Tag Archives: World War I

International news

Politics turned on its ear

Our crazy, nutty political world has become a topsy-turvy mix that bears little resemblance to the world many of us once knew.

There once was a time when Democrats were seen as being “soft” on Russia, which once was known as the Soviet Union, an empire cobbled together by the communists who took over the Russian government after World War I. Republicans became known as the anti-communist party. The nation was divided along a line that defined the two major political parties over their relative antipathy toward Russia/Soviet Union.

Do you remember when Ronald W. Reagan defined the Soviets as the Evil Empire?

Reagan is gone. So is the Soviet Union. Russia emerged from the rubble of the Cold War. These days Russia is governed by a tyrant — Vladimir Putin — who two months ago decided to invade Ukraine, one of the former Soviet republics that has functioned nicely as a sovereign state since USSR collapsed in 1991.

Who among the American political movement is now lined up (more or less) in Russia’s camp? It’s those Republican descendants of Ronald Reagan, but whose allegiance now rests with the Russian tyrant’s pal who once served as president of the United States.

We hear Democrats, for crying out loud, now speaking of Russia with language that Republicans used to speak when condemning the Russians. We hear occasional rants from right-wingers — the former commie haters — wondering about why Americans are all worked up over what the Russians have done.

We also hear from the occasional Republican politician uttering outrageous statements about who’s to blame for the atrocities we see revealed as Russians retreat from captured territory.

I’m confused beyond my ability to comprehend matters over the flip-flop we are witnessing. Someone will have to explain it to me.

But … wait! I think I know. It’s that former POTUS, Putin’s pal, who continues to call the tune to which Republican pols and their media pals are marching.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

military news

Veterans Day story for the ages

I want to share a story about a particular U.S. Army veteran, a man I did not know, but who is a dearly beloved member of my family.

His name was George Filipu. He was my grandfather, Mom’s dear, sweet father. I was born in December 1949. My Papou and my Yiayia came to meet me when I was about three weeks old. He died later that day of a heart attack. Note: I want to refer them by the Greek terms for “grandfather” and “grandmother.” 

But when he first arrived in the United States in the early 1900s, he and my Yiayia got married. In November 1918, he decided he wanted to enlist in the Army. At that time U.S. immigration policy granted instant citizenship to non-citizens who wanted to serve in the military.

Papou wanted to serve, so he joined the Army because he wanted to get into the fight in Europe; I refer to World War I.

Then something happened for the betterment of the planet: they signed an armistice and the fighting stopped. Papou’s military service was cut short.

However, because of the policy that granted him citizenship, he was able to maintain his American citizen status. I want to add that, according to stories handed down by Mom and her brothers Phil and Jim, Papou wore his pride in his new country on his sleeve as well as in his heart.

He and Yiayia loved this country beyond measure. They never returned to the “old country.” Yiayia in particular refused to return, saying, in effect, “This is my home and this is where I will remain.”

Yiayia lived a long life after Papou died. She passed away on the Fourth of July 1978. We are certain she chose that day to leave this world because (a) she loved this country deeply and (b) she wanted to make sure we would remember it.

My Papou, George Filipu was willing to fight for the country that he, too, loved. He was a proud U.S. Army veteran.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

military news

‘Losers’ and ‘suckers? My a**!

I am having a difficult time setting aside this latest reporting about Donald Trump’s hideous and profoundly despicable view of those who chose to serve their country.

The Atlantic magazine’s editor in chief, Jeffrey Goldberg, has written a detailed account of statements that have come from Trump about those who were wounded in battle, those who died in battle, those who were captured and held as prisoner and, yes, even those who volunteered to serve in politically unpopular wars.

Goldberg is a first-rate journalist. He stands firmly behind the story he has written. He has sourced it meticulously. Yes, he granted anonymity to the sources, but I understand his reasoning: He wanted to protect them against retribution from Donald Trump.

Trump, though, calls him ghastly names. He denigrates the journalism contained inside the magazine’s covers. Goldberg is a pro and as practitioner of a fine craft, he has every reason to stand behind his reporting. Those who take up careers in serious journalism do so while pledging to always be truthful, accurate and fair. Donald Trump is none of that and we all know it.

I am simply astonished that a commander in chief could say the things attributed to Trump in this piece. It exhibits at so many levels what many of us have known all along, that someone with no public service experience prior to becoming elected president of the U.S. would harbor such miserable views about those who serve their country.

