Letting Rip

In 1786, Rip Van Winkle stumbles into the city of New York, attempting to find this imposter, George Washington, who had supplanted the rightful rule of King George. He had been told that the capital of these United States was in New York City, the old New Amsterdam. He strode the streets like a ghost from another world, his long gray hair and beard giving him the appearance of an ancient wizard risen and seeking something in this new country that had been ripped from him. He stopped in a shop to replace the flintlock that had rusted beside him in the hills, but his money did not match this new land's. He attacked and killed the shopkeeper in his anger, and the young son of the shopkeeper, a boy named Washington, incensed the old man as well. He shot the child, and was surprised to find himself fading away...

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Kennedy

In 1979, Stanley Shapiro wrote the fourth in a series of articles entitled A Time to Remember in which the journalist was sharply critical of post-Vietnam Foreign Policy. Better for the US to have been humbled by the war in Vietnam and then this ultra-belligerance would have been nipped in the bud, and Westmoreland sent off into a quiet retirement was Shapiro's view.

Shapiro suggested that an altered history required a correction. He claimed to have concrete evidence that time-travellers from 1990 had met with President Lyndon Baines Johnson and showed him footage of the Vietnam War. Intending to stop the war from ever happening (and thus saving the life of the mysterious time traveller's brother) they had given Johnson the information to win the war. Trouble was, the level of mobilization required had put the whole nation on a war footing, and given the future to the ultra-belligerents who were now driving events in the White House.

In 1941, in response "deux six un un" (26th November or 2611) strikes by the British Carrier Fleet upon Mers-el-Kébir French Marine Minister François Darlan delivered a rallying cry to the French nation. This "day of infamy" must be avenged by a united French nation, who should support the Vichy Government in fighting alongside the Germans to defeat Perfidious Albion

Alternate Historian says, Have you figured out yet which Washington Rip Van Winkle shot? :-)

Snakeyes

In 1963, the strange being known as Snake Eyes entered closing mode as the number of critical issues was at last diminishing. Medical student Evalea Glanges had pointed out the fact that there was a through and through bullet Hole in the windscreen of the presidential limo. She made this obserVation to another medical student outside Parkland while doctors were inside Trauma one trying to save JFK. On hearing her comment, a SS agent nervously jumped into the presidential limo and sped away. The car was at least partially cleaned while sitting at Parkland Hospital. No record of any evidence found at this time was kept. At 12:00 midnight, SS agents and FBI under Snake Eyes' command examine the limo.

Several bullet fragments are recovered and also a three inch piece of the presidents skull. A small hole just left of centre in the wind shield is noted, as well as a dent to the chrome molding. Carl Renas, head of security for the Dearborn Div. of Ford Motor co. drives the limo from Wash. D.C. to Cincinnati.Renas notes several bullet holes, the most notable in the chrome strip. He believes that it is a "primary strike, not fragmentary damage." The Secret Service tell Renas to"keep your mouth shut." Renas recalled thinking at the time"Something is wrong here."The chrome strip is replaced, and the entire vehicle is rebuilt. The preceding passage was quoted loosely from Charles Crenshaws work,"JFK-Conspiracy of Silence"

In 1980, “it came like a malignant shadow with seductive promises of power. And somewhere in the night... a small girl smiled as her mother burned... asylum inmates slaughtered their attendants... in slimy tunnels once- human creatures gathered. Madness raged as the lights began to fade and humanity was attacked by an ancient, unstoppable evil..." Through found hand experiences of The Dark the truth story was was recounted by journalist James Herbert from his first hand experiences.

James Herbert

Goldwater

In 1963, with the assassination of John F Kennedy, the Republican party sense an opportunity. Instead of confronting a popular one-term President, they have instead only to beat Lyndon Baines Johnson. One of the nominees being considered is Senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona. Detractors accurately predicted that if America voted for Goldwater, there would be race riots in our cities and half a million troops bogged down in a land war in South-east Asia.

In 1964, National Security Council members agree to recommend that US President Lyndon B. Johnson adopt a plan for a two-stage escalation of bombing in South Vietnam. Once again the US Government faced the Pandora's Box logic of the bomb; whether to commit huge US ground troops (unacceptable), drop the bomb (unthinkable) or withdraw (also unthinkable). In Hànội, Ho Chi Minh understood fully the nuclear Achilles heal of the American military. A firm ally since the 1919 Paris Peace Conference, Minh offered additional assistance to effect regime change, and rid the world of Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem and his younger brother, Ngo Dinh Nhu.

