BREAKING: Incomprehensible Shouting Named Official U.S. Language

Full coverage tonight at 10/9c on IFC TV. Congress has deemed yelling and screaming as the nation's official mode of communication.

"Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice" Review

https://wktw.blogspot.com/2016/03/batman-v-superman-dawn-of-justice-review.html

Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice is a superhero film that has been in production for several years, with its controversial cast being announced all the way back in the fall of 2013. Since then, due to the hiring of Chris Terrio to help write the screenplay, the film was pushed back a full year to fully realize the greatness that is America's two biggest superhero icons duking it out to the death. The film is directed by Zack Snyder (Watchmen, Man of Steel, 300, Sucker Punch), written by Chris Terrio (Argo) and David S. Goyer (Batman Begins, Blade), and stars Ben Affleck as Bruce Wayne/Batman, Henry Cavill as Clark Kent/Superman, Gal Gadot was Wonder Woman, Jeremy Irons as Alfred, Amy Adams as Lois Lane, and Jesse Eisenberg as Lex Luthor. Laurence Fishburne, Diane Lane, and Holly Hunter play other characters. The story centers on the controversy in Metropolis surrounding the man-god Kryptonian savior Superman in the aftermath of the events of 2013's Man of Steel, a film that was lambasted for compromising its protagonist's heroic image with his blind destruction of the vast majority of the city in the name of beating up one dude he didn't like, resulting in thousands of civilian casualties and probably a couple 9/11's worth of property damage. This was a problem that Batman v. Superman promised to address, as Bruce Wayne/Batman, resident and vigilante protector of the neighboring and similarly crime-ridden Gotham City, sees the destruction firsthand, and thinks Superman is flaunting a lot of unchecked power and posing as a hero without understanding the consequences of his other-worldly power. The United States government seems to agree with Batman on this one, as a Kentucky senator is trying to propose (incredibly vague) restrictions on Superman's hero activity. Superman has problems with the Bat as well, criticizing his vigilante justice practices. So, they have a little spat. Add a ton of other shit and you have this movie.

Batman v. Superman is an absolute mess. I want to make that clear from the get-go. Let me first, though, say the things that this movie does well (don't worry, this won't take long). First of all, the casting of Ben Affleck, which three years ago seemed to some as a sin against humanity, ends up being the most reliably good thing in this movie. Affleck brings his A-game, as does Irons as his assistant Alfred, who provides all two of the amusing parts of the entire movie. The cinematography has Zack Snyder's signature touch, in that it's dark and often very pretty, and yes, there is ample slow-mo. The action sequences are hit or miss (more on that later), but a number of them are fairly well-done, curiously all of them having Batman at their center. Not only is Batman an inherently more interesting and malleable character, but also seems to make for much more compelling action. The actual fight with Superman is suitably tense and pretty exciting, as are the scenes, both real and imagined, of Batman throwing down with armored baddies - even if they are a tad excessive in brutality. The score is also decent, even if the choir sections are pretty ridiculous.

The film, probably thanks to having one-half of its writing team be a pretty good screenwriter (Terrio), does have a story that lends itself to some themes that are interesting on paper, and are what primarily got me excited about the movie in the first place. The idea of essentially an indestructible god being among humankind and how mankind would deal with that is inherently intriguing, as is the theme of what limits should be placed on and what litigation should be allowed in regards to the activities of superhumans (although this idea was much better examined already in The Incredibles). Especially in the first half of the movie, these themes are given some light as we get to know the motivations behind Batman and Superman and try to understand their philosophical squabble. This is where the list of the good things about the movie ends. On to the excrement.

Now, like I just said, this movie's story, when handled well, lends itself to some inherently very thought provoking themes regarding the relation between gods and men, conflicting ideas of justice, and the political implications of a superhero in the modern world. The first 100 minutes or so of this movie are largely action-free and are almost entirely devoted to setting up these ideas. The remaining 50 minutes are mostly allocated toward brainless, poorly put together action sequences underscored by character decisions that not only completely bury any semblance of cohesion or conclusiveness to the themes harped on so aggressively in the first act, but also actively make these themes make no sense at all.

One of the most intriguing things about BvS's premise was its seeming legitimizing of the mind-numbing pointless cataclysm at the climax of Man of Steel. It almost covered up for one of that movie's biggest flaws by making it the starting point for the entire plot, seeing as how Batman sees that destruction as reason enough to try and destroy Superman. Unfortunately, the ethical codes of these characters are completely muddled and nonsensical in the last two-thirds of the movie. Batman suddenly becomes a vicious, remorseless murderer despite his claims for superhero accountability for collateral damage, and Superman (with the help of Batman and the two minutes Wonder Woman pretends to matter on screen) causes and/or facilitates arguably even wider destruction and casualties in his "heroic" efforts, yet these are conveniently glossed over. Lex Luthor had the opportunity to have an interesting motivation regarding his borderline atheism and fear of a godlike creature, but it ends up getting lost in Jesse Eisenberg's weird, twitchy monologues that end up coming off goofy instead of menacing the majority of the time. When your main villain's haunting final scene gets laughs from the audience, your villain is not working.

All of these motivations and themes are completely devoid of cohesion, and the film instead elects partway through to pull a complete 180 from a tense, dark, outwardly political (not necessarily good) superhero movie to a loud, obnoxious video game. My mind has become completely numb to almost all computer generated imagery, and yet these superhero movies seem to be having a contest to one-up each other with how many virtual fireworks displays they can shoehorn to the film's climax. The already pretty muddled and empty attempts at depth made in BvS are made even more shallow and pointless as the third act tries scene by scene to best itself by how much shit it can clutter the frame with. The inky Instagram filter lighting, break-neck editing, and smudgy punk rock color palette turn the majority of the latter half's action sequences into pure sensory overload, and by the end the action had become so tensionless and numbing to me that I was really just waiting for the credits to start because I'd already basically decided how I felt about the movie.

If the irksomely under-realized thematic material wasn't enough to drag the already thin plot to its knees, there's also the fact that Snyder's self-indulgent slow-motion and inclusion of repeats of pretty imagery we saw before bloat the already insultingly huge running time even further, and the one potentially risky story move toward the end (and also the only thing about the entire movie not shown in the trailer) is completely negated in the sequel-guaranteeing final shot. Oh yeah, we also have some sequels to set up for, which results in a number of incredibly rushed, forced, and groan-inducing flash-forwards to the Justice League that honestly felt really hammy. Remember how Age of Ultron was like the middle-point movie for the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and had to kind of move all one thousand of its characters' stories along by like an inch so they can each have their own movie, and as a result it was kind of a big jumbly mess? Yeah, well the DC Cinematic Universe has already had that movie now and we're only two movies in, which is not a promising foundation for your dozen-odd-film meta-franchise.

