Gulf War ground offensive begins on February 24, 1991

Gulf War ground offensive begins: After six weeks of intensive bombing against Iraq and its armed forces, U.S.-led coalition forces launch a ground invasion of Kuwait and Iraq.

On August 2, 1990, Iraq invaded Kuwait, its tiny oil-rich neighbor, and within hours had occupied most strategic positions in the country. One week later, Operation Shield, the American defense of Saudi Arabia, began as U.S. forces massed in the Persian Gulf. Three months later, the United Nations Security Council passed a resolution authorizing the use of force against Iraq if it failed to withdraw from Kuwait by January 15, 1991.

At 4:30 p.m. EST on January 16, 1991, Operation Desert Storm, a massive U.S.-led offensive against Iraq, began as the first fighter aircraft were launched from Saudi Arabia and off U.S. and British aircraft carriers in the Persian Gulf. All evening, aircraft from the U.S.-led military coalition pounded targets in and around Baghdad as the world watched the events transpire in television footage transmitted live via satellite from Baghdad and elsewhere.

Operation Desert Storm was conducted by an international coalition under the command of U.S. General Norman Schwarzkopf and featured forces from 32 nations, including Britain, Egypt, France, Saudi Arabia, and Kuwait. During the next six weeks, the allied force engaged in a massive air war against Iraq’s military and civil infrastructure, encountering little effective resistance from the Iraqi air force. Iraqi ground forces were also helpless during this stage of the war, and Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein’s only significant retaliatory measure was the launching of SCUD missile attacks against Israel and Saudi Arabia. Saddam hoped that the missile attacks would provoke Israel, and thus other Arab nations, to enter the conflict; however, at the request of the United States, Israel remained out of the war.

On February 24, a massive coalition ground offensive began, and Iraq’s outdated and poorly supplied armed forces were rapidly overwhelmed. By the end of the day, the Iraqi army had effectively folded, 10,000 of its troops were held as prisoners, and a U.S. air base had been established deep inside Iraq. After less than four days, Kuwait was liberated, and a majority of Iraq’s armed forces had either been destroyed or had surrendered or retreated to Iraq. On February 28, U.S. President George Bush declared a cease-fire, and Iraq pledged to honor future coalition and U.N. peace terms. One hundred and twenty-five American soldiers were killed in the Persian Gulf War, with another 21 regarded as missing in action.

History Channel / Wikipedia / Encyclopedia Britannica / Office of the Historian / The Atlantic / Gulf War 1991 (YouTube)

Alamo defenders call for help on February 24, 1836

Alamo defenders call for help: On this day in 1836, in San Antonio, Texas, Colonel William Travis issues a call for help on behalf of the Texan troops defending the Alamo, an old Spanish mission and fortress under attack by the Mexican army.

A native of Alabama, Travis moved to the Mexican state of Texas in 1831. He soon became a leader of the growing movement to overthrow the Mexican government and establish an independent Texan republic. When the Texas revolution began in 1835, Travis became a lieutenant-colonel in the revolutionary army and was given command of troops in the recently captured city of San Antonio de Bexar (now San Antonio). On February 23, 1836, a large Mexican force commanded by General Antonio Lopez de Santa Ana arrived suddenly in San Antonio. Travis and his troops took shelter in the Alamo, where they were soon joined by a volunteer force led by Colonel James Bowie.

Though Santa Ana’s 5,000 troops heavily outnumbered the several hundred Texans, Travis and his men determined not to give up. On February 24, they answered Santa Ana’s call for surrender with a bold shot from the Alamo’s cannon. Furious, the Mexican general ordered his forces to launch a siege. Travis immediately recognized his disadvantage and sent out several messages via couriers asking for reinforcements. Addressing one of the pleas to “The People of Texas and All Americans in the World”, Travis signed off with the now-famous phrase “Victory or Death”.

Only 32 men from the nearby town of Gonzales responded to Travis’ call for help, and beginning at 5:30 a.m. on March 6, Mexican forces stormed the Alamo through a gap in the fort’s outer wall, killing Travis, Bowie and 190 of their men. Despite the loss of the fort, the Texan troops managed to inflict huge losses on their enemy, killing at least 600 of Santa Ana’s men.