As I have re-read The Atlantic article I find myself muttering to myself that none of this surprises me. Trump cannot tell the truth, so his reported lie about skipping a World War I victory celebration because of “security concerns” is now revealed to have been because he didn’t want the rainfall to mess up his coiffed combover.

Trump infamously denigrated the Vietnam War service of the late John McCain and now we learn that he thought little of the late George H.W. Bush’s World War II service because he, too, got shot down over the Pacific Ocean.

So now Trump has gone on the attack against Jeffrey Goldberg, against a Fox News reporter who has corroborated Goldberg’s reporting, against The Atlantic, against Fox News itself.

The reporting of what Donald Trump has said cuts me deeply, as I am certain it cuts many of us who (a) served our country and (b) are members of families with others who have done their duty for the nation we all love.

national news

Ignorance isn’t bliss, Mr. POTUS

1 Comment

I hereby declare it to be a semi-official recognition that Donald J. Trump can be labeled the Ignoramus in Chief.

I say that understanding fully that other presidents have misspoken or misstated certain facts, such as when Barack Obama once boasted of having visited “all 57 states.”

Still, to hear Donald Trump make a declaration about how the 1917 flu pandemic likely ended World War II makes my head spin 360 degrees.

World War II commenced in 1939 when Nazi Germany invaded Poland. The flu pandemic occurred two decades earlier.  Was Trump referring to World War I, the War to End All Wars, the Great War? Who knows? The Ignoramus in Chief won’t say what he meant.

Such hideous misstatements of well-chronicled history, though, does reveal how utterly uniformed and uneducated this individual truly is, even though he keeps boasting about how he attended the “best schools,” how he knows “the best words,” and how he surrounds himself with “the best people.”

He does none of the above.

Trump has boasted about being a self-made business tycoon. He isn’t. Trump has bragged about his fabulous wealth. He refuses to release for public review his financial records, which previous presidents all have done. He couldn’t pronounce properly the name of an iconic American national park, Yosemite.

Trump has become damn near legendary in his lack of knowledge of basic American history. He recently declined to cite a single aspect of the late Rep. John Lewis’s iconic civil rights struggle. Why? Because he detested Lewis over the fighter’s refusal to attend his inaugural and because he has no understanding or appreciation for the struggle that Lewis embodied.

Trump keeps placing his ignorance on public display. It’s one thing to misspeak. I wouldn’t object one little bit if Trump ever would offer a simple “my bad” were he to be caught misspeaking. He doesn’t do that. Trump’s refusal to own his goofs and gaffes only tells me he believes that the wrongheadedness he blurts out to be the truth.

Sickening and weird.

military news, national news

‘Beautiful’ World War II? Seriously?

(CNS photo/Paul Haring)

Question of the Moment: Who in their right mind would ever place the adjective “beautiful” in front of the words “World War … “?

Answer: No one in their right mind would ever say that, which leads me to conclude that Donald John “Best Wordsmith in Chief” Trump is out of his mind. He’s gone loony. Bonkers.

He was asked on Fox News Sunday about the issue of renaming U.S. military bases that currently carry the names of Confederate army officers. He then launched into yet another incoherent rant about how those installatons had sent young Americans off to fight in two world wars … which he then described as “beautiful.” 

Yes, he told Chris Wallace that World Wars I and II were “beautiful” conflicts.

They were hideous, ghastly, monumentally tragic at every level imaginable. World War I veterans were subject to mustard gas while dug into trenches along a line facing their enemy.  World War II veterans were sent to battlefields that spanned the globe. The remaining WWII vets are in the 90s now, but ask any of them if they thought that conflict was a “beautiful” endeavor.

Yet the president of the United States, who sought to avoid service during the Vietnam War by claiming to have bone spurs in his feet, now calls the two global conflicts “beautiful.”

Donald J. Trump is batsh** crazy.

military news, national news

Trump’s belittling of brass simply stinks beyond belief

The history of Donald Trump’s pre-business history is well-known.

He sought to avoid service in the military during the height of the Vietnam War. He received dubious medical deferments citing bone spurs or some such ailment that kept him out of being eligible for military service.

He went into business. Made a lot of money. Lost a lot of money. Had mixed success as a business mogul. Then he went into politics. He ran for president of the United States. He won!

So for this current president to dress down men who have served their country honorably, in combat, thrust themselves into harm’s way is insulting, degrading and astonishingly unpatriotic.

