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painted-bees · 7 months

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Hi!! Can I ask what happens at the festival? Do people recognize her music?

By this point, Raf and Magritte had composed a fair few tracks together, for fun. Most of it having been written and recorded during their year on Cortes Island. And so, they put together a setlist of these songs and rehearsed them as a three part band, which included Cortes.

This would be the first time Cortes accompanied them on stage (Raf insisted, just having Cortes involved does a lot to soothe his Anxieties), but Raf and Magritte had played together for shows prior to this...however, it had only ever been for very, very small venues, and under obscure ever-changing band names, without Raf himself ever explicitly having to identify himself to his audience. He had always been...rather covert.

Now, as part of his deal for getting Margie on the stage, his end of the bargain was to allow his name and likeness be used as a way of drawing in more attendees. He figured (and prefered) that he may as well do it as a bandmate to Magritte. And so, it was Stampy Ptarmigans ft. Rafael Ephrem. Just one band from a rather robust lineup of bands that would be playing during the weekend of the festival.

Being on stage, and everything around it, isn't difficult for Raf. One thing he kinda loathes to admit is that a part of him really does miss playing for large crowds. He likes putting on his stage persona and playing to an audience--he gets to be someone who doesn't really exist, playing for people who don't really exist. On stage, with the lights, it's hard to make out individual faces and expressions much of the time, and the people in the audience can be who ever he imagines them to be. It is like his life is a cartoon where he is simply a cartoon character playing to a cartoon audience, and all of it is within the realm of his control. When he was growing up, and as a teenager--being on stage in the middle of a live preformance was when he felt the safest.

But right before, and especially right after, was always the worst...the most uncomfortable. The scariest.

However, compared to what he was use to, rehearsals and the moments leading up to the show were quite different when Magritte and Cortes occupied the space where his parents/managers would have been. A lot of the energy he would have spent worrying about (and preemptively bracing for) the inevitable fallout of a less-than-perfect preformance was instead spent vibing with Cortes and assuring Magritte that they're just here to have a good time and have fun playing their silly little tunes same as they always have, and that folks in the audience are gonna enjoy it. After all, back when they first started meeting for their weekly jam sessions, one of the first tenants they agreed on was that they'd only play music together for as long as it was fun. They wouldn't be here, preparing to walk on stage together, if it wasn't fun to do so.

Thankfully, jitters aside, Magritte was eager and excited as always to just play music...and under such energizing circumstances! The lights, the VOLUME!! It's a lot more than she was use to, and despite her nerves, she couldn't stop smiling--so much that the muscles in her face hurt.

And it was fun. Their set list was an hour long, everything went well, and they had a blast playing. There had been a moment where Magritte skipped an entire verse of a song, and some clever improvisation was required to keep things moving forward in a way that felt pleasing and natural. But after the show, Magritte would cite that moment as her favorite part. Which is...more than a little refreshing from Raf's perspective, since those kinds of mistakes would usually mean a scathing lecture lasting into the earliest hours of the morning, followed by stricter hours of practise during the following weeks/months until the next major show.

But no. After the show, Magritte was on cloud 9, and would ride that high for months. The three of them would be remembered fondly by the audience, exactly the way they had hoped, with Raf's preformance being wholly overshadowed by his other two band members (especially the ""Icelandic"" one with the otherworldly vocals) and Magritte's Stampy Ptarmigans youtube channel enjoyed a healthy influx of enthusiastic new subscribers.

Certainly, there might have been people in the audience who recognized her from youtube and MySpace. But mostly, it was a fresh new audience hearing her work for the first time. And a lot of them decided they didn't want it to be the last time they'd ever hear her music.

All in all, a positive experience..! And certainly not the last of its kind to be enjoyed by our trio♡

#raf's mother however would be very interested and delighted to hear that her som was making public appearances again.#Hi-Note #rafael #magritte #cortes

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lonely-paracosmos · 1 year

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I will do a Techno-organic Raf design with a human Sari design too, in other words, a role swap AU 😂😋

Wanna give some suggestions for the story, powers, or how he deals with it???

HELLO!

I actually been hyperfixating on this! Ixve been workin on my own version of Raf being a techno human, i dont imagine him being OP, but still rather strong.

He doesnt have super strength but has increased agility, and while his nearsight is awful, his farsight is SPECTACULAR.

Also something ive been playing around with is him being a technopath. I feel his abilities would be more psychological/mental rather than it being physical like in strength. So his abilities would be a lot more covert than Sari's.

---

My idea with how it happens- while i have multiple i'll give one. After being hurt by dark energon, the energon used to save him changed him slightly, not fully, but made him susceptible for something.

He decided to join the bots to fight the finale fight, when him and bee fell into the cybermatter. They were both revived, but Raf was changed, he looked the same phsyically, but had some none organic elements about him.

I think hes a little confused- woozy, and if it affects him a lot he will feel dysphoric.

I think it would rapidly slow his ageing, kind of like a viltramite from invincible!

Thats all i have for rn dkdjdkd brian empty

#transformers #tfp #rafael esquivel #tf #quy ask

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ao3feed-brucewayne · 1 year

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Gambit

read it on the AO3 at https://ift.tt/n1g6Ea9

by Adamantium43

Growing up without her father, though she wasn't entirely sure the man knew she existed, Anise Mora could take comfort in few things. 1. Her mentor: Black Canary. 2. Her partner, and best friend: Josie, also known as Mirage. 3. Her cousin: Jack. But, after Josie goes missing out of the blue, she's left scrambling through life as one change after another comes at her. She gets involved in an alien war, and a covert operations team run by Batman himself. The boy she's spent the last two years pining over is finally starting to notice her. Her father comes stumbling into her life, and she has no idea how to talk to him. It wasn't often that Anise was at a loss for what to do. She always had a plan. But she also always knew the variables in her life. Now she has to figure it out as she goes. Disclaimer: I don't own anything besides Anise.

Words: 4459, Chapters: 1/?, Language: English

Fandoms: Transformers: Prime, Transformers: Rescue Bots, Young Justice (Cartoon), Black Veil Brides, Palaye Royale (Band)

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings

Categories: F/M

Characters: Original Female Character(s), Optimus Prime, Arcee (Transformers), Ratchet (Transformers), Bulkhead (Transformers), Bumblebee (Transformers), Jazz (Transformers), June Darby, Jack Darby, Miko Nakadai, Rafael "Raf" Esquivel, Charlie Burns, Kade Burns, Graham Burns, Dani Burns, Cody Burns, Doc Greene (Rescue Bots), Francine Greene, Heatwave (Transformers), Blades (Transformers), Boulder (Transformers), Chase (Transformers), Robin (DCU), Aqualad (DCU), M'gann M'orzz, Kon-El | Conner Kent, Wally West, Artemis Crock, Black Canary (DCU), Oliver Queen, Bruce Wayne, Clark Kent, Arthur Curry (DCU), Barry Allen, J'onn J'onzz, Andy Biersack, Christian "CC" Coma, Ashley Purdy, Jake Pitts, Jeremy "Jinxx" Ferguson, Remington Leith, Sebastian Danzig, Emerson Barrett

