This page features brief excerpts of stories published by the mainstream
media and, less frequently, blogs, alternative media, and even obviously
biased sources. The excerpts are taken directly from the websites cited in
each source note. Quotation marks are not used.
Source: CNN
June 8, 2009
"National treasures," Maj. Gen. Vincent Boles said Saturday evening.
It marked the first time in history the U.S. Army recognized 350 soldiers held as slaves inside Nazi Germany. The men were beaten, starved and forced to work in tunnels at Berga an der Elster where the Nazi government had a hidden V-2 rocket factory. Berga was a subcamp of the notorious concentration camp Buchenwald.
"These men were abused and put under some of the most horrific conditio
Source: Telegraph (UK)
June 6, 2009
As America's first black president attends D-Day commemmorations in Normandy, the Second World War's forgotten African-American soldiers say they enjoyed more freedom in Britain in the 1940s than in the segregated United States.
Their faces were missing from the Hollywood films that heaped glory on US forces and and their stories were missing from the books, exhibitions and museums that commemorated the Normandy landings.
“Where we were in The Longest Day or Saving Pr
Source: Foxnews
June 7, 2009
A U.S. Army veteran who has masqueraded as a D-Day paratrooper for the elite 82nd Airborne Division for decades is due to receive France’s highest military award despite discrepancies in his service accounts.
Howard Manoian told of landing behind enemy lines on D-Day as a paratrooper, but National Archives records prove he served as a member of a less glamorous chemical warfare unit that came ashore on Utah Beach and ran a supply dump.
The French government still plans
Source: CNN
June 7, 2009
When then-President-elect Barack Obama first asked Hillary Clinton to be his top diplomat, she turned him down and recommended others for the job, the secretary of state said in an interview broadcast Sunday.
When her name was mentioned in the media as a possible member of Obama's cabinet, Clinton said, she found the idea "absurd."
"And then when he called and asked me to come see him, and we had our first conversation, I said, 'You know, I really don't t
Source: Telegraph (UK)
June 5, 2009
D-Day anniversary commemorations could be thrown into chaos after threats from French trade unionists to sabotage electricity and gas supplies to all major events.
As world leaders including Gordon Brown and Barack Obama prepare to arrive in Normandy along with thousands of World War II veterans, organisers received warnings from militant power workers they would stop public address systems and lighting from working.
They said they would break into electricity sub stat
Source: Telegraph (UK)
June 5, 2009
Charles Donald Albury, co-pilot of the plane that dropped the atomic bomb on Nagasaki, Japan, has died after years of congestive heart failure, aged 88.
Mr Albury died on May 23 in hospital.
During the Second World War, he helped fly the B-29 Bockscar that dropped the weapon on Aug. 9, 1945. He also witnessed the deployment of the first atomic bomb over Hiroshima three days earlier as a pilot for a support plane. His plane dropped instruments to measure the magnitude o
Source: Daily Mail (UK)
June 5, 2009
Veterans contaminated during atomic tests more than 50 years ago will be able to sue the Government, the High Court said yesterday.
In a landmark ruling, Mr Justice Foskett said ten test cases could go to full trial, paving the way for claims of up to £100million.
The ageing survivors are demanding the Ministry of Defence reaches a settlement before they die.
A total of 1,011 blame their ill-health, including cancer, skin defects and fertility problems,
Source: Telegraph (UK)
June 6, 2009
It is a picture of what might have been, of a "beautiful, kind-looking lady", her face wrinkled by the passage of time over a life never lived: Holocaust victim Anne Frank at the age of 80.
The 'age progression' image shows the diarist as she might have appeared today had she not died of typhus and starvation at the age of 15 in Bergen Belsen in March 1945, just a few weeks before the Nazi concentration camp was liberated by British troops.
Created for the An
Source: CNN
June 6, 2009
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown misspoke on stage during ceremonies for the 65th anniversary of D-Day at Omaha Beach, France, Saturday.
Discussing U.S.–Great Britain cooperation during the invasion, Brown said, “Next to Obama Beach, we join President Obama in paying particular tribute to the spectacular bravery of American soldiers who gave their lives”.
He stumbled again on a second reference to Omaha Beach before saying it correctly.
There was no reac
Source: BBC
June 6, 2009
The UK's oldest man and one of Britain's two surviving WWI veterans has turned 113.
Henry Allingham joined the Royal Navy Air Service in September 1915 before transferring to the RAF in April 1918.
