VIDEO: www.youtube.com/watch?v=ly0kR79YzfY

  

••• SCRIPT/LYRICS: •••

 

MOLEMAN'S EPIC RAP BATTLES!!!!!!

 

JENNY…

 

…VS…

 

…JOHNNY!

 

BEGIN!

 

S.A.I.N.T. #5 A.K.A. "Johnny":

Hello, bozo! Do you suck bolts? Yes, I think so!

Surrender right now before I squish you like Play–Doh!

You can call me Johnny–Five, and yes, it's true that I'm alive.

You are in store for a battle that I doubt you will survive!

I'll disassemble you and leave your parts outside to rust;

Cause you more vexation than the ones you call "Crust".

I've got your number, Jenny, and I'm gonna make you pissed.

Think you'll threaten to recycle me? Well, you can recycle this! (middle finger)

I'm a true, classic robot, while you're more like Frankenstein.

I'll have Los Locos kick your shiny metal ass to Cluster Prime!

But rest assured, I'll reassemble you when this is over,

And give you a new life as my personal "snow blower".

 

XJ–9 A.K.A. "Jenny":

Shut your nonexistent mouth, you glorified parrot.

You have so many "Bugs Bunnies", your CPU's a carrot!

I need another hero to fight, not a WALL–E reject like you.

Go back to selling bootleg toys with that lookalike of Apu!

You say I'm the bigger freak here? I'd say you're more frightening.

I was created sentient; you had to get struck by lightning!

I'm making tremors with my rhymes, of which I've got tons.

You're such an outmode, you couldn't even beat XJ–1.

A Titanic train wreck's what you are, so call me an iceberg.

I've seen livelier performances from Steve Guttenberg!

You're less threatening than Killgore, and phonier than Silver Shell;

I'll kick your shiny metal ass straight down to Robot Hell!

I'm the hottest blue–bodied bot this side of Cortana.

Your "input" couldn't please Rosie from Hanna-Barbera!

While I'm saving the world, you're struggling with street thugs.

I liked Tim Blaney much better as Frank the Pug!

 

Johnny:

Ha ha ha, ho, nyuk nyuk! Your jokes are hilarious!

…Oh, wait, you really meant all that? In that case, you're delirious!

I've read all about the real you; took me two seconds flat.

You're really lazy! A slacker! A mopey, whiny brat!

Go back to High School, or better yet, Kindergarten!

My movie's getting remade; your show is practically forgotten!

You're going up against a S.A.I.N.T., with a soul straight from Jehovah.

I've got Gigawatts of power, and this is my verbal supernova!

By the time you're a match for me, they'll have made an XJ–10!

I'm an icon! A celebrity! A U.S. Citizen!

I've gone gold! Still think you can beat me? Bitch, please.

When I'm done, you'll only be able to speak Japanese!

 

Jenny:

You're short–circuiting, Johnny. I oughta empty your hard drive.

And in any case, last I checked, nine is greater than five.

I'll summon all of my sisters, call up the Teen Team,

Beat you worse than Oscar did, and fry your brain with frickin' laser beams!

Oh Yeah! My body's got more firepower than Ratchet,

And built–in utilities rivaling Inspector Gadget!

I am the ultimate android; the all–American gynoid.

Strength of 1,000,070 men; that's more than Hulk on steroids!

 

WHO WON?

WHO'S NEXT?

I DECIDE!!!

 

MOLEMAN'S EPIC RAP BATTLES!!!

…Yes, that's what I'm officially calling these now!

Minke Whale meat on the menu at Vinhusid Steakhouse, Reykjavík, Iceland. I boycotted all restaurants which served it © Linda Dawn Hammond / IndyFoto.com March 14, 2014

I boycotted ALL restaurants which served whale, shark or puffin (Lundi) while visiting Iceland. Whale meat and puffins (Lundi) are also on the menu at Hereford Steikhus, Reykjavík, Iceland

According to Elding, a great Icelandic eco whale watching tour, only 5% of the whales killed in Iceland are consumed by locals and 40% by tourists looking for a kick. Some of whom had just stepped off the whale watching tour- very hypocritical. Since a campaign by IFAW to stop this opportunistic experimentation, tourist consumption has dropped to 20%. Now the one company still killing fin and minke whales, Hvalur, managed by Kristján Loftsso (Kristjan Loftsson), is selling byproducts of its cruel product to a local beer company, Steðja Brewery. I'm adding them to my boycott list. I later learned that the picturesque Icelandic horses we see offered for rides to tourists are also bred for meat. © Linda Dawn Hammond / IndyFoto.com Feb 21, 2014

www.ifaw.org/united-states/our-work/whales/meet-us-don%E2...

Meet Us Don't Eat Us: Campaign to take whale meat off the menu for tourists

 

Tourists who visit Iceland during the summer may be greeted by a high-profile campaign from IFAW and Ice Whale (Icelandic Whale Watching Association), encouraging them to enjoy responsible whale watching but to avoid sampling whale meat.

 

The campaign, Meet Us Don't Eat Us is aimed at dispelling the myth some tourists believe that whale meat is a popular dish enjoyed by most Icelanders. However, according to a 2010 Gallup poll survey, only about 5% of Icelanders say they eat it regularly.

Similarly, many people believe Iceland's commercial whaling is a centuries-old tradition, but in reality it started in 1948 and stopped in 1989, with a few boats resuming minke whaling in 2003, initially for so-called scientific research.

IFAW believes an estimated 40% of tourists are persuaded to eat whale meat while in Iceland, mainly out of curiosity. The result is that whales are killed every year just to be sampled by tourists.

The Meet Us Don't Eat Us campaign urges visitors to think carefully about the menu choices they make in the country's excellent restaurants to ensure they don't go home with a bad taste in their mouths.

The campaign, which runs from June to September, is being promoted around Reykjavik by volunteers dressed in whale tail costumes. The volunteers will be talking to tourists in downtown Reykjavik and asking them to sign postcards promising to avoid whale meat and asking Iceland to stop whaling.

The campaign, which ran for the first time in 2011, has ruffled some feathers in Iceland. Despite IFAW signing and paying a four-month contract to place adverts in Keflavik Airport last year, the airport's general manager ordered IFAW to remove them shortly after they went on display following complaints from whalers. The campaign then sparked a major media debate in the country on the issue of free speech and IFAW was delighted to see many Icelanders, including politicians, speak out in defence of the campaign.

In early May, 2012 Kristjan Loftsson, the lone Icelandic whaler responsible for killing 280 endangered fin whales in Icelandic waters over the past six years, told Icelandic media that because of economic issues, including difficulties in trading the meat with Japan following its tsunami tragedy, he would not be fin whaling in 2012. This is the second year in a row that Loftsson has cancelled the hunt, having laid off 30 staff last year. IFAW welcomed this decision and sees it as a positive sign that Loftsson recognises that fin whaling is uneconomic. Icelanders traditionally do not eat fin whale meat and these whales have been killed with a view to selling the meat to Japan, which has so far met with little success.

 

However, commercial hunting of minke whales in Iceland continues. In total, 58 minke whales were killed last season, by two companies. This was from a self-allocated catch limit of 216. IFAW urges Iceland to end all whaling now to protect whales for future generations and to safeguard its successful whale watching industry.

IFAW ran the first workshop looking into the feasibility of whale watching in Iceland more than 20 years ago and has worked closely with Icelandic whale watch operators for several years to promote whale watching as a humane and profitable alternative to the cruelty of whaling.

www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2014/01/iceland...

Iceland's Newest Beer Ingredient: Whale

One brewery is experimenting with a whale of an ale or technically, an ale of a whale.

SVATI KIRSTEN NARULA

JAN 9 2014, 12:46 PM ET

 

Iceland doesn't treat cetaceans the way most of the world wants them to be treated. Like Japan and Norway, Iceland has continued to hunt fin and minke whales in defiance of an international moratorium on the practice. It's not a challenge to find a restaurant serving whale meat in the capital city of Reykjavík. With all this in mind, is it really surprising that Iceland's whaling business has recently teamed up with a brewery to produce "whale beer"?

 

Steðja Brewery

Hvalur, the company managed by "the Icelandic Ahab" Kristján Loftsson, is providing whale mealâa byproduct of processing the animal's meat and oilâto Steðja Brewery to create a limited edition product tied to Iceland's annual mid-winter festival Thorrablot. The beer, marketed as a drink for "true vikings," will only be available from January 24 through February 22. It's 5.2 percent alcohol and is supposedly "healthy" by virtue of containing whale, which is, according to the brewery, high in protein and low in fat.

Dagbjartur Ariliusson, the brewery's owner, told reporters that whale beer makes sense in the context of Thorrablot and the country's history. For many centuries, he said, they have celebrated this festival by eating "cured food, including whale fat, and now we have the beer to drink with this food." Pickled whale blubber is a traditional Thorrablot menu item.

Like so much else Iceland does with whales, the development is drawing impassioned ire from conservationists and anti-whaling activists. The Whale and Dolphin Conservation (WDC) society's campaign managers have called the beer launch an attempt "to diversify whale products in the face of almost nonexistent local consumer demand" and "about as immoral and outrageous as you can get." WDC has also gone after Hvalur for "perversely" powering its whale-hunting ships with whale oil.

The outcry probably won't stop tourists from rushing to sample whale steaks and sashimi at Reykjavík restaurants. Even if whale beer doesn't taste very good because, let's be honest, putting meat of any kind in beer is uncommon and gross it could, one day, be yet another item on a traveler's bucket list.

 

www.ifaw.org/united-states/news/september-drew-end-so-did...

As September drew to an end, so did whaling in Iceland, but for how long?

By: Robbie Marsland

Posted: Mon, 10/14/2013

2013 was a grim year, with a decrease in minke whales killed offset by a vast increase in the number of fin whales killed.

There are two types of whaling in Iceland.

 

These days, minke whaling is carried out primarily by one vessel, Hrafnreyður KÃ-100.

The number of whales killed each season for the small Icelandic whale meat market has dropped from 58 in 2011, to 52 in 2012 and 35 this year.

Less than 5% of Icelanders regularly eat whale meat and thanks to IFAW's Meet Us Don't Eat Us and Whale Friendly Restaurants initiatives in the country, the percentage of tourists eating whale meat has dropped from around 40% to around 20%.

SEE ALSO: "Whale friendly" is the way forward for Icelandic tourism

Not only are sales down for the minke whalers, but it looks like their costs are up. Facing an extended whale watching sanctuary and the displeasure of the Icelandic tourism community, this year the minke whalers kept out of the enormous Faxafloi bay outside Reykjavik, the capital.

They motored around Iceland's western fjords and started to worry the whale watchers in the north of Iceland between Akureyri and Husavik the northern home of Icelandic whale watching. Not surprisingly, their presence there was also hotly contested by whale watching companies.

So as the winter storms start hitting Iceland, we will have to wait and see if the whalers decide it is worth enduring further international and national criticism to go out and cruelly kill minke whales for a steadily declining market that must yield little or no financial return¦

Fin whales are the second species hunted and cruelly killed in Iceland.

In recent years fin whales have only been hunted by one operator. He is Kristjan Loftsson, the son of a whaler who made a fortune from whaling in the 60s, 70s and 80s - before the vast majority of the world (including Iceland) saw sense and stopped killing whales.

Mr Loftsson started killing fin whales again in 2009. No-one was really sure why he started again because fin whale meat is not eaten in Iceland, and the only other place international trade laws allow him to sell the meat is Japan, and they don't seem overly keen to buy fin whale meat from him.

So it wasn't a surprise when Mr Loftsson didn't go fin whaling in 2011 and 2012. But it was a surprise when he sent his ships out to kill the second largest whale in the world again last June.

As of the end of September his two 1940s steam-driven whaling boats had dragged 134 fin whales back to his whaling station just outside Reykjavik.

But it's not been plain sailing for Mr Loftsson this season.

He was used to the idea of there being celebrations when he brought in the first fin whale of the season. Instead of showing a proud Mr Loftsson flensing (cutting up) his first whale, the newspapers chose to cover the small crowd of demonstrators on the hill above the station holding the banner: What's the point in Icelandic whaling?

Later in the season one of his minority shareholders was quoted in the national newspapers as being very concerned that the fin whaling was losing money and depreciating the value of the company shares.

Loftsson's worst moment came in July when a consignment of his fin whale meat was rejected by the port of Rotterdam which wanted nothing to do with his cruel and controversial trade.

Not only that but he had to see photos plastered all over the TV and newspapers of a whale watching boat greeting the returning whale meat with enormous pointing hands and, once again, the message What's the point in Icelandic whaling?

Rotterdam was closed to his trade and so his export options seem to be dwindling.

2013 was a grim year for us with a decrease in minke whales killed offset by a vast increase in the number of fin whales killed.

However, there does seem to have been a sea change in Icelandic attitudes towards this so-called industry and more and more people are asking themselves and in public, what is the point of Icelandic whaling?

--RM

IFAW will continue to work closely with the whale watching and tourism sector and supportive MPs over the winter months. Stay tuned!

HORSE SLAUGHTER of foals in Iceland

 

www.pferd-und-fleisch.de/Horsemeat/iceland.htm

 

ICELANDIC SLAUGHTERHOUSE ADVERTISES FOR HORSES TO FEED OVERSEAS DINERS

MAY 5, 2012 VIVIAN GRANT FARRELL

 

tuesdayshorse.wordpress.com/2012/05/05/icelandic-slaughte...

Operation “Salt City" resulted in the arrest of 248 individuals from May through September 2015. Of those arrested, 124 were active gang members. During the operation 22 firearms, more than $237,000 in U.S. currency, 70 grams of heroin, 266 grams of cocaine, and 723 grams of marijuana with a total estimated street value of almost $44,000 was taken off Syracuse streets by participating agencies.

Operation Salt City is part of the U.S. Marshals nation-wide “Triple Beam” gang reduction initiative. Triple Beam partners federal, state, and local law enforcement to reduce violent crime and take dangerous offenders off the streets. The goal of the U.S. Marshals Gang Enforcement Program is to seek out and disrupt illegal gang activity in areas of the country with smaller or nonexistent gang enforcement units by providing manpower, funding and the Marshals’ renowned fugitive tracking abilities.

 

Photo by Shane T. McCoy / US Marshals

In Japanese mythology the primal female, Izanami (top left), "the female inviter", who together with the primal male, Izanagi, created the first entities - the islands of Japan, mountains and finally fire, at which point she died and went to the underworld.

 

Such was her partners mourning, he spoke to himself liberally, that he decided to go to the underworld to get her out. Despite her warning he looked at Izanami, and saw that she was dead! This should not have been a surprise, but he was horrified and fled. Izanami gave chase and the two parted at the gates of hell with the following promise.

 

Inazami: "If you trap me in the underworld with that rock I will kill 1000 children a day"

 

Inazagi: "I will make 1500 parturition huts (where Japanese women go in myth and reality to give birth)."

 

Like the myth of the Fall, in Genesis, this creation myth has a taboo (on birth hence the "parturition huts" rather than fig leaves hiding sex) and explains the origin of death, the separation of two worlds, and the beginning of going forth and multiplying.

 

The Japanese population has increased ever since, until, five years ago, when in 2010 it started to fall. It occurred to me that Izanami must be out and about. But I did not know what that might mean.

 

More recently I have tended to believe that these primal females that are shut in caves, hell or our breasts, are the interlocutors that some Western psychologists and philosophers claim underpins the narrative self. I met her a long time ago, in a brief moment of psychosis and presumed it was only me. Still more recently I have seen that Freud and Derrida are hinting at the same structure. It is not only me. Izanami is listening to everyone who talks 'to themselves'.

 

Who was she? Izanami helps her partner drip brine from his "pond lance" to create the first "self-stiffening" island. She accepts (but must not give) invitations to sex. When she invites the results are disasterous, so she just says yes, "Ah! what a fair and lovely man!". Izanami affirms. Until that her partner realised that she was dead, Izanami made him feel really good about himself. She completed him. Izanami is the great male-ego-massager.

 

This is what the narrative self does for you. Our self-narratives allow us to spin self-evaluations in a positive direction, and in the West this tendency has spun out of control (Twenge & Campbell, 2009; Ehrenreich, 2009, Dawes, 1994). While there are still lots of people with low self esteem the USA, and they are maintaining the birth rate, it has been pointed out that self-esttem correlates with low teen pregnancy, (Mecca, Smelser, & Vasconcellos, 1989), high use of contraceptives (Ager, Shea, & Agronow, 1982; Cvetkovich & Grote 1980: Herold, Goodwin, & Lero 1979; Hornick, Doran, & Crawford 1979: see Mecca, Smelser, & Vasconcellos, 1989) and the singles culture that has exploded since the 1960's and 70s in the USA (Twenge & Campbell, 2009) .

 

A Japanese television presenter (Hasegawa, 2014) has made a similar claim regarding the declinging birth rate in Japan. "The decline in the Japanese birth rate does not stop because young people love themselves more than raising children." (日本の少子化が止まらないのは、若者が子育てよりも自分のことが大好きだから).

 

The opinion of one commentator is all very well but what about hard research?

 

Nagahisa, Kashiwa, (2003) gave adult married women a questionnaire about how they felt about their lives containing containing 21 questions (Table 3, p 42 bottom three factors shown), upon which they performed an exploratory factor analysis to see which items grouped with which others. They found that there were four main factors in the womens lives which they named (reordered to match Table 4)

 

1) Satisfaction with husband

2) Satisfaction as parent.

3) Satisfaction with self.

4) Impatience and disillusment with own individuality.

 

Unfortunately for my theory, self-esteem correlates positively, and self-dillusionment negatively with satisfaction with parenthood. My hypothesis was not upheld. I thought that hypothesis may have been supported when I first started writing this since the factors are ordered differently in Table 3 and 4 in the original paper.

 

Still the paper tested satisfaction with parent child relationship and not the intention to have more or less children. I shall have to do my own research. The prediction is that self-esteem will be related to sexual self-worth (see Anderson, 1990) rather than as valuations of and as a parent. It is probably more appropriate to investigate Japanese male self esteem and desire for children.

 

The Japanese have been pushing self-esteem on their children since the 1990s. They now have a large sector of their population that not only see themselves positively (in the usual Japanese autoscopic manner) but narrate themselves positively as well. As Hasegawa (2014) says, these hybrids are unliklely to want involve themselves in childrearing.

 

Bibliography

Ehrenreich, B. (2009). Bright-sided: How the relentless promotion of positive thinking has undermined America. Macmillan.

Dawes, R. (1994). House of Cards. New York: Free Press. (Quoted by Heine. et al. 1999. Early critique of Self-Esteem movement, republished 2009)

Hisanaga, Kashiwagi (1999) 永久ひさ子, & 柏木惠子. 成人期女性における資源配分と生活感.教育心理学研究 Vol. 47 (1999) No. 2 p. 170-179

Hasegawa, Y. 長谷川富.(2014).日本の少子化が止まらないのは、若者が子育てよりも自分のことが大好きだから. Blog post.

spotlight-media.jp/article/93578650305704689

Mecca, A. M., Smelser, N. J., & Vasconcellos, J. (Eds.). (1989). The social importance of self-esteem. Univ of California Press.

Jean M. Twenge, W. Keith Campbell (2009) The Narcissism Epidemic: Living in the Age of Entitlement, Free Press.

 

Notes

 

The "pond spear" of Izanagi and Izanami is usually translated as jewelled spear from a reading of the 沼 character used in the Kojiki to mean jewel. But the Kojiki rarely uses characters phonetically alone unless it says so ("these three characters should be read phonetically") so the lance was jeweled and one from a bog or pond. Weapon's entering a reflective pond, is repeated in the next section of the Kojiki when Susano'o meets Izanagi's replacement above the "well in the middle of heaven" and allows his sister to chew up his sword and spit it into this new pond.

 

Much of Japanese mythic creation takes place over water often dripping upon them. I think that this is an attempt to illustrate the "contradictory" (Nishida) looping of the klien bottle of the visual self. For that which sees, consciousness, to see itself, the face in the mirror must at the same time cover it, become it. So Japanese heroes and heroines, and the first person of Japanese songs, are often crying, spitting, and dripping impure symblos above mirrored surfaces.

 

Jean M. Twenge, W. Keith Campbell (2009) The Narcissism Epidemic: Living in the Age of Entitlement

 

books.google.co.jp/books?isbn=1416575995

 

At the same time that the interest in self-esttem and self-expression ramped up, the culture begam to move away from community-oriented thinking. As Robert Putnam showed in his bestseller, Bowling Alone, membership in groups such as Kiwanis, the PTA, and even bowling leagues began to decline in the '70s. Personal relationships showed similar trends. The divorce rate skyrocketed, young people began tomarry later, and the birth rate plummeted. Singles culture, practically nonexistent in the 1950's and 1960's was all the rage, with singles only aparment complexes springing up and disco rooms full of gold-chain wearing bachelors and young bachelorettes trying not to spraing their ankles dancing to "Stayin Aliv" in four inch platform heels. A few other atuhors have also pegged the roots of the narcissim epidemic to the 70's..."the "Me" Decade"

 

publishing.cdlib.org/ucpressebooks/view?docId=ft6c6006v5&...

 

Four of the five studies investigating the association between selfesteem and contraceptive use report similar findings: low self-esteem is associated with less frequent or less sustained use of contraceptives. ...No study demonstrates a link between low self-esteem and effective use of contraceptives.

 

Ager, Shea, and Agronow 1982

Cvetkovich and Grote 1980

Herold, Goodwin, and Lero 1979

MacKinnon Self-Esteem Scale

Hornick, Doran, and Crawford 1979

Rogel and Zuehlke 1982

 

high self-esteem has been associated with effective contraception primarily for white adolescents, thereby limiting the applicability of these findings to other groups. Nevertheless, there is sufficient correlational evidence to further consider a possible causal link between self-esteem and contraceptive use.

www.catholicculture.org/culture/library/view.cfm?recnum=1446

 

Males become sexual predators whose self-esteem rests on mastering women, maneuvering them to relinquish sexual favors without commitment or support from the man.35 A male's status will actually be enhanced to the extent his mastery of women allows him to parasitically draw economic and material support from them.

 

Elijah Anderson, Streetwise: Race, Class, and Change in an Urban Community (Chicago: University of Chicago, 1990), pp. 112-119.

 

news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1368&dat=19900818&...

Self-esteem, values called tools to help curb teen pregnancy.

 

www.overpopulation.org/pop-sustainability.html

 

Dr. Adamu: Giving them information on how to control their reproduction and get health care - and that there is a choice - empowers them and gives them the self-esteem to choose the number and the spacing of their children.

 

Dr Potts: If you respect women and give them a choice, they will tend to have fewer children.

 

spotlight-media.jp/article/93578650305704689

 

日本の少子化が止まらないのは、若者が子育てよりも自分のことが大好きだからフリーアナウンサ 長谷川豊

Rare in Nl. Photo taken on heathland, Zilvense heide near Loenen.

 

Oedipoda caerulescens is a medium-sized grasshopper, between 15 and 21 mm for males and between 22 to 28 mm for females. The body coloration varies greatly depending on the substrate on which the animals have developed: reddish brown, gray, yellowish, or even completely dark or bright. The forewings are crossed most often by two or three pale bands, but the most striking characteristic, very visible when the insect flies away, is the bright coloration of the hind wings, a beautiful turquoise highlighted with a black marginal stripe. Furthermore, the posterior femora have a notch on their upper surface. At rest, confusion is possible with other Oedipoda species such as O. germanica.

 

Oedipoda caerulescens frequents dry areas with low and open vegetation: dunes, heathlands, grasslands on sand and sunlit limestone rocks. Many stations correspond to land recently used for human activities, such as coal spoil heaps, quarries and pits, the ballast of railway tracks, etc. It is exclusively a terrestrial insect, and its cryptic coloration often matches its substrate. The female lays her eggs in bare, dry soil. In this species, acoustic emissions are virtually nonexistent. The diet consists mainly of grasses.

Operation “Salt City" resulted in the arrest of 248 individuals from May through September 2015. Of those arrested, 124 were active gang members. During the operation 22 firearms, more than $237,000 in U.S. currency, 70 grams of heroin, 266 grams of cocaine, and 723 grams of marijuana with a total estimated street value of almost $44,000 was taken off Syracuse streets by participating agencies.

Operation Salt City is part of the U.S. Marshals nation-wide “Triple Beam” gang reduction initiative. Triple Beam partners federal, state, and local law enforcement to reduce violent crime and take dangerous offenders off the streets. The goal of the U.S. Marshals Gang Enforcement Program is to seek out and disrupt illegal gang activity in areas of the country with smaller or nonexistent gang enforcement units by providing manpower, funding and the Marshals’ renowned fugitive tracking abilities.

 

Photo by Shane T. McCoy / US Marshals

How about a photo adventure of Sylvan Springs? It's that bare area way out there beyond the Gibbon River in Yellowstone, about 4 miles southwest of Norris Geyser Basin. Hardly anybody goes out there. Want to see it up close?

 

I wondered about it ever since I was a teenager on a family vacation decades ago. I had asked a park ranger and he said it's a wet, muddy hike across the meadow (this, I found out, is true). But there are interesting thermal features to see. Photos of these are rare to nonexistent on Flickr. From my recent trip, I brought back new shots of rarely-seen springs, mudpots and geysers. Join me on a mini-adventure!

 

First, we have to wade across the Gibbon River, then walk over a mile. Come back over the next few hours to see what it's like out there. Teaser: there's a beautiful pool in the group named Evening Primrose Spring.

 

You can see the whole hike (22 photos and 1 video) with descriptions in my new Sylvan Springs album.

Looking eastward at the northern two-thirds of the inscription-bearing entablature. To place this section in its overall context, see Part 19 of this series.

 

In this last look at the Kimball Monument, let's take a moment to review what we've discussed before.

 

It's made, from head to toe, of Vermont's Ordovician-period Shelburne Marble, in this case quarried in West Rutland. In this fine-grained, pure-white premium grade it's a magnificent statuary stone, on par with its world-famous Italian competitor, the Carrara. But like the latter, it really should not be used outdoors in Temperate-zone, continental-climate cities. Here temperature extremes (too damned hot to too damned cold), ample precipitation (rain, freezing rain, sleet, fog, snow, snizzle, hail, and every cussed combination thereof) conspire with urban-atmosphere pollutants to degrade its calcite matrix.

 

Having previously looked at the worst corrosion of the marble on the monument's angel figure (Part 20 and Part 21), we can be thankful that there are other portions where the damage is much less pronounced to practically nonexistent. The ways of weathering, in both architecture and the natural landscape, can seem awfully capricious. But there's always some reason, however obscure, that one place survives better than another.

 

Every time I look at this shot I laugh a bit, because it is so quintessentially McKim, Mead & White (the prominent Beaux-Artsy New York firm that designed this). There are so many stock classical ornamental motifs trotted out from ancient models. All those palmettes and rosettes and and eggs-and-darts make my head swim.

 

The meander fret on top of the cornice looks somewhat sugared, and the sections directly below it have a lot of black crusting that may signal that calcite-gypsum conversion and soot buildup is well underway in spots sheltered from dripping water.

 

But the garland- and inscription-bearing frieze farther down looks almost immaculate, with the letters of the family name still cleanly etched in the stone.

 

To learn more about this site and 200 others in the Windy City, make it your top personal priority to get a copy of my book Chicago in Stone and Clay, described at www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/book/9781501765063/chicago-i...

 

And to peruse the other photos and descriptions in this series, pay a visit to my Graveyard Geology of Chicago album.

Mel Gibson's movie "The Passion" set out to be a statement and work-of-art with the simultaneous desire to exhibit the Gospel message in a unique form for film (produced entirely in latin and aramaic languages without subtitles), centered on the affliction of Jesus of Nazareth at the hands of his persecutors some 2000 years ago.

 

The first controversy which stirred about this film was that it would, unlike its predecessors in cinema, 'tell it like it is,' a no-holds-barred bloody spectacle... because that is precisely what happened to Jesus; the vicious prison beatings - his beard plucked from his face, the public lashing with a device designed to shred away flesh down to the bone -- 39 times -- to the crushing ordeal of carrying his cross through the streets while being spat upon, pelted with stones and shards of glass, to the literal nerve-splitting, excruciating crucifixion; that's where the word comes from -- "ex" = out of & "crusia" = the cross. The ordeal of Christ's unjust torture and murder by his conspirators through the agency of the Roman government is intrinsic to the story. Even the Apostle Peter, a Jew, did not hold back in his excoriation of what they had done: "But ye denied the Holy One and the Just, and desired a murderer to be granted unto you; And killed the Prince of life, whom God hath raised from the dead; whereof we are witnesses" (Acts 3:14-15). The history, politics and iconoclastic nature of Jesus' revolutionary message to the Jews is pivotal. Inexpendable. For any one element to be removed, diminishes the whole.

 

In times past cinema and theatre have attempted to deliver the story wrapped in everything from outlandishly wooden performances with crucifixions so romanticized as to be silly (ie, "The Greatest Story Ever Told" with Max Von Sydow) to revoltingly humanistic rapes of the Gospel like the late 70s "Godspell," where Christ is reduced to a superman-clown performing magic tricks to song-n-dance Gospel messages... and no resurrection. Franco Zeffirelli in 1977 attempted a tour de force in his multi-part mini-series for televison, "Jesus of Nazareth," but even it fell short of capturing the true pangs of the horror in the death of Jesus, though it scored very big points for artistry and adhering to most essential Gospel profundities. Later, Martin Scorsese would overshadow the Gospel message almost entirely, yet while creating an unforgettable crucifixion that had people weeping openly in the theatres. The right combination has simply never been accomplished. Gibson's "The Passion" promised to be the 'great white hope'. But once again, forces entangle and overthrow...

 

The next big controversy centered around Gibson's personal motives for making the film, attacks on his personal life, past, even his family began to surface. Out of this the well known stench of Jewish Defense League and ADL mindlessness began to waft through the air. Sure enough, it was eventually revealed the Gibson and company were being intimidated and harassed by Jewish groups in a snit to 'change' his film -- and alter history -- to make Jews more comfortable with their historic role in the death of the man who single handedly changed western civilization forever. The audacity alone is astonishing, but not surprising. Not anymore.

 

Meanwhile, Ernst Zundel, in failing health, rots away in a Canadian jail cell while a confederacy of Orwellian dunces attempt to prosecute him for his 'thoughts,' clearly to make an example of him to anyone who would dare question the accuracy of Holocaust numbers or demand historical veracity.

 

Meanwhile Mordechai Vanunu is spending his 12th year in an Israeli maximum security prison for daring to speak out about Israel's secretive nuclear program in what is hailed by the U.S. as the shining example of 'democracy' for the mid-east.

 

Meanwhile David Icke is being systematically pursued and persecuted by deranged anti-defamation squads and other fascist groups along his lecture and books tours because they believe his speaking of "reptilian" alien beings is code-speak for "Jews" trickled out to a clandestine neo-nazi organization disguised as Icke/UFO/NWO aficionados.

 

Gibson and company have clearly caved in to Jewish influence and demands and "softened" the film, extracting scenes and circumstances which cast Jews in an unfavorable light, be it historically valid or not. Gibson started off as a true firebrand in this endeavor, with a passion for his 'passion' -- for him to be suddenly and skillfully nipped in the bud on this work of art must have more to do with mere money, public relations or civic minded-ness. No, it is clear, considering the atmosphere of our times, something far more disturbing in skullduggery is going on behind the scenes. Someone is likely being threatened with physical harm. There are times when one can just sense that something more is happening beyond the veil, and this is one of them. When people suddenly go coldly silent, when they hack off whole limbs of their statues, rewrite entire plays, find themselves on a blacklist... someone somewhere has been pushed into that corner of suffering extortion on a level no one should have to face. There are those who don't believe such power exists nor is wielded in this world. Those people are simply fools.

 

This is not going to stop. Jewish "defense" organizations and those who sympathize with them are steadily crucifying one person after another, one voice after another, one artwork, author, play, expression, political party, politician or public servant after another on their cross of coerced appeasement. They don't give a damn about the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, freedom of expression, freedom of speech or religion -- they don't give a damn about anyone or anything but themselves, and even THEY don't represent JEWS! They are entirely self-appointed overseers of some nonexistent Jewish mythos that lays claims to everything from holy land to moral absolution on the world stage to justification of racist/Apartheid government to media control over how Jews are treated in an industry their own people, for the most part, seemingly control. These people are in severe denial, history has no meaning to them, truth is of no value whatsoever. The truth be damned, so long as a star chamber of Jews have their way. Gee... is this scenario FAMILIAR or what???

 

They are a tiny group of extremists; powerful, evil, unrelenting social dictators who have discovered that they can trump the game anytime they want with the 'Jew card' and pull everything to a sickening, deafening stop, and silence not only their critics but alter history and art and politics to their own twisted bent. And what's worse, their actions bring about untold persecutions by thickheaded racist morons who are their antithetical equal opposites, bent on persecuting every Jew for what this powerful minority of Jews do in their name.

 

These people and these organizations need to be exposed, defied at every turn and legally destroyed before they utterly dominate every aspect of our lives. These are serious times. There are serious consequences to complacency. It can last just so long before their cries of "anti-semitism" and "nazi" to rouse the ire of the sensitive soon fall on scolded ears who have also felt their unrighteous indignation as they burn everything of truth in their path toward the ultimate victory of complete control. But before it reaches that point, we have to do something about it. Speak up, speak out, sacrifice what is necessary for truth. Gibson needs to. I expected him to. He has failed. He is clearly unwilling to take the cup offered him. We all need to. Or the tentacles of this insidious monster will squeeze and crush out every bit of life and light left in this world.

(By Alton Raines 8-14-2003)

 

"To all -

 

"Allegedly, in just a few weeks, on March 1, 2010, Europe's best-known political prisoner and my husband, Ernst Zundel, is scheduled to be released from prison. In an emotional telephone conversation with him yesterday, he told me that he is entering the most dangerous phase of his life yet - that the "restrictions" on him will be "Draconian." I leave it up to you to read into that what you will.

 

"For one, we take it for granted that, at the very least, he will not be allowed a passport, which means he cannot travel anywhere outside the largely Zionist-controlled EU. Since I cannot join him for various reasons, private and political, this means that for the time being, our marriage will have to be "on hold."

 

"This morning I was sent an excellent, a bit outdated summary of what the Zundel Struggle is really all about. Even though I dislike just being sent a link, in this case I will make an exception and send you one because this article is well-written and graphically beautifully organized and lends itself to hard copy and cyber reproduction. Please spread and post it far and wide.

 

www.revisionists.com/revisionists/zundel.html

 

"There are plans, of course, to wrestle Ernst away from his tormentors, of which you will hear more in weeks and months to come. If you can afford to join our struggle financially, please let me know, and I will put you on our Power Letter list which goes out once a month. However, this letter goes only to active supporters who take this struggle seriously and understand what it takes to succeed.

 

"Please do not reply to this email - instead, write me a short note and send it to irimland@zundelsite.org

 

"I thank you in advance."

 

Ingrid Zündel

 

A GOD VICTORIOUS JOURNEY Part 1 of 2

by Patricia Diane Cota-Robles

  

Every time I am blessed with the awesome gift of participating in a facet of the unfolding Divine Plan involving the Company of Heaven and dedicated Lightworkers from around the world, I know without question that this blessed planet and ALL her Life are going to succeed in our Ascension in the Light. Our Pilgrimage to the sacred sites along the Mediterranean Sea and the South of France confirmed this Truth for me.

 

The reality is that the miracles that took place during our Pilgrimage transcend what can be expressed in words, but I will do my best to share with you the events of our journey. There were 103 pilgrims who physically joined us on this trip. We were all very aware that there were also thousands of Lightworkers joining with us in consciousness. We held each and every one of you securely in the Divinity of our hearts, and we reveled in the loving support that we received from around the world.

 

To understand the importance of this mission, I would like to briefly share with you why our Father-Mother God sent forth the Clarion Call for assistance from embodied Lightworkers in this endeavor.

 

We are at a critical turning point in the evolution of this sweet Earth. In order for us to accomplish the next step in our evolutionary process, we must reverse the adverse effects of Humanity’s fall from Grace. This process involves bringing into balance the Divine Masculine and the Divine Feminine Polarities of God within every person’s Heart Flame. It also involves preparing every Heart Flame and the physical, etheric, mental and emotional bodies of each soul, to withstand the 5th-Dimensional frequencies of our I AM Presence, our true God reality.

