text:
CNR

CNR may stand for:

Arts, entertainment and media

 * China National Radio, the national radio station of the People's Republic of China
 * CNR Music, a Dutch record and video/DVD label
 * "CNR", a song about Charles Nelson Reilly by "Weird Al" Yankovic on the 2009 album Internet Leaks
 * Cartoon Network Racing, a racing video game for the PlayStation 2 and Nintendo DS

Businesses and organisations

 * Canadian National Railway (CN), formerly Canadian National Railways (CNR)
 * CNR Group, the China Northern Locomotive & Rolling Stock Industry (Group) Corporation
 * China CNR, a Chinese railway equipment manufacturer
 * Rausser College of Natural Resources at the University of California, Berkeley
 * College of New Rochelle, Catholic college based in New Rochelle, New York, U.S.
 * College of Natural Resources (Bhutan)
 * Compagnie Nationale du Rhône, a French electricity generating company
 * Council of National Representatives, governing body of International Council of Nurses
 * Czech National Council, Česká národní rada (ČNR), former legislative body of the Czech Republic
 * National Council of the Resistance, Conseil national de la Résistance, World War II French organisation
 * National Council of European Resistance (French: Conseil National de la Résistance Européenne), French political organization
 * National Research Council (Italy), Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche, Italian national research council
 * Romanian National Committee (Romanian: Comitetul Național Român), the name of several organisations

People

 * Charles Nelson Reilly (1931–2007), American actor, comedian, director
 * C. N. R. Rao (born 1934), solid state scientist

Science and technology

 * CNR (software), formerly software for Linux
 * Carrier-to-noise ratio, the signal-to-noise ratio of a modulated signal
 * Chief of Naval Research, in the U.S. Navy
 * Cisco Network Registrar, software
 * Communications and networking riser, a PC motherboard slot
 * Combat-net radio
 * Contrast-to-noise ratio, a measure used to determine image quality

Other uses

 * CNR Yenişehir Exhibition Center, Mersin, Turkey
 * , ISO 639-3 and ISO 639-2 code for Montenegrin language
 * Catholic, nationalist, republican community in Northern Ireland

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: CNR


text:
Signal strength and readability report

A signal strength and readability report is a standardized format for reporting the strength of the radio signal and the readability (quality) of the radiotelephone (voice) or radiotelegraph (Morse code) signal transmitted by another station as received at the reporting station's location and by their radio station equipment. These report formats are usually designed for only one communications mode or the other, although a few are used for both telegraph and voice communications. All but one of these signal report formats involve the transmission of numbers.

History
As the earliest radio communication used Morse code, all radio signal reporting formats until about the 1920s were for radiotelegraph, and the early voice radio signal report formats were based on the telegraph report formats.

Timeline of signal report formats

 * The first signal report format code may have been QJS.
 * The U.S. Navy used R and K signals starting in 1929.
 * The QSK code was one of the twelve Q Codes listed in the 1912 International Radiotelegraph Convention Regulations, but may have been in use earlier.
 * The QSA code was included in the Madrid Convention (Appendix 10, General Regulations) sometime prior to 1936.
 * The Amateur radio R-S-T system signal report format currently in use was first developed in 1934.
 * As early as 1943, the U.S and UK military published the first guidance that included the modern "Weak but readable", "Strong but distorted", and "Loud and clear" phrases.
 * By 1951, the CCEB had published ACP 125(A) (a.k.a. SGM-1O82-51), which formalized the 1943 "Loud and clear" format.

Q-Code signal report formats
The QSA code and QRK code are interrelated and complementary signal reporting codes for use in wireless telegraphy (Morse code). They replaced the earlier QSJ code.

Currently, the QSA and QRK codes are officially defined in the ITU Radio Regulations 1990, Appendix 13: Miscellaneous Abbreviations and Signals to Be Used in Radiotelegraphy Communications Except in the Maritime Mobile Service. They are also described identically in ACP131(F),:

R-S-T system
Amateur radio users in the U.S. and Canada have used the R-S-T system since 1934. This system was developed by amateur radio operator Arthur W. Braaten, W2BSR. It reports the readability on a scale of 1 to 5, the signal strength on a scale of 1 to 9, and the tone of the Morse code continuous wave signal on a scale of 1 to 9. During amateur radio contests, where the rate of new contacts is paramount, contest participants often give a perfect signal report of 599 even when the signal is lower quality, because always providing the same signal format enables them to send Morse code with less thought and thus increased speed.

SINPO code
SINPO is an acronym for Signal, Interference, Noise, Propagation, and Overall, which was developed by the CCIR in 1951 (as C.C.I.R. Recommendation No. 251) for use in radiotelegraphy, and the standard is contained in Recommendation ITU-R Sm.1135, SINPO and SINPFEMO codes. This format is most notably used by the BBC for receiving signal reports on postcards mailed from listeners, even though that same standard specifies that the SINPFEMO code should be used for radiotelephony transmissions. SINPO is the official radiotelegraph signal reporting codes for international civil aviation and ITU-R.

R-S-T system
Amateur radio operators use the R-S-T system to describe voice transmissions, dropping the last digit (Tone report) because there is no continuous wave tone to report on.

SINPEMFO code
An extension of SINPO code, for use in radiotelephony (voice over radio) communications, SINPFEMO is an acronym for Signal, Interference, Noise, Propagation, Frequency of Fading, Depth, Modulation, and Overall.

Plain-language radio checks
The move to plain-language radio communications means that number-based formats are now considered obsolete, and are replaced by plain language radio checks. These avoid the ambiguity of which number stands for which type of report and whether a 1 is considered good or bad. This format originated with the U.S. military in World War II, and is currently defined by ACP 125 (G)., published by the Combined Communications Electronics Board.

The prowords listed below are for use when initiating and answering queries concerning signal strength and readability.

Use in analog vs. digital radio transmission modes
In analog radio systems, as receiving stations move away from a radio transmitting site, the signal strength decreases gradually, causing the relative noise level to increase. The signal becomes increasingly difficult to understand until it can no longer be heard as anything other than static.

These reporting systems are usable for, but perhaps not completely appropriate for, rating digital signal quality. This is because digital signals have fairly consistent quality as the receiver moves away from the transmitter until reaching a threshold distance. At this threshold point, sometimes called the "digital cliff,"the signal quality takes a severe drop and is lost". This difference in reception reduces attempts to ascertain subjective signal quality to simply asking, "Can you hear me now?" or similar. The only possible response is "yes"; otherwise, there is just dead air. This sudden signal drop was also one of the primary arguments of analog proponents against moving to digital systems. However, the "five bars" displayed on many cell phones does directly correlate to the signal strength rating.

Informal terminology and slang
The phrase "five by five" can be used informally to mean "good signal strength" or "loud and clear". An early example of this phrase was in 1946, recounting a wartime conversation. The phrase was used in 1954 in the novel The Blackboard Jungle. Another example usage of this phrase is from June 1965 by the crew of the Gemini IV spacecraft. This phrase apparently refers to the fact that the format consists of two digits, each ranging from one to five, with five/five being the best signal possible.

Some radio users have inappropriately started using the Circuit Merit telephone line quality measurement. This format is unsuitable for radiotelegraph or radio-telephony use because it focuses on voice-to-noise ratios, for judging whether a particular telephone line is suitable for commercial (paying customer) use, and does not include separate reports for signal strength and voice quality.

title: Signal strength and readability report


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GTR

GTR may refer to:

Transportation

 * Great River Railroad, in Mississippi, US
 * Grand Trunk Railway, a defunct North American railway
 * Golden Triangle Regional Airport (IATA and FAA LID codes), serving Columbus, Mississippi, US
 * Govia Thameslink Railway, a British railway operator
 * GTR Euroseries, a short-lived European auto racing series
 * Global Technical Regulations, a 1998 multinational agreement regarding vehicle regulations

Automobiles

 * Gran Turismo (racing), a type of sports car
 * BMW M3 GTR
 * Holden Torana GTR
 * Isuzu Bellett GT-R
 * Mazda Familia GT-R
 * McLaren F1 GTR
 * McLaren P1 GTR
 * Mercedes-AMG GT R
 * Mercedes-Benz CLK GTR
 * Nissan Skyline GT-R
 * Nissan GT-R
 * Porsche 924 Carrera GTR
 * Toyota Celica 2000 GTR
 * Ultima GTR
 * Ford Mustang GT-R concept car

Science and medicine

 * General theory of relativity, also known as General relativity, in physics
 * Generalised time reversible, in biology
 * Guided tissue regeneration, in dentistry

Video games

 * GTR – FIA GT Racing Game, a video game
 * GTR Evolution, a video game
 * GTR Group, owner of the defunct video game company Mad Catz

Other uses

 * GTR (band), a British rock band
 * GTR (album), their sole official studio album
 * Gateway to Research (Gtr), UK research information portal
 * GTR-18 Smokey Sam, an American SAM training rocket
 * Green tree reservoir, flooded forest land

title: GTR


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Sexual Offences Act 2003

The Sexual Offences Act 2003 (c. 42) is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom.

It partly replaced the Sexual Offences Act 1956 with more specific and explicit wording. It also created several new offences such as non-consensual voyeurism, assault by penetration, causing a child to watch a sexual act, and penetration of any part of a corpse. It defines and sets legal guidelines for rape in English law. It is also the main legislation dealing with child sexual abuse.

The corresponding legislation in Scotland is the Sexual Offences (Scotland) Act 2009 and in Northern Ireland the Sexual Offences (Northern Ireland) Order 2008.

Major changes
Part I of the Act makes many changes to the sexual crimes laws in England and Wales (and to some extent Northern Ireland), almost completely replacing the Sexual Offences Act 1956.

Rape
Rape has been redefined from the Sexual Offences Act 1956 (amended in 1976 and 1994) to read: A person (A) commits an offence if—

(a) he intentionally penetrates the vagina, anus or mouth of another person (B) with his penis,

(b) B does not consent to the penetration, and

(c) A does not reasonably believe that B consents.

Rape previously did not include penetration of the mouth. The Act also changes the way in which lack of consent may be proved, and section 75 and 76 of the Act list circumstances in which lack of consent may be presumed.

Assault by penetration
Section 2 creates the offence of Assault by penetration. This offence is set out separately because rape is defined as requiring penile penetration. Therefore, non-consensual sexual penetration of the vagina or anus with either another part of the body (such as the fingers), or an object, must be prosecuted under this section. Section 2 closely mirrors section 1's definition of rape, including the same maximum sentence (life imprisonment), but does not include penetration of the mouth, and carries the additional requirement that "the penetration is sexual", i.e. performed for the purpose of either the offender's sexual gratification or the victim's sexual humiliation.

Consent
The Act made significant changes to the legal definition of consent.

Sections 64 and 65 relate to sexual relationships within the family. Section 64 prohibits penetrating any other family member, and section 65 prohibits consenting to such sexual activities. Initially the legislation did not include uncles, aunts, nieces and nephews but after some debate these were written into the provision.

Section 74 states that: "For the purposes of this Part, a person consents if he agrees by choice, and has the freedom and capacity to make that choice."

