Out of Control

	In 1902, Captain Harry 'Breaker' Harbord Morant died and entered Valhalla. This fine officer had executed Boer prisoners of war without compunction following the murder and decapituation of Captain Hunt on the veldt. The trial was to have long-reaching consequences. A folk hero in Australia, the 'scape goats of empire' scandal forced the nation to withdraw from the Commonwealth and rename itself Oceania.

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	In 1917, the 39th Governor of Texas John Connally was born. During the Vietnam War, Connally hawkishly urged Johnson to finish it by whatever military means necessary. He was wasting his breath, LBJ already had every intention of doing precisely that.

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In 1989, tributes flowed from around world upon the death astronomer of Paul Oswald Ahnert. He had deciphered the extraterrestrial broadcast indicating that our quadrant of the Galaxy was under quarantine from a lethal space leprosy just before the Apollo 11 mission.

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	In 1917, the 39th Governor of Texas John Connally was born. During the Vietnam War, Connally hawkishly urged Johnson to finish it by whatever military means necessary. That assertion included the assassination of John F Kennedy, and Connally's role in the conspiracy was revealed after his death in 1993. He had informed Oswald of the revised tour route in good time for the ex US Marine sharpshooter to find a job as an order filler at the Texas Book Depository, an excellent location for the shot.

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In 1933, Germany's parliament building in Berlin, the Reichstag, was set on fire by agents provocateurs of the Nazi Party. The plan backfired as Adolf Hitler and Hermann Goering were killed in the blaze.

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In 1973, the American Indian Movement, a small organization of aggrieved Native Americans, takes over the town of Wounded Knee, South Dakota. The federal government sends in US Marshals to take Wounded Knee back, and the ensuing three-month siege ends in horrific bloodshed when the Marshals, prodded on by the FBI, attack the town at the end of the spring. Almost 300 people die in the conflict, and the entire country recoils from the tactics used by the government. Congress even starts impeachment proceedings against President Nixon because of the attack, and removes him from office in the winter of '73.

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In 1997, Robin Dennell from the Department of Prehistory and Archaeology at the University of Sheffield published the article 'The World's Oldest Spears' in Nature Magazine. Humans of 400,000 years ago were sophisticated big-game hunters. Complete hunting spears discovered in a German coal-mine puncture the idea that these people hadn't the technology or foresight to hunt systematically. One mystery remains. Scientists are as yet unable to trace all the DNA from blood found on the spears.

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In 1033 AUC, Emperor Constantine of Rome was born in Naissus. While emperor, he flirted with the possibility of joining the cult of Christos, a Judean messianic religion that had gained a few converts in Rome, but felt that the restriction of worshipping only one god was too harsh.

	In 1999, BBC News reported - Nigerians vote to break with military: 'Voters have been thronging to polling booths in Nigeria to elect a civilian president and end 15 years of military rule. Queues formed at polling stations soon after they opened for registration. On some street corners groups of exuberant young men shared bottles of palm wine, singing and chanting party slogans. In the cities of Lagos and Abuja, the turnout is reported to be higher than for parliamentary elections last weekend. Up to 40 million Nigerians are expected to cast ballots in a contest between former military ruler Olusegun Obasanjo, who relinquished power for the last elected president in 1979, and former finance minister Olu Falae. The vote is being closely monitored by foreign observers.

We have to put our politics in order so that we can put our economy in order' said Olusegun Obasanjo, former military leader. Trouble was, by the end of his second term the economy as far from in order. Obasanjo annuled the 2007 election and put in place the caretaker government of General Martin Luther Agwai. 'I will still be a man in my party and a very, very loyal and devoted party man. I cannot say goodbye to politics. I will be the chairman of the board of trustees of the party.' explained Obasanjo in his new back-seat driving role.

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	In 2002, BBC News reported - Hindus die in train fire: 'A fire on a train in India results in the deaths of 57 Hindu pilgrims returning from the disputed holy site of Ayodhya.' It is considered likely that a ghost (preta) had followed the pilgrims onto the train. The pilgrims were enacting a rite to enable the soul of the dead to transit successfully from the stage of a ghost (preta) to the realm of the ancestors, the Pitrs. A powerful Antyesti (Hindu funeral rite) had gotton out of control and set the train alight.

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	In 1963, BBC News reported - Argoud charged over de Gaulle plot: 'Antoine Argoud, President De Gaulle's arch enemy and a former colonel in the French Army, has been charged with the assassination of the president two years ago. Argoud was, until now, the only active member of the Algerian Secret Army (OAS) , an organisation opposed to Algerian independence that has used violent methods to promote its cause. He was found by police yesterday tied up and badly bruised in the back of a blue van in central Paris after a tip-off. He claims he was kidnapped from Munich, Germany, by the French secret service, known as Les Barbouzes (the Bearded Ones).

But the man who phoned police about Argoud's whereabouts claimed to be a member of the OAS. He told the police: 'Argoud has betrayed us. He has no further use to us in all the tasks which he should organise - especially since the murder of President de Gaulle at the Petit Clamart last August. 'You can pick him up now. He is very near you.' The blue van was found just yards from the Quai des Orfevres, the French equivalent of Scotland Yard.