Speaking of the Marvel movies, let's use them as a means of illustrating what is probably the biggest surface-level problem with this movie - it's not fun. At the very least, Age of Ultron was quippy, fast-paced, and had some characters we liked. Even if the action grew tiresome, the thought-provoking themes weren't explored very well, and it was kind of overstuffed and overlong, at the very least I can say it's a fast, fun movie to sit through. Batman v Superman tries to take a page from the Nolan Batman trilogy and take superhero stories more seriously, but somehow translates that into making the film overly grim, dark, and completely devoid of fun - yes, Batman v Superman makes Christopher Nolan seem subtle by comparison. Besides some small quips by Alfred (which seem super out of place within the rest of the movie), the only fun things are the cool action bits the trailers spoiled for us and unintentionally funny lines by the villain. Especially after seeing a movie like Deadpool, it's really hard watching a superhero movie that doesn't just take itself seriously, but is just brooding and dull and dreary. It's dudes in spandex punching a swamp demon. You're not directing fucking Hamlet, Zack Snyder. Have some fun with it.

Overall, Batman v Superman raised my expectations in its first act with some clever writing and themes and even some good action sequences, then proceeded to instead deliver exactly what the trailers made me believe beforehand that I would get, and also usurped all fun and advertised future movies in the process, all while completely ditching its potential to be powerful and drowning it in an incoherent, inconclusive 40-minute eyefuck. This movie isn't complete shit. It's just a blockbuster that tries to be ambitious, gives up, then tries to go by the numbers, and then gets the numbers wrong. Good thing I'm not a comic book fan so I only see this as a shitty movie and not some kind of act of sacrilege.

On my way out of the theater, I saw a 12-year-old girl walking out next to me that had a Batman shirt on that said, "That was probably the best movie I've ever seen." And that's a pretty good way to look at it. This movie will probably satiate the hunger of the least demanding of die-hard comic fans, and will probably give Zack Snyder fans a huge boner to add to his trophy room, but if you don't fit in one of those categories, I don't think it's worth the trip to the theater. Just wait for Civil War like I'm doing.

Grade: C-

Now listening to Big Bad Noise by Choirboys and Diana & Marvin by Diana Ross & Marvin Gaye...

Just finished watching Murphy's Romance (1985) and Raintree County (1957)...

Metroid Retrospective Part 3

Samus breaks free from two dimensions and confronts a new villain!

The impeachment crisis and US war plans against Russia

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2019/12/31/pers-d31.html

With each passing day of the impeachment crisis, the distance between the official reasons for the conflict in Washington and the real reasons grows wider.

It has become increasingly clear that the central issue is not Trump’s attempt to “solicit interference from a foreign country” by “pressuring a foreign country to investigate one of the president’s main domestic political rivals,” as alleged in the whistleblower complaint that triggered the impeachment inquiry.

Rather, the conflict raging within the state centers on Trump’s decision to temporarily delay a massive weapons shipment to Ukraine.

The ferocity with which the entire US national security apparatus responded to the delay raises the question: Is there a timetable for using these weapons in combat to fight a war against Russia?

A New York Times front-page exposé published Monday, coming in at 5,000 words and bearing six bylines, makes it clear that Trump’s decision to withhold military aid—over a month before his phone call with Ukrainian President Zelensky—triggered the conflict that led to the president’s impeachment.

As the Times reports, “Mr. Trump’s order to hold $391 million worth of sniper rifles, rocket-propelled grenades, night vision goggles, medical aid and other equipment the Ukrainian military needed to fight a grinding war against Russian-backed separatists would help pave a path to the president’s impeachment.”

The newspaper states that Trump decided to hold up the distribution of military aid to Ukraine on June 19 after he read a news article saying that the “Pentagon would pay for weapons and other military equipment for Ukraine, bringing American security aid to the country to $1.5 billion since 2014.”

Trump’s action sparked a “fiery internal debate,” according to the Times, leading to an intervention by the “national security team” arrayed in a “united front” around National Security Advisor John Bolton, an architect of the Iraq war.

After Trump rejected the officials’ calls for the aid to be released, saying, “We are pissing away our money,” details of the hold on the military assistance were leaked to the press and a high-ranking CIA official submitted a “whistleblower” complaint accusing Trump of soliciting “dirt” on his political rival.

The CIA spun up its “Mighty Wurlitzer.” The intelligence agencies and the media began promoting the narrative that Trump held up the military aid to hurt his political rival, even though Trump made his decision on the aid package a month before he asked Zelensky to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden.

These actions would ultimately lead to only the third impeachment of a president in the history of the United States, throwing the country into a constitutional crisis with an unknown outcome.

All of this begs the question: Given the enormous political cost of impeachment to those who initiated it, what could possibly explain the urgency and ferocity with which the entire national security establishment responded to a delay in the distribution of weapons to Ukraine?

Is there a timetable for using these weapons in combat? Is the United States planning a provocation that would thrust Ukraine into a major new military offensive?

The Russian military is certainly drawing such conclusions. In a statement earlier in December, the chief of the Russian General Staff, Valery Gerasinov, said the increased tempo of US exercises in Eastern Europe indicates that the US is making plans for “using their forces in a large-scale military conflict.”

“Military activities are increasing in the Baltic States and Poland, in the Black and Baltic Seas,” Gerasimov said. “The intensity of the [NATO] bloc’s military exercises is growing. Their scenarios point to NATO’s deliberate preparation to use their forces in a large-scale military conflict.”

In February, the United States will ship some 20,000 soldiers to Europe to participate in a military exercise that will be the largest deployment of forces to the European continent in a quarter-century. The exercise, dubbed Defender 2020, will include 17,000 European troops and, according to Breaking Defense, see NATO forces “extend their logistics trains and communications lines from the Baltic to the Black Seas.” The exercise will cost $340 million.

The National Defense Authorization Act, passed with overwhelming bipartisan support within days of the House vote to impeach Trump, includes an additional $300 million in military aid to Ukraine as part of a record-shattering increase in US military spending.

Overall, the United States and its NATO allies have provided more than $18 billion in military and other aid to Ukraine since the 2014 US-backed coup that overthrew the pro-Russian president, Viktor Yanukovych, and installed the current pro-US regime. This was on top of what Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland bragged in 2013 was “over $5 billion” in aid to “ensure a secure and prosperous and democratic Ukraine.”

The bags of money handed out by the CIA via various “civil society” pass-throughs in Ukraine helped overthrow its elected government and bring to power a US proxy regime supported by the extreme right.

In 2013, the US supported a measure that would integrate Ukraine into a political association and trade pact with the EU. This was intended to pave the way for Ukraine joining NATO. When the Yanukovych government opposed the agreement, the US launched the 2014 coup, installing a puppet regime viciously hostile to Russia.

The 2014 coup was a pivotal point in the efforts of the United States to militarily encircle and ultimately carve up Russia. Since the dissolution of the USSR, the United States has led a systematic drive to expand NATO right up to and beyond the borders of the former USSR.

As Foreign Affairs notes:

In March 2004, NATO accepted into its ranks the three Baltic states—Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania—which were once part of the Soviet Union, and four other states. The accession of the Baltics signaled that NATO enlargement would not halt at the former border of the Soviet Union. The EU followed suit in May 2004, extending its border eastward to include a number of former Soviet republics and allies, including the Baltic states, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Slovakia, and Slovenia.