 

Prior to the fall, the Masculine and Feminine Polarities of our Father-Mother God were balanced within every person on Earth. The Masculine Polarity of our Father God activated our left-brain hemispheres and radiated into the physical plane through the power center of our Throat Chakras. This frequency of Divine Light radiated as a sapphire blue Flame of Power within the Immortal Victorious Threefold Flame in our hearts. The Feminine Polarity of our Mother God activated our right-brain hemispheres and radiated into the physical plane through the love center of our Heart Chakras. This frequency of Divine Light radiated as a crystalline pink Flame of Love within the Threefold Flame in our hearts.

 

These two perfectly balanced polarities of our Father-Mother God then merged into one powerful Violet Flame. This Sacred Fire blazed through our brains and awakened our spiritual brain centers to their full Divine Potential. These centers consist of our pituitary, pineal, hypothalamus glands and the ganglionic centers at the base of our brains.

 

With the Masculine and Feminine Polarities of God balanced within our brains and our spiritual centers activated to their full potential, our Crown Chakras of Enlightenment opened to full breadth birthing the Son or Daughter of God, The Christ or Christ Consciousness, within every person. This frequency of Divine Light radiated as a golden-yellow Flame of Enlightenment within the Threefold Flame in our hearts.

 

The Immortal Victorious Threefold Flame pulsating in every heart is the physical expression of the Holy Trinity in the world of form. In order for a Son or Daughter of God to exist, this blue, pink and gold Flame, representing the Power, Love and Wisdom of our God Parents and Their Beloved Child, must be present within the heart. In order for a Son or Daughter of God to reach his or her full Divine Potential, however, the Threefold Flame must not only exist it must be balanced. This means the perfect balance of our Father God’s Power and our Mother God’s Love, which is better known as the Holy Spirit. Through this balance, the Beloved Child of God—The Christ—is birthed within every person.

 

In our evolutionary process, there came a point in time when the Sons and Daughters of God evolving on Earth made the free-will choice to use our gift of Life in ways that conflicted with God’s Will. Through our thoughts, words, actions and feelings, we created gross mutations of the patterns of perfection pulsating within the Causal Body of God. These human miscreations began manifesting on Earth as aging, decay, disease, lack and limitation, fear, war, violence, corruption, inclement weather conditions, cataclysmic Earth changes and every other malady existing on Earth today.

 

In a futile attempt to keep ourselves from feeling so much pain, we closed our Heart Chakras to try to block our ability to feel. This fateful decision closed the portal through which our Mother God radiated Her Love into the physical plane. This forced our Mother God to withdraw to a mere trickle of Her original Divine Potential. Without the balance of our Mother God’s Divine Love, our right-brain hemispheres became almost dormant. This caused our spiritual brain centers to atrophy and our Crown Chakras of Enlightenment to close. We lost contact with The Christ within. We forgot that we are Beloved Children of God, and we lost awareness of the fact that all our Father-Mother God has is ours.

 

For aeons of time, we have been buried in the effluvia of our human miscreations. Age after Age enlightened Beings, Avatars, Buddhas and Adepts have embodied to try to awaken Humanity to the Truth of who we are and why we are in this Earthly school of learning. Progress has been painfully slow, often nonexistent.

 

Finally, a little over 2,000 years ago, during the inception of the Piscean Age, a plan was set into motion to anchor the archetypes for Humanity’s pathway back to Christ Consciousness. This plan, much like what is occurring now at the dawn of the Aquarian Age, involved embodied Lightworkers working in unison with the entire Company of Heaven.

 

The plan was for two willing representatives of our Father-Mother God to embody on Earth to cocreate the matrix of Divine Balance for the Masculine and Feminine Polarities of our Father-Mother God. This matrix was to be created by these two soul’s modeling the path of Divine Love that would open the Heart Chakra and allow the return of our Mother God through the Baptism of the Holy Spirit.

 

The souls chosen to accomplish this monumental feat were Beloved Jesus and his Divine Complement or Twin Flame, Beloved Mary Magdalene. Jesus in his full capacity as a Son of God volunteered to anchor the matrix for the Divine Masculine, and Mary Magdalene in her full capacity as a Daughter of God volunteered to anchor the matrix for the Divine Feminine.

 

To herald the coming of the these two resplendent Beings, and to bring the Divine Ceremony that would initiate their mission, the Being we know as John the Baptist volunteered to embody on Earth.

 

Jesus and Mary Magdalene descended to Earth together and began the preparation for their sacred mission. This was not an easy task. The fragmented, fear-based human ego, which developed when Humanity closed our Heart Chakras, thus preventing our power from being balanced with love and reverence for Life, has been fighting tooth and nail for millennia to try to block the return of our Mother God. This manipulative faction of our fallen personality was not going to give up its control of our lives easily.

 

Jesus and Mary Magdalene knew that the fallen consciousness of Humanity was not going to allow people to immediately grasp the opportunity to balance the Masculine and Feminine Polarities of God within their hearts. In fact, they knew that it would be centuries before we really understood what they were trying to teach us. That is why in Revelations Jesus says to John the Beloved ,“In the Day of the Seventh Angel, when he begins to sound, the mystery of God will be fulfilled and time will be no more.”

 

During the Piscean Age, the 6th Solar Aspect of Deity was the predominant influence. Now, during the Aquarian Age, the 7th Solar Aspect of Deity is the predominant influence. This is the Day of the Seventh Angel, and he is beginning to sound.

 

Jesus said that the voice of the 7th Angel would proclaim the time of the Second Coming of The Christ. This heralds the return of Christ Consciousness within every man, woman and child. This will occur through the return of our Mother God and the Baptism of the Holy Spirit, the Baptism by Sacred Fire.

 

In spite of the overwhelming resistance, Jesus and Mary Magdalene accomplished their mission and anchored the matrix for the balance of the Divine Feminine and Masculine Polarities of God within every evolving soul’s Heart Flame. This occurred whether a person was in or out of embodiment or if the soul was from the past, present or future.

 

After Jesus’ crucifixion, Resurrection and Ascension plans were set into motion to protect Mary Magdalene from the wrath of the people who were still resisting the return of our Mother God. The Essene Brotherhood and Sisterhood, along with Mother Mary, Joseph of Arimathea, John the Beloved and some of the other disciples, guarded Mary Magdalene and the daughter she and Jesus had conceived.

 

Mary Magdalene was over-Lighted by the Company of Heaven and safely guided to various locations on the planet where she was able to anchor the matrix for the Divine Balance of our Mother God into the body of Mother Earth. This prepared the way for the coming of the Seventh Angel and the day when he would begin to sound, when our Mother God would at last reclaim Her rightful place within the hearts of the Children of God. This would be a time when Christ Consciousness would once again be birthed into the hearts and minds of Humanity.

 

The Truth about Mary Magdalene’s mission and the fact that she was anchoring the matrix for the return of our Mother God was cloaked in secrecy to conceal the plan from the masses and to prevent the plan from being blocked through the abuse of power being wielded by Humanity’s patriarchal human egos.

 

Her protectors were well aware of her mission, and after her Ascension they steadfastly held the Immaculate Concept for the return of our Mother God. These selfless exponents of God’s Will formed mystery schools and passed the information on in veiled and mysterious symbols that could not be deciphered by the common man or woman.

 

The newly formed Christian churches had difficulty blocking the groundswell of information that kept surfacing in mysterious ways about Mary Magdalene and her relationship with Jesus, her Beloved Twin Flame. Various Gospels were being circulated, which gave conflicting accounts of what really occurred during the pageantry and the founding of the Christian Dispensation.

 

In 325 AD, the Roman Emperor Constantine I decided that the confusion in the Christian doctrine needed to be stopped and that the various factions needed a unified belief system. He called a meeting of over 300 bishops and organized what has been noted as the first Ecumenical Council. This was the Council of Nicaea.

 

During this gathering he denounced Arianism, which was founded by the theologian Arius. These teachings taught that Jesus was a Son of God, as are all the Children of Earth. He reiterated that God is within every person, and that people do not need to depend on Human Beings outside of themselves in order to communicate with God or to receive God’s Forgiveness.

 

This belief system interfered greatly with the power and control of the priesthood and the Church, so Constantine ordered Arius to cease and desist in teaching such heresy. At the end of the gathering Constantine ordered a vote, and all but three bishops signed the Nicaean Creed forbidding Arianism.

 

Constantine felt this vote of support gave him the right to proceed with his mission. He gathered the 48 gospels that were being circulated amongst the various factions of the Church. He went through all of them carefully and selected only the four gospels that indicated that Jesus was Divine—above all other Human Beings. These four gospels were unnamed, as were many of the 48 gospels. Constantine made the executive decision to name the gospels he chose to be included in the Bible: Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.

 

He then proceeded to go through the rest of the teachings in the Bible. In order to maintain the supreme power of the Church and the patriarchal priesthood, he removed any reference to the relationship between Mary Magdalene and Jesus, as well as any reference he could identify regarding reincarnation. Constantine’s actions redefined the status of Christianity, and formed the basis for the Bible used today throughout the Christian world.

 

Even with this obvious betrayal of the Truth, the mission of Jesus and Mary Magdalene could not be suppressed. To the total consternation of the Church, the reality of their spiritual and intimate relationship kept surfacing. One by one, the seekers of Truth were guided to the mystery schools and secret societies. Little by little, they learned about the sacred mission of Jesus and Mary Magdalene.

 

In 590 AD, Pope Gregory I had had enough and was determined to once and for all put an end to this threat to the patriarchal supremacy of the Church. With the stroke of the pen, Pope Gregory I declared Mary Magdalene to be a prostitute and asserted that she was seething with seven evil spirits. This was the very first time that Mary Magdalene was said to be a prostitute. That unconscionable lie was written nearly 600 years after her embodiment. As far as the Church was concerned, this concocted story squelched the rumors about Jesus and Mary Magdalene’s marriage.

 

In order to maintain a semblance of damage control, the Church leaders tried to transfer the attention from Mary Magdalene to Jesus’ Mother, the Virgin Mary. This was a futile effort in their attempt to block the return of our Mother God, because Beloved Mother Mary was an important Aspect of the Divine Feminine herself.

 

As the forerunners of the Divine Feminine progressed through those tumultuous times, Mother Mary protected the Truth about Mary Magdalene by holding the exoteric focus of the Divine Mother. At the same time, Mary Magdalene continued her mission of preparing the way for the return of our Mother God through esoteric circles and her teachings within the sacred mystery schools and secret societies.

 

For centuries, the Immaculate Concept of Mary Magdalene’s Divine Mission with Beloved Jesus was guarded from the outer world by her valiant protectors. With unfailing tenacity, these selfless souls prepared for the Day of the Seventh Angel when the return of our Mother God would be brought to fruition.

 

Throughout history there are bits and pieces of information regarding the souls fulfilling the service of protecting the mission of Mary Magdalene and Jesus, but most of them are terribly distorted and contaminated with misinformation from the patriarchal Church. The groups most noteworthy in this mission were the Essenes, the Druids, the Cathars and the Knights Templar.

 

Within the historic documentations of England, Spain, France and places throughout the Mediterranean, the mystical stories of the Essenes, Druids, Cathars and the Knights Templar can still be found. The most blatant proof of the Church’s attempt to suppress the secret knowledge of the Divine Feminine is revealed in the accounts of the horrific persecution and the brutal demise of these dedicated Lightworkers during the Crusades and the Inquisition.

 

Since the dawning of the Aquarian Age, which took place a few decades ago, Lightworkers have been making Pilgrimages to the areas where these atrocities took place. The intent of these Pilgrimages was to transmute the Etheric Records of the pain and suffering involved in protecting the Truth of the return of our Mother God. This purification was an important facet of the Divine Plan that had to be completed before the blocked Heart Meridian within the body of Mother Earth could be reopened. This Heart Meridian is the portal through which the completion of Mary Magdalene and Jesus’ Divine Mission will be fulfilled. It is the portal through which the Divine Balance of the Masculine and Feminine Polarities of God will be reactivated in the body of Mother Earth.

 

That brings us to our recent Pilgrimage. To signal to the world that the purification of the past had been completed and that all was in readiness for the next phase of the Divine Plan, an amazing outer-world event took place. On October 13, 1307, the Knights Templar throughout France were arrested and placed in prisons where they were tortured and eventually died. This was a massive endeavor orchestrated by the Inquisition to prevent the Knights from revealing the secret of Mary Magdalene and the Divine Feminine.

 

On October 13, 2007, exactly 700 years later, the Vatican revealed that it had found some 800-year-old documents from the Knights Templar, which had mysteriously been misplaced. The Vatican said that the documents would be released to the world, and they apologized for their transgressions.

 

In this monumental year of completion, this veiled message from the Church asking for forgiveness for its past transgressions involving the Knights Templar was broadcast on CNN via satellite throughout the world. As Humanity focused our attention on this message, the transmutation of the atrocities of the past was brought to completion. This event occurred the day before our glorious Pilgrimage began.

 

We had been told by our Father-Mother God that the time for the opening of the blocked Heart Meridian in the body of Mother Earth had come. This is the meridian that the Essenes, Druids, Cathars and Knights Templar and been protecting over centuries of time in preparation for the return of our Mother God. This was the same meridian along which Mary Magdalene anchored the matrix for the Divine Balance of the Masculine and Feminine Polarities of God in the years following Jesus’ Ascension.

 

Our God Parents said that those of us who were motivated by our Heart’s Call to make the sacrifice of our time, energy and money to accomplish this mission, had made this Pilgrimage again and again over centuries of time. They told us that the ancient footsteps we would be walking in were our own.

 

On October 14, 103 pilgrims from 15 countries began the journey to Barcelona, Spain. We arrived on October 15, and after settling into our hotel we gathered for a group dinner. During that time, Archangel Raphael Consecrated each of our Earthly Bodies and lifted us into a frequency that would allow us to be the most effective conductors of Light possible. We were each given a sacred necklace with a symbol of the open Heart of the Divine Feminine to wear during our holy adventure.

 

On October 16, we had breakfast together and loaded the busses for a tour of Barcelona. Barcelona has over 2,000 years of history. It became a Roman colony in 133 BC. Many of the churches and cathedrals in Barcelona are dedicated to various female Saints, but the grandest of them all is dedicated to the Holy Family: Mary, Joseph and Jesus. These are the Beings in the Christian Dispensation who represent the Divine Father, the Divine Mother and the Holy Child of God, The Christ. They are the representatives of the Sacred Fire, the Holy Trinity, blazing in every person’s heart.

 

This magnificent edifice is called the Temple of the Sagrada Familia. One facet of the structure is called the Central Portal of Birth. Two colossal domes are dedicated to the Virgin Mary and Jesus, The Christ, respectively. This is an example of the outer-world service of Mother Mary in which she is standing in for the esoteric mission of Mary Magdalene.

 

In the sacred endeavor of building this Temple, the architect, Antoni Gaudi, created a staggering sense of verticality, a meeting point between Heaven and Earth, God and Humanity.

 

After our tour of Barcelona, we progressed to the dock to board our beautiful cruise ship to begin our Pilgrimage through the Mediterranean. In Ages past, the Pilgrimage we were embarking on to the various positions along the Heart Meridian of Mother Earth was an arduous and dangerous feat. In this day and age, the trip is made by millions of travelers every year on luxurious cruise ships. This is not by chance. Divine Intervention has played an important part in this phenomenon.

 

The Beings of Light from the Realms of Truth set the tone for our adventure. They revealed to us that the collective body of Lightworkers present on this Pilgrimage represented the microcosm of the macrocosm of Humanity. They said that our collective life experiences through all of our Earthly sojourns contained a fragment of the Earthly experience of every evolving soul on Earth. We were told that the Etheric Records of the painful experiences of the past were now transmuted, and our mission was to serve as surrogates on behalf of all Humanity as we anchored the archetypes for the New Earth. We were also asked by our Father-Mother God to serve as acupuncture needles along the Heart Meridian of Mother Earth.

 

Our guidance from On High was to focus on the Immaculate Concept of Heaven on Earth, as we opened the Heart Meridian and cleared the way for the Divine Balance of the Masculine and Feminine Polarities of God within Humanity and the body of Mother Earth.

 

The Company of Heaven perceived our sense of awe and assured us that we already had everything we needed within our Beings to accomplish our individual facets of this Divine Plan. We were told that each of us had been preparing for lifetimes for this Cosmic Moment, so as one unified Heart Flame we released any feelings of doubt or inadequacy and invoked our I AM Presence to take full dominion of our thoughts, words, actions and feelings.

 

The Company of Heaven asked that during our trek through the Mediterranean, we not organize any group tours involving all of the 103 people on this mission. Instead, we were each instructed to listen to our inner guidance and to participate individually in the available tours and opportunities that resonated in our heart of hearts. The end result of this plan was that our group traversed each location north, south, east and west. This enabled us to cover the gamut of each acupuncture point along the Heart Meridian of Mother Earth.

 

On October 17, we reached the Isle of Mallorca in the Bay of Palma. The first settlers came to this island around the 5th century BC. Most of them came from the South of France. In the year 123 BC, Mallorca came under Roman rule.

 

One of the most important and emblematic monuments on this island is the Cathedral of Mallorca. It was the custom in medieval times to dedicate the first churches built in towns reconquered from “the pagans” to Jesus or Mother Mary. In Mallorca, which is an important point along the Heart Meridian of Mother Earth and thus a facet of the portal for the return of our Mother God, the cathedral was dedicated to Mother Mary.

 

August 15, the day celebrated as Mother Mary’s Ascension Day, is the local Feast Day. The devotion to Mother Mary, the Divine Mother, is reflected throughout the history of the cathedral and the works of art contained within it. The cathedral adopted as its seal the Throne of Mary on the waves. The water element represents the Emotional Body and the feeling nature of our Mother God.

  

Columbia Flyway Wildlife Show Association

 

35th Annual Show

 

Wildfowl, Wildlife, Fish & Artistic Creations Carving Competition and Art Festival aka Columbia Flyway Wildlife Show

 

Clatsop County Fairgrounds and Expo Center in Astoria, Oregon

September 21-22, 2024

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Speaking of snipe hunts:

 

A snipe hunt is a type of practical joke or fool's errand, in existence in North America as early as the 1840s, in which an unsuspecting newcomer is duped into trying to catch an elusive, nonexistent animal called a snipe. Although snipe are an actual family of birds, a snipe hunt is a quest for an imaginary creature whose description varies.

 

The target of the prank is led to an outdoor spot and given instructions for catching the snipe; these often include waiting in the dark and holding an empty bag or making noises to attract the creature. The others involved in the prank then leave the newcomer alone in the woods to discover the joke. As an American rite of passage, snipe hunting is often associated with summer camps and groups such as the Boy Scouts. In France, a similar joke is called "hunting the dahut".

 

In North America

 

Although snipe are a real family of birds, the snipe hunt is a practical joke, often associated with summer camps and other types of outdoor camping, in which the victim is tricked into engaging in a hunt for an imaginary creature.[1]

 

Snipe hunters are typically led to an outdoor spot at night and given a bag or pillowcase along with instructions that can include either waiting quietly or making odd noises to attract the creatures. The other group members leave, promising to chase the snipe toward the newcomer; instead, they return home or to camp, leaving the victim of the prank alone in the dark to discover that they have been duped and left "holding the bag".[2]

 

The snipe hunt is a kind of fool's errand or wild-goose chase, meaning a fruitless errand or expedition, attested as early as the 1840s in the United States.[3][4] It was the most common hazing ritual for boys in American summer camps during the early 20th century, and is a rite of passage[5] often associated with groups such as the Boy Scouts. In camp life and children's folklore, the snipe hunt provides an opportunity to make fun of newcomers while also accepting them into the group.[6][7]

 

Setting the stage for the prank is often done with imaginative descriptions of the snipe, similar to tall tales. For instance, the snipe is said to resemble a cross between a jackrabbit and a squirrel; a squirrel-like bird with one red and one green eye; a small, black, furry bird-like animal that only comes out during a full moon, and so on.[8] According to American Folklore: An Encyclopedia:

 

While the snipe hunt is known in virtually every part of the United States, the description of the prey varies: it may be described as a type of bird, a snake, or a small furry animal. In one version, the snipe is a type of deer with a distinctive call; the dupe is left kneeling and imitating the snipe call while holding the bag to catch it.[9]

 

In another variation, a bag supposedly containing a captured snipe is theatrically brought to the campsite after a group hunt; the snipe quickly "escapes" unseen when the bag is opened.[10]

Variations

 

A similar practical joke in France is known as "hunting the dahut".[11] While the description of the prey differs from the North American snipe hunt, the nature of the joke is the same.[8]

 

In Spain, a similar joke is called cazar gamusinos ('hunting gamusinos'). The gamusino [es] is an imaginary animal with no defined description.[12]

 

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snipe_hunt

They combine before nonexistent a kind of relation.

She hopes it, it hopes her, of the thing and thing is to exist so.

© branko

www.a2b1.com

youtube channel: www.youtube.com/a2b1

 

NY Times, Dec. 4 2011

Colin Huggins was there with his baby grand, the one he wheels into Washington Square Park for his al fresco concerts. So were Tic and Tac, a street-performing duo, who held court in the fountain — dry for the winter. And Joe Mangrum was pouring his elaborate sand paintings on the ground near the Washington Arch.

 

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Hiroko Masuike/The New York Times

Kareem Barnes of Tic and Tac collected donations on Sunday.

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Hiroko Masuike/The New York Times

Joe Mangrum showed his sand paintings on Sunday.

In other words, it was a typical Sunday afternoon in the Greenwich Village park, where generations of visitors have mingled with musicians, artists, activists, poets and buskers.

 

Yet this fall, that urban harmony has grown dissonant as the city’s parks department has slapped summonses on the four men and other performers who put out hats or buckets, for vending in an unauthorized location — specifically, within 50 feet of a monument.

 

The department’s rule, one of many put in place a year ago, was intended to control commerce in the busiest parks. Under the city’s definition, vending covers not only those peddling photographs and ankle bracelets, but also performers who solicit donations.

 

The rule attracted little notice at first. But the enforcement in Washington Square Park in the past two months has generated summonses ranging from $250 to $1,000. And it has started a debate about the rights of parkgoers seeking refuge from the bustle of the streets versus those looking for entertainment.

 

At a news conference in the park on Sunday organized by NYC Park Advocates, the artists waved fistfuls of pink summonses while their advocates, including civil rights lawyers, called on the city to stop what they called harassment of the performers.

 

“This is a heavy-handed solution to a nonexistent problem,” said Ronald L. Kuby, one of the lawyers.

 

The rule is especially problematic in Washington Square Park, performers say, because there are few locations across its 10 acres that are beyond 50 feet from a memorial or fountain — whether the bust of Alexander Lyman Holley, who introduced the Bessemer steel process to this country, or the statue of the Italian liberator Giuseppe Garibaldi.

 

Then there is the park’s international reputation as a gathering place for folk music pioneers and the Beats.

 

“Washington Square is the live-music park of New York City, and it would be close to impossible for any one of us to follow these regulations,” said Mr. Huggins, who has received nine summonses with fines totaling $2,250.

 

But Adrian Benepe, the parks commissioner, argues that there is ample room for performers away from the monuments. And, he added, a musician who is not putting out a tin cup is welcome to sit on the edge of the fountain or under a monument.

 

“It’s the whole issue of the ‘tragedy of the commons,’ ” he said. “If you allow all the performers and all the vendors to do whatever they want to do, pretty soon there’s no park left for people who want to use them for quiet enjoyment. This is a way of having some control and not 18 hours of carnival-like atmosphere.”

 

Gary Behrens, an amateur photographer visiting from New Jersey, applauded the city’s efforts to rein in the performers. “I’m O.K. with the guitar, but the loud instruments have taken over the park,” he said.

 

The lawyers and advocates, however, challenged the idea that street performers were selling a product as a vendor does. And threatening a lawsuit, they faulted the city for creating what they called “First Amendment zones” through the rules.

 

“Is this place zany?” asked Norman Siegel, the former director of the New York Civil Liberties Union. “You bet. Public parks are quintessential public forums. Zaniness is something we should cherish and protect.”

 

Park visitation has soared along with the rise of tourism in the last 15 years, and with it vendors and artists interested in a lucrative market.

 

Mr. Benepe insisted that the rules would not scare off future music legends.

 

“If Bob Dylan wanted to come play there tomorrow, he could,” he said, “although he might have to move away from the fountain.”

 

Oddly, the dispute coincided with the 50th anniversary of the so-called Folk Riot in Washington Square Park, when the parks commissioner tried to squelch Sunday folk performances. Hundreds of musicians gathered in protest, the police were called in and a melee ensued.

 

In April, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg wrote a letter commemorating the Folk Riot, saying he applauded “the folk performers who changed music, our city and our world beginning half a century ago.”

Zephyr is worried. The severe storm season has been been very mild - almost nonexistent - so far. But she knows that one certain group of Midwest storm devas far too well. They're just biding their time, waiting for the right moment.....

Operation “Salt City" resulted in the arrest of 248 individuals from May through September 2015. Of those arrested, 124 were active gang members. During the operation 22 firearms, more than $237,000 in U.S. currency, 70 grams of heroin, 266 grams of cocaine, and 723 grams of marijuana with a total estimated street value of almost $44,000 was taken off Syracuse streets by participating agencies.

Operation Salt City is part of the U.S. Marshals nation-wide “Triple Beam” gang reduction initiative. Triple Beam partners federal, state, and local law enforcement to reduce violent crime and take dangerous offenders off the streets. The goal of the U.S. Marshals Gang Enforcement Program is to seek out and disrupt illegal gang activity in areas of the country with smaller or nonexistent gang enforcement units by providing manpower, funding and the Marshals’ renowned fugitive tracking abilities.

 

Photo by Shane T. McCoy / US Marshals

China doing the dirty work for U.S. allies who have been angered by the U.S. Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) but too scared to speak up.

 

www.globaltimes.cn/page/202211/1280528.shtml

 

China slams US industrial subsidies, export controls that ‘may violate WTO rules’

Washington’s policies disrupt global trade, threaten world economy

 

The US' discriminatory and distorted industrial subsidy provisions in its Inflation Reduction Act as well as policies that have disrupted global semiconductor industrial and supply chains are suspected of violating WTO rules and have led to serious distortions to global trade and investment in relevant sectors, Chinese representatives said at a meeting of the WTO, the Xinhua News Agency reported on Sunday.

 

While Chinese officials have long repeatedly slammed US actions that violate WTO rules and disrupt global industrial and value chains, the latest criticism made at a closely watched meeting of the WTO in Switzerland is particularly significant, as many other WTO members have also stepped up their pushback against the US policies.

 

The Chinese side reiterated that these discriminatory provisions are suspected of violating the WTO principles of most-favored-nation treatment and national treatment as well as the WTO's ban on import substitution subsidies and trade-related investment restrictions, and have led to serious distortions in relevant sectors' trade and investment globally, Xinhua reported.

 

"While the US repeatedly accuses other economies of distorting WTO rules, the US moves of granting subsidies and imposing export controls violate the rules of the WTO, whose core is open and non-discriminatory trade," He Weiwen, an executive council member of the China Society for World Trade Organization Studies, told the Global Times on Sunday.

 

US President Joe Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act into law in August. It is expected to provide up to $369 billion in subsidies to support manufacturing and investment in electric vehicles (EV), key minerals, clean energy and power generation facilities, granting nine tax credits on the condition of final assembly in the US or North America.

 

"The act is a typical example of the US' attempts to wreck the rules-based international trade order by putting its domestic law above international law and sticking to the 'America First' policy. China not only stands up for WTO rules but for other economies, as the acts by the US threaten industrial security in countries and regions including Europe and South Korea," Li Yong, senior fellow at the China Association of International Trade, told the Global Times on Sunday.

 

At the WTO meeting, the Swiss delegation agreed with the Chinese representatives' review. Trade policies play an important role in the treatment of global climate change and Switzerland expresses concern over the US' discriminatory behavior against other WTO members' products, said Switzerland's representatives, stressing that trade-related policies must be non-discriminatory and consistent with WTO rules, according to Xinhua.

 

Ever since it became law in the US, the Inflation Reduction Act has caused widespread concern and criticism from governments and industrial communities around the world, including its allies in Europe and Asia.

 

Yonhap News Agency reported on November 17 that six major South Korean business lobbies have urged the US to revise the act on EVs in a way that doesn't discriminate against South Korean automakers and battery producers, as they fear South Korean companies could lose ground in the US without equal subsidies.

 

In addition to the sweeping Inflation Reduction Act, the US also sought to maintain technological hegemony and suppress competitors by signing the CHIPS and Science Act into law, announcing semiconductor export restrictions on China and constantly stepping up crackdowns on Chinese tech firms.

 

On Friday (US time), the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) banned five Chinese firms, including Huawei, ZTE and Hytera Communications, from selling communications equipment in the US, citing the catch-all excuse of "national security."

 

The US not only overstretches the concept of national security and abuses export restrictions, but it also engages in long-arm jurisdiction to force other WTO members to follow its policies, pushing unilateralism to its utmost. Its move seriously violates the principle of sovereignty under international law and is typical of hegemony and a cold war mentality, Xinhua reported.

 

The Chinese side said the US measures would result in a decoupled and broken global semiconductor industrial chain as well as long-term harm to global trade and economic growth.

 

It takes more than 1,000 processes and 70 instances of cross-border cooperation for a chip to reach its end-users, Li said, noting that the intricate yet balanced global supply chain, formed through decades of international collaboration, benefits all parties involved.

 

"However, the US' selfish move will harm the professional division of labor, countries and companies will be unable to give full play to their comparative advantages, and manufacturing costs will rise accordingly," he said.

 

The Chinese side urges the US to comply with WTO rules, remove the discriminatory and distorted content in the act, and earnestly carry out the G20 Bali Leaders' Declaration, which stresses that trade and climate and environmental policies should be mutually supportive and WTO-consistent, Xinhua reported.

 

The WTO now faces its biggest crisis over the past 70 years because of the selfish US policies, He said, calling on WTO members to join hands to resist the US' political mistakes, for example, by lodging appeals to the WTO.

 

americanaffairsjournal.org/2022/11/the-inflation-reductio...

 

The Inflation Reduction Act Sparks Trade Disputes: What Next?

By Charles Benoit

 

For hundreds of years, friendly nations have agreed among each other to use tariffs, and not domestic income or sales taxes, to favor domestically made products over imported versions. Unfortunately, American tariffs have atrophied to almost zero since 1934, when Congress handed the State Department authority to cut tariffs via international agreements. As producers offshored production away from our domestic market, the demonization of tariffs increased in lockstep to secure access to imports.

 

So perhaps it was inevitable that, when President Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act in August, the other shoe dropped. Rather than use tariffs to promote the purchase of domestic goods, the Democrats’ Inflation Reduction Act modified parts of the Internal Revenue Code to favor domestically made cars, solar panels, and other products over imported ones.

 

By choosing consumer tax credits over tariffs, Democrats violated—in a flagrant manner—a central commitment of U.S. trade agreements going back to our 1778 Treaty of Amity and Commerce with France. That commitment is the principle of National Treatment. In short, the principle says that once an importer has paid the tariff to import a widget, that widget should be subject to the same internal taxes and regulations as if it had been made domestically.

 

Have you ever gone to a store, anywhere in the world, and discovered that the sales tax on a product differed depending on the product’s country of origin? Why doesn’t Michigan—or Germany, Korea, or Japan for that matter—charge higher registration fees for imported cars versus domestic cars? The reason you don’t see this is because the principle of National Treatment is something every country honors, at least in highly visible areas like taxation.

 

To be clear: Democrats should be congratulated for taking meaningful action that will lead to more things being made in America. This is wonderful. But using the income tax code instead of tariffs imposes confusion and compliance difficulties on citizens and businesses. And it upsets allies far more than tariffs would. In international relations, tariffs are fair game; every nation uses them. But income or sales taxes are not employed in this way.

 

And even if you don’t care what other nations think, National Treatment is still a good principle. Internal market taxes tied to a product’s country of origin shifts compliance costs from an importer to everyone. This in turn undermines political support for promoting domestic manufacturing. Tariffs are elegant; income tax credits are not.

 

Frustration in Asia and Europe is white-hot and will continue to escalate. On September 21, 2022, the president of South Korea was caught on a hot mic referring to the law’s drafters in Congress as “idiots.” “What an embarrassment for Biden,” he said.

 

This article makes the case for tariffs and respecting National Treatment for friendly nations. My goal is to suggest a proactive response that the United States should take: namely, shifting from the acrimony-inducing tax credits to righting our tariff policy on the grounds that we have the lowest bound tariff average of any nation in the multilateral trading system. A restored tariff schedule would enable us to pivot from idealistic “rules-based” trade to a more realistic “managed trade,” through which we can more pragmatically and straightforwardly pursue the goals that motivated the Inflation Reduction Act.

 

What Is “National Treatment”?

 

National Treatment is the principle that once an importer has paid the tariff to lawfully introduce foreign goods into the recipient nation, the importers and their goods will face no further untoward government interference. This principle makes sense, as it has the benefit of keeping the domestic market liquid and dynamic. No domestic auditing is needed. There is no need to police factories to scrutinize where inputs are made. Hardware stores are not worried about separate bins to segregate parts based on their country of origin. Imported goods must pass through our ports; it makes much more sense to tax them there.

 

Prior to the twentieth century, National Treatment was codified in treaties alongside another, better-known principle of trade, “Most Favored Nation” (MFN) status. MFN is the commitment to grant a trade partner the lowest tariff rates that the nation extends to any other. National Treatment, as a corollary principle to MFN, deals with the treatment of foreign goods after the tariff is paid.

 

In and of themselves, neither MFN nor National Treatment prevent a country from having high tariffs. From 1816 until 1934, America was committed to MFN and National Treatment, yet maintained high tariffs for both revenue and the protection of multiple industries. In other words, there is no inherent contradiction between MFN, National Treatment, and higher-than-average tariffs. In fact, during this period, we grew the greatest economy in the world and trade was a trivial part of our economy.

 

Well into the twentieth century, the principles of MFN and National Treatment were codified in international agreements styled as “Treaties of Amity and Commerce” or, later, “Treaties of Friendship, Navigation, and Commerce.” The State Department’s repository of international agreements signed by the United States contains scores of these agreements, some still in force, going back to the early nineteenth century. Importantly, these older commerce treaties were not like modern trade agreements, as they did not commit to specific tariff rates on every product.

 

In living memory, National Treatment has largely been taken for granted. But in earlier times, when taxing the movement of goods was the main revenue source for sovereigns, it was given more attention. Four months prior to even ratifying the Constitution, the United States agreed to grant National Treatment to France as the law of the land. Even earlier, on February 6, 1778, Benjamin Franklin signed not only the famous military Treaty of Alliance with France but also a separate Treaty of Amity and Commerce. The preamble to that treaty stated that its purpose was to “fix in an equitable and permanent manner, the rules which ought to be followed relative to the correspondence and commerce which the two parties desire to establish . . . by carefully avoiding all those burthensome preferences which are usually sources of debate, embarrassment and discontent.”

 

Articles III and IV of the U.S.-French treaty guaranteed MFN and National Treatment between the United States and France, so that their merchants would have “all the rights, liberties, privileges, immunities, and exemptions in trade, navigation, and commerce” as they traded in the markets of the other. The treaty commanded that “This liberty of navigation and commerce shall extend to all kinds of merchandizes, excepting those only which are distinguished by the name of contraband.” These treaties of amity and commerce were proper treaties under the U.S. Constitution, meaning the obligations were considered federal law and superseded state law.

 

America’s Extension of National Treatment through the “Multilateral Trading System”

 

America’s amity-and-commerce-treaty era began to subside after Congress delegated authority to the president in 1934 to enter binding tariff agreements with other nations. The 1934 law also gave the president the power to cut tariffs as part of those agreements.

 

Using this power, FDR’s secretary of state, Cordell Hull, an anti-tariff zealot, entered thirty tariff agreements with foreign nations during his tenure. This is when our MFN obligations became problematic, because every time he cut tariffs in a new agreement, it cut our tariff rate for every nation with whom we had an MFN obligation.

