In 1979, a quiet former naval officer died in Japan without ever telling his family what he did on March 2, 1942.
At his small funeral, his relatives knew only that he had served on destroyers in World War Two and disliked talking about the war.
None of them knew that 422 families across the ocean existed only because of a single order he gave at sea.
His name was Shunsaku Kudo.
Thirty-seven years earlier, Kudo commanded the Imperial Japanese Navy destroyer Ikazuchi in the Java Sea.
The day before, a fierce battle had sent the British warship HMS Encounter to the bottom, leaving hundreds of Allied sailors adrift in thick black fuel oil.
Blinded by toxic sludge and burning with thirst under a blazing sun, exhausted men clung to wreckage and waited to die.
When a gray Japanese destroyer cut through the haze toward them, men in the oil closed their eyes and braced for machine-gun fire.
Mines drifted in those waters, and Allied submarines were hunting nearby.
Stopping dead in the water meant gambling the lives of Kudo's entire crew for men who had been firing at his fleet the day before.
Kudo stopped anyway.
He cut his engines, raised a rescue flag, and ordered ropes and cargo nets thrown over the side.
Many of the young British sailors were too weak and slick with black oil to hold the lines.
So Kudo's sailors climbed down into the sea themselves, tied ropes around the chests of their enemies, and hauled them aboard one by one.
For hours they refused to quit until 422 half-dead strangers crowded a small deck built for roughly half that number.
Japanese seamen knelt beside shivering prisoners, gently wiped burning oil from their eyes, gave them dry uniforms, and shared hot rations and fresh water.
Kudo then stepped onto the deck, saluted the captured officers as fellow sailors, and addressed them in English, praising their courage and welcoming them as honored guests.
The next day, he delivered every man safely to a hospital ship and sailed back into the war.
Here's where it gets strange.
Two years after Kudo was reassigned, Ikazuchi was sunk in combat with all hands lost.
When peace came, Kudo went home, mourned his lost crew in silence, and never once mentioned the rescue at the dinner table.
Not to his wife, not to his family, not to anyone.
Meanwhile, a rescued British officer named Samuel Falle became a diplomat, raised a family that almost never existed, and spent decades searching Japan for his savior.
By the time Falle finally learned his rescuer's name, it was too late.
Kudo was already gone.
Still, in 2008, an elderly Sir Samuel Falle flew to Japan, sixty-six years after that afternoon in the Java Sea.
Standing before Kudo's gravestone, the old survivor bowed his head to deliver the thank-you Kudo never lived to hear, for 422 men and every child and grandchild born because one enemy chose mercy.
Real honor never asks to be remembered, which is why the lives it saves never let it die.
La noche en que Nadia Comăneci se fue de Rumanía, no le dijo nada a su madre. Sabía que quizá no volvería a verla nunca. Tenía 28 años, era la gimnasta más famosa del mundo y no podía ni tomarse un café sin que la siguieran. Hoy cumple 65 años.
Trece años antes, en Montreal, con solo 14, había logrado el primer 10 de la historia olímpica. El marcador no estaba preparado y mostró un 1,00. Pero la fama se volvió una jaula. El régimen de Ceaușescu la vigilaba y le había prohibido salir del país.
A finales de noviembre de 1989 caminó unas seis horas hacia Hungría, a oscuras, entre barro, agua y hielo, con un pequeño grupo. No pudo llevarse sus medallas de oro ni una foto de su familia. Años después lo contó así: «No se lo dije a mi madre. Pensé que le daría un infarto». A su hermano Adrian, su mejor amigo, sí se lo dijo. Él la acercó a la frontera y le dijo: «Vete y búscate una vida».
En 2014, al hablar de ello abiertamente por primera vez, se le saltaron las lágrimas: «Cuando vuelvo a aquella noche, lo siento otra vez. Pensaba que nunca volvería a ver a mi familia». Pocas semanas después de su huida cayó el régimen y pudo volver. Hoy vive en Estados Unidos con su marido, Bart Conner, y su hijo Dylan.
Lo que más me emociona no es aquel 10, sino la frase de su hermano en la oscuridad. Hay despedidas que se hacen sin palabras para proteger a quien se queda, y otras que alguien te regala para que puedas irte.
In the UK, an abused white child is in Labour Authority care in Bradford.
She has a Muslim abuser who began abusing her when she was 13.