The brave defense of the Alamo became a powerful symbol for the Texas revolution, helping the rebels turn the tide in their favor. At the crucial Battle of San Jacinto on April 21, 910 Texan soldiers commanded by Sam Houston defeated Santa Ana’s army of 1,250 men, spurred on by cries of “Remember the Alamo!” The next day, after Texan forces captured Santa Ana himself, the general issued orders for all Mexican troops to pull back behind the Rio Grande River. On May 14, 1836, Texas officially became an independent

History Channel / Wikipedia / Encyclopedia Britannica / Texas State Library and Archives Commission.gov / Alamo defenders call for help on February 24, 1836 (YouTube)

Understanding Military Terminology - Movement phase

(DOD) Those ships and embarked units that load out and proceed to rendezvous in the objective area.

Joint Publications (JP 3-02) Amphibious Operations

The Old Salt’s Corner

“Bury Me Not In The Deep Deep Sea”

“Oh bury me not in the deep deep sea.”

Those words came slow and faintly

From the pallid lips of a youth who lay,

In his cabin bunk at the close of day.

“Oh bury me not in the deep deep sea

Where the cold dark waves will swallow me,

Where no light shall break through the darkening waves,

And no sunbeam find my silent grave.”

He had mourned and pined till o'er his brow

Death's shades had slowly crept there now,

He wished his home and loved ones nigh

As the sailors gathered to see him die.

“Oh bury me where my mother's prayer,

And my sister's tears shall mingle there,

By my father's grave my grave shall be,

Oh bury me not in the deep deep sea.”

“Oh bury me not” - his voice failed there,

They paid no heed to his dying prayer

They lowered him down o'er the ship's dark side

And above him closed the dismal tide.

He had no costly winding sheet

To wrap around his head or feet,

They lowered him down where the billows roar

In the deep deep sea far from the shore.

A girl on shore many tears will shed

For him who lies on the ocean bed;

Where above his heart the whale will hiss,

And his pallid lips the fish will kiss.

~ Kenneth Peacock

“I’m Just Sayin”

“I do not mistrust the future.

I do not fear what is ahead. For our problems are large,

but our heart is larger.

Our challenges are great,

but our will is greater.”

~ George H. W. Bush

“Thought for the Day”

“Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction.

We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream.

It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same,

or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children

what it was once like in the United States where men were free.”

~ Ronald Reagan

“What I Learned”

“Bullfight critics row on row

Crowd the vast arena full

But only one man’s there who knows

And he's the man who fights the bull.”

~ Anonymous

Second Hand News (Links to Articles from Week 7 - February 18, 2019 - February 24, 2019)

Ex-FBI lawyer: Rosenstein said two Cabinet officials were 'ready to support' effort to oust Trump • Trump could order up 234 miles of new border wall • Former vice president and potential 2020 Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden tells Europeans in Munich that America is “an embarrassment” • Dueling vice presidents: Pence and Biden joust in Munich over foreign policy • Heather Nauert withdraws as Trump's UN ambassador pick • Aurora shooter began rampage immediately after firing from manufacturing plant Washington Examiner

'I made a big mistake': American ISIS bride who called for terror attacks at Memorial Day parades and has married three jihadi fighters begs the U.S. to let her go back to Alabama • Nancy Pelosi DELETES a tweet saying 'attack' on actor Jussie Smollett was 'an affront to humanity' after allegations the Empire star staged homophobic and racist attack to save his job • Grand Jury prepares to consider claims Jussie Smollett paid for 'MAGA' attack on him by two Nigerian brothers - as Empire star still fails to make himself available for new police interview • New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio slams Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez over the collapse of Amazon's move to the Big Apple and says she did not UNDERSTAND the $3bn deal