But the US was taken aback by Russia’s determined response to the Ukraine coup. Russia annexed Crimea following a referendum in which the overwhelming majority of the population of the enclave supported leaving Ukraine. Moscow at the same time backed a secessionist movement in the country’s east.

Given these circumstances, Foreign Affairs writes:

In fact, that Ukraine is at the center of this storm [the impeachment crisis] should not be surprising at all. Over the past quarter-century, nearly all major efforts at establishing a durable post–Cold War order on the Eurasian continent have foundered on the shoals of Ukraine. For it is in Ukraine that the disconnect between triumphalist end-of-history delusions and the ongoing realities of great-power competition can be seen in its starkest form.

Despite the unforeseen and disastrous consequences of the CIA-backed coup in Ukraine, the United States is determined to continue its efforts to militarily encircle Russia, which it sees as a major obstacle to its central geopolitical aim—control of the Eurasian landmass, which would give it a staging ground for a conflict with China.

The relentless drive for military escalation has brought the Democrats into an alliance with the fascistic right in Ukraine, which has held street demonstrations to pressure President Zelensky to continue and escalate the US-backed proxy war against Russia.

One thing is clear. If there is indeed a timetable to use the hundreds of millions of dollars in weapons being transferred to Ukraine, such a war risks a nuclear escalation. In 2018, Elbridge A. Colby, one of the principal authors of the National Defense Strategy issued by the Pentagon in January of that year, published an article titled, “If You Want Peace, Prepare for Nuclear War.”

He wrote:

The risks of nuclear brinkmanship may be enormous, but so is the payoff from gaining a nuclear advantage over an opponent.

Any future confrontation with Russia or China could go nuclear… In a harder-fought, more uncertain struggle, each combatant may be tempted to reach for the nuclear saber to up the ante and test the other side’s resolve, or even just to keep fighting.

Amid a growing upsurge of the class struggle all over the world, the Trump administration, representing a despised and isolated capitalist class, can see in war a means to tamp down, as one comment in the Financial Times recently put it, the “class war” at home, and “make domestic antagonism seem beside the point, if not unconscionable.”

But it is the international growth of the class struggle that provides the means to oppose the war drive of the ruling elite. As mankind enters the third decade of the 21st century, the advanced stage of war preparations on the part of the ruling class makes it all the more urgent, in the immortal words of Leon Trotsky, to counterpose to the “war map” of the capitalists the “map of the class struggle.”

This means unifying the growing struggles and forging a common movement against war and attacks on democratic rights, as an essential part of the struggle for socialism.

CIA Video Shows That The Soviet Union Was Right All Along

What the Soviet Union said America was, is eerily similar to what it is.

The 6,000

https://nomadiceveryman.blogspot.com/2019/09/the-6000.html

High above the Manhattan skyline, in the early 70’s, over 6,000 of these prefabricated floor sections were hoisted by construction cranes and then set into place by union steel workers fabricating the World Trade Centers.   On Sept. 11th 2001, according to the official record of that day, they simply fell and in so doing, disappeared into the history books as if they never existed.

I for one, would like to know how that is possible.

They were prefabricated elsewhere and lifted and set in place by the construction cranes, as pictured.

Some consisted of 3 trusses but most were made up of 4.

18′ wide by 60′ long, they were welded together along with the transverse mounted trusses (3 Bridging Trusses you can see in the picture) and the corrugated metal floor pans that the concrete for the floors was poured on top of.

“Two or more beams will be preassembled with steel decking and erected as a unit, to save erection time...”  Engineering News Record

I reported yesterday that the trusses were made of A-36 structural steel. I was wrong.  The columns were made of A-36 structural steel. The trusses were made of High-strength low-alloy (HSLA) which is quite a bit stronger than even A-36 structural steel, with a yield strength of up to 80,000 psi as compared to the 35,000 psi of A-36.

“Clear span of the floorbeams is as much as 60 ft. They will be fabricated of high-strength low-alloy steels.”  Engineering News Record

“Their (HSLA steels) yield strengths can be anywhere between 250–590 megapascals (36,000–86,000 psi). Due to their higher strength and toughness HSLA steels usually require 25 to 30% more power to form, as compared to carbon steels.”   Wiki

So in fact, the trusses themselves were made of stronger and harder metal than the columns were.

We know that the floors were brought in an set in place in sections, not just because the article from Engineering News Record says so, but also because we have photographic evidence that supports the claim.

In the photograph above, you can clearly see the floor sections are being set in place and one of them is laying on the lower floor (left side) waiting to be lifted installed.

From this other photo, we can see the same process.

When they were lowered into place as a prefabricated unit, they were bolted then welded to both the interior core columns and the exterior columns at the spandrels.

Then the next section would be brought in and it would then be bolted and welded in the same manner, but also then welded to the previous floor section at the floor pan and the transverse mounted trusses.

The end result, per floor, would look something like this prior to the pouring of the concrete floor.

Now why is all of this important?

According to the official explanation of the collapse of these two buildings, the upper section fell down on the lower, intact building, crushing the concrete into dust, and destroying the structural integrity of the building.

But no amount of pressure that could possibly have been generated by the upper block, or “piston”, can explain the virtual disappearance of the floor systems you are now looking at.

So what you should see, if nothing else, is at least several thousand of these lying scattered about the Ground Zero debris field.

 Allow me to put this another way.

The standard size of these was 18′ x 60′. That equals 1,080 square feet of surface area for the floor pan.

A football field is 360 feet by 160 feet. That equals 57,600 square feet of surface area.

With those dimensions, it would take only 53 of these floor sections to cover an entire football field. 

There were about 4,400 of these 60′ floor sections used to make the 220 floors of the Twin Towers.

That means that with just the 60′ sections alone, there were enough of these floor sections to cover 83 football fields. 83.

And again, I ask you, do you see anything that even resembles the floor sections (much less, 83 football fields worth of them)?

With 20 60′ prefabricated floor sections and 8 35′ sections per floor times 110 floors of each of the two World Trade Centers, that comes to over 6,000 welded floor sections that had to have “fallen” to the ground on Sept. 11th 2001.

I ask you to find one.  Just one.

I can find them for you. Steven Jones already found them for you (he just called them something else)  as did the RJ Lee study and the FEMA report.

They just look a little different now.

Now the question is, what could have turned the prefabricated floor systems into tons of “iron-rich” spheres in the blink of an eye?

My guess would be this.

People, This Is Sick by Alex Jones

Peter Kuznick on Untold History of the United States

American University historian Peter J. Kuznick talks with David Swanson of Talk Nation Radio about the 2012 documentary series directed, produced, and narrated by Oliver Stone.

The documentary miniseries for Showtime had a working title Oliver Stone's Secret History of America. It covers "the reasons behind the Cold War with the Soviet Union, U.S. President Harry Truman's decision to drop the atomic bomb on Japan, and changes in America's global role since the fall of Communism." Stone is the director and narrator of all ten episodes. The series is a re-examination of some of the under-reported and darkest parts of American modern history using little known documents and newly uncovered archival material. The series looks beyond official versions of events to the deeper causes and implications and explores how events from the past still have resonant themes for the present day.

Just finished watching King Of Kings (1961) and Eight Legged Freaks (2002)...

