Well said, Rainer and Roger concerning labels. I couldn't agree more.
However to come back to the issue at hand - President Roosevelt's train trip
to Birch Island, Ontario:
First - to speak to the general situation surrounding that trip:
Heavily armoured private cars are the sort of things that key political,
military and business leaders tend to indulge themselves with, especially in
times of serious trouble. In the case of FDR, an Axis attempt on his life
was a possibility, though not too likely to be successful. American history
to date has shown plainly that the most serious attempts (publically
acknowledged by the American authorities - successful and otherwise) have
come from American domestic extremists, not foreign agents. So, it is quite
correct to state that the American president faces more of an immediate
threat from certain crackpot elements within his own people than from
foreign or even domestic operatives working at the behest of a government
such as the Nazis or the Soviets. How quickly an America deeply shaken by
the 9/11 attacks forgot about what had recently happened in Oklahoma City
and who was to blame. Scum-bag politicians and business leaders lost no
time exploiting American ignorance and fear to the max to scare Americans
into accepting quite a few administration actions that would never have
flown otherwise. After 9/11, all sorts of steps were taken in the name of
safety, some reasonable and some definitely only to the advantage of special
interests. Likewise in 1942. An armoured car for the Prez was probably
overkill, but an attack mounted by then-enemy agents couldn't be completely
ruled out. If anything, I speculate that it was probably most likely to
come from domestic elements aided and abetted by foreign agents. So far as
the railways were concerned, officialdom had to keep an open mind about
unpleasant possibilities. (In my experience, open minds could be a tall
order for quite a large percentage of railway management. In that light ...
poor old FDR ... if somebody'd actually been after him while he was on the
train, he would have been toast.)
Second - Gentlemen of all points of view: it looks to me that we have a
situation where we aren't likely to know the exact sequence of events so far
as what happened once FDR's train got to Birch Island - or wherever it was -
until we can put our hands on a reliable diary or official documentation.
Truth be known, that's probably just exactly the way officialdom at the time
desired things should be. We have (apparently) established that FDR's
heavily armoured private car definitely made the trip over what I gather was
a somewhat light-weight line and an extremely unusual place for such a car
to show up.
I reiterate: so far as Birch Island and the private car are concerned,
until we get our hands on some conclusive documentation from whatever
credible source ... I think we've gone as far as we can go.
Joe Smuin
1. - "Joey, the secret to telling a good railway story is to always try to
stick just as close to the facts as possible." --- (the late) Cliff
Inkster; CPR Engineman, raconteur and philosopher.
2. - The secret to contacting Joe by email is to be sure to insert "Joe" or
"Smuin" into the main text portion of any message you send to him, and thus
your message should percolate through his spam filters.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Roger T." <rogertra@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <cpsig@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Sunday, August 02, 2009 3:34 PM
Subject: Re: [cpsig] Re: President Roosevelt's Train Trip to Birch Island,
Canada in 1943
Furthermore, I hate simplistic labels
such as enemies, terrorists etc. They change as the propagandists
feel the need.
----------------------------------------
In the 1980s and to date, one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter.
In 1775 to 1783 one man's rebel, was another man's patriot.
All depends on your point of view, who's side you are on and who writes the history (Or makes the movie). :-)
Cheers.
Roger T.
See the GER at: -
http://www.islandnet.com/~rogertra/
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