We could point to the multipart document that was being sent to the Japanese Embassy in Washington DC during the previous days with instructions to deliver it at a specific time on Sunday December 7, 1941, a time that was just after Sunrise at Pearl.  I am sure this should have raised some eyebrows but I do not blame the military for not taking action.  There had been many false alarms. 

But the alarm bells did go off loudly and they were ignored. 

About two hours before the attack the Destroyer Ward with a reserve captain and crew spotted a mini-submarine off the entrance of the harbor.  They considered it hostile by its location in the security zone and fired two 5 inch shells.  The Ward and other Naval vessels had ‘guns free’ to handle such a threat as did the vessels of any navy in the waters near its major bases.  The first shot missed, the second hit and sunk it.  Why wasn’t this taken seriously?  Let’s think about it.  A mini-sub has very limited range.  It could not have sailed to Pearl from any port.  Somewhere within fifty or so miles there had to be another larger vessel that launched it.  That vessel was likely a hostile submarine.  This sinking claim by the Ward was discounted by the shore personnel.  Why?  Because the Ward had a reserve captain and a reserve crew and you could not have expected them to spot a mini-sub, bring up fire control and get one hit out of two shots.  It was simply naval snobbery.  Reserve crews couldn’t be that good.  At 0645, an hour and a quarter before the aircraft attacked Perl the Ward reported the action.  The Navy ignored that warning.

At 0702 a radar set at Opana Point detected a large formation of inbound planes.  These planes were not on the heading of the expected B-17’s that they were written off as.  An opportunity to raise an alarm about 55 minutes before the attack was missed.

How much would these have helped?  I doubt that more than two or three of the ships could have gotten under way before the first bombs fell.  Instead of trying to get guns manned and ships buttoned up when the bombs were falling and some ships were already hit it could have been done more orderly.  Ammunition could have been ready at the guns.  The damage may have been nearly as great but the Japanese would definitely have paid a much higher price in aircraft and men.  It is difficult to see how this preparation would have made the American losses worse.  A few minutes could have afforded more of the planes on Army airfields time to take off.  This could have raised pilot losses somewhat but may also have taken a higher toll of the Japanese. 

Let us face it, any Japanese pilot who was captured or killed at Pearl would not have been flying somewhere else against us.  The cost of ignoring the alarms was high.

On 15 September, 1940, the Bismarck began her sea trials and the Germans were keen to get her operational as soon as possible. Once out in the sea lanes of the North Atlantic she would be able to wreck havoc with the convoys coming from America that were vital to Britain’s survival. The Commander of the Kreigsmarine Erich Raeder was determined to implement his policy of using his heavy surface ships against British merchant shipping. If a battleship with the immense firepower of the Bismarck could get amongst a convoy it could utterly destroy it in double-quick time making the convoy system untenable, and forcing merchant ships to sail individually and unprotected, thereby easy prey for marauding U.Boats. The British supply line would then be cut and she would be forced to seek terms or starve. The battleships Scharnhorst and Gneisenau were already operating out of Brest in France, and the Bismarck’s sister ship Tirpitz was close to completion.

Operation Rheinebung had originally intended for the Bismarck and Tirpitz accompanied by the heavy-cruisers Admiral Hipper and Admiral Scheer to link up with the Scharnhorst and Gneisenau and  head for the shipping-lanes of the mid-Atlantic; but the Tirpitz was not yet ready and a British bombing raid on Kiel Harbour had damaged supply depots meaning the Admiral Hipper and Admiral Scheer could not be refitted and repaired, the Gneisenau had also been damaged by a torpedo whilst moored in Brest. Even so, Operation Rheinebung would go ahead with the Bismarck accompanied by the heavy-cruiser Prinz Eugen.

The man chosen to lead the operation was Gunther Lutjens, a 52 year old veteran of the First World War with more than 30 years experience. He was by no means a Nazi rather a dedicated military man of the old school. Indeed, he was one of only three officers who protested in writing against the anti-Jewish pogroms of Kristallnacht (November, 1938) and was known to have a Jewish grandmother. The Captain of the Bismarck was Ernst Lindermann, again no Nazi but a proud Navy man. He had, however, never commanded a ship at sea and was rather a gunnery expert.

At 02.00 on 19 May, 1941, the Bismarck and Prinz Eugen accompanied by the destroyers Z23, Hans Lody,  Friedrich Eckholdt, and a flotilla of minesweepers left Gotenhafen Harbour in the Baltic heading for the Denmark Straits and access to the North Atlantic. Some 8 merchant ships had been strategically positioned to meet the needs of re-supply and 4 U.Boats stationed to act as convoy spotters. However, by noon of the same day any hopes of operational secrecy were dashed when they were spotted by Swedish reconnaissance aircraft. Just over an hour later they encountered the Swedish cruiser Gotland which shadowed the fleet for more than two hours. In no time at all the Royal Navy had been alerted.

Back in Britain, Admiral John Tovey ordered the battleships Hood and Prince of Wales with 6 destroyers to reinforce the 2 cruisers already patrolling the Denmark Straits. If the Bismarck was going to break out into the Atlantic it appeared that it would have to fight. This Lutjens hoped to avoid and at 04.00 he ordered his ships to increase speed to 27 knots with the aim of making a quick dash through the Denmark Strait before any reinforcements arrived. By 1900 on 23 May, they had reached a point north of Iceland. Not long after they discovered that they were being shadowed by the cruiser HMS Suffolk. Lutjens ordered the Prinz Eugen to engage the Suffolk and under intense fire she was forced to withdraw. It was too late, however, and she had already reported the Bismarck’s new position. The Suffolk was now joined by HMS Norfolk and despite Lutjens best efforts he was unable to shake them off. At 05.45 on 24 May, lookouts aboard the Bismarck spotted HMS Hood and HMS Prince of Wales in the distance.

HMS Hood held an iconic status in the mind of the British public. She had gone into service in 1921 and was an almost ever-present at flag-waving events throughout the world. She was considered to be Britain’s premier warship and the very image of British naval power. But by 1941, she was ageing and had evident faults. A major refit had been planned but the outbreak of war had put this on indefinite hold. By contrast the Prince of Wales had only recently been commissioned, was not yet complete, and still had civilian contractors on board.

Though they were not in a good position and could only bring their front turrets to bear at 05.52 the British opened fire at a range of 26,000 metres. Admiral Lutjens was reluctant to return fire, after all his orders were to attack Britain’s Merchant Fleet not engage in highly dangerous duels with other major surface vessels. An argument now broke out between him and