THINGS MCDONALDS EMPLOYEES DONT WANT YOU TO KNOW | MCDONALDS HACKS | WHY I QUIT

Hi everyone! I have wanted to make this video for a while for many reasons and FINALLY made it! Like I said in the video, I'm only speaking from mine and my co-workers experience. Thanks for watching!

How Team Hillary played the press for fools on Russia

https://nypost.com/2017/10/26/how-team-hillary-played-the-press-for-fools-on-russia/

Hillary Clinton’s campaign didn’t just pay for the Kremlin-aided smear job on Donald Trump before the election; she continued to use the dirt after the election to frame her humiliating loss as a Russian conspiracy to steal the election.

Bitter to the core, she and her campaign aides hatched a scheme, just 24 hours after conceding the race, to spoon-feed the dirty rumors to an eager liberal media and manufacture the narrative that Russia secretly colluded with her neophyte foe to sabotage her coronation.

But it was Hillary who was trying to kneecap Trump, even after he licked her, fair and square, in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Michigan and other blue states.

Exhibit A is the book “Shattered: Inside Hillary Clinton’s Doomed Campaign,” by Jonathan Allen and Amie Parnes. In light of this week’s revelation that Hillary’s campaign funded the dirty anti-Trump “Steele” dossier, the book takes on a new significance. It reveals:

“Within 24 hours of her concession speech, [campaign chair John Podesta and manager Robby Mook] assembled her communications team at the Brooklyn headquarters to engineer the case that the election wasn’t entirely on the up-and-up. For a couple of hours, with Shake Shack containers littering the room, they went over the script they would pitch to the press and the public. Already, Russian hacking was the centerpiece of the argument.”

The plan, according to the book, was to push journalists to cover how “Russian hacking was the major unreported story of the campaign,” and it succeeded to a fare-thee-well. After the election, coverage of the Russian “collusion” story was relentless, and it helped pressure investigations and hearings on Capitol Hill and even the naming of a special counsel, which in turn has triggered virtually nonstop coverage.

A new Media Research Center study finds that, since the inauguration, major TV news networks have devoted an astonishing 1,000 minutes out of a total 5,015 minutes of Trump administration coverage discussing speculation that the Trump campaign may have colluded with Moscow in hacking Clinton campaign emails, “which means the Russia story alone has comprised almost one-fifth of all Trump news this year.” In contrast, they so far have devoted just 20 seconds to the more substantive scandal of Hillary and her husband possibly trading US uranium rights for Russian cash.

MRC analysts also found that more than a third of the networks’ Russia “scandal” coverage was based on anonymous sources who worked in the Obama administration, including Hillary’s State Department.

Though some of that coverage has proved erroneous, leading to retracted stories and fired reporters, the damage is done. Trump’s approval ratings have suffered, and the Russia investigation has distracted the administration.

Which was also part of Hillary’s plan.

In March, former Clinton campaign communications director Jennifer Palmieri summed up the post-election strategy in a Washington Post column comparing “Russiagate” to Watergate and encouraging the press and other Democrats to “turn the Russia story against Trump.”

“If we make plain that what Russia has done is nothing less than an attack on our republic, the public will be with us. And the more we talk about it, the more they’ll be with us,” she advised. “Polls show that voters are now concerned about the Russia story and overwhelmingly support an independent investigation.”

In short, Hillary couldn’t beat Trump with the political dirt she secretly purchased during the campaign, so she tried to cripple his presidency with help from an overwhelmingly anti-Trump media. Framing Trump as some sort of modern-day KGB plant was an easy sell, since the pro-Democrat media were also searching for a scapegoat to rationalize the crushing defeat of their shared liberal agenda at the polls.

The irony is, it may have in fact been Hillary who came closer to colluding with the Russians in smearing Trump as a Russian traitor than anything Trump did in trying to beat Hillary. The information in the dossier she bought for millions came from Russian intelligence sources, and her lawyers brokered the deal with a Kremlin-tied lobbyist. When it failed to stop Trump, the Russia paymaster turned into the Russia spinmeister.

Now we really know “What Happened.”

Now reading Pacific Vortex! by Clive Cussler...

DREDD (2012) Retrospective / Review

Joe Biden for President 2020

https://joebiden.info/

Uncle Joe is back and ready to take a hands-on approach to America’s problems! Joe Biden has a good feel for the American people and can smell what they really want deep down. Joe is ready for a fight and will give a good ol’ fashioned pounding to anybody who gets in his way!

In 1996, Senator Joe Biden voted for the Defense of Marriage Act which defined marriage as between a man and a woman. This law also prevented states from recognizing same sex marriages.

Senator Joe Biden authored and voted for the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 which initiated the “3 Strikes and You’re Out” policy which has resulted in many people spending life sentences in jail for minor crimes. He nicknamed it the “Biden Bill.”

In 1982, Senator Joe Biden initially voted for a constitutional amendment which would have allowed states to overturn Roe v. Wade – the Supreme Court decision which legalized abortion.

In the 1970’s Joe Biden stated that “I have become convinced that busing is a bankrupt concept.” He actively worked to oppose busing as a way to desegregate schools. Biden even wrote letters seeking the support of people who thought schools should be segregated by race.

Senator Joe Biden, who at the time was chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, voted for the resolution to authorize military involvement in Iraq. The Iraq war resulted in the death of 4,424 US military members and cost taxpayers $2.4 trillion.

Harsher mandatory minimum sentences for drug use, civil asset forfeiture without a conviction, and imposing death penalty for drug related murders – this is Joe Biden’s legacy. He voted for both the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 and its 1988 counterpart and claimed George H. Bush’s war on drugs was “not tough enough, bold enough, or imaginative enough.”

Catherine Zeta Jones 1001 nuits Les clips

Now listening to Super Street Fighter II Turbo by Isao Abe & Syun Nishigaki and Colour By Numbers by Culture Club...

On Pacific Boulevard in Yaletown. Autumn of 2019.

Canada “at war” with Russia, high-level Ottawa conference told

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2020/03/09/omsc-m09.html

Leading Defence Ministry officials and Canada’s military top brass used a Canadian Defence Association Institute (CDAI) conference in Ottawa last week to press for tens of billions of dollars in additional military spending to prepare for future wars.

Held under the title “How to position Canada in a world of great power plays,” the conference focused on the strategic threat Russia and China represent for Canada’s ruling elite. To counter this purported threat, speaker after speaker called on Ottawa to expand its already vast, global military-strategic partnership with US imperialism, and in particular for the “modernization” of the Canada-US joint North American Aerospace Defence Command (NORAD).

Canada’s Chief of Defence Staff, General Jonathan Vance, invoked a nightmare scenario in which Canada is forced to deal with attacks launched by Moscow or Beijing with hi-tech weaponry that NORAD’s current radar systems, which were last upgraded during the Cold War, are incapable of coping with. “We’re facing new, more advanced conventional missiles that can be launched from further away, travel faster and are more maneuverable,” said Vance. “More importantly, they have the potential to hold North American decision-making hostage in a period of conflict, let alone threaten our force generation capacity and critical infrastructure. Even a modest attack could hamper or cripple Canadian response to crisis—or harm Canadians or critical infrastructure.”