Section 75
Section 75 of the Act introduced a number of evidential presumptions, which prove lack of consent unless the defence can provide sufficient, contrary evidence that the claimant did consent. These presumptions require the relevant act to have taken place at the same time as one of six circumstances existed, about which the defendant was aware.

The circumstances are (summarised):

1. violence was used or threatened to be used against the complainant, during or immediately before the act

2. violence was used or threatened to be used against another person, during or immediately before the act

3. complainant was unlawfully detained

4. complainant was asleep/unconscious

5. complainant had a physical disability which prevented them from communicating consent

6. complainant was able to be overpowered/ subdued by a substance administered to them against their will.

Section 76
Section 76 of the Act introduces two conclusive presumptions. These are:

1. where the defendant deceives the victim as to the nature or purpose of the relevant act (i.e. fraud)

2. where the defendant induces the victim to consent by impersonating someone known to the complainant.

When either is proven, the law states that it is conclusively presumed that the complainant did not consent to the act, and the defendant was aware of the lack of consent. This cannot be rebutted by any contrary evidence, as is possible with section 75.

Dual criminality
Section 72 provides differing levels of dual criminality for specified offences according to the UK citizenship status of an offender. For UK nationals, acts outside the UK that would amount to an offence in the UK can be prosecuted as if they had been done in the UK, regardless of whether the acts are lawful where they were done. For UK residents, acts outside the United Kingdom have to constitute an offence in the country where they are committed, in order to be prosecuted in Britain.

Other provisions
The Act also now includes provisions against sex tourism. People who travel abroad with the intent to commit sexual offences can have their passports revoked or travel restricted.

Group homosexual sex has been decriminalised, in that Schedule 6 of the 2003 Act caused section 12 of the Sexual Offences Act 1956 to be omitted, removing the offence of homosexual sex "when more than two persons take part or are present".

Part II of the Act also consolidated the provisions of the Sex Offenders Act 1997 on registration of sex offenders and protective orders. These provisions generally apply throughout the United Kingdom.

Section 45(2) changed the definition of "child" in the Protection of Children Act 1978 (which applies to child pornography) from a person under 16 to a person under 18. Section 45 also inserted section 1A of the 1978 Act, and section 160A of the Criminal Justice Act 1988, which create defences which apply where the photograph showed the child alone or with the defendant (but not if it showed any other person), the defendant proves that the photograph was of the child aged 16 or over and that he and the child were married or lived together as partners in an enduring family relationship, and certain other conditions are met.

The Sexual Offences Act 2003 creates further offences relating to prostitution. A new section 51A was inserted by the Policing and Crime Act 2009, which prohibits soliciting. This came into effect on 1 April 2010.
 * Sections 47 to 50 prohibit child prostitution.
 * Sections 52 and 53 prohibit pimping for financial gain.
 * Sections 57 to 59 create offences relating to sex trafficking.
 * The Act also inserted a new section 33A into the Sexual Offences Act 1956, which relates to brothels.

Criticisms
The Act has faced criticism on several grounds.

Consent
The definition of consent has caused some academics to raise concerns about the way consent is interpreted. Bethany Simpson has suggested the terms "freedom" and "choice" used to define consent are too complex for the courts to apply.

Underage persons
One of the more controversial parts of the Act involves the criminalising of various common behaviours, such as laws which, on the face of it, outlaw consensual "sexual hugging" in public places or by underage persons, even when both participants are under age, followed by the issue of guidance notes which countermand this, saying they should almost never be prosecuted.

The Home Office stated that legalising consensual sexual activity between children "would damage a fundamental plank in our raft of child protection measures". A spokesman said, "We are not prepared to do this. We accept that genuinely mutually agreed, non-exploitative sexual activity between teenagers does take place and in many instances no harm comes from it. We are putting safeguards in place to ensure that these cases, which are not in the public interest, are not prosecuted – by amending guidance to the police and Crown Prosecution Service."

Criticism came from Action on Rights for Children: "Laws should mean what they say. It's astonishing that the government could consider legislation with the prior intent of issuing guidance to countermand it. I worry about the message it sends to young people – it seems to say that sometimes the law means what it says and sometimes it doesn't."

Professor Nicola Lacey of the London School of Economics commented: "What the Home Office would say was that they wanted to use the criminal law for symbolic impact, to say that it's not a good thing for kids to be having sex. My counter-argument is that the criminal law is too dangerous a tool to be used for symbolic purposes. With this on the statute book, it will give police and prosecutors a lot of discretion. It could be used as a way of controlling kids who perhaps the police want to control for other reasons. Kids who perhaps are a nuisance or who belong to a group who attract the attention of the police in some way."

Lack of transitional provisions
The 2003 Act repealed most sections of the Sexual Offences Act 1956 and several other statutes dealing with sexual offences. Section 141 of the Act gave the Home Secretary the power to make rules by statutory instrument to deal with the transition from the old to the new laws, to cover the situation where a defendant is charged with offences which overlap the commencement date of 1 May 2004. However no such "transitional provisions" were ever made.

This resulted in cases where a defendant was accused of committing a sexual offence but the prosecution could not prove the exact date of the offence, which could have been committed either before or after 1 May 2004. In these cases, the defendant had to be found not guilty, regardless of how strong the evidence against them was because a sexual offence committed before 1 May was an offence under the old law, but an offence committed on or after that date was a different offence under the new law. For example, an assault might either be indecent assault under the 1956 Act, or the new offence of sexual assault under the 2003 Act, depending on when it happened, but it could not be both. If the prosecution could not prove beyond reasonable doubt which offence had been committed, then the defendant could not be convicted of either.

The Court of Appeal first dealt with this problem in December 2005, when the prosecution appealed against the decision of a judge to order a jury to acquit a defendant for precisely that reason. Dismissing the appeal, Lord Justice Rose said: "If a history of criminal legislation ever comes to be written it is unlikely that 2003 will be identified as a year of exemplary skill in the annals of Parliamentary drafting."

This situation was not resolved until Parliament passed Section 55 of the Violent Crime Reduction Act 2006, which came into force in February 2007.

Gendered definition of rape
Under the Act's definition of rape (penetration of the "mouth, anus or vagina with [the defendant's] penis"), only a man can be charged with rape. A woman who forces a man or woman to have sexual intercourse with her against their will could only be charged, under Section 4 of the Act, with sexual assault or "causing a person to engage in sexual activity without consent". Rape is an indictable offence while Section 4 offences are either way offences.

There have been calls for the Act to be amended to include female-perpetrated rape within the definition of rape. In September 2016, the Government responded to a petition requesting that the legal definition of rape be changed to include female-on-male assaults: “There was a considerable amount of agreement that rape should remain an offence of penile penetration. We therefore have no plans to amend the legal definition of rape.”

Extent and repeals
The Act applies to England and Wales only, except for the provisions listed in s.142(2) of the Act which also apply to Northern Ireland and the provisions listed in s.142(3) of the Act which also apply to Scotland. The Act repealed the Sex Offenders Act 1997 in its entirety, and almost all of the Sexual Offences Act 1956, which until then had been the main legislation for sexual offences. It also repealed much of the Sexual Offences Act 1967 which had discriminated heavily against homosexual and bisexual men, leaving it largely gutted of statutory effect.

Amendments
The Voyeurism (Offences) Act 2019 amended the Sexual Offences Act 2003 to make upskirting a specific offence in England and Wales.

title: Sexual Offences Act 2003


text:
Approximation property

In mathematics, specifically functional analysis, a Banach space is said to have the approximation property (AP), if every compact operator is a limit of finite-rank operators. The converse is always true.

Every Hilbert space has this property. There are, however, Banach spaces which do not; Per Enflo published the first counterexample in a 1973 article. However, much work in this area was done by Grothendieck (1955).

Later many other counterexamples were found. The space $$\mathcal L(H)$$ of bounded operators on an infinite-dimensional Hilbert space $$H$$ does not have the approximation property. The spaces $$\ell^p$$ for $$p\neq 2$$ and $$c_0$$ (see Sequence space) have closed subspaces that do not have the approximation property.

Definition
A locally convex topological vector space X is said to have the approximation property, if the identity map can be approximated, uniformly on precompact sets, by continuous linear maps of finite rank.

For a locally convex space X, the following are equivalent: where $$\operatorname{L}_p(X, Y)$$ denotes the space of continuous linear operators from X to Y endowed with the topology of uniform convergence on pre-compact subsets of X.
 * 1) X has the approximation property;
 * 2) the closure of $$X^{\prime} \otimes X$$ in $$\operatorname{L}_p(X, X)$$ contains the identity map $$\operatorname{Id} : X \to X$$;
 * 3) $$X^{\prime} \otimes X$$ is dense in $$\operatorname{L}_p(X, X)$$;
 * 4) for every locally convex space Y, $$X^{\prime} \otimes Y$$ is dense in $$\operatorname{L}_p(X, Y)$$;
 * 5) for every locally convex space Y, $$Y^{\prime} \otimes X$$ is dense in $$\operatorname{L}_p(Y, X)$$;

If X is a Banach space this requirement becomes that for every compact set $$K\subset X$$ and every $$\varepsilon>0$$, there is an operator $$T\colon X\to X$$ of finite rank so that $$\|Tx-x\|\leq\varepsilon$$, for every $$x \in K$$.

Related definitions
Some other flavours of the AP are studied:

Let $$X$$ be a Banach space and let $$1\leq\lambda<\infty$$. We say that X has the $$\lambda$$-approximation property ($$\lambda$$-AP), if, for every compact set $$K\subset X$$ and every $$\varepsilon>0$$, there is an operator $$T\colon X \to X$$ of finite rank so that $$\|Tx - x\|\leq\varepsilon$$, for every $$x \in K$$, and $$\|T\|\leq\lambda$$.

A Banach space is said to have bounded approximation property (BAP), if it has the $$\lambda$$-AP for some $$\lambda$$.

A Banach space is said to have metric approximation property (MAP), if it is 1-AP.

A Banach space is said to have compact approximation property (CAP), if in the definition of AP an operator of finite rank is replaced with a compact operator.

Examples

 * Every subspace of an arbitrary product of Hilbert spaces possesses the approximation property. In particular,
 * every Hilbert space has the approximation property.
 * every projective limit of Hilbert spaces, as well as any subspace of such a projective limit, possesses the approximation property.
 * every nuclear space possesses the approximation property.
 * Every separable Frechet space that contains a Schauder basis possesses the approximation property.
 * Every space with a Schauder basis has the AP (we can use the projections associated to the base as the $$T$$'s in the definition), thus many spaces with the AP can be found. For example, the $\ell^p$ spaces, or the symmetric Tsirelson space.

title: Approximation property


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Wang Yuanlu

Wang Yuanlu (c. 1849 – 1931) was a Taoist priest and abbot of the Mogao Caves at Dunhuang during the early 20th century. He is credited with the discovery of the Dunhuang manuscripts and was engaged in the restoration of the site, which he funded with the sale of numerous manuscripts to Western and Japanese explorers.