Relationships: Remington Leith/Original Female Character(s), Artemis Crock & Dick Grayson & Kaldur'ahm & Kon-El | Conner Kent & M'Gann M'orzz & Wally West, Jack Darby & Original Female Character(s), Christian "CC" Coma & Original Female Character(s)

Additional Tags: Hurt/Comfort, Angst, Pining, True Love, War, Superpowers, Crimes & Criminals, Crime Fighting, Missing Persons, Young Justice Season 1, Sharing a Bed, Single Parents, Absent Parents, First Meetings, Bullying

read it on the AO3 at https://ift.tt/n1g6Ea9

#IFTTT #bruce wayne #batman #the dark knight #the cape crusader #gotham #dc universe #ao3 #ao3feed

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dismains · 2 years

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The waltons the hostage

THE WALTONS THE HOSTAGE FULL

The AC (plus the MC?) did a ~16 hour round trip last night. vHLoold2sWĢ x USAF KC135R QUID640/641 followed by an USAF AC-130J Ghostrider from Morón southbound over #Morocco /oBCwttKyDI Quite a grouping! x4 MC-130J and x2 Osprey’s out of Mildenhall with transponders on heading across the English Channel looks like a Special Ops exercise. AFSOC MC-130Js and CV-22 Ospreys, forward deployed to Rota, Spain, took part in the raid, supported by 6x KC-135s from RAF Mildenhall: Part of the activity could be tracked online by means of ADS-B/Mode-S. Following a “brief but intense firefight”, Walton was moved on foot to the extraction site where helicopters flew the hostage and rescue force to safety. Once the rescue force was inserted into the area by parachute, they moved on foot approximately three miles to the target area where the rescue was made. There were approximately 30 special operations personnel involved in the raid. It is also used if forces assigned to the raid must travel into the target area from a significant distance on longer range aircraft. This insertion method is generally used only if other means of covert insertion are not immediately available. special operations began with a parachute insertion into the area according to reports. personnel were injured during the raid, but reports indicate that all but one of the kidnappers were killed during the operation. The captors demanded nearly $1 million in ransom for Mr. He offered them $40 and was then taken away by the armed gunmen on motorbikes, the officials said. Walton was seized from his backyard on Monday in front of family members after assailants asked him for money. American and Nigerian officials had said that Mr. Walton, the son of missionaries, lives with his wife and young daughter on a farm near Massalata, a small village close to the border with Nigeria. While unconfirmed, it is possible that Walton has been moved to Niger Airbase 201, a facility that has been significantly upgraded for expanded operations in the region.Ī report by Eric Schmidt in the New York Times today said that, “Mr.

THE WALTONS THE HOSTAGE FULL

hostage, Philip Walton, was not named during the Pentagon press briefing. The Waltons (TV Series) The Hostage (1981) Full Cast & Crew See agents for this cast & crew on IMDbPro Directed by Herbert Hirschman Writing Credits Cast (in credits order) Produced by Music by Alexander Courage Cinematography by Hugh K. Hoffman added that Walton, “…is safe and is now in the care of the U.S. in northern Nigeria to recover an American citizen held hostage by a group of armed men”. forces conducted a hostage rescue operation during the early hours of 31 Oct. Learn more about some of the historical events addressed on the show.Pentagon spokesman Jonathan Hoffman told reporters on Saturday, “U.S. The moon landing ( 'A Walton Easter', Special #6) The assassination of President Kennedy ( 'A Walton Thanksgiving Reunion', Special #4) The death of President Roosevelt ( 'The Outrage', s9-ep1) The abdication of King Edward the 8th ( 'The Abdication', s4-ep11)Ĭherokee "Trail of Tears" 1836-'38 ( 'The Warrior', s6-ep4) The Hindenburg disaster ( 'The Inferno', s5-ep19) The Spanish Civil War 1936 – 1939 ( 'The Collision', s4-ep24) The Spanish-American War & The Battle of San Juan Hill ( 'The Fox', s4-ep17) Events that affected the Walton family and most Americans during that time include: In doing so the writers never failed to immerse the characters and viewers on a bit of a histroy lesson. The show spanned more than 30 years of American history from 1933 to 1969. Teen Pregnancy ( "The Odyssey", s2-ep2 "The Revelation", s6-ep21 'The Pursuit', s9-ep6) Religious persecution ( 'The Unthinkable', s8-ep14) Racism ( 'The Festival', s6-ep16 'The Illusion', s7-ep8 'The Outrage', s9-ep1) Physical disabilities ( 'The Foundling', s1-ep1 'The Job', s3-ep11 'The Obstacle' s7-ep14) While many see the Walton's as a family that represents conservative values they in fact exhibit very liberal attitudes when dealing with a variety of topics and issues, these include:Īlcoholism ( 'The Calling' s7-ep2 'The Captive', s7-ep7)Īnimal welfare ( 'The Calf", s1-ep3 'The Hunt', s1-ep4 'The Fawn', s2-ep8 'The Last Mustang', s5-ep12)Īnti-German sentiment ( 'The Firestorm', s5-ep5 'The Hiding Place', s5-ep22 'The Rumor' s6-ep14 'The Spirit', s8-ep12)Ĭonscientious objection ( 'The Conscience', s7-ep13)Ĭustoms & traditions ( 'The Ceremony', s1-ep9 'The Shivaree', s3-ep19 'The Quilting', s4-ep21 'The Hostage', s9-ep20)ĭomestic violence ( 'The Victims', s9-ep15)

#The waltons the hostage

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mercurygray · 3 years

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Making Of Featurette - Build An OC

Some of you may have seen my post yesterday about how to introduce an OC and met my new gal, Phyl, who seems to have broken a land speed record on acquiring fans.

The challenge posed yesterday - or more, the question - was how to introduce an original character, but it was also sort of a fun exercise for me to take a look at my process for creating a character from scratch at the same time.

There was some discussion about whether including the Toccoa training sequence was necessary, and while that applies to a large number of BoB OCs, many of whom find themselves included in the unit for various and sundry reasons, it doesn't apply to all of them, so part of the spec was also to create someone to whom that rule wouldn’t apply.

But why ask that question? The opening scenes at Toccoa serve a specific storytelling purpose - they establish the relationship between Sobel and his men, paint a picture of a difficult training program, and create an environment to explain why these men bonded like they did.

The larger issue here, then, isn't about whether training was important, but rather 'Have your given your character believable context and backstory and set them up for success within the narrative?' For some original characters who are being included in the unit, that context and their integration is essential to the story. For others, that context will need to come from somewhere else.

We also talked about a character's 'purpose' within the narrative. For most of my fics, I start with a specific romantic purpose in mind, but I didn't have one of those here, so I started with a wartime service - the WAAF - and a name. I used common 1920s UK name lists and a random name generator to assemble some possibilities. Having a name to roll around with helps a little, sometimes and can change, too!

The Women's Auxiliary Air Force fills a wide variety of roles within the RAF, but a great number of jobs for women are in technical positions, learning new technologies like radar and range-finding. Assignments at stations closer to the channel would be much busier than those further inland, which solves two problems. One, it means my OC is closer to Aldbourne, which is in Wiltshire, well out of the way, and two, a sleepy station allows for much less technical knowledge because I don't have to describe people actually using the equipment they're seated next to.