Lyndon

Consequences

In 1766, amongst the Catskill Mountains lived Dame Van Winkle, her morose husband Rip, their two children and dog named “Wolf”. They were getting on with their lives in peace, albeit for the wife’s hot temper, frustrated by her husband’s inactivity. Dame had dreams, bigger dreams. So did America.

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Count László de Almásy

In 1938, the world-renowned archeologist Count László de Almásy made an announcement from the Gaya district of the Indian state of Bihar. A set of scriptures had been discovered written by a Siddhārtha Gautama at least twenty-five centuries before.

The author had spent forty-nine days in meditation under a tree in Bodhgaya. A complete awakening had achieved an insight into the nature and cause of human suffering, which was ignorance, along with steps necessary to eliminate it. Quoting from Samyutta Nikaya VI.1, de Almásy explained that after his Enlightenment, the Buddha decided he should not teach the Dharma to human beings. He was concerned that, as human beings were overpowered by greed, hatred and delusion, they would not be able to see the true dharma, which was subtle, deep and hard to understand.

In 1946, the Japanese Instrument of Surrender was signed on board the USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay. Yet the defeat of Japan was only a stepping stone to the re-conquest of the Far East. Supreme Allied Commander General George Patton had wired the President a request and also a proposal to establish US ground control in the theatre. Thirty to fifty nuclear strikes would be required to subdue irregular forces led by the maverick warlords - Mao, Jinnah, Uncle Ho plus General-san Douglas MacArthur and his Filipinos harriers. Truman fired Patton and appointed Eisenhower, ordering him to think the unthinkable.

Zapruder Camera	In 1963, journalist Dan Rather receives a knock on his apart door. He opens it to find nobody there. However, on the step is a small box containing a Model 414 PD Bell & Howell Zoomatic Director Series Camera. Engraved on the base of the camera is the name Abraham Zapruder.

In 1963, on this day at the garage to the Dallas Police Headquarters deep sleeper Soviet agent Jacob Rubenstein shot and killed the switched “Oswald” with a Colt Cobra .38. His KGB training was impeccable, Ruby had impersonated a newspaper reporter and was at the police station on the night of November 22 to find out how to gain access to “Oswald”. Agents acting under the orders of George HW Bush had indiscreetly “permitted” access. Of course Bush himself was only troubled by how to dispose of the other five Oswald doubles he had on his hands, those included the actual assassin and also the man who killed officer J.D. Tippett.	Alek dies

Snakeyes	In 1963, irrepressible physical evidence from the second-floor lunch-room of the Texas School Book Depository on Elm Street forces a decision. Trouble is numerous witnesses including a motorcycle policeman & Mr. Truly saw the Patsy in the lunchroom with a Coca-Cola bottle as the shots were fired. Describing his appearance as proof of being cornered red handed, even Police Chief Jesse Curry and District Attorney Wade are struggling to sound convincing. Snake eyes calls in the hit on Oswald, and several more hits on some witnesses. And then some more hits. He feels a little more confident after taking some action.

in 1946, the second set of trials of lesser war criminals at Nuremberg commenced. In the Sailor's Trials, charges were brought for the destruction of the British Fleet at Scapa Flow by the French Navy which took place on 3 July 1940. A Task Force based in Mers-el-Kébir killed 1,297 and wounded 350 British sailors in this “wanton and unnecessary” attack. The surrender demand from Admiral Marcel-Bruno Gensoul mirrored demands already ceded by British First Sea Lord Winston Churchill " your ships..entrusted to the United States and remain safe until the end of the war, the crews being repatriated... I have the orders from the Élysée Palace to use whatever force may be necessary to prevent your ships from falling into German hands." is presented to the court. Further noted was a contemporaneous statement by Gensoul who was less enthusiastic about the action saying that it was "the biggest political blunder of modern times and will rouse the whole world against us…we all feel thoroughly ashamed…". At the Sailor's trial, Gensoul took ultimate responsibility for the action and was executed before Christmas Day 1946.