Biography
Wang Yuanlu was an itinerant monk, originally from Shanxi Province. He was active from the late 19th to the early 20th centuries.

He was a self-appointed caretaker of the Dunhuang cave complex and a self-styled Taoist priest. The cave complex contained 50,000 manuscripts detailing medieval China, the Silk Roads, and Buddhism.

He died in 1931 at the Mogao Grottoes.

Involvement with Dunhuang manuscripts
When engaging in an amateur restoration of statues and paintings in what is now known as Cave 16, Wang noticed a hidden door which opened into another cave, later named Cave 17 or the "Library Cave". There, he found a yet-undiscovered cache of thousands of ancient manuscripts, many of which relate to early Chinese Buddhism. He first spoke of the manuscripts to the local officials in an attempt to gain funding for their conservation. The officials ordered the reseal of the cave, in preparation for transportation, preservation and study. He would also later sell numerous manuscripts to archaeologist Aurel Stein, who took a largely random selection of the works. Later, Paul Pelliot would purchase what is considered the most valuable among them. Because of his involvement in the discovery and sale of the Dunhuang manuscripts to Westerners for a fraction of their value (£220 in 1907), Wang is both "revered and reviled."

title: Wang Yuanlu


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HMS Lagos (D44)

HMS Lagos was a Battle-class destroyer of the Royal Navy. She was named in honour of the Battle of Lagos which happened in 1759 off the coast of Portugal, between the Royal Navy and a French fleet, resulting in a British victory.

History
Lagos was built by Cammell Laird of Birkenhead. She was one of ten Battle-class destroyers ordered under the 1942 naval estimates. She was launched on 4 August 1944 and commissioned on 2 November 1945. Her pennant number was originally 'R44', which was later (post-1948) changed to 'D44' when the Royal Navy rationalised the numbering system.

Post World War II
In 1946, after the end of hostilities, Lagos deployed to the Far East with the 19th Destroyer Flotilla to join the British Pacific Fleet. Her journey included stops at various ports, such as for example, Port Said (March), Colombo, Singapore, Hong Kong (May), Shanghai (June), before finally reaching Japan in July 1946.

After visiting Japan Lagos, along with the rest of the Flotilla, began the journey home to the UK, once again visiting many ports on fly-the-flag visits, mainly in Malaya. Upon returning to the UK in early 1947, Lagos was placed in Reserve.

In 1957, Lagos joined the 1st Destroyer Squadron, seeing service with the Home and Mediterranean Fleets. The following year, Lagos, with the rest of the squadron, joined the Far East Fleet. In 1959, following the collision between sister ship HMS Hogue (D74) and the Indian cruiser INS Mysore (C60), Lagos and the destroyer HMS Solebay (D70), towed Hogue to Singapore.

Decommissioning
In 1960, Lagos was decommissioned, being scrapped at Bo'ness in 1967.

title: HMS Lagos (D44)


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Landing zone

In military terminology a landing zone (LZ) is an area where aircraft can land.

In the United States military, a landing zone is the actual point where aircraft, especially helicopters, land (equivalent to the commonwealth landing point.)

In commonwealth militaries, a landing zone is the cartographic (numeric) zone in which the landing is going to take place (e.g., a valley). The landing area is the area in which the landing is going to take place (e.g., the field where the aircraft are to land). The landing point is the actual point on which aircraft are going to land (e.g., a point of the field). Each aircraft has a different landing point.

Identifying an LZ from the air
Landing areas are most commonly marked by colored smoke. The standard procedure is for troops already on the ground at the landing area to "pop smoke" (set off a smoke grenade). The aircraft pilot(s) radio back when the smoke is spotted and what color smoke they see. Troops on the ground then respond with what color the smoke should be. Smoke of a different color can mean that the landing area has been discovered and compromised by the enemy, and the pilot will usually have the authority to cancel any landing.

Vietnam War

The United States used LZs to a greater extent in the Vietnam War than in other wars because of the widespread use of helicopters, which provided increased mobility and rapid transportation of forces. LZs could be temporary, being little more than a clearing in the jungle or a clearing made using special munitions, such as commando vault bombs, which cleared everything in a diameter of 150 feet. Other LZs were permanent or semi-permanent built with more deliberate construction. The Battle of Ia Drang in 1965 centered on two LZs.

Afghanistan
The Soviet Union and Coalition forces also used LZs extensively because of the rugged terrain and distances traveled during wars in Afghanistan.

Temporary LZs
LZs operated by the First Cavalry Division, especially in War Zone C in 1968 and 1969, were often established for specific operations or to draw out the North Vietnamese Army (NVA) units thought to be operating in that area. When a sizable enemy force was located, it could be decisively engaged, forced to move on, or if determined to be elsewhere, the LZ would be abandoned for a new location after a successful mission.

LZ Carolyn was one such LZ; first established as a special forces outpost near Cambodia at Prek Lok in Tay Ninh province, it was abandoned and later occupied by mechanized elements of the 1st Infantry Division. LZ Carolyn was situated in a location especially irritating to the NVA, astride one of the main access routes for the Viet Cong (VC) & NVA to reach Saigon, its presence was a constant problem for them. In April 1969, the US Army's 2/8 Cavalry reopened the LZ and began operations in its vicinity, and the hornet's nest had been prodded. Incoming rocket and mortar rounds fired by the VC/NVA were a daily and nightly occurrence, and skirmishes near the LZ were common. Then on the night of May 6, 1969, an entire NVA regiment (95C) attacked the LZ, which was defended by 300 US Army troops. As described by Tom Lane: In the early morning darkness of 6 May, the NVA retaliated with an intensive rocket and mortar barrage, followed by a massive 95th Regiment pincer grand assault against 2 sides of the base an hour later. LZ Carolyn's garrison was reduced by the absence of several line companies on patrol, and the withering defensive fires of the battalion's COMPANY C and E were unable to prevent the onrushing battalions from storming through the wire and into the LZ from both directions.

Six perimeter bunkers were overrun, one of the medium howitzers was captured, and the enemy threatened to slice through the center of the base.

The Americans counterattacked with all available personnel, the officers involved being killed at the head of their troops. Artillerymen, supply and signal personnel, and engineers fought and died as emergency infantry reserves. The US counterattacks were hurled against both enemy penetrations, but the most violent fighting occurred on the northern side, where a seesaw battle raged for possession of the 155mm howitzer position. During the course of the battle, this weapon exchanged hands 3 times in hand-to-hand fighting deceded at close range with rifles and E-tools (entrenching tools, or shovels).

Overhead, rocket-firing AH1G Cobra helicopters rolled in, ignoring heavy flak, and blasted the NVA with rockets and miniguns. Air Force AC47 SPOOKY and AC119 SHADOW aircraft, supported by fighter-bombers, were employed against the numerous enemy antiaircraft weapons ringing the perimeter.

Controlled and uncontrolled fires were raging everywhere, and it seemed that the LZ was ablaze throughout its entire length. Waves of NVA infantry charging into the southern lines were met by defending troops who took advantage of the aviation gasoline storage area. The Americans shot holes into the fuel drums and ignited the flowing rivers of gas to create a flaming barrier, which effectively blocked further enemy penetration. In the LZ's opposite sector, a medium howitzer gun pit received 3 direct hits, which touched off a fire in its powder bunker, yet the crew calmly stood by its weapon and employed it throughout the night.

Both of the 105mm howitzer ammunition points were detonated by enemy fire at around 0330, and shrapnel from more than 600 disintegrating rounds in the 2 dumps sprayed the entire LZ for more than four hours. LZ Carolyn appeared threatened with total destruction as the thundering conflagration tossed detonating artillery projectiles to shower men and equipment with flying rounds and burning shell fragments.

The defending artillerymen and mortar crews fought in desperation, heightened by the loss of communications between most weapons and their fire direction centers (FDC). The initial enemy barrage destroyed communication from the 155mm gun sections to their FDC, forcing crews to individually engage targets on their own volition by leveling tubes full of BEE HIVE or HE charges. When telephone lines from the mortar tubes to their FDC were severed, the direction personnel switched to a bullhorn to relay fire commands across the deafening noise of the battlefield. The battalion mortar platoon's four tubes fired 1500 rounds, ranging from critical illumination to searing WP. In all cases, effective fire support was maintained.

Ammunition shortages quickly developed, and as on-hand mortar ammunition beside the weapons was exhausted, volunteers dashed through fire-swept open areas to retrieve more rounds from storage bunkers. The destruction of the 105mm ammunition points caused an immediate crisis in the light howitzer pits. The cannon cockers (artillerymen) were forced to redistribute ammo by crawling from one gun section to another under a hail of enemy direct fire and spinning shrapnel from the exploding dump. The crews continued rendering direct fire, even though they were often embroiled in defending their own weapons. One light howitzer section was caught in an enemy crossfire between a heavy machine gun and rifles, until the artillerymen managed to turn their lowered muzzle and pump BEE HIVE flechettes into the enemy. All enemy automatic weapon fire against the howitzer was instantly silenced. Cavalry counterattacks reestablished the perimeter, and the enemy force began withdrawing, breaking contact at 0600. The 1st Cav troopers suffered 9 dead and 160 wounded. The NVA's 95C regiment suffered hundreds of dead, many more wounded, and six were captured alive. The LZ was abandoned two weeks later.

Tactical landing zones
Tactical landing zones (abbreviated to TLZ) are landing zones selected on the battlefield for the insertion of troops or supplies. A TLZ can be used for the landing of an aircraft (in terms of the Royal Air Force, this could be a Hercules carrying supplies or troops or any of their other helicopters, such as the Merlin, Puma or the Chinook). A TLZ would be situated in an area safer or easier to defend than the open battlefield, and troops are carefully trained in the insertion process and defensive circles are common.

title: Landing zone


text:
Rudolph of Burgundy

Rudolph of Burgundy may refer to:

 * Rudolph, Duke of Burgundy (French, Raoul; also referred to as Ralph), Duke of Burgundy from 921 and King of West Francia from 923 to 936
 * Rudolph I, King of Burgundy, elected in 888 after the death of Charles the Fat. He died in 912
 * Rudolph II, King of Burgundy, son of Rudolph I, and ruled (Upper) Burgundy from 912 to 937; also king of Provence and Italy
 * Rudolph III, King of Burgundy, grandson of Rudolph II, ruled 993 - 1032

title: Rudolph of Burgundy


text:
Surbahar

Surbahar sometimes known as bass sitar, is a plucked string instrument used in the Hindustani classical music of the Indian subcontinent. It is closely related to the sitar, but has a lower pitch. Depending on the instrument's size, it is usually pitched two to five whole steps below the standard sitar.