So - Air Aux, very technical, (so she's smart) slow assignment (so she's either not good at her job or she asked to be here?). People get bored all the time at work, so they bring stuff to do. My OC needed some stuff. I had a thought that the British Intelligence Services solved a recruitment problem by putting out an advertisement for people who enjoyed solving crosswords. This was a covert way to get in people who were interested in language and could see patterns and think critically. They're cheap, they're published in a lot of newspapers, they're a good way to pass time on a long shift.

Puzzles are always better with a freind, so I started writing some dialogue between unnamed OFC #1 and OFC #2, later Phyllis and Bernice.

Unkempt women, nine letters.

Us.

I think that leaves us a bit short, I said nine letters. Slatterns! Right, thirty five down, a sticker that doesn't know it's been licked - oh, a stamp.

Why do you bother asking?

Because I'm trying to be sociable, and it's helping keep me awake.

Starting in conversation is helpful to me only because people don’t exist in a vacuum - you can find out more about them, I have found, in group settings, than trying to build them away from all human contact.

As I started writing this dialogue, it came out that Phyl (reading the clues) was really good at puzzles (smart again), and Bernice, her friend, wasn't. Bernice asked why Phyl hadn't done something with that, and that question got me thinking - maybe the reason Phyl didn't go into codebreaking was because they didn't want her - because she's of a slightly lower social class. One of the books about codebreakers is called The Debs of Bletchley Park for the simple reason that a lot of upper class debutantes ended up getting posts there because they knew someone.

I fiddled around with some backstory and dropped some references in for flavor, though I'm still not sure where she's from - in my head, Phyl still speaks with an RP accent. I thought about making her from Yorkshire (thank you, All Creatures Great and Small) but McCray is a Scottish name, so her father or grandfather might have immigrated, probably for work, so I considered Hull (boat-building) Sheffield (mining) and Manchester (manufacturing) as possible cities. National Service could be and often was a great mixer of classes in the UK, and allowed women to do and see things that wouldn't have been possible before the war, so a young woman from a working class background could make something of herself with hard work.

Though this didn't make it into the sketch, the magazine I used for the crossword, MacCleans, is a periodical from Canada. I thought about putting in a reference to one or more of the pilots on their base being from Canada, but in the end it didn't work, so the reference got cut. There's actually a story in that particular issue (April 1943) about Bomber Command. A reference to other pilots or officers on base would give me some more characters to play with in later scenes, and possibly set up a romantic entanglement, if the Canadian officer gave her the magazine as a gift, knowing she liked puzzles.

I didn't do too much with this in specific, but as the scene played out, I got the sense that Phyl is older than Bernie by a few years, and has also been in the services longer - she's seen more, heard more, and done more, and is used to this life. And we sort of see that in the scene - she's prepared for the night shift with her crossword and her cup of tea, whereas Bernie is fidgeting.

In a cursory look through tumblr, I found a quote from Sergeant Anne Lowe, talking about the Battle of Britain, saying "You always knew when they were dead when they took their names off the board. (…) There were so many. They mourned each other so simply and with no fuss and went off rushing into the air again. Now at last, we began to know and understand a little and now we knew war. Always there was a sound of weeping. Every day some girl was weeping."

So, someone who had been longer in the service, who had lived through life at one of those busier coastal installations, had lived through the Battle of Britain, had watched a lot of men she'd danced with come back changed or not come back at all, would have a very different perspective than a young woman who just joined and comes with none of that baggage, and is anxious about being on a slow assignment when she could be doing something much more exciting.

The ending line of the scene - "She would learn. They all did, eventually" was supposed to be a hat tip to the fact that something has happened to Phyllis in the past, regarding boyfriends or making new friends, which would hopefully pay out when she meets the promised Americans in the next scene.

So. Started with some dialogue, let the two characters in the scene feel each other out a bit and learned more about them in the process, tried to come up with some backstory that would support them and a story going forward, tried to give them some context within the story and the larger picture of the war, hopefully gave the reader some reasons to come back for the next chapter.

Wash, rinse, repeat.

More on that Anne Lowe quote:>> http://spitfiresite.com/2010/09/battle-of-britain-1940-losses.html

#director's commentary #phyl mccray #1940s girl gang #meet my originals #original character

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airmanisr · 3 years

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68-8284 1968 Sikorsky MH-53M Pave Low lV USAF RAF Museum Cosford 26.06.18 by Phil Rawlings Via Flickr: Built by Sikorsky Aircraft in 1968. Medium-lift Combat Search and Rescue helicopter; USAF version of US Navy and Marine Corp’s CH-53A/D Sea Stallion helicopter. The HH-53C ‘Super Jolly Green Giant’ (officially known as the Stallion) was long-range Combat Search and Rescue helicopter that was also used for covert operations during the Vietnam War. May 71-Jan 72 Active in South East Asia; Call Sign JG 55. Made two known aircrew recoveries. One of nine MH-53Hs and 32 HH-53s later converted to ‘MH-53J Pave Low III Enhanced’ low-level, long-range Special Operations standard with uprated engines, more armour, forward-looking infrared, global positioning system, Doppler navigation systems, terrain following and terrain-avoidance radar, on-board computer and integrated avionics for ‘low-level, long-range, undetected penetration into denied areas, day or night, in adverse weather, for infiltration, exfiltration and resupply of special operations forces’ to quote the USAF official website. There were 41 MH-53Js in all, all modified from existing airframes between 1986 and 1990; they all retained Combat Search And Rescue (CSAR) capability in addition to Special Operations duties, and were the largest helicopter in the USAF inventory. Pave refers to the allweather sensor system, Precision Avionics Vectoring Equipment. Later modified from J model to MH-53M Pave Low IV standard with Interactive Defensive Avionics System/Multi-Mission Advanced Tactical Terminal, enhancing its defensive capabilities. Latterly assigned to 20th Expeditionary Special Operations Squadron (20 SOS – the ‘Green Hornets’), part of 1st Special Operations Group, Air Force Special Operations Command at Hurlburt Field, Florida, USA. This unit converted to the HH-53 at Hurlburt Field in 1980, equipping with the MH-53H Pave Low in 1986 and the MH-53J from 1988 and MH-53M in 1999. The unit was involved in Operation Desert Shield from August 1990 and later operations in Bosnia-Herzegovina 1992/94 and Operation Desert Thunder in 1998. 24.09.08 Final flight, flying time 4hrs. Total airframe hours 12066.6. 30.09.08 type finally retired from USAF Inventory following a final operational combat mission by 20 SOS in Iraq on 26 September 2008. 28 Oct 08 Following gifting by the United States Air Force via the National Museum of the United States Air Force, delivered by USAF C.17 to RAF Brize Norton, Oxfordshire, arriving from Joint Base Balad, Baghdad, Iraq. 17.12.08 flown by No. 99 Squadron RAF C.17A Globemaster III ZZ176 from RAF Brize Norton to Cosford for reassembly. Info from museum website

#MH-53 #movie star

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gingyboo · 3 years

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Mirror Mirror

A/N: Again many thanks to @booglebug

Description- Soulmates existed. People knew that much. Soulmates were rare, a handful in each generation, an unexplainable phenomenon that formed a bond closer than blood and more sacred than marriage.

Bucky finds his soulmate when he needs her most. Little does he know how much she needs him too.

(Soulmate au that slots pretty much in to the MCU but with soulmates. Set after TFATWS.)