Two reporters for the Washington Post, Philip Rucker and Carol Leonnig, have written a book that tells just how disgraceful Trump’s conduct has gotten with regard to the military high command. An excerpt from that book tells of a meeting in a Pentagon room called The Tank. The brass sought to explain the nuts and bolts of military matters to the commander in chief. He was having none of it.

He called the generals “babies and dopes.” He has told them they are “losers” and said he wouldn’t “go into battle” with them.

I am trying imagine, were I one of those decorated combat veterans, hearing such denigration coming from the commander in chief. The entire world knows this man’s history. We all know that, when he had the opportunity to serve his country, he chose another path.

Don’t misunderstand me on this score. I do not begrudge a president who’s never worn the nation’s military uniform. Two recent presidents did not serve: Barack Obama or Bill Clinton. Neither did Franklin Roosevelt or Woodrow Wilson, both of whom led this country through two world wars.

What is so objectionable is the snarky attitude this president demonstrates to individuals who have done what he sought to avoid doing. That he would speak to these patriots in such a manner is disgraceful on its face.

national news

My favorite veteran would enjoy the recognition he deserves

The picture you see here reveals my favorite veteran. He’s the fellow on the right, the sailor who is standing guard next to a British marine in front of a door where some highly sensitive negotiations were underway.

The sailor is Pete Kanelis, my father. The marine’s name, as Dad told me, was Tony. That’s all I know. The year was 1943. The place was off the coast of Sicily aboard a command ship in the Mediterranean Sea.

The negotiation involved the Allied naval commander in the Med and the British prime minister, Winston Churchill.

So, Dad had a brush with arguably the 20th century’s greatest statesman. As Dad told me the story, Churchill looked at him, asked Dad a question, then patted him on the head and said something like, “There you go, Yank.”

Dad will be among the veterans we will honor Monday. It’s called Veterans Day, a holiday that came into being known as Armistice Day; it was established to commemorate the end of World War I, which was supposed to be The War to End All Wars. It wasn’t.

World War II followed. The United States joined the fight on Dec. 7, 1941, with the attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.

I learned something profound about my favorite veteran on a trip to the Pacific Northwest with my wife in September. Dad’s youngest brother, Tino, told my wife and me about the day of the attack on Pearl Harbor. “I was 9 nine years old at the time,” Uncle Tino told us, “and I remember it vividly.” The family was listening to the radio news broadcast of the attack and its immediate aftermath.

Tino looked around for his big brother. “Where’s Pete?” Tino said he asked about Dad. He was gone. He had left the house in northeast Portland; he went downtown to enlist in the Navy.

Yes, Dad was so incensed at what had happened in Hawaii, he enlisted on that very day to get into the fight. He would suit up a month or so later. He would complete his basic training in San Diego, Calif. and then would ship out for Europe.

He got his wish. Dad took part in the fight to save the world from the despots in Berlin, Rome and Tokyo who wanted to subject the rest of us to their tyranny.

All told, about 16 million Americans took part in that great struggle. Seventy-five years later, their numbers have dwindled to just slightly less than 500,000 men and women. They are almost all gone.

Indeed, just this weekend, the last known survivor of the Pearl Harbor attack reportedly passed on. I fear the day when all those Americans who answered their nation’s call will be gone.

We honor them today. We honor all our veterans who have donned a military uniform — in war and in peace.

It is their day. As for Dad, I am immensely proud to be the son of an American who performed heroically and who, along with his comrades in arms, saved the world.

entertainment news, International news

World War I, Vietnam: chilling symmetry

I have just watched a chilling, remarkable and utterly jaw-dropping film. New Zealand director/producer Peter Jackson’s documentary, “They Shall Not Grow Old” hit me like a punch in the gut.

It is a film pulled together with many hours of archived film taken from World War I. Jackson colorized the raw film, restored its quality to a stunning level and then added narration taken from audio recordings made at the time.

The documentary takes us through British soldiers’ combat along The Western Front, how they confronted the Germans, fought them hand-to-hand. How they endured the most deplorable living conditions imaginable.

Then at the end of the film, we learn about the Armistice, which was proclaimed on the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918. The narrative tells how the guns just stopped firing. The battlefield fell strangely silent after years of constant bombardment.

There was no celebration among the British ranks. They packed up their gear and boarded boats for the ride home across the Channel.