Overview
The surbahar is over 130 cm (51 inches). It uses a dried gourd as a resonator, and has a neck with very wide frets, which allow a glissando or "meend" of as much as an octave on the same fret through the method of pulling. The neck is made out of toona, or mahogany wood. It has 3-4 rhythm strings (chikari), four playing strings (the broadest 1 mm), and 10 to 11 sympathetic strings. There are two bridges; the playable strings pass over the greater bridge, which is connected to the tabli with small legs, which are glued in place. The sympathetic strings pass over the smaller bridge which is directly glued on the tabli. The bridges have a slightly curved upper surface parallel to the string that the strings touch when vibrating, which results in a buzzing sound known as jawari. The body of the instrument is similar to that of a sitar, in that it is made of a large dried gourd with a carved wood face on one side and joined to the neck by a carved wooden yoke or "gulu". It differs in that most surbahars have a gourd that is larger and tilted 90º so that the bottom of the gourd is to the back of the instrument, creating a shallower and rounder body for an enhanced bass response.

The instrumentalist plays the strings using a plectrum of bent steel wire, the mizrab, which is fixed on the index finger of the player's right hand. Three plectrums are used on the first three fingers to play the dhrupad style of alap, jor, and jhala on surbahar. In the dhrupad style, instead of performing the sitarkhani and masitkhani gats, the instrumentalist plays the slow dhrupad composition in accompaniment with pakhawaj.

Some researchers believe that surbahar was invented around 1825. At the time, the veena, which is considered a holy instrument associated with the goddess Saraswati, was only taught to descendants of veena players. The development of the surbahar was due in part to the desire to play in a lower range similar to that of the veena.

Surbahar was invented by Omrao Khan Beenkar and Ghulam Mohammad was his disciple. Omrao Khan Beenkar was the grandfather of Wazir Khan of Rampur. The invention is also attributed to Ustad Sahebdad Khan. Recent research shows that Lucknow-based sitarist Ustad Ghulam Mohammed may also have been the inventor. A similar kind of instrument, known as the Mahakachhapi Vina, is also known to exist during that period.

Notable performers

 * Annapurna Devi (1927 - 2018)
 * Imdad Khan (1848 - 1920)
 * Wahid Khan
 * Enayat Khan (1894 - 1938)
 * Imrat Khan (1935 - 2018)
 * Mushtaq Ali Khan (1911 - 1989)
 * Pushparaj Koshti (born 1950)
 * Ashwin M. Dalvi (born 1977)
 * Irshad Khan
 * Budhaditya Mukherjee (born 1955)
 * Manilal Nag (born 1939)
 * Kushal Das (born 1959)
 * Rajeev Janardan (born 1967)
 * Suvir Misra
 * Deobrat Mishra (born 1976)
 * Babu Khan
 * Rameshwar Pathak (1938 - 2010)

title: Surbahar


text:
Naushon

Naushon may refer to:

 * Naushon Island, one of the Elizabeth Islands in Gosnold, Massachusetts
 * USS Naushon (SP-517), a United States Navy patrol vessel in commission from 1918 to 1919

 * USCGC Naushon (WPB-1311), a United States Coast Guard Island-class patrol boat
 * SS Naushon (1957), a car ferry operating in Massachusetts from 1957 to 1987

title: Naushon


text:
Adriaan van Roomen

Adriaan van Roomen (29 September 1561 – 4 May 1615), also known as Adrianus Romanus, was a mathematician, professor of medicine and medical astrologer from the Duchy of Brabant in the Habsburg Netherlands who was active throughout Central Europe in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. As a mathematician he worked in algebra, trigonometry and geometry; and on the decimal expansion of pi. He solved the Problem of Apollonius using a new method that involved intersecting hyperbolas. He also wrote on the Gregorian calendar reform.

Life
Van Roomen was born in Leuven, the son of Adriaan Van Roomen and Maria Van Den Daele. He was educated partly in Leuven and partly After studying at the Jesuit College in Cologne, also attending the University of Cologne where he began his study of medicine. He also briefly studied medicine at Leuven University. Roomen was professor of mathematics and medicine at Louvain from 1586 to 1592. He met Kepler, and discussed with François Viète two questions about equations and tangencies. He then spent some time in Italy, particularly with Clavius in Rome in 1585. His publication of 1595, Parvum theatrum urbium, contained Latin verse on the cities of Italy (possibly written by Thomas Edwards).

In June 1593 Van Roomen became the inaugural professor of medicine at the newly refounded University of Würzburg. He was also appointed physician in ordinary to the court of Rudolf II. From around 1595 to 1603 he produced calendars, almanacs and prognostications published under the patronage of Julius Echter, prince-bishop of Würzburg. At the same time, he served as mathematician of the king of Poland and become famous for the computation of the value of pi to sixteen decimals, surpassing François Viète who had arrived at ten digits. After being widowed he was ordained to the priesthood in 1604 and on 8 October 1608 was installed as a canon of the collegiate church of St John the Evangelist in Würzburg.

His Mathesis Polemica, published in Frankfurt in 1605, explained the military applications of mathematics. In June 1610 he was in Prague, after which he travelled to Poland at the invitation of Jan Zamoyski to give public lectures on mathematics at Zamość in Red Ruthenia. He made the return journey via Hungary, arriving back in Würzburg at the end of 1611.

Struggling with health problems, Van Roomen undertook a journey to Spa to take the waters but died en route at Mainz in the arms of his son, who was travelling with him.

Works

 * Ouranographia sive caeli descriptio (Leuven, Joannes Masius, 1591)
 * Ideae mathematicae pars prima, sive methodus polygonorum (Antwerp, Jan van Keerbergen, 1593)
 * Canon triangulorum rectangulorum, tam sphaericorum quam rectilineorum, methodo brevissima ([Leuven], 1593)
 * Supputatio Ecclesiastica Secundum novam et antiquam Calendarii rationem (Würzburg, 1595)
 * Parvum Theatrum Urbium (Frankfurt, Nicolaus Bassalus, 1595).
 * Almanack Wurztburger Bisthumbs, awff das Jar nach Christi unsers Seligmacher Geburt 1596 (Würzburg, Georgius Fleischmann, 1596)
 * In Archimedis circuli dimensionem expositio et analysis (Würzburg, 1597)
 * Newer und Alter Schreib Calender auf das M.D.XCVIII Jar (Würzburg, Georgius Fleischmann, 1598)
 * Newer und Alter Screib Calender Auff das MDXCIX Jar (Würzburg, Georgius Fleischmann, 1599)
 * Almanach Würtzburger Bisthumbs auff das Jar nach der heilsamen Geburt Jesu Christi MDC (Würzburg, Georgius Fleischmann, 1600)
 * Prognosticon Astrologicum oder Teutsche Practica auff das Jar nach der allein selichmachenden Geburt Unsers Heylands Jesu Christi M.DC. (Würzburg, Georgius Fleischmann, 1600)
 * Newer und Alter Schreib Calender auff das M.DCI. Jar (Würzburg, Georgius Fleischmann, 1601)
 * Prognosticon Astrologicum oder Teutsche Practica auff das Jar nach der Glorwürdigen Geburt Jesu Christi M.DCI. (Würzburg, Georgius Fleischmann, 1601)
 * Almanach Wurtzburger Bisthumbs auff dass Jar nach der heilsamen Geburt Jesu Christi M.DC.II. (Würzburg, Georgius Fleischmann, 1602)
 * Newer und Alter Schreib Calender auff das M.DC.II. Jar (Würzburg, Georgius Fleischmann, 1602)
 * Prognosticum astrologicum oder Teutsche Practica auff das M.DC.II. Jar (Würzburg, Georgius Fleischmann, 1602)
 * Universae mathesis idea (Würzburg, Georgius Fleischmann, 1602)
 * Chordarum arcubus circuli primariis (Würzburg, Georgius Fleischmann, 1602)
 * Newer und Alter Schreib Calender auff das M.DC.III. Jar (Würzburg, Georgius Fleischmann, 1603)
 * Prognosticon Astrologicum oder Teutsche Practica auff das Jar ... M.DC.III. (Würzburg, Georgius Fleischmann, 1603)
 * Arithmetica quatuor instrumenta nova Methodo ac forma patente exhibita (Würzburg, 1603)
 * Mathesis Polemica (Frankfurt, 1605)
 * Speculum Astronomicum sive Organum Forma Mappae Expressum (Leuven, Joannes Masius, 1606)
 * Canon triangulorum sphaericorum (Mainz, Joannis Albini, 1609)
 * Pyrotechnia, hoc est, de ignibus festivis, jocosis artificialibus et seriis, variisque eorum structuris libri duo (Frankfurt, Palthenius, 1611)

title: Adriaan van Roomen


text:
Talk:The Desert Song

Untitled
The bulk of this article is fine, and there is no need for it to be moved or deleted - I have replaced it, minus the lyrics which some people felt were a copyright violation. If you want to play around with the lyrics, you can do so at The Desert Song/Temp. If you just want to edit the article, you can do so in the normal way. Deb 16:15, 1 May 2004 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:Desert-Song-film-VHS.JPG
Image:Desert-Song-film-VHS.JPG is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to ensure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images lacking such an explanation can be deleted one week after being tagged, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

BetacommandBot (talk) 21:46, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

 * Added more specific fair use explanation. -- Ssilvers (talk) 03:54, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

title: Talk:The Desert Song


text:
Bernard Lyot

Bernard Ferdinand Lyot (27 February 1897 in Paris – 2 April 1952 in Cairo) was a French astronomer.

Biography
An avid reader of the works of Camille Flammarion, he became a member of the Société Astronomique de France in 1915 and made his first observations using the society's telescope on rue Serpente in Paris. He soon acquired a 4 in telescope and soon upgraded to a 6 in. From graduation in 1918 until 1929, he worked as a demonstrator at the École Polytechnique and studied engineering, physics, and chemistry at the University of Paris.

From 1920 until his death he worked for the Meudon Observatory, where in 1930 he earned the title of Joint Astronomer of the Observatory. After gaining the title, he earned a reputation of being an expert of polarized and monochromatic light. Throughout the 1930s, he labored to perfect the coronagraph, which he invented to observe the corona without having to wait for a solar eclipse. Most of this work implied painstaking long observations at the Pic du Midi Observatory. It was an exceptionally good site, free of both air pollution and light pollution but it came with a disadvantage: In the interwar period access to the peak implied mountaineering skills and physical fitness, especially in winter when access was only gained with a long and tiresome ski touring trek on sealskin-fitted skis, a technique mastered by Lyot, a keen sportsman and mountaineer. Accommodation on site can only be described as spartan, before a powerline, a bigger refuge and a cablecar were built in the early 1950's. In 1938, he showed a movie of the corona in action to the International Astronomical Union. In 1939, he was elected to the French Academy of Sciences. He became Chief Astronomer at the Meudon Observatory in 1943 and received the Bruce Medal in 1947.

Lyot was the President of the Société astronomique de France, the French astronomical society, from 1945-1947.

He suffered a heart attack while returning from an eclipse expedition in Sudan and died on 2 April 1952, at the age of 55.

Observations and Achievements on Pic du Midi

 * Lunar soil behaves like volcanic dust.
 * Mars has sandstorms.
 * Improved his coronagraph.
 * Made motion pictures of solar prominences and the corona.
 * Found spectral lines in the corona.

