Rao bulletin 15 June 2016 html edition this bulletin contains the following articles
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- Boxer Rebellion ► 116 th Anniversary
- This group of Marines was part of the international relief expedition sent lift the siege of Peking
- WWII Battles QA (3) ► Questions
- Military History Anniversaries ► 16 thru 30 JUN
- WWII Battles QA (3) ► Answers 1. Answer
- D-Day ► Forgotten Black Heroes
- Waverly Bernard Woodson, Jr.
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Arnold was now at the height of his fame, yet eight short months later he made his approach to the British. He was rewarded very well for his services and received land for himself and his family to live on in Canada. He tried to become a ship merchant, but they had no use for a cripple. He never found an actual job, but he did not live much longer so his reward money sufficed until he died. What prompted him to do so? While we will probably never know for sure, we can draw inferences from two major events which affected him deeply. In February 1777, Congress announced the promotion of five new major generals. Arnold's name was not among them. To make matters worse for a man of his sensitivities, all five men on the list had been brigadier generals a shorter time than he had, and none equaled his military achievements. Although, at the urging of Washington, he was eventually promoted and his date of rank adjusted, it took months of haggling in Congress to accomplish, convincing Arnold that certain members of that body would always view him with disfavor. After Saratoga, Arnold's wounded leg was slow to heal. He limped noticeably, could not mount a horse, and was generally unfit for military campaigning. Partly for this reason, Washington appointed him as military commander of Philadelphia, giving his leg time to mend. His high living and questionable financial dealings while in this position soon aroused the attention, and later the ire of Joseph Reed, President of the Executive Council of Pennsylvania. In February 1779, Reed published eight charges against Arnold, and in March a Congressional committee recommended court-martial on two of them. In May, without waiting for the court to convene, Benedict Arnold offered his services to the British. Arnold received a commission with the British army and served in several minor engagements against the Americans. Over the many years since that fateful day in September 1780 when his treachery was discovered, there has been no mercy for Benedict Arnold in either the hearts or in the minds of his countrymen. He has been vilified by the press, in books, and in the halls of learning from grade school to university. His very name has become synonymous with treason. But perhaps it is finally time to take a more moderate view, to recognize that there were two Benedict Arnolds. In judging him, we should rightly condemn The Traitor, but can we not also remember The Patriot? [Source: Trgrthrt We Served | Richard McMahon | December 2015 ++] ******************************** Boxer Rebellion ► 116th Anniversary The U.S. Marine Corps landed in China 116 years ago on May 31, 1900. An expeditionary force of 56 Marines and sailors arrived in Beijing to protect the U.S. diplomatic mission in the face of mounting militia attacks in what would be known as the Boxer Rebellion. Over a brutal 55-day siege, the Marines would fend off repeated assaults through dense urban terrain by militias and Chinese government forces determined to wipe them out. "The Americans who have been besieged in Peking desire to express their hearty appreciation of the courage, fidelity and patriotism of the American Marines, to whom we so largely owe our salvation," a group of American missionaries wrote in the aftermath of the battle, according to the National Archives. "By their bravery in holding an almost untenable position in the face of overwhelming numbers, and in cooperating in driving the Chinese from a position of great strength, they made all foreigners in Peking their debtors, and have gained for themselves an honorable name among the heroes of their country." 