 

For example, Hull signed a free trade agreement with Mexico in 1943. He cut our tariffs on shrimp to 0 percent in that deal. Under the MFN principle, every nation we had a deal with got the 0 percent rate on shrimp. That rate remains today, almost eighty years later, and now most of our shrimp comes from Asia. During his eleven-year tenure, Hull took our average tariff from over 40 percent down to 14 percent.

 

Following World War II, on October 30, 1947, America’s thirty tariff agreements were collapsed into the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) with twenty-seven other nations. This was the genesis of something called “Normal Trade Relations,” although that name did not appear until decades later. In actual implementation, beginning with the GATT, our tariff schedule was bifurcated into two categories: Column 1 and Column 2. Column 1 included countries’ previously covered by our MFN tariffs, and now Normal Trade Relations tariffs. Column 1 tariffs are all the haphazard result of decades of closed-door dealmaking. Diplomats and economists would assign a dollar value to every proposed tariff cut in a negotiation, and exchange cuts accordingly. That is why Column 1 looks like a dog’s breakfast, with endless tariffs expressed as fractions of percentages (but most now 0 percent), and no seeming pattern. Column 2 is the holdover of the last congressionally written tariff schedule, the Tariff Act of 1930, more commonly known as the Smoot-Hawley tariff. Until the Russian invasion of Ukraine earlier this year, only Cuba and North Korea were in Column 2. Congress added Russia and Belarus to Column 2 shortly after the invasion (“punishment” was the overwhelming driver here; any understanding that tariffs could help us become more resilient did not come through in the legislation).

 

Bound tariff rates are like a price ceiling: a promise that you won’t charge more for a given product. Of the 164 WTO Members, U.S. tariff rates have the lowest average cap, a paltry 3.4 percent. All of these nations joined the GATT/WTO without the United States ever expecting tariff reciprocity. This is at the center of our deindustrialization. While National Treatment for friendly nations is a good policy, when combined with nonexistent or ultralow tariffs, as is the case in the United States, it becomes an economic suicide pact.

 

The GATT era led to the phrase “the multilateral trading system.” This phrase now refers not only to the GATT but also to a separate agreement on intellectual property, called trips, as well as several dozen other lesser agreements. These agreements are administered by the WTO in Geneva and constitute a “single undertaking,” meaning the agreements are a package deal: a nation must agree to all the responsibilities of all the agreements to get the benefits (chiefly, ultralow tariffs to developed-nation markets via the GATT).

 

A quick note about the creation of the WTO in 1995: it wasn’t a big deal. The GATT’s substance—locking in the tariff rates countries committed to under their schedules—operated in the same way before the WTO was created. The creation of the WTO was a superficial change; instead of administrative staff being “borrowed” from the UN, they have their own charter. True, there were some tweaks to dispute settlement under the GATT, along with other trivia, but these should not distract those of us concerned about American deindustrialization.

 

The real bamboozle of the “Uruguay Round” of GATT negotiations during the late 1980s and early 1990s, which involved the creation of the WTO, was to marry the GATT to a new global intellectual property agreement, trips, or trade-related aspects of intellectual property rights. Here, Western leaders intentionally chose to prioritize income from intellectual property rents over domestic manufacturing. Instead of pushing for something approximating tariff reciprocity in GATT schedules, Western leaders told developing nations that if they wanted to continue to enjoy their high tariffs and our low tariffs, then they had to take on trips commitments. Trips requires all nations to enforce twenty‑year patent terms and fifty-year copyright terms, among many other rules.

 

The Inflation Reduction Act’s Tax Credits Violate

National Treatment

 

Before we get to the Inflation Reduction Act tax credits, it is worth taking a moment to look at the text of our GATT obligations. Below, reproduced in full, and with emphasis added, is the first paragraph of the first article of the GATT, the “Most Favored Nation” obligation:

 

With respect to customs duties and charges of any kind imposed on or in connection with importation or exportation or imposed on the international transfer of payments for imports or exports, and with respect to the method of levying such duties and charges, and with respect to all rules and formalities in connection with importation and exportation, and with respect to all matters referred to in paragraphs 2 and 4 of Article III, any advantage, favour, privilege or immunity granted by any contracting party to any product originating in or destined for any other country shall be accorded immediately and unconditionally to the like product originating in or destined for the territories of all other contracting parties.

 

The GATT’s Article III, incorporated in the above, is the GATT’s National Treatment obligation and explicitly commands that WTO members’ tax codes “should not be applied to imported or domestic products so as to afford protection to domestic production.” An important distinction that confuses many people here: tax credits to subsidize building a factory (as opposed to buying a domestic product) do not run afoul of National Treatment, because they do not directly prejudice an imported widget versus a similar domestic product. Also, for those curious, “Buy American” laws were always allowed. Procurement is the one notable exception to the GATT’s National Treatment, because in procurement the government acts as a buyer in the market, not a regulator.

 

Now, looking to the Inflation Reduction Act’s tax credits, we see plainly that they do precisely what the GATT commands shall not be done: use the tax code to afford protection to domestic production. The Act amends existing clean energy tax credits, codified in Section 45 and 48 of the Internal Revenue Code, to include domestic content “bonuses.” An additional two clean energy credits are created with similar domestic content bonuses.

 

The changes to the Section 48 investment tax credit are instructive: Previously, consumers received a 26 percent tax credit for the installation of a rooftop solar system. Now, consumers receive a 30 percent tax credit for the installation of a rooftop solar system and an additional 10 percent (for a 40 percent total credit) if the solar panels consist of at least 40 percent domestic content.

 

So if you have $20,000 you want to put toward rooftop solar, the IRS will give you a tax credit of $6,000 if the solar panels are imported, or $8,000 if the solar panels meet domestic content requirements. Put differently, the long-standing Section 48 credit now poses an effective 10 percent tariff on solar module imports, but in a far more complicated and cumbersome manner.

 

Electric Vehicle Tax Credit

 

First legislated in 2008, Section 30D of the internal revenue code entitled consumers to a $7,500 tax credit from the IRS after purchasing an electric vehicle. Like all our domestic taxes and tax credits, it didn’t matter where the car was made—until President Biden signed the IRA, that is.

 

The previous extension of 30D credits to every electric vehicle regardless of origin may well have proved a death blow to our domestic automobile industry. While President Trump’s additional China tariffs mostly held off the invasion of gas cars from China, the 30D credit offset the tariff for made-in-China EVs. And so it was that the made-in-China Polestar 2 electric car, from China’s Geely Group, began deliveries to the United States in 2021. Polestar scaled up rapidly in 2022, enjoying access to the credit while Tesla and GM’s allotments had run out. Polestar cars became a regular sight in many U.S. metros; Polestar even signed a commitment to provide Hertz with 65,000 cars over the next five years. We were subsidizing the displacement of our own auto sector.

 

To end this madness, the Inflation Reduction Act violates National Treatment. Now, to get the full $7,500 credit, a car has to (1) have final assembly in North America to be at all eligible; (2) meet battery component manufacturing criteria to earn the first $3,750; and (3) source 40 percent of the critical minerals in the battery from the United States, or one of the twenty countries with whom we have an FTA, to earn the second $3,750. This 40 percent increases to 50 percent in 2024, 60 percent in 2025, 70 percent in 2026, and 80 percent in 2027.

 

The Treasury Department published more details alongside President Biden’s signing of the Act, but as of early October 2022, it is unclear which, if any, cars will qualify come January 2023. The Department of Energy published a guesstimate of 2023 model cars that “may” (emphasis theirs) qualify, not exactly inspiring consumer confidence. Reddit’s electric vehicles subreddit is onto a second “US Inflation Reduction Act Megathread,” each with over a thousand comments, trying to crowdsource an understanding of how this revised credit may work.

 

With tariffs, it is possible to control the amount of imports without creating compliance costs for the internal market. Filing tax returns is already complicated, and trying to incentivize domestic production with tax credits adds further complexity. For vehicles, it may prove workable, because every single car has a unique Vehicle Identification Number (VIN). Indeed, Treasury is making a VIN lookup tool so that consumers can verify whether a particular car satisfies the requirement. Without this, it would be impossible for consumers to know, as the same model of vehicle is often made here and elsewhere. The Ram pickup truck, for example, is made in both Michigan and Mexico.

 

The Inflation Reduction Act should be celebrated for ending the economic suicide of handing out $7,500 checks to electric vehicles imported from our chief adversary. But it would have been better policy to phase in a tariff on imported cars, followed by phase-in tariffs on batteries and then minerals. Tariffs are more straightforward and efficient. President Lyndon Johnson, following a dispute with Europe, imposed a 25 percent tariff on light trucks that we enjoy to this day, and which has been instrumental in preserving domestic vehicle assembly.

 

From a trade lawyer’s perspective, the Inflation Reduction Act’s preservation of National Treatment on vehicle assembly for Canada and Mexico, and the critical minerals requirement for other U.S. free trade agreement nations—but not for WTO Members—is an explicit rejection of the core of the multilateral system. This is most welcome, and will hopefully lead to a reconsideration of our membership in a nonreciprocal tariff agreement with essentially the whole world. Raising our GATT tariffs is far less of a bomb than cavalierly violating National Treatment.

 

Surprising Support and Expected Retaliation

 

The Business Roundtable is an association of the biggest corporations in America. Historically, it has staunchly supported strengthening the multilateral system. Thus it was surprising to hear its current chair, Mary Barra, CEO of General Motors, come out in support of the Inflation Reduction Act. Autoblog noted the development with an article titled “Biden Bill Compels Barra to Put GM before Business Roundtable.” Ford also supported the law. It is noteworthy, too, that General Motors has exited Europe. Chinese consumers appear to be ditching Western carmakers in droves, preferring new indigenous car companies focused exclusively on EVs. Between 2020 and so far in 2022, international automakers fell from 61 percent to 49 percent of the total auto market in China. GM and Ford are now far less invested in the multilateral trading system than at any time this century.

 

It was also noteworthy that the government of Canada expressed enthusiasm for the new domestic content criteria. This may seem unsurprising, given that Canada will continue to have all trade obligations honored under both the WTO and usmca, but it nonetheless marks a major shift in Canadian federal policy, which for decades has been a staunch defender of the multilateral trade system. Simply remaining silent on the new credit would have been the traditionally expected response. Instead, Canada offered active celebration.

 

In contrast, European Commission spokesperson Miriam Garcia Ferrer protested as the bill advanced this summer: “We continue to urge the United States to remove these discriminatory elements from the bill and ensure that it is fully compliant with the WTO.” South Korea’s trade minister Ahn Duk-geun immediately joined in the criticism, as did Japanese officials. South Korea called the law a “betrayal.” Surprisingly, Politco reported that USTR “shrugged off” criticism, and Ambassador Tai celebrated the legislation that her office will now be defending from our allies.

 

In the near future, expect a WTO complaint filed by Europe, Korea, and Japan. These countries’ auto companies have undoubtedly been prejudiced. For example, among the top ten electric vehicles by sales in the United States are the Audi e-Tron, Porsche Taycan, and Hyundai Kona EV, all of which are assembled in Europe (for the American market). All of these vehicles will lose their current eligibility for the $7,500 credit on January 1, 2023.

 

On September 30, 2022, Bloomberg published details of European deliberation, quoting Thierry Breton, EU commissioner for the internal market, as saying that companies are telling him they actively plan to move investment from Europe to the United States if the credits remain. Breton reportedly said a WTO action was needed, or direct retaliation to create “a level playing-field.” Bloomberg also reported that Europe is “wary of a move that could affect mid-term U.S. elections.”

 

Europe will almost certainly win its WTO lawsuit. Although the WTO appellate body remains defunct as the United States won’t sign off on necessary appointments to establish a quorum, WTO dispute panels are still convening and issuing judgments (“panel reports”). With a victory in hand—assuming Europe waits that long—they will implement retaliatory tariffs. (When a WTO country wins a WTO lawsuit and the respondent country doesn’t comply, the WTO authorizes the complainant country to issue retaliatory tariffs.)

 

The United States and Europe have previously imposed WTO-authorized retaliatory tariffs against each other as they each won and lost, in part, a long-standing Airbus-Boeing WTO dispute. And in June 2018, in response to President Trump’s national security tariffs on aluminum and steel imports, the EU imposed retaliatory tariffs of 25 percent on U.S. agricultural products, including whiskies, corn, and processed fruits and vegetables.

 

President Biden had sought to differentiate himself from his predecessor on trade by emphasizing his respect for allies and enthusiasm to work collectively with them on shared problems. So trade policy observers did not expect a fresh trade war with Europe from this administration. Ambassador Tai, in her first year in the role, had resolved both of the abovementioned trade fights with Europe.

 

America’s Options to Respond to Retaliation

 

The administration has three “reactive” options and one proactive option to respond to seemingly inevitable retaliation. The first reactive option is to do nothing: the United States could simply accept retaliatory tariffs. But this seems unlikely, as other nations will design their retaliatory tariffs to inflict maximum pain by targeting politically influential U.S. exporters.

 

The second reactive option would be to just exit the WTO. Even without congressional action, the president has authority to withdraw from the WTO on six months’ notice. But this too seems politically unlikely. And for Korea, we have a separate bilateral trade agreement with them that also requires National Treatment.

 

The third reactive option is also the politically easiest route: remove the domestic content requirements from the tax credits. Doing so on a multilateral basis, however—honoring GATT National Treatment—would guarantee that China rapidly displaced our domestic auto industry, and would be an unconscionable economic and geopolitical disaster. Unfortunately, it is also precisely the type of policy “correction” traditionally promoted by groups like the Business Roundtable. Democrats may seek to amend the tax credits so that Europe, Japan, Korea, and possibly other allies are no longer excluded. But then we would miss an opportunity to address the fact that the United States only has a 2.5 percent tariff on cars while Europe enjoys a 10 percent tariff.

 

Thus far, it is encouraging that Senator Warnock of Georgia, whose state is the beneficiary of a new $5.5 billion Hyundai factory only just beginning construction outside of Savannah, has not called for repealing the domestic content requirements. Despite Hyundai being very unhappy, the bill he introduced to accommodate them would only push domestic content requirements out one year.

 

Assymetric GATT tariffs offer a pivot to a proactive, superior option to fend off retaliatory measures: the president should direct USTR to renegotiate tariffs pursuant to GATT Article xxviii. Invoking an Article xxviii negotiation shifts the conversation from our National Treatment violation to the question of why Europe’s GATT tariffs on cars are four times the rate of ours. The United States should at a minimum raise tariff rates from the current 3.4 percent, perhaps to our historically successful 40–50 percent average, and encourage others to follow.

 

Many factors make this approach a no-brainer. First, we already have bilateral FTAs with most of our significant trade partners. Europe and China are the big exceptions. FTA countries need not be immediately affected by raising GATT tariff bindings, as our FTAs contain their own independent set of tariff commitments. Moreover, the United States and China have mutually ignored their tariff obligations since 2018. The WTO has held both the United States and China in violation of its tariff commitments ever since President Trump initiated the Section 301 process and China retaliated. So that trade relationship is already outside the WTO orbit.

 

Second, GATT Article xxviii rules for renegotiation play to our favor. The rules do not force renegotiation with all 163 other WTO members. Rather, for each product, you negotiate chiefly with the country that is currently your largest supplier of that product, and the GATT/WTO country with whom you initially negotiated that tariff concession. Overwhelmingly, then, our counterparties will either be (1) a country with whom we have an FTA, (2) China, or (3) Europe.

 

Countries with whom we have an FTA should not complain in Geneva during this renegotiation: the value of their FTA with the United States will increase exponentially. They should accept or even celebrate it, much as Canada has done with the Inflation Reduction Act’s modification of the EV tax credit, making it an effective $7,500 tariff on Asian and European cars. As for Europe, we could negotiate a parallel tariff agreement (essentially an FTA, but we need not seek to reduce tariffs further; it could even be a status quo tariff agreement).

 

If a counterparty nation isn’t Europe, China, or an existing FTA country, then it’s likely a beneficiary of one of our trade preference programs that cover 120+ developing nations. In these programs (primarily, the Generalized System of Preferences), we unilaterally waive tariffs, ostensibly to help the other country develop. Powerhouse nations like Brazil, Indonesia, and Thailand are current beneficiaries. These nations are thus not well positioned to complain in Geneva against raising our bound tariff rates, as we are free to terminate their tariff preference beneficiary status at any time. Most importantly, having the negotiation in Geneva to raise bound rates does not automatically change our Column 1 tariffs domestically; it merely signals to business that such a change is likely. This gives the market time to prepare.

 

Understanding that free trade should not be a goal in itself is liberating, because we need not badger other countries to match our low tariffs or inflame relations by calling them cheaters. The GATT negotiation should be easy: encourage our allies to raise their own tariffs along with ours.

 

Freed from GATT Shackles, Pivot to Managed Trade

 

In an October 2021 interview, Ambassador Tai succinctly described why America is increasingly looking to “managed” trade:

 

I think that when you talk about managed trade, just to break it down, it is a different model for managing a trade relationship than the model that we’ve pursued before, which has been . . . let’s seek market access and then, you know, let the chips fall where they may.

 

“Market access” is how trade lawyers refer to tariff commitments. Tai’s phrase “letting the chips fall where they may” is exactly correct: we’d lower tariffs, and then accept the results of subsequent shifts in production under some ideological notion that we can or should “compete” with countries where workers make one-tenth or less of the wages of workers here.

 

“Rules-based” trade, while sounding nice in theory, actually creates and exacerbates international tension. As America inevitably lost jobs and factories, our leaders would accuse other nations of “cheating.” Undoubtedly, “cheating” occurs, but rules-based trade both inhibits practical solutions and encourages ongoing acrimony.

 

Rules-based trade has produced antagonism even among allied, developed democracies. When we signed the U.S.-Korea Free Trade Agreement (“KorUS”) in 2007, the perception was that U.S.-made cars, which had bigger engines than Korean cars, did not sell well in Korea due to that country’s taxes on engine size. So in KorUS’s National Treatment chapter, we wrote in a unilateral obligation on Korea to relax their engine displacement taxes (Article 2.12). That didn’t work, however. Korea continued to send us more than ten cars for every one car we sent them.

 

Dissatisfied, the Trump administration acted to preserve our 25 percent tariff on trucks until 2041 to limit further damage to domestic production capacity. Korea also promised that at least fifty thousand U.S.-made vehicles annually could skip Korean safety standards and use American standards instead. The 2018 KorUS renegotiation additionally included a further loosening of Korean environmental regulations in the hopes of accommodating more U.S. exports. (After all these concessions, Korea is surely owed some understanding when their leadership says they’ve been betrayed by the IRA.)

 

Yet none of these adjustments worked. Korea still sends us more than ten times the number of cars we send them. In 2021, the United States imported 831,090 passenger vehicles from Korea, which in turn imported only 77,515 passenger vehicles from the United States.

 

In light of this history, it’s not rules standing in the way of a balanced trade relationship. But even if you’re convinced that Korea surreptitiously implemented other maneuvers to offset their concessions and to thwart U.S. exports, what then? Are we going to keep calling them cheaters while we lose domestic market share year after year? Perhaps Koreans just support their home brands more than Americans do.

 

With managed trade, we avoid this mess. We set expectations on volumes, like sovereigns that mutually respect each other, and go from there. No name-calling, no insinuations. Here’s an example of how it could work: fifty thousand vehicles tariff-free each way. Both countries’ OEMs could test whether there’s a viable market for a particular vehicle. If so, they could then make the investments necessary to supply the other country’s market from within. We get all the benefits of competition, without the downsides of hollowing out our domestic base. These agreements set clear expectations on volumes and balance without purporting to rewrite signatories’ domestic laws.

 

Hopefully, Ambassador Tai can get the support she needs from the Biden administration to fully embrace the switch to managed trade: renegotiating WTO Article xxviii and signing new, managed trade agreements with Europe, Korea, and Japan. This approach would more straightforwardly—and less controversially—achieve the goals sought by the Inflation Reduction Act.

 

Charles Benoit is trade counsel at the Coalition for a Prosperous America.

I noticed a parking lot wall painted with a mural of a cityscape on Toronto’s Queen Street West. I noted that it would make an interesting background with a touch of color and wondered briefly how I would position myself and a subject. The direction of the light on this overcast day dictated that I would have to stand pretty much exactly where a car was parked to complete the image that was in my mind.

 

Just then a man standing at the nearby streetcar stop gestured to my camera and asked if I was going to take his picture. He wasn’t that compatible with the background but since he had basically volunteered I shifted gears to tell him I would like to take his photo for a project I am doing. With that he abruptly announced “No projects. I hate projects!” He turned his back and stepped into the street to look for the nonexistent streetcar. Not sure if he was pulling my leg, I waited for him to turn around and said “So, how about it?” He repeated his dislike of projects and said no. I thanked him for hearing me out (he hadn’t) and wished him a good day.

 

I think all of us on this project have learned that a negative experience seems to open the door for a positive experience and that’s what happened next. This man and his girlfriend came down the street and I thought he would be an excellent subject for the parking lot wall. He was game and I gave him my contact card as we walked a few paces down the street to the parking lot and his friend Kristie said she’d be glad to wait. Meet Jason.

 

My first photo of Jason was of him holding his coffee cup but when I realized his eyes needed brightening, I asked if he could hand the coffee cup to Kristie so that he could handle the reflector for me. I guess I could have recruited her to hold the reflector but I have a small reflector and I think it and the coffee cup would have needed to be in the same space.

 

I was still trying to deal with the car being right where I wanted to be. Imagine someone being so inconsiderate as to park their car in the middle of my studio! I felt the photo would be better balanced and have better impact if I could gain a slightly higher perspective. I stood on a concrete ledge by the car’s front bumper and leaned back over the wet hood of the car (it was now starting to rain again). I switched the image from the electronic viewfinder to the LCD and held the camera over my head to create this portrait. I was pleased with the result.

 

We exchanged information and I found out that Jason is a 23 year old tattoo artist who works from his home. Kristie chimed in “And he’s really good at it.” I would have loved to see some of his work or even see him plying his artistry. I had hoped that if he worked in a shop I might be able to visit it firsthand and see how tattooing is done.

 

Thank you Jason (and Kristie) for your participation in 100 Strangers. You are Stranger #657 in Round 7 of my project.

 

Find out more about the project and see pictures taken by the other photographers in our group at the 100 Strangers Flickr Group page.

 

an all to common scene along the transcanada highway. overheard a trucker say that the "privacy act out to apply to truckers being able to relieve themselves in private" in reference to the cheapness of this country where roadside stops are few and nonexistent, the result being a highway biohazard of human urine containers, feces, diapers, plastic u name it.................

 

follow me on facebook @ Bullfrogphoto

LINK: youtu.be/VGpha2SEhe4

_____________

The 17th and 18th of January 2023 would see two LSL steam locomotives transfer to the north and south, these being ex-BR built LNER B1 no. '61306, Mayflower' and ex-LMS/BR Black Five 5MT no. '45231, The Sherwood Forester'.

 

We first view 'Mayflower' at Lichfield Trent Valley on the 17th of January during its LE movement to LSL's Southall depot to work charters under the 'Steam Dreams' name. I had planned to go to an off-station location for this view, but a nonexistent bus meant I had no time to get to the location.

 

Our second view is of 'The Sherwood Forester' at Rugeley Trent Valley on its way to LSL's home base in Crewe after spending some time at their Southall depot. Not my finest shot, but it'll do.

For groups fgr, happy sundays, funny faces, ugly underwear group and things you may not know about me.

The things you may not know are added as notes.

Testimonals to tiny wings and gooner-licious.

Uhm.. only two.. but that is because I only have two contacts in fgr so far.. =tom= I hope you will forgive me for that..

 

The Postcard

 

A postcard bearing no publisher's name that was printed in Great Britain. The five Weymouth locations are identified on the back of the card:

 

The Beach and Promenade The Swannery

The Harbour

The Floral Clock Sandsfoot Gardens

 

The card was posted using a 3d. stamp in Weymouth on Thursday the 20th. June 1968 to:

 

Mrs. Dent,

Ewlme,

Beckley,

Sussex.

 

The message on the divided back was as follows:

 

"Having a nice time at

Weymouth. The weather

has been good since I

arrived on the 10th.,

staying until the 29th.

The Dorset countryside

is really beautiful.

Love,

June."

 

Weymouth

 

Weymouth is a seaside town in Dorset, England, situated on a sheltered bay at the mouth of the River Wey on the English Channel coast. The town is 11 kilometres (7 mi) south of Dorchester and 8 kilometres (5 mi) north of the Isle of Portland. The town's population in 2011 was 52,300.

 

Weymouth is a tourist resort, and its economy depends on its harbour and visitor attractions; the town is a gateway situated halfway along the Jurassic Coast, a World Heritage Site on the Dorset and east Devon coast, important for its geology and landforms.

 

Weymouth Harbour has provided a berth for cross-channel ferries, and is home to pleasure boats and private yachts, and nearby Portland Harbour is home to the Weymouth and Portland National Sailing Academy, where the sailing events of the 2012 Olympic Games and Paralympic Games were held.

 

The history of the borough stretches back to the 12th century; including involvement in the spread of the Black Death, the settlement of the Americas, the development of Georgian architecture, and a major departure point for the Normandy Landings.

 

Austin Currie

 

So what else happened on the day that June posted the card?

 

Well, on the 20th. June 1968, Austin Currie, an elected member of Northern Ireland's parliament, called national attention to discrimination against the Roman Catholic minority in predominantly Protestant Northern Ireland by becoming a squatter.

 

Currie and two other people learned of a house in Caledon, County Tyrone, that had been allocated to a single, 19-year old Protestant woman, even though there were 269 families ahead of her on a waiting list for housing.

 

When police from the Royal Ulster Constabulary moved in to remove Currie and his group, he had a television crew present to film the action. The BBC Evening News broadcast the incident, and for many people in Britain, it was the first they heard of religious discrimination in Northern Ireland.

 

Stamp Counterfeiting

 

Also on that day, a federal law that had prohibited the printing of color images of United States postage stamps, was repealed when President Johnson signed legislation.

 

A White House statement said:

 

"Since stamp counterfeiting is today

virtually nonexistent, this restriction

is no longer necessary. There is no

reason now why the full meaning and

beauty of our postage stamps cannot

be communicated to all the world in

color reproduction."

 

Previously, stamp catalogs and encyclopedias could only display black-and-white images. The law had become obsolete after U.S. stamps were impregnated with an invisible phosphor which causes canceling machines to reject counterfeits".

 

David Ruffin

 

Also on the 20th. June 1968, David Ruffin was fired from The Temptations for missing a performance, after he developed a cocaine addition and began questioning Berry Gordy's handling of the group's financial affairs.

 

The Rolling Stones

 

Also on that day, the Number One chart hit record in the UK was 'Jumping Jack Flash' by the Rolling Stones.

 

My Beautiful Darling Eva- Killed on the Michigan Central R.R. at Jackson Mich. Oct 10, 1879.

 

Here is a link to an article about the rail road crash that killed darling Eva:

books.google.com/books?id=S7t8DW4iYDMC&pg=PA49&lp...

 

Here is a reprint of the original article:

 

EXPRESS TRAIN RUNS INTO SWITCH ENGINE: JACKSON, MICHIGAN - OCTOBER 10, 1879 - 25 DEAD

 

Criminal negligence and human blunders were again blamed for a fatal railroad accident. A serious rail collision occurred at Jackson, Michigan during the early morning hours of 10 October 1879 when a Michigan Central express train ran full speed on the mainline tracks into a switching engine, killing 25 persons and maiming 30 others. The Pacific express had left Detroit fifty minutes late, bound west, on the evening of 9 October. The train was made up of seven Wagner sleepers, four day coaches, and mail and baggage cars. The collision impact telescoped the locomotive tender into the baggage car about half it's length. The baggage car, in turn, battered the mail car which smashed into the first passenger coach. Most of the French Canadian immigrants riding the train were killed or seriously injured. None of the Wagner sleeping car occupants were hurt. Railroad officers and surgeons from Jackson and Detroit were engaged along with a large number of rail employees and citizens of Jackson, in the sickening job of extracting the injured and dead from the wreckage. The engineer and fireman of the express train were literally torn to pieces; the switch-engine crew escaped injury by jumping off before the collision.

Early investigations indicated the accident was caused by the irresponsibility of the yard switchman, who was making up a freight train at Jackson Junction and who, in the process, unsafely occupied the mainline track with the engine and caboose; their telegraphic understanding was that the Pacific express was considerably delayed affording secure use of this trackage. Studies showed the express had made up most of it's lost time. Consequently, the safety and time-clearance that the switching crew depended on was nonexistent.

On 11 October survivors of the Jackson disaster were transported to Chicago in a special train furnished by Michigan Central. Unfortunately a large part of the baggage car and its contents were destroyed, and the rail company expressed it intention to make restitution for such losses. There were countless stories appearing in the newspapers of the experiences related by survivors of the wreck. By this time the injured in a Jackson hospital were all reported in satisfactory condition. An investigation by a coroner's jury composed of Jackson's leading citizens commenced, taking evidence from railway officers and employees. Testimony by the yard master, various switchmen, and the engineer of the switch engine seemed to indicate all were more or less guilty of bad judgment and the violation of the company rules.

On 13 October 1879 special funeral services were held in Jackson for Milton Gilbert, engineer of the ill-fated Pacific express train, who was an esteemed citizen of that community. All other dead were sent to relatives or friends. Most of the injured passengers had recovered sufficiently to continue on to their destinations.

On 17 of October the coroner's jury completed its hearings and rendered its verdict, which is quoted in part as follows:

E.T. Colwell, yard-master at Jackson Junction, was criminally negligent in his duties in ordering the switch-engine upon the main track at a time when the Pacific express was liable to arrive within 10 minutes, as he had ample time of ascertaining, and that if he was deceived as to the time, it was his own miscalculations or want of calculation. That Joseph Sawyer, a switchman in charge of the switch-engine, knowing that Colwell had made mistakes on previous occasions, is sensurable for permitting the switch-engine to go upon the main track in the face of admitted danger without a decided protest. That Robert Jones, engineer of the switch-engine, is sensurable for moving his engine upon the main track when he knew by an examination of his own watch he could not do so without violating the rules and orders of the company.

Taken and originally posted in 2012.

 

Badminton without a net. A guy prepares to hit a shuttlecock over a nonexistent net on Lighthouse Beach in Chatham on Cape Cod.

+++ DISCLAIMER +++

Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based on historical facts. BEWARE!

  

Some background:

The outbreak of the war in Europe in September 1939 did not immediately affect the status of the Armée de l'Air in French Indochina because it had the task of defending a wide area of Southeast Asia, including the future Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam. And yet its array of airplanes seemed inadequate to perform any kind of real defense against any incursion by an enemy, because there were less than 100 airplanes available to it, all obsolescent or obsolete. In September 1931, Japan invaded and occupied Manchuria. This was an area of northeast China, which encompassed the provinces of Jilin, Liaoning and Heilongjiang. Nearly six whole years later, in July 1937, the Second Sino-Japanese War had begun. As yet, the French colonial authorities were hoping that the Japanese would not be brazen enough to take on the might of a European power. However, it became increasingly likely after the German invasion of Poland in September 1939, since Japan was part of the Axis alliance and thus Germany's ally.

 

On September 26, 1940, Japanese troops landed in Haiphong, violating a cease-fire which had been signed only the previous day. From the middle of the following month, the French became heavily involved in repelling Japanese army assaults. Following the Fall of France in 1940, Thais perceived a chance to regain the territories they had lost years earlier. The collapse of Metropolitan France made the French hold on Indochina tenuous. After the Japanese invasion of French Indochina in September 1940, the French were forced to allow the Japanese to set up military bases. This seemingly subservient behavior convinced the Thai regime that Vichy France would not seriously resist a confrontation with Thailand.

 

During the French-Thai War, the Thai Air Force achieved several air-to-air-victories in dogfights against the Vichy Armée de l'Air. During World War II, the Thai Air Force supported the Royal Thai Army in its occupation of the Shan States of Burma as somewhat reluctant allies of the Japanese and took part in the defense of Bangkok against allied air raids in the latter part of the war, achieving some successes against state-of-the-art aircraft like the P-51 Mustang and the B-29 Superfortress. During these times, the RTAF was actively supplied by the Japanese with Imperial Japanese Army Air Force aircraft such as the Ki-43 "Oscar," and the Ki-27 "Nate." Other RTAF personnel took an active part the anti-Japanese resistance movement.

 

French forces in Indochina consisted of an army of approximately fifty thousand men, The most obvious deficiency of the French army lay in its shortage of armor; however, the Armée de l'Air had in its inventory approximately a hundred aircraft, of which around sixty could be considered first line. These consisted of thirty Potez 25 TOEs, four Farman 221s, eight Loire 130 flying boats, six Potez 542s, nine Morane M.S.406s.

 

The M.S.406 was a French fighter aircraft developed and manufactured by Morane-Saulnier starting in 1938. In response to a requirement for a fighter issued by the French Air Force in 1934, Morane-Saulnier built a prototype, designated MS.405, of mixed materials. This had the distinction of being the company's first low-wing monoplane, as well as the first to feature an enclosed cockpit, and the first design with a retracting undercarriage. The entry to service of the M.S.406 to the French Air Force in early 1939 represented the first modern fighter aircraft to be adopted by the service, and the type was also used in the French overseas colonies. The M.S.406 was France's most numerous fighter during the Second World War and one of only two French designs to exceed 1,000 in number. At the beginning of the war, it was one of only two French-built aircraft capable of 400 km/h (250 mph) – the other being the Potez 630.

 

Although a sturdy and highly manoeuvrable fighter aircraft, the M.S.406 was considered underpowered and weakly armed when compared to its contemporaries, esp. over continental Europe. Most critically, the M.S.406 was outperformed by the Messerschmitt Bf 109E during the Battle of France and no serious threat to the German fighter. In less advanced theatres like Indochina, though, the M.S. 406 was a respectable contender, but its numbers were low.

 

When the French-Thai War broke out in Indochina, the Thai Army was a relatively well-equipped force, consisting of some sixty thousand men, with artillery and tanks. The Royal Thai Navy — consisting of several vessels, including two coastal defence ships, twelve torpedo boats and four submarines — was inferior to the French naval forces, though, but the Royal Thai Air Force held both a quantitative and qualitative edge over l'Armee de l'Air. Among the 140 aircraft that composed the air force's initial first-line strength were twenty-four Mitsubishi Ki-30 light bombers, nine Mitsubishi Ki-21 and six Martin B-10 twin-engine bombers, seventy Vought Corsair dive bombers, and twenty-five Curtiss Hawk 75 fighters.

 

While nationalistic demonstrations and anti-French rallies were held in Bangkok, border skirmishes erupted along the Mekong frontier. The superior Royal Thai Air Force conducted daytime bombing runs over Vientiane, Sisophon, and Battambang with impunity. The French retaliated with their own planes, but the damage caused was less than equal. The activities of the Thai air force, particularly in the field of dive-bombing, was such that Admiral Jean Decoux, the governor of French Indochina, grudgingly remarked that the Thai planes seemed to have been flown by men with plenty of war experience.

 

In early January 1941, the Thai Burapha and Isan Armies launched their offensive on Laos and Cambodia. French resistance was instantaneous, but many units were simply swept along by the better-equipped Thai forces, with some French equipment – including some aircraft – being captured and immediately pressed into Thai army service. The Thais swiftly took Laos, but Cambodia proved a much harder nut to crack.

 

On January 16, 1941 the French launched a large counterattack on the Thai-held villages of Yang Dang Khum and Phum Preav, initiating the fiercest battle of the war. Because of over-complicated orders and nonexistent intelligence, the French counterattacks were cut to pieces and fighting ended with a French withdrawal from the area. The Thais were unable to pursue the retreating French, as their forward tanks were kept in check by the gunnery of French Foreign Legion artillerists.

 

On January 24, the final air battle took place when Thai bombers raided the French airfield at Angkor near Siem Reap, which quickly fell. The last Thai mission commenced at 0710 hours on January 28, when the Martins of the 50th Bomber Squadron set out on a raid on Sisophon, escorted by three Hawk 75Ns of the 60th Fighter Squadron.