Pairing- Bucky Barnes x OFC

Warnings- Mentions of violence and guns, but its mostly fluff, drama and angst.

This is a multi chaptered fic.

Please like, comment, reblog!

prologue Chapter 1 Chapter 2

---------------------------------------------------

Chapter 3

She was falling.

And then she wasn’t, strong arms held her up as her fall was broken. Her bare feet hit the uneven pavement of the back ally. Who knew when she’d lost her shoes? She spun round to her rescuer, breathing deeply.

‘’You must be Sam?’’ She leant against the building behind her, looking the new Captain America up and down. ‘’Thanks Cap,’’ Sam nodded,

‘’Bucky!’’ She shouted, the initial adrenaline had passed, and she turned sharply trying to catch a glimpse of him on the roof top.

‘’Already in hand,’’ red wing was slowly lowering Bucky down to the street, he looked embarrassed shaking his head at Sam. Redwing released him two feet from the ground and he hit it running. He was back at her side in seconds, hands ghosting over her shoulders, checking for signs of injury.

‘’She’s fine Buck, she did good.’’ Blue and red lights flashed around them. Sam and Bucky shared a knowing look.

‘’We need to get you off the streets, this isn’t the covert rescue we were after.’’ Bucky stated pulling Nancy to his side, arm wrapped protectively around her bare shoulders, Nancy shivered at the coolness of the metal through his jacket sleeve. Bucky drew back, embarrassed wringing his hands. ‘’Sorry.’’ He muttered.

‘’No,’’ she whispered back threading her fingers through the vibranium, ‘’we’ll go to my house, we’ll be safe there.’’ Bucky shook his head opening his mouth to protest, ‘’no don’t you start James Barnes, I trusted you and you threw me off a bloody building, it’s your turn to trust me.’’ Nancy cut him off, Sam smiled looking between the pair.

‘’Are either of you two gonna tell me what’s going on here?’’ He gestured between the two of them.

‘’No!’’ They responded in unison. They shared a discreet smile.

‘’Okay princess you want to go home we’ll get you home, but Torres is gonna find a way of getting you to Wakanda in the morning, your dad wants you safe. Now the RAF is keeping him grounded for now, apparently the jet wasn’t stealthy enough. So, I’ll keep an eye from up there,’’ Sam pointed to the sky’s, ‘’make sure no one’s thinking of following you two. We’ll rendezvous at your house,’’

‘’Perfect,’’ she smiled smugly up at Bucky who sighed, ‘’ we can take the tube it’ll be easy to hide, it’ll be packed this time of night.’’ 9.30 didn’t strike Bucky as particularly late but then a lot of the surrounding pubs were tightly packed.

‘’What’s the tube?’’ Bucky asked frowning.

‘’It’s their version of a subway.’’ Sam said laughing at the look of disgust on Bucky’s face.

‘’No, no we are not taking a subway,’’ he spat out, looking around for inspiration. ‘’I got a better idea.’’ He looked at Sam and then jerked his head in the direction of a huddle of police operatives. ‘’Just follow our lead.’’ He attempted a reassuring smile at Nancy, she looked deadpan back at him.

‘’Officers, could I have your assistance please?’’ Sam walked out into the street calling out, Stars and Stripes shining off his chest.

‘’Oh my god is Captain America!’’ One of them called.

‘’Captain, what’s going on here?’’

‘’I’m afraid I’m not at liberties to disclose that information at the present time, what I do require is your assistance, my associates here require a vehicle.’’ The officers bit back with a barricade of questions. Nancy rolled her eyes, pushing past, this was getting them nowhere.

‘’Officers? If I may,’’ she stretched out a hand and shot them a winning smile, ‘’Nancy Cartwright, I was seeing the show with the finance secretary tonight, there were these men, they came for me, the captain and his, er, associate as he said, they are here to take me to a safe place. We just require a vehicle, a bike preferable given the traffic, will you help us?’’

The officer in charge looked torn, eyes jumping between Nancy and her companions. Finally, he turned, talking quickly into his radio, then he nodded to another officer. Apparently from nowhere a large bike appeared, gleaming with the neon green and blue.

‘’You sure you can handle this thing sweetheart?’’ The new arrival smirked eyebrows raised at Nancy’s attire.

‘’I’m sure he can.’’ She beamed up at Bucky, with her heels gone the height difference was more noticeable, where they would have stood just off even she now found herself a head shorter than him. Bucky removed his suit jacket, slipped it over Nancy’s bare shoulders, he stretched out his arms before mounting the bike. Nancy climbed on behind him, a bare leg released out into the cold night air through the slit in her dress, the excess material added some protection from the cold metal footrests.

‘’Hold on tight.’’ Bucky pulled her arms tight around crossing over his chest. Nancy’s front was flush against her back his heart beating in between.

‘’Redwings got the address, I’ll keep you updated anything coming your way.’’ Sam nodded to Bucky before launching into the sky. Nancy buried her head into Bucky’s shoulder waiting for the first jolt of movement.

‘’Umm, ma’am,’’ the officer who’d brought the bike was holding out a helmet for Nancy.

‘’I, er, thank you.’’ She slipped the helmet on seeing Bucky shake his head at you forgetting, ‘’where’s yours?’’ She responded tapping him playfully on the chin with the back of her hand.

‘’I’ll be just fine, don’t you worry about me.’’ He laughed, gently he dropped a soft kiss one of the fingers now resting on his shoulder. He revved the engine, and the police cleared a path to the main road. Nancy tensed as soon as the bike lurched, she could feel a chuckle radiate through Bucky at her reaction, though soon enough they were weaving through the London night life. Nancy tried to take in this new perspective of the city, catching glimpses of colour and music, playing brief whiteness to revelry and chaos. There was always new beauty to be discovered in this city of hers. Redwing had attached itself the font of the bike and was projecting a map on to the bikes windshield, every couple of minutes Bucky would respond to Sam’s voice in his ear. Nancy kept holding on tight, almost scared to suffocate him but more scared of flying off the back as Bucky pushed the bikes speed capabilities. At one point he took one hand from the handlebars and removed his gun from the holster he wore. In a flash he shot out the tires of a bike at the mouth of a secluded ally. He then thanked Sam for the heads up. More came to follow, Sam took out two cars that were waiting outside Nancy’s house just as Bucky pulled up in front of the old town house. Car alarms were going off everywhere and the neighbours pulled back the curtains to see the disturbance in the square.

#bucky barnes #winter solider #sam wilson #captain america #soulmate #mcu fic #mcu

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popcornrya · 10 days

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"Don, analysis."

Leon : "okay I get it she just came out of a burning building but..."

Raf : "what is that..."

Mike : "Don?"

Don : "Does the word Vivisection mean anything to anyone?"

—————

Not quite Covert Au OC Iodine, she usually hides her scars but unlike herself, her clothes aren't fireproof...

Covert Au by @chessman-protocol

#not quite covert au #rottmnt #rise of the turtles #rottmnt fanart #covert au fanart

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gleeandshame · 5 years

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JtV Semi-liveblogging Chapter Ninety Two Rewatch

I’m probably just skipping to the Jetra parts tbh. Under the cut for length and spoilers

Oh yeah the man of the house bs when Actually they just showed Jane helping with household things like......