This group of Marines was part of the international relief expedition sent lift the siege of Peking Over the previous year, local militias — known as "Boxers" — had launched a wave of violence in northern China against foreigners and Chinese Christians. When their attention turned to foreigners in the diplomatic quarter in Beijing, called "Peking" at the time, the Americans there telegraphed a distress call for military support. Two Marine detachments aboard the nearby Navy battleship Oregon and cruiser Newark immediately heeded the call and, along with approximately 350 foreign troops, disembarked and quickly established a defensive perimeter to prepare for an onslaught of the armed militants. Two weeks later, British Vice Adm. Sir Edward Seymour hastily assembled a second multinational force, including 112 more Marines and sailors, and attempted to move on Beijing. They were repulsed, but the imperial Chinese government saw their march as an unprovoked act of war and promptly sided with the Boxer militia, joining them to assault the Beijing defenders. U.S. and German Marines occupied the most crucial piece of real estate for the fight: the massive, 45-foot high Tartar Wall on the southern end of the diplomatic quarter, which offered a clear line of sight over the battle. The Chinese pounded them with a constant barrage of artillery and small arms fire, and built a network of barricades inching closer and closer to assault the wall. On July 2, the Germans were forced off and the Chinese advanced to within a few feet of the wall. It was then that the Marines attacked. At 2 a.m. in a blinding downpour, Capt. John Twiggs Myers led the Marines and a handful of British and Russian troops to charge the Chinese positions. Bewildered, the Chinese forces broke and fled to barricades hundreds of yards away, never attempting to attack the wall again. Meanwhile, a coalition of the willing scrambled to launch a proper relief of the city, with troops from Germany, Austria-Hungary, Japan, Russia, the British Empire, France and Italy joining the Americans to form the China Relief Expedition. On Aug. 4, the 18,000-strong force stepped off from Tianjin to begin the 80-mile march on Beijing. It took them 10 days to reach the besieged defenders. The Boxers and Imperial Chinese forces were defeated, and a peace accord was signed in September 1901, with hefty reparations put on the Chinese. A total of 1,151 enlisted Marines and 49 officers participated in the Boxer Rebellion, according to the National Archives. Of these, 33 Marines received the Medal of Honor, including Pvt. Harry Fisher, the first Marine posthumously awarded the nation’s highest military honor. Three officers would also become commandants of the Marine Corps: Gens. William Biddle, Wendell Neville and Ben Fuller. [Source: Marine Corps Times | Matthew L. Schehl | May 31, 2016 ++] ******************************** WWII Battles Q&A (3) ► Questions 1. The invasion of which country is also known as the September Campaign, and also marks the beginning of WWII? Poland |Bulgaria | Italy | France 2. Which country withstood a German invasion for the second longest period of time, after the Soviet Union? Norway | Greece | South Africa | Poland 3. What was the name of the US Chief of Staff during WWII, who although he never personally led troops in combat, he picked or recommended the top commands including Eisenhower, Devers, Patton, and McNair? Keith Park | George Marshall | Georgy Zhukov | Edmund Herring 4. In which battle did Germany use submarines to devastating effect by cutting off Britain's supply routes? Siege of Calais | Battle of Bloody Gulch | Battle of El Agheila | Battle of the Atlantic 5. What was the codename for the Allied invasion of Sicily, a major campaign of WWII which started the Italian Campaign? Battle of Mechili | Operation Husky | Operation Queen | Battle of the North Cape 6. What was the name of the 1942-1943 major battle along the Eastern Front for control of a Southern Russian city? Battle of Stalingrad | Battle of Kollaa | Battle of Tarakan | Battle of Tassafaronga 7. Which of the following is NOT a WWII battle in the New Guinea campaign? Battle of Wau | Huon Peninsula campaign | Battle of the Bismarck Sea | Second Battle of Kharkov 8. Which battle saw one of the first major uses of paratroopers to occupy crucial targets prior to ground troops reaching the area? Battle of the Netherlands | Battle of Normandy | Operation Goodwood | Siege of Warsaw 9. Beginning three months after the outbreak of WWII, where did the so-called "Winter War" take place? Italy | Finland | Albania | Philippines 10. What was the name of the operation used to mislead the German high command about the date and place of the Normandy invasion? Operation Slapstick | Operation Compass | Operation Bodyguard |Operation Pugilist 11. Which battle inspired Churchill's famous speech including the phrase, "Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duties, and so bear ourselves that, if the British Empire and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years, men will still say, "This was their finest hour"? Battle of France | Battle of Britain | Battle of Cherbourg | Siege of Bastogne [Source: http://www.zoo.com/quiz/world-war-ii-battles | May 2016 ++] ******************************** Military History Anniversaries ► 16 thru 30 JUN Significant events in U.S. Military History over the next 15 days are listed in the attachment to this Bulletin titled, “Military History Anniversaries 16 thru 30 JUN”. [Source: This Day in History http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history | June 2016 ++] ******************************** WWII Battles Q&A (3) ► Answers 1. Answer: The German invasion began on September 1, 1939, one week after the signing of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, while the Soviet invasion commenced on September 17 following the Molotov-Tōgō agreement. After the Polish defeat at the Battle of Kock, German and Soviet forces gained full control over Poland and the success of the invasion marked the end of the Second Polish Republic, although Poland never formally surrendered. 