Inventions

 * Coronagraph
 * Lyot filter
 * Lyot stop
 * Lyot depolarizer

Awards and honors
Awards
 * Lalande Prize from the French Academy of Sciences
 * Janssen Medal from the French Academy of Sciences (1930)
 * Prix Jules Janssen, the highest award of the Société astronomique de France(1932)
 * Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society (1939)
 * Howard N. Potts Medal (1942)
 * Bruce Medal (1947)
 * Henry Draper Medal of the National Academy of Sciences (1951)

Named for him
 * Lyot (lunar crater).
 * Lyot (Martian crater).
 * Minor planet 2452 Lyot.

title: Bernard Lyot


text:
Europe, the Middle East and Africa

Europe, the Middle East and Africa, commonly known by its acronym EMEA among the North American business spheres, is a geographical region used by institutions, governments and global spheres of marketing, media and business when referring to this region. The acronym EMEA is a shorthand way of referencing the two continents (Africa and Europe) and the Middle Eastern sub-continent all at once.

As the name suggests, the region includes all of the countries found on the continents of Africa and Europe, as well as the countries that make up the Middle East. The region is generally accepted to include all European nations and all African nations, and extends east to Iran, including part of Russia. Typically, the acronym does not include independent overseas territories of mainland countries in the region, such as French Guiana. However, the term is not completely clear, and while it usually refers to Europe, the Middle East and Africa, it is not uncommon for businesses and other institutions to slightly tweak the countries they include under this umbrella term.

One of the reasons why the term is commonly used is because it is useful for business purposes, as most of the region falls within four time zones, which facilitates communication and travel.

The related term "EAA" refers to "Europe, Africa, and Asia".

Historical influence
The historical influence and interdependence of Europe on the Middle East and Africa in relation to trade routes contributed to the development of the term EMEA. The establishment of the Suez Canal in 1869 impacted international commerce. It directly linked Europe to the Indian Ocean and East Asian trade routes. The direct channel between Britain and India enabled Britain to gradually gain authority over Egypt. This authority was reinforced via the development and maintenance of the Pax Britannica which gave Britain naval power and control over the world's maritime trade routes during the late nineteenth century period of peace.

Related regions

 * Eastern Europe, Middle East and Africa (EEMEA). Some companies separate their Eastern European business from the rest of Europe, and refer to the EEMEA region separately from the Western/Central European (EU/EFTA) region
 * Southern Europe, Middle East and Africa (SEMEA)
 * Southeastern Europe, Middle East and Africa (SEEMEA)
 * Central and Eastern Europe (CEE)
 * Central Europe, Middle East and Africa (CEMEA)
 * The Middle East and Africa (MEA)
 * The Middle East and North Africa (MENA)
 * The Middle East, Turkey and Africa (META)
 * The Middle East, North Africa, Afghanistan and Pakistan (MENAP)
 * Europe and the Middle East (EME)
 * Europe, the Middle East and North Africa (EUMENA or EMENA)
 * Europe, the Middle East, India and Africa (EMEIA or EMIA)
 * Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Russia (EMEAR)
 * Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Commonwealth of Independent States (EMEACIS)
 * Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Caribbean (EMEAC)
 * The Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), around the Black Sea and Caspian Sea
 * North Atlantic and Central Europe (NACE)
 * Central and Eastern Europe, the Middle East and Africa (CEMA)
 * Europe, Latin America, Africa, Arab world

Component areas
The EMEA region generally includes:

Central and Eastern Europe

 * 🇧🇾 Belarus
 * 🇧🇬 Bulgaria
 * 🇨🇿 Czech Republic
 * Georgia
 * 🇭🇺 Hungary
 * 🇲🇩 Moldova
 * 🇵🇱 Poland
 * 🇷🇴 Romania
 * 🇷🇺 Russia
 * 🇸🇰 Slovakia
 * 🇺🇦 Ukraine
 * 🇦🇲 Armenia
 * 🇦🇿 Azerbaijan
 * 🇰🇿 Kazakhstan
 * 🇰🇬 Kyrgyzstan
 * 🇹🇯 Tajikistan
 * 🇹🇲 Turkmenistan
 * 🇺🇿 Uzbekistan

Northern Europe

 * 🇩🇰 Denmark
 * 🇪🇪 Estonia
 * 🇫🇮 Finland
 * 🇮🇸 Iceland
 * 🇱🇻 Latvia
 * 🇱🇹 Lithuania
 * 🇳🇴 Norway
 * 🇸🇪 Sweden

Southern Europe

 * 🇦🇱 Albania
 * 🇧🇦 Bosnia and Herzegovina
 * 🇭🇷 Croatia
 * 🇨🇾 Cyprus
 * 🇬🇷 Greece
 * 🇮🇹 Italy
 * Kosovo
 * 🇲🇹 Malta
 * 🇲🇪 Montenegro
 * North Macedonia
 * 🇵🇹 Portugal
 * 🇷🇸 Serbia
 * 🇸🇮 Slovenia
 * 🇪🇸 Spain
 * 🇹🇷 Turkey

Western Europe

 * 🇦🇹 Austria
 * 🇧🇪 Belgium
 * 🇫🇷 France
 * 🇩🇪 Germany
 * 🇮🇪 Ireland
 * 🇱🇺 Luxembourg
 * 🇳🇱 Netherlands
 * 🇨🇭 Switzerland
 * 🇬🇧 United Kingdom

MENA

 * 🇩🇿 Algeria
 * 🇧🇭 Bahrain
 * 🇪🇬 Egypt
 * 🇮🇷 Iran
 * 🇮🇶 Iraq
 * 🇮🇱 Israel
 * 🇯🇴 Jordan
 * 🇰🇼 Kuwait
 * 🇱🇧 Lebanon
 * 🇱🇾 Libya
 * 🇲🇦 Morocco
 * 🇴🇲 Oman
 * Palestine
 * 🇶🇦 Qatar
 * 🇸🇦 Saudi Arabia
 * 🇸🇩 Sudan
 * Syria
 * 🇹🇳 Tunisia
 * 🇦🇪 United Arab Emirates
 * 🇾🇪 Yemen

Eastern Africa

 * 🇧🇮 Burundi
 * 🇩🇯 Djibouti
 * 🇪🇷 Eritrea
 * 🇪🇹 Ethiopia
 * 🇰🇪 Kenya
 * 🇷🇼 Rwanda
 * 🇸🇴 Somalia
 * 🇸🇸 South Sudan
 * 🇸🇩 Sudan
 * 🇹🇿 Tanzania
 * 🇺🇬 Uganda

Central Africa

 * 🇨🇲 Cameroon
 * 🇨🇫 Central African Republic
 * 🇹🇩 Chad
 * Democratic Republic of the Congo
 * Republic of the Congo
 * 🇬🇶 Equatorial Guinea
 * 🇬🇦 Gabon
 * São Tomé and Príncipe

Southern Africa

 * 🇦🇴 Angola
 * 🇧🇼 Botswana
 * 🇰🇲 Comoros
 * Eswatini
 * 🇱🇸 Lesotho
 * 🇲🇬 Madagascar
 * 🇲🇼 Malawi
 * 🇲🇺 Mauritius
 * 🇲🇿 Mozambique
 * 🇳🇦 Namibia
 * 🇸🇨 Seychelles
 * 🇿🇦 South Africa
 * 🇿🇲 Zambia
 * 🇿🇼 Zimbabwe

Western Africa

 * 🇧🇯 Benin
 * 🇧🇫 Burkina Faso
 * 🇨🇻 Cape Verde
 * 🇬🇲 Gambia
 * 🇬🇭 Ghana
 * 🇬🇳 Guinea
 * 🇬🇼 Guinea-Bissau
 * Ivory Coast
 * 🇱🇷 Liberia
 * 🇲🇱 Mali
 * 🇲🇷 Mauritania
 * 🇳🇪 Niger
 * 🇳🇬 Nigeria
 * 🇸🇭 Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha
 * 🇸🇳 Senegal
 * 🇸🇱 Sierra Leone
 * 🇹🇬 Togo

title: Europe, the Middle East and Africa


text:
Pre-Pottery Neolithic A

Pre-Pottery Neolithic A (PPNA) denotes the first stage of the Pre-Pottery Neolithic, in early Levantine and Anatolian Neolithic culture, dating to c. 12,000 years ago, that is, 10,000–8800 BCE. Archaeological remains are located in the Levantine and Upper Mesopotamian region of the Fertile Crescent.

The time period is characterized by tiny circular mud-brick dwellings, the cultivation of crops, the hunting of wild game, and unique burial customs in which bodies were buried below the floors of dwellings.

The Pre-Pottery Neolithic A and the following Pre-Pottery Neolithic B (PPNB) were originally defined by Kathleen Kenyon in the type site of Jericho, State of Palestine. During this time, pottery was not yet in use. They precede the ceramic Neolithic Yarmukian culture. PPNA succeeds the Natufian culture of the Epipalaeolithic Near East.

Settlements
PPNA archaeological sites are much larger than those of the preceding Natufian hunter-gatherer culture, and contain traces of communal structures, such as the famous Tower of Jericho. PPNA settlements are characterized by round, semi-subterranean houses with stone foundations and terrazzo-floors. The upper walls were constructed of unbaked clay mudbricks with plano-convex cross-sections. The hearths were small and covered with cobbles. Heated rocks were used in cooking, which led to an accumulation of fire-cracked rock in the buildings, and almost every settlement contained storage bins made of either stones or mud-brick.

As of 2013 Gesher, modern Israel, became the earliest known of all known Neolithic sites (PPNA), with a calibrated Carbon 14 date of 10,459 BCE ± 348 years, analysis suggesting that it may have been the starting point of a Neolithic Revolution. A contemporary site is Mureybet in modern Syria.

One of the most notable PPNA settlements is Jericho, thought to be the world's first town (c. 9,000 BCE). The PPNA town contained a population of up to 2–3000 people and was protected by a massive stone wall and tower. There is much debate over the function of the wall, for there is no evidence of any serious warfare at this time. One possibility is the wall was built to protect the salt resources of Jericho. It has also been proposed that the tower caught the shadow of the largest nearby mountain on summer solstice in order to create a sense of power in support of whatever hierarchy ruled the town's inhabitants.

Burial practices
PPNA cultures are unique for their burial practices, and Kenyon (who excavated the PPNA level of Jericho) characterized them as "living with their dead". Kenyon found no fewer than 279 burials, below floors, under household foundations, and in between walls. In the PPNB period, skulls were often dug up and reburied, or mottled with clay and (presumably) displayed.

Lithics
The lithic industry is based on blades struck from regular cores. Sickle-blades and arrowheads continue traditions from the late Natufian culture, transverse-blow axes and polished adzes appear for the first time.

Crop cultivation and granaries
Sedentism of this time allowed for the cultivation of local grains, such as barley and wild oats, and for storage in granaries. Sites such as Dhra′ and Jericho retained a hunting lifestyle until the PPNB period, but granaries allowed for year-round occupation.

This period of cultivation is considered "pre-domestication", but may have begun to develop plant species into the domesticated forms they are today. Deliberate, extended-period storage was made possible by the use of "suspended floors for air circulation and protection from rodents". This practice "precedes the emergence of domestication and large-scale sedentary communities by at least 1,000 years".

