"The War" Ken Burns

World War II documentary on PBS. With the slogan, "During extraordinary times, their are no ordinary people."

I am looking forward to viewing this 7 part documentary that focuses on interviews with U.S. veterans and the people back home. PBS will be airing the documentary soon. In Los Angles it will start Sept. 23rd on KCET.

Some people have voiced views that the show neglects the contributions of Hispanic Americans during WW2. San Fransisco will be airing an edited version omitting some language (Ian rolls his eyes). I know Berkley is a communist nursery...... but come on guys. Someone please smack these hippies with their dang love beads and wake them up.

Ken Burns picked 4 small towns. I don't know of any major Hispanic forces created from the 4 small towns Mr. Burns picked. But I want to say this. Hispanics did contribute much to the U.S. effort. However there was also an all Japanese Unit that was one of the most decorated (per man) Unit in WW2. There was also the Black Airmen that flew P-51 Mustangs defending B-17 Bombers over Berlin, they were another one of our best military Units. The fact is if I made a documentary I am sure I would be talking with Americans with Scottish or German decent, like myself. I would be able to understand their struggle and plight and cultural values more readily than if I tried to understand someone with African, Asian or Hispanic heritage/decent. So I say get over it and make a Hispanic documentary and PBS I am sure will air it. They have aired them in the past and I have enjoyed those and ones about the Japanese and Black troops.

One thing is certain as a result of Ken Burns Documentary many more of the 17 million living veterans will now have a chance and know where to tell their story. The Library of Congress will now get a lot more backing and data for their "the Veterans History project" which collects stories and interviews from veterans and family members. The Veterans history Project collects information and story's from all war veterans in America. From letters during the Cival war, through WW1 and WW2, to the modern Gulf wars. So I say good job Mr. Burns for allowing so many people to find an outlet to tell their storys so that generations to come will be able to read and learn more, and to view War threw the eyes of those who have lived it and those at home who bare its toll. - Ian Bach

A World Wide Web of terrorist plotting

Bektasevic, 19, stands in court in January, when he was sentenced to 15 years in prision on terrorism charges. (Associated Press – January 10, 2007)

The Internet has become a virtual operations center replacing the Al Qaeda bases in Afghanistan and Bosnia.

I have been searching for, tracking movements of, known terrorists, suspect terrorists, and Islamic extremist sympathizers for about 4 months now.

The terrorists are spreading the "stop the war in Iraq" rhetoric. Also they are spreading the 9-11 conspiracy theories. They also are the ones who started the "it was Bush", "it was Isreal", or "it wasn't Arabs" theories. This is a tactic of Terrorism. One goal of the terrorists is to make citizens distrust their governments. This makes it easy for them to recruit and also for them to infiltrate and take over governments. They are currently using military terror tactics (guns and bombs) in over 60 countries; the worst areas infected today by the radical Islamic terror groups include Iraq, Somalia, Egypt, Algeria, Afghanistan, Turkey, Palestine, Jordan, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Nigeria. So as you can see if we pull out and don’t allow the time needed for the Iraqis to defend themselves against these forces it will be devastating for the world. The number of innocent civilian deaths will skyrocket over night. One other thing to consider is many of these countries have Christians, Jews, Hindi, and many other religions that will end up in genocide. Yes there is Christians in Iraq and those other countries.

Here is how my travel began. I saw a PBS special that talked about Afghanistan and how the Taliban wanted to destroy burn and eliminate anything that was not in accordance with their extremist views. However, the good (moderate Muslim) people of Afghanistan respect their heritage, history, art, music, and freedom. All of which were under attack by extremists. The moderates were able to hide (under penalty of torture and death) many things. Such as Artwork, The Gold Treasures from around 500 AD, and the original negatives of the nations film achieve (approx 50 yrs of film history - the Taliban did burn the prints but never knew the negatives had been hidden. After seeing this I knew the common Western View that "these people were all Radical Muslims and wanted to kill westerners", was a misconception AND A LIE.

So I started looking for and shutting down terrorist’s web sites and propaganda.

After about 2 months I started to contact people in Afghanistan and Iraq. I was happy to learn how many felt the extremists/radicals were terrible people and not true Muslims and how much they wanted their freedoms and to be rid of the terrorists.

"Currently Al Qaeda and other Terrorists get 15 minutes of Fame for evil deeds, Lets turn that around and make it 15 minutes of Shame." - Ian Bach

So I continued my efforts urged on by touching letters from Muslims who hate the terrorists and their propaganda that infects their News as well as ours News and the Internet. Currently Al Qaeda and radical Muslims get the 15 minutes of fame for saying hateful things and showing videos of them blowing up American vehicles, beheading people who help in the efforts to bring peace, and now Al Qaeda is even wants and has tried to kill the Dali Lama. But when do we see the other side the other 99.97 % of the Muslims who are not hateful people. That's the biggest problem we don't. The news doesn't make money off a nice Muslim person saying how much he wants peace and how they denounce the extremists.

As I went on my journey I became more and more aware of how the enemy was changing tactics. One bad person, someone else had found was posing as a NY police officer (I hope you see the connection - 9/11?) he had sent many hateful emails to US troops and families. The guy even had a picture of the NY policeman and was using the guy’s name. I had already seen many suspects that were posing as normal people but this was first time I had seen such outright arrogance.

One thing I can tell you from my journey is that the enemy has adapted and infiltrated into our main stream Medias and are currently influencing the way others view the world. They use deception in many ways. One is the constant talk of we must leave Iraq. For me that is a good sign in some ways. It shows me that they are so worried about losing Iraq to a democratic government that they are franticly trying every trick in the book to twist the realities into lies. Trust me there are many good things happening in Iraq like our troops having been retrained in "winning the hearts and minds" a counterinsurgency tactic aimed at making friends and protecting them from the Al Qaeda and its umbrella organization of gangs’ hell bent on derailing the progress. Almost every Iraqi and coalition force member I speak to agree it is not a civil war it is a gang war. With people vieing for local power.

Also the one thing cited by most Iraqis is that the people responsible are foreign fighters from countries like Egypt, Iran, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and about 60 other countries including 1-2 a year from each Britain and the USA!!!. These are radical Muslims who are sent to Iraq to attempt to derail the progress. It includes approx. 600 foreign fighters caught or killed each year.

The radicals also have made the INTERNET their new home. FACT. This is their new recruiting base and propaganda machine. So next time you read something look at the persons profile and look at some of the Q&A they do. If you see all they are doing is hateful stuff..... Well you get the picture I hope.

Here is a link to a recent Article by the LA Times that talks about one operative a 22 year old Serbian of Palestinian decent. He was posting Videos on the internet given directly to him from al Qaeda. He had moved around a lot once he was in the organization and was very active in propaganda on the internet he also posted how to make a suicide vest and he was trying to buy explosives in the USA. He was caught in Europe and will be going to jail for a long time. - By Ian Bach

Source(s):

Web Site
www.ianbach.com

A Times april 2007 - Internet replacing terrorist http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-net16apr16,1,1935334.stor...