2. Answer: The Norwegian Campaign, between April 9 to June 10, 1940, was fought in Norway between the Allies and Germany. In April, the United Kingdom and France came to Norway's aid with an expeditionary force. Despite moderate success in the northern parts of Norway, Germany's invasion of France in May eventually compelled the Allies to withdraw and the Norwegian government to seek exile in London. The campaign ended with the occupation of Norway by Germany, and the continued fighting of exiled Norwegian forces from abroad. 3. Answer: To support WWII efforts Marshall organized the largest military expansion in U.S. history, inheriting an outmoded, poorly equipped army of 189,000 men and, partly drawing from his experience teaching and developing techniques of modern warfare as an instructor at the Army War College, coordinated the large-scale expansion and modernization of the U.S. Army. 4. Answer: Because shipping was vital to supply Britain with food, raw material, and fuel, the strategy in the Battle of the Atlantic leveraged submarines smartly. However, while U-boats destroyed a significant number of ships, the strategy ultimately failed. Although the U-boats had been updated in the interwar years, the major innovation was improved communications, encrypted using the famous Enigma cipher machine. This allowed for mass-attack naval tactics (Rudeltaktik, commonly known as "wolfpack"), but was also ultimately the U-boats' downfall. By the end of the war, almost 3,000 Allied ships (175 warships, 2,825 merchantmen) had been sunk by U-boats. 5. Answer: The Allied invasion of Sicily was a major WWII campaign in which the Allies performed a large amphibious and airborne operation into Sicily, followed by a six-week land campaign. This also marked the beginning of the Italian Campaign. Beginning on the night of July 9, 1943 and lasting through August 17, Husky achieved the goals set out for it by driving Axis air, land and naval forces from the island and opening the Mediterranean sea lanes merchant ships for the first time since 1941. Benito Mussolini was toppled from power in Italy and the way was opened for the invasion of Italy. 6. Answer: Marked by constant close quarters combat and direct assaults on civilians by air raids, the Battle of Stalingrad is often regarded as one of the single largest (nearly 2.2 million personnel) and bloodiest (1.7 – 2 million wounded, killed or captured) battles in the history of warfare. The heavy losses inflicted on the German Wehrmacht make it arguably the most strategically decisive battle of the whole war. It was a turning point in the European theater of WWII and German forces never regained the initiative in the East. 7. Answer: Second Battle of Kharkov. The New Guinea campaign resulted in a crushing defeat and very heavy losses for Japan. As in most Pacific War campaigns, disease and starvation claimed more Japanese lives than enemy action. Most Japanese troops never even came into contact with Allied forces, and were instead simply cut off and subjected to an extremely effective blockade by the US Navy. Garrisons were effectively besieged and denied shipments of food and medical supplies, and as a result, a staggering 97% of Japanese deaths in this campaign were from non-combat causes. 8. Answer: The Battle of the Netherlands lasted from May 10, 1940 until the main Dutch forces surrendered on the 14th. Dutch troops in the province of Zealand continued to resist the Wehrmacht until May 17 when Germany completed its occupation of the whole nation. The German Luftwaffe used paratroopers in the capture of several major airfields in the Netherlands in and around key cities such as Rotterdam and The Hague in order to quickly overrun the nation and immobilize Dutch forces. The battle ended soon after the terrible bombing of Rotterdam and the threat by Germans of additional such bombings. 9. Answer: The Soviet Union ostensibly sought to claim parts of Finnish territory, demanding that Finland cede substantial border territories in exchange for land elsewhere, claiming security reasons and the protection of Leningrad, only 20 mi (32 km) from the Finnish border. When Finland refused, the USSR invaded the country. 10. Answer: Operation Bodyguard was the code name for an Allied deception plan before the 1944 invasion of north-west Europe. It was intended to mislead the German high command and it delayed German reinforcements to the region for some time after D-Day. The Allies had already employed deception operations against the Germans, aided by the capture of all of the German agents in the United Kingdom and the systematic decryption of German Enigma communications. 11. Answer: The Battle of Britain has an unusual distinction in that it gained its name prior to being fought, since it is derived from this famous speech delivered by Prime Minister Winston Churchill in the House of Commons on June 18, 1940, more than three weeks prior to the generally accepted date for the start of the battle. [Source: http://www.zoo.com/quiz/world-war-ii-battles | May 2016 ++] ******************************** D-Day ► Forgotten Black Heroes 