Granaries are positioned in places between other buildings early on c. 11,500 BP, however, beginning around 10,500 BP, they were moved inside houses, and by 9,500 BP storage occurred in special rooms. This change might reflect changing systems of ownership and property as granaries shifted from communal use and ownership to become under the control of households or individuals.

It has been observed of these granaries that their "sophisticated storage systems with subfloor ventilation are a precocious development that precedes the emergence of almost all of the other elements of the Near Eastern Neolithic package—domestication, large scale sedentary communities, and the entrenchment of some degree of social differentiation". Moreover, "[b]uilding granaries may [...] have been the most important feature in increasing sedentism that required active community participation in new life-ways".

Regional variants
With more sites becoming known, archaeologists have defined a number of regional variants of Pre-Pottery Neolithic A:
 * (Aswadian) in the Damascus Basin, defined by finds from Tell Aswad IA; typical: bipolar cores, big sickle blades, Aswad points. The 'Aswadian' variant recently was abolished by the work of Danielle Stordeur in her initial report from further investigations in 2001–2006. The PPNB horizon was moved back at this site, to around 10,700 BP.
 * Mureybetian in the Northern Levant, defined by the finds from Mureybet IIIA, IIIB, typical: Helwan points, sickle-blades with base amenagée or short stem and terminal retouch. Other sites include Sheyk Hasan and Jerf el Ahmar.
 * Sites in "Upper Mesopotamia" include Çayönü and Göbekli Tepe, with the latter possibly being the oldest ritual complex yet discovered.
 * Sites in central Anatolia that include the 'mother city' Çatalhöyük and the smaller, but older site, rivaling even Jericho in age, Aşıklı Höyük.
 * Sultanian in the Jordan River valley and southern Levant, with the type site of Jericho. Other sites include Netiv HaGdud, El-Khiam, Hatoula, and Nahal Oren.

title: Pre-Pottery Neolithic A


text:
Massacre at Huế

The Huế massacre (Thảm sát tại Huế Tết Mậu Thân, or Thảm sát Tết Mậu Thân ở Huế, lit. translation: "Tết Offensive massacre in Huế") was the summary executions and mass murder perpetrated by the Viet Cong and People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN) during their capture, military occupation and later withdrawal from the city of Huế during the Tet Offensive, considered one of the longest and bloodiest battles of the Vietnam War.

The Battle of Huế began on 31 January 1968, and lasted a total of 26 days. During the months and years that followed, dozens of mass graves were discovered in and around Huế. The estimated death toll was between 2,800 and 6,000 civilians and prisoners of war, or 5–10% of the total population of Huế. The Republic of Vietnam (South Vietnam) released a list of 4,062 victims identified as having been either murdered or abducted. Victims were found bound, tortured, and sometimes buried alive. Many victims were also clubbed to death.

A number of U.S. and South Vietnamese authorities as well as a number of journalists who investigated the events took the discoveries, along with other evidence, as proof that a large-scale atrocity had been carried out in and around Huế during its four-week occupation. The killings were perceived as part of a large-scale purge of a whole social stratum, including anyone friendly to American forces in the region. The massacre at Huế came under increasing press scrutiny later, when press reports alleged that South Vietnamese "revenge squads" had also been at work in the aftermath of the battle, searching out and executing citizens that had supported the communist occupation. In 2017, Ben Kiernan described the massacre as "possibly the largest atrocity of the war."

Executions
The Vietcong set up provisional authorities shortly after it had captured Huế in the early hours of 31 January 1968. They were charged with removing the existing government administration from power in the city and replacing it with a "revolutionary administration". Working from lists of "cruel tyrants and reactionary elements" previously developed by Vietcong intelligence officers, many people were to be rounded up following the initial hours of the attack. These included Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) soldiers, civil servants, political party members, local religious leaders, schoolteachers, American civilians, and other international people. Cadres called out the names on their lists over loudspeakers, ordering them to report to a local school. Those who did not report voluntarily were hunted down.

Communist preliminary occupation plans and orders
The communists' actions were based on a series of orders issued by the High Command and the PRG. In a 3500-page document issued on 26 January 1968, by the Trị-Thiên-Huế Political Directorate, the political cadres were given specific instructions: "Operating in close support of the regular military and guerrilla elements, the political cadre were to: destroy and disorganize the Republic of Viet Nam's (RVN's) administrative machinery 'from province and district levels to the city wards, streets, and wharves;' motivate the people of Huế to take up arms, pursue the enemy, seize power, and establish a revolutionary government; motivate (recruit) local citizens for military and 'security' forces... transportation and supply activities, and to serve wounded soldiers...;" "pursue to the end (and) punish spies, reactionaries, and 'tyrants' and 'maintain order and security in the city.'"

Another section, dealing with Target Area 1 ("the Phu Ninh ward") read: "Annihilate all spies, reactionaries, and foreign teachers (such as Americans and Germans) in the area. Break open prisons. Investigate cadre, soldiers and receptive civilians imprisoned by the enemy. Search for tyrants and reactionaries who are receiving treatment in hospitals." The orders for Target Area 2 ("the Phu Vinh ward") were similar: "Annihilate the enemy in the area.... Rally the Buddhist force to advance the isolation of reactionaries who exploit the Catholics of Phu Cam." The orders for Target Area 3 ("the wharves along the An Cuu River and from Truong Sung to the Kho Ren Bridge") followed the same pattern: "Search for and pursue spies, tyrants and reactionaries hiding near the wharf.... Motivate the people in the areas along the River to annihilate the enemy." For Target Area 4 (the district including Phu Cam and the Binh Anh, Truong Giang, Truong Cuu and An Lang sections) the orders were "Search for and pursue spies and reactionaries in the area.... Destroy the power and influence of reactionary leaders...." For Area 1, Cell 3 was assigned the job of "Annihilation of tyrants and the elimination of traitors".

In June 1968, the American 1st Cavalry troops captured PAVN documents that included a directive written two days before the battle began. It included these instructions: "For the purpose of a lengthy occupation of Huế, we should immediately liberate the rural areas and annihilate the wicked GVN administrative personnel.

Specific Mission.... We must attack the enemy key agencies, economic installations, and lines of communications. We must also annihilate the enemy mobile troops, reactionary elements and tyrants."

On 1 February, the provincial administration, having taken control of Huế, issued a directive that ordered the troops, in part, "To wipe out all puppet administrative organs of the puppet Thiệu-Kỳ (President Nguyễn Văn Thiệu, Vice President Nguyễn Cao Kỳ) clique at all levels in the province, city and town down to every single hamlet."

On the same day, the Liberation Front radio announced, "We tell our compatriots that we are determined to topple the regime of the traitorous Thiệu-Kỳ clique and to punish and annihilate those who have been massacring and oppressing our compatriots... we ask our compatriots to... help us arrest all the U.S.-puppet cruel henchmen."

Occupation
Foreign Service Officer Douglas Pike wrote that according to Vietcong documents captured during and after the siege, members of the provincial administration were to be taken out of the city, held, and punished for their "crimes against the Vietnamese people". The disposition of those who were previously in control of the city was carefully laid out, and the lists were detailed and extensive. Those in the Saigon-based-state police apparatus at all levels were to be rounded up and held outside the city. High civilian and military officials were also removed from the city to await the study of their individual cases.

Ordinary civil servants who worked for "the Saigon enemy" out of necessity but did not oppose the communists were destined for reeducation and later employment. Low-level civil servants who had at some point been involved in paramilitary activities were to be held for reeducation but not employed. There are documented cases of individuals who were executed by the Vietcong when they tried to hide or otherwise resisted during the early stages of Huế's occupation.

Within days of the capture, US Marine Corps (USMC), US Army, and ARVN units were dispatched to counterattack and recapture the city after weeks of fierce fighting during which the city and its outlying areas were exposed to repeated shelling and bombing. It was reported that during the attack by USMC and ARVN, North Vietnam's forces had rounded up the individuals whose names it had previously collected and had them executed or sent North for "reeducation."

Many people had taken sanctuary from the battle in a local church. Several hundred of them were ordered out to undergo indoctrination in the "liberated area" and told that they would be allowed to return home. After marching the group south 9 km, 20 of the people were separated, tried in a kangaroo court, found guilty, executed and buried. The others were taken across the river and turned over to a local communist unit in an exchange that even included written receipts. Douglas Pike noted "It is probable that the Commissar intended that their prisoners should be reeducated and returned, but with the turnover, matters passed from his control." Sometime in the following several weeks, the communists decided to kill the individuals under their control.

Eyewitness accounts
Nguyễn Công Minh, the daughter of the Deputy Mayor of Huế, reported that her father, who was of old age, was arrested at his home in the beginning of the communist occupation three days after he ordered his children (including herself) and his wife to flee via the back of their house when communist troops first came knocking at their home. Upon telling the troops that he was Deputy Mayor of Huế and was set to retire in one year (1969), he was ordered to report to a camp for reeducation and to pack clothing and food sufficient for 10 days. He was never seen again, and his remains were never recovered. She recalled that in the search of her father's remains, she witnessed that many of the bodies she came across in the mass graves were found to be in a fetal position, with their hands tied behind their backs, and the back of the heads/skulls were smashed, indicating that they knelt on the ground prior to their deaths and they died due to blunt-force trauma to their heads.

In 1971, the journalist Don Oberdorfer's book, Tet!, documented some eyewitness accounts of what happened in Huế during the occupation. Pham Van Tuong, a part-time janitor for the Huế government information office who made it on the Vietcong list of "reactionaries" for working there, was hiding with his family as it hunted for him. When he was found with his 3-year-old daughter, 5-year-old son and two nephews, the Vietcong immediately gunned them all down, leaving their bodies on the street for the rest of the family to see.

Don Oberdorfer spent five days in late 1969 with Paul Vogle, an American professor of English at Huế University, to go through Huế to interview witnesses of the occupation. Oberdorfer classified all the killings into two categories: the planned execution of government officials and their families, political and civil servants, and collaborators with Americans, and those civilians not connected to the government who ran from questioning, who spoke harshly about the occupation, or who the occupiers believed "displayed a bad attitude" towards the occupiers.

Oberdorfer reported that on the fifth day of the Viet Cong occupation in the Catholic district of Huế, Phủ Cam, all able-bodied males over 15, approximately 400 boys and men, who took refuge in Phủ Cam Cathedral were taken away and killed. Some had been on the Vietcong's blacklist, some were of military age and some just looked prosperous. Oberdorfer interviewed Ho Ty, a Vietcong commander who took part in the advanced planning of a general uprising. He reported that Ty recounted that the Communist party "was particularly anxious to get those people at Phủ Cam.... The Catholics were considered particular enemies of ours." It was apparently that group whose remains were later found in the Da Mai Creek bed. The murders of 500 people at Da Mai were authorized by PRG command "on grounds that the victims had been traitors to the revolution."

Three professors, Professor Horst-Günther Krainick, Dr. Alois Alteköster, and Dr. Raimund Discher, who taught at the Huế University's Faculty of Medicine and were members of the West German Cultural Mission, along with Mrs. Elisabeth Krainick, were arrested and executed by North Vietnamese troops during their invasion of Huế in February 1968. On 5 April 1968, the bodies of the executed professors along with many Vietnamese civilians also executed, were discovered in mass graves near Huế.