Vance’s drastic warnings were echoed by almost every other speaker, with general agreement among those present that conflict with Russia has already begun. “This is not an interwar period. The war is on,” asserted Frederick Kagan, resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. “The principle challenge is our own failure to recognize we are involved in a great scale conflict with Russia.”

The Trudeau government already dramatically intensified Canadian imperialism’s preparation for great-power conflict when it tabled a new National Defence Policy in 2017 that motivated a 73 percent increase in military spending by 2026. In an address to Parliament introducing the new policy, then Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland, a notorious anti-Russia war hawk, placed great emphasis on Canada’s participation in the two imperialist world wars of the first half of the twentieth century. She proclaimed that this history shows that “hard power,” i.e., the ability to wage war, has always been part of Canada’s foreign policy and must remain so in the future.

The new military spending is being used to purchase a new fleet of fighter jets, upgrade Canada’s submarines, construct a new fleet of warships and obtain other modern weapons systems, including armed drones. This massive rearmament program is supported by the entire political establishment, including the social-democratic New Democrats, which waged an election campaign last fall based on the need to spend tens of billions of additional dollars on the armed forces.

In addition, the Trudeau government has further integrated Canada’s armed forces into US imperialism’s aggressive military operations around the world, from the ongoing war in Syria and Iraq to the huge NATO-led military build-up against Russia in Eastern Europe and the Baltic states, and the expansion of naval operations in the Asia-Pacific aimed at encircling and isolating China.

However, the discussions now underway go far beyond what has already been implemented. Speakers at the conference made clear that the modernization of NORAD, which they argued was unavoidable, had not been costed in the 2017 military spending hike and would require tens of billions of dollars in additional investment.

Deputy Minister of Defence Jody Thomas spelt this out most clearly, declaring that the 2017 national defence policy was now obsolete. “The world is changing faster than first projected when we presented our defence policy,” she remarked in her speech to the meeting.

Thomas’ statements were backed up by Lieutenant Gen. Christopher Coates, deputy commander of NORAD. “North America is no longer a sanctuary,” stated Coates. “Russia and others are engaged in an uncontrolled race for dominance across a variety of domains… Russia’s actions and capabilities are a large part of what’s driving that need for change.”

Last week’s conference marks the culmination of a long-running push by top US and Canadian military and defence policy figures for unprecedented financial resources to be made available to the armed forces. At last November’s Halifax International Security Forum, leading US defence policy officials, including Trump’s National Security Adviser Robert O’Brien, bluntly demanded that Canada immediately move towards the NATO target of allocating 2 percent of its GDP for military spending. O’Brien also warned Canada about the consequences of failing to maintain a hard-line stance towards China when he stated that any involvement of China’s tech giant Huawei in Canada’s 5G network would result in a downgrading of intelligence sharing between Washington and Ottawa.

In a conference on the future of NORAD hosted by the Canadian Global Affairs Institute in late January, Commodore Jamie Clarke, the deputy director of strategy for NORAD, underscored that the planning for a war with Russia has reached a very advanced stage. Addressing the specific capabilities of NORAD’s North Warning System, a chain of radar stations located in Canada’s Arctic, Clarke said, “Currently, the North Warning System cannot identify and track Russian long-range bombers prior to their missile-launch points or their overflights of the Arctic region. Yet this system, entering its fourth decade of service, is the system we rely on each and every day.”

Vance also focused on the theme of continental defence in his speech to last week’s CDAI Security and Defence Conference. Stressing the importance of Canada’s role in the Arctic, he said, “What I am increasingly concerned about is the Arctic as an avenue of approach. The Canadian Armed Forces are mandated to deter and defeat threats to North America that would travel through the Arctic waters and airspace in the years to come. We must be able to ensure Arctic security be it a region, a place, or an avenue of approach. This requires strengthening inter-agency and multinational partnerships, increasing surveillance and military capabilities, and improving our ability to base, project, and sustain forces in the North. It requires new approaches to sovereignty assurance that accounts for the very real pan-domain nature of conflict.”

Taken together, the comments of Canada’s leading military personnel and Defence Ministry civil servants amount to a plan for a vast program of rearmament that will make the tens of billions of dollars in new spending unveiled in 2017 look like little more than a modest down payment. This will also entail revisiting Canada’s participation in an upgraded version of the US-led Ballistic Missile Defence shield, an initiative that is aimed at creating conditions to wage a “winnable” nuclear war.

This mad war drive, which puts the lives of billions of people around the world at risk, is being sold as a crusade for human rights. Speakers at the Security and Defence Conference repeatedly referred to Canada’s commitment to “the rule of law,” a euphemism for the US imperialist-dominated world order that emerged from World War II and which Ottawa is determined to uphold with military force.

The ruling elite intends to advance its predatory interests at home and abroad by savaging what remains of workers’ social rights and public services, so as to divert society’s resources into rearmament and further massive tax cuts for big business, the rich and super-rich.

This is why the Trudeau government, citing the need for “national unity”—the same justification used by the bourgeoisie everywhere to demand support for aggressive militarism and war—is aligning itself ever more openly with Canada’s most right-wing provincial governments in decades. Doug Ford’s Progressive Conservatives in Ontario, François Legault’s Coalition Avenir Québec, Jason Kenney’s United Conservatives in Alberta and Scott Moe’s right-wing government in Saskatchewan have been tasked with saving tens of billions of dollars through austerity measures so the funds spent on education, health care and social services can be redirected to purchasing armed drones, missiles, fighter jets and warships.

Barry Lituchy on Stepan Bandera and Ukrainian nationalism

Barry Lituchy is a history professor at Kingsborough Community College.

Aldabra Atoll

http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/185

The atoll is comprised of four large coral islands which enclose a shallow lagoon; the group of islands is itself surrounded by a coral reef. Due to difficulties of access and the atoll's isolation, Aldabra has been protected from human influence and thus retains some 152,000 giant tortoises, the world's largest population of this reptile.

Brief synthesis

Located in the Indian Ocean, the Aldabra Atoll is an outstanding example of a raised coral atoll. Due to its remoteness and inaccessibility, the atoll has remained largely untouched by humans for the majority of its existence.  Aldabra is one of the largest atolls in the world, and contains one of the most important natural habitats for studying evolutionary and ecological processes. It is home to the largest giant tortoise population in the world. The richness and diversity of the ocean and landscapes result in an array of colours and formations that contribute to the atoll's scenic and aesthetic appeal.

Criterion (vii): Aldabra Atoll consists of four main islands of coral limestone separated by narrow passes and enclosing a large shallow lagoon, providing a superlative spectacle of natural phenomena.  The lagoon contains many smaller islands and the entire atoll is surrounded by an outer fringing reef. Geomorphologic processes have produced a rugged topography, which supports a variety of habitats with a relatively rich biota for an oceanic island and a high degree of endemism. Marine habitats range from coral reefs to seagrass beds and mangrove mudflats with minimal human impact.