 

Although the French won an important naval victory over the Thais, Japan forced the French to accept Japanese mediation of a peace treaty that returned the disputed territory to Thai control. A general armistice was arranged by Japan to go into effect on January 28. On May 9 a peace treaty was signed in Tokyo, with the French being coerced by the Japanese into relinquishing their hold on the disputed territories. However, the French (now part of the Axis Forces’ Vichy regime) were left in place to administer the rump colony of Indochina until 9 March 1945, when the Japanese staged a coup d'état in French Indochina and took control, establishing their own colony, the Empire of Vietnam, as a puppet state controlled by Tokyo.

 

Until then, Japanese authorities heavily influenced the diminishing Vichy French presence in the region and handed over a lot of leftover military hardware to its own allies, primarily the Thai forces. However, there was not much left to be distributed: about 30% of the French aircraft were rendered unserviceable by the end of the French-Thai War in early 1941, some as a result of minor damage sustained in air raids that remained unrepaired. The Armée de l'Air admitted the loss of only one Farman F221 and two Morane M.S.406s destroyed on the ground, but, in reality, its losses were greater and the influence of Japan on the leftover stock was fogged in order to save face. However, even in 1944, single former Vichy French aircraft and tanks were still active in the region, primarily under Thai flag.

  

General characteristics:

Crew: 1

Length: 8.17 m (26 ft 10 in)

Wingspan: 10.61 m (34 ft 10 in)

Height: 3.25 m (10 ft 8 in)

Wing area: 16 m2 (170 sq ft)

Empty weight: 1,895 kg (4,178 lb)

Gross weight: 2,540 kg (5,600 lb)

 

Powerplant:

1 × Hispano-Suiza 12Y-31 V-12 liquid-cooled piston engine with

619 kW (830 hp) for take-off at 2,520 rpm at sea level,

driving a 3-bladed variable-pitch propeller, 3 m (9 ft 10 in) diameter

 

Performance:

Maximum speed: 490 km/h (304 mph; 265 kn) at 4,500 m (14,764 ft)

Stall speed: 160 km/h (99 mph, 86 kn) without flaps

135 km/h (84 mph; 73 kn) with flaps

Range: 1,100 km (680 mi, 590 nmi) at 66% power

Combat range: 720 km (450 mi, 390 nmi)

Endurance: 2 hours 20 minutes 30 seconds (average combat mission)

Service ceiling: 9,400 m (30,800 ft)

Time to altitude: 2,000 m (6,562 ft) in 2 minutes 32 seconds

9,000 m (29,528 ft) in 21 minutes 37 seconds

Wing loading: 154 kg/m2 (32 lb/sq ft)

Power/mass: 2.95 kg/kW (4.85 lb/hp)

Take-off run to 8 m (26 ft): 270 m (886 ft)

Landing run from 8 m (26 ft): 340 m (1,115 ft)

 

Armament:

1× 20 mm (0.787 in) Hispano-Suiza HS.404 cannon, firing through the propeller hub

2× 7.5 mm (0.295 in) MAC 1934 machine guns in the outer wings

  

The kit and its assembly:

This quick build was created in the wake of the “Captured” group build at whatifmodellers.com and actually is a personal interpretation of someone else’s idea, namely of fellow modeler NARSES who came up with the idea of a captured French M.S. 406 in Indochina under a new Thai flag. I found the idea so weird, yet realistic, that I decided to build one, too.

 

The model is the very simple but quite acceptable M.S. 406 from Hobby Boss. Externally the model is nice, with recessed panel lines and a basic landing gear. Internally, it is rather bleak, even though it has a full cockpit with a floor, integrally molded seat and even some details behind the pilot’s armor bulkhead. The canopy is a single piece and very clear, but it comes with massive locator bars, so that I decided to keep the canopy closed and added a pilot figure to cover the minimal interior. I was lucky to find a Japanese (though pretty “flat”) WWII pilot in the donor bank, left over from a Hasegawa model. I also gave the figure some seat belts (made from adhesive tape), but the rest remained unchanged – even the original metal axis for the propeller was used. I just replaced the machine gun barrels with hollow steel needles and added a pitot on the wing, which is probably part of the kit but not indicated in the instructions. The same is true for the foldable ventral antenna.

 

The build was finished quickly, in the course of just a single evening, including the pilot and some overall PSR.

  

Painting and markings:

My interpretation of a French aircraft in Thai service after the French-Thai War stuck closely to the real world Vichy livery, which was the standard French camouflage in grey/green/brown with light blue-grey undersides (all from ModelMaster’s Authentic Color range), together with a yellow-and-red-striped cowling (a base with Humbrol 69 and red decal stripes added later) and a white cheatline long the fuselage. The tail of French aircraft in Indochina was painted all-red from early 1941 onwards upon Japanese command, because of friendly fire incidents. This was adopted for the model (with a mix of Humbrol 19 and some 73), which is supposed to belong into the 1942 time frame.

 

As a captured aircraft, the original French roundels were replaced/overpainted with red disks/hinomaru, and then Thai elephant markings added on top. That’s a personal idea, ordnance directly supplied to the Thai forces from Japan had the simple, square “elephant flag” emblem directly applied to the wings and the fin (but no fuselage roundel). The all-red tail was taken over, but I painted the rudder in a dark IJA green, since it would formerly carry a French fin flash. The same green was used to overpaint a serial number on the fin and a former squadron emblem under the cockpit.

The hinomaru come from a PrintScale Ki-46 sheet, and these markings are intentionally a bit oversized, so that they cover well the former French markings and are highly visible. The elephant markings some from a PrintScale Ki-27 sheet, so that the red tone on both sources are very close to each other. The Ki-27 sheet also provided the Thai ciphers “3” and “4”, combined into a “34”.

 

The interior was painted in medium grey, and the model externally received some signs of wear and tear in the form of dry-brushed leading edges and around the cockpit as well as some soot stains behind the exhaust stubs and the machine guns. Finally, the model was sealed with a coat of matt acrylic varnish (Italeri).

  

A quick build, and the easy-build Hobby Boss M.S. 406 is certainly not as crisp as a “real” model, but in this case the story behind the weird livery was more in the focus than the canvas underneath. However, an interesting result, and the hybrid paint scheme with heritage from three different operators make the aircraft an unusual, if not exotic sight.

I don't know WHY I insist on taking pics of my dolls when the light is nonexistent. But, I had her out to take a pic for DoA user Cloudedmind and I just couldn't help it. She's so beautiful to me that I had to TRY to take a pic, even though it failed. I'm going to try to take more this weekend when there's actual sunlight. :D

. . . is low to nonexistent

 

Wednesday morning I walked up Mount Tolmie via Horner Park and Mayfair Drive to Glastonbury.

The overnight snowfall added more to what we had to a depth of approximately 30cm (1ft.).

It was enervating walking in the deep snow so I stuck to the roads where the few vehicles who ventured out had pounded down ruts.

My GoPro was mounted on my chestcam holder so there are a few pix taken from those videos.

Answers About the Empire State Building, Part 3

By The New York Times

Mark KingwellMark Kingwell

 

Following is the final set of answers from Mark Kingwell, the author of “Nearest Thing to Heaven: The Empire State Building and American Dreams.” This week he is answering selected readers’ questions about the history, significance and architecture of the Empire State Building. We are no longer accepting questions for this feature.

  

Question:

 

How did it get built so quickly?

 

— Posted by Mark Curiale

Answer:

 

Starrett Brothers, the general contractors, executed one of the most impressive construction schedules in history, in large measure because they adopted then cutting-edge time-motion ideas developed by Taylor and Ford. Materials and labor were matched according to rigid guidelines and variance was not tolerated. Workers were supported with food,and other resources high above the ground — for example, lunch stations serving hot meals so they would not need to descend to ground level.

 

There are a number of good sources that detail this construction, but to me the most interesting are (1) “Building the Empire State,” which is a reproduction of the original notebooks, pages of graph paper painstakingly typed, that guided the site; and (2) Rem Koolhaas’s brilliant book about Manhattan and Coney Island, “Delirious New York,” which is partly preoccupied with the mechanical relentlessness of the schedules creating the building.

 

Such feats of fast construction still occur, but not in North America. In Shanghai during the last decade, and in Dubai now, one can observe the same unearthly speed. These are, of course, places were labor is cheap and regulation either nonexistent or easily pliable.

Question:

 

I am interested in any retrofitting the Emp is getting or planning on getting with regards to energy generation and green building techniques. The age and size of the building leads me to believe it must be a massive energy hog and the electrical and HVAC systems outdated and inefficient.

 

— Posted by Jackson

 

Answer:

 

The new renovation is being done to current code, but there is no sign that it is particularly green. But the changes, especially to electrical, should make the building cleaner and more efficient. The changes are also driven by the new target tenants. For years, companies who had elaborate electrical needs, especially with respect to computer equipment and systems unimagined at the time of the building’s construction, were not inclined to consider the building as a home. The new infrastructure is meant to change that.

Question:

 

The vast majority of landmark buildings seem to be identified by their main tenants or developers — Woolworth’s, The N.Y. Times, Seagrams, AT&T, Hearst, Time Warner, etc., etc. I don’t really know of any flagship tenants in the E.S.B. now or then — who occupies the building now, and what occupants of note have there been in the past?

 

— Posted by PJ

 

Answer:

 

The building has seen every kind of tenant, from actual private eyes in the Philip Marlowe mode and small garment and jewelry companies to insurance firms and charities. One of my favorite tenants, in part because a friend of mine works there, is the New York Foundation, which endows money to city-based projects. Visiting their office one day, I was shown a faded ink record of a $10,000 grant made to Dr. Albert Einstein on Feb. 23, 1934. That was one reason I included in my book a photo of Einstein, taken on the Observation Deck, him gazing upward quizzically. It might have been the day he got his check!

 

But you’re right that there has never been a signature tenant, nor one who occupied any significant chunk of the available space. The Times recently ran this story about changes resulting from the refitting.

 

As highlighted there, some of the shiny new tenants, leasing a whole floor or more, are: BBG-BBGM, an architectural firm; Taylor, a public relations firm; Funaro, accountants; and Skanska, a Swedish engineering company. The perfume company Coty Inc. has taken almost two floors.

Question:

 

My grandfather purportedly maintained an office in the building that was replaced by the E.S.B. Do you know where I could obtain a photo of the E.S.B. predecessor?

 

— Posted by Bill

 

Answer:

 

The photo archive where you can view this was linked in another question. The Empire State’s immediate predecessor was the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, which was re-established on Park Avenue in Midtown. The Fifth Avenue site had been owned by the Astor family, and the Waldorf-Astoria was the combination of two separate hotels opened by rival interests within the family. I detail some of this history in my book: contestation over the site, and family conflicts about whether to stay or demolish and move the hotel to a more impressive location, were enabling conditions of the Empire State going up. The present Waldorf-Astoria, itself a grand 47-story Art Deco pile completed in 1931, was a sort of by-product of the Empire State.

 

Thus, a very New York story. All cities witness change on their various sites, individual buildings coming and going. But the combined forces of money, ambition and population, constrained and forced by the limits of small, gridded Manhattan, make for a superheated architectural atmosphere. It was those conditions, plus the new developments in steel and concrete, that generated the skyscraper as a form: the first vertebrate, rather than crustacean, buildings, as one critic phrased it.

 

The Swiss architect Le Corbusier, who had imagined sleek towers, was disappointed when he first visited New York: the tall buildings were less gleaming spires than a dark forest. But the Empire State, in part because of its formal beauty and relative isolation from rivals, but also because of its gathering resonances of Americanness, cannot be dismissed so easily. The title of my book, taken from the Cary Grant-Deborah Kerr weepie “An Affair to Remember,” suggests we can’t get any nearer to heaven than at its summit. I’m not sure about that, but I am sure it is my favorite building in the world.

+++ DISCLAIMER +++

Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based on historical facts. BEWARE!

  

Some background:

The outbreak of the war in Europe in September 1939 did not immediately affect the status of the Armée de l'Air in French Indochina because it had the task of defending a wide area of Southeast Asia, including the future Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam. And yet its array of airplanes seemed inadequate to perform any kind of real defense against any incursion by an enemy, because there were less than 100 airplanes available to it, all obsolescent or obsolete. In September 1931, Japan invaded and occupied Manchuria. This was an area of northeast China, which encompassed the provinces of Jilin, Liaoning and Heilongjiang. Nearly six whole years later, in July 1937, the Second Sino-Japanese War had begun. As yet, the French colonial authorities were hoping that the Japanese would not be brazen enough to take on the might of a European power. However, it became increasingly likely after the German invasion of Poland in September 1939, since Japan was part of the Axis alliance and thus Germany's ally.

 

On September 26, 1940, Japanese troops landed in Haiphong, violating a cease-fire which had been signed only the previous day. From the middle of the following month, the French became heavily involved in repelling Japanese army assaults. Following the Fall of France in 1940, Thais perceived a chance to regain the territories they had lost years earlier. The collapse of Metropolitan France made the French hold on Indochina tenuous. After the Japanese invasion of French Indochina in September 1940, the French were forced to allow the Japanese to set up military bases. This seemingly subservient behavior convinced the Thai regime that Vichy France would not seriously resist a confrontation with Thailand.

 

During the French-Thai War, the Thai Air Force achieved several air-to-air-victories in dogfights against the Vichy Armée de l'Air. During World War II, the Thai Air Force supported the Royal Thai Army in its occupation of the Shan States of Burma as somewhat reluctant allies of the Japanese and took part in the defense of Bangkok against allied air raids in the latter part of the war, achieving some successes against state-of-the-art aircraft like the P-51 Mustang and the B-29 Superfortress. During these times, the RTAF was actively supplied by the Japanese with Imperial Japanese Army Air Force aircraft such as the Ki-43 "Oscar," and the Ki-27 "Nate." Other RTAF personnel took an active part the anti-Japanese resistance movement.

 

French forces in Indochina consisted of an army of approximately fifty thousand men, The most obvious deficiency of the French army lay in its shortage of armor; however, the Armée de l'Air had in its inventory approximately a hundred aircraft, of which around sixty could be considered first line. These consisted of thirty Potez 25 TOEs, four Farman 221s, eight Loire 130 flying boats, six Potez 542s, nine Morane M.S.406s.

 

The M.S.406 was a French fighter aircraft developed and manufactured by Morane-Saulnier starting in 1938. In response to a requirement for a fighter issued by the French Air Force in 1934, Morane-Saulnier built a prototype, designated MS.405, of mixed materials. This had the distinction of being the company's first low-wing monoplane, as well as the first to feature an enclosed cockpit, and the first design with a retracting undercarriage. The entry to service of the M.S.406 to the French Air Force in early 1939 represented the first modern fighter aircraft to be adopted by the service, and the type was also used in the French overseas colonies. The M.S.406 was France's most numerous fighter during the Second World War and one of only two French designs to exceed 1,000 in number. At the beginning of the war, it was one of only two French-built aircraft capable of 400 km/h (250 mph) – the other being the Potez 630.

 

Although a sturdy and highly manoeuvrable fighter aircraft, the M.S.406 was considered underpowered and weakly armed when compared to its contemporaries, esp. over continental Europe. Most critically, the M.S.406 was outperformed by the Messerschmitt Bf 109E during the Battle of France and no serious threat to the German fighter. In less advanced theatres like Indochina, though, the M.S. 406 was a respectable contender, but its numbers were low.

 

When the French-Thai War broke out in Indochina, the Thai Army was a relatively well-equipped force, consisting of some sixty thousand men, with artillery and tanks. The Royal Thai Navy — consisting of several vessels, including two coastal defence ships, twelve torpedo boats and four submarines — was inferior to the French naval forces, though, but the Royal Thai Air Force held both a quantitative and qualitative edge over l'Armee de l'Air. Among the 140 aircraft that composed the air force's initial first-line strength were twenty-four Mitsubishi Ki-30 light bombers, nine Mitsubishi Ki-21 and six Martin B-10 twin-engine bombers, seventy Vought Corsair dive bombers, and twenty-five Curtiss Hawk 75 fighters.

 

While nationalistic demonstrations and anti-French rallies were held in Bangkok, border skirmishes erupted along the Mekong frontier. The superior Royal Thai Air Force conducted daytime bombing runs over Vientiane, Sisophon, and Battambang with impunity. The French retaliated with their own planes, but the damage caused was less than equal. The activities of the Thai air force, particularly in the field of dive-bombing, was such that Admiral Jean Decoux, the governor of French Indochina, grudgingly remarked that the Thai planes seemed to have been flown by men with plenty of war experience.

 

In early January 1941, the Thai Burapha and Isan Armies launched their offensive on Laos and Cambodia. French resistance was instantaneous, but many units were simply swept along by the better-equipped Thai forces, with some French equipment – including some aircraft – being captured and immediately pressed into Thai army service. The Thais swiftly took Laos, but Cambodia proved a much harder nut to crack.

 

On January 16, 1941 the French launched a large counterattack on the Thai-held villages of Yang Dang Khum and Phum Preav, initiating the fiercest battle of the war. Because of over-complicated orders and nonexistent intelligence, the French counterattacks were cut to pieces and fighting ended with a French withdrawal from the area. The Thais were unable to pursue the retreating French, as their forward tanks were kept in check by the gunnery of French Foreign Legion artillerists.

 

On January 24, the final air battle took place when Thai bombers raided the French airfield at Angkor near Siem Reap, which quickly fell. The last Thai mission commenced at 0710 hours on January 28, when the Martins of the 50th Bomber Squadron set out on a raid on Sisophon, escorted by three Hawk 75Ns of the 60th Fighter Squadron.

 

Although the French won an important naval victory over the Thais, Japan forced the French to accept Japanese mediation of a peace treaty that returned the disputed territory to Thai control. A general armistice was arranged by Japan to go into effect on January 28. On May 9 a peace treaty was signed in Tokyo, with the French being coerced by the Japanese into relinquishing their hold on the disputed territories. However, the French (now part of the Axis Forces’ Vichy regime) were left in place to administer the rump colony of Indochina until 9 March 1945, when the Japanese staged a coup d'état in French Indochina and took control, establishing their own colony, the Empire of Vietnam, as a puppet state controlled by Tokyo.

 

Until then, Japanese authorities heavily influenced the diminishing Vichy French presence in the region and handed over a lot of leftover military hardware to its own allies, primarily the Thai forces. However, there was not much left to be distributed: about 30% of the French aircraft were rendered unserviceable by the end of the French-Thai War in early 1941, some as a result of minor damage sustained in air raids that remained unrepaired. The Armée de l'Air admitted the loss of only one Farman F221 and two Morane M.S.406s destroyed on the ground, but, in reality, its losses were greater and the influence of Japan on the leftover stock was fogged in order to save face. However, even in 1944, single former Vichy French aircraft and tanks were still active in the region, primarily under Thai flag.

  

General characteristics:

Crew: 1

Length: 8.17 m (26 ft 10 in)

Wingspan: 10.61 m (34 ft 10 in)

Height: 3.25 m (10 ft 8 in)

Wing area: 16 m2 (170 sq ft)

Empty weight: 1,895 kg (4,178 lb)

Gross weight: 2,540 kg (5,600 lb)

 

Powerplant:

1 × Hispano-Suiza 12Y-31 V-12 liquid-cooled piston engine with

619 kW (830 hp) for take-off at 2,520 rpm at sea level,

driving a 3-bladed variable-pitch propeller, 3 m (9 ft 10 in) diameter

 

Performance:

Maximum speed: 490 km/h (304 mph; 265 kn) at 4,500 m (14,764 ft)

Stall speed: 160 km/h (99 mph, 86 kn) without flaps

135 km/h (84 mph; 73 kn) with flaps

Range: 1,100 km (680 mi, 590 nmi) at 66% power

Combat range: 720 km (450 mi, 390 nmi)

Endurance: 2 hours 20 minutes 30 seconds (average combat mission)

Service ceiling: 9,400 m (30,800 ft)

Time to altitude: 2,000 m (6,562 ft) in 2 minutes 32 seconds

9,000 m (29,528 ft) in 21 minutes 37 seconds

Wing loading: 154 kg/m2 (32 lb/sq ft)

Power/mass: 2.95 kg/kW (4.85 lb/hp)

Take-off run to 8 m (26 ft): 270 m (886 ft)

Landing run from 8 m (26 ft): 340 m (1,115 ft)

 

Armament:

1× 20 mm (0.787 in) Hispano-Suiza HS.404 cannon, firing through the propeller hub

2× 7.5 mm (0.295 in) MAC 1934 machine guns in the outer wings

  

The kit and its assembly:

This quick build was created in the wake of the “Captured” group build at whatifmodellers.com and actually is a personal interpretation of someone else’s idea, namely of fellow modeler NARSES who came up with the idea of a captured French M.S. 406 in Indochina under a new Thai flag. I found the idea so weird, yet realistic, that I decided to build one, too.

 

The model is the very simple but quite acceptable M.S. 406 from Hobby Boss. Externally the model is nice, with recessed panel lines and a basic landing gear. Internally, it is rather bleak, even though it has a full cockpit with a floor, integrally molded seat and even some details behind the pilot’s armor bulkhead. The canopy is a single piece and very clear, but it comes with massive locator bars, so that I decided to keep the canopy closed and added a pilot figure to cover the minimal interior. I was lucky to find a Japanese (though pretty “flat”) WWII pilot in the donor bank, left over from a Hasegawa model. I also gave the figure some seat belts (made from adhesive tape), but the rest remained unchanged – even the original metal axis for the propeller was used. I just replaced the machine gun barrels with hollow steel needles and added a pitot on the wing, which is probably part of the kit but not indicated in the instructions. The same is true for the foldable ventral antenna.

 

The build was finished quickly, in the course of just a single evening, including the pilot and some overall PSR.

  

Painting and markings:

My interpretation of a French aircraft in Thai service after the French-Thai War stuck closely to the real world Vichy livery, which was the standard French camouflage in grey/green/brown with light blue-grey undersides (all from ModelMaster’s Authentic Color range), together with a yellow-and-red-striped cowling (a base with Humbrol 69 and red decal stripes added later) and a white cheatline long the fuselage. The tail of French aircraft in Indochina was painted all-red from early 1941 onwards upon Japanese command, because of friendly fire incidents. This was adopted for the model (with a mix of Humbrol 19 and some 73), which is supposed to belong into the 1942 time frame.

 

As a captured aircraft, the original French roundels were replaced/overpainted with red disks/hinomaru, and then Thai elephant markings added on top. That’s a personal idea, ordnance directly supplied to the Thai forces from Japan had the simple, square “elephant flag” emblem directly applied to the wings and the fin (but no fuselage roundel). The all-red tail was taken over, but I painted the rudder in a dark IJA green, since it would formerly carry a French fin flash. The same green was used to overpaint a serial number on the fin and a former squadron emblem under the cockpit.

The hinomaru come from a PrintScale Ki-46 sheet, and these markings are intentionally a bit oversized, so that they cover well the former French markings and are highly visible. The elephant markings some from a PrintScale Ki-27 sheet, so that the red tone on both sources are very close to each other. The Ki-27 sheet also provided the Thai ciphers “3” and “4”, combined into a “34”.

 

The interior was painted in medium grey, and the model externally received some signs of wear and tear in the form of dry-brushed leading edges and around the cockpit as well as some soot stains behind the exhaust stubs and the machine guns. Finally, the model was sealed with a coat of matt acrylic varnish (Italeri).

  

A quick build, and the easy-build Hobby Boss M.S. 406 is certainly not as crisp as a “real” model, but in this case the story behind the weird livery was more in the focus than the canvas underneath. However, an interesting result, and the hybrid paint scheme with heritage from three different operators make the aircraft an unusual, if not exotic sight.

Stivan, a small settlement on Adriatic Sea island Cres in Kvarner bay, is an almost abandoned place. Incredibly stony ground, almost nonexistent arable soil, not close enough to the sea shore to be of interest for tourists, offers little to survive. Some old fig trees and olive trees and sheep, this is all one can rely on. But it is situated in a great landscape, in an open, rather flat (as the whole south part of the island) Mediterranean landscape, harsh, wind-swept and sunny, with mild spring and autumn climate and hot summers. Yet, 200 years ago men was capable not only to survive here but also to live full lives and to build large stony farmhouses like this one on my pictures. Now it is a ruin worth nothing, defeated by time and overtaken by Wulfen's Spurge (Euphorbia wulfeni).

Operation “Salt City" resulted in the arrest of 248 individuals from May through September 2015. Of those arrested, 124 were active gang members. During the operation 22 firearms, more than $237,000 in U.S. currency, 70 grams of heroin, 266 grams of cocaine, and 723 grams of marijuana with a total estimated street value of almost $44,000 was taken off Syracuse streets by participating agencies.

Operation Salt City is part of the U.S. Marshals nation-wide “Triple Beam” gang reduction initiative. Triple Beam partners federal, state, and local law enforcement to reduce violent crime and take dangerous offenders off the streets. The goal of the U.S. Marshals Gang Enforcement Program is to seek out and disrupt illegal gang activity in areas of the country with smaller or nonexistent gang enforcement units by providing manpower, funding and the Marshals’ renowned fugitive tracking abilities.

 

Photo by Shane T. McCoy / US Marshals

Everyone knows of Superman. The American icon began his life as a unique comic book character in 1938. Penned and written by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, the Man of Steel debuted in Action Comics' first issue and has been overwhelmingly popular ever since. Almost 60 years later, Superman is still an American favorite, appearing in everything from comic books to television shows, movies and cartoons. So it should come as no surprise that the figure described as "faster than a speeding bullet," has raced to a Nintendo 64 near you. Unfortunately for Nintendo 64 owners though, the Titus Software-developed game is executed so poorly that it actually serves to butcher the reputation of the prominent action hero.

 

The Facts

  

•Play as Superman through 14 alternating indoor/outdoor levels.

•Use the Man of Steel's special abilities for flight, heat vision, freezing breath, super-strength and X-ray vision.

•Pick up and use objects as weapons.

•Battle on land, underwater and in the sky against such villains as Metallo, The Parasite, Darkseid and Lex Luthor's minions.

•Four-player compatible modes.

•Game comes with "collector's edition Superman comic book."

The history behind Titus' 3D polygonal Superman is long and filled with setbacks. The game was originally scheduled to debut close to a year ago, but was pushed back due to a less than stellar reaction from Electronics Entertainment Expo '98 showgoers. With concerns ranging from gameplay hindering framerates to unforgivably unresponsive controls, it was certainly a wise decision on Titus' part to hold back the title. The problem is that the recently released finished product still has these flaws, bugs and oversights. In fact, the game is practically drowning in them. Perhaps the biggest problem of all, though, is that the game just isn't very fun.

 

As far as storyline goes, straight from the game's instruction booklet we are informed that, "Lois Lane and Jimmy Olsen have disappeared -- they've been kidnapped by the malevolent powers of Lex Luthor and Braniac, who have brought them into a virtual reality version of Metropolis." Not exactly an epic tale, but it sure beats Titus' previous explanation for the game's graphic flaws -- namely that a thick screen of fog present in the title was in fact "Kryptonite fog" deployed by Lex Luthor himself to destroy Superman.

 

Right.

 

Imagine if all developers explained their game's visual limitations in storyline. "No, no -- those are not jumpy framerates you are seeing. Superman is merely drunk, which also blurs his vision considerably."

 

Or maybe, "You've got it all wrong, that is not clipping. Superman is simply using his X-Ray vision to look through the walls." While it would certainly make for some interesting story additions, it would most likely also rapidly ruin the gaming industry. Gamers take control of Superman through 14 missions that range in size and difficulty. Some levels see the Man of Steel racing through the skies of Metropolis, picking up automobiles (and other objects) and hurling them across the city at enemies, while others take place deep underground or even underwater. Each level begins with an objective that must be accomplished by everyone's favorite superhero. In some cases this can be as simple (in theory) as flying through rings (much more difficult than it sounds thanks to unbearable controls), while later levels put forward more difficult tasks such as retrieving access cards and/or disarming bombs.

 

Superman is manipulated with the analog stick. The Z button works to send the superhero soaring into the air or, if players are already airborne, to land. Because controls are so clumsy, it often takes six or seven taps of the Z button before Superman will do anything other than stutter around retardedly. Once airborne, controlling the Man of Steel is a whole other adventure altogether. Strangely, he seems to be neither faster than a speeding bullet nor more powerful than a locomotive. Actually, the sluggish polygonal mutant Titus has created moves more like a hovering couch. Turning around can take five or six seconds, while landing and taking off sometimes feel as if they're completely up to chance.

 

"Hello! I pressed the damn Z button. Is he going to do anything?" The answer, more often than not, is no.

 

The method by which objects are picked up (or not) in Superman is reason enough to think twice about the game. Though it says in the instruction booklet that "flying into an object automatically picks it up," we found this to be completely untrue on multiple occasions. Rather, flying into an object resulted in Superman convulsing and flying around it or, even better, picking it up for a split second and then flying on without it. The training mission is a perfect example of this. In it, Superman must pick up a car on the street before Lex Luthor's minions can blow it up. Worse yet, the Man of Steel has only a few seconds to execute the act before a timer runs out and the player loses. Okay, this seems like a fair goal, right? Not always. Sometimes the level starts and Lex Luthor's minions blow up the car right off the bat, long before Superman can ever reach it. How is that fair? Supposing the AI gives players a chance the next time around, it's often so difficult to pick up the vehicle before the computer-controlled characters blow it to smithereens that it's just not worth the effort.

 

And then we come to the various bugs of the game. After 10 minutes of play, we found a neat little feature that let us clip through all of the walls in Superman's universe. At first we thought it was X-Ray vision, but when we reappeared in the regular world only to be knee-deep in floor, well, something seemed a bit out of place. Pathetically, we found ourselves having more fun walking through walls than we did playing the working game. Other fun "features" include sometimes nonexistent collision detection and worthless AI that automatically shoots above Superman's shoulder. Imagine controlling multiple versions of Superman with friends. Imagine soaring to the tops of skyscrapers, circling around, shooting off your X-Ray vision and then freezing an opponent with your breath. While that certainly might have been a good idea, Titus has taken another approach entirely. Rather than using Superman in the game's multiplayer mode, players control one of Lex Luthor's minions and flying through levels is done via spaceships. Makes perfect sense if your absolutely insane.

 

The multiplayer feature, which supports up to four people, can be played in battle or race mode. Battle mode plays very much like a poor man's version of Forsaken. Dumbed down graphics, tunnel-like levels (minus one wide-open city arena) and one gun animation. Though multiple different weapons are obtainable, they are only represented with a change of sound. Instead of bleep, players get bloop. Woo-hoo! The one good thing about this mode is its smooth framerates -- something not even the single-player game can achieve.

 

Race mode, on the other hand, is completely baffling. Not only do players control more spaceships (why?), but rings shoot from the backside of one opponent. We played with this mode for a short while before giving up in utter confusion. Later we cried and decided never to speak of the so-called "race" again. Unfortunately, Superman is not saved by its eye-popping graphics. The game has this very rushed, careless feel about it that overflows into its visuals. In a smothering field of fog sits Metropolis. Superman can fly up into fog or down into fog. Straight ahead, meanwhile, awaits more fog and behind, good old fog. Amazingly enough, all of this fog does little to tame the title's jittery, sometimes slideshow-like framerates. Honestly, there are occasions where the framerates drop so low that the game becomes nearly unplayable.

 

And it's not as if all of Nintendo 64's power has gone to animation routines. Superman and friends feature an estimated 20 frames of animation between them. Punching is done with two or three frames, while flying eats up four or five. Everything -- and we do mean everything -- looks very robotic and unconvincing. The animated series of which this game is based on will never be known for its top-quality animation, but compared to the game it looks like a multi-million dollar Disney feature film.

 

Clipping also plays a major part in this "virtual Metropolis." Maybe it's because Superman is in a virtual reality world, but everything from trees to buildings and enemies clips, especially when the Man of Steel is up close and personal. Top everything off with the fact that the game runs in constant letterbox mode and we think we have a winner -- er, loser. This is not a visually striking game. The only thing moderately good we can think to note about it is that it's not blurry. The sound samples in Superman are actually very well done. The problem is that there are only a handful of them. In the beginning of the game we hear Lex Luthor say, "In short time your fate will be sealed, Superman." The level begins and Superman says, "Then there is no time to waste." That sounded pretty good, we say to ourselves. Then the next level kicks in and Superman says, "Then there is no time to waste." It's at this point that we begin to wonder what the hell is going on. The next area kicks in and the Man of Steel says -- you guessed it -- "Then there is no time to waste." This also happens whenever a player dies. Flying up to the limits of the sky, on the other hand, gives us a whole new sound sample of Lex Luthor laughing. This is meant to mean that Superman cannot escape the virtual reality world, no doubt.

 

The music in the game is doable, though it does become more and more repetitive as levels progress. It's obvious that sound effects and music were not one of Titus' main priorities for Superman. Now that we think about it, though, we're not sure if the developer put forth any priorities for this title other than to finish it. Having grown up with the Man of Steel, Superman for Nintendo 64 is a huge, whopping disappointment for me. In fact, the game is so all-around poorly executed that it's downright offending to people like myself who have enjoyed the comic books, movies, television shows and more based upon the America icon. Not only is this sub-par effort one of Nintendo 64's worst games, it serves as even more proof that it takes more than a solid license to make a solid game.

With horrible control, unforgivable framerates and more bugs than can be counted, Titus should be absolutely ashamed of this awful game, and the company should be doubly ashamed for pissing all over such a beloved license.

 

Do not buy this piece of garbage.

           

+++ DISCLAIMER +++

Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based on historical facts. BEWARE!

  

Some background:

The outbreak of the war in Europe in September 1939 did not immediately affect the status of the Armée de l'Air in French Indochina because it had the task of defending a wide area of Southeast Asia, including the future Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam. And yet its array of airplanes seemed inadequate to perform any kind of real defense against any incursion by an enemy, because there were less than 100 airplanes available to it, all obsolescent or obsolete. In September 1931, Japan invaded and occupied Manchuria. This was an area of northeast China, which encompassed the provinces of Jilin, Liaoning and Heilongjiang. Nearly six whole years later, in July 1937, the Second Sino-Japanese War had begun. As yet, the French colonial authorities were hoping that the Japanese would not be brazen enough to take on the might of a European power. However, it became increasingly likely after the German invasion of Poland in September 1939, since Japan was part of the Axis alliance and thus Germany's ally.

 

On September 26, 1940, Japanese troops landed in Haiphong, violating a cease-fire which had been signed only the previous day. From the middle of the following month, the French became heavily involved in repelling Japanese army assaults. Following the Fall of France in 1940, Thais perceived a chance to regain the territories they had lost years earlier. The collapse of Metropolitan France made the French hold on Indochina tenuous. After the Japanese invasion of French Indochina in September 1940, the French were forced to allow the Japanese to set up military bases. This seemingly subservient behavior convinced the Thai regime that Vichy France would not seriously resist a confrontation with Thailand.

 

During the French-Thai War, the Thai Air Force achieved several air-to-air-victories in dogfights against the Vichy Armée de l'Air. During World War II, the Thai Air Force supported the Royal Thai Army in its occupation of the Shan States of Burma as somewhat reluctant allies of the Japanese and took part in the defense of Bangkok against allied air raids in the latter part of the war, achieving some successes against state-of-the-art aircraft like the P-51 Mustang and the B-29 Superfortress. During these times, the RTAF was actively supplied by the Japanese with Imperial Japanese Army Air Force aircraft such as the Ki-43 "Oscar," and the Ki-27 "Nate." Other RTAF personnel took an active part the anti-Japanese resistance movement.

 

French forces in Indochina consisted of an army of approximately fifty thousand men, The most obvious deficiency of the French army lay in its shortage of armor; however, the Armée de l'Air had in its inventory approximately a hundred aircraft, of which around sixty could be considered first line. These consisted of thirty Potez 25 TOEs, four Farman 221s, eight Loire 130 flying boats, six Potez 542s, nine Morane M.S.406s.

 

The M.S.406 was a French fighter aircraft developed and manufactured by Morane-Saulnier starting in 1938. In response to a requirement for a fighter issued by the French Air Force in 1934, Morane-Saulnier built a prototype, designated MS.405, of mixed materials. This had the distinction of being the company's first low-wing monoplane, as well as the first to feature an enclosed cockpit, and the first design with a retracting undercarriage. The entry to service of the M.S.406 to the French Air Force in early 1939 represented the first modern fighter aircraft to be adopted by the service, and the type was also used in the French overseas colonies. The M.S.406 was France's most numerous fighter during the Second World War and one of only two French designs to exceed 1,000 in number. At the beginning of the war, it was one of only two French-built aircraft capable of 400 km/h (250 mph) – the other being the Potez 630.