And then they were greeted by — you guessed it — raging indifference. Indeed, many of the men who returned home from the War to End All Wars wondered: Why were we fighting? What was the point? What was the mission?

To those of us who had some exposure to another war, the one in Vietnam, the baffling reasons for fighting World War I among the British warriors seems to ring so very true.

I had a brief exposure to the Vietnam War. I didn’t suffer the hideous conditions experienced by the men I just witnessed on film. I did come home to what I have referred to as “raging indifference.” Make no mistake, either: I, too, wondered about what in the world I had just experienced and to what end was this war going to conclude.

I haven’t given away too much of the film. Just take my word for it: Peter Jackson has worked a technological miracle with this documentary.

It’s a classic!

national news

Our nation will survive — and flourish

Make no mistake about it: I am alarmed at the accelerating crisis in Washington, D.C.

Some Republican lawmakers, such as U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, might believe that “no one outside the D.C. Beltway cares” about Russia and Donald J. Trump’s alleged involvement with the nation’s pre-eminent adversary. I, though, do care about it. So do millions of other Americans, senator; you’re just not listening to us.

Does my alarm extend to my fear for the resilience of this system of government of ours? No. Not for an instant.

I remain an eternal optimist that we’ll get through all of this, no matter what the special counsel’s report reveals to us. Robert Mueller could exonerate the president of any wrongdoing. Or he could lay out a smorgasbord of questions that call into fact-based suspicion about the president’s fitness for the job.

Whatever happens, I feel compelled to remind us all that this country has survived equally serious — and more serious — crises throughout our history. We endured the Civil War; we engaged in two worldwide wars; we also endured a Great Depression; we have watched our political leaders gunned down by assassins; Americans have rioted in the streets to protest warfare; we witnessed a constitutional crisis bring down a president who resigned in disgrace; we have entered an interminable war against international terrorism.

Through it all we survived. The nation pulled itself together. It dusted itself off. It collected its breath. It analyzed what went wrong. The nation mobilized.

Our leaders have sought to unite us against common enemies. We responded.

Here we are. The special counsel is preparing — I hope — to conclude a lengthy investigation. There have been deeply troubling questions about the president’s conduct. One way or another I expect the special counsel, Robert Mueller, to answer those questions. They might not be to everyone’s satisfaction. Indeed, I can guarantee that the findings will split Americans between those who support the president and those (of us) who oppose him.

But we’re going to get through it. We might be bloodied and bruised. It might take some time to heal.

It’s going to happen.

The founders knew what they were doing when they crafted a government that they might have known — even then — would face the level of crisis it is facing today.

local news

USS Arizona artifact honors the fallen

Randall County Judge Ernie Houdashell’s mission is accomplished.

A piece of an iconic historical treasure is now in display at the Texas Panhandle War Memorial. It is a small section of the USS Arizona, the World War I-era battleship that was sunk 77 years ago today at the attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, by Japanese fighter pilots.

The event thrust the United States into World War II.

More than 1,000 men died on the Arizona.

Houdashell made it his mission to bring a piece of the sunken ship to Amarillo, to display it at the War Memorial, which honors the men from the Texas Panhandle who fell in battle in conflicts dating back to the Spanish-American War.

The judge told KFDA NewsChannel 10: “Pearl Harbor, the Arizona, is a cemetery,” said Judge Houdashell. “There’s hundreds of men still buried on that. We have a piece of a national relic and it’s a sacred relic. Very few people have a piece that big. There’s a little bitty piece at the WWII Museum but we have a huge piece.”

He meant to welcome the display on Pearl Harbor Day, when the nation remembers the event that mobilized the nation into a new era of industrial and military might in the fight to quell the tyrants in Europe and Asia who sought to conquer the world.

I am delighted that Ernie Houdashell accomplished his mission, just as he worked to bring the F-100 Super Sabre jet fighter and the UH-1 Huey helicopter — both Vietnam War relics — to the War Memorial grounds at the site of the former Randall County Courthouse Annex in south Amarillo.

These displays are important to Houdashell, who served two tours in the Vietnam War himself and who wears his love of country on his sleeve. Indeed, they are important to all Americans, all of us who understand the sacrifice made by those who fell in battle. The names of the Panhandle sons who fell are inscribed on the stone tablets that stand on the memorial grounds.

They now are accompanied by yet another historical artifact, a reminder of the horror of the bloodiest war the world has ever seen. May it stand as the worst the world will ever see.