“When you reward incompetence, we all lose” - Petra is iconique

Honestly this episode had some much Raf and Jane co-parenting well rights

Jane loves lists and routines...

Yeah I’m gonna skip Jorge parts, he’s such a jerk in this one

No, petra crying :’(

I think petra had 10 temps in 3 weeks, geez girl

I’m guessing the make up department makes your eyes and cheeks all red for crying way too much look?

Ugh, Jane comforting Petra, I can’t... I’m emotion

Jane’s been on the phone with petra for 20 nights straight, and she’s in person this time. On the Porch of Tears

Every time, I’m like Jane I don’t think you need to specify returning the ring tomorrow? It’s pitch black out I don’t think the jeweler would be open. But it’s a segue for

AREPAS?

Yeah, eff me, I’m always emotional at praying scenes, well usually, but Petra as part of the family at the table I’m.... :’)

Oops watched part of Jorge Alba stuff, talking trouts remind me of Wonderfalls, that’s a good show....... but it’s not streaming anywhere :/

jane talking about her problems with Petra, Jane encouraging petra in and touching the small of her back :’)

I know someone on a gifset or a post mentioned it, but that poor jeweler, he probably just thought they were a wlw getting it resized :’)

3 karats... imagine having that money

Honestly this moving on storyline makes Petramos getting back together less satisfying... like the ring... it still would have been too soon. Itt’s like a whole thing...

LIke just a couple episodes ago the girls were trying to torment JR away and like... yikes JtV

I really do support Petramos, but I wish it was better written for those of you that love them

This is Mars is also a waste of time

Jorge f*cking turning up the tv while Jane is trying to talk to Mateo I’ll murder a man, i will

Oh man, this was when Krisha x Petra was still a possibility, I would support if she wasn’t working for Petra, POWER DYNAMICS, ethics, you know

Petra’s death glare to Raf, but he is right, I do like when Jane or Raf push each other to try to be covert to get through to Petra (This is about her remodel idea)

Raf talking about sustainability of a routine, he only has rights when they’re not romantic I swear

Oh, Raf talked to Jane, it was the other way around I forgot. But lol Petra’s eyeroll again, love her always

Petra feeling powerless about wanting JR, didn’t Jane have a plot about being powerless about wanting Raf? Gosh it would have been so much better if they truly moved on

I do love how they tied the Petra and Mateo plotline with Jane taking Petra on a run :’)

also Petra and Jane are so cute, they were already ready to run

Exterior shot running on the beach, like probably on the back of a truck ?

I just love it since we’re not used to movement on this show you know?

“I never believed in this sappy destiny stuff before. And for a while there, because of you, “

… “I actually thought JR was my happily ever after”

Oh yeah, just remembered why i was rewatching this episode. I’m writing a ficlet, of course being me it’s like half just trying to make a headcanon about what Jane is thinking into a narrative...

The f*cking bokeh lights in the background.... it’s like so whimsical or romantic, I”M

“Is she done waiting” Petra stares at Jane out of focus behind Jane’s face...

‘Yeah she is”

OUT of context this is so much, in context it feels like so much

I know we’ve all said it but it was shot like a rom com, who was the cinnamon topographer or director?

The director was Leo Zisman, I owe you my life

There’s something about them sitting next to each other but not looking in each others eyes, one looks off to the ocean, the other looks lovingly at the other, the f*ck

Jane’s smile at Petra saying bankrupting the hotel is not a good way to get over JR

WHy did they do this to me (I mean I thank them but I have emotions)

Petra looks so sad :(

and then Jane does the cute little nudge/bump, I cry

The letter Jane leaves Petra... normal and cute, but then Petra’s smile??? Yael and Gina really made some choices this episode

I knew it was Krishna. Gosh I really get how people ship them tho...

And we Ignore River Fields

Gosh, this episode said Jetra rights sooo loud

#jtv #jtv season 5 #jetra #chapter ninety two #anti jafael #I don't mean to be but that's how the commentary skews

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mattkennard · 5 years

Text

Britain’s seven covert wars: An Explainer

Published: Daily Maverick (17 September 2019) w/ Mark Curtis

The United Kingdom is fighting at least seven covert wars largely outside parliamentary or democratic oversight.

The British government states that its policy on the covert wars it fights is “not to comment, and to dissuade others from commenting or speculating, about the operational activities of special forces because of the security implications”.

The British public’s ability to scrutinise policy is further restricted by the UK’s Freedom of Information Act which applies an “absolute exemption” to its special forces.

UK special forces consist of a number of regiments, but the Special Air Service (SAS), a unit of the British army, is the most renowned. Based at RAF Credenhill, just outside Hereford in western England, it is rumoured to have about 500 personnel.

This explainer outlines what is known of these covert wars, which is likely to represent only a small part of actual UK military operations in these countries. Nearly all the leaks which appear in the mainstream media are officially sanctioned and have been further approved by the Ministry of Defence’s DSMA Committee, which seeks to prevent material deemed damaging to the national security interest from being published in the media.

Afghanistan

The SAS has fought in Afghanistan since 2001, longer than any war in the regiment’s history, according to some sources.

The public was told at the end of 2014 that British forces had withdrawn from Afghanistan. However, some British troops stayed behind to help create and train an Afghan special forces unit. Despite officially only having “advisers” in the country, British covert forces have consistently fought Islamic State and the Taliban.

By 2018, the SAS was reportedly fighting almost every day in Afghanistan, usually in support of Afghan commandos leading the battle against the Taliban.

In February 2018, Britain doubled the size of its SAS force in Afghanistan from about 50 to more than 100. One newspaper reported at the time:

“The commandos will conduct kill-or-capture missions alongside US special forces and come under the command of the American-led Joint Special Operations Command. Part of the force will be made up of 15 snipers who will be part of a specialist unit tasked with killing Taliban commanders.”

In July 2018, “dozens” more special forces troops were sent to Afghanistan as part of a contingent of 490 extra soldiers deployed to join the almost 650 already there.

By March 2019, the Pentagon was asking British special forces to play a key role in counter-terrorist operations in Afghanistan. This followed US President Donald Trump’s decision to pull US troops out of the country. It was also reported that a contingent of the Special Boat Service (SBS) is operating in central and eastern Afghanistan.

In 2014, the government stated that it had ended its drone strikes programme in Afghanistan, which had begun in 2008 and covered much of the country. It is believed that all British Reaper drones were withdrawn from Afghanistan by the end of 2014. Yet in 2015, British special forces were still calling in airstrikes using US drones instead.

Overall, British troops in Afghanistan numbered about 1,000 by mid-2019.

Iraq

Hundreds of British troops have been deployed in Iraq to train local security forces. But they are also engaged in covert combat operations against Islamic State.

In early 2016, Britain reportedly had more than 200 special forces soldiers in the country, operating out of a fortified base within a Kurdish Peshmerga camp near Mosul in northern Iraq. In May 2016, special forces were given the green light to conduct covert parachute assaults involving SAS and SBS commandos being sent in to support Kurdish and Iraqi troops fighting Islamic State, with small vehicles, heavy machine guns and mortars.

The SAS in Iraq was also reported in 2016 to have been given a “kill or capture” list of up to 200 UK citizens who had joined the Islamic State group.