 

Although a sturdy and highly manoeuvrable fighter aircraft, the M.S.406 was considered underpowered and weakly armed when compared to its contemporaries, esp. over continental Europe. Most critically, the M.S.406 was outperformed by the Messerschmitt Bf 109E during the Battle of France and no serious threat to the German fighter. In less advanced theatres like Indochina, though, the M.S. 406 was a respectable contender, but its numbers were low.

 

When the French-Thai War broke out in Indochina, the Thai Army was a relatively well-equipped force, consisting of some sixty thousand men, with artillery and tanks. The Royal Thai Navy — consisting of several vessels, including two coastal defence ships, twelve torpedo boats and four submarines — was inferior to the French naval forces, though, but the Royal Thai Air Force held both a quantitative and qualitative edge over l'Armee de l'Air. Among the 140 aircraft that composed the air force's initial first-line strength were twenty-four Mitsubishi Ki-30 light bombers, nine Mitsubishi Ki-21 and six Martin B-10 twin-engine bombers, seventy Vought Corsair dive bombers, and twenty-five Curtiss Hawk 75 fighters.

 

While nationalistic demonstrations and anti-French rallies were held in Bangkok, border skirmishes erupted along the Mekong frontier. The superior Royal Thai Air Force conducted daytime bombing runs over Vientiane, Sisophon, and Battambang with impunity. The French retaliated with their own planes, but the damage caused was less than equal. The activities of the Thai air force, particularly in the field of dive-bombing, was such that Admiral Jean Decoux, the governor of French Indochina, grudgingly remarked that the Thai planes seemed to have been flown by men with plenty of war experience.

 

In early January 1941, the Thai Burapha and Isan Armies launched their offensive on Laos and Cambodia. French resistance was instantaneous, but many units were simply swept along by the better-equipped Thai forces, with some French equipment – including some aircraft – being captured and immediately pressed into Thai army service. The Thais swiftly took Laos, but Cambodia proved a much harder nut to crack.

 

On January 16, 1941 the French launched a large counterattack on the Thai-held villages of Yang Dang Khum and Phum Preav, initiating the fiercest battle of the war. Because of over-complicated orders and nonexistent intelligence, the French counterattacks were cut to pieces and fighting ended with a French withdrawal from the area. The Thais were unable to pursue the retreating French, as their forward tanks were kept in check by the gunnery of French Foreign Legion artillerists.

 

On January 24, the final air battle took place when Thai bombers raided the French airfield at Angkor near Siem Reap, which quickly fell. The last Thai mission commenced at 0710 hours on January 28, when the Martins of the 50th Bomber Squadron set out on a raid on Sisophon, escorted by three Hawk 75Ns of the 60th Fighter Squadron.

 

Although the French won an important naval victory over the Thais, Japan forced the French to accept Japanese mediation of a peace treaty that returned the disputed territory to Thai control. A general armistice was arranged by Japan to go into effect on January 28. On May 9 a peace treaty was signed in Tokyo, with the French being coerced by the Japanese into relinquishing their hold on the disputed territories. However, the French (now part of the Axis Forces’ Vichy regime) were left in place to administer the rump colony of Indochina until 9 March 1945, when the Japanese staged a coup d'état in French Indochina and took control, establishing their own colony, the Empire of Vietnam, as a puppet state controlled by Tokyo.

 

Until then, Japanese authorities heavily influenced the diminishing Vichy French presence in the region and handed over a lot of leftover military hardware to its own allies, primarily the Thai forces. However, there was not much left to be distributed: about 30% of the French aircraft were rendered unserviceable by the end of the French-Thai War in early 1941, some as a result of minor damage sustained in air raids that remained unrepaired. The Armée de l'Air admitted the loss of only one Farman F221 and two Morane M.S.406s destroyed on the ground, but, in reality, its losses were greater and the influence of Japan on the leftover stock was fogged in order to save face. However, even in 1944, single former Vichy French aircraft and tanks were still active in the region, primarily under Thai flag.

  

General characteristics:

Crew: 1

Length: 8.17 m (26 ft 10 in)

Wingspan: 10.61 m (34 ft 10 in)

Height: 3.25 m (10 ft 8 in)

Wing area: 16 m2 (170 sq ft)

Empty weight: 1,895 kg (4,178 lb)

Gross weight: 2,540 kg (5,600 lb)

 

Powerplant:

1 × Hispano-Suiza 12Y-31 V-12 liquid-cooled piston engine with

619 kW (830 hp) for take-off at 2,520 rpm at sea level,

driving a 3-bladed variable-pitch propeller, 3 m (9 ft 10 in) diameter

 

Performance:

Maximum speed: 490 km/h (304 mph; 265 kn) at 4,500 m (14,764 ft)

Stall speed: 160 km/h (99 mph, 86 kn) without flaps

135 km/h (84 mph; 73 kn) with flaps

Range: 1,100 km (680 mi, 590 nmi) at 66% power

Combat range: 720 km (450 mi, 390 nmi)

Endurance: 2 hours 20 minutes 30 seconds (average combat mission)

Service ceiling: 9,400 m (30,800 ft)

Time to altitude: 2,000 m (6,562 ft) in 2 minutes 32 seconds

9,000 m (29,528 ft) in 21 minutes 37 seconds

Wing loading: 154 kg/m2 (32 lb/sq ft)

Power/mass: 2.95 kg/kW (4.85 lb/hp)

Take-off run to 8 m (26 ft): 270 m (886 ft)

Landing run from 8 m (26 ft): 340 m (1,115 ft)

 

Armament:

1× 20 mm (0.787 in) Hispano-Suiza HS.404 cannon, firing through the propeller hub

2× 7.5 mm (0.295 in) MAC 1934 machine guns in the outer wings

  

The kit and its assembly:

This quick build was created in the wake of the “Captured” group build at whatifmodellers.com and actually is a personal interpretation of someone else’s idea, namely of fellow modeler NARSES who came up with the idea of a captured French M.S. 406 in Indochina under a new Thai flag. I found the idea so weird, yet realistic, that I decided to build one, too.

 

The model is the very simple but quite acceptable M.S. 406 from Hobby Boss. Externally the model is nice, with recessed panel lines and a basic landing gear. Internally, it is rather bleak, even though it has a full cockpit with a floor, integrally molded seat and even some details behind the pilot’s armor bulkhead. The canopy is a single piece and very clear, but it comes with massive locator bars, so that I decided to keep the canopy closed and added a pilot figure to cover the minimal interior. I was lucky to find a Japanese (though pretty “flat”) WWII pilot in the donor bank, left over from a Hasegawa model. I also gave the figure some seat belts (made from adhesive tape), but the rest remained unchanged – even the original metal axis for the propeller was used. I just replaced the machine gun barrels with hollow steel needles and added a pitot on the wing, which is probably part of the kit but not indicated in the instructions. The same is true for the foldable ventral antenna.

 

The build was finished quickly, in the course of just a single evening, including the pilot and some overall PSR.

  

Painting and markings:

My interpretation of a French aircraft in Thai service after the French-Thai War stuck closely to the real world Vichy livery, which was the standard French camouflage in grey/green/brown with light blue-grey undersides (all from ModelMaster’s Authentic Color range), together with a yellow-and-red-striped cowling (a base with Humbrol 69 and red decal stripes added later) and a white cheatline long the fuselage. The tail of French aircraft in Indochina was painted all-red from early 1941 onwards upon Japanese command, because of friendly fire incidents. This was adopted for the model (with a mix of Humbrol 19 and some 73), which is supposed to belong into the 1942 time frame.

 

As a captured aircraft, the original French roundels were replaced/overpainted with red disks/hinomaru, and then Thai elephant markings added on top. That’s a personal idea, ordnance directly supplied to the Thai forces from Japan had the simple, square “elephant flag” emblem directly applied to the wings and the fin (but no fuselage roundel). The all-red tail was taken over, but I painted the rudder in a dark IJA green, since it would formerly carry a French fin flash. The same green was used to overpaint a serial number on the fin and a former squadron emblem under the cockpit.

The hinomaru come from a PrintScale Ki-46 sheet, and these markings are intentionally a bit oversized, so that they cover well the former French markings and are highly visible. The elephant markings some from a PrintScale Ki-27 sheet, so that the red tone on both sources are very close to each other. The Ki-27 sheet also provided the Thai ciphers “3” and “4”, combined into a “34”.

 

The interior was painted in medium grey, and the model externally received some signs of wear and tear in the form of dry-brushed leading edges and around the cockpit as well as some soot stains behind the exhaust stubs and the machine guns. Finally, the model was sealed with a coat of matt acrylic varnish (Italeri).

  

A quick build, and the easy-build Hobby Boss M.S. 406 is certainly not as crisp as a “real” model, but in this case the story behind the weird livery was more in the focus than the canvas underneath. However, an interesting result, and the hybrid paint scheme with heritage from three different operators make the aircraft an unusual, if not exotic sight.

+++ DISCLAIMER +++

Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based on historical facts. BEWARE!

  

Some background:

The outbreak of the war in Europe in September 1939 did not immediately affect the status of the Armée de l'Air in French Indochina because it had the task of defending a wide area of Southeast Asia, including the future Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam. And yet its array of airplanes seemed inadequate to perform any kind of real defense against any incursion by an enemy, because there were less than 100 airplanes available to it, all obsolescent or obsolete. In September 1931, Japan invaded and occupied Manchuria. This was an area of northeast China, which encompassed the provinces of Jilin, Liaoning and Heilongjiang. Nearly six whole years later, in July 1937, the Second Sino-Japanese War had begun. As yet, the French colonial authorities were hoping that the Japanese would not be brazen enough to take on the might of a European power. However, it became increasingly likely after the German invasion of Poland in September 1939, since Japan was part of the Axis alliance and thus Germany's ally.

 

On September 26, 1940, Japanese troops landed in Haiphong, violating a cease-fire which had been signed only the previous day. From the middle of the following month, the French became heavily involved in repelling Japanese army assaults. Following the Fall of France in 1940, Thais perceived a chance to regain the territories they had lost years earlier. The collapse of Metropolitan France made the French hold on Indochina tenuous. After the Japanese invasion of French Indochina in September 1940, the French were forced to allow the Japanese to set up military bases. This seemingly subservient behavior convinced the Thai regime that Vichy France would not seriously resist a confrontation with Thailand.

 

During the French-Thai War, the Thai Air Force achieved several air-to-air-victories in dogfights against the Vichy Armée de l'Air. During World War II, the Thai Air Force supported the Royal Thai Army in its occupation of the Shan States of Burma as somewhat reluctant allies of the Japanese and took part in the defense of Bangkok against allied air raids in the latter part of the war, achieving some successes against state-of-the-art aircraft like the P-51 Mustang and the B-29 Superfortress. During these times, the RTAF was actively supplied by the Japanese with Imperial Japanese Army Air Force aircraft such as the Ki-43 "Oscar," and the Ki-27 "Nate." Other RTAF personnel took an active part the anti-Japanese resistance movement.

 

French forces in Indochina consisted of an army of approximately fifty thousand men, The most obvious deficiency of the French army lay in its shortage of armor; however, the Armée de l'Air had in its inventory approximately a hundred aircraft, of which around sixty could be considered first line. These consisted of thirty Potez 25 TOEs, four Farman 221s, eight Loire 130 flying boats, six Potez 542s, nine Morane M.S.406s.

 

The M.S.406 was a French fighter aircraft developed and manufactured by Morane-Saulnier starting in 1938. In response to a requirement for a fighter issued by the French Air Force in 1934, Morane-Saulnier built a prototype, designated MS.405, of mixed materials. This had the distinction of being the company's first low-wing monoplane, as well as the first to feature an enclosed cockpit, and the first design with a retracting undercarriage. The entry to service of the M.S.406 to the French Air Force in early 1939 represented the first modern fighter aircraft to be adopted by the service, and the type was also used in the French overseas colonies. The M.S.406 was France's most numerous fighter during the Second World War and one of only two French designs to exceed 1,000 in number. At the beginning of the war, it was one of only two French-built aircraft capable of 400 km/h (250 mph) – the other being the Potez 630.

 

Although a sturdy and highly manoeuvrable fighter aircraft, the M.S.406 was considered underpowered and weakly armed when compared to its contemporaries, esp. over continental Europe. Most critically, the M.S.406 was outperformed by the Messerschmitt Bf 109E during the Battle of France and no serious threat to the German fighter. In less advanced theatres like Indochina, though, the M.S. 406 was a respectable contender, but its numbers were low.

 

When the French-Thai War broke out in Indochina, the Thai Army was a relatively well-equipped force, consisting of some sixty thousand men, with artillery and tanks. The Royal Thai Navy — consisting of several vessels, including two coastal defence ships, twelve torpedo boats and four submarines — was inferior to the French naval forces, though, but the Royal Thai Air Force held both a quantitative and qualitative edge over l'Armee de l'Air. Among the 140 aircraft that composed the air force's initial first-line strength were twenty-four Mitsubishi Ki-30 light bombers, nine Mitsubishi Ki-21 and six Martin B-10 twin-engine bombers, seventy Vought Corsair dive bombers, and twenty-five Curtiss Hawk 75 fighters.

 

While nationalistic demonstrations and anti-French rallies were held in Bangkok, border skirmishes erupted along the Mekong frontier. The superior Royal Thai Air Force conducted daytime bombing runs over Vientiane, Sisophon, and Battambang with impunity. The French retaliated with their own planes, but the damage caused was less than equal. The activities of the Thai air force, particularly in the field of dive-bombing, was such that Admiral Jean Decoux, the governor of French Indochina, grudgingly remarked that the Thai planes seemed to have been flown by men with plenty of war experience.

 

In early January 1941, the Thai Burapha and Isan Armies launched their offensive on Laos and Cambodia. French resistance was instantaneous, but many units were simply swept along by the better-equipped Thai forces, with some French equipment – including some aircraft – being captured and immediately pressed into Thai army service. The Thais swiftly took Laos, but Cambodia proved a much harder nut to crack.

 

On January 16, 1941 the French launched a large counterattack on the Thai-held villages of Yang Dang Khum and Phum Preav, initiating the fiercest battle of the war. Because of over-complicated orders and nonexistent intelligence, the French counterattacks were cut to pieces and fighting ended with a French withdrawal from the area. The Thais were unable to pursue the retreating French, as their forward tanks were kept in check by the gunnery of French Foreign Legion artillerists.

 

On January 24, the final air battle took place when Thai bombers raided the French airfield at Angkor near Siem Reap, which quickly fell. The last Thai mission commenced at 0710 hours on January 28, when the Martins of the 50th Bomber Squadron set out on a raid on Sisophon, escorted by three Hawk 75Ns of the 60th Fighter Squadron.

 

Although the French won an important naval victory over the Thais, Japan forced the French to accept Japanese mediation of a peace treaty that returned the disputed territory to Thai control. A general armistice was arranged by Japan to go into effect on January 28. On May 9 a peace treaty was signed in Tokyo, with the French being coerced by the Japanese into relinquishing their hold on the disputed territories. However, the French (now part of the Axis Forces’ Vichy regime) were left in place to administer the rump colony of Indochina until 9 March 1945, when the Japanese staged a coup d'état in French Indochina and took control, establishing their own colony, the Empire of Vietnam, as a puppet state controlled by Tokyo.

 

Until then, Japanese authorities heavily influenced the diminishing Vichy French presence in the region and handed over a lot of leftover military hardware to its own allies, primarily the Thai forces. However, there was not much left to be distributed: about 30% of the French aircraft were rendered unserviceable by the end of the French-Thai War in early 1941, some as a result of minor damage sustained in air raids that remained unrepaired. The Armée de l'Air admitted the loss of only one Farman F221 and two Morane M.S.406s destroyed on the ground, but, in reality, its losses were greater and the influence of Japan on the leftover stock was fogged in order to save face. However, even in 1944, single former Vichy French aircraft and tanks were still active in the region, primarily under Thai flag.

  

General characteristics:

Crew: 1

Length: 8.17 m (26 ft 10 in)

Wingspan: 10.61 m (34 ft 10 in)

Height: 3.25 m (10 ft 8 in)

Wing area: 16 m2 (170 sq ft)

Empty weight: 1,895 kg (4,178 lb)

Gross weight: 2,540 kg (5,600 lb)

 

Powerplant:

1 × Hispano-Suiza 12Y-31 V-12 liquid-cooled piston engine with

619 kW (830 hp) for take-off at 2,520 rpm at sea level,

driving a 3-bladed variable-pitch propeller, 3 m (9 ft 10 in) diameter

 

Performance:

Maximum speed: 490 km/h (304 mph; 265 kn) at 4,500 m (14,764 ft)

Stall speed: 160 km/h (99 mph, 86 kn) without flaps

135 km/h (84 mph; 73 kn) with flaps

Range: 1,100 km (680 mi, 590 nmi) at 66% power

Combat range: 720 km (450 mi, 390 nmi)

Endurance: 2 hours 20 minutes 30 seconds (average combat mission)

Service ceiling: 9,400 m (30,800 ft)

Time to altitude: 2,000 m (6,562 ft) in 2 minutes 32 seconds

9,000 m (29,528 ft) in 21 minutes 37 seconds

Wing loading: 154 kg/m2 (32 lb/sq ft)

Power/mass: 2.95 kg/kW (4.85 lb/hp)

Take-off run to 8 m (26 ft): 270 m (886 ft)

Landing run from 8 m (26 ft): 340 m (1,115 ft)

 

Armament:

1× 20 mm (0.787 in) Hispano-Suiza HS.404 cannon, firing through the propeller hub

2× 7.5 mm (0.295 in) MAC 1934 machine guns in the outer wings

  

The kit and its assembly:

This quick build was created in the wake of the “Captured” group build at whatifmodellers.com and actually is a personal interpretation of someone else’s idea, namely of fellow modeler NARSES who came up with the idea of a captured French M.S. 406 in Indochina under a new Thai flag. I found the idea so weird, yet realistic, that I decided to build one, too.

 

The model is the very simple but quite acceptable M.S. 406 from Hobby Boss. Externally the model is nice, with recessed panel lines and a basic landing gear. Internally, it is rather bleak, even though it has a full cockpit with a floor, integrally molded seat and even some details behind the pilot’s armor bulkhead. The canopy is a single piece and very clear, but it comes with massive locator bars, so that I decided to keep the canopy closed and added a pilot figure to cover the minimal interior. I was lucky to find a Japanese (though pretty “flat”) WWII pilot in the donor bank, left over from a Hasegawa model. I also gave the figure some seat belts (made from adhesive tape), but the rest remained unchanged – even the original metal axis for the propeller was used. I just replaced the machine gun barrels with hollow steel needles and added a pitot on the wing, which is probably part of the kit but not indicated in the instructions. The same is true for the foldable ventral antenna.

 

The build was finished quickly, in the course of just a single evening, including the pilot and some overall PSR.

  

Painting and markings:

My interpretation of a French aircraft in Thai service after the French-Thai War stuck closely to the real world Vichy livery, which was the standard French camouflage in grey/green/brown with light blue-grey undersides (all from ModelMaster’s Authentic Color range), together with a yellow-and-red-striped cowling (a base with Humbrol 69 and red decal stripes added later) and a white cheatline long the fuselage. The tail of French aircraft in Indochina was painted all-red from early 1941 onwards upon Japanese command, because of friendly fire incidents. This was adopted for the model (with a mix of Humbrol 19 and some 73), which is supposed to belong into the 1942 time frame.

 

As a captured aircraft, the original French roundels were replaced/overpainted with red disks/hinomaru, and then Thai elephant markings added on top. That’s a personal idea, ordnance directly supplied to the Thai forces from Japan had the simple, square “elephant flag” emblem directly applied to the wings and the fin (but no fuselage roundel). The all-red tail was taken over, but I painted the rudder in a dark IJA green, since it would formerly carry a French fin flash. The same green was used to overpaint a serial number on the fin and a former squadron emblem under the cockpit.

The hinomaru come from a PrintScale Ki-46 sheet, and these markings are intentionally a bit oversized, so that they cover well the former French markings and are highly visible. The elephant markings some from a PrintScale Ki-27 sheet, so that the red tone on both sources are very close to each other. The Ki-27 sheet also provided the Thai ciphers “3” and “4”, combined into a “34”.

 

The interior was painted in medium grey, and the model externally received some signs of wear and tear in the form of dry-brushed leading edges and around the cockpit as well as some soot stains behind the exhaust stubs and the machine guns. Finally, the model was sealed with a coat of matt acrylic varnish (Italeri).

  

A quick build, and the easy-build Hobby Boss M.S. 406 is certainly not as crisp as a “real” model, but in this case the story behind the weird livery was more in the focus than the canvas underneath. However, an interesting result, and the hybrid paint scheme with heritage from three different operators make the aircraft an unusual, if not exotic sight.

Now that I have HBO NOW, I pretty much have all of the television I need, along with Netflix and Hulu. Ah, good times. But, I'm not talking about good times today, because this show GIRLS has taken a considerable dive since it debuted a few years ago. I was a big fan and championing it when it first came out, I loved it.

 

I just watched the last episode of the 4th season. I feel like this show has just become too cynical, these characters don't grow in any way, they keep making the same stupid mistakes, and the writers aren't taking them as seriously as they probably should.

 

My main gripe with this show is that Lena Dunham has completely taken center stage and and writes Hannah as oblivious and an asshole and then rewards her, doesn't punish her. We don't even get to see what everybody else is doing six months later, just Hannah's bitch ass.

  

I can only vouch for the 1st and 2nd season, which I really liked, then it started to lose me on the 3rd season. It was just too much Hannah, not enough character growth. The only things that seem to be going on, are relationships and Hannah's future. That's it. Everything else is just pushed off to the side. And I can't watch another season of these vapid, lost white girls constantly making the same mistakes over and over. They don't punish these characters for being assholes, they punish the good and innocent characters and mock them and laugh at them. I can't stand that.

The show never gave me enough Marnie, Jessa or Shoshanna. In every season. They're also getting the short end of the stick in terms of the progression of their characters - which is pretty nonexistent. And this sequence with Adam's sister naked in the tub about to give birth...was just too much.

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San Francisco. California. USA

 

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Faith McAllister, "Inside the Flames", Sony Digital Camera, Faith McAllister_JFD Collection, Jasper GA

 

This picture is of the inside of an actual residential structure fire. In honor of the Privacy Act, the exact location, nor the names of the homeowners may be disclosed to any non-personnel. The house caught fire one night and was extinguished and preserved by Jasper Fire and Rescue Station 1, Pickens County Fire Station 11, and Talking Rock Volunteer Fire Station 7. Several volunteers also responded to this call. The owners of the home decided to rebuild and donated the structure to be used as a controlled burn, also known as a training fire. The inside of a structure fire, depending on the type of materials being burned and gasses being omitted, is about 1,100 degrees Fahrenheit after only 3-1/2 minutes of engulfment! The inside of other rooms that are not even on fire yet can reach over 300 degrees, which is hot enough to melt plastic without flames. The inside of the house will be completely dark within only 4 minutes, regardless of the lighting. A single-wide trailer can burn to the ground in only 7 short minutes.

Imagine such a horrendous fire happening on a night over 100 years ago, when fire apparatus and training wasn't nearly as advanced as it is now...Catastrophic. Well, they did happen back in 1871, and changed the way that America fights fire today. On Sunday evening, October 8, 1871, The Great Chicago Fire and the Preshtigo fire raged on the same night, just 262 miles apart from one another.

In 1871, Chicago was considered a "boom town" with around 60,000 buildings. 40,000 of those then magnificent buildings were constructed of wood, and had roofs made of either felt, wood, or wooden shingles. The construction laws were extremely lax, and fire codes were practically nonexistent. Chicago was extremely dry that night due to lack of rain for the three weeks prior. The Great Chicago Fire was rumored to have been started by a cow kicking over a lantern in a barn. Ignition did occur in a barn on the west side of the city; however, I'm convinced that the cow should remain innocent since she was never proven guilty!

The boys of the Chicago Fire Department were exhausted from fighting a fire earlier that day that spanned four blocks. Their response time to what is now known as The Great Chicago Fire was delayed due to errors in judgement of the location of the fire and in signaling the alarm. The fire fighters were first sent to the wrong neighborhood, causing the loss of precious time. Upon their arrival, the fire was already spreading out of control to the east and north and was consuming EVERYTHING in it's path. Private homes and mansions, as well as commercial buildings were all raging out of control--fueling the flames of Chicago's Hell. With limited equipment and personnel, the Chicago Fire Department seemed to be meeting it's match! The Great Chicago fire raged on relentlessly for 3 days and was finally extinguished by Mother Nature as the rain finally began to fall on the morning of October 10, 1871. The entire central business and heart of the city was completely leveled to ash and smouldering rubble. More than 2,000 acres and 17,000 homes were destroyed, leaving upwards of 100,000 people homeless. The city suffered more than $200 million in damages, and at least 300 people were killed.

On that same fateful October day, (10/08/1871) the under-publicized Preshtigo Fire occurred, just 262 miles north of Chicago. Preshtigo, Wisconsin had been the host to a large logging operation, which left the forest floor carpeted with pine branches and sawdust. Clearing projects at the time used a "slash and burn" method, in which tiny, controlled fires were used to dispose of the refuse. The city was under drought-like conditions for the entire summer of 1871 and was severely dry by the fall. Several of the "slash and burn" fires caught wind and were swept up into a huge cyclonic fire storm. This "tornado of fire" quickly grew to more than 1,000 feet high and 5 miles wide. The Preshtigo Fire Company consisted of a single, horse-drawn steam pumper and was NO match for a forest fire of this magnitude--their efforts were hopeless. The Preshtigo Fire blazed on destroying more than 2,400 square miles of forest, as well as several small communities. It claimed the lives of more than 2,200 settlers. It then became a firestorm and actually jumped the Green Bay-which was about 60 miles wide. It then went on to completely burn and destroy several hundred more miles of land and settlements on the northeast peninsula of Wisconsin.

In the light of these two tragic fires, America began to enact strict building and fire codes. Improvements in communications are still constantly being made. Advances in firefighting equipment as a whole were set in force then to ensure that these such tragedies do not recur. The Preshtigo Fire is still known as the biggest forest fire in North American History today.

 

Jones and Bartlett. "Fundamentals of Fire Fighter Skills, Second Edition" (10-12) Print

 

"Hot Facts About House Fires". www.ok.gov/health/documents/house_fires.pdf . Retrieved July 28, 2011.

 

"The Great Chicago Fire". www.chicagohs.org/history/fire.html . Retrieved July 28, 2011.

 

"The Great Preshtigo Fire of 1871". www.preshtigofire.info/ . Retrieved June 27, 2011.

 

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peshtigo_Fire

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Chicago_Fire

+++ DISCLAIMER +++

Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based on historical facts. BEWARE!

  

Some background:

The outbreak of the war in Europe in September 1939 did not immediately affect the status of the Armée de l'Air in French Indochina because it had the task of defending a wide area of Southeast Asia, including the future Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam. And yet its array of airplanes seemed inadequate to perform any kind of real defense against any incursion by an enemy, because there were less than 100 airplanes available to it, all obsolescent or obsolete. In September 1931, Japan invaded and occupied Manchuria. This was an area of northeast China, which encompassed the provinces of Jilin, Liaoning and Heilongjiang. Nearly six whole years later, in July 1937, the Second Sino-Japanese War had begun. As yet, the French colonial authorities were hoping that the Japanese would not be brazen enough to take on the might of a European power. However, it became increasingly likely after the German invasion of Poland in September 1939, since Japan was part of the Axis alliance and thus Germany's ally.

 

On September 26, 1940, Japanese troops landed in Haiphong, violating a cease-fire which had been signed only the previous day. From the middle of the following month, the French became heavily involved in repelling Japanese army assaults. Following the Fall of France in 1940, Thais perceived a chance to regain the territories they had lost years earlier. The collapse of Metropolitan France made the French hold on Indochina tenuous. After the Japanese invasion of French Indochina in September 1940, the French were forced to allow the Japanese to set up military bases. This seemingly subservient behavior convinced the Thai regime that Vichy France would not seriously resist a confrontation with Thailand.

 

During the French-Thai War, the Thai Air Force achieved several air-to-air-victories in dogfights against the Vichy Armée de l'Air. During World War II, the Thai Air Force supported the Royal Thai Army in its occupation of the Shan States of Burma as somewhat reluctant allies of the Japanese and took part in the defense of Bangkok against allied air raids in the latter part of the war, achieving some successes against state-of-the-art aircraft like the P-51 Mustang and the B-29 Superfortress. During these times, the RTAF was actively supplied by the Japanese with Imperial Japanese Army Air Force aircraft such as the Ki-43 "Oscar," and the Ki-27 "Nate." Other RTAF personnel took an active part the anti-Japanese resistance movement.

 

French forces in Indochina consisted of an army of approximately fifty thousand men, The most obvious deficiency of the French army lay in its shortage of armor; however, the Armée de l'Air had in its inventory approximately a hundred aircraft, of which around sixty could be considered first line. These consisted of thirty Potez 25 TOEs, four Farman 221s, eight Loire 130 flying boats, six Potez 542s, nine Morane M.S.406s.

 

The M.S.406 was a French fighter aircraft developed and manufactured by Morane-Saulnier starting in 1938. In response to a requirement for a fighter issued by the French Air Force in 1934, Morane-Saulnier built a prototype, designated MS.405, of mixed materials. This had the distinction of being the company's first low-wing monoplane, as well as the first to feature an enclosed cockpit, and the first design with a retracting undercarriage. The entry to service of the M.S.406 to the French Air Force in early 1939 represented the first modern fighter aircraft to be adopted by the service, and the type was also used in the French overseas colonies. The M.S.406 was France's most numerous fighter during the Second World War and one of only two French designs to exceed 1,000 in number. At the beginning of the war, it was one of only two French-built aircraft capable of 400 km/h (250 mph) – the other being the Potez 630.

 

Although a sturdy and highly manoeuvrable fighter aircraft, the M.S.406 was considered underpowered and weakly armed when compared to its contemporaries, esp. over continental Europe. Most critically, the M.S.406 was outperformed by the Messerschmitt Bf 109E during the Battle of France and no serious threat to the German fighter. In less advanced theatres like Indochina, though, the M.S. 406 was a respectable contender, but its numbers were low.

 

When the French-Thai War broke out in Indochina, the Thai Army was a relatively well-equipped force, consisting of some sixty thousand men, with artillery and tanks. The Royal Thai Navy — consisting of several vessels, including two coastal defence ships, twelve torpedo boats and four submarines — was inferior to the French naval forces, though, but the Royal Thai Air Force held both a quantitative and qualitative edge over l'Armee de l'Air. Among the 140 aircraft that composed the air force's initial first-line strength were twenty-four Mitsubishi Ki-30 light bombers, nine Mitsubishi Ki-21 and six Martin B-10 twin-engine bombers, seventy Vought Corsair dive bombers, and twenty-five Curtiss Hawk 75 fighters.

 

While nationalistic demonstrations and anti-French rallies were held in Bangkok, border skirmishes erupted along the Mekong frontier. The superior Royal Thai Air Force conducted daytime bombing runs over Vientiane, Sisophon, and Battambang with impunity. The French retaliated with their own planes, but the damage caused was less than equal. The activities of the Thai air force, particularly in the field of dive-bombing, was such that Admiral Jean Decoux, the governor of French Indochina, grudgingly remarked that the Thai planes seemed to have been flown by men with plenty of war experience.

 

In early January 1941, the Thai Burapha and Isan Armies launched their offensive on Laos and Cambodia. French resistance was instantaneous, but many units were simply swept along by the better-equipped Thai forces, with some French equipment – including some aircraft – being captured and immediately pressed into Thai army service. The Thais swiftly took Laos, but Cambodia proved a much harder nut to crack.

 

On January 16, 1941 the French launched a large counterattack on the Thai-held villages of Yang Dang Khum and Phum Preav, initiating the fiercest battle of the war. Because of over-complicated orders and nonexistent intelligence, the French counterattacks were cut to pieces and fighting ended with a French withdrawal from the area. The Thais were unable to pursue the retreating French, as their forward tanks were kept in check by the gunnery of French Foreign Legion artillerists.

 

On January 24, the final air battle took place when Thai bombers raided the French airfield at Angkor near Siem Reap, which quickly fell. The last Thai mission commenced at 0710 hours on January 28, when the Martins of the 50th Bomber Squadron set out on a raid on Sisophon, escorted by three Hawk 75Ns of the 60th Fighter Squadron.

 

Although the French won an important naval victory over the Thais, Japan forced the French to accept Japanese mediation of a peace treaty that returned the disputed territory to Thai control. A general armistice was arranged by Japan to go into effect on January 28. On May 9 a peace treaty was signed in Tokyo, with the French being coerced by the Japanese into relinquishing their hold on the disputed territories. However, the French (now part of the Axis Forces’ Vichy regime) were left in place to administer the rump colony of Indochina until 9 March 1945, when the Japanese staged a coup d'état in French Indochina and took control, establishing their own colony, the Empire of Vietnam, as a puppet state controlled by Tokyo.

 

Until then, Japanese authorities heavily influenced the diminishing Vichy French presence in the region and handed over a lot of leftover military hardware to its own allies, primarily the Thai forces. However, there was not much left to be distributed: about 30% of the French aircraft were rendered unserviceable by the end of the French-Thai War in early 1941, some as a result of minor damage sustained in air raids that remained unrepaired. The Armée de l'Air admitted the loss of only one Farman F221 and two Morane M.S.406s destroyed on the ground, but, in reality, its losses were greater and the influence of Japan on the leftover stock was fogged in order to save face. However, even in 1944, single former Vichy French aircraft and tanks were still active in the region, primarily under Thai flag.

  

General characteristics:

Crew: 1

Length: 8.17 m (26 ft 10 in)

Wingspan: 10.61 m (34 ft 10 in)

Height: 3.25 m (10 ft 8 in)

Wing area: 16 m2 (170 sq ft)

Empty weight: 1,895 kg (4,178 lb)

Gross weight: 2,540 kg (5,600 lb)

 

Powerplant:

1 × Hispano-Suiza 12Y-31 V-12 liquid-cooled piston engine with

619 kW (830 hp) for take-off at 2,520 rpm at sea level,

driving a 3-bladed variable-pitch propeller, 3 m (9 ft 10 in) diameter

 

Performance:

Maximum speed: 490 km/h (304 mph; 265 kn) at 4,500 m (14,764 ft)

Stall speed: 160 km/h (99 mph, 86 kn) without flaps

135 km/h (84 mph; 73 kn) with flaps

Range: 1,100 km (680 mi, 590 nmi) at 66% power

Combat range: 720 km (450 mi, 390 nmi)

Endurance: 2 hours 20 minutes 30 seconds (average combat mission)

Service ceiling: 9,400 m (30,800 ft)

Time to altitude: 2,000 m (6,562 ft) in 2 minutes 32 seconds

9,000 m (29,528 ft) in 21 minutes 37 seconds

Wing loading: 154 kg/m2 (32 lb/sq ft)

Power/mass: 2.95 kg/kW (4.85 lb/hp)

Take-off run to 8 m (26 ft): 270 m (886 ft)

Landing run from 8 m (26 ft): 340 m (1,115 ft)

 

Armament:

1× 20 mm (0.787 in) Hispano-Suiza HS.404 cannon, firing through the propeller hub

2× 7.5 mm (0.295 in) MAC 1934 machine guns in the outer wings

  

The kit and its assembly:

This quick build was created in the wake of the “Captured” group build at whatifmodellers.com and actually is a personal interpretation of someone else’s idea, namely of fellow modeler NARSES who came up with the idea of a captured French M.S. 406 in Indochina under a new Thai flag. I found the idea so weird, yet realistic, that I decided to build one, too.

 

The model is the very simple but quite acceptable M.S. 406 from Hobby Boss. Externally the model is nice, with recessed panel lines and a basic landing gear. Internally, it is rather bleak, even though it has a full cockpit with a floor, integrally molded seat and even some details behind the pilot’s armor bulkhead. The canopy is a single piece and very clear, but it comes with massive locator bars, so that I decided to keep the canopy closed and added a pilot figure to cover the minimal interior. I was lucky to find a Japanese (though pretty “flat”) WWII pilot in the donor bank, left over from a Hasegawa model. I also gave the figure some seat belts (made from adhesive tape), but the rest remained unchanged – even the original metal axis for the propeller was used. I just replaced the machine gun barrels with hollow steel needles and added a pitot on the wing, which is probably part of the kit but not indicated in the instructions. The same is true for the foldable ventral antenna.