Criterion (ix): The property is an outstanding example of an oceanic island ecosystem in which evolutionary processes are active within a rich biota.  Most of the land surface comprises ancient coral reef (~125,000 years old) which has been repeatedly raised above sea level. The size and morphological diversity of the atoll has permitted the development of a variety of discrete insular communities with a high incidence of endemicity among the constituent species. The top of the terrestrial food chain is, unusually, occupied by an herbivore: the giant tortoise. The tortoises feed on grasses and shrubbery, including plants which have evolved in response to its grazing patterns. The atoll's isolation has also allowed the evolution of endemic flora and fauna. Due to minimal human interference, these ecological processes can be clearly observed in their full complexity.

Criterion (x): Aldabra provides an outstanding natural laboratory for scientific research and discovery. The atoll constitutes a refuge for over 400 endemic species and subspecies (including vertebrates, invertebrates and plants). These include a population of over 100,000 Aldabra Giant Tortoise. The tortoises are the last survivors of a life form once found on other Indian Ocean islands and Aldabra is now their only remaining habitat. The tortoise population is the largest in the world and is entirely self-sustaining: all the elements of its intricate interrelationship with the natural environment are evident.  There are also globally important breeding populations of endangered green turtles, and critically endangered hawksbill turtles are also present.  The property is a significant natural habitat for birds, with two recorded endemic species (Aldabra Brush Warbler and Aldabra Drongo), and another eleven birds which have distinct subspecies, amongst which is the White-throated Rail, the last remaining flightless bird of the Western Indian Ocean. There are vast waterbird colonies including the second largest frigatebird colonies in the world and one of the world's only two oceanic flamingo populations. The pristine fringing reef system and coral habitat are in excellent health and distinguished by their intactness and the sheer abundance and size of species contained within them.

Integrity

The property includes the four main islands which form the atoll plus numerous islets and the surrounding marine area. It is sufficiently large to support all ongoing biological and ecological processes essential for ensuring continued evolution in the atoll. The remoteness and inaccessibility of the atoll limit extensive human interference which could otherwise jeopardize ongoing processes. As such, Aldabra displays an almost intact ecosystem, sustaining naturally viable populations of all key species.

Protection and management requirements

The property is legally protected under national legislation and is managed by a public trust, the Seychelles Islands Foundation, with daily operations guided by a management plan. Boundaries are ecologically viable but the extension of the seaward boundary some 20 km into the sea would provide additional protection to the marine fauna. While the remoteness of the property has limited human interference, thus contributing for the protection of the biological and ecological processes, it also poses tremendous logistical challenges. Tourism is limited and carefully controlled. Whilst the property displays an almost intact ecosystem, protection and management need to address the constant threats posed by invasive alien species, climate change and oil spills, particularly in the event that oil exploration increases in the wider region.

President George Bush Busts a Move & Plays Drums

Former President Bush danced with members of Kankouran West African Dance Company during a Rose Garden event to mark Malaria Awareness Day at the White House, April 25, 2007.

Back to the Future | Reelviews Movie Reviews

https://www.reelviews.net/reelviews/back-to-the-future

Had Back to the Future come to life as originally envisioned by the purse string-holders at Universal Pictures (which owned the rights to Bob Gale's screenplay), it might have been a very different project, with Eric Stoltz in the lead role. Stoltz, however, bowed out early during filming due to that ever-popular reason: "creative differences," opening the door for Michael J. Fox (or, as nearly everyone knew him at the time, Alex P. Keaton). Would Back to the Future have become a modern classic with a different lead actor? That's as much of an unknown as what Casablanca would have been like with Ronald Reagan asking Sam to play "As Time Goes By." What is known, however, is that the version of Back to the Future produced by Robert Zemeckis remains one of the mid-'80s most enduring and enjoyable confections: an infectious mix of comedy, fantasy, satire, excitement, and nostalgia.

In 1985, Marty McFly (Fox) is an average high school teenager with a pretty girlfriend and a lousy home life. His father, George (Crispin Glover), is a spineless toady who can't so "no" to his overbearing boss, Biff Tannen (Thomas F. Wilson), and his mother, Lorraine (Lea Thompson), is a nagger. Marty spends as much time away from home as possible, often stopping by the house of Doc Brown (Christopher Lloyd), the local mad inventor. But Doc Brown's latest invention - in function if not appearance - is anything but laughable. It's a DeLorean converted into a time machine. When Marty inadvertently ends up in the driver's seat, he is sent back 30 years to 1955. His appearance in an era before he was born forces him to seek out a younger version of Doc Brown, but also has unintended consequences. When a teenage Lorraine become infatuated with him, she loses all interest in other boys and this puts the future, and Marty's existence, in jeopardy.

Back to the Future is played neither entirely seriously nor entirely for laughs, and therein lies the nature of its success. It's funny and breezy but doesn't descend to a level where the characters are little more than props for jokes. We believe in Marty, like him, and root for him to succeed. Part of the reason for that is Michael J. Fox, whose unforced screen charisma had already made him a huge television success. (He was the #1 reason Family Ties was a Sunday night staple.) Fox brought a lion's share of that "aw shucks" affability to Marty, and Back to the Future launched Fox's big-screen career. In order to appear in Back to the Future (once he had agreed to replace Stoltz), Fox had to go virtually without sleep. During the day on weekdays, he would film Family Ties episodes. At nights and on weekends, he made Back to the Future.

Like Crocodile Dundee one year later, Back to the Future is at its heart a "fish out of water" story, about an '80s boy being trapped in a 1950s small town. His mother is smitten with him, the local bully doesn't like him, his dad is a wimp, and he doesn't fully understand the customs and lingo of the period in which he has become stranded. Plus, there are the twin difficulties of repairing a state-of-the-art 1980s time machine using 1950s technology and patching the damage his presence has caused to the time continuum. Zemeckis plays much of this with a light touch, but when there are opportunities for some excitement (as when Marty has a deadline to get to the "finish line" or risk not getting to 1986 until he's middle-aged), he milks it for all it's worth. Back to the Future leaves viewers a little breathless, but not drained - exhilarated and smiling.

Nostalgia plays a role in Back to the Future's success. For kids in the '80s, it suggested the '50s of Leave it to Beaver and other black-and-white sit-coms that were in UHF re-runs around the time Back to the Future opened. For 40-somethings, the movie provided a glimpse of their past through rose-colored glasses (always the best way to remember high school). When the film is watched today, some 25 years after its release, the nostalgia is double-barreled. Now, the '80s scenes are as evocative as the '50s material.

Back to the Future represented a career resuscitation for Christopher Lloyd, whose popularity had nosedived after the cancelation of Taxi, where he spent six years playing Reverend Jim. Roles in Star Trek III: The Search for Spock and Buckaroo Banzai enabled him to avoid obscurity, but it was his wacky turn as Doc Brown that defined his movie career. He plays the Doc like a stereotypical mad scientist - as brilliant as he is forgetful, a combination of Einstein and Doctor Who. Lea Thompson, a popular choice of the era to play high school sweethearts (see also All the Right Moves and Some Kind of Wonderful), shows that Lorraine is less prim-and-proper than her middle-aged self might indicate. (How many of us, I wonder, would be surprised if given an opportunity to interact with our parents when they were teenagers?) Crispin Glover, who has always marched to his own beat (as in his infamous appearance on David Letterman's talkshow in 1987), is wonderful as the quavering, self-doubting George. For Glover, this may have been the most mainstream role he ever accepted (and he quickly distanced himself from it after the movie was released). Thomas F. Wilson provides a deliciously cartoonish sense of menace in his portrayal of the film's thuggish villain, Biff.

