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Post by EXO on Jun 30, 2016 18:20:19 GMT 8
If you've been following our Facebook page, you'll probably have noticed I have been playing with clickable links. It's not much to show for a day's work, but here's what I've discovered. The following is a 'test' posting based on a code I found. It makes an image clickable, essentially turning the image into the button to jump to another page. It may not seem important to you, but facebook has made a gazillion bucks developing this sort of thing. Here's the example. Click on the graphic and it will take you elsewhere. Don't forget to come back now, you hear? If I give you the code with the square brackets intact, the proboards program will think it's real code, and will run the code and fetch the image and the URL you have included and you won't be able to read it. So instead of the square brackets, I have substituted an asterisk for the opening bracket [ and the underlined asterisk for the closing bracket ]. The URL is the new page address you want to open in a new tab. The URL OF IMAGE is the image address which is to be the button. *a href="URL"**img*URL OF IMAGE*/img**/a*
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Post by beirutvet on Jul 1, 2016 3:15:24 GMT 8
Well done, sir.
Perhaps this should have it's own thread but thought I would ask this here anyway. In following the link and perusing it's contents, I came across the courts marshal of Captain Walsh and Captain Bache. They were charged with having contact with and discussing details of an order with a Dr. T. J. Cotter. They were not to discuss anything with this doctor for he was under suspicion of subversive activities.
I tried googling Cotter but only came up with the references on this site.
Does anyone have any info on the good doctor in question? What was the nature of his subversive activities? Was he a subversive or was this just war hysteria/paranoia?
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Post by EXO on Jul 1, 2016 8:48:10 GMT 8
The Walsh-Bache-Cotter Affair had very little to do with subversion, and a lot to do with the personality of Col. Kinsler. I should really like to have been a scriptwriter, for this has the hallmarks of a cracking morality tale, an abuse of power, a curtailing of freedom, and a good courtroom drama. The Caine Mutiny has been done already. Perhaps this is the Cairns Mutiny. It appears to have grown out of a very active social life that some of the Officers were pursuing with the Australian women in the Cairns area, much to the chagrin of the tongue-clickers, moral guardians and temperance wowsers. Parties were held, alcohol was being drunk in copious amounts, boys were being boys, and who knows what sinning was being sinned with the lonely ladies of the immediate Cairns area. Complaints were made, and Col. Kinsler, former academic and moral disciplinarian that he was, decided to law down the law. If he couldn't stop the parties, at least he could stop his officers socializing. Henceforth, he decreed, contact with the Doctor was verbotten! I think you can get the best "background" about the drama that led to Col. Kinsler's demise in the writings of the Adjutant, Jerry B. Riseley. If you have seen the TV Series Band of Brothers, the early episodes deal with the troubles which were occurring during their time in England. Herbert Sobel was played by the actor David Schwimmer, and although the script was a little heavy-handed in parts, I believe that Schwimmer did a wonderful job of portraying a commanding officer being drawn to a point of realization that he was out of his true depth, and had no idea of what it was that he didn't know. Being a good commander is not one and the same as being a martinet. I think Col. Kinsler was in that predicament, a man who was essentially an academic put in charge of a bunch of robust paratroopers chomping at the bit, and not quite understanding how to deal with them. There was certainly pressure from the West Pointers below him.
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Post by beirutvet on Jul 1, 2016 23:23:41 GMT 8
EXO
Correct me if I am wrong, but isn't Kinsler the one who out of the blue committed suicide paving the way for Col George Jones to take command of the 503rd?
If he was unstable enough to take his own life for no apparent reason, then only God knows what was going through his mind during this time.
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Post by EXO on Jul 2, 2016 10:50:31 GMT 8
The circumstances immediately leading to the death of Col. Kinsler remain shrouded, as indeed are many a tragic denouement.
Col. Kinsler certainly knew he was to be relieved, on the grounds that the Inspector General having determined that he had lost the confidence of his command. On the morning of his death, he had met with the investigating officer. That same afternoon, he gathered his lieutenant colonels and had a personal meeting with them in his tent, sharing a bottle of whiskey. That evening, he took an Australian nurse with him to a nearby quarry (gravel pit). The nurse later made a statement that, in her presence, he shot himself through the heart with a pistol.
Much is left to the imagination. I don't know if I would say "no apparent reason", though. I suspect there was no lack of reasons. Kinsler clearly saw himself as a man's man, a tough, heartless SOB. I'm inclined to the view that he suddenly saw his entire self-worth reduced to ashes, and had nowhere to go. The episode has a King Lear atmosphere enshrouding it.
I am surprised that the documents of the IG's investigation have never surfaced. Nor, indeed, have any other original documents. (I have only been able to refer to a redacted version of Jerry Riseley's transcript and would encourage any budding researcher to obtain a copy of the original from Stanford.)
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