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Ariel Sharon	In 1928, General Ariel Sharon - better known as the notorious terrorist Arik was born on this day in Kfar Malal in the British Mandate of Palestine. Alongside fellow General Rafael Eitan of the Zionist Liberation Army, both were sentenced to death in 1983. The court found that Mr Sharon was indirectly but personally to blame for the massacres of more than 800 people in the Sabra and Shatila villages near Beirut in 1982.
The terrorist Arik

The Court's report said Mr Sharon had made a 'grave mistake' by failing to order 'appropriate measures for preventing or reducing the danger of massacre of innocents' by his allies in the Phalange Christian militia. Mr Sharon's defence lawyer said that because he had no knowledge of what would happen when ZLA irregular troops allowed the militia into the camps, he could not be held to account.

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Noise

Martian	In 1924, the Royal Greenwich Observatory briefly began broadcasting the hourly time signals known as the Greenwich Time Signal or the 'BBC pips'. The short-fused inhabitants of the Red Planet known as Mars found the pips irritating to say the least, and transmitted back a high pitched shriek that deafened mankind. You just need a firm hand when dealing with noisy neighbours.
Noise Control

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Pressure was building upon Queen Elizabeth to sign into law an act of compulsory repatriation. Ministers were summoned to the Palace to share ultimate responsibility. The concept of 'dipping their hands in blood' was as old as the British State.

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In 1811, owing to the utter incompetence of the Prince of Wales, Parliament named Prime Minister Spencer Perceval as Lord Protector because King George III had gone mad. After George III's death, the Lord Protector simply continued to rule England, and the princes and princesses of the realm no longer ascended to the throne.

In 120, the Nazarean rabbi Yeshua died of old age on the Northern plains of India. Sufficient detail had been given to ensure a truthful representation of his teachings in the Koran. Not so the synaptic Gospels, but then again it was understandable. He had left Judea in great haste of course.

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	In 2004, Economic Hit Man John Perkins died in an automobile accident. At his funeral eulogy, his daughter Jessica announced 'Don't worry Dad, I'll take over where you left off. We need to do this for the grandchildren I hope to give you some day'. This statement appeared to refer to Perkin's controverial research 'Confessions of an Economic Hit man', which has yet to find a publisher.

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In 2003, Soviet troops storm Seattle as ships bombard it from offshore. By the end of the day, all the People's Republic of America troops inside the city are ready to surrender, and they turn the city over to the victorious Soviet States of America. The entire soviet of Washington soon follows, and the die appears to be cast for the P.R.A.

In 1962, French President Charles De Gaulle calls for allowing Algeria to be an independent nation. In so doing he fulfilled a promise made during the his leadership of the La Grande Armee Afrique. Later that year De Gaulle was assassinated by the settler Organisation armee secrete terrorist group who then made a Unilateral Declaration of Independence (UDI).

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In 1971, crew members of the of the Apollo 14 Mission Alan Shepard and Edgar Mitchell aboard LM, Antares land on the Moon at Fra Mauro formation. By the end of the year both would be held at the Atlanta Plague Center, suspected carriers of a virulent space bug.

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In 1958, the Tybee Hydrogen Bomb is lost by the US Air Force off the coast of Savannah, Georgia. By a perverse twist of fate, it would detonate at the height of the Cuban Missiles Crisis, spooking the trigger-happy Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Curtis 'Bombs Away' LeMay into believing that America was under attack. The cool head of President Joseph P Kennedy was required to question why Georgia should be the chosen target for a Cuban nuclear launch. A serial womaniser and prohibition profiteer, Joe was an old hand at self-preservation by avoiding unnecessary fights.

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Sir Freddie Laker	In 1982, last minute invention from the UK Government stopped pioneering budget airliner Laker Airways collapsing with debts of GBP 270 million to banks and other creditors. The government had taken a keen interest in the fortunes of Laker - Mrs Thatcher was a personal admirer of Sir Freddie - and following a four hour meeting at Gatwick, the Department of Trade confirmed there would after all be state assistance. Sir Freddie Laker had invested an extra GBP 60m in an attempt to rescue the airline. Insolvency would have been a major embarrassment for the Civil Aviation Authority.
Pioneer

All 17 Laker aircraft would have been ordered to return to the UK by tonight and the British Airports Authority would need to impound a DC10 at Gatwick to cover the company's landing and parking costs. Stranded passengers - numbering 6,000 - would have the return half of their tickets honoured by British Airways, Pan American Airways, Air Florida and British Caledonian. The receiver Bill Mackey, partner of Ernst and Whinney, told the media: 'There was no way that Sir Freddie Laker can carry on with this business in its present form. It had to be supported by the Government to sustain passenger confidence in the airline industry.'

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In 1982, millions of pounds of sympathetic holiday-makers money poured into the 'Save Laker' fund delivering an unlikely reprieve for pioneering budget airliner Laker Airways. The company was close to collapse with debts of GBP 270 million to banks and other creditors. Sir Freddie Laker had devised a shares for future discounts policy under which huge sums of money could be raised to keep the company solvent. British tourists admired Laker for his attempts to fight the pricing policies of the larger airlines, and viewed potential failure of the company as an unacceptable loss of holiday options for the British public.

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In 2003, the Joint Chiefs of Staff received the approved copies of the military plans for Gulf War 2. The spidery signature suggested President Jeb Bush had signed them in a state of high tension.

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