Vignettes

Amputees Return to Duty The number of amputees returning to duty has increased significantly, from 2.3% to 16.5%, due to advancements in combat casualty care and the establishment of centralized amputee centers. During the period reviewed, there were 395 major limb amputees that met inclusion criteria. Of those, 65 returned to active duty (16.5%) (Link). Read their stories Joshua Pitcher - Ivan Morera - Dan Luckett - Nicholas Lavery.

Army Ranger has confirmed kill in hand to hand combat with an MRE spoon (Link).

Eisenhower & Patton (~1920) Their leading-edge ideas of speed-oriented offensive tank warfare were strongly discouraged by superiors, who considered the new approach too radical and preferred to continue using tanks in a strictly supportive role for the infantry. After being threatened with a court-martial by General Charles S. Farnsworth, the chief of infantry, Eisenhower refrained from publishing theories that challenged existing tank doctrine (Wiki).

Helen Adams Keller (June 27, 1880 – June 1, 1968) was an American author (14 books and hundreds of speeches and essays), disability rights advocate, political activist and lecturer. Born in West Tuscumbia, Alabama, she lost her sight and her hearing after a bout of illness at the age of 19 months. She then communicated primarily using home signs until the age of seven, when she met her first teacher and life-long companion Anne Sullivan. Sullivan taught Keller language, including reading and writing. After an education at both specialist and mainstream schools, Keller attended Radcliffe College of Harvard University and became the first deafblind person to earn a Bachelor of Arts degree (Wiki).

Kyle Maynard is an American speaker, author and mixed martial arts athlete, known for becoming the first quadruple amputee to ascend Mount Kilimanjaro without the aid of prosthetics. He is also founder of the No Excuses Crossfit gym (Link).

Nelson Mandela In 1964, Mandela and his co-accused were transferred from Pretoria to the prison on Robben Island, remaining there for the next 18 years. Isolated from non-political prisoners in Section B, Mandela was imprisoned in a damp concrete cell measuring 8 feet (2.4 m) by 7 feet (2.1 m), with a straw mat on which to sleep. Verbally and physically harassed by several white prison wardens, the Rivonia Trial prisoners spent their days breaking rocks into gravel, until being reassigned in January 1965 to work in a lime quarry. Mandela was initially forbidden to wear sunglasses, and the glare from the lime permanently damaged his eyesight. At night, he worked on his LLB degree, which he was obtaining from the University of London through a correspondence course with Wolsey Hall, Oxford, but newspapers were forbidden, and he was locked in solitary confinement on several occasions for the possession of smuggled news clippings. He was initially classified as the lowest grade of prisoner, Class D, meaning that he was permitted one visit and one letter every six months, although all mail was heavily censored.

Winston Churchill In October 1911, Asquith appointed Churchill First Lord of the Admiralty, and he took up official residence at Admiralty House. He created a naval war staff and, over the next two and a half years, focused on naval preparation, visiting naval stations and dockyards, seeking to improve morale, and scrutinising German naval developments. After the German government passed its 1912 Naval Law to increase warship production, Churchill vowed that Britain would do the same and that for every new battleship built by the Germans, Britain would build two. He invited Germany to engage in a mutual de-escalation of naval building projects, but this was refused.
Churchill pushed for an increase in the building of submarines, and a renewed focus on the Royal Naval Air Service, encouraging them to experiment with how aircraft could be used for military purposes. He coined the term "seaplane" and ordered 100 to be constructed. Some Liberals objected to his levels of naval expenditure; in December 1913 he threatened to resign if his proposal for four new battleships in 1914–15 was rejected (Wiki). World War I July 28, 1914 – November 11, 1918.

Ukraine In early 2020, prior to the war, Ukraine launched the Diia app, intended as a good government initiative to make it easier for citizens to renew licensing permits, pay for parking tickets, and report potholes. Since the invasion, Ukraine’s government has repurposed the app to serve as frontline eyes and ears for the Ukrainian army. Citizens can submit geolocated photos and videos of Russian military sightings through the app. Citizens can also use Diia to provide tips about “suspicious” people who might be collaborators, invaders, or saboteurs. As Gulsana Mamediieva, an official in Ukraine’s Ministry of Digital Transformation, told the author during an interview, the app allows Ukrainians to report sightings of “tanks, military forces, and anything like Russian troops they have seen. We really urge citizens to do it.” This data is then aggregated on a map and used by intelligence officials working on defense and counterstrikes (WoTR).