By May 2019 about 30 SAS and SBS troops were reported to be working on a “kill or capture” mission to hunt down Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in Iraq. They were said to be operating from a special forces HQ north of Baghdad and teaming up with US special forces. The search for al-Baghdadi reportedly involved MI6, UK listening station GCHQ and the American National Security Agency.

British Reaper drones were first deployed over Iraq in 2014 and continue to fly. From then until March 2019, UK drones conducted 1,384 missions in Iraq, releasing 666 weapons.

Libya

SAS forces were secretly deployed to Libya at the beginning of 2016, working with Jordanian special forces embedded in the British contingent. This followed a mission by MI6 and the Royal Air Force in January 2016 to gather intelligence on Islamic State and draw up potential targets for airstrikes.

Some 100 British special forces were said to be operating in Libya in early 2016, helping to protect government officials and advising Libyan forces on fighting Islamic State. The Libyan Express reportedthat “British and American intelligence officers ‘with suitcases full of cash’ are bribing tribal leaders not to oppose an international ground force” in the country.

British commandos were soon also engaged in fighting and directing assaults against Islamic State in Libya. They also ran intelligence, surveillance and logistical support operations from a base in the western city of Misrata.

A team of 15 British special forces were also reported in June 2016 to be based in a French-led multinational military operations centre in Benghazi, eastern Libya, supporting Libyan general Khalifa Haftar. In July 2016, Middle East Eye reported that this British involvement was intended to help coordinate airstrikes in support of Haftar, whose forces are opposed to the Tripoli-based government that Britain is otherwise supporting. It was unclear why.

In 2017, eight members of the SBS — supported by 40 British specialists — were deployed with US, French and Italian forces “to deny Islamic State any opportunity to establish a base in Libya”.

A Libyan anti-terrorism official was quoted as saying in May 2019 that the UK was co-operating with the Libyan government in “surveilling and fighting terrorists”. In the same month, an SAS unit was evacuatedby the RAF following the rapid advance of Haftar’s forces in the cities of Tobruk and Tripoli.

Pakistan

The UK has been a co-party to the US’s extensive drone campaign in Pakistan. The UK spy base at Menwith Hill in Yorkshire has facilitated US drone strikes against jihadists in Pakistan, with Britain’s GCHQ providing “locational intelligence” to US forces for use in these attacks.

RAF pilots at Creech Air Force Base in Nevada have been involved in these US drone operations in Pakistan (and Afghanistan) which have killed hundreds of civilians. The role of these pilots is unclear but, Amnesty International notes, “this does raise concerns that UK pilots under US command may have been ordered to carry out drone strikes and could therefore implicate them in these violations”.

US drone strikes continue in Pakistan, although at much lower levels than in previous years, and the UK role in them remains obscure.

Somalia

A small contingent of SAS troops has been training and advising Kenyan security forces and providing intelligence to help Kenya in its efforts against al-Shabaab in Somalia, including to capture its leaders.

In 2012, it was reported that the SAS was working on the ground in Somalia with Kenyan forces to target al-Shabaab terrorists. This involved up to 60 SAS soldiers, close to a full squadron, including forward air controllers who called in airstrikes by the Kenyan air force, which also employs a number of ex-RAF pilots.

In early 2016, Jordan’s King Abdullah, whose troops have operated with UK special forces for the war against Bashar Assad in Syria and whose special forces were planned to be embedded with the UK’s in Libya, said that his troops were also ready with Britain and Kenya to go “over the border” to attack al-Shabaab in Somalia.

By April 2016 it was reported that the SAS had a 10-strong team in Somalia, based at a camp north of Mogadishu, which was engaged in “regular skirmishes” with al-Shabaab and was also training Somali soldiers. The SAS team was also working with US Delta Force directing airstrikes against the insurgents by US jets based in Djibouti.

The British government said in May 2016 that it had 27 military personnel in Somalia. These troops were said to be supporting the UN, EU and African Union training missions in Somalia which were set up to counter al-Shabaab and were “developing” the Somali national army.

The Menwith Hill base in Yorkshire has also facilitated US drone strikes against jihadists in Somalia (as they have in Pakistan), with Britain’s GCHQ similarly providing “locational intelligence” to US forces for use in these attacks.

Syria

Evidence suggests that a British covert operation in Syria began in late 2011. By November of that year, MI6 and French special forces were reportedly assisting Syrian fighters and assessing their training, weapons and communications needs. The CIA, meanwhile, was providing communications equipment and intelligence.

Britain also became involved in the “rat line” of weapons delivered from Libya to Syria via southern Turkey. This was authorised in early 2012 following a secret agreement between the US and Turkey. Revealed by journalist Seymour Hersh, the project was funded by Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar while “the CIA, with the support of MI6, was responsible for getting arms from Gaddafi’s arsenals into Syria”.

British and US covert operations were focused on toppling the Assad regime in the first few years of the war. Britain began training Syrian rebel forces fighting Assad from bases in Jordan in 2012. At the same time, the SAS and SBS also began “slipping into Syria on missions”.

No evidence appears to have emerged of British training of Syrian rebels to fight Islamic State in Syria before May 2015, when Britain sent 85 troops to Turkey and Jordan to train rebels to fight both Islamic State and Assad. By July 2015, Britain was training Syrians in Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Jordan and Qatar to fight Islamic State, but the war against Assad also continued. As part of a US-led training programme, British special forces provided training, weapons and other equipment to the New Syrian Army, comprised of defectors from the Syrian army.

In 2015, British special forces were “mounting hit-and-run raids against Islamic State deep inside eastern Syria dressed as insurgent fighters”. They were reported to “frequently cross into Syria to assist the New Syrian Army”, from their base in Jordan.

Turkey also offered a base for British military training. In 2015, for example, Britain deployed several military trainers to Turkey as part of the US-led training programme in Syria. This programme was providing small arms, infantry tactics and medical training to rebel forces.

British aircraft began covert strikes against Islamic State targets in Syria in 2015, months before Parliament voted in favour of overt action in December 2015. These strikes were conducted by British pilots embedded with US and Canadian forces.

In September 2016, UK forces were involved in US-led airstrikes against targets in Syria which killed more than 60 Syrian troops. These strikes were part of a battle against Islamic State in Deir Ezzor in eastern Syria which the US and UK claimed they were targeting and had hit Syrian army targets accidentally. In June 2018, the RAF targeted Syrian army forces near the border with Iraq and Jordan in close proximity to a UK/US special forces base.

Some 200 UK troops were in Syria in early 2018, consisting of the SAS, Parachute Regiment and Royal Marines which together make up the Special Forces Support Group. They were working alongside the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces.

In March 2018, Matt Tonroe, an SAS soldier embedded with US forces, was killed in the northern city of Manbij, fighting with local Kurdish troops against Islamic State. SAS sources claimed that those who planted the bomb which killed Tonroe could have belonged to the Free Syrian Army. However, a media investigation in 2019 revealed that Tonroe was killed by “friendly forces” after an accidental detonation.

British special forces continue to operate on the ground in Syria in 2019 and are reported to number at least 120 soldiers.

Britain has also been operating a secret drone warfare programme in Syria which began in 2014. From then until March 2019, UK drones conducted 1,801 missions in Syria, releasing 304 weapons. In 2017, Reaper drones killed two British Islamic State militants in Syria, again before parliament approved military action.