Facebook broke the law in its quest to destroy other businesses and behaved like a 'digital gangster', British politicians say • Fired FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe claims Trump said he trusted the Russian leader on North Korea over U.S. intelligence and says President's 'own words' sparked FBI probe after he fired Comey • Trump calls plots to secretly record him and force him out of office 'illegal and treasonous' as he blasts Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and fired FBI official Andrew McCabe who dropped the bombshells • Trump brands Mueller's Russia probe 'illegal', says the 'conflicted' investigation is 'rigged' and the 'Witch Hunt' should never have begun, as he hits out at Democrat 'collusion'

Navy sailor seen in iconic photograph locking lips with nurse on V-J Day in Times Square dies aged 95 • Russia unveils unmanned drone capable of carrying a 6.6lb bomb at up to 80mph and 'bypassing air defence systems' • Russia claims to have successfully tested a NUCLEAR-POWERED cruise missile with unlimited range and is impossible to shoot down • NASCAR driver Paul Menard triggers huge fiery crash involving 18 cars at Daytona 500 as he tries to pass Matt DiBenedetto with just 10 laps to go Daily Mail UK

Beijing finally lays out China’s ‘Greater Bay Area’ plan • Blacklist labels millions of Chinese citizens and businesses untrustworthy • How Huawei became the world’s No. 1 telecoms gear supplier • Warship row: why Britain can’t afford to be on China’s bad side • China applauds ‘positive’ Donald Trump tweet ahead of Washington talks

North Korea Nuclear Crisis: Abe refuses to deny nominating Trump for Nobel Prize - Japanese leader wrote five-page letter to the Peace Prize committee in which he praised his efforts to defuse tensions with North Korea

Most Read: New Zealand bans Huawei, China has message for New Zealand • China data leak exposes vast hi-tech surveillance operation in Xinjiang • Taiwan’s darkest military secrets revealed by Google Maps • China’s crowded labour market is making life tough for foreign workers and new graduate ‘sea turtles’ • Who are the world’s worst tourists? Six nations that stand out - you may be surprised South China Morning Post

Poland cancels participation in Israel summit over FM Katz’s ‘racist’ remarks - Polish PM Morawiecki says move comes in response to ‘unacceptable’ remark by foreign minister that Poles ‘suckle anti-Semitism with their mother’s milk’ • Japan’s Abe mum on Trump Nobel Prize nomination • Police arrest 5 Palestinians said to have entered restricted area on Temple Mount • MP says UK’s Labour ‘institutionally anti-Semitic’ as 7 lawmakers quit party • Fired Ex-FBI deputy director: ‘Crime may have been committed’ by Trump - confirms officials discussed invoking 25th Amendment to remove him from office • Disgraced ex-congressman Anthony Weiner released from prison Times of Israel

Judicial Watch: Documents Reveal FBI Cover Up of ‘Chart’ of Potential Violations of Law by Hillary Clinton • D.C. Mayor Gives Open Borders Group $100,000 to Help Immigrants Become Citizens • Judicial Watch and Allied Educational Foundation File Brief with Supreme Court Urging it to Allow Inclusion of Citizenship Question • Judicial Watch Requests DOJ IG Investigate Any Leaks to CNN on Stone Raid and Leaks to BuzzFeed on Cohen Testimony

A Rising Tide of Global Corruption • Judicial Watch: FBI General Counsel Talked to Hillary Clinton’s Lawyer about Comey’s Letter on Weiner Laptop Clinton Emails • El Paso a Major Smuggling Route for Mexican Drugs, Illegal Aliens, Islamic Terrorists • VA Evicts Groups that Help Vets; Dog Park, Baseball Stadium, Prep School Athletic Fields, Upscale Store Parking Stay Judicial Watch

Mr. Answer Man Please Tell Us: What’s the Difference Between All-Wheel Drive and Four-Wheel Drive?

As the weather turns nasty, you may start to think more about your car’s transmission—particularly, its ability to get you up and down muddy, snowy, or icy roads. While you may know that two-wheel drive isn’t the best option for driving in harsh weather, other terms are more confusing. Like, for instance, all-wheel drive versus four-wheel drive. Don’t all cars have four wheels (at least when it comes to sedans, SUVs, and other consumer vehicles)? As Jalopnik explains, the difference between all-wheel drive (AWD) and four-wheel drive (4WD) is more than just semantics—and which type you need depends heavily on the kind of driving you do on a regular basis.

