army indoctrinator, the fearsome drill instructor sergeant. I have it on good authority from my nephew, who is currently serving valiantly, that there’s definite truth to this article about Teresa King, one of the first female D.I.’s currently making sure the recruits are “squared away.”  It started with 9/11.

In the period after 9/11, the Army was losing about 10 percent of its volunteer recruits during boot camp, a number that was way too high, especially given the Army’s trouble meeting recruitment quotas and the growing demand for troops first in Afghanistan, then in Iraq. To help keep people in basic training, drill sergeants reined in the verbal abuse and began providing more mentorship.

If a recruit is acting petulant, the drill sergeant may ask him what’s wrong—or ask his friends. He’ll give tips for how to get along with peers in close quarters, how to get by on an Army paycheck, and how to handle homesickness.

So, is this a step in the right direction for the military, or a laming down of the troops?

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Private Kevin Elliott and his friend, Barry Delaney, had agreed that whoever survived the other should wear a dress to the dead man’s funeral. Mr Delaney duly fulfilled the pledge as a tribute to Private Elliott, who was killed aged 24 while on foot patrol in the southern province of Helmand on August 31.

Mr Delaney wept on his knees at the graveside in Dundee as shots were fired during the military funeral. His dress plans are believed to have been known about in advance by other mourners.

Elliot, who had fulfilled his hitch and could have left the army, decided instead to fight in Afghanistan at the last minute. Hundreds turned out for the funeral. Link -via Fark

A well-insulated 20,000 square foot home complete with an airstrip and a Jacuzzi sounds really nice. This one is underground in an abandoned missile silo! It was once the home of an Atlas-F missile built for the Cold War, but it’s been converted into a luxury home. See seven such military installations now used as living spaces. Link -via Dark Roasted Blend

RTI’s patent pending robotic system will be able to find, ingest and extract energy from biomass in the environment. Despite the far-reaching reports that this includes “human bodies,” the public can be assured that the engine Cyclone has developed to power the EATR runs on fuel no scarier than twigs, grass clippings and wood chips – small, plant-based items for which RTI’s robotic technology is designed to forage. Desecration of the dead is a war crime under Article 15 of the Geneva Conventions, and is certainly not something sanctioned by DARPA, Cyclone or RTI.

Link -via Digg

If the Indians were, in fact, better armed at the Battle of the Little Bighorn, Custer may have contributed to the situation by declining to include Gatling guns in his van. Because he was setting off on what amounted to a search-and-destroy mission, he argued that the Gatlings were too cumbersome and would only slow him down.

At the point where he was surrounded and outnumbered by a ratio as high as 9-to-1, he probably regretted making that choice. In such a dire situation, the Gatling gun would have considerably reduced the enemy’s numerical advantage and may have even proven decisive in turning the tide.

The Lakota and Cheyenne warriors did join the battle with a number of Henry and Spencer repeating rifles, which provided a higher rate of fire than the single-shot Springfield Model 1873 carbines carried by the cavalry troopers.

In the end, several factors led to the deaths of the 197 men under Custer, each stemming from his underestimation of his adversaries. Link

“My hobby deals strictly with World War II militaria & insignia.

However, rather than collecting the actual items, I collect and use high resolution photos of them to create Photoshop images that show myself in the uniform of a Captain (or equivalent rank) in whichever armed force and branch of service those insignia were worn by.

Link -via Metafilter

(image credit: Richard Mosse)

The Navy was not interested in the Titanic. … I mean, they funded the technology because it had so many military applications. And I was a naval intelligence officer for 30 years, and so I did a lot of missions for the Navy. Many remain classified, my best stuff. Rats …

Yes, the Titanic was a cover for a series of military operations. The Titanic was here, and over here was the Scorpion and over here was the Thresher (as he says this, he arranges three objects on a tabletop, roughly in a line, the center one depicting the Titanic).

And had that not occurred, I probably would not have found the Titanic because they wouldn’t have funded me. I mean, if the Titanic was in the Indian Ocean, it’d probably still be in the Indian Ocean. But … it was straddled by two very interesting subs that we had lost — and the Scorpion was lost on war patrol … and it was carrying nuclear weapons. So it was a very hot sub to the Navy …

Link

Boeing completed the laser installation Dec. 4 at Kirtland Air Force Base, N.M. The laser, including its major subsystem, a 12,000-pound integrated laser module, was moved into place aboard the aircraft and aligned with the previously-installed beam control system, which will direct the laser beam to its target.

With the laser installed, Boeing is set to conduct a series of tests leading up to a demonstration in 2008 in which the program will fire the laser in-flight at mission-representative ground targets to demonstrate the military utility of high-energy lasers. The test team will fire the laser through a rotating turret that extends through the aircraft’s belly.

ATL, which Boeing is developing for the U.S. Department of Defense, will destroy, damage or disable targets with little to no collateral damage, supporting missions on the battlefield and in urban operations.

Link: defensetech