 

The build was finished quickly, in the course of just a single evening, including the pilot and some overall PSR.

  

Painting and markings:

My interpretation of a French aircraft in Thai service after the French-Thai War stuck closely to the real world Vichy livery, which was the standard French camouflage in grey/green/brown with light blue-grey undersides (all from ModelMaster’s Authentic Color range), together with a yellow-and-red-striped cowling (a base with Humbrol 69 and red decal stripes added later) and a white cheatline long the fuselage. The tail of French aircraft in Indochina was painted all-red from early 1941 onwards upon Japanese command, because of friendly fire incidents. This was adopted for the model (with a mix of Humbrol 19 and some 73), which is supposed to belong into the 1942 time frame.

 

As a captured aircraft, the original French roundels were replaced/overpainted with red disks/hinomaru, and then Thai elephant markings added on top. That’s a personal idea, ordnance directly supplied to the Thai forces from Japan had the simple, square “elephant flag” emblem directly applied to the wings and the fin (but no fuselage roundel). The all-red tail was taken over, but I painted the rudder in a dark IJA green, since it would formerly carry a French fin flash. The same green was used to overpaint a serial number on the fin and a former squadron emblem under the cockpit.

The hinomaru come from a PrintScale Ki-46 sheet, and these markings are intentionally a bit oversized, so that they cover well the former French markings and are highly visible. The elephant markings some from a PrintScale Ki-27 sheet, so that the red tone on both sources are very close to each other. The Ki-27 sheet also provided the Thai ciphers “3” and “4”, combined into a “34”.

 

The interior was painted in medium grey, and the model externally received some signs of wear and tear in the form of dry-brushed leading edges and around the cockpit as well as some soot stains behind the exhaust stubs and the machine guns. Finally, the model was sealed with a coat of matt acrylic varnish (Italeri).

  

A quick build, and the easy-build Hobby Boss M.S. 406 is certainly not as crisp as a “real” model, but in this case the story behind the weird livery was more in the focus than the canvas underneath. However, an interesting result, and the hybrid paint scheme with heritage from three different operators make the aircraft an unusual, if not exotic sight.

+++ DISCLAIMER +++

Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based on historical facts. BEWARE!

  

Some background:

The outbreak of the war in Europe in September 1939 did not immediately affect the status of the Armée de l'Air in French Indochina because it had the task of defending a wide area of Southeast Asia, including the future Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam. And yet its array of airplanes seemed inadequate to perform any kind of real defense against any incursion by an enemy, because there were less than 100 airplanes available to it, all obsolescent or obsolete. In September 1931, Japan invaded and occupied Manchuria. This was an area of northeast China, which encompassed the provinces of Jilin, Liaoning and Heilongjiang. Nearly six whole years later, in July 1937, the Second Sino-Japanese War had begun. As yet, the French colonial authorities were hoping that the Japanese would not be brazen enough to take on the might of a European power. However, it became increasingly likely after the German invasion of Poland in September 1939, since Japan was part of the Axis alliance and thus Germany's ally.

 

On September 26, 1940, Japanese troops landed in Haiphong, violating a cease-fire which had been signed only the previous day. From the middle of the following month, the French became heavily involved in repelling Japanese army assaults. Following the Fall of France in 1940, Thais perceived a chance to regain the territories they had lost years earlier. The collapse of Metropolitan France made the French hold on Indochina tenuous. After the Japanese invasion of French Indochina in September 1940, the French were forced to allow the Japanese to set up military bases. This seemingly subservient behavior convinced the Thai regime that Vichy France would not seriously resist a confrontation with Thailand.

 

During the French-Thai War, the Thai Air Force achieved several air-to-air-victories in dogfights against the Vichy Armée de l'Air. During World War II, the Thai Air Force supported the Royal Thai Army in its occupation of the Shan States of Burma as somewhat reluctant allies of the Japanese and took part in the defense of Bangkok against allied air raids in the latter part of the war, achieving some successes against state-of-the-art aircraft like the P-51 Mustang and the B-29 Superfortress. During these times, the RTAF was actively supplied by the Japanese with Imperial Japanese Army Air Force aircraft such as the Ki-43 "Oscar," and the Ki-27 "Nate." Other RTAF personnel took an active part the anti-Japanese resistance movement.

 

French forces in Indochina consisted of an army of approximately fifty thousand men, The most obvious deficiency of the French army lay in its shortage of armor; however, the Armée de l'Air had in its inventory approximately a hundred aircraft, of which around sixty could be considered first line. These consisted of thirty Potez 25 TOEs, four Farman 221s, eight Loire 130 flying boats, six Potez 542s, nine Morane M.S.406s.

 

The M.S.406 was a French fighter aircraft developed and manufactured by Morane-Saulnier starting in 1938. In response to a requirement for a fighter issued by the French Air Force in 1934, Morane-Saulnier built a prototype, designated MS.405, of mixed materials. This had the distinction of being the company's first low-wing monoplane, as well as the first to feature an enclosed cockpit, and the first design with a retracting undercarriage. The entry to service of the M.S.406 to the French Air Force in early 1939 represented the first modern fighter aircraft to be adopted by the service, and the type was also used in the French overseas colonies. The M.S.406 was France's most numerous fighter during the Second World War and one of only two French designs to exceed 1,000 in number. At the beginning of the war, it was one of only two French-built aircraft capable of 400 km/h (250 mph) – the other being the Potez 630.

 

Although a sturdy and highly manoeuvrable fighter aircraft, the M.S.406 was considered underpowered and weakly armed when compared to its contemporaries, esp. over continental Europe. Most critically, the M.S.406 was outperformed by the Messerschmitt Bf 109E during the Battle of France and no serious threat to the German fighter. In less advanced theatres like Indochina, though, the M.S. 406 was a respectable contender, but its numbers were low.

 

When the French-Thai War broke out in Indochina, the Thai Army was a relatively well-equipped force, consisting of some sixty thousand men, with artillery and tanks. The Royal Thai Navy — consisting of several vessels, including two coastal defence ships, twelve torpedo boats and four submarines — was inferior to the French naval forces, though, but the Royal Thai Air Force held both a quantitative and qualitative edge over l'Armee de l'Air. Among the 140 aircraft that composed the air force's initial first-line strength were twenty-four Mitsubishi Ki-30 light bombers, nine Mitsubishi Ki-21 and six Martin B-10 twin-engine bombers, seventy Vought Corsair dive bombers, and twenty-five Curtiss Hawk 75 fighters.

 

While nationalistic demonstrations and anti-French rallies were held in Bangkok, border skirmishes erupted along the Mekong frontier. The superior Royal Thai Air Force conducted daytime bombing runs over Vientiane, Sisophon, and Battambang with impunity. The French retaliated with their own planes, but the damage caused was less than equal. The activities of the Thai air force, particularly in the field of dive-bombing, was such that Admiral Jean Decoux, the governor of French Indochina, grudgingly remarked that the Thai planes seemed to have been flown by men with plenty of war experience.

 

In early January 1941, the Thai Burapha and Isan Armies launched their offensive on Laos and Cambodia. French resistance was instantaneous, but many units were simply swept along by the better-equipped Thai forces, with some French equipment – including some aircraft – being captured and immediately pressed into Thai army service. The Thais swiftly took Laos, but Cambodia proved a much harder nut to crack.

 

On January 16, 1941 the French launched a large counterattack on the Thai-held villages of Yang Dang Khum and Phum Preav, initiating the fiercest battle of the war. Because of over-complicated orders and nonexistent intelligence, the French counterattacks were cut to pieces and fighting ended with a French withdrawal from the area. The Thais were unable to pursue the retreating French, as their forward tanks were kept in check by the gunnery of French Foreign Legion artillerists.

 

On January 24, the final air battle took place when Thai bombers raided the French airfield at Angkor near Siem Reap, which quickly fell. The last Thai mission commenced at 0710 hours on January 28, when the Martins of the 50th Bomber Squadron set out on a raid on Sisophon, escorted by three Hawk 75Ns of the 60th Fighter Squadron.

 

Although the French won an important naval victory over the Thais, Japan forced the French to accept Japanese mediation of a peace treaty that returned the disputed territory to Thai control. A general armistice was arranged by Japan to go into effect on January 28. On May 9 a peace treaty was signed in Tokyo, with the French being coerced by the Japanese into relinquishing their hold on the disputed territories. However, the French (now part of the Axis Forces’ Vichy regime) were left in place to administer the rump colony of Indochina until 9 March 1945, when the Japanese staged a coup d'état in French Indochina and took control, establishing their own colony, the Empire of Vietnam, as a puppet state controlled by Tokyo.

 

Until then, Japanese authorities heavily influenced the diminishing Vichy French presence in the region and handed over a lot of leftover military hardware to its own allies, primarily the Thai forces. However, there was not much left to be distributed: about 30% of the French aircraft were rendered unserviceable by the end of the French-Thai War in early 1941, some as a result of minor damage sustained in air raids that remained unrepaired. The Armée de l'Air admitted the loss of only one Farman F221 and two Morane M.S.406s destroyed on the ground, but, in reality, its losses were greater and the influence of Japan on the leftover stock was fogged in order to save face. However, even in 1944, single former Vichy French aircraft and tanks were still active in the region, primarily under Thai flag.

  

General characteristics:

Crew: 1

Length: 8.17 m (26 ft 10 in)

Wingspan: 10.61 m (34 ft 10 in)

Height: 3.25 m (10 ft 8 in)

Wing area: 16 m2 (170 sq ft)

Empty weight: 1,895 kg (4,178 lb)

Gross weight: 2,540 kg (5,600 lb)

 

Powerplant:

1 × Hispano-Suiza 12Y-31 V-12 liquid-cooled piston engine with

619 kW (830 hp) for take-off at 2,520 rpm at sea level,

driving a 3-bladed variable-pitch propeller, 3 m (9 ft 10 in) diameter

 

Performance:

Maximum speed: 490 km/h (304 mph; 265 kn) at 4,500 m (14,764 ft)

Stall speed: 160 km/h (99 mph, 86 kn) without flaps

135 km/h (84 mph; 73 kn) with flaps

Range: 1,100 km (680 mi, 590 nmi) at 66% power

Combat range: 720 km (450 mi, 390 nmi)

Endurance: 2 hours 20 minutes 30 seconds (average combat mission)

Service ceiling: 9,400 m (30,800 ft)

Time to altitude: 2,000 m (6,562 ft) in 2 minutes 32 seconds

9,000 m (29,528 ft) in 21 minutes 37 seconds

Wing loading: 154 kg/m2 (32 lb/sq ft)

Power/mass: 2.95 kg/kW (4.85 lb/hp)

Take-off run to 8 m (26 ft): 270 m (886 ft)

Landing run from 8 m (26 ft): 340 m (1,115 ft)

 

Armament:

1× 20 mm (0.787 in) Hispano-Suiza HS.404 cannon, firing through the propeller hub

2× 7.5 mm (0.295 in) MAC 1934 machine guns in the outer wings

  

The kit and its assembly:

This quick build was created in the wake of the “Captured” group build at whatifmodellers.com and actually is a personal interpretation of someone else’s idea, namely of fellow modeler NARSES who came up with the idea of a captured French M.S. 406 in Indochina under a new Thai flag. I found the idea so weird, yet realistic, that I decided to build one, too.

 

The model is the very simple but quite acceptable M.S. 406 from Hobby Boss. Externally the model is nice, with recessed panel lines and a basic landing gear. Internally, it is rather bleak, even though it has a full cockpit with a floor, integrally molded seat and even some details behind the pilot’s armor bulkhead. The canopy is a single piece and very clear, but it comes with massive locator bars, so that I decided to keep the canopy closed and added a pilot figure to cover the minimal interior. I was lucky to find a Japanese (though pretty “flat”) WWII pilot in the donor bank, left over from a Hasegawa model. I also gave the figure some seat belts (made from adhesive tape), but the rest remained unchanged – even the original metal axis for the propeller was used. I just replaced the machine gun barrels with hollow steel needles and added a pitot on the wing, which is probably part of the kit but not indicated in the instructions. The same is true for the foldable ventral antenna.

 

The build was finished quickly, in the course of just a single evening, including the pilot and some overall PSR.

  

Painting and markings:

My interpretation of a French aircraft in Thai service after the French-Thai War stuck closely to the real world Vichy livery, which was the standard French camouflage in grey/green/brown with light blue-grey undersides (all from ModelMaster’s Authentic Color range), together with a yellow-and-red-striped cowling (a base with Humbrol 69 and red decal stripes added later) and a white cheatline long the fuselage. The tail of French aircraft in Indochina was painted all-red from early 1941 onwards upon Japanese command, because of friendly fire incidents. This was adopted for the model (with a mix of Humbrol 19 and some 73), which is supposed to belong into the 1942 time frame.

 

As a captured aircraft, the original French roundels were replaced/overpainted with red disks/hinomaru, and then Thai elephant markings added on top. That’s a personal idea, ordnance directly supplied to the Thai forces from Japan had the simple, square “elephant flag” emblem directly applied to the wings and the fin (but no fuselage roundel). The all-red tail was taken over, but I painted the rudder in a dark IJA green, since it would formerly carry a French fin flash. The same green was used to overpaint a serial number on the fin and a former squadron emblem under the cockpit.

The hinomaru come from a PrintScale Ki-46 sheet, and these markings are intentionally a bit oversized, so that they cover well the former French markings and are highly visible. The elephant markings some from a PrintScale Ki-27 sheet, so that the red tone on both sources are very close to each other. The Ki-27 sheet also provided the Thai ciphers “3” and “4”, combined into a “34”.

 

The interior was painted in medium grey, and the model externally received some signs of wear and tear in the form of dry-brushed leading edges and around the cockpit as well as some soot stains behind the exhaust stubs and the machine guns. Finally, the model was sealed with a coat of matt acrylic varnish (Italeri).

  

A quick build, and the easy-build Hobby Boss M.S. 406 is certainly not as crisp as a “real” model, but in this case the story behind the weird livery was more in the focus than the canvas underneath. However, an interesting result, and the hybrid paint scheme with heritage from three different operators make the aircraft an unusual, if not exotic sight.

George Lucas was born and raised in Modesto, California, a dusty transportation center in the agricultural Sacramento Valley. As a teenager, Lucas developed an interest in racing, then in vogue as part of the "Cruising" trend of the early 1960s, as kids built up and worked on their cars, picked up girls, and participated in street racing. However a nearly fatal car accident in 1962 turned Lucas over to film making.

 

In 1971, after the failure of THX1138, Lucas decided to turn back to a nostalgic view of Cruising. American Graffiti was set in 1962 Modesto and is loosely autobiographical. However, Modesto was not as accommodating, with a zealous urban-renewal program that demolished most of the old downtown by the 1970s and replaced it with what remains a pretty sterile cityscape. Lucas ended up filming American Graffiti in San Rafael and Petaluma. Released in 1973, the film became a critical and commercial success, and Lucas went on to create the blockbuster Star Wars and Indiana Jones franchises.

 

Modesto did not really give much of a thought to the whole thing, besides banning cruising in 1993. In 1997, it decided to recognize its famed son by erecting this statue of a cruising couple on a 1957 Chevy (or at least a part of it) by Betty Saletta. There was a storm of controversy, as locals opposed the use of funds for the artwork. However the statue was finally erected at what is called Five Points, now George Lucas Plaza. It has nothing to do with the old cruising sites, which were closer to Downtown and now mostly nonexistent.

 

Recently, the city began embracing its history, with a marker-based tour route and a popular American Graffiti Car Show held on the first week of June. Last year, George Lucas, now retired, showed up as the Grand Marshal of the parade to enthusiastic crowds.

Modesto, California

+++ DISCLAIMER +++

Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based on historical facts. BEWARE!

  

Some background:

The outbreak of the war in Europe in September 1939 did not immediately affect the status of the Armée de l'Air in French Indochina because it had the task of defending a wide area of Southeast Asia, including the future Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam. And yet its array of airplanes seemed inadequate to perform any kind of real defense against any incursion by an enemy, because there were less than 100 airplanes available to it, all obsolescent or obsolete. In September 1931, Japan invaded and occupied Manchuria. This was an area of northeast China, which encompassed the provinces of Jilin, Liaoning and Heilongjiang. Nearly six whole years later, in July 1937, the Second Sino-Japanese War had begun. As yet, the French colonial authorities were hoping that the Japanese would not be brazen enough to take on the might of a European power. However, it became increasingly likely after the German invasion of Poland in September 1939, since Japan was part of the Axis alliance and thus Germany's ally.

 

On September 26, 1940, Japanese troops landed in Haiphong, violating a cease-fire which had been signed only the previous day. From the middle of the following month, the French became heavily involved in repelling Japanese army assaults. Following the Fall of France in 1940, Thais perceived a chance to regain the territories they had lost years earlier. The collapse of Metropolitan France made the French hold on Indochina tenuous. After the Japanese invasion of French Indochina in September 1940, the French were forced to allow the Japanese to set up military bases. This seemingly subservient behavior convinced the Thai regime that Vichy France would not seriously resist a confrontation with Thailand.

 

During the French-Thai War, the Thai Air Force achieved several air-to-air-victories in dogfights against the Vichy Armée de l'Air. During World War II, the Thai Air Force supported the Royal Thai Army in its occupation of the Shan States of Burma as somewhat reluctant allies of the Japanese and took part in the defense of Bangkok against allied air raids in the latter part of the war, achieving some successes against state-of-the-art aircraft like the P-51 Mustang and the B-29 Superfortress. During these times, the RTAF was actively supplied by the Japanese with Imperial Japanese Army Air Force aircraft such as the Ki-43 "Oscar," and the Ki-27 "Nate." Other RTAF personnel took an active part the anti-Japanese resistance movement.

 

French forces in Indochina consisted of an army of approximately fifty thousand men, The most obvious deficiency of the French army lay in its shortage of armor; however, the Armée de l'Air had in its inventory approximately a hundred aircraft, of which around sixty could be considered first line. These consisted of thirty Potez 25 TOEs, four Farman 221s, eight Loire 130 flying boats, six Potez 542s, nine Morane M.S.406s.

 

The M.S.406 was a French fighter aircraft developed and manufactured by Morane-Saulnier starting in 1938. In response to a requirement for a fighter issued by the French Air Force in 1934, Morane-Saulnier built a prototype, designated MS.405, of mixed materials. This had the distinction of being the company's first low-wing monoplane, as well as the first to feature an enclosed cockpit, and the first design with a retracting undercarriage. The entry to service of the M.S.406 to the French Air Force in early 1939 represented the first modern fighter aircraft to be adopted by the service, and the type was also used in the French overseas colonies. The M.S.406 was France's most numerous fighter during the Second World War and one of only two French designs to exceed 1,000 in number. At the beginning of the war, it was one of only two French-built aircraft capable of 400 km/h (250 mph) – the other being the Potez 630.

 

Although a sturdy and highly manoeuvrable fighter aircraft, the M.S.406 was considered underpowered and weakly armed when compared to its contemporaries, esp. over continental Europe. Most critically, the M.S.406 was outperformed by the Messerschmitt Bf 109E during the Battle of France and no serious threat to the German fighter. In less advanced theatres like Indochina, though, the M.S. 406 was a respectable contender, but its numbers were low.

 

When the French-Thai War broke out in Indochina, the Thai Army was a relatively well-equipped force, consisting of some sixty thousand men, with artillery and tanks. The Royal Thai Navy — consisting of several vessels, including two coastal defence ships, twelve torpedo boats and four submarines — was inferior to the French naval forces, though, but the Royal Thai Air Force held both a quantitative and qualitative edge over l'Armee de l'Air. Among the 140 aircraft that composed the air force's initial first-line strength were twenty-four Mitsubishi Ki-30 light bombers, nine Mitsubishi Ki-21 and six Martin B-10 twin-engine bombers, seventy Vought Corsair dive bombers, and twenty-five Curtiss Hawk 75 fighters.

 

While nationalistic demonstrations and anti-French rallies were held in Bangkok, border skirmishes erupted along the Mekong frontier. The superior Royal Thai Air Force conducted daytime bombing runs over Vientiane, Sisophon, and Battambang with impunity. The French retaliated with their own planes, but the damage caused was less than equal. The activities of the Thai air force, particularly in the field of dive-bombing, was such that Admiral Jean Decoux, the governor of French Indochina, grudgingly remarked that the Thai planes seemed to have been flown by men with plenty of war experience.

 

In early January 1941, the Thai Burapha and Isan Armies launched their offensive on Laos and Cambodia. French resistance was instantaneous, but many units were simply swept along by the better-equipped Thai forces, with some French equipment – including some aircraft – being captured and immediately pressed into Thai army service. The Thais swiftly took Laos, but Cambodia proved a much harder nut to crack.

 

On January 16, 1941 the French launched a large counterattack on the Thai-held villages of Yang Dang Khum and Phum Preav, initiating the fiercest battle of the war. Because of over-complicated orders and nonexistent intelligence, the French counterattacks were cut to pieces and fighting ended with a French withdrawal from the area. The Thais were unable to pursue the retreating French, as their forward tanks were kept in check by the gunnery of French Foreign Legion artillerists.

 

On January 24, the final air battle took place when Thai bombers raided the French airfield at Angkor near Siem Reap, which quickly fell. The last Thai mission commenced at 0710 hours on January 28, when the Martins of the 50th Bomber Squadron set out on a raid on Sisophon, escorted by three Hawk 75Ns of the 60th Fighter Squadron.

 

Although the French won an important naval victory over the Thais, Japan forced the French to accept Japanese mediation of a peace treaty that returned the disputed territory to Thai control. A general armistice was arranged by Japan to go into effect on January 28. On May 9 a peace treaty was signed in Tokyo, with the French being coerced by the Japanese into relinquishing their hold on the disputed territories. However, the French (now part of the Axis Forces’ Vichy regime) were left in place to administer the rump colony of Indochina until 9 March 1945, when the Japanese staged a coup d'état in French Indochina and took control, establishing their own colony, the Empire of Vietnam, as a puppet state controlled by Tokyo.

 

Until then, Japanese authorities heavily influenced the diminishing Vichy French presence in the region and handed over a lot of leftover military hardware to its own allies, primarily the Thai forces. However, there was not much left to be distributed: about 30% of the French aircraft were rendered unserviceable by the end of the French-Thai War in early 1941, some as a result of minor damage sustained in air raids that remained unrepaired. The Armée de l'Air admitted the loss of only one Farman F221 and two Morane M.S.406s destroyed on the ground, but, in reality, its losses were greater and the influence of Japan on the leftover stock was fogged in order to save face. However, even in 1944, single former Vichy French aircraft and tanks were still active in the region, primarily under Thai flag.

  

General characteristics:

Crew: 1

Length: 8.17 m (26 ft 10 in)

Wingspan: 10.61 m (34 ft 10 in)

Height: 3.25 m (10 ft 8 in)

Wing area: 16 m2 (170 sq ft)

Empty weight: 1,895 kg (4,178 lb)

Gross weight: 2,540 kg (5,600 lb)

 

Powerplant:

1 × Hispano-Suiza 12Y-31 V-12 liquid-cooled piston engine with

619 kW (830 hp) for take-off at 2,520 rpm at sea level,

driving a 3-bladed variable-pitch propeller, 3 m (9 ft 10 in) diameter

 

Performance:

Maximum speed: 490 km/h (304 mph; 265 kn) at 4,500 m (14,764 ft)

Stall speed: 160 km/h (99 mph, 86 kn) without flaps

135 km/h (84 mph; 73 kn) with flaps

Range: 1,100 km (680 mi, 590 nmi) at 66% power

Combat range: 720 km (450 mi, 390 nmi)

Endurance: 2 hours 20 minutes 30 seconds (average combat mission)

Service ceiling: 9,400 m (30,800 ft)

Time to altitude: 2,000 m (6,562 ft) in 2 minutes 32 seconds

9,000 m (29,528 ft) in 21 minutes 37 seconds

Wing loading: 154 kg/m2 (32 lb/sq ft)

Power/mass: 2.95 kg/kW (4.85 lb/hp)

Take-off run to 8 m (26 ft): 270 m (886 ft)

Landing run from 8 m (26 ft): 340 m (1,115 ft)

 

Armament:

1× 20 mm (0.787 in) Hispano-Suiza HS.404 cannon, firing through the propeller hub

2× 7.5 mm (0.295 in) MAC 1934 machine guns in the outer wings

  

The kit and its assembly:

This quick build was created in the wake of the “Captured” group build at whatifmodellers.com and actually is a personal interpretation of someone else’s idea, namely of fellow modeler NARSES who came up with the idea of a captured French M.S. 406 in Indochina under a new Thai flag. I found the idea so weird, yet realistic, that I decided to build one, too.

 

The model is the very simple but quite acceptable M.S. 406 from Hobby Boss. Externally the model is nice, with recessed panel lines and a basic landing gear. Internally, it is rather bleak, even though it has a full cockpit with a floor, integrally molded seat and even some details behind the pilot’s armor bulkhead. The canopy is a single piece and very clear, but it comes with massive locator bars, so that I decided to keep the canopy closed and added a pilot figure to cover the minimal interior. I was lucky to find a Japanese (though pretty “flat”) WWII pilot in the donor bank, left over from a Hasegawa model. I also gave the figure some seat belts (made from adhesive tape), but the rest remained unchanged – even the original metal axis for the propeller was used. I just replaced the machine gun barrels with hollow steel needles and added a pitot on the wing, which is probably part of the kit but not indicated in the instructions. The same is true for the foldable ventral antenna.

 

The build was finished quickly, in the course of just a single evening, including the pilot and some overall PSR.

  

Painting and markings:

My interpretation of a French aircraft in Thai service after the French-Thai War stuck closely to the real world Vichy livery, which was the standard French camouflage in grey/green/brown with light blue-grey undersides (all from ModelMaster’s Authentic Color range), together with a yellow-and-red-striped cowling (a base with Humbrol 69 and red decal stripes added later) and a white cheatline long the fuselage. The tail of French aircraft in Indochina was painted all-red from early 1941 onwards upon Japanese command, because of friendly fire incidents. This was adopted for the model (with a mix of Humbrol 19 and some 73), which is supposed to belong into the 1942 time frame.

 

As a captured aircraft, the original French roundels were replaced/overpainted with red disks/hinomaru, and then Thai elephant markings added on top. That’s a personal idea, ordnance directly supplied to the Thai forces from Japan had the simple, square “elephant flag” emblem directly applied to the wings and the fin (but no fuselage roundel). The all-red tail was taken over, but I painted the rudder in a dark IJA green, since it would formerly carry a French fin flash. The same green was used to overpaint a serial number on the fin and a former squadron emblem under the cockpit.

The hinomaru come from a PrintScale Ki-46 sheet, and these markings are intentionally a bit oversized, so that they cover well the former French markings and are highly visible. The elephant markings some from a PrintScale Ki-27 sheet, so that the red tone on both sources are very close to each other. The Ki-27 sheet also provided the Thai ciphers “3” and “4”, combined into a “34”.

 

The interior was painted in medium grey, and the model externally received some signs of wear and tear in the form of dry-brushed leading edges and around the cockpit as well as some soot stains behind the exhaust stubs and the machine guns. Finally, the model was sealed with a coat of matt acrylic varnish (Italeri).

  

A quick build, and the easy-build Hobby Boss M.S. 406 is certainly not as crisp as a “real” model, but in this case the story behind the weird livery was more in the focus than the canvas underneath. However, an interesting result, and the hybrid paint scheme with heritage from three different operators make the aircraft an unusual, if not exotic sight.

+++ DISCLAIMER +++

Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based on historical facts. BEWARE!

  

Some background:

The outbreak of the war in Europe in September 1939 did not immediately affect the status of the Armée de l'Air in French Indochina because it had the task of defending a wide area of Southeast Asia, including the future Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam. And yet its array of airplanes seemed inadequate to perform any kind of real defense against any incursion by an enemy, because there were less than 100 airplanes available to it, all obsolescent or obsolete. In September 1931, Japan invaded and occupied Manchuria. This was an area of northeast China, which encompassed the provinces of Jilin, Liaoning and Heilongjiang. Nearly six whole years later, in July 1937, the Second Sino-Japanese War had begun. As yet, the French colonial authorities were hoping that the Japanese would not be brazen enough to take on the might of a European power. However, it became increasingly likely after the German invasion of Poland in September 1939, since Japan was part of the Axis alliance and thus Germany's ally.

 

On September 26, 1940, Japanese troops landed in Haiphong, violating a cease-fire which had been signed only the previous day. From the middle of the following month, the French became heavily involved in repelling Japanese army assaults. Following the Fall of France in 1940, Thais perceived a chance to regain the territories they had lost years earlier. The collapse of Metropolitan France made the French hold on Indochina tenuous. After the Japanese invasion of French Indochina in September 1940, the French were forced to allow the Japanese to set up military bases. This seemingly subservient behavior convinced the Thai regime that Vichy France would not seriously resist a confrontation with Thailand.

 

During the French-Thai War, the Thai Air Force achieved several air-to-air-victories in dogfights against the Vichy Armée de l'Air. During World War II, the Thai Air Force supported the Royal Thai Army in its occupation of the Shan States of Burma as somewhat reluctant allies of the Japanese and took part in the defense of Bangkok against allied air raids in the latter part of the war, achieving some successes against state-of-the-art aircraft like the P-51 Mustang and the B-29 Superfortress. During these times, the RTAF was actively supplied by the Japanese with Imperial Japanese Army Air Force aircraft such as the Ki-43 "Oscar," and the Ki-27 "Nate." Other RTAF personnel took an active part the anti-Japanese resistance movement.

 

French forces in Indochina consisted of an army of approximately fifty thousand men, The most obvious deficiency of the French army lay in its shortage of armor; however, the Armée de l'Air had in its inventory approximately a hundred aircraft, of which around sixty could be considered first line. These consisted of thirty Potez 25 TOEs, four Farman 221s, eight Loire 130 flying boats, six Potez 542s, nine Morane M.S.406s.

 

The M.S.406 was a French fighter aircraft developed and manufactured by Morane-Saulnier starting in 1938. In response to a requirement for a fighter issued by the French Air Force in 1934, Morane-Saulnier built a prototype, designated MS.405, of mixed materials. This had the distinction of being the company's first low-wing monoplane, as well as the first to feature an enclosed cockpit, and the first design with a retracting undercarriage. The entry to service of the M.S.406 to the French Air Force in early 1939 represented the first modern fighter aircraft to be adopted by the service, and the type was also used in the French overseas colonies. The M.S.406 was France's most numerous fighter during the Second World War and one of only two French designs to exceed 1,000 in number. At the beginning of the war, it was one of only two French-built aircraft capable of 400 km/h (250 mph) – the other being the Potez 630.

 

Although a sturdy and highly manoeuvrable fighter aircraft, the M.S.406 was considered underpowered and weakly armed when compared to its contemporaries, esp. over continental Europe. Most critically, the M.S.406 was outperformed by the Messerschmitt Bf 109E during the Battle of France and no serious threat to the German fighter. In less advanced theatres like Indochina, though, the M.S. 406 was a respectable contender, but its numbers were low.

 

When the French-Thai War broke out in Indochina, the Thai Army was a relatively well-equipped force, consisting of some sixty thousand men, with artillery and tanks. The Royal Thai Navy — consisting of several vessels, including two coastal defence ships, twelve torpedo boats and four submarines — was inferior to the French naval forces, though, but the Royal Thai Air Force held both a quantitative and qualitative edge over l'Armee de l'Air. Among the 140 aircraft that composed the air force's initial first-line strength were twenty-four Mitsubishi Ki-30 light bombers, nine Mitsubishi Ki-21 and six Martin B-10 twin-engine bombers, seventy Vought Corsair dive bombers, and twenty-five Curtiss Hawk 75 fighters.

 

While nationalistic demonstrations and anti-French rallies were held in Bangkok, border skirmishes erupted along the Mekong frontier. The superior Royal Thai Air Force conducted daytime bombing runs over Vientiane, Sisophon, and Battambang with impunity. The French retaliated with their own planes, but the damage caused was less than equal. The activities of the Thai air force, particularly in the field of dive-bombing, was such that Admiral Jean Decoux, the governor of French Indochina, grudgingly remarked that the Thai planes seemed to have been flown by men with plenty of war experience.

 

In early January 1941, the Thai Burapha and Isan Armies launched their offensive on Laos and Cambodia. French resistance was instantaneous, but many units were simply swept along by the better-equipped Thai forces, with some French equipment – including some aircraft – being captured and immediately pressed into Thai army service. The Thais swiftly took Laos, but Cambodia proved a much harder nut to crack.

 

On January 16, 1941 the French launched a large counterattack on the Thai-held villages of Yang Dang Khum and Phum Preav, initiating the fiercest battle of the war. Because of over-complicated orders and nonexistent intelligence, the French counterattacks were cut to pieces and fighting ended with a French withdrawal from the area. The Thais were unable to pursue the retreating French, as their forward tanks were kept in check by the gunnery of French Foreign Legion artillerists.

 

On January 24, the final air battle took place when Thai bombers raided the French airfield at Angkor near Siem Reap, which quickly fell. The last Thai mission commenced at 0710 hours on January 28, when the Martins of the 50th Bomber Squadron set out on a raid on Sisophon, escorted by three Hawk 75Ns of the 60th Fighter Squadron.

 

Although the French won an important naval victory over the Thais, Japan forced the French to accept Japanese mediation of a peace treaty that returned the disputed territory to Thai control. A general armistice was arranged by Japan to go into effect on January 28. On May 9 a peace treaty was signed in Tokyo, with the French being coerced by the Japanese into relinquishing their hold on the disputed territories. However, the French (now part of the Axis Forces’ Vichy regime) were left in place to administer the rump colony of Indochina until 9 March 1945, when the Japanese staged a coup d'état in French Indochina and took control, establishing their own colony, the Empire of Vietnam, as a puppet state controlled by Tokyo.

 

Until then, Japanese authorities heavily influenced the diminishing Vichy French presence in the region and handed over a lot of leftover military hardware to its own allies, primarily the Thai forces. However, there was not much left to be distributed: about 30% of the French aircraft were rendered unserviceable by the end of the French-Thai War in early 1941, some as a result of minor damage sustained in air raids that remained unrepaired. The Armée de l'Air admitted the loss of only one Farman F221 and two Morane M.S.406s destroyed on the ground, but, in reality, its losses were greater and the influence of Japan on the leftover stock was fogged in order to save face. However, even in 1944, single former Vichy French aircraft and tanks were still active in the region, primarily under Thai flag.

  

General characteristics:

Crew: 1

Length: 8.17 m (26 ft 10 in)

Wingspan: 10.61 m (34 ft 10 in)

Height: 3.25 m (10 ft 8 in)

Wing area: 16 m2 (170 sq ft)

Empty weight: 1,895 kg (4,178 lb)

Gross weight: 2,540 kg (5,600 lb)

 

Powerplant:

1 × Hispano-Suiza 12Y-31 V-12 liquid-cooled piston engine with

619 kW (830 hp) for take-off at 2,520 rpm at sea level,

driving a 3-bladed variable-pitch propeller, 3 m (9 ft 10 in) diameter

 

Performance:

Maximum speed: 490 km/h (304 mph; 265 kn) at 4,500 m (14,764 ft)

Stall speed: 160 km/h (99 mph, 86 kn) without flaps

135 km/h (84 mph; 73 kn) with flaps

Range: 1,100 km (680 mi, 590 nmi) at 66% power

Combat range: 720 km (450 mi, 390 nmi)

Endurance: 2 hours 20 minutes 30 seconds (average combat mission)

Service ceiling: 9,400 m (30,800 ft)

Time to altitude: 2,000 m (6,562 ft) in 2 minutes 32 seconds

9,000 m (29,528 ft) in 21 minutes 37 seconds

Wing loading: 154 kg/m2 (32 lb/sq ft)

Power/mass: 2.95 kg/kW (4.85 lb/hp)

Take-off run to 8 m (26 ft): 270 m (886 ft)

Landing run from 8 m (26 ft): 340 m (1,115 ft)

 

Armament:

1× 20 mm (0.787 in) Hispano-Suiza HS.404 cannon, firing through the propeller hub

2× 7.5 mm (0.295 in) MAC 1934 machine guns in the outer wings

  

The kit and its assembly:

This quick build was created in the wake of the “Captured” group build at whatifmodellers.com and actually is a personal interpretation of someone else’s idea, namely of fellow modeler NARSES who came up with the idea of a captured French M.S. 406 in Indochina under a new Thai flag. I found the idea so weird, yet realistic, that I decided to build one, too.