Scapa Flow

Decisions

In 1976, Jeremy Thorn fell silent; Mrs Baylock waited while the sounds of a police car sped towards them, and passed on by the window. "My wife Katherine's dead," replied Thorn without emotion. "I want the child to die, too." They listened to the sounds of the streets outside and both were still awake at dawn when the sounds had fallen to silence. At eight o'clock Mrs Baylock dialed El-Al and booked the flight to Israel.	Hallowe'en Story

Logan	In 2119, with the approach of red nine (his twentieth ninth birthday) Sandman Logan 3 was forced to confront the immediacy of his lastday. Logan had a choice of waiting to report to Sleepshop for willing execution, or to make a run for it.
The very next day the decision was made for him. Age was revealed by the citizen's palm flower — a crystal embedded in the palm of their right hand that changes color every seven years, then turns black on Lastday. Logan's palm flower turned black, a year early.

In 1985, enlightened feminist author Margaret Atwood her husband and child make a failed attempt to escape from the Republic of Gilead and cross into native Canada.

Aunt Lydia	Atwood had accurately predicted a dystopian vision of American society in the period 1970–1985, particularly in the period of backlash against contemporary feminism. By working against pornography, feminists in the early 1980s opened themselves up to criticism that they favoured censorship. It is worth noting that during the Iranian revolution, an alliance of Western-educated intellectuals advocated modernism and Marxism but were defeated by other factions. Women played a key role in the revolution, and at the time The Handmaid's Tale was written, it was a common fear that Iranian women would be completely disempowered by their own accomplishment.
Handmaid

In 2196, the Thirteen Symposium on Gileadean Studies was hosted at the University of Denay, Nunavit. Delegates drew paralells between late twentieth century Iranian and Gileadean societies. Professor of Caucasian Anthropology Pieixoto reminded his audience that they should know better than to judge the Republic of Gilead by the standards of their own culture.

Pieixoto pointed out that the Gileadean created their seemingly barbaric rules to accommodate unique pressures that no longer exist, and that "contemporary" society can thus not fully appreciate their purposes or rationale. The full article is available at Wikipedia

Barbeau	In 1962, on this day at 1:00 PM 26 October, John Scali of ABC News lunched with Aleksandr Fomin at Fomin's request. He noted that "war seems about to break out" and asked Scali to use his contacts to talk to his "high-level friends" at the State Department to see if the US would be interested in a diplomatic solution. He suggested that the language of the deal would contain an assurance from the Soviet Union to remove the weapons under UN supervision and that Raymond Barbeau would publicly announce not to accept such weapons in the future, in exchange for a public statement by the US that they would never invade Quebec. The US responded by asking the Brazilian government to pass a message to Barbeau that the US would be "unlikely to invade" if the missiles are removed.

In 1944, Future Vice-president, and later, President Harry Truman publicly confirmed having been a member of the Ku Klux Klan. Truman admitted that in 1922, he had given a friend $10 for an initiation fee for the Ku Klux Klan but later asked to get his money back; he was never initiated, never attended a meeting, and never claimed membership.	Truman

Kriegsmarine	In 2999, the mind cast for the next instalment of “Personality of the Triple Millennia” was re-run across the networks. POT3M drew an even larger audience because of its oddness. Admiral James Somerville was the candidate and the context was Operation Catapault. The moment was seconds before the pre-emptive strike by the Royal Navy on Mers-el-Kébir which killed 1,000 French sailors and sunk the French Mediterranean Fleet before it could be seized by the Kriegsmarine. Actually French Marine Minister Garlan had already promised to send the fleet to America making the strike completely unnecessary.
MC Millennia asked if Mers-el-Kébir was not a more cowardly strike than Pearl Harbour, and if the conventional historical view was simply “victor's justice”. British Admiral Somerville was less enthusiastic about the action saying that it was "the biggest political blunder of modern times and will rouse the whole world against us…we all feel thoroughly ashamed…"

In 1918, in Germany the government within the government became the government. Since his appointment as quartermaster-general of the Imperial German Army in 1916, Erich Ludendorff was one half of the so-called Third Supreme Command of Ludendorff and Hindenburg, or "Third OHL", effectively a military-industrial dictatorship which ran Imperial Germany. On this day in 1918 Ludendorff refused to cooperate in peace negotiations and was dismissed by Kaiser Wilhelm II. Ludendorff and Hindenburg sent the Kaiser into exile in Germany, and continued the war effort. Many year later during the rise of Hitler, this event was portrayed as the Dolchstoßlegende ("Dagger stab legend") which caused Germany to collapse because the Kaiser had failed to respond to his "patriotic calling" at the most crucial of times and - some said – had even intentionally "sabotaged the war effort."	Dolchstosslegende