Yemen

The government previously claimed it had no military personnel based in Yemen. Yet a Vice News report in 2016 based on interviews with UK officials revealed that British special forces were in Yemen. They were, in fact, seconded to MI6, which was training Yemeni troops fighting Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) and had infiltrated AQAP.

Vice News also revealed in 2016 that British military personnel were helping with US drone strikes against AQAP. Britain was playing “a crucial and sustained role with the CIA in finding and fixing targets, assessing the effect of strikes and training Yemeni intelligence agencies to locate and identify targets for the US drone programme”. UK officials, the report said, were taking part in “hits”, preparing “target packages” and participating in a “joint operations room” with US and Yemeni forces in support of strikes.

The Menwith Hill base in Yorkshire facilitates US drone strikes in Yemen, as shown in files from Edward Snowden revealed by The Intercept in 2016. Documents show that the US National Security Agency has pioneered groundbreaking new spying programmes at Menwith Hill to pinpoint the locations of suspected terrorists accessing the internet in remote parts of the world. This role for Menwith Hill was denied for years by the UK government.

In November 2017, it was revealed that the British Army was secretly training Saudi troops to fight in Yemen. It was reported that up to 50 UK military personnel were in Saudi Arabia teaching battlefield skills. The training mission — codenamed Operation Crossways — came to light only after the army released photos and information by mistake. The training was undertaken by UK troops from the 2nd Battalion of the Royal Regiment of Scotland who were imparting “irregular warfare” techniques to officers from the Royal Saudi Land Forces Infantry Institute.

In January 2019, a 12-man US/UK special forces task force, comprising the SAS and the US Green Berets, was flown into Yemen from Djibouti. The soldiers were dressed in Arab clothing and were reported to be operating near the government-held town of Marib, 500 miles north of Aden.

By March 2019, 30 SBS personnel were deployed inside Yemen, based in the Sa’dah area of the northern part of the country. The SBS force includes medics, interpreters and intelligence officers and their mission is to “advise” official Saudi and Yemeni government troops. However, the media has reported that these SBS forces have also been involved in fierce clashes with militia groups. An SBS spokesperson has said that British soldiers have been injured in “firefights”.

More on the UK’s drone wars

The UK has been recently involved in drone strikes in at least six countries: Afghanistan,Iraq, Pakistan, Somalia, Syria and Yemen. Its squadron of 10 Reaper drones is controlledremotely by satellite from RAF Waddington in Lincolnshire and by RAF aircrew at Creech Air Force Base in Nevada, US.

The RAF’s secret drone war beganin Afghanistan in October 2007 and elsewherein 2014. The NGO Reprieve notesthat Britain provides communications networks to the CIA “without which the US would not be able to operate this programme”. Reprieve says that this is a particular matter of concern as the US covert drone programme is illegal.

UK personnel have been embeddedwithin US units and form part of US drone operations. UK personnel flew US drones (Predators) during Operation Ellamy, the codename for the UK’s participation in the military intervention in Libya in 2011. UK personnel embedded with the US Air Force have also operated US armed and unarmed drones in Afghanistan and Iraq.

In July 2018, a two-year probe by the All Party Parliamentary Group on Drones revealedthat the number of drone operations facilitated by the UK in Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Pakistan and Somalia has been growing without any public scrutiny. The drone strategy also involved working with repressive regimes including the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Qatar.

Amnesty International’s 2018 report, Deadly Assistance, documented four RAF bases in the UK involved in the US drone attacks programme: Menwith Hill in Yorkshire, Molesworth in Cambridgeshire, Digby in Lincolnshire and Croughton in Northamptonshire. Around one-third of all US military communications in Europe pass through RAF Croughton, which has a direct link through a fibre-optic communications system to a US military base in Djibouti (Camp Lemonnier), from where most US drone strikes in Yemen and Somalia are carried out.

Embedded in the US and other militaries

The government stated in 2015 that it had 177 military personnel embedded in other countries’ forces. Some 30 of those were working with the US military. UK military personnel are assignedto various commands in the US and to US Navy Carrier Strike Groups.

It is possible that these forces are also engaged in combat. For example, the then First Sea Lord, Admiral Sir Philip Jones, saidBritish pilots fly US F18s from the decks of US aircraft carriers in the Gulf. This means that some “US” airstrikes may well be carried out by British pilots.

“British forces embedded in the armed forces of other nations operate as if they were the host nation’s personnel, under that nation’s chain of command”, the Ministry of Defence has stated.

#SpecialForces #UKmilitary #Syria #Yemen #Pakistan #drones

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antoine-roquentin · 5 years

Link

Hammarskjöld’s death happened amid a post-colonial race for resources in Africa. On his final flight, he was heading for a secret meeting to broker an end to the civil war in recently independent Congo, mineral-rich and on the brink of collapse.

The eastern province of Katanga, home to most of the country’s vast deposits of ore – including the uranium ore used to make the bomb that America dropped on Hiroshima – and source of much of the country’s income, had declared independence the previous year.

Rebel leader Moïse Tshombe had covert military and technical backing from the Belgian government, the former colonial power, and support from western mining firms with interests in the area. Hammarskjöld believed the UN had a duty to intervene because Katanga’s secession posed an existential threat to Congo.

A champion of decolonisation and an implacable idealist who believed the UN should be protector and platform for small countries, he over-ruled the reservations of the UN’s legal adviser to order military action to end the rebellion, infuriating Britain and the US. But UN troops had been outmanoeuvred and a group were now under siege. In a bid to end the standoff and the conflict, Hammarskjöld was flying to a secret meeting with Tshombe when he died....

Since the UN reopened its inquiry, further evidence has been unearthed, including the US diplomatic cable that names Van Risseghem (misspelled as Vak Risseghel) as a suspect.

It has also emerged that at least one US plane with powerful radio surveillance capacity was on the tarmac at Ndola that evening. Transcripts of any radio recordings America holds, from the Albertina or its attacker, could settle once and for all the questions about Hammarskjöld’s fate – and whether Van Risseghem had a role.

But while the US has admitted it has further evidence in classified files, it has so far declined to share it with the UN, despite repeated requests from the new commissioner.

belgium and the us, of course, supported tshombe’s secession because it undermined the independence of the congo from western colonialism, and assassinated the first independently elected leader of that country, patrice lumumba.

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gentlemansaurusrex · 5 years

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Arabian Knight

Hey friends, this week we will be looking at the mysterious and iconic T.E. Lawrence. Lawrence has been romanticized as this great figure in history for his exploits in exploration, archaeology, and rebellions. So, with summer coming up pretty close, I thought it would be neat to take us to the blazing hot desert of the Middle East.

Thomas Edward Lawrence was born in Wales in 1888 to the unmarried Sarah Junner and Thomas Chapman. Junner was a Scottish governess Chapman was an Anglo-Irish nobleman who eventually rose in rank. A year after T.E. was born, his family moved to Scotland in 1889, the same year his brother William George was born. The same year, the family moved to the town of Dinard located in Brittany, France. In 1896, the family moved to Oxford, England where Lawrence started his professional education in history at Jesus College. He graduated in 1910 where he was hired by the British Museum working as an archaeologist. He would often work in Carchemish (Karkemish) located in Ottoman Syria. When the Great War broke out in 1914, Lawrence volunteered for the army and was stationed in Egypt. In 1916, he was reassigned to do intelligence work in the Arabian Peninsula. This began Lawrence’s covert career against the Ottoman Empire.

