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Milestones

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Eulalia said:
Some very interesting letters she wrote while she was imprisoned have only just been recognised and deciphered:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-64568222
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She did what I do for passwords--a code (they were written in French) then a cipher (replacing letters with other symbols) to overlay the code. If I recall, the Enigma machine used a (mechanical) computer for the cipher, which was generated by an initial setting that was changed regularly. This required a lot of work for Turing and his computers. It also required some old-fashioned intelligence. In one operation the Royal Navy sent ships in a gird pattern to find, surprise, and board a Nazi weather ship to seize the code books and the cipher machines to get the initial settings (God was on the side of the Allies, apparently, because weather flows west to east and the Nazis needed western weather sources the Allies' geography furnished for free). Royal Navy personnel took a lot of risks (and sometimes lost) trying to retrieve Nazi code materials from sinking ships and submarines.
Innovation and initiative spike during wars, when bean counters worried about "cash flow" and "return on equity" are ignored.
 
Darkprincess69 said:
I heard about it while on the radio while I was driving into Cardiff to sit on a Crown Court jury. (it was a 7-week long trial and although an interesting experience, I wouldn't want to do it again as that's 7 weeks taken out of my life that I'll never get back :( )

Hard to believe that it's 20 years ago.

The Columbia tragedy was another one of those major news events that makes you remember where you were and what you were doing at the time


In other news, today is the ancient pagan festival of Imbolc, where traditionally it is a time to start making preparations for the coming of Spring. Of course the church appropriated this ufeast day and decided to call it Candlemass (which is also the name of an awesome Swedish power metal band), and of course in the US you have the wonderfully quaint Groundhog Day which is a great fun event and a major tourist attraction, which gives a welcome post-Christmas boost to the economies of a number of local communities (mainly in the Northeast US I believe)

Let's see if Punxsutawney Phil is going to predict an early Spring this time, or are we going to have to suffer another 6 weeks of shit weather (which to be fair, here in Wales, we can get at any time of year :) )
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There is a ground hog in Sun Prairie, Wisconsin, there was one in Alberta, Canada, there is one (General Beuregard Lee) in Georgia in addition to the northeastern ones. All apparently bring in some cash. The Chicago Zoological Society's Brookfield Zoo used to have Groundhog (Tumbleweed) whom they would roust out (clearly bleary-eyed in the videos) every February 2 and treat to a salad spread worthy of a fancy hotel. When she died, they stopped doing it. I guess the attendance bump wasn't substantial, especially during winter storm conditions.
There used to be a chart published years ago with the results for each Groundhog. Once there were close to 35 entries.
https://abc7chicago.com/groundhogs-chicago-groundhog-day/1183907/
 
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on 14th February, 2013, I first joined cruxforums, so now celebrating ten years on this great site :)
 
Eighty years ago, on February 18th 1943, Joseph Goebbels delivered his 'Total War' speech during a rally in the Sportpalast in Berlin :
"I ask you: Do you want total war? If necessary, do you want a war more total and radical than anything that we can even imagine today?"

The crowd - in fact handpicked among Nazi party members - enthusiastically replied "Yes!"
Under the motto 'Total war means a shorter war', the rally was the sign to revert to a full mobilisation of the German home front and the economy for the war efforts. Until then, it had been the policy in the Reich, that daily life should not suffer from the war. But the failure of Operation Barbarossa, and particularly the recent defeat of the 6th Army at Stalingrad, had made clear that a short war was no longer an option, and that the entire society would have to contribute to win the war. Under the guidance of Albert Speer, the war economy would soon quadrupple its production.
 
montycrusto said:
Yes here you are on page 48 of the “new here “ thread:
https://www.cruxforums.com/xf/threads/new-here.1398/post-64545
Congrats on the milestone :D :beer-toast1:
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New Here had only been going for a year at that point, Jan 2012.
2012 was the year I started posting here more seriously, having been a relatively infrequent visitor prior to that.
And Feb 18 marks my anniversary here in 2006. Both this group and the Crux Foundation were founded in 2005 when Yahoo was killing off adult groups and the old Crux group was under threat and then deleted, but it took me a while before I wandered over here to have a look.
 
On February 20th 1943, Mexican farmer Dionisio Pulido was working on his cornfield near Uruapan, 322 km west of Mexico City. Suddenly, the ground of his cornfield was ripped open. Soon volcanic ash and lava came pouring out. The eruption lasted until 1952 and created the Paricutin, a 424 m high volcanic cone. A very rare and famous case of the birth and growth of a brand new volcano.
 
Loxuru said:
On February 20th 1943, Mexican farmer Dionisio Pulido was working on his cornfield near Uruapan, 322 km west of Mexico City. Suddenly, the ground of his cornfield was ripped open. Soon volcanic ash and lava came pouring out. The eruption lasted until 1952 and created the Paricutin, a 424 m high volcanic cone. A very rare and famous case of the birth and growth of a brand new volcano.
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One of the first book images I remember was from a circa 1960 children's encyclopedia, very like this one.