If there's a problem with Back to the Future, it's the film's ending, which left open the expectation that there would be more chapters to come. In fact, the movie was originally designed as a one-off project, with the final scene being a quirky way to wrap up things rather than a teaser for another installment. However, when Back to the Future topped the 1985 box office and public sentiment was high in wanting to know what the problem was with Marty and Jennifer's kids, Zemeckis went to work on Back to the Future Part II and III, which were filmed back-to-back and took four years to reach the screen. In retrospect, it might have been better if they had died in development. Rarely have sequels underwhelmed to this degree, with Part II seeming forced and awkward and Part III tired and unnecessary. As a movie, Back to the Future is tremendous fun, but the series is memorable only for what started it.

The '80s were a dark and cynical decade, remembered by most for excesses of consumption and greed. Back to the Future is unapologetically lighthearted and upbeat - a tonic for a weary movie-going society. Even its theme song (Huey Lewis' "The Power of Love") brought a smile to the face on its way up the charts to the #1 position. For Zemeckis, this represented an opportunity to join his buddy Steven Spielberg on the A-list - his next film would be Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, and Forrest Gump was less than a decade away. Like Spielberg, Zemeckis has a keen understanding of how to blend diverse elements of comedy, action, adventure, and drama into concoctions that win over audiences. Marty's story could easily have been suspenseful, purely comedic, or a three-hankie melodrama, but Zemeckis found the balance and employed it. Back to the Future is a success because of a compelling premise, terrific casting, and exemplary execution. It's the kind of alchemy that, on those rare occasions when it materializes, cannot be replicated - as the filmmakers discovered when they re-assembled for Back to the Future Part II. The magic lasted for one film, and that's the one to re-visit.

Just finished watching Godzilla vs. Biollante (1989) and Zombie High (1987)...

Igor Nazaruk - All Costs Paid (Main Theme)

Main theme from the 1988 Soviet film All Costs Paid. Composed by Igor Nazaruk.

All Costs Paid (За всё заплачено) is a three-part television feature film from 1988, filmed by director Alexei Saltykov and based on the documentary novel of the same name by A. Smirnov. It's one of the first films to show the war of the USSR in Afghanistan.

1453: The Fall of Constantinople

https://www.ancient.eu/article/1180/1453-the-fall-of-constantinople/

The city of Constantinople (modern Istanbul) was founded by Roman emperor Constantine I in 324 CE and it acted as the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire, or Byzantine Empire as it has later become known, for well over 1,000 years. Although the city suffered many attacks, prolonged sieges, internal rebellions, and even a period of occupation in the 13th century CE by the Fourth Crusaders, its legendary defences were the most formidable in both the ancient and medieval worlds. It could not, though, resist the mighty cannons of the Ottoman Sultan Mehmed II, and Constantinople, jewel and bastion of Christendom, was conquered, smashed, and looted on Tuesday, 29 May 1453 CE.

An Impregnable Fortress

Constantinople had withstood many sieges and attacks over the centuries, notably by the Arabs between 674 and 678 CE and again between 717 and 718 CE. The great Bulgar Khans Krum (r. 802-814 CE) and Symeon (r. 893-927 CE) both attempted to attack the Byzantine capital, as did the Rus (descendants of Vikings based around Kiev) in 860 CE, 941 CE, and 1043 CE, but all failed. Another major siege was instigated by the usurper Thomas the Slav between 821 and 823 CE. All of these attacks were unsuccessful thanks to the city’s location by the sea, its naval fleet, and the secret weapon of Greek Fire (a highly inflammable liquid), and, most importantly of all, the protection of the massive Theodosian Walls.

The city’s celebrated walls were a triple row of fortifications built during the reign of Theodosius II (408-450 CE) which protected the land side of the peninsula occupied by the city. They extended across the peninsula from the shores of the Sea of Marmara to the Golden Horn, eventually being fully completed in 439 CE and stretching some 6.5 kilometres. Attackers first faced a 20-metre wide and 7-metre deep ditch which could be flooded with water fed from pipes when required. Behind that was an outer wall which had a patrol track to oversee the moat. Behind this was a second wall which had regular towers and an interior terrace so as to provide a firing platform to shoot down on any enemy forces attacking the moat and first wall. Then, behind that wall was a third, much more massive, inner wall. This final defence was almost 5 metres thick, 12 metres high, and presented to the enemy 96 projecting towers. Each tower was placed around 70 metres distant from another and reached a height of 20 metres. The towers, either square or octagonal in form, could hold up to three artillery machines. The towers were so placed on the middle wall so as not to block the firing possibilities from the towers of the inner wall. The distance between the outer ditch and inner wall was 60 metres while the height difference was 30 metres.

To take Constantinople, an army would, then, need to attack by both land and sea, but all attempts failed no matter who tried and no matter what weapons and siege engines they launched at the city. In short, Constantinople, with the greatest defences in the medieval world, was impregnable. Well, not quite. After 800 years of resisting all comers, the city’s defences were finally breached by the knights of the Fourth Crusade in 1204 CE, although the attackers got in through a carelessly left-open door and not because the fortifications themselves had failed in their purpose. Repaired and rebuilt by Michael VIII (r. 1261-1282 CE) in 1260 CE, the city remained the most difficult military nut to crack in the world, but this reputation did not in any way deter the ever-more ambitious Ottomans.

The Ottoman Empire

The Ottoman Empire had begun as a small Turkish emirate founded by Osman in Eskishehir (western Asia Minor) in the late 13th century CE, but by the early 14th century CE, it had already expanded into Thrace. With their capital at Adrianople, further captures included Thessaloniki and Serbia. In 1396 CE, at Nikopolis on the Danube, an Ottoman army defeated a Crusader army. Constantinople was the next target as Byzantium teetered on the brink of collapse and became no more than a vassal state within the Ottoman Empire. The city was attacked in 1394 CE and 1422 CE but still managed to resist. Another Crusader army was defeated in 1444 CE at Varna near the Black Sea coast. Then the new Sultan, Mehmed II (r. 1451-1481 CE), after extensive preparations such as building, extending, and occupying fortresses along the Bosporus, notably at Rumeli Hisar and Anadolu in 1452 CE, moved to finally sweep away the Byzantines and their capital.

The Defenders

The crushing of the Crusader army at Varna in 1444 CE meant that the Byzantines were now on their own. No significant help could be expected from the West where the Popes were already unimpressed with the Byzantine’s unwillingness to form a union of the Church and accept their supremacy. The Venetians did send a paltry two ships and 800 men in April 1453 CE, Genoa promised another ship, and even the Pope later promised five armed ships, but the Ottomans had by then already blockaded Constantinople. The people of the city could only stock up on food and arms and hope their defences would save them yet again. According to the 15th-century CE Greek historian and eyewitness Georges Sphrantzes, the defending army was composed of fewer than 5,000 men, not a sufficient number to adequately cover the length of the city’s walls, some 19 km in total. Worse still, the once great Byzantine navy now consisted of a mere 26 ships, and most of those belonged to the Italian colonists of the city. The Byzantines were hopelessly outnumbered in men, ships, and weapons.