When a car manufacturer specifies something as two-, four-, or all-wheel drive, the company is referring to the tires that receive power from the engine. With two-wheel drive, the engine powers either the front axle or the back axle of the car, meaning that the engine is moving only the front tires or the back tires. The other axle is just rolling along. When four-wheel drive (sometimes referred to as 4x4) is engaged, meanwhile, the engine rotates all four wheels. This helps give the car extra traction on slippery surfaces like sand, ice, and gravel—so that even if one set of wheels can’t get traction on a slippery surface, the other wheels might be able to.

The key word there is “engaged”. Traditionally, four-wheel drive means that your car can drive with all four wheels, but you have to manually choose that option. The rest of the time, you’re in two-wheel drive mode. As Ray Magliozzi of NPR’s “Car Talk” once explained to a listener, four-wheel drive is “designed to be engaged when you're already stuck, or in a specific situation where you know you might get stuck - like in snow, sand, or mud. It’s not designed for normal road use, and must be disengaged before you drive on dry, paved roads.”

In all-wheel drive, meanwhile, the car figures out what kind of traction you need all on its own. It has sensors that figure out how much power should go to each wheel to give you the best traction without any input on your part. This is a useful feature for driving in a variety of different conditions, while a dedicated four-wheel drive mode might be better for serious off-roading.

Be warned: There are downsides to all that extra traction. A car’s engine has to work harder to power all four wheels. Those engines are also heavier, which itself takes more power to move. As a result, four-wheel or all-wheel drive cars usually use significantly more fuel than your typical two-wheel drive model.

There are other caveats to this explanation: Full-time four-wheel drive cars do exist, but they differ slightly from all-wheel drive vehicles because of how the two axles of the car move in relation to each other. In four-wheel drive, the front and rear wheels are locked together so they spin at the same rate; in all-wheel drive, the wheels aren’t locked like this - different amounts of power go to the different wheels as needed.

All this said, even if you live somewhere with snowy winters, it doesn’t necessarily mean you should spring for all-wheel drive. If you’re driving a lot in inclement weather - say, if you live in South Dakota or Wyoming rather than sunny Southern California - winter tires may actually be a lot more important than which wheels the engine is powering. Need proof? Watch the video comparison.

Cars for Sale • Consumer Reports.org • Edmunds • Mental Floss • Quara • All-wheel Drive - Four-wheel drive, Wikipedia • X-Engineer.org • What’s the Difference Between All-Wheel Drive and Four-Wheel Drive? (YouTube Search)

NAVSPEAK aka U.S. Navy Slang

Broke-dick: Technical term describing malfunctioning or inoperable equipment. Example: “The fuckin' aux drain pump is fuckin' broke-dick.”

Brown bagger: Married sailor who brings his lunch from home in a paper bag.

Brown Nose: Sailor trying a “little too hard” to make rate by sucking up to superiors. Can also refer to those who wear khakis (Chiefs, Officers) since it is assumed that most have “brown-nosed” to obtain their present position. Mythical rates include “Chief Brownnose” and “Brow Nose First Class”. Also known as a ”Butt Shark”.

Brown Shoe: Term used to describe aviation community officers and senior enlisted members, due to the dark brown footwear worn with khaki uniforms and aviation winter working green uniforms.

Brown Trout: Occurs when some Hull Tech blasts the sewer lines, causing raw sewage to be disbursed onto the decks of lower level berthing areas. Called that for the fact the turds could look like a rumpled brown fish.

Brown Water: Shallow water close to land; littoral water in which smaller ships can operate. Sometimes specifically: the portion of Vietnam where Navy patrol boats operated.

Brown Water Navy (Sailor): Any Sailor who operates a small boat in inshore areas.

Brown Water Puddle Pirate: Affectionate name given to the US Coast Guard by their brethren blue water sailors.

Bubble (or The Bubble):

1. The edge of passing or failing at something, or “the fence”: when someone is on the edge of passing or failing at something, or is undecided, that person is “on the bubble”.