 

The model is the very simple but quite acceptable M.S. 406 from Hobby Boss. Externally the model is nice, with recessed panel lines and a basic landing gear. Internally, it is rather bleak, even though it has a full cockpit with a floor, integrally molded seat and even some details behind the pilot’s armor bulkhead. The canopy is a single piece and very clear, but it comes with massive locator bars, so that I decided to keep the canopy closed and added a pilot figure to cover the minimal interior. I was lucky to find a Japanese (though pretty “flat”) WWII pilot in the donor bank, left over from a Hasegawa model. I also gave the figure some seat belts (made from adhesive tape), but the rest remained unchanged – even the original metal axis for the propeller was used. I just replaced the machine gun barrels with hollow steel needles and added a pitot on the wing, which is probably part of the kit but not indicated in the instructions. The same is true for the foldable ventral antenna.

 

The build was finished quickly, in the course of just a single evening, including the pilot and some overall PSR.

  

Painting and markings:

My interpretation of a French aircraft in Thai service after the French-Thai War stuck closely to the real world Vichy livery, which was the standard French camouflage in grey/green/brown with light blue-grey undersides (all from ModelMaster’s Authentic Color range), together with a yellow-and-red-striped cowling (a base with Humbrol 69 and red decal stripes added later) and a white cheatline long the fuselage. The tail of French aircraft in Indochina was painted all-red from early 1941 onwards upon Japanese command, because of friendly fire incidents. This was adopted for the model (with a mix of Humbrol 19 and some 73), which is supposed to belong into the 1942 time frame.

 

As a captured aircraft, the original French roundels were replaced/overpainted with red disks/hinomaru, and then Thai elephant markings added on top. That’s a personal idea, ordnance directly supplied to the Thai forces from Japan had the simple, square “elephant flag” emblem directly applied to the wings and the fin (but no fuselage roundel). The all-red tail was taken over, but I painted the rudder in a dark IJA green, since it would formerly carry a French fin flash. The same green was used to overpaint a serial number on the fin and a former squadron emblem under the cockpit.

The hinomaru come from a PrintScale Ki-46 sheet, and these markings are intentionally a bit oversized, so that they cover well the former French markings and are highly visible. The elephant markings some from a PrintScale Ki-27 sheet, so that the red tone on both sources are very close to each other. The Ki-27 sheet also provided the Thai ciphers “3” and “4”, combined into a “34”.

 

The interior was painted in medium grey, and the model externally received some signs of wear and tear in the form of dry-brushed leading edges and around the cockpit as well as some soot stains behind the exhaust stubs and the machine guns. Finally, the model was sealed with a coat of matt acrylic varnish (Italeri).

  

A quick build, and the easy-build Hobby Boss M.S. 406 is certainly not as crisp as a “real” model, but in this case the story behind the weird livery was more in the focus than the canvas underneath. However, an interesting result, and the hybrid paint scheme with heritage from three different operators make the aircraft an unusual, if not exotic sight.

+++ DISCLAIMER +++

Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based on historical facts. BEWARE!

  

Some background:

The outbreak of the war in Europe in September 1939 did not immediately affect the status of the Armée de l'Air in French Indochina because it had the task of defending a wide area of Southeast Asia, including the future Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam. And yet its array of airplanes seemed inadequate to perform any kind of real defense against any incursion by an enemy, because there were less than 100 airplanes available to it, all obsolescent or obsolete. In September 1931, Japan invaded and occupied Manchuria. This was an area of northeast China, which encompassed the provinces of Jilin, Liaoning and Heilongjiang. Nearly six whole years later, in July 1937, the Second Sino-Japanese War had begun. As yet, the French colonial authorities were hoping that the Japanese would not be brazen enough to take on the might of a European power. However, it became increasingly likely after the German invasion of Poland in September 1939, since Japan was part of the Axis alliance and thus Germany's ally.

 

On September 26, 1940, Japanese troops landed in Haiphong, violating a cease-fire which had been signed only the previous day. From the middle of the following month, the French became heavily involved in repelling Japanese army assaults. Following the Fall of France in 1940, Thais perceived a chance to regain the territories they had lost years earlier. The collapse of Metropolitan France made the French hold on Indochina tenuous. After the Japanese invasion of French Indochina in September 1940, the French were forced to allow the Japanese to set up military bases. This seemingly subservient behavior convinced the Thai regime that Vichy France would not seriously resist a confrontation with Thailand.

 

During the French-Thai War, the Thai Air Force achieved several air-to-air-victories in dogfights against the Vichy Armée de l'Air. During World War II, the Thai Air Force supported the Royal Thai Army in its occupation of the Shan States of Burma as somewhat reluctant allies of the Japanese and took part in the defense of Bangkok against allied air raids in the latter part of the war, achieving some successes against state-of-the-art aircraft like the P-51 Mustang and the B-29 Superfortress. During these times, the RTAF was actively supplied by the Japanese with Imperial Japanese Army Air Force aircraft such as the Ki-43 "Oscar," and the Ki-27 "Nate." Other RTAF personnel took an active part the anti-Japanese resistance movement.

 

French forces in Indochina consisted of an army of approximately fifty thousand men, The most obvious deficiency of the French army lay in its shortage of armor; however, the Armée de l'Air had in its inventory approximately a hundred aircraft, of which around sixty could be considered first line. These consisted of thirty Potez 25 TOEs, four Farman 221s, eight Loire 130 flying boats, six Potez 542s, nine Morane M.S.406s.

 

The M.S.406 was a French fighter aircraft developed and manufactured by Morane-Saulnier starting in 1938. In response to a requirement for a fighter issued by the French Air Force in 1934, Morane-Saulnier built a prototype, designated MS.405, of mixed materials. This had the distinction of being the company's first low-wing monoplane, as well as the first to feature an enclosed cockpit, and the first design with a retracting undercarriage. The entry to service of the M.S.406 to the French Air Force in early 1939 represented the first modern fighter aircraft to be adopted by the service, and the type was also used in the French overseas colonies. The M.S.406 was France's most numerous fighter during the Second World War and one of only two French designs to exceed 1,000 in number. At the beginning of the war, it was one of only two French-built aircraft capable of 400 km/h (250 mph) – the other being the Potez 630.

 

Although a sturdy and highly manoeuvrable fighter aircraft, the M.S.406 was considered underpowered and weakly armed when compared to its contemporaries, esp. over continental Europe. Most critically, the M.S.406 was outperformed by the Messerschmitt Bf 109E during the Battle of France and no serious threat to the German fighter. In less advanced theatres like Indochina, though, the M.S. 406 was a respectable contender, but its numbers were low.

 

When the French-Thai War broke out in Indochina, the Thai Army was a relatively well-equipped force, consisting of some sixty thousand men, with artillery and tanks. The Royal Thai Navy — consisting of several vessels, including two coastal defence ships, twelve torpedo boats and four submarines — was inferior to the French naval forces, though, but the Royal Thai Air Force held both a quantitative and qualitative edge over l'Armee de l'Air. Among the 140 aircraft that composed the air force's initial first-line strength were twenty-four Mitsubishi Ki-30 light bombers, nine Mitsubishi Ki-21 and six Martin B-10 twin-engine bombers, seventy Vought Corsair dive bombers, and twenty-five Curtiss Hawk 75 fighters.

 

While nationalistic demonstrations and anti-French rallies were held in Bangkok, border skirmishes erupted along the Mekong frontier. The superior Royal Thai Air Force conducted daytime bombing runs over Vientiane, Sisophon, and Battambang with impunity. The French retaliated with their own planes, but the damage caused was less than equal. The activities of the Thai air force, particularly in the field of dive-bombing, was such that Admiral Jean Decoux, the governor of French Indochina, grudgingly remarked that the Thai planes seemed to have been flown by men with plenty of war experience.

 

In early January 1941, the Thai Burapha and Isan Armies launched their offensive on Laos and Cambodia. French resistance was instantaneous, but many units were simply swept along by the better-equipped Thai forces, with some French equipment – including some aircraft – being captured and immediately pressed into Thai army service. The Thais swiftly took Laos, but Cambodia proved a much harder nut to crack.

 

On January 16, 1941 the French launched a large counterattack on the Thai-held villages of Yang Dang Khum and Phum Preav, initiating the fiercest battle of the war. Because of over-complicated orders and nonexistent intelligence, the French counterattacks were cut to pieces and fighting ended with a French withdrawal from the area. The Thais were unable to pursue the retreating French, as their forward tanks were kept in check by the gunnery of French Foreign Legion artillerists.

 

On January 24, the final air battle took place when Thai bombers raided the French airfield at Angkor near Siem Reap, which quickly fell. The last Thai mission commenced at 0710 hours on January 28, when the Martins of the 50th Bomber Squadron set out on a raid on Sisophon, escorted by three Hawk 75Ns of the 60th Fighter Squadron.

 

Although the French won an important naval victory over the Thais, Japan forced the French to accept Japanese mediation of a peace treaty that returned the disputed territory to Thai control. A general armistice was arranged by Japan to go into effect on January 28. On May 9 a peace treaty was signed in Tokyo, with the French being coerced by the Japanese into relinquishing their hold on the disputed territories. However, the French (now part of the Axis Forces’ Vichy regime) were left in place to administer the rump colony of Indochina until 9 March 1945, when the Japanese staged a coup d'état in French Indochina and took control, establishing their own colony, the Empire of Vietnam, as a puppet state controlled by Tokyo.

 

Until then, Japanese authorities heavily influenced the diminishing Vichy French presence in the region and handed over a lot of leftover military hardware to its own allies, primarily the Thai forces. However, there was not much left to be distributed: about 30% of the French aircraft were rendered unserviceable by the end of the French-Thai War in early 1941, some as a result of minor damage sustained in air raids that remained unrepaired. The Armée de l'Air admitted the loss of only one Farman F221 and two Morane M.S.406s destroyed on the ground, but, in reality, its losses were greater and the influence of Japan on the leftover stock was fogged in order to save face. However, even in 1944, single former Vichy French aircraft and tanks were still active in the region, primarily under Thai flag.

  

General characteristics:

Crew: 1

Length: 8.17 m (26 ft 10 in)

Wingspan: 10.61 m (34 ft 10 in)

Height: 3.25 m (10 ft 8 in)

Wing area: 16 m2 (170 sq ft)

Empty weight: 1,895 kg (4,178 lb)

Gross weight: 2,540 kg (5,600 lb)

 

Powerplant:

1 × Hispano-Suiza 12Y-31 V-12 liquid-cooled piston engine with

619 kW (830 hp) for take-off at 2,520 rpm at sea level,

driving a 3-bladed variable-pitch propeller, 3 m (9 ft 10 in) diameter

 

Performance:

Maximum speed: 490 km/h (304 mph; 265 kn) at 4,500 m (14,764 ft)

Stall speed: 160 km/h (99 mph, 86 kn) without flaps

135 km/h (84 mph; 73 kn) with flaps

Range: 1,100 km (680 mi, 590 nmi) at 66% power

Combat range: 720 km (450 mi, 390 nmi)

Endurance: 2 hours 20 minutes 30 seconds (average combat mission)

Service ceiling: 9,400 m (30,800 ft)

Time to altitude: 2,000 m (6,562 ft) in 2 minutes 32 seconds

9,000 m (29,528 ft) in 21 minutes 37 seconds

Wing loading: 154 kg/m2 (32 lb/sq ft)

Power/mass: 2.95 kg/kW (4.85 lb/hp)

Take-off run to 8 m (26 ft): 270 m (886 ft)

Landing run from 8 m (26 ft): 340 m (1,115 ft)

 

Armament:

1× 20 mm (0.787 in) Hispano-Suiza HS.404 cannon, firing through the propeller hub

2× 7.5 mm (0.295 in) MAC 1934 machine guns in the outer wings

  

The kit and its assembly:

This quick build was created in the wake of the “Captured” group build at whatifmodellers.com and actually is a personal interpretation of someone else’s idea, namely of fellow modeler NARSES who came up with the idea of a captured French M.S. 406 in Indochina under a new Thai flag. I found the idea so weird, yet realistic, that I decided to build one, too.

 

The model is the very simple but quite acceptable M.S. 406 from Hobby Boss. Externally the model is nice, with recessed panel lines and a basic landing gear. Internally, it is rather bleak, even though it has a full cockpit with a floor, integrally molded seat and even some details behind the pilot’s armor bulkhead. The canopy is a single piece and very clear, but it comes with massive locator bars, so that I decided to keep the canopy closed and added a pilot figure to cover the minimal interior. I was lucky to find a Japanese (though pretty “flat”) WWII pilot in the donor bank, left over from a Hasegawa model. I also gave the figure some seat belts (made from adhesive tape), but the rest remained unchanged – even the original metal axis for the propeller was used. I just replaced the machine gun barrels with hollow steel needles and added a pitot on the wing, which is probably part of the kit but not indicated in the instructions. The same is true for the foldable ventral antenna.

 

The build was finished quickly, in the course of just a single evening, including the pilot and some overall PSR.

  

Painting and markings:

My interpretation of a French aircraft in Thai service after the French-Thai War stuck closely to the real world Vichy livery, which was the standard French camouflage in grey/green/brown with light blue-grey undersides (all from ModelMaster’s Authentic Color range), together with a yellow-and-red-striped cowling (a base with Humbrol 69 and red decal stripes added later) and a white cheatline long the fuselage. The tail of French aircraft in Indochina was painted all-red from early 1941 onwards upon Japanese command, because of friendly fire incidents. This was adopted for the model (with a mix of Humbrol 19 and some 73), which is supposed to belong into the 1942 time frame.

 

As a captured aircraft, the original French roundels were replaced/overpainted with red disks/hinomaru, and then Thai elephant markings added on top. That’s a personal idea, ordnance directly supplied to the Thai forces from Japan had the simple, square “elephant flag” emblem directly applied to the wings and the fin (but no fuselage roundel). The all-red tail was taken over, but I painted the rudder in a dark IJA green, since it would formerly carry a French fin flash. The same green was used to overpaint a serial number on the fin and a former squadron emblem under the cockpit.

The hinomaru come from a PrintScale Ki-46 sheet, and these markings are intentionally a bit oversized, so that they cover well the former French markings and are highly visible. The elephant markings some from a PrintScale Ki-27 sheet, so that the red tone on both sources are very close to each other. The Ki-27 sheet also provided the Thai ciphers “3” and “4”, combined into a “34”.

 

The interior was painted in medium grey, and the model externally received some signs of wear and tear in the form of dry-brushed leading edges and around the cockpit as well as some soot stains behind the exhaust stubs and the machine guns. Finally, the model was sealed with a coat of matt acrylic varnish (Italeri).

  

A quick build, and the easy-build Hobby Boss M.S. 406 is certainly not as crisp as a “real” model, but in this case the story behind the weird livery was more in the focus than the canvas underneath. However, an interesting result, and the hybrid paint scheme with heritage from three different operators make the aircraft an unusual, if not exotic sight.

+++ DISCLAIMER +++

Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based on historical facts. BEWARE!

  

Some background:

The outbreak of the war in Europe in September 1939 did not immediately affect the status of the Armée de l'Air in French Indochina because it had the task of defending a wide area of Southeast Asia, including the future Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam. And yet its array of airplanes seemed inadequate to perform any kind of real defense against any incursion by an enemy, because there were less than 100 airplanes available to it, all obsolescent or obsolete. In September 1931, Japan invaded and occupied Manchuria. This was an area of northeast China, which encompassed the provinces of Jilin, Liaoning and Heilongjiang. Nearly six whole years later, in July 1937, the Second Sino-Japanese War had begun. As yet, the French colonial authorities were hoping that the Japanese would not be brazen enough to take on the might of a European power. However, it became increasingly likely after the German invasion of Poland in September 1939, since Japan was part of the Axis alliance and thus Germany's ally.

 

On September 26, 1940, Japanese troops landed in Haiphong, violating a cease-fire which had been signed only the previous day. From the middle of the following month, the French became heavily involved in repelling Japanese army assaults. Following the Fall of France in 1940, Thais perceived a chance to regain the territories they had lost years earlier. The collapse of Metropolitan France made the French hold on Indochina tenuous. After the Japanese invasion of French Indochina in September 1940, the French were forced to allow the Japanese to set up military bases. This seemingly subservient behavior convinced the Thai regime that Vichy France would not seriously resist a confrontation with Thailand.

 

During the French-Thai War, the Thai Air Force achieved several air-to-air-victories in dogfights against the Vichy Armée de l'Air. During World War II, the Thai Air Force supported the Royal Thai Army in its occupation of the Shan States of Burma as somewhat reluctant allies of the Japanese and took part in the defense of Bangkok against allied air raids in the latter part of the war, achieving some successes against state-of-the-art aircraft like the P-51 Mustang and the B-29 Superfortress. During these times, the RTAF was actively supplied by the Japanese with Imperial Japanese Army Air Force aircraft such as the Ki-43 "Oscar," and the Ki-27 "Nate." Other RTAF personnel took an active part the anti-Japanese resistance movement.

 

French forces in Indochina consisted of an army of approximately fifty thousand men, The most obvious deficiency of the French army lay in its shortage of armor; however, the Armée de l'Air had in its inventory approximately a hundred aircraft, of which around sixty could be considered first line. These consisted of thirty Potez 25 TOEs, four Farman 221s, eight Loire 130 flying boats, six Potez 542s, nine Morane M.S.406s.

 

The M.S.406 was a French fighter aircraft developed and manufactured by Morane-Saulnier starting in 1938. In response to a requirement for a fighter issued by the French Air Force in 1934, Morane-Saulnier built a prototype, designated MS.405, of mixed materials. This had the distinction of being the company's first low-wing monoplane, as well as the first to feature an enclosed cockpit, and the first design with a retracting undercarriage. The entry to service of the M.S.406 to the French Air Force in early 1939 represented the first modern fighter aircraft to be adopted by the service, and the type was also used in the French overseas colonies. The M.S.406 was France's most numerous fighter during the Second World War and one of only two French designs to exceed 1,000 in number. At the beginning of the war, it was one of only two French-built aircraft capable of 400 km/h (250 mph) – the other being the Potez 630.

 

Although a sturdy and highly manoeuvrable fighter aircraft, the M.S.406 was considered underpowered and weakly armed when compared to its contemporaries, esp. over continental Europe. Most critically, the M.S.406 was outperformed by the Messerschmitt Bf 109E during the Battle of France and no serious threat to the German fighter. In less advanced theatres like Indochina, though, the M.S. 406 was a respectable contender, but its numbers were low.

 

When the French-Thai War broke out in Indochina, the Thai Army was a relatively well-equipped force, consisting of some sixty thousand men, with artillery and tanks. The Royal Thai Navy — consisting of several vessels, including two coastal defence ships, twelve torpedo boats and four submarines — was inferior to the French naval forces, though, but the Royal Thai Air Force held both a quantitative and qualitative edge over l'Armee de l'Air. Among the 140 aircraft that composed the air force's initial first-line strength were twenty-four Mitsubishi Ki-30 light bombers, nine Mitsubishi Ki-21 and six Martin B-10 twin-engine bombers, seventy Vought Corsair dive bombers, and twenty-five Curtiss Hawk 75 fighters.

 

While nationalistic demonstrations and anti-French rallies were held in Bangkok, border skirmishes erupted along the Mekong frontier. The superior Royal Thai Air Force conducted daytime bombing runs over Vientiane, Sisophon, and Battambang with impunity. The French retaliated with their own planes, but the damage caused was less than equal. The activities of the Thai air force, particularly in the field of dive-bombing, was such that Admiral Jean Decoux, the governor of French Indochina, grudgingly remarked that the Thai planes seemed to have been flown by men with plenty of war experience.

 

In early January 1941, the Thai Burapha and Isan Armies launched their offensive on Laos and Cambodia. French resistance was instantaneous, but many units were simply swept along by the better-equipped Thai forces, with some French equipment – including some aircraft – being captured and immediately pressed into Thai army service. The Thais swiftly took Laos, but Cambodia proved a much harder nut to crack.

 

On January 16, 1941 the French launched a large counterattack on the Thai-held villages of Yang Dang Khum and Phum Preav, initiating the fiercest battle of the war. Because of over-complicated orders and nonexistent intelligence, the French counterattacks were cut to pieces and fighting ended with a French withdrawal from the area. The Thais were unable to pursue the retreating French, as their forward tanks were kept in check by the gunnery of French Foreign Legion artillerists.

 

On January 24, the final air battle took place when Thai bombers raided the French airfield at Angkor near Siem Reap, which quickly fell. The last Thai mission commenced at 0710 hours on January 28, when the Martins of the 50th Bomber Squadron set out on a raid on Sisophon, escorted by three Hawk 75Ns of the 60th Fighter Squadron.

 

Although the French won an important naval victory over the Thais, Japan forced the French to accept Japanese mediation of a peace treaty that returned the disputed territory to Thai control. A general armistice was arranged by Japan to go into effect on January 28. On May 9 a peace treaty was signed in Tokyo, with the French being coerced by the Japanese into relinquishing their hold on the disputed territories. However, the French (now part of the Axis Forces’ Vichy regime) were left in place to administer the rump colony of Indochina until 9 March 1945, when the Japanese staged a coup d'état in French Indochina and took control, establishing their own colony, the Empire of Vietnam, as a puppet state controlled by Tokyo.

 

Until then, Japanese authorities heavily influenced the diminishing Vichy French presence in the region and handed over a lot of leftover military hardware to its own allies, primarily the Thai forces. However, there was not much left to be distributed: about 30% of the French aircraft were rendered unserviceable by the end of the French-Thai War in early 1941, some as a result of minor damage sustained in air raids that remained unrepaired. The Armée de l'Air admitted the loss of only one Farman F221 and two Morane M.S.406s destroyed on the ground, but, in reality, its losses were greater and the influence of Japan on the leftover stock was fogged in order to save face. However, even in 1944, single former Vichy French aircraft and tanks were still active in the region, primarily under Thai flag.

  

General characteristics:

Crew: 1

Length: 8.17 m (26 ft 10 in)

Wingspan: 10.61 m (34 ft 10 in)

Height: 3.25 m (10 ft 8 in)

Wing area: 16 m2 (170 sq ft)

Empty weight: 1,895 kg (4,178 lb)

Gross weight: 2,540 kg (5,600 lb)

 

Powerplant:

1 × Hispano-Suiza 12Y-31 V-12 liquid-cooled piston engine with

619 kW (830 hp) for take-off at 2,520 rpm at sea level,

driving a 3-bladed variable-pitch propeller, 3 m (9 ft 10 in) diameter

 

Performance:

Maximum speed: 490 km/h (304 mph; 265 kn) at 4,500 m (14,764 ft)

Stall speed: 160 km/h (99 mph, 86 kn) without flaps

135 km/h (84 mph; 73 kn) with flaps

Range: 1,100 km (680 mi, 590 nmi) at 66% power

Combat range: 720 km (450 mi, 390 nmi)

Endurance: 2 hours 20 minutes 30 seconds (average combat mission)

Service ceiling: 9,400 m (30,800 ft)

Time to altitude: 2,000 m (6,562 ft) in 2 minutes 32 seconds

9,000 m (29,528 ft) in 21 minutes 37 seconds

Wing loading: 154 kg/m2 (32 lb/sq ft)

Power/mass: 2.95 kg/kW (4.85 lb/hp)

Take-off run to 8 m (26 ft): 270 m (886 ft)

Landing run from 8 m (26 ft): 340 m (1,115 ft)

 

Armament:

1× 20 mm (0.787 in) Hispano-Suiza HS.404 cannon, firing through the propeller hub

2× 7.5 mm (0.295 in) MAC 1934 machine guns in the outer wings

  

The kit and its assembly:

This quick build was created in the wake of the “Captured” group build at whatifmodellers.com and actually is a personal interpretation of someone else’s idea, namely of fellow modeler NARSES who came up with the idea of a captured French M.S. 406 in Indochina under a new Thai flag. I found the idea so weird, yet realistic, that I decided to build one, too.

 

The model is the very simple but quite acceptable M.S. 406 from Hobby Boss. Externally the model is nice, with recessed panel lines and a basic landing gear. Internally, it is rather bleak, even though it has a full cockpit with a floor, integrally molded seat and even some details behind the pilot’s armor bulkhead. The canopy is a single piece and very clear, but it comes with massive locator bars, so that I decided to keep the canopy closed and added a pilot figure to cover the minimal interior. I was lucky to find a Japanese (though pretty “flat”) WWII pilot in the donor bank, left over from a Hasegawa model. I also gave the figure some seat belts (made from adhesive tape), but the rest remained unchanged – even the original metal axis for the propeller was used. I just replaced the machine gun barrels with hollow steel needles and added a pitot on the wing, which is probably part of the kit but not indicated in the instructions. The same is true for the foldable ventral antenna.

 

The build was finished quickly, in the course of just a single evening, including the pilot and some overall PSR.

  

Painting and markings:

My interpretation of a French aircraft in Thai service after the French-Thai War stuck closely to the real world Vichy livery, which was the standard French camouflage in grey/green/brown with light blue-grey undersides (all from ModelMaster’s Authentic Color range), together with a yellow-and-red-striped cowling (a base with Humbrol 69 and red decal stripes added later) and a white cheatline long the fuselage. The tail of French aircraft in Indochina was painted all-red from early 1941 onwards upon Japanese command, because of friendly fire incidents. This was adopted for the model (with a mix of Humbrol 19 and some 73), which is supposed to belong into the 1942 time frame.

 

As a captured aircraft, the original French roundels were replaced/overpainted with red disks/hinomaru, and then Thai elephant markings added on top. That’s a personal idea, ordnance directly supplied to the Thai forces from Japan had the simple, square “elephant flag” emblem directly applied to the wings and the fin (but no fuselage roundel). The all-red tail was taken over, but I painted the rudder in a dark IJA green, since it would formerly carry a French fin flash. The same green was used to overpaint a serial number on the fin and a former squadron emblem under the cockpit.

The hinomaru come from a PrintScale Ki-46 sheet, and these markings are intentionally a bit oversized, so that they cover well the former French markings and are highly visible. The elephant markings some from a PrintScale Ki-27 sheet, so that the red tone on both sources are very close to each other. The Ki-27 sheet also provided the Thai ciphers “3” and “4”, combined into a “34”.

 

The interior was painted in medium grey, and the model externally received some signs of wear and tear in the form of dry-brushed leading edges and around the cockpit as well as some soot stains behind the exhaust stubs and the machine guns. Finally, the model was sealed with a coat of matt acrylic varnish (Italeri).

  

A quick build, and the easy-build Hobby Boss M.S. 406 is certainly not as crisp as a “real” model, but in this case the story behind the weird livery was more in the focus than the canvas underneath. However, an interesting result, and the hybrid paint scheme with heritage from three different operators make the aircraft an unusual, if not exotic sight.

+++ DISCLAIMER +++

Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based on historical facts. BEWARE!

  

Some background:

The outbreak of the war in Europe in September 1939 did not immediately affect the status of the Armée de l'Air in French Indochina because it had the task of defending a wide area of Southeast Asia, including the future Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam. And yet its array of airplanes seemed inadequate to perform any kind of real defense against any incursion by an enemy, because there were less than 100 airplanes available to it, all obsolescent or obsolete. In September 1931, Japan invaded and occupied Manchuria. This was an area of northeast China, which encompassed the provinces of Jilin, Liaoning and Heilongjiang. Nearly six whole years later, in July 1937, the Second Sino-Japanese War had begun. As yet, the French colonial authorities were hoping that the Japanese would not be brazen enough to take on the might of a European power. However, it became increasingly likely after the German invasion of Poland in September 1939, since Japan was part of the Axis alliance and thus Germany's ally.

 

On September 26, 1940, Japanese troops landed in Haiphong, violating a cease-fire which had been signed only the previous day. From the middle of the following month, the French became heavily involved in repelling Japanese army assaults. Following the Fall of France in 1940, Thais perceived a chance to regain the territories they had lost years earlier. The collapse of Metropolitan France made the French hold on Indochina tenuous. After the Japanese invasion of French Indochina in September 1940, the French were forced to allow the Japanese to set up military bases. This seemingly subservient behavior convinced the Thai regime that Vichy France would not seriously resist a confrontation with Thailand.

 

During the French-Thai War, the Thai Air Force achieved several air-to-air-victories in dogfights against the Vichy Armée de l'Air. During World War II, the Thai Air Force supported the Royal Thai Army in its occupation of the Shan States of Burma as somewhat reluctant allies of the Japanese and took part in the defense of Bangkok against allied air raids in the latter part of the war, achieving some successes against state-of-the-art aircraft like the P-51 Mustang and the B-29 Superfortress. During these times, the RTAF was actively supplied by the Japanese with Imperial Japanese Army Air Force aircraft such as the Ki-43 "Oscar," and the Ki-27 "Nate." Other RTAF personnel took an active part the anti-Japanese resistance movement.

 

French forces in Indochina consisted of an army of approximately fifty thousand men, The most obvious deficiency of the French army lay in its shortage of armor; however, the Armée de l'Air had in its inventory approximately a hundred aircraft, of which around sixty could be considered first line. These consisted of thirty Potez 25 TOEs, four Farman 221s, eight Loire 130 flying boats, six Potez 542s, nine Morane M.S.406s.

 

The M.S.406 was a French fighter aircraft developed and manufactured by Morane-Saulnier starting in 1938. In response to a requirement for a fighter issued by the French Air Force in 1934, Morane-Saulnier built a prototype, designated MS.405, of mixed materials. This had the distinction of being the company's first low-wing monoplane, as well as the first to feature an enclosed cockpit, and the first design with a retracting undercarriage. The entry to service of the M.S.406 to the French Air Force in early 1939 represented the first modern fighter aircraft to be adopted by the service, and the type was also used in the French overseas colonies. The M.S.406 was France's most numerous fighter during the Second World War and one of only two French designs to exceed 1,000 in number. At the beginning of the war, it was one of only two French-built aircraft capable of 400 km/h (250 mph) – the other being the Potez 630.

 

Although a sturdy and highly manoeuvrable fighter aircraft, the M.S.406 was considered underpowered and weakly armed when compared to its contemporaries, esp. over continental Europe. Most critically, the M.S.406 was outperformed by the Messerschmitt Bf 109E during the Battle of France and no serious threat to the German fighter. In less advanced theatres like Indochina, though, the M.S. 406 was a respectable contender, but its numbers were low.

 

When the French-Thai War broke out in Indochina, the Thai Army was a relatively well-equipped force, consisting of some sixty thousand men, with artillery and tanks. The Royal Thai Navy — consisting of several vessels, including two coastal defence ships, twelve torpedo boats and four submarines — was inferior to the French naval forces, though, but the Royal Thai Air Force held both a quantitative and qualitative edge over l'Armee de l'Air. Among the 140 aircraft that composed the air force's initial first-line strength were twenty-four Mitsubishi Ki-30 light bombers, nine Mitsubishi Ki-21 and six Martin B-10 twin-engine bombers, seventy Vought Corsair dive bombers, and twenty-five Curtiss Hawk 75 fighters.

 

While nationalistic demonstrations and anti-French rallies were held in Bangkok, border skirmishes erupted along the Mekong frontier. The superior Royal Thai Air Force conducted daytime bombing runs over Vientiane, Sisophon, and Battambang with impunity. The French retaliated with their own planes, but the damage caused was less than equal. The activities of the Thai air force, particularly in the field of dive-bombing, was such that Admiral Jean Decoux, the governor of French Indochina, grudgingly remarked that the Thai planes seemed to have been flown by men with plenty of war experience.

 

In early January 1941, the Thai Burapha and Isan Armies launched their offensive on Laos and Cambodia. French resistance was instantaneous, but many units were simply swept along by the better-equipped Thai forces, with some French equipment – including some aircraft – being captured and immediately pressed into Thai army service. The Thais swiftly took Laos, but Cambodia proved a much harder nut to crack.

 

On January 16, 1941 the French launched a large counterattack on the Thai-held villages of Yang Dang Khum and Phum Preav, initiating the fiercest battle of the war. Because of over-complicated orders and nonexistent intelligence, the French counterattacks were cut to pieces and fighting ended with a French withdrawal from the area. The Thais were unable to pursue the retreating French, as their forward tanks were kept in check by the gunnery of French Foreign Legion artillerists.

 

On January 24, the final air battle took place when Thai bombers raided the French airfield at Angkor near Siem Reap, which quickly fell. The last Thai mission commenced at 0710 hours on January 28, when the Martins of the 50th Bomber Squadron set out on a raid on Sisophon, escorted by three Hawk 75Ns of the 60th Fighter Squadron.

 

Although the French won an important naval victory over the Thais, Japan forced the French to accept Japanese mediation of a peace treaty that returned the disputed territory to Thai control. A general armistice was arranged by Japan to go into effect on January 28. On May 9 a peace treaty was signed in Tokyo, with the French being coerced by the Japanese into relinquishing their hold on the disputed territories. However, the French (now part of the Axis Forces’ Vichy regime) were left in place to administer the rump colony of Indochina until 9 March 1945, when the Japanese staged a coup d'état in French Indochina and took control, establishing their own colony, the Empire of Vietnam, as a puppet state controlled by Tokyo.

 

Until then, Japanese authorities heavily influenced the diminishing Vichy French presence in the region and handed over a lot of leftover military hardware to its own allies, primarily the Thai forces. However, there was not much left to be distributed: about 30% of the French aircraft were rendered unserviceable by the end of the French-Thai War in early 1941, some as a result of minor damage sustained in air raids that remained unrepaired. The Armée de l'Air admitted the loss of only one Farman F221 and two Morane M.S.406s destroyed on the ground, but, in reality, its losses were greater and the influence of Japan on the leftover stock was fogged in order to save face. However, even in 1944, single former Vichy French aircraft and tanks were still active in the region, primarily under Thai flag.

  

General characteristics:

Crew: 1

Length: 8.17 m (26 ft 10 in)

Wingspan: 10.61 m (34 ft 10 in)

Height: 3.25 m (10 ft 8 in)

Wing area: 16 m2 (170 sq ft)

Empty weight: 1,895 kg (4,178 lb)

Gross weight: 2,540 kg (5,600 lb)

 

Powerplant:

1 × Hispano-Suiza 12Y-31 V-12 liquid-cooled piston engine with

619 kW (830 hp) for take-off at 2,520 rpm at sea level,

driving a 3-bladed variable-pitch propeller, 3 m (9 ft 10 in) diameter

 

Performance:

Maximum speed: 490 km/h (304 mph; 265 kn) at 4,500 m (14,764 ft)

Stall speed: 160 km/h (99 mph, 86 kn) without flaps

135 km/h (84 mph; 73 kn) with flaps

Range: 1,100 km (680 mi, 590 nmi) at 66% power

Combat range: 720 km (450 mi, 390 nmi)

Endurance: 2 hours 20 minutes 30 seconds (average combat mission)

Service ceiling: 9,400 m (30,800 ft)

Time to altitude: 2,000 m (6,562 ft) in 2 minutes 32 seconds

9,000 m (29,528 ft) in 21 minutes 37 seconds

Wing loading: 154 kg/m2 (32 lb/sq ft)

Power/mass: 2.95 kg/kW (4.85 lb/hp)

Take-off run to 8 m (26 ft): 270 m (886 ft)

Landing run from 8 m (26 ft): 340 m (1,115 ft)

 

Armament:

1× 20 mm (0.787 in) Hispano-Suiza HS.404 cannon, firing through the propeller hub

2× 7.5 mm (0.295 in) MAC 1934 machine guns in the outer wings

  

The kit and its assembly:

This quick build was created in the wake of the “Captured” group build at whatifmodellers.com and actually is a personal interpretation of someone else’s idea, namely of fellow modeler NARSES who came up with the idea of a captured French M.S. 406 in Indochina under a new Thai flag. I found the idea so weird, yet realistic, that I decided to build one, too.