Her key Social Worker is a Muslim.
Her Muslim Social Worker arranges a Muslim wedding between the white child and her Muslim abuser when she is 15.
The "husband" forced the victim to wear Islamic dress, eat a halal diet and stopped her from seeing her family because they were “non-believers.” He was also reported to have sometimes locked the victim in a cellar, sexually abused her, sexually exploited her and deprived her of food, education and medical care.
Not a single Labour Politician said a word.
The police eventually interviewed her Social Worker but failed to bring a case against him.
But when a celeb is on trial, Labour politicians queue up to be interviewed on the subject because they all care soooo much about protecting women.
But the hypocrites did not give a toss about a little abused white child, after all, she could not vote could she?
But all of her Muslim abusers could.
https://t.co/I2ZeGUjXKC
Have you ever seen a pair looking so proud? Spotted recently near Blue Diamond, completely in charge of their portion of the desert. Michelle Gey photo.
"After our old dog died, I kept listening for his nails clicking down the hall. The kids had lives of their own, and my husband and I told ourselves we’d get used to a quieter house. We put the bowls away. There’d be no more muddy paw prints to wipe up, and we’d never have to go through another goodbye like that. Whenever the subject came up, my husband would say, “At our age? Can you imagine us raising a puppy?” Then our son talked us into going to an adoption fair. “Just walk around with me,” he said. “You might meet an older dog you like.” We went because he asked, figuring we’d be home by lunch. Every senior dog had found a home by the time we got there. The only two left were scruffy little terrier-mix brothers. A volunteer told us both puppies had been born deaf and that people had been passing them by all day. One of the brothers chased every moving shadow across the pen. The other kept tumbling over him and looking up afterward like his brother owed him an apology. My husband bent down to say hello, and the smaller puppy scrambled into his arms. He let out a tiny sigh and fell asleep right there. His brother wandered over to me, looked up at my face, and laid one paw across my fingers. “We’re too old for this,” my husband said, so softly I almost missed it. He was still holding that puppy. I’m 66, and there’s a puppy gate in my hallway, a basket of chew toys that never stay in the basket, and barely enough room for me on my own couch. I used to sit in that same spot and listen to how quiet the house had become. These days, I hear two sets of paws coming down the hall. Thank you, Gus and Benny. You made this house feel like home again. I still think the two of you made up your minds about us before we did."
The political parties are irrelevant now. The country isn’t divided between Democrats and Republicans, it’s divided between people who hate America and people who don’t hate America. You should be able to hang with anyone who doesn’t hate America. That’s where we are now.
During the first Trump admin read a fascinating article about a small pharmacy near Capitol Hill that catered to congress. He spilled the tea on all the Alzheimer’s medications being doled out. Wish I had printed a hard copy. Went back a few days later to share with a friend. Gone.
This right here is why Trump became a thing in the first place.
Every illegal alien is a criminal. Businesses that hire them are criminals. They both broke immigration laws.
Crime doesn't have to be violent to warrant deportations.
Nayib Bukele: “There is no State that cannot defeat criminals. If a State does not defeat criminality, it is because the State is complicit.” @nayibbukele
This is almost unbelievable. But it's true.
The 1986 vaccine law that gave vaccine makers immunity from damages their vaccines cause... ordered the government through HHS to report to Congress every two years on what it had done to make childhood vaccines safer.
First report due: December 1989.
When was the first report filed?
HHS admitted in court it never filed one.
Not once.
In forty years.
That same law gave manufacturers protection from lawsuits, even when their products caused "unavoidable" injury. Of course *that* part of the law was followed from the very start.
Because of deep flaws in this 1986 law, Vaccine Safety Research Foundation is working to repeal it.
Check out the petition at the link to sign--and consider sharing.
https://t.co/xzkNogszzM
🚨 ELECTION ISSUES: Nevada - Statewide official rolls are at 113.1%. 12 of 17 counties are over 100%.
Clark County is at 113.9%, 221,854 over.
Washoe County is at 110.9%, 39,191 over.
Lyon County is at 121.6%, 10,154 over.
Douglas County is at 116.9%, 6,959 over.
Carson City is at 113.1%, 5,656 over.
Nye County is at 111.3%, 4,869 over.
10 of those counties stay over after the Census margin of error.
The official totals include 405,857 inactive voters still on the rolls. Active rolls are at 94.6%.