2. (Submarine Service) The indication of the ship's angle fore and aft. The Diving Officer of the Watch (DOOW, pronounced “Dive”) controls the angle on the ship by various means. The original ship's angle gages were liquid filled glass tubes with an air bubble that indicated the trim angle. If the angle becomes too large, he will be ordered “mind your bubble”. In rough weather near the surface, maintaining the angle on the ship can be very difficult. When the Dive can no longer control the angle on the ship by the means at his disposal, he is said to have “lost the bubble”.

3. The area on an aircraft carrier where the Catapult Launch Officer sits. So called because it is raised only a few inches above the flight deck and has angled windows.

4. (In the expressions “have the bubble” and “lose the bubble”) A grasp of the situation; understanding or control of what is going on.

Bubblegummer: A newbie or young sailor just out of boot camp or school.

Bubblehead: A sailor in the Submarine service..

Just for you MARINE

Brass:

1. Shell casings;

2. Uniform insignia;

3. Senior officers (cf. rank insignia);

4. BRASS) USMC shooting technique: Breathe, Relax, Aim, Slack, Squeeze.;

Break-off Session: Extraordinarily strenuous or tiring physical activity; usually Physical Training (PT).

Brig: Military prison on ship or ashore.

Brig Rat: Marine who has served much brig time; also used to refer to the 5831 MOS Marines who serve as corrections specialists (guards).

Broke-dick: Any person who does not perform up to standards, or a sorry piece of equipment.

Naval Aviation Squadron Nicknames

Special Projects Patrol Squadron TWO (VPU-2) - nicknamed the “Wizards”

United States Navy - Special Projects Patrol Squadron, Marine Corps Base Hawaii, Kaneohe Bay - Established July 1, 1982.

Where Did That Saying Come From?

“Dead Ringer:”  Meaning: An exact duplicate.

History: We use phrases all the time without really giving their meaning a great deal of thought. You may well know that dead ringer means exact duplicate, but why is that? To a non-English speaker the two terms appear to have nothing in common. So, why dead; why ringer?

Let's first dispense with the nonsensical idea that's sometimes put forward as the origin of this phrase, that is, that it refers to people who were prematurely buried and who pulled on bell ropes that were attached to their coffins in order to attract attention. This popular fallacy seems to have been encouraged by the erroneous belief that 'dead ringers' are saved by the bell. In fact, there is no connection between the two expressions - and neither of them have anything to do with coffins.

So, what is the origin of 'dead ringer'. Let's answer in two parts - why dead and why ringer?

A ringer is a horse substituted for another of similar appearance in order to defraud the bookies. This word originated in the US horse-racing fraternity at the end of the 19th century. The word is defined for us in a copy of the Manitoba Free Press from October 1882:

“A horse that is taken through the country and trotted under a false name and pedigree is called a 'ringer.'”

It has since been adopted into the language to mean any very close duplicate. As a verb, 'ring' has long been used to mean 'exchange/substitute' in a variety of situations, most of them illegal. From the same period is the term 'ring castors', meaning to surreptitiously exchange hats. Castors, or casters, were hats made from beaver fur. From the 20th century we have the Australian phrase, 'ring in the gray (or knob)', meaning to substitute a double-sided penny for a genuine one. Coming more up to date we have 'car ringing', which is the replacing of the identification numbers on a stolen car with those from a genuine (usually scrapped) vehicle.

So, that's ringer; what about dead? Dead, in the sense of lifeless, is so commonly used that we tend to ignore its other meanings. The meaning that's relevant here is exact or precise. This is demonstrated in many phrases; 'dead shot', 'dead centre', 'dead heat', etc.

So, 'dead ringer' is literally the same as 'exact duplicate'. It first came into use soon after the word ringer itself, in the U.S. at the end of the 19th century. The earliest reference I can find that confirms the 'exact duplicate' meaning is from the Oshkosh Weekly Times, June 1888, in a court report of a man charged with being 'very drunk':

“Dat ar is a markable semlance be shoo”, said Hart looking critically at the picture. “Dat's a dead ringer fo me. I nebber done see such a semblence.”