Philip W. Manhard, a U.S. senior advisor in Huế province, was taken to a prisoner-of-war camp by the PAVN and held until 1973. Manhard recounted that during the PAVN's withdrawal from Huế, they summarily executed anyone in their custody who resisted being taken out of the city or who was too old, young, or frail to make the journey to the camp.

Two French priests, Fathers Urbain and Guy, were seen being led away and suffered a similar fate. Urbain's body was found buried alive, bound hand and foot. Guy, who was 48, was stripped of his cassock and forced to kneel down on the ground, where he was shot in the back of the head. He was in the same grave with Father Urbain and 18 others.

Captured in the home of Vietnamese friends, Stephen Miller of the U.S. Information Service was bound and shot in a field behind a Catholic seminary. Courtney Niles, an American civilian working for NBC International, was killed during an attack by communist forces while in the presence of U.S. soldiers.

Alje Vennema, a Dutch-Canadian doctor who lived in Huế and witnessed the battle and the massacre, wrote The Viet Cong Massacre at Huế in 1976. He recounts numerous stories of murders. A 48-year-old street vendor, Mrs. Nguyen Thi Lao, was "arrested on the main street. Her body was found at the school. Her arms had been bound and a rag stuffed into her mouth; there were no wounds to the body. She was probably buried alive." A 44-year-old bricklayer, Mr. Nguyen Ty, was "seized on February 2, 1968.... His body was found on March 1st; his hands were tied, and he had a bullet wound through his neck which had come out through the mouth." At Ap Dong Gi Tay "110 bodies were uncovered; again most had their hands tied and rags stuffed in their mouth. All of them were men, among them fifteen students, several military men, and civil servants, young and old." "Sometimes a whole family was eliminated, as was the case with the merchant, Mr. Nam Long, who together with his wife and five children was shot at home." "Mr. Phan Van Tuong, a laborer at the province headquarters, suffered a similar fate by being shot outside his house with four of his children."

Vennema listed 27 graves with a total of 2,397 bodies, most of which had been executed. He cited numerous eyewitness accounts of executions and described the condition of bodies found in the graves. Many had their hands tied behind their backs. Some were shot in the head. Some had rags stuffed in their mouths and had no evidence of wounds, apparently having been buried alive. Some had evidence of having been beaten. A few were identified as PAVN or VC troops killed during the battle.

Some graves were found purely by accident. A farmer working in his field tripped on a wire sticking out of the ground. He pulled on it to remove it and a skeletal hand popped out of the ground. Other graves were found when people noticed suspiciously green grass in sandy areas. The Da Mai Creek massacre was discovered after three Vietcong defected and told authorities about the murders. An ARVN soldier on patrol south of Huế noticed a wire sticking out of the ground. Thinking it was a booby trap, he very carefully worked to uncover it. He discovered the body of an old man, his hands tied together with the wire. Two days later, 130 bodies had been uncovered.

In another case,

"...a squad with a death order entered the home of a prominent community leader and shot him, his wife, his married son and daughter-in-law, his young unmarried daughter, a male and female servant and their baby. The family cat was strangled; the family dog was clubbed to death; the goldfish scooped out of the fishbowl and tossed on the floor. When the Communists left, no life remained in the house."

An eyewitness, Nguyen Tan Chau, recounted how he was captured by communist troops and marched south with 29 other prisoners bound together, in three groups of ten. Chau managed to escape and hide in the darkness just before the others were executed. From there, he witnessed what happened next.

The larger prisoners were separated into pairs, tied together back to back, and shot. The others were shot singly. All were dumped into two shallow graves, including those who had been wounded but were not dead.

Documents confirming the massacre
Captured Vietcong documents boasted that they "eliminated" thousands of enemy and "annihilated members of various reactionary political parties, henchmen, and wicked tyrants" in Huế. One regiment alone reported that it killed 1,000 people. Another report mentioned 2,867 killed. Yet another document boasted of over 3,000 killed. A further document listed 2,748 executions. A captured Vietcong enemy document, which numerous writers cited, including Guenter Lewy in his 1980 book America in Vietnam, and Peter Macdonald's 1993 book Giap, recorded that the communists had "eliminated 1,892 administrative personnel, 38 policemen, 790 tyrants", 2720 politically persecuted persons in all, during the communist occupation of the city.

The translation of an official Vietnamese campaign study of the Tet Offensive in Thừa Thiên–Huế Province released by the communists recognized that Vietcong cadres "hunted down and captured tyrants and Republic of Vietnam military and government personnel" and that "many nests of reactionaries [...] were killed." Hundreds of others "who owed blood debts were executed." Another official history from the communist side, "The Trị-Thiên-Huế Battlefield During the Victorious Resistance War Against the Americans to Save the Nation," recognized the widespread killings but claimed they were done by civilians who armed themselves and "rose up in a flood-tide, killing enemy thugs, eliminating traitors, and hunting down the enemy.... The people captured and punished many reactionaries, enemy thugs, and enemy secret agents." However, the word "eliminate" may be a mistranslation of the word "diệt," or "loại khỏi vòng chiến đấu," and instead actually mean "destroy" or "neutralize," as in neutralizing their administrative function and eliminating of their political influence by detention, as opposed to physical liquidation.

When Trương Như Tảng was appointed as Vietcong justice minister soon after Huế, he understood it to be a critical position because the massacre had "left us with a special need to address fears among the Southern people that a revolutionary victory would bring with it a bloodbath or reign of terror." That was because "large numbers of people had been executed" including "captured American soldiers and several other international people who were not combatants." According to Trạng, "discipline in Huế was seriously inadequate" and "fanatic young soldiers had indiscriminately shot people, and angry local citizens who supported the revolution had on various occasions taken justice into their own hands...." The massacre was "one of those terrible spontaneous tragedies that inevitably accompany war."

On 4 February, Radio Hanoi announced, "After one hour's fighting the Revolutionary Armed Forces occupied the residence of the puppet provincial Governor (in Huế), the prison and the offices of the puppet administration.... The Revolutionary Armed Forces punished most cruel agents of the enemy and seized control of the streets... rounded up and punished dozens of cruel agents and caused the enemy organs of control and oppression to crumble." On 14 February, the Thừa Thiên-Huế People's Revolutionary Committee issued a statement that read in part,

"Concerned over the country's survival and their own fate, on 31 January 1968, the Thừa Thiên-Huế people rose up holding weapons in their hands, smashed the puppet ruling apparatus from the provincial to the village and hamlet levels, and completely liberated the rural areas and the city of Huế. The enemy has suffered disastrous defeats. A number of ringleaders of the puppet administration have surrendered to the people or have been arrested and have been detained by the revolutionary forces. Except for some localities and scattered guard posts which have not yet been liquidated, the Thừa Thiên-Huế puppet administration has basically disintegrated."

An entry in a captured communist document dated 22 February stated, "Troop proselyting by the VC/PAVN forces was not successful because the troops had to devote themselves to combat missions. Moreover, they were afraid of being discovered by the enemy. It was very difficult for them to handle POWs so they executed the policy of 'catch and kill.'"  A 25 February captured communist document detailed some of the successes of the Special Action Company of the PAVN 6th Regiment. "We captured and exterminated thousands of people of the revolutionary network. From province to village we broke the enemy's administrative grip for the people to rise."

A report written immediately after the battle by a political officer of the People's Revolutionary Party listed 2,826 "administrative personnel, nationalist political party members, 'tyrants' and policemen that were killed by their troops."

Another document, undated, written by a senior political officer and marked "ABSOLUTE SECRET", was entitled "Information On the Victory of Our Armed Forces in Huế from 31 January to 23 March 1968;" it was captured by the US 1st Cavalry Division on 25 April 1968 and reported on the results of the political operation.

"We also killed one member of the Dai Viet Party Committee, one Senator of South Viet-Nam, 50 Quoc Dan Dang party members, six Dai Viet Party members, thirteen Can Lao Nhan Vi Party members, three captains, four 1st lieutenants, and liberated 35 hamlets with 32,000 people.... We eliminated 1,892 administrative personnel, 38 policemen, 790 tyrants, six captains, two first lieutenants, 20 second lieutenants, and many NCOs."

The same document contained a passage that read:

"The people joined our soldiers in their search for tyrants, reactionaries and spies. For instance, Mrs. Xuan followed our soldiers to show the houses of the tyrants she knew, although she had only six days before given birth to a child."

In March 1968, in the official Hanoi press, the North reported:

"Actively combining their efforts with those of the People's Liberation Armed Forces and population, other self-defense and armed units of the city of Huế arrested and called to surrender the surviving functionaries of the puppet administration and officers and men of the puppet army who were skulking. Die-hard cruel agents were punished."

A 6 March document written by a Vietcong sapper unit commander recounted that his unit "participated in the killing of tyrants and the digging of trenches"  A 13 March 1968 entry in captured documents reviewed the successes of the attack on Huế. "Enormous victory: We annihilated more than 3,000 tyrannical puppet army and government administrative personnel, including the Deputy Province Chief of Thừa Thiên." A report written by the commander of the 6th Regiment on 30 March stated that they had captured thousands of "local administrative personnel, puppet troops, and cruel tyrants" and successfully "annihilated members of various reactionary political parties, henchmen, and wicked tyrants." It also stated that they had "killed 1,000 local administrative personnel, spies and cruel tyrants."

On 26 April 1968, Hanoi, reacting to the discovery of graves in Huế, announced that the people murdered by their troops were "hooligan lackeys who had incurred blood debts of the Huế compatriots and who were annihilated by the Front's Armed Forces in the early spring of 1968." On 27 April 1969, Radio Hanoi criticized authorities in Huế and South Vietnam:

"In order to cover up their cruel acts, the puppet administration in Huế recently played the farce of setting up a so-called committee for the search for burial sites of the hooligan lackeys who had owed blood debts to the Tri-Thien-Huế compatriots and who were annihilated by the Southern Armed Forces and people in early Mau Than spring."

A cadre diary captured by 1st Cavalry Division troops contained an entry that read:

"The entire puppet administrative system from hamlet to province was destroyed or disintegrated. More than 3,000 persons were killed. The enemy could never reorganize or make up for his failure. Although he could immediately use inexperienced elements as replacements, they were good for nothing."

In December 1968, the Huế City People's Revolutionary Party Central Committee released a summary of the party's accomplishments during Tet. The summary included the following statement: "Thousands of tyrants were killed. Many reactionary factions and organizations were exterminated."

The same month, Don Oberdorfer reported:

"Ho Ty was arrested by the government police on Sept. 4 this year. At the time of his arrest, he was party secretary for a section of Huế city...Ho Ty reported that the part of the plan from higher headquarters was to destroy the government machinery of Huế and the people who made it work.... He said the killings were planned and executed by a separate group in charge of security."