What Lawrence is most known for during his time in the Arabian Peninsula was helping revolutionary leaders of the Arab Revolt. The Arab Revolt was a revolution based on what British and Middle Eastern leaders established as a single Arabic state stretching from Aleppo, Syria to Aden, Yemen. If the revolt were to succeed against the Ottoman Empire, the British would formally recognize the territory as an independent nation. Lawrence was sent to Hejaz to interview the would-be leader Sharif Hussein’s sons to find who would lead the revolt. Out of his three sons, Faisal was best suited for the job. Faisal and Lawrence’s relationship bloomed soon after. Lawrence received word that would eventually be replaced, but due to miscommunication, Lawrence’s replacement did not show up on time. As a result of this delay, the two men strategized how they could best use Arab forces to prevent the Ottomans from taking railways in Syria that would surround Medina, located in the southern part of the peninsula. When the replacement came, Faisal objected to the British command. Faisal suggested that his replacement be sent somewhere else and that Lawrence stayed under his command. The wish was granted, and the two men served with each other until the end of the war in 1918. The two would work on several different missions together stopping the Ottoman Empire from devastating more of the British lines and spreading the Arab revolt.

His guerilla tactics led to many legends about Lawrence, who would later be known as Lawrence of Arabia. As part of his exploits aside from guerrilla tactics, was a 300-mile journey to recruit and warn Arabs about the Ottoman threat. In 1917, on route to Aqaba located in Jordan, he stopped in various towns in Syria to tell Arab villages to not attack the Ottomans until Faisal gave them the word. As part of his instructions to the Arabs in the Jordanian town of Azraq outside of Damascus, Syria, he destroyed a bridge the Ottomans used. The destruction of the bridge created a diversion for the Arabs and showing how guerilla warfare was used became a powerful example for the British. Lawrence was considered to receive the Victoria Cross which is considered the most prestigious award in England. However, his consideration was past on and he received a companionship in the Order of Bath (still prestigious as heck though). He was also promoted to Major. His years in Middle Eastern Theatre served as the majority for his fame. In the wilds and desert of the Middle East, stories of Lawrence riding around on camels, living with Arab rebels, and dawning the garb of an Arabian mystified and enamored the world. When the war ended, he became romanticized and toured around the world giving lectures of what he learned.

Aside from lectures at Madison Square Garden discussing the life he lived in the Middle East, work still had to be done. He served in the British Foreign Office during the post-war activity. He received word that Faisal had asked him to be a part of his delegation during the Paris Peace Conference in 1919. While in-route back to the Middle East, his flight from Italy to Egypt crashed, in Italy. The pilots were killed, but Lawrence only received a broken shoulder and ribs. While hospitalized he was visited by King Emmanuel III of Italy. His work to promote and secure a British-backed the Arabian state became fruitless. While regions like the Hejaz became temporarily independent, much of the Middle East after the fall of the Ottoman Empire either went to European powers. A good portion of Yemen in the southern peninsula fell under British rule, while Arabia and Oman were somewhat independent. Unfortunately, various tribespeople would wage war against each other and did so until a unified Saudi Arabia emerged.

With the idea of a fallen Arabian Peninsula put down by those who promoted it, Lawrence still served the foreign office diligently. During this time, he would work closely with American Lowell Thomas.

Thomas was a journalist who became great friends with Lawrence. He and Lawrence promoted the culture and history of the Middle East by creating a photographic show detailing how exotic the countries Lawrence visited were. This is what launched Lawrence into fame, and possibly (I hate to say this) caused him to talk himself up in public. He would wear clothing such as Bedouin robes while regaling his tales. Many people in England began to fantasize of how wondrous places such as Syria, Jordan, and Arabia must be from the stories that Lawrence told. While he did the show on the side, he would eventually land himself working alongside Winston Churchill doing colonial work for the foreign office. Despite working for a man who would later become prime minister of England, Lawrence hated the bureaucratic work he did. While doing this, he had earned a bad reputation in France for his opinion of French colonialism in Syria. The rumor in France was that Lawrence was a notorious Francophobe that encouraged the Syrians to rise up and take arms against the French. This was not the case. Lawrence loved France. By 1922, Lawrence decided that he would join the Royal Air Force (RAF) under the alias of John Hume Ross.

The goal for Lawrence was to become a pilot. He was interviewed by Flying Officer W. E. Johns who would later create the Biggles novel series (I have never heard of these, but we all love fun facts). Johns was suspicious of Lawrence and had assumed that the Ross name was falsified. He dismissed Lawrence, who later confessed that he had forged papers along with the name. Later, Johns would send word to recruit Lawrence into the RAF. He was in the RAF for roughly a year, where he was dismissed due to falsifying his information. This led to another attempt at changing his identity. He went from John Hume Ross to T. E. Shaw which was super creative. No, not really. Under Shaw, he joined the Royal Tank Corps in 1923 where he was unhappy. By 1925, he was back and accepted within the RAF. During a short tenure with the RAF, he published his autobiography, Revolt in the Desert, based on his experiences in the Middle Eastern Theatre with the Arab Revolt. Due to his knowledge, the RAF moved him to the Pakistani region of British India. He was in this area from 1925 to 1928 where he had to return to Britain after rumors circulated around him helping locals break free from the British.

Once he returned from British India, he served various RAF posts around England. This never amounted to much, but he kept serving Britain diligently through his military services. Two months after he retired from military service in 1935, he was leaving his home in Dorset, England on a motorbike where he swerved away from two young men riding their motorbikes. He landed headfirst on the side of the road. Six days later, T. E. Lawrence passed away. At his funeral, mourners included Winston and Clementine Churchill, T. E’s brother Arnold, the first female member of the British parliament Lady Astor, and author E. M. Foster. Though his death was a surprise too many, it led to many surprising legacies. While Lawrence was survived through his legends in the Middle East, there is a unique remembrance to him that is used every day. One of the doctors who cared for him during the six days after the accident later created the Motorcycle helmet. Aside from the helmet, Lawrence wrote books such as The Mint and Seven Pillars of Wisdom. While many people helped form the literary mind of Lawrence, the one author that stuck out to me the most was Joseph Conrad. Conrad wrote The Heart of Darkness which was non-fiction based on Conrad’s adventure into the Congo. The book is a scathing inditement of how poorly the Belgians treated the Congolese. Literature is great, but his life was also made into a 1962 movie titled Lawrence of Arabia where Peter O’Toole (who was a tool, in my opinion) portrayed him. Now to end this long tirade of fanboying. I have never seen the movie, which is a three-hour journey through the desert. My grandfather has; he saw it in his youth. The reaction my grandpa had was along the lines of, “I left the theatre in a hurry so I could get a drink of water. It looked so hot and dusty.” While T. E. Lawrence had lived a long and dangerous life, it is shrouded in mystery whether he just boasted lies or whether these heroics were true. To me, Lawrence will always be a unique and romanticized figure despite what has been said.

“All men dream, but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds, wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act on their dreams with open eyes, to make them possible.” – T. E. Lawrence

#history

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