See also saved by the bell and graveyard shift.

Phrases.org UK

Science & Technology

Here's Our First Look at the Sun's North Pole (No spacecraft with a camera has ever flown over the Sun's north pole to take a photo, so scientists had to make one the hard way) • For Motor Oil, How Old Is Too Old? (It's been in the ground for 100 million years. What's six more months?) • There Could Be Hundreds of Interstellar Asteroids Lurking in Our Solar System • Watch NASA's OSIRIS-REx Rendezvous With an Asteroid • It Turns Out the Interstellar Visitor 'Oumuamua Is Just a Little Guy (NASA has gotten its best shot at learning about the interstellar oddity. Here's what it knows) • Scientists Find Dwarf Planet 'The Goblin' Lurking in the Outer Solar System • Where and When to Watch the Leonid Meteor Shower This Weekend

Popular Mechanics

Bizarre News (we couldn’t make up stuff this good – real news story)

Young Seals Keep Getting Eels Stuck Up Their Noses, and Nobody Knows Why

The Hawaiian Monk Seal Research Program released a photo of a poor Hawaiian monk seal, squinting in what can only be a what-is-my-life look, with a probably-also-distressed eel stuck up its nose.

This phenomenon, eels getting stuck in seals' noses, is rare; the team has observed only three or four cases of eel-nose in the past four decades, said Charles Littnan, a monk seal conservation biologist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Fisheries. But weirdly, the incidence has been increasing in the past couple of years. “In almost 40 years of monitoring, we have actually never observed this until a few years ago”, Littnan said. [Gallery: Seals of the World]

Oddly, it seems to always be in the right nostril, but “I don't really think that means anything», Littnan told Live Science. This whole situation could just be a “weird anomaly” or a “crazy statistical quirk, and we may never see it again”, he added. “We have no idea why it's happening.”

As to how the eel gets stuck, Littnan has several ideas. The monk seals feed on or near the bottom of the ocean, because they're “very efficient” and “don't like to chase things in the water”, he said. So, they go for the food, like eels, whose strategy is to hide.

Monk seals nose around in coral reefs, root around in the sand, and flip over 50-lb. (22 kilograms) rocks to grab hiding octopuses, Littnan said. While the unfortunate, recently photographed seal was doing this, an eel could have, in a case of self-defense, "rammed itself into the nostril and maybe got stuck," Littnan said.

Or if the seal brought the eel out to the surface to eat the prey, the eel could have whipped around and got into the nose, Littnan said. Since this phenomenon has been observed only in juvenile seals, Littnan said it could also just be that the seals are inexperienced at hunting.

Or, just like in the YouTube videos where people sneeze and spit up long strands of pasta through their noses, the seal could have regurgitated an eel that it ate, with the eel coming out the wrong pipe, Littnan said.

In this case, a relatively small part of the eel is in the nose, which “leads me to thinking that the eel forced itself in while trying to escape”, Littnan said. In some other cases, the researchers have seen, in which around 2 feet (0.6 meters) of the eel was stuck the seal's nose, the seals must have regurgitated the prey, Littnan said.

If that had been the case with this seal, the animal probably could have gotten rid of the eel on its own by shaking its head around. But the eel may have gotten deeper into the nose, preventing the seal from removing the invader. An eel in the nose may be bad, but a rotting eel in the nose would be even worse; bacteria from the rotting flesh could have infected the animal, Littnan said. Also, seals' nostrils close automatically when the animals go under water, and having an eel in there could have hindered that process, closing off an all-around great day for the seal with some water up the nose.

In every instance of eel-nose, including this one, the researchers have removed the eel successfully. The seals were all fine, but the eels did not make it, according to the scientists' post.

Hawaiian monk seals are among the most endangered seals on the planet, with only about 1,400 of them living in Hawaii. But recent years have shown “encouraging developments”, according to NOAA Fisheries. The seals' numbers have increased, even though these little creatures always “find unique ways to get themselves into trouble”, Littnan said.

Live Science (12/06/2018)