The Royal Navy hosted a birthday party on HMS President in London for his family, close friends and members of the Royal Navy and Royal Air Force.
The birthday is another landmark for a man who is the last surviving founder member of the RAF and whose life has
Source: BBC
June 5, 2009
Former CIA agent Bernard Leon Barker, who took part in the Watergate burglary in Washington more than 30 years ago, has died in Miami at the age of 92.
In the course of a long and colourful career, Mr Barker was also one of the leaders of the failed CIA attempt to invade Cuba at the Bay of Pigs in 1961.
He had suffered from cancer and heart problems, the AP news agency said.
Source: BBC
June 5, 2009
An official inquiry has been started in Italy to determine whether a statue attributed to Michelangelo was really made by him.
The wooden statue of Christ on the Cross was bought by the Italian government for millions of dollars.
The authorities made their move after a number of experts declared that the statue was genuine.
But the statue is at the centre of a long-running dispute, with some experts insisting it is not a Michelangelo.
The ro
Source: CNN
June 5, 2009
The woman who stabbed pregnant actress Sharon Tate to death will be considered for parole from prison a month after the 40th anniversary of the killings that cast a shadow of fear over southern California.
Susan Atkins, 61, has been denied parole in 17 previous hearings, but the former "Manson Family" member now is terminally ill with brain cancer and is paralyzed.
Atkins -- who was initially sentenced to death along with Manson and three others -- will have h
Source: CNN
June 6, 2009
World leaders gave thanks Saturday to military veterans for their efforts in the D-Day landings of 65 years ago at a ceremony in northwest France, warning that their legacy must not be forgotten as the world faces renewed threats of tyranny.
More than 150,000 allied troops, about half of them Americans, took part in D-Day on June 6, 1944, overwhelming German forces in an operation that proved a turning point in driving the Nazis out of France.
The speeches were followe
Source: MSNBC
June 5, 2009
Craft involved in major World War II disaster gets $8 million restoration.
In a nondescript shed in a English seaside village, the remains of a Nazi torpedo boat behind one of worst U.S. catastrophes in World War II rests on cradle of lumber.
And almost 65 years to the day after this German vessel played its part in a D-Day dress rehearsal gone wrong that ended with 749 Americans servicemen dead, three survivors of the Exercise Tiger disaster garner their first glimpse
Source: Daily Mail (UK)
June 6, 2009
Prince Charles and Gordon Brown have joined presidents Barack Obama and Nicolas Sarkozy to take part in commemorations of the 65th anniversary of the D-Day landings.
Both men this morning attended a service of remembrance at the Bayeux Cathedral in honour of those who fought and died on June 6 1944, when some 150,000 allied troops landed in occupied France in an offensive which would end World War II in Europe.
They then gathered at the Franco American-led remembrance s
Source: Telegraph (UK)
June 5, 2009
A set of photographs showing the private side of Adolf Hitler have been published for the first time.
The colour pictures come from the collection of Hugo Jaeger, Hitler's personal photographer, who captured him on camera him from 1936 to the final days of his rule in 1945.
They include a glimpse inside Berghof, his mountaintop estate in Bavaria, and his private apartments in Berlin.The collection, sold by Jaeger to Life magazine in 196
Source: Telegraph (UK)
June 5, 2009
A treasure-trove of books that are more than 500 years old are to be catalogued online by the University of Cambridge.
The selection includes a 1455 copy of the Gutenberg Bible, the first book printed in Europe using movable metal type, and the first printed edition of Homer's works, from 1488.
Currently only a small selection of the university's 4,650-strong body of pre-1501 works are included in its online catalogue.
However, they will now all be catal
Source: Telegraph (UK)
June 5, 2009
South African Moloko Temo, a grandmother-of-29, passed away on Wednesday, officials near her home said.
Mrs Temo said she was born on July 4, 1874 – making her at least five years older than any other claimant to the title of world's oldest person.
Despite Mrs Temo's claim to be the world's oldest woman, her age was never formally verified by the Guinness Book of Records.
The officially-recognised world's oldest woman, Portuguese grandmother Maria de Jesus,
Source: The Times (UK)
June 5, 2009
Chinese police turned out in force yesterday to smother any commemoration of the crackdown in Tiananmen Square 20 years ago, but thousands lit candles in Hong Kong in memory of the victims.
The anniversary sparked a fresh row between the US and China over the fate of the victims the Chinese authorities would prefer to forget.
The diplomatic spat broke out when Hillary Clinton, the US Secretary of State, urged Beijing to name the victims of the massacre and release all