The sky was thick with smoke and haze on the morning of June 6, 1944, when an explosion rocked a boat packed tight with American troops within sight of Omaha Beach. Wedged among the five dozen men was a 21-year-old pre-med student from West Philadelphia named Waverly Bernard Woodson, Jr. He was one of five medics assigned to the 320th Barrage Balloon Battalion, the only African-American combat to participate in the Normandy landings. The U.S. Army was segregated during World War II, meaning the 320th was all black except for the top officers, who were white. Moments before a shell hit Woodson’s landing craft, a mine had knocked out the engine. The second blast felled troops like matchsticks. Shrapnel killed the man beside Woodson, whose own extremities burned. He reached down and brought up a hand covered in blood. “I am dying,” he thought. A fellow medic slapped dressings on his buttocks and thigh as the helpless craft drifted to a stop. For the next 30 hours, Woodson worked through his pain to save lives. An Army news release credits him with treating 200 men. Other accounts put that figure higher. He pulled the drowning to safety. He patched wounds, pulled out bullets and dispensed blood plasma. He amputated a right foot. When he thought he could do no more, he resuscitated four drowning men. Then he collapsed. Woodson was nominated for the Medal of Honor, the nation’s ultimate symbol of heroism. He never got it. Instead, the medic was given the Bronze Star, the fourth-highest award for bravery. It would be another half century until an African American received the Medal of Honor for his service during World War II. There was another soldier whose heroics on D-Day were strikingly similar to Woodson’s. Private Carlton William Barrett landed on Omaha Beach with the First Infantry Division under intense fire. He plunged into the surf and repeatedly dragged drowning men to safety. For his service, Barrett was awarded the Medal of Honor in October 1944. “He arose as a leader in the stress of the occasion,” his citation reads. To rate the top honor, a soldier must distinguish himself “conspicuously in actual conflict with the enemy.” Private Barrett was not a medic. He was assigned to an intelligence and reconnaissance platoon. It was not his job to save the dying. Perhaps the Army commanders who considered Woodson for the Medal of Honor decided that the medic, though wounded, was merely doing his job on June 6, 1944. Or maybe there was another reason. An independent panel of researchers commissioned by the Army in 1993 to investigate why none of the more than 1 million African Americans who served in World War II received the Medal of Honor found no records to indicate that any had been nominated for the high award. They concluded that failure to acknowledge soldiers of color “most definitely lay in the racial climate and practice within the Army.” Their findings prompted President Bill Clinton in January 1997 to present the Medal of Honor to seven black men who served in World War II. Only one of them was still living to shake the President’s hand. “History has been made whole today,” President Clinton said. Not exactly. The researchers said they couldn’t recommend other soldiers of color whose service records were missing. Among them was Waverly Woodson. Comparatively few Army records from World War II still exist—as government archivists like to tell frustrated researchers—and the majority of records housed at the Army’s Personnel Records Center in St. Louis, Missouri, were destroyed in a 1973 fire. Yet during the five years I researched the stories of Waverly Woodson and other men from his battalion, I found an intriguing document revealing that the young man from Philly was nominated for the Medal of Honor. An unsigned note addressed to “Jonathan” says that Woodson’s commanding officer had recommended him for the Distinguished Service Cross, the second-highest decoration. But the writer adds that the office of U.S. Gen John C.H. Lee in Britain believed Woodson deserved better—the Medal of Honor—and the recommendation was changed to reflect the higher award. The next part of the note betrays the toxic racial climate that existed for African Americans serving in the U.S. Army. “Here is a Negro from Philadelphia who has been recommended for a suitable award. This is a big enough award that the President can give it personally, as he has in the case of some white boys.” The note was almost certainly written by Philleo Nash, an official in the Office of War Information, who maintained a prolific correspondence with Jonathan Daniels, an aide to President Franklin D. Roosevelt. A bulging file of their missives can be found at the Harry S. Truman Presidential Library in Independence, Missouri, which is where I saw it. The Army-commissioned investigators also saw the Nash note, which they concluded was “hearsay,” as one of them told me, and not proof enough of Woodson’s valor on a day replete with heroism. Indeed, the bar was higher on Omaha Beach compared with other wartime battles. Only four Medals of Honor and 214 Distinguished Service Crosses were awarded for valor on D-Day. 