It seemed that only divine intervention could save them now, but in the many previous sieges over centuries gone by, it was believed that just such intervention had saved the city; perhaps history would be repeated. Then again, there were also ominous tales of impending doom: prophesies that proclaimed the fall of Constantinople when the emperor was called Constantine (a good number were, of course) and there was an eclipse of the moon - which there was in the days before the siege of 1453 CE.

The Byzantine emperor at the time of the attack was Constantine XI (r. 1449-1453 CE), and he took personal charge of the defence along with such notable military figures as Loukas Notaras, the Kantakouzenos brothers, Nikephoros Palaiologos, and the Genoese siege expert Giovanni Giustiniani. The Byzantines had catapults and Greek Fire, the highly inflammable liquid which could be sprayed under pressure from ships or walls to torch an enemy, but the technology of warfare had moved on and the Theodosian Walls were about to get their sternest ever test.

The Attackers

Mehmed II had one thing that previous besiegers of Constantinople had lacked: cannons. And they were big ones. The Byzantines had actually had first option on the cannons as they had been offered them by their inventor, the Hungarian engineer named Urban, but Constantine could not meet his asking price. Urban then peddled his expertise to the Sultan, and Mehmed showed more interest and offered him four times what he was asking. These fearsome weapons were put to good use in November 1452 CE when a Venetian ship, disobeying a ban on traffic, was blown out of the water as it sailed down the Bosphorus. The captain of the vessel survived but was captured, decapitated, and then impaled on a stake. It was an ominous sign of things to come.

According to Georges Sphrantzes, the Ottoman army numbered 200,000 men, but modern historians prefer a more realistic figure of 60-80,000. When the army assembled at the city walls of Constantinople on 2 April 1453 CE, the Byzantines got their first glimpse of Mehmed’s cannons. The largest was 9 metres long with a gaping mouth one metre across. Already tested, it could fire a ball weighing 500 kilos over 1.5 km. So mammoth was this cannon that it took an awfully long time to load and cool it so that it could only be fired seven times a day. Still, the Ottomans had plenty of smaller cannon, each capable of firing over 100 times a day.

On 5 April, Mehmed sent a demand for immediate surrender to the Byzantine emperor but received no reply. On 6 April the attack began. The Theodosian Walls were relentlessly blasted, chunk by chunk, into rubble. The defenders could do no more than fire back with their own smaller cannons by day, hold off the attackers where the cannons had punched the biggest holes, and try and repair those gaps each night as best they could, using rocks, barrels, and anything else they could get their hands on. The resulting rubble piles actually absorbed the cannon shot better than fixed walls but, eventually, one of the infantry assaults would surely get through.

A Fight For Survival

The onslaught went on for six weeks but there was some effective resistance. The Ottoman attack on the boom which blocked the city’s harbour was repelled, as were several direct assaults on the Land Walls. On 20 April, miraculously, three Genoese ships sent by the Pope and a ship carrying vital grain sent by Alphonso of Aragon managed to break through the Ottoman naval blockade and reach the defenders. Mehmed, infuriated, then got around the harbour boom by building a railed road via which 70 of his ships, loaded onto carts pulled by oxen, could be launched into the waters of the Golden Horn. The Ottomans then built a pontoon and fixed cannons to it so that they could now attack any part of the city from the sea side, not just the land. The defenders now struggled to station men where they were needed, especially along the structurally weaker sea walls.

Time was running out for the city but, then, a reprieve came from an unexpected quarter. Back in Asia Minor, Mehmed faced several revolts as his subjects became unruly while their Sultan and his army were abroad. For this reason, Mehmed offered Constantine a deal: pay tribute and he would withdraw. The emperor refused, and Mehmed gave the news to his men that now, when the city fell, as surely it would, they could plunder whatever they wished from one of the richest cities in the world.

Mehmed launched a massive go-for-broke, throw-everything-at-them assault at dawn on 29 May. First to be sent in after the usual cannon barrage were the second-rate troops, then a second wave was launched with better-armed troops, and, finally, a third wave attacked the walls, this time composed of the Janissaries - the well-trained and highly determined elite of Mehmed's army. It was during this third wave that disaster struck the Byzantines who by now were forced to employ women and children to defend the walls. Some fool had left the small Kerkoporta gate in the Land Walls open and the Janissaries did not hesitate in using it. They climbed to the top of the wall and raised the Ottoman flag, then they worked their way around to the main gate and allowed their comrades to flood into the city.

Destruction

Chaos now ensued with some of the defenders maintaining their discipline and meeting the enemy while others rushed back to their homes to defend their own families. It is at this point that Constantine was killed in the action, most likely near the Gate of St. Romanos, although, as he had discarded any indications of his status to avoid his body being used as a trophy, his demise is not known for certain. The emperor could have fled the city days before but he chose to stay with his people, and a legend soon grew up that he had not died at all but, instead, he had been magically encased in marble and buried beneath the city which he would, one day, return to rule again.  

Meanwhile, the rape, pillage, and destruction began. Many of the city’s inhabitants committed suicide rather than be subject to the horrors of capture and slavery. Perhaps 4,000 were killed outright, and over 50,000 were shipped off as slaves. Many sought refuge in churches and barricaded themselves in, including inside the Hagia Sophia, but these were obvious targets for their treasures, and after they were looted for their gems and precious metals, the buildings and their priceless icons were smashed, the cowering captives butchered. Uncountable art treasures were lost, books were burned, and anything with a Christian message was hacked to pieces, including frescoes and mosaics.

In the afternoon, Mehmed entered the city himself, called an end to the pillaging and declared that the Hagia Sophia church be immediately converted into a mosque. It was a powerful statement that the city’s role as a bastion of Christianity for twelve centuries was now over. Mehmed then rounded up the most important survivors from the city’s nobility and executed them. 

Aftermath

Constantinople was made the new Ottoman capital, the massive Golden Gate of the Theodosian Walls was made part of the castle treasury of Mehmed, while the Christian community was permitted to survive, guided by the bishop Gennadeios II. What was left of the old Byzantine empire was absorbed into Ottoman territory following the conquest of Mistra in 1460 CE and Trebizond in 1461 CE. Meanwhile, Mehmed, aged only 21 and now known as "the Conqueror", settled in for a long reign and another 28 years as Sultan. Byzantine culture would survive, especially in the arts and architecture, but the fall of Constantinople was, nevertheless, a momentous episode of world history, the end of the old Roman Empire and the last surviving link between the medieval and ancient worlds. As the historian J. J. Norwich notes,

"That is why five and a half centuries later, throughout the Greek world, Tuesday is still believed to be the unluckiest day of the week; why the Turkish flag still depicts not a crescent but a waning moon, reminding us that the moon was in its last quarter when Constantinople finally fell." (383)