85303961-AD31-414A-9FE1-D38C8A73BFEF.jpeg

The name Paricutin still triggers that 5 year old's unease.
 
Ninety years ago, on February 27th 1933, the Reichstag (parliament) building in Berlin was set on fire. A Dutchman, Marinus Van der Lubbe, was caught in the act and arrested. Van der Lubbe was a communist, but also mentally ill. Whether he has acted alone or not, and if not, who had instigated him to do the arson (communists or nazis), was never cleared out.

Anyway, the arson, by a communist, gave the government (with nazis but still having to deal with opposition) a reason to activate a few articles in the - in fact democratic - Weimar constitution to temporary suspend a lot of rights and liberties. Using these laws, Hitler could eradicate his political opponents, and establish dictatorship. Shortly after, parliament stopped its activities. An obedient mock parliament was installed, that yearly prolonged the state of exception, so Hitler did not even have to abolish the Weimar constitution itself during his reign.

Whoever did it, the Reichstag fire made a quick takeover of power by the nazis possible.
Marinus van der Lubbe was brought to trial, condemned to death and beheaded under the guillotine.
 
Loxuru said:
Ninety years ago, on February 27th 1933, the Reichstag (parliament) building in Berlin was set on fire. A Dutchman, Marinus Van der Lubbe, was caught in the act and arrested. Van der Lubbe was a communist, but also mentally ill. Whether he has acted alone or not, and if not, who had instigated him to do the arson (communists or nazis), was never cleared out.

Anyway, the arson, by a communist, gave the government (with nazis but still having to deal with opposition) a reason to activate a few articles in the - in fact democratic - Weimar constitution to temporary suspend a lot of rights and liberties. Using these laws, Hitler could eradicate his political opponents, and establish dictatorship. Shortly after, parliament stopped its activities. An obedient mock parliament was installed, that yearly prolonged the state of exception, so Hitler did not even have to abolish the Weimar constitution itself during his reign.

Whoever did it, the Reichstag fire made a quick takeover of power by the nazis possible.
Marinus van der Lubbe was brought to trial, condemned to death and beheaded under the guillotine.
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When I played Medieval Total War 2 as the Holy Roman Empire, every time I sent out an assassin to burn down an enemy building, the voiceover would say “And the Reichstag it is!” I thought this was a bit weird, in a medieval game. Then I accidentally turned on the subtitles, and the voice is actually saying “And the Reich’s target is..?” :doh:
 
montycrusto said:
When I played Medieval Total War 2 as the Holy Roman Empire, every time I sent out an assassin to burn down an enemy building, the voiceover would say “And the Reichstag it is!” I thought this was a bit weird, in a medieval game. Then I accidentally turned on the subtitles, and the voice is actually saying “And the Reich’s target is..?” :doh:
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Making a note of the fact that our God-Emperor is hard of hearing. Could be a useful thing to know someday.
 
Loxuru said:
Ninety years ago, on February 27th 1933, the Reichstag (parliament) building in Berlin was set on fire. A Dutchman, Marinus Van der Lubbe, was caught in the act and arrested. Van der Lubbe was a communist, but also mentally ill. Whether he has acted alone or not, and if not, who had instigated him to do the arson (communists or nazis), was never cleared out.

Anyway, the arson, by a communist, gave the government (with nazis but still having to deal with opposition) a reason to activate a few articles in the - in fact democratic - Weimar constitution to temporary suspend a lot of rights and liberties. Using these laws, Hitler could eradicate his political opponents, and establish dictatorship. Shortly after, parliament stopped its activities. An obedient mock parliament was installed, that yearly prolonged the state of exception, so Hitler did not even have to abolish the Weimar constitution itself during his reign.

Whoever did it, the Reichstag fire made a quick takeover of power by the nazis possible.
Marinus van der Lubbe was brought to trial, condemned to death and beheaded under the guillotine.
Click to expand...
Van der Lubbe's body has recently been exhumed.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...may-help-solve-puzzle-of-1933-reichstag-blaze
 
Migoz2 said:
Van der Lubbe's body has recently been exhumed.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...may-help-solve-puzzle-of-1933-reichstag-blaze
Click to expand...
Apart from Van der Lubbe, three Bulgarian communists have been accused of the arson, including later Bulgarian prime minister Grigori Dimitrov. To the annoyance of Göring and the other nazis, the court remained impartial and refused to play the game of the nazi propaganda. The three Bulgarians were acuitted for lack of evidence. Later on, Hitler would try to get grip on penal courts, by introducing the concept of 'guilty by profile'. Often, he overruled court verdicts, mostly in cases of national security and resistance, and thereby ordered executions, regardless of the verdict. Civil courts remained more independent, and are known to have issued verdicts against the interests of the state.
 
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