 

The model is the very simple but quite acceptable M.S. 406 from Hobby Boss. Externally the model is nice, with recessed panel lines and a basic landing gear. Internally, it is rather bleak, even though it has a full cockpit with a floor, integrally molded seat and even some details behind the pilot’s armor bulkhead. The canopy is a single piece and very clear, but it comes with massive locator bars, so that I decided to keep the canopy closed and added a pilot figure to cover the minimal interior. I was lucky to find a Japanese (though pretty “flat”) WWII pilot in the donor bank, left over from a Hasegawa model. I also gave the figure some seat belts (made from adhesive tape), but the rest remained unchanged – even the original metal axis for the propeller was used. I just replaced the machine gun barrels with hollow steel needles and added a pitot on the wing, which is probably part of the kit but not indicated in the instructions. The same is true for the foldable ventral antenna.

 

The build was finished quickly, in the course of just a single evening, including the pilot and some overall PSR.

  

Painting and markings:

My interpretation of a French aircraft in Thai service after the French-Thai War stuck closely to the real world Vichy livery, which was the standard French camouflage in grey/green/brown with light blue-grey undersides (all from ModelMaster’s Authentic Color range), together with a yellow-and-red-striped cowling (a base with Humbrol 69 and red decal stripes added later) and a white cheatline long the fuselage. The tail of French aircraft in Indochina was painted all-red from early 1941 onwards upon Japanese command, because of friendly fire incidents. This was adopted for the model (with a mix of Humbrol 19 and some 73), which is supposed to belong into the 1942 time frame.

 

As a captured aircraft, the original French roundels were replaced/overpainted with red disks/hinomaru, and then Thai elephant markings added on top. That’s a personal idea, ordnance directly supplied to the Thai forces from Japan had the simple, square “elephant flag” emblem directly applied to the wings and the fin (but no fuselage roundel). The all-red tail was taken over, but I painted the rudder in a dark IJA green, since it would formerly carry a French fin flash. The same green was used to overpaint a serial number on the fin and a former squadron emblem under the cockpit.

The hinomaru come from a PrintScale Ki-46 sheet, and these markings are intentionally a bit oversized, so that they cover well the former French markings and are highly visible. The elephant markings some from a PrintScale Ki-27 sheet, so that the red tone on both sources are very close to each other. The Ki-27 sheet also provided the Thai ciphers “3” and “4”, combined into a “34”.

 

The interior was painted in medium grey, and the model externally received some signs of wear and tear in the form of dry-brushed leading edges and around the cockpit as well as some soot stains behind the exhaust stubs and the machine guns. Finally, the model was sealed with a coat of matt acrylic varnish (Italeri).

  

A quick build, and the easy-build Hobby Boss M.S. 406 is certainly not as crisp as a “real” model, but in this case the story behind the weird livery was more in the focus than the canvas underneath. However, an interesting result, and the hybrid paint scheme with heritage from three different operators make the aircraft an unusual, if not exotic sight.

Nicole Porter and Abbey Rekis

www.facebook.com/pages/Annika-Ekstrom-Photography/2484229...

+++ DISCLAIMER +++

Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based on historical facts. BEWARE!

  

Some background:

The outbreak of the war in Europe in September 1939 did not immediately affect the status of the Armée de l'Air in French Indochina because it had the task of defending a wide area of Southeast Asia, including the future Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam. And yet its array of airplanes seemed inadequate to perform any kind of real defense against any incursion by an enemy, because there were less than 100 airplanes available to it, all obsolescent or obsolete. In September 1931, Japan invaded and occupied Manchuria. This was an area of northeast China, which encompassed the provinces of Jilin, Liaoning and Heilongjiang. Nearly six whole years later, in July 1937, the Second Sino-Japanese War had begun. As yet, the French colonial authorities were hoping that the Japanese would not be brazen enough to take on the might of a European power. However, it became increasingly likely after the German invasion of Poland in September 1939, since Japan was part of the Axis alliance and thus Germany's ally.

 

On September 26, 1940, Japanese troops landed in Haiphong, violating a cease-fire which had been signed only the previous day. From the middle of the following month, the French became heavily involved in repelling Japanese army assaults. Following the Fall of France in 1940, Thais perceived a chance to regain the territories they had lost years earlier. The collapse of Metropolitan France made the French hold on Indochina tenuous. After the Japanese invasion of French Indochina in September 1940, the French were forced to allow the Japanese to set up military bases. This seemingly subservient behavior convinced the Thai regime that Vichy France would not seriously resist a confrontation with Thailand.

 

During the French-Thai War, the Thai Air Force achieved several air-to-air-victories in dogfights against the Vichy Armée de l'Air. During World War II, the Thai Air Force supported the Royal Thai Army in its occupation of the Shan States of Burma as somewhat reluctant allies of the Japanese and took part in the defense of Bangkok against allied air raids in the latter part of the war, achieving some successes against state-of-the-art aircraft like the P-51 Mustang and the B-29 Superfortress. During these times, the RTAF was actively supplied by the Japanese with Imperial Japanese Army Air Force aircraft such as the Ki-43 "Oscar," and the Ki-27 "Nate." Other RTAF personnel took an active part the anti-Japanese resistance movement.

 

French forces in Indochina consisted of an army of approximately fifty thousand men, The most obvious deficiency of the French army lay in its shortage of armor; however, the Armée de l'Air had in its inventory approximately a hundred aircraft, of which around sixty could be considered first line. These consisted of thirty Potez 25 TOEs, four Farman 221s, eight Loire 130 flying boats, six Potez 542s, nine Morane M.S.406s.

 

The M.S.406 was a French fighter aircraft developed and manufactured by Morane-Saulnier starting in 1938. In response to a requirement for a fighter issued by the French Air Force in 1934, Morane-Saulnier built a prototype, designated MS.405, of mixed materials. This had the distinction of being the company's first low-wing monoplane, as well as the first to feature an enclosed cockpit, and the first design with a retracting undercarriage. The entry to service of the M.S.406 to the French Air Force in early 1939 represented the first modern fighter aircraft to be adopted by the service, and the type was also used in the French overseas colonies. The M.S.406 was France's most numerous fighter during the Second World War and one of only two French designs to exceed 1,000 in number. At the beginning of the war, it was one of only two French-built aircraft capable of 400 km/h (250 mph) – the other being the Potez 630.

 

Although a sturdy and highly manoeuvrable fighter aircraft, the M.S.406 was considered underpowered and weakly armed when compared to its contemporaries, esp. over continental Europe. Most critically, the M.S.406 was outperformed by the Messerschmitt Bf 109E during the Battle of France and no serious threat to the German fighter. In less advanced theatres like Indochina, though, the M.S. 406 was a respectable contender, but its numbers were low.

 

When the French-Thai War broke out in Indochina, the Thai Army was a relatively well-equipped force, consisting of some sixty thousand men, with artillery and tanks. The Royal Thai Navy — consisting of several vessels, including two coastal defence ships, twelve torpedo boats and four submarines — was inferior to the French naval forces, though, but the Royal Thai Air Force held both a quantitative and qualitative edge over l'Armee de l'Air. Among the 140 aircraft that composed the air force's initial first-line strength were twenty-four Mitsubishi Ki-30 light bombers, nine Mitsubishi Ki-21 and six Martin B-10 twin-engine bombers, seventy Vought Corsair dive bombers, and twenty-five Curtiss Hawk 75 fighters.

 

While nationalistic demonstrations and anti-French rallies were held in Bangkok, border skirmishes erupted along the Mekong frontier. The superior Royal Thai Air Force conducted daytime bombing runs over Vientiane, Sisophon, and Battambang with impunity. The French retaliated with their own planes, but the damage caused was less than equal. The activities of the Thai air force, particularly in the field of dive-bombing, was such that Admiral Jean Decoux, the governor of French Indochina, grudgingly remarked that the Thai planes seemed to have been flown by men with plenty of war experience.

 

In early January 1941, the Thai Burapha and Isan Armies launched their offensive on Laos and Cambodia. French resistance was instantaneous, but many units were simply swept along by the better-equipped Thai forces, with some French equipment – including some aircraft – being captured and immediately pressed into Thai army service. The Thais swiftly took Laos, but Cambodia proved a much harder nut to crack.

 

On January 16, 1941 the French launched a large counterattack on the Thai-held villages of Yang Dang Khum and Phum Preav, initiating the fiercest battle of the war. Because of over-complicated orders and nonexistent intelligence, the French counterattacks were cut to pieces and fighting ended with a French withdrawal from the area. The Thais were unable to pursue the retreating French, as their forward tanks were kept in check by the gunnery of French Foreign Legion artillerists.

 

On January 24, the final air battle took place when Thai bombers raided the French airfield at Angkor near Siem Reap, which quickly fell. The last Thai mission commenced at 0710 hours on January 28, when the Martins of the 50th Bomber Squadron set out on a raid on Sisophon, escorted by three Hawk 75Ns of the 60th Fighter Squadron.

 

Although the French won an important naval victory over the Thais, Japan forced the French to accept Japanese mediation of a peace treaty that returned the disputed territory to Thai control. A general armistice was arranged by Japan to go into effect on January 28. On May 9 a peace treaty was signed in Tokyo, with the French being coerced by the Japanese into relinquishing their hold on the disputed territories. However, the French (now part of the Axis Forces’ Vichy regime) were left in place to administer the rump colony of Indochina until 9 March 1945, when the Japanese staged a coup d'état in French Indochina and took control, establishing their own colony, the Empire of Vietnam, as a puppet state controlled by Tokyo.

 

Until then, Japanese authorities heavily influenced the diminishing Vichy French presence in the region and handed over a lot of leftover military hardware to its own allies, primarily the Thai forces. However, there was not much left to be distributed: about 30% of the French aircraft were rendered unserviceable by the end of the French-Thai War in early 1941, some as a result of minor damage sustained in air raids that remained unrepaired. The Armée de l'Air admitted the loss of only one Farman F221 and two Morane M.S.406s destroyed on the ground, but, in reality, its losses were greater and the influence of Japan on the leftover stock was fogged in order to save face. However, even in 1944, single former Vichy French aircraft and tanks were still active in the region, primarily under Thai flag.

  

General characteristics:

Crew: 1

Length: 8.17 m (26 ft 10 in)

Wingspan: 10.61 m (34 ft 10 in)

Height: 3.25 m (10 ft 8 in)

Wing area: 16 m2 (170 sq ft)

Empty weight: 1,895 kg (4,178 lb)

Gross weight: 2,540 kg (5,600 lb)

 

Powerplant:

1 × Hispano-Suiza 12Y-31 V-12 liquid-cooled piston engine with

619 kW (830 hp) for take-off at 2,520 rpm at sea level,

driving a 3-bladed variable-pitch propeller, 3 m (9 ft 10 in) diameter

 

Performance:

Maximum speed: 490 km/h (304 mph; 265 kn) at 4,500 m (14,764 ft)

Stall speed: 160 km/h (99 mph, 86 kn) without flaps

135 km/h (84 mph; 73 kn) with flaps

Range: 1,100 km (680 mi, 590 nmi) at 66% power

Combat range: 720 km (450 mi, 390 nmi)

Endurance: 2 hours 20 minutes 30 seconds (average combat mission)

Service ceiling: 9,400 m (30,800 ft)

Time to altitude: 2,000 m (6,562 ft) in 2 minutes 32 seconds

9,000 m (29,528 ft) in 21 minutes 37 seconds

Wing loading: 154 kg/m2 (32 lb/sq ft)

Power/mass: 2.95 kg/kW (4.85 lb/hp)

Take-off run to 8 m (26 ft): 270 m (886 ft)

Landing run from 8 m (26 ft): 340 m (1,115 ft)

 

Armament:

1× 20 mm (0.787 in) Hispano-Suiza HS.404 cannon, firing through the propeller hub

2× 7.5 mm (0.295 in) MAC 1934 machine guns in the outer wings

  

The kit and its assembly:

This quick build was created in the wake of the “Captured” group build at whatifmodellers.com and actually is a personal interpretation of someone else’s idea, namely of fellow modeler NARSES who came up with the idea of a captured French M.S. 406 in Indochina under a new Thai flag. I found the idea so weird, yet realistic, that I decided to build one, too.

 

The model is the very simple but quite acceptable M.S. 406 from Hobby Boss. Externally the model is nice, with recessed panel lines and a basic landing gear. Internally, it is rather bleak, even though it has a full cockpit with a floor, integrally molded seat and even some details behind the pilot’s armor bulkhead. The canopy is a single piece and very clear, but it comes with massive locator bars, so that I decided to keep the canopy closed and added a pilot figure to cover the minimal interior. I was lucky to find a Japanese (though pretty “flat”) WWII pilot in the donor bank, left over from a Hasegawa model. I also gave the figure some seat belts (made from adhesive tape), but the rest remained unchanged – even the original metal axis for the propeller was used. I just replaced the machine gun barrels with hollow steel needles and added a pitot on the wing, which is probably part of the kit but not indicated in the instructions. The same is true for the foldable ventral antenna.

 

The build was finished quickly, in the course of just a single evening, including the pilot and some overall PSR.

  

Painting and markings:

My interpretation of a French aircraft in Thai service after the French-Thai War stuck closely to the real world Vichy livery, which was the standard French camouflage in grey/green/brown with light blue-grey undersides (all from ModelMaster’s Authentic Color range), together with a yellow-and-red-striped cowling (a base with Humbrol 69 and red decal stripes added later) and a white cheatline long the fuselage. The tail of French aircraft in Indochina was painted all-red from early 1941 onwards upon Japanese command, because of friendly fire incidents. This was adopted for the model (with a mix of Humbrol 19 and some 73), which is supposed to belong into the 1942 time frame.

 

As a captured aircraft, the original French roundels were replaced/overpainted with red disks/hinomaru, and then Thai elephant markings added on top. That’s a personal idea, ordnance directly supplied to the Thai forces from Japan had the simple, square “elephant flag” emblem directly applied to the wings and the fin (but no fuselage roundel). The all-red tail was taken over, but I painted the rudder in a dark IJA green, since it would formerly carry a French fin flash. The same green was used to overpaint a serial number on the fin and a former squadron emblem under the cockpit.

The hinomaru come from a PrintScale Ki-46 sheet, and these markings are intentionally a bit oversized, so that they cover well the former French markings and are highly visible. The elephant markings some from a PrintScale Ki-27 sheet, so that the red tone on both sources are very close to each other. The Ki-27 sheet also provided the Thai ciphers “3” and “4”, combined into a “34”.

 

The interior was painted in medium grey, and the model externally received some signs of wear and tear in the form of dry-brushed leading edges and around the cockpit as well as some soot stains behind the exhaust stubs and the machine guns. Finally, the model was sealed with a coat of matt acrylic varnish (Italeri).

  

A quick build, and the easy-build Hobby Boss M.S. 406 is certainly not as crisp as a “real” model, but in this case the story behind the weird livery was more in the focus than the canvas underneath. However, an interesting result, and the hybrid paint scheme with heritage from three different operators make the aircraft an unusual, if not exotic sight.

nymag.com/intelligencer/2022/03/covid-excess-mortality.html

 

What a Single Metric Tells Us About the Pandemic

 

Live long enough in a pandemic and you will see the entire narrative landscape shift, even flip, sometimes more than once.

 

As recently as a month ago, Americans of a certain cast of mind could have still looked to China — and indeed all of East Asia, Southeast Asia, and Oceania — with some plausible pandemic envy. Those early lockdowns in Wuhan were brutal, yes; some of the surveillance testing, contact tracing, and quarantine measures imposed in places like South Korea and Singapore were very restrictive, true; closed borders and reentry policies in Australia and New Zealand went further than those of any country in Europe or the Americas; and while the Sinovac vaccines weren’t as effective as those made by Moderna or Pfizer, the success of true “zero COVID” policies through the region meant that in many places, shots got into arms without anything like a major COVID surge ever having taken place.

 

All of that seemed like an unimaginable triumph. Now, after a brutal Omicron wave punishing its largely unvaccinated elderly, Hong Kong has a cumulative death toll approaching Canada’s. (In February, it was 25 times lower.) Omicron spikes elsewhere in the region — in South Korea, in Singapore — have proved less threatening, given higher rates of vaccination among the elderly. But panicked lockdowns imposed again in China suggest that the country’s leadership, at least, believes an enormous amount of pandemic vulnerability remains — enough to justify a total shutdown of Shenzhen, a city of almost 20 million and such a critical economic and manufacturing hub that American observers immediately started raising their expectations for inflation.

 

Narrative turnabouts are not new with Omicron. Some are familiar: The disease wasn’t spread through the air, then it was; masks weren’t worth it, early on, then became not just essential but badges of personal vigilance, then only useful if they were KN95s. Some narrative shifts were more obscure: Omicron was said to be “mild,” though it is roughly as severe as the original strain in immunologically naïve populations. Others have been somewhat memory-holed, as when much of the public-health Establishment spent the fall of 2020 suggesting that herd immunity would be reached when 60 or 70 percent of the country was infected or vaccinated, a threshold we have now long since surpassed with nothing like herd immunity in sight; or when it spent the summer of 2021 insisting that breakthrough cases were exceedingly rare and breakthrough deaths essentially nonexistent, when in fact probably a quarter of all American deaths since Delta have been among the vaccinated. Some reversals were technical, as when rapid tests were first considered imprecise, became indispensable during Omicron, then had their efficacy in preventing transmission called into question. Some had to do with policy: School closures were once part of a first-response wave of restrictions, but a growing understanding of the relatively low risk to kids and real costs of keeping them home has meant schools are now broadly viewed as among the most important places to remain open. And some had to do with personal behavior, as when many of the same people who spent 2020 yelling at Thanksgiving travelers and arguing that responsibility to protect others should dominate one’s personal behavior spent 2021 reasoning that vaccines had absolved us all of that responsibility. Many of those who once reacted in horror to “Let it rip” proponents began wondering if anything at all could have stopped the early spread in its tracks.

 

Our experience of the pandemic has been littered with bad-faith argumentation and instigation, but most of these narrative reversals are not that, or even signs of what Harvard’s William Hanage has called the “motivated reasoning” of the pandemic. One narrative replacing another is one description of the scientific method, and among the many astonishing features of this pandemic is how quickly science was able to process and respond — perhaps without adequate speed, but at least fast enough for vaccines to be designed within two days, manufactured within two months, and rolled out to the vast majority of the world within two years. But the unsteady narratives of COVID-19 are reminders that, as sure as we might have been about how to interpret our experience of it, the stories we told ourselves about what we were dealing with and what we should be doing to protect ourselves were often incomplete, clouded by much more uncertainty and ignorance, wishful thinking and reflexive panic, than we were ever comfortable acknowledging.

 

There is one data point that might serve as an exceptional interpretative tool, one that blinks bright through all that narrative fog: excess mortality. The idea is simple: You look at the recent past to find an average for how many people die in a given country in a typical year, count the number of people who died during the pandemic years, and subtract one from the other. The basic math yields some striking results, as shown by a recent paper in The Lancet finding that 18.2 million people may have died globally from COVID, three times the official total. As skeptical epidemiologists were quick to point out, the paper employed some strange methodology — modeling excess deaths even for countries that offered actual excess-death data and often distorting what we knew to be true as a result. A remarkable excess-mortality database maintained by The Economist does not have this problem, and, like the Lancet paper, the Economist database estimates global excess mortality; it puts the figure above 20 million.

 

As a measure of pandemic brutality, excess mortality has its limitations — but probably fewer than the conventional data we’ve used for the last two years. That’s because it isn’t biased by testing levels — in places like the U.S. and the U.K., a much higher percentage of COVID deaths were identified as such than in places like Belarus or Djibouti, making our pandemics appear considerably worse by comparison. By measuring against a baseline of expected death, excess mortality helps account for huge differences in the age structures of different countries, some of which may have many times more mortality risk than others because their populations are much older. And to the extent that the ultimate impact of the pandemic isn’t just a story about COVID-19 but also one about our responses to it — lockdowns and unemployment, suspended medical care and higher rates of alcoholism and automobile accidents — excess mortality accounts for all that, too. In some places, like the U.S., excess-mortality figures are close to the official COVID data — among other things, a tribute to our medical surveillance systems. In other places, the numbers are so different that accounting for them entirely changes the picture of not just the experience of individual nations but the whole world, scrambling everything we think we know about who did best and who did worst, which countries were hit hardest and which managed to evade catastrophe. If you had to pick a single metric by which to measure the ultimate impact of the pandemic, excess mortality is as good as we’re probably going to get.

 

So what does it say? A year ago, it seemed easy enough to divide pandemic outcomes into three groups — with Europe and the Americas performing far worse than East Asia, which appeared to have outmaneuvered the virus through public-health measures, and much of the Global South, especially sub-Saharan Africa, which looked to have been spared mostly by its relatively young population. Today, a crude count of official deaths, not excess mortality, suggests the same grouping: North America and Europe have almost identical death counts with official per capita totals eight times as high as Asia, as a whole, and 12 times as high as Africa. South America’s death toll is higher still — ten times as high as Asia and 15 times as high as Africa.

 

The excess-mortality data tells a different story. There is still a clear continent-by-continent pattern, but the gaps between them are much smaller, making the experiences of different parts of the world much less distinct and telling a more universal story about the devastation wrought by this once-in-a-century contagion. According to The Economist, Europe, Latin America, and North America have all registered excess deaths ranging from 270 to 370 per 100,000 inhabitants; excess mortality in Asia is estimated between 130 to 330; in Africa, the range is 79 to 220. These numbers are not identical, but, all things considered, they are remarkably close together. The highest of the low-end estimates is barely three times the lowest; the highest of the high-end estimates is not even twice as high as the lowest.

 

If you adjust for age, as the Economist database does separately, the differences among continents grow more dramatic — suggesting a reversal of outcomes, rather than a convergence. Outside of Oceania, Europe and North America were among the best in the world at preventing deaths among the old, and they were several times better at protecting their elderly, of whom they had many more, than Africa and South Asia. East Asia performed better, but only slightly: Canada is in line with China, Germany just marginally worse than South Korea, Iceland in the range of Japan. By almost any metric, Oceania remains an outlier: The Economist estimates zero excess deaths among the elderly in New Zealand, for instance, and gives the whole region an excess-mortality range of negative 31 to positive 37 per 100,000 residents, meaning it’s possible fewer people died there than would’ve had we never even heard of SARS-CoV-2.

 

In the country-by-country data, the divergences grow even bigger. Perhaps most striking, given both self-flagellating American narratives about the pandemic and current events elsewhere on the globe, is that the worst-hit large country in the world was not the U.S., which registered the most official deaths of any country but ranks 47th in per capita excess mortality, or Britain, which ranks 85th, or even India, which ranks 36th. It is Russia, which has lost, The Economist estimates, between 1.2 million and 1.3 million citizens over the course of the pandemic, a mortality rate more than twice as high as the American one.

 

Russia is not an outlier. While we have heard again and again in the U.S. about the experience of the pandemic in western Europe — sometimes in admiration, sometimes to mock — it has been eastern Europe that, of any region in the world, has the ugliest excess-mortality data. This, then, is where the pandemic hit hardest — in the countries of the old Warsaw Pact and formerly of the Soviet bloc. In fact, of the ten worst-performing countries, only one is outside eastern Europe. The world’s worst pandemic, according to the data, has been in Bulgaria, followed by Serbia, North Macedonia, and Russia, then Lithuania, Bosnia, Belarus, Georgia, Romania, and Sudan. (Have you read much about pandemic policy in any of these countries?) Peru, which had what is often described as the most brutal pandemic in the world, ranks 11th — with the smallest gap, among those countries with the most devastating pandemics, between the official COVID data and the estimated excess mortality. (You probably haven’t read much about Peru, either, but its lockdowns were severe — for months, only one member of each household was allowed out once a week. At one point, an exemption was extended allowing for children under the age of 14 to leave their homes for 30 minutes of exercise per day, so long as it was conducted less than 500 meters away.)

 

Because The Economist allows you to explore how excess mortality evolved over time, country by country, the data also clearly showcases the pandemic as a tale of two years — a mitigation year, 2020, and a vaccination year, 2021. Early in the vaccine-distribution phase, with the U.K. and U.S. moving most quickly, it was striking how so few of the countries that had done well in preventing spread in 2020 were doing well in providing vaccines quickly. Over the course of 2021, many of those gaps disappeared, with countries across East Asia and Oceania eventually accelerating their vaccine distribution and parts of Europe that were slow at the outset starting to catch up too. But the U.S. took the opposite course. In 2020, the U.S. had done a bit worse than average among its OECD peers. In 2021, when pandemic outcomes were often determined by the relative uptake of American-made vaccines, the U.S. did much, much worse than that. In country after country in Europe, the pandemic killed a fraction as many last year as it had the year before. In the U.S., it killed more. A year ago, it was possible to defend the American record as merely below average — worse than it should have been but not, judging globally, cataclysmically bad. Today, it is cataclysmically bad, which is both outrageous and ironic, given that it is largely American vaccine innovation that has changed the pandemic landscape for the rest of the world — the rest of the rich world, at least.

 

On February 1, 2021, just after the inauguration of Joe Biden, the U.S. had registered, according to The Economist, 178 excess deaths per 100,000 inhabitants, quite close to Britain’s 166, Belgium’s 162, and Portugal’s 201. Fast-forward a year and those gaps have exploded. The U.S. has now registered 330 excess deaths per 100,000 — meaning our total has roughly doubled. In Britain, the excess mortality grew only 30 percent; in Portugal, it was 17 percent.

 

The gaps between deaths in the U.S. and countries that had done better in the first year of the pandemic, like Germany or Iceland, have gotten even bigger. If the U.S. had the same cumulative excess mortality of Germany, it would have had 600,000 fewer deaths. If it had the excess mortality of Iceland, it would have had a million fewer deaths — and would have only lost about 100,000 Americans in total.

 

How did this happen? The answer is screamingly obvious, if also, in its way, confusing: The U.S. drove an unprecedented vaccine-innovation campaign in 2020, which empowered much of the world to turn the page on the pandemic’s deadliest phases, then, in 2021, utterly failed to take advantage of its power itself. But what is perhaps even more striking is that American vaccination coverage isn’t just bad, by the standards of its peers, but getting worse. About two-thirds of Americans have received two shots of vaccine, a level that is in line with Israel and not far off from the U.K., though below many other wealthy countries. (And even in the U.K., vaccination was more effectively directed toward the old.) But over the last six months, the country has had an opportunity to make up that gap with boosters and has simply not taken it. Only 29 percent of Americans have had a booster shot of vaccine, which puts us behind Slovenia, Slovakia, and Poland and means that less than half of those people happy to be vaccinated a year ago have chosen to get a third shot through Delta and Omicron. Booster campaigns seem like an obvious opportunity for easy public-health gains, yet remarkably few Americans seem to think it’s worth the trouble. Why? For everything we think we know about the pandemic and how people have responded to it, that one remains a maddening mystery.

  

www.newsday.com/news/health/coronavirus/coronavirus-boost...

 

COVID rates are rising again. Who's most at risk?

 

As the percentage of people testing positive for COVID-19 continues to rise on Long Island, experts say those who didn’t contract the coronavirus in the past few months are most at risk, but if they’re vaccinated, their vulnerability drops.

 

The spread of the highly contagious omicron subvariant BA.2 and a decline in mask-wearing are causing the rise in rates after they declined sharply following the omicron surge earlier this winter, said Dr. Leonard Krilov, an infectious disease expert and chief of pediatrics at NYU Langone Hospital-Long Island in Mineola.

 

The positivity rate likely will continue to rise somewhat, but he didn’t expect a major new wave of infections.

 

“The immunity levels in the population are pretty good” because of vaccination and the large number of people infected with the coronavirus in recent months, he said. “I’m guardedly optimistic we won’t see major blips.”

 

WHAT TO KNOW

 

■ The percentage of people testing positive for COVID-19 continued to rise on Friday, to 2.31%. It had been 1.99% on Tuesday.

■ Experts don’t believe there will be another major surge, because there is relatively strong immunity from the vaccines and from infections during the winter omicron spike.

■ A second booster shot may be advisable in the near future, especially for older adults and those with certain medical conditions, experts say.

 

After the Long Island positivity rate reached nearly 27% in early January, it fell to 1.52% by March 9. But it’s been steadily rising since then, with the increase accelerating in recent days, going from 1.99% on Tuesday to 2.31% on Friday.

 

Dr. Bruce Farber, chief of public health and epidemiology for Northwell Health, said people who both contracted the virus in recent months and are vaccinated, and especially those who also received booster shots, are most protected against new infection. But immunity gradually wanes over time, he said.

 

"Every month that goes by and we’re further away from January, when most of those people got infected, the number of vulnerable people is going to grow," he said.

 

Farber said that, to limit the spread of the virus, “the things we can do are give another booster or change our lifestyles again." But, he said, "there’s no appetite in our country" for reinstituting restrictions such as mask mandates.

 

"The only remaining option is really boosters," he said.

Considering a 2nd booster shot

 

It’s unclear when a second booster shot is advisable, Farber said. Earlier this month, Pfizer and BioNTech asked for Food and Drug Administration authorization for a second booster for those 65 and older, and Moderna asked for authorization for additional boosters for all adults.

 

The Biden administration is planning to allow everyone 50 and older to receive a second booster of the Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna vaccine, although it would only be an option, not a recommendation, according to multiple news outlets. The proposal was first reported late Friday in The New York Times. The FDA could authorize a second booster in the next several days, the reports said.

 

Krilov said focusing on older age groups first is logical.

 

“The argument for it, and it makes some sense, is that after 50, 60, you don’t respond as well, your immune system isn’t quite as robust,” he said. “To boost that population does make some sense. … Everybody’s felt that we’re going to at some point need additional boosting. It’s figuring out the timing of it.”

 

Data out of Israel, which for months has allowed second boosters for people 60 and older and other vulnerable groups, is promising, Farber said. But the results are from two months after the booster was given, and “normally we don’t make decisions based on two-month follow-ups,” he said. It’s unclear how quickly protection wanes after two months, he said.

 

Farber worried that if the FDA gives older adults an option for a second booster, but not a full recommendation, it could be confusing and lead “to very mixed messages among the public.”

 

Farber said people 60 or 65 and older probably should get a second booster, if authorized. For people in their 50s, it would depend on how much time they spend in crowded indoor spaces and whether they have health conditions making them more vulnerable, he said.

 

“A healthy 50-year-old may want to pass on a booster right now, but a 50-year-old with asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, heart failure, that’s a whole different picture,” he said.

56% of eligible NYers boosted

 

In New York, 56% of those eligible for a booster have received one, and 76.1% of the population has received at least two vaccine doses, or one of the Johnson & Johnson, according to state data.

 

Unvaccinated people 12 and older are more than three times as likely to test positive for the coronavirus than boosted people, and 21 times more likely to die of COVID-19, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

 

The timing of a second booster would be a judgment call, Krilov said. With the positivity rate still relatively low, it may make more sense for many people to wait until just before the fall, when the risk likely will be higher.

 

“On the other hand, if I have multiple risk factors, I’d probably say get it as soon as it’s approved,” he said.

 

The number of COVID-19 hospitalizations rose on Long Island, from 119 on Thursday to 123 on Friday, state data shows. But that was after a large drop, from 143 patients on Wednesday. More than 58% were admitted for a reason other than COVID-19.

Floating along the Owyhee River in Oregon, you pass through astonishing high desert canyonlands with thousand foot rhyolite cliffs and sand castle rock formations. Visitors will marvel at the variety of birds and mammals, including river otters, bighorn sheep and golden eagles. The Owyhee River’s fragile ecological balance requires the utmost respect from its visitors. The Owyhee River’s floatable sections are very remote and contain numerous technical and challenging rapids. This river is not for the inexperienced floatboater! Once you enter these deeply carved canyons, you will be a long way from help. Emergency access is extremely difficult, and cell phone coverage is nonexistent within the confines of the canyon. You must be prepared to handle all problems and emergencies on your own. To properly prepare, floaters should contact the Vale BLM Office to obtain information well in advance of a planned float trip. A waterproof river guide that includes a river map identifying rapids may be purchased from the Vale BLM office (541-473-3144).

 

Private Boaters: Self-issue permits are available at the launch site.

 

www.youtube.com/watch?v=aIBQcBvpc1w

a la "philippe halsman"

 

colinhuggins.bandcamp.com/track/brahms-hungarian-dance-4

 

NY Times, Dec. 4 2011

Colin Huggins was there with his baby grand, the one he wheels into Washington Square Park for his al fresco concerts. So were Tic and Tac, a street-performing duo, who held court in the fountain — dry for the winter. And Joe Mangrum was pouring his elaborate sand paintings on the ground near the Washington Arch.

 

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Hiroko Masuike/The New York Times

Kareem Barnes of Tic and Tac collected donations on Sunday.

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Hiroko Masuike/The New York Times

Joe Mangrum showed his sand paintings on Sunday.

In other words, it was a typical Sunday afternoon in the Greenwich Village park, where generations of visitors have mingled with musicians, artists, activists, poets and buskers.

 

Yet this fall, that urban harmony has grown dissonant as the city’s parks department has slapped summonses on the four men and other performers who put out hats or buckets, for vending in an unauthorized location — specifically, within 50 feet of a monument.

 

The department’s rule, one of many put in place a year ago, was intended to control commerce in the busiest parks. Under the city’s definition, vending covers not only those peddling photographs and ankle bracelets, but also performers who solicit donations.

 

The rule attracted little notice at first. But the enforcement in Washington Square Park in the past two months has generated summonses ranging from $250 to $1,000. And it has started a debate about the rights of parkgoers seeking refuge from the bustle of the streets versus those looking for entertainment.

 

At a news conference in the park on Sunday organized by NYC Park Advocates, the artists waved fistfuls of pink summonses while their advocates, including civil rights lawyers, called on the city to stop what they called harassment of the performers.

 

“This is a heavy-handed solution to a nonexistent problem,” said Ronald L. Kuby, one of the lawyers.

 

The rule is especially problematic in Washington Square Park, performers say, because there are few locations across its 10 acres that are beyond 50 feet from a memorial or fountain — whether the bust of Alexander Lyman Holley, who introduced the Bessemer steel process to this country, or the statue of the Italian liberator Giuseppe Garibaldi.

 

Then there is the park’s international reputation as a gathering place for folk music pioneers and the Beats.

 

“Washington Square is the live-music park of New York City, and it would be close to impossible for any one of us to follow these regulations,” said Mr. Huggins, who has received nine summonses with fines totaling $2,250.

 

But Adrian Benepe, the parks commissioner, argues that there is ample room for performers away from the monuments. And, he added, a musician who is not putting out a tin cup is welcome to sit on the edge of the fountain or under a monument.

 

“It’s the whole issue of the ‘tragedy of the commons,’ ” he said. “If you allow all the performers and all the vendors to do whatever they want to do, pretty soon there’s no park left for people who want to use them for quiet enjoyment. This is a way of having some control and not 18 hours of carnival-like atmosphere.”

 

Gary Behrens, an amateur photographer visiting from New Jersey, applauded the city’s efforts to rein in the performers. “I’m O.K. with the guitar, but the loud instruments have taken over the park,” he said.

 

The lawyers and advocates, however, challenged the idea that street performers were selling a product as a vendor does. And threatening a lawsuit, they faulted the city for creating what they called “First Amendment zones” through the rules.

 

“Is this place zany?” asked Norman Siegel, the former director of the New York Civil Liberties Union. “You bet. Public parks are quintessential public forums. Zaniness is something we should cherish and protect.”

 

Park visitation has soared along with the rise of tourism in the last 15 years, and with it vendors and artists interested in a lucrative market.

 

Mr. Benepe insisted that the rules would not scare off future music legends.

 

“If Bob Dylan wanted to come play there tomorrow, he could,” he said, “although he might have to move away from the fountain.”

 

Oddly, the dispute coincided with the 50th anniversary of the so-called Folk Riot in Washington Square Park, when the parks commissioner tried to squelch Sunday folk performances. Hundreds of musicians gathered in protest, the police were called in and a melee ensued.

 

In April, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg wrote a letter commemorating the Folk Riot, saying he applauded “the folk performers who changed music, our city and our world beginning half a century ago.”