BamaTexan Loc: Deep in the heart of Texas

Again thank you.

RichardQ Loc: Colorado

Thank you so much, Camlane. I'm my own worst critic. I never write less than four drafts of these mini-essays before I post -- and sometimes a lot more before I'm satisfied.

RichardQ Loc: Colorado

Sorry about that, Jerry! Of course, I don't know how many essays I have left but I'll keep plugging because I enjoy writing now that I can't use my cameras anymore. I've been working for months on a very complex post that will probably run into three parts when finished. It deals with Operation Paperclip and the 1,700 Nazi scientists that our Military Intelligence brought into the U.S.illegally after WW II.

RichardQ Loc: Colorado

Many thanks for your appreciation, elad! There are many reasons why these facts were censored at the time -- and some would still be hidden if not for the Freedom Of Information Act (FOIA), signed (without a public event) by President Johnson in 1966. He appended a signing statement, "I sign this measure with a deep sense of pride that the United States is an open society." It had no enforcement provisions until the Watergate scandal and Nixon's defiance, which resulted in Congress introducing a lot of amendments that pried the access doors open for reporters and others. President Ford tried to shut them again with a veto but the House and Senate overrode him. In 1982 President Reagan issued an Executive Order to tighten the doors again, but in 1996 President Clinton signed the Electronic Information Act Amendments, which required agencies to make documents available in electronic formats and distributed digitally. Then it was President George W. Bush's turn to issue an Executive Order in 2001 zipping up access to presidential records. Finally, in 2007 Bush relented and signed the OPEN Government Act, praising it for extending crucial services to alternative journalists and bloggers. President Obama's administration, however, became more secretive. Who knows what President Trump has in mind?

RichardQ Loc: Colorado

My goodness, sr71 --- four smilies! Well, many thanks for your comments. Much appreciated!

RichardQ Loc: Colorado

You're very welcome, phlash46!

RichardQ Loc: Colorado

Those portraits of the hanged Nazis laid in their coffins are available on several web sites of the Internet, if anybody is interested. Thank you for your comments, bthomas42! If they are not too gruesome, why not share some of the other photos from among the 150 you printed? Obviously, a lot of Hoggers are interested in the subject!

RichardQ Loc: Colorado

Hi, Mike! Glad to hear from you. I don't know about that "amazing talent" comment, but I guess I'll keep writing as long as people like to read my stuff. Take care, buddy!

RichardQ Loc: Colorado

Thank you for the compliment, Bushpilot! I'm happy to remind folks of the Military Occupation following WW II. It was a lot more than just atanding guard.

RichardQ Loc: Colorado

Thanks for commenting, rightofattila. Last year, on May 8, 2016, I posted "Was the Nuremberg Tribunal a valid trial?" You'll see that the Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, Harlan Fisk Stone, agrees with you. He wrote, "Jackson is away conducting his high-grade lynching party in Nuremberg. I don't mind what he does to the Nazis, but I hate to see the pretense that he is running a court and proceeding according to common law. This is a little too sanctimonious a fraud to meet my old-fashioned ideas." Regarding your reservations about the French and the Russians, Justice Jackson made the following points to President Truman in 1945, about the upcoming Tribunal: "The Allies themselves have done or are doing some of the very things we are prosecuting the Germans for. The French are so vioating the Geneva Convention in the treatment of prisoners of war that our command is taking back prisoners sent to them. We are prosecuting plunder and our Allies are practicing it. We say aggressive war is a crime and one of our Allies asserts sovereignty over the Baltic states based on no title except conquest." The German lawyers in the Tribunal were prohibited from citing any of those points.

The Katyn Massacre took place in 1940, when America was officially neutral and Congress was predominently isolationist. We reportedly knew nothing about it at the time. When Russia invaded Finland, our sympathy was with the Finns, who unfortunately were assisted by the Nazis. Our main concern was to rebuild our armed forces. Our intelligence was pitiful, as shown when Japan attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, and Hitler declared war on the U.S. a few days later. We enthusiastically supported the Soviets in their battles against the Nazi invaders. I mention all this because it is pertinent to your comment. I urge you (and anybody else interested in the subject) to click into an essay posted in 2007 by a 30-year veteran of the CIA (Benjamin B. Fischer): "The Katyn Controversy: Stalin's Killing Field." It's a 10-page review that pulls no punches and lists 30 references. Try this

www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-studies/studies/winter99-00/art6.html

Or simply Google the title of the essay.

RichardQ Loc: Colorado

Hi, Shelty! I too was in the occupation army, and I not only read the Stars and Stripes newspaper but even sent copies to my parents back in Pennsylvania, which explains why I now have some yellowed copies to scan and post here. The paper was not free; the price was five cents for the daily and ten cents for the Sunday "Weekend" edition. It was available in the magazine stand in the Post Exchange (PX). The "Stripes" was the "Unofficial Paper of U.S. Armed Forces in the European Theater" according to the front page header.

RichardQ Loc: Colorado

Shelty, here's the masthead showing the makeuo of the Stars and Stripes when you and I were stationed in Occupied Germany in 1947.

Cape Codder Loc: Cape Cod

Thanks again, Richard, for a wonderful history lesson. I have enjoyed all of your posts and was just thinking the other day that we had not heard from you in a while.

RichardQ Loc: Colorado

That's not quite accurate, I'm afraid. On May 7, 1945, Patton was hosting Under Secretary of War Patterson during a visit to the Spanish Imperial Riding Academy. Afterwards, Patton urged Patterson to stop the point system, stop breaking up the Armies and keep 30% of the battlewise troops at home on leave -- "Send us replacements and let us start training here, keeping our forces intact. Let's keep our boots polished, bayonets sharpened, and present a picture of force and strength to these people (the Russians). This the only language they understand and respect." Patton went on to describe the Russians as living off "chickens in their coops and cattle on the hoof." He predicted they would survive his fighting men for only five days. "After that it would make no difference how many million men they have, and if you wanted Moscow, I could give it to you." Of course, our European forces were being shipped Stateside for transfer to the Pacific and the invasion of Japan, which he didn't mention. Nobody, including Patton, knew about the atomic bomb. Unfortunately, his assessment of the Russians ignored their thousands of tanks which many regarded as superior to both the German and U.S. equipment. And if the American forces left Germany to attack Russia, who was going to occupy the Nazis? Besides, his idea of a swift aggressive attack on Russia without a Congressional Declaration of War would have been unconstitutional. In fact, it strongly resembled the Nazi tactics of 1941. Like Hitler's invasion army, Patton's army did not have winter gear appropriate for Russian weather. He knew it was bluster but he wanted to maintain his fighting image. In reality, he was planning a trip to China when his Occupation job was over.

rockdog Loc: Berkeley, Ca.

Hi Richard, I just found your response. Your need to correct the fine point of "actually witnessing" vs my comment of "first hand account" is a pleasant verification of your integrity and one of the reasons I admire your writing. You are what historians call a primary source, you were there!
You write with clarity and cogent purpose in each installment and it is clear I'm not the only one who values your posts. Thank you and be well my friend.
Phil