In 1987, at a Hanoi conference to discuss the history of the Tet offensive, Colonel General Tran Van Quang, one of the commanders of the Huế operation, assessed the strengths and weaknesses of his forces and cited as one of their strengths:

"We resolutely carried out the orders and fulfilled the requirements set out for us by the High Command. We motivated our cadre, soldiers, and the civilian population through the use of the slogans, 'Tri-Thien fights for Tri-Thien and for the entire nation,' and 'Heroically and resolutely conduct attacks and uprisings.'"

In February 1988, Vietnamese communist leaders admitted "mistakes" were made in Huế. Col Nguyen Quoc Khanh, commander of part of the forces that took over Huế stated, "There was no case of killing civilians purposefully.... Those civilians who were killed were killed accidentally, in cross fire." However, he admitted "some rank and file soldiers may have committed individual mistakes." However, in an internal document discussing the 1968 Tet offensive in Hue, General (Tổng) Hồ Trung wrote, referring to the Giá Hơi section: "These forces hunted down and killed enemy thugs, reactionaries, and puppet policemen" and that they "cleaned out.... nests of Catholic reactionaries."

Discovery

A first summary was published for the U.S. Mission in Vietnam by Douglas Pike, then working as a Foreign Service Officer for the U.S. Information Agency in 1970. Pike identified three distinct phases for the executions in Huế. In a report published in 1970, The Viet Cong Strategy of Terror, Pike wrote that at least half of the bodies unearthed in Huế revealed clear evidence of "atrocity killings: to include hands wired behind backs, rags stuffed in mouths, bodies contorted but without wounds (indicating burial alive)." Pike concluded that the killings were done by local Vietcong cadres and were the result of "a decision rational and justifiable in the Communist mind." The three phases are as follows:

 * Phase one was a series of kangaroo court trials of local ARVN officials. The highly publicized trials lasted anywhere from 5 to 10 minutes and the accused were always found guilty of "crimes against the people."
 * Phase two was implemented when the communists thought that they could hold the city long-term and was a campaign of "social reconstruction" along Maoist dogmatic lines. Those who the communists believed to be counter-revolutionaries were singled out. Catholics, intellectuals, prominent businessmen, and other "imperialist lackeys" were targeted in order to "build a new social order."
 * The last phase began when it became evident that the communists could not hold the city, and it was designed to "leave no witnesses." Anyone who could identify individual Vietcong members who participated in the occupation was to be killed and their bodies hidden.

After the Battle of Huế, between 1968 and 1969 a total of almost 2,800 bodies were recovered from mass graves, with 4 major mass grave finds.
 * A few months after the battle, about 1,200 civilian bodies were found in 18 hastily concealed mass graves.
 * A second major group of graves were discovered in the first 7 months of 1969. In February 1968, a list of 428 names of people identified from the recovered bones was released by local authorities.
 * In September 1969, three communist defectors confessed to the 101st Airborne Division intelligence officers that they had witnessed several hundred people being killed in a 100-yard area at Da Mai Creek bed (about 10 miles south of Huế).
 * In November 1969, another major mass grave was found at Phu Thu Salt Flats, near the fishing village of Lương Viện, Vinh Hưng commune, Phú Lộc provincial district, 10 miles east of Huế and halfway between the cities of Huế and Đà Nẵng.

Disputes, revisionism and denials
In Bùi Tín's 2002 memoir, From Enemy to Friend: a North Vietnamese perspective on the war, the former PAVN Colonel acknowledged that executions of civilians had occurred in Huế. However, he added that under the intensity of the American bombardment, discipline of the troops disintegrated. The "units from the north" had been "told that Huế was the stronghold of feudalism, a bed of reactionaries, the breeding ground of Cần Lao Party loyalists who remained true to the memory of former South Vietnamese president Ngô Đình Diệm and of Nguyễn Văn Thiệu's Democracy Party." Tin explained that over 10,000 prisoners were taken at Huế, with the most important of them sent to North Vietnam for imprisonment. When U.S. Marines launched their counterattack to retake the city, communist troops were instructed to move the prisoners with the retreating troops. According to Tín, in the "panic of retreat," the company and battalion commanders shot their prisoners "to ensure the safety of the retreat."

Marilyn B. Young disputes the "official figures" of executions at Huế. While acknowledging that there were executions, she cites freelance journalist Len Ackland, who was at Huế and estimated the number to be somewhere between 300 and 400.

Ngo Vinh Long claims that 710 people were killed by the communists. In an interview he stated, "Yeah, there was a total of 710 persons killed in the Huế area, from my research, not as many as five thousand, six thousand, or whatever the Americans claimed at that time, and not as few as four hundred as people like some of the people in the peace movement here claim...."

The Italian journalist Oriana Fallaci reported, "In the last few days the Vietcong lost their heads and did nothing but make reprisals, kill, punish". However, citing a French priest to whom she spoke in Huế, she also claimed that the death toll of up to 8,000 included deaths by American bombardment, and at least 200 people, and perhaps as many as 1,100, who were killed following the liberation of Huế by the US and ARVN forces. Stanley Karnow wrote that the bodies of those executed by South Vietnamese teams were thrown into common graves. Some reports alleged that South Vietnamese "revenge squads" had also been at work in the aftermath of the battle to search out and execute citizens supporting the communist occupation.

The historian David Hunt posited that Douglas Pike's study for the U.S. Mission was "by any definition, a work of propaganda." In 1988, Pike said that he had earlier been engaged in a conscious "effort to discredit the Vietcong."

In a letter to the editor of The New York Times, the historian Gareth Porter stated that there was little evidence that the communists carried out more than "several hundred" political executions and revenge killings in Huế, while the U.S. official estimate maintains that over 2,800 bodies were "victims of Communist executions." He alleged that the site of one set of mass graves was also the site of a major battle in which some 250 communist troops were reported killed in U.S air strikes and that Saigon's minister of health, after visiting burial sites, said the bodies could have been communist soldiers killed in battle. He dismissed Pike's claim that there were communist blacklists of students and intellectuals to be killed as unsupported by interviews and captured communist documents.

The historian James Willbanks concluded, "We may never know what really happened at Huế, but it is clear that mass executions did occur." According to Stanley Karnow, "Balanced accounts have made it clear, however, that the Communist butchery at Huế did take place—perhaps on an even larger scale than reported during the war." Ben Kiernan's 2017 history of Vietnam states that "thousands" were killed at Huế in "possibly the largest atrocity of the war."

Legacy
Reports of the massacre had a profound impact on the South Vietnamese for many years after the Tet Offensive, with an anticipation of a bloodbath following any North Vietnamese takeover, like the one in Huế. Novelist James Jones, in a New York Times article wrote, "Whatever else they accomplished, the Huế massacres effectively turned the bulk of the South Vietnamese against the Northern Communists. In South Vietnam, wherever one went, from Can Tho in the delta to Tay Ninh to Kontum in the north, and of course in Huế, the 1968 Tet massacres were still being talked about in 1973." For their part, left-leaning scholars have since commented that the massacre was a rare propaganda coup during the unpopular war in Vietnam, especially as it allowed Richard Nixon's government to counteract the public outrage derived from the American-perpetrated Mỹ Lai massacre that would take place a few weeks later during that same year.

Anticipation of a bloodbath was a major factor in the widespread panic and chaos across South Vietnam when North Vietnam executed their 1975 Spring Offensive, and the panic culminated in the disintegration and defeat of South Vietnamese military forces, and the fall of the Republic of Vietnam on 30 April 1975. Today, the massacre remains unrecognized and entirely ignored in the Vietnamese communist government's War Remnants Museum in Ho Chi Minh City.

title: Massacre at Huế


text:
Ba space

In mathematics, the ba space $$ba(\Sigma)$$ of an algebra of sets $$\Sigma$$ is the Banach space consisting of all bounded and finitely additive signed measures on $$\Sigma$$. The norm is defined as the variation, that is $$\|\nu\|=|\nu|(X).$$

If Σ is a sigma-algebra, then the space $$ca(\Sigma)$$ is defined as the subset of $$ba(\Sigma)$$ consisting of countably additive measures. The notation ba is a mnemonic for bounded additive and ca is short for countably additive.

If X is a topological space, and Σ is the sigma-algebra of Borel sets in X, then $$rca(X)$$ is the subspace of $$ca(\Sigma)$$ consisting of all regular Borel measures on X.

Properties
All three spaces are complete (they are Banach spaces) with respect to the same norm defined by the total variation, and thus $$ca(\Sigma)$$ is a closed subset of $$ba(\Sigma)$$, and $$rca(X)$$ is a closed set of $$ca(\Sigma)$$ for Σ the algebra of Borel sets on X. The space of simple functions on $$\Sigma$$ is dense in $$ba(\Sigma)$$.

The ba space of the power set of the natural numbers, ba(2N), is often denoted as simply $$ba$$ and is isomorphic to the dual space of the ℓ∞ space.

Dual of B(Σ)
Let B(Σ) be the space of bounded Σ-measurable functions, equipped with the uniform norm. Then ba(Σ) = B(Σ)* is the continuous dual space of B(Σ). This is due to Hildebrandt and Fichtenholtz & Kantorovich. This is a kind of Riesz representation theorem which allows for a measure to be represented as a linear functional on measurable functions. In particular, this isomorphism allows one to define the integral with respect to a finitely additive measure (note that the usual Lebesgue integral requires countable additivity). This is due to Dunford & Schwartz, and is often used to define the integral with respect to vector measures, and especially vector-valued Radon measures.

The topological duality ba(Σ) = B(Σ)* is easy to see. There is an obvious algebraic duality between the vector space of all finitely additive measures σ on Σ and the vector space of simple functions ($$\mu(A)=\zeta\left(1_A\right)$$). It is easy to check that the linear form induced by σ is continuous in the sup-norm if σ is bounded, and the result follows since a linear form on the dense subspace of simple functions extends to an element of B(Σ)* if it is continuous in the sup-norm.

Dual of L∞(μ)
If Σ is a sigma-algebra and μ is a sigma-additive positive measure on Σ then the Lp space L∞(μ) endowed with the essential supremum norm is by definition the quotient space of B(Σ) by the closed subspace of bounded μ-null functions:
 * $$N_\mu:=\{f\in B(\Sigma) : f = 0 \ \mu\text{-almost everywhere} \}.$$

The dual Banach space L∞(μ)* is thus isomorphic to
 * $$N_\mu^\perp=\{\sigma\in ba(\Sigma) : \mu(A)=0\Rightarrow \sigma(A)= 0 \text{ for any }A\in\Sigma\},$$

i.e. the space of finitely additive signed measures on Σ that are absolutely continuous with respect to μ (μ-a.c. for short).

When the measure space is furthermore sigma-finite then L∞(μ) is in turn dual to L1(μ), which by the Radon–Nikodym theorem is identified with the set of all countably additive μ-a.c. measures. In other words, the inclusion in the bidual
 * $$L^1(\mu)\subset L^1(\mu)^{**}=L^{\infty}(\mu)^*$$

is isomorphic to the inclusion of the space of countably additive μ-a.c. bounded measures inside the space of all finitely additive μ-a.c. bounded measures.

title: Ba space