Waverly Bernard Woodson, Jr. In the Navy, one African American received a high award, though not the highest. Doris “Dorie” Miller was the first hero of World War II—even before the United States officially went to war. The messman was collecting dirty laundry aboard the USS West Virginia in Pearl Harbor when the Japanese surprised the Americans on Dec. 7, 1941. After his ship was hit, Mr. Miller helped drag the mortally wounded captain off the bridge, then jumped behind an antiaircraft gun that he had never been trained to use and fired at enemy planes until he ran out of ammo. Navy regulations forbade artillery training for African Americans, yet Mr. Miller, the son of a Texas sharecropper, “was blazing away as though he had fired one all his life,” an officer said later. The black press campaigned for a Medal of Honor for Mr. Miller, whose rank was cook third class. He eventually received the Navy Cross, which was at that time the third-highest award (today it is the second-highest). In the case of Waverly Woodson, the record of the young medic’s heroics extended beyond Army documents. In fact, in the summer of 1944, the shy pre-med student became a star. Woodson’s story trails into June 7, 1944, when he performed one last act of bravery, saving four floundering soldiers whose guide rope broke as they were coming ashore. Then he collapsed. Woodson was taken to a hospital ship where he was treated for his injuries. Three days later, he asked to go back to the beach. News of the medic’s heroics spread far beyond the beach. Newspaper reporters interviewed him. Back home, a black newspaper hailed him as “No. 1 invasion hero.” Stars and Stripes wrote that Woodson and the medics “covered themselves with glory on D-Day.” Under pressure to acknowledge the good deeds of black soldiers, the Army issued a news release, dated August 28, 1944, that singled out “a story of a modest Negro American’s heroism.” The release said Woodson was “cited by his commanding officer for extraordinary bravery on D-Day.” After Woodson returned home in late 1944, he was invited to recount his adventures in a nationwide radio broadcast. His proud father compiled all of the plaudits in a fat scrapbook that Waverly Woodson’s wife of 53 years, Joann, keeps close at hand in Clarksburg, Md. Waverly Woodson, who left the Army as a staff sergeant, died on August 12, 2005. His grave is at Arlington National Cemetery, where American buries its heroes. His family has started a petition drive to obtain for him the Medal of Honor. U.S. Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) has appealed to the Army to recommend Waverly Woodson for the Medal of Honor. In June 2015, President Barack Obama awarded the Medal of Honor to an African-American soldier who fought ferociously in the trenches of France during World War I. Sgt. Henry Johnson, a member of the legendary 369th Infantry Regiment—the Harlem Hellfighters—was the Waverly Woodson of his day. Johnson was lauded by reporters who covered in gripping detail his heroics on a lonely night in May 1918 when he single-handedly fought off a party of German raiders, left with only a bolo knife after his other weaponry was spent. Though he earned the nickname “Black Death” and praise from awestruck white reporters, Johnson won the French Croix de Guerre but never an American Purple Heart, which would have entitled him to disability benefits. He never healed from his battlefield injuries, and died 11 years later in poverty. At a ceremony at the White House, President Obama paid tribute to a fallen, long-forgotten hero. “It is never too late,” he said, “to say thank you.” [Source: The Daily Beast | Linda Hervieux | June 5, 2016 ++] ******************************** Directory: wp-content -> uploads -> 2016 2016 -> 2017 afoCo Landmark Scholarship Program 2016 -> Instructions for the Preparation of Camera-Ready Contributions to the Conference Proceedings 2016 -> Step student Scholarships for Year 10-13 2016 -> The united church of canada 2016 -> Idan raichel biography – May 2016 Brief Producer, keyboardist, Lyricist, composer and Performer Idan Raichel 2016 -> An introduction to centre’s interventions expanding access to justice 2016 -> Sanchar Shakti 2016 -> Unit analysis should help here. We want number of bananas 2016 -> The Autobiography of Elder Joseph Bates 2016 -> The Great Heat and the Rhode Island Deep Water Bay Scallop (Argopecten irradians) Fishery 1875-1905 Download 0.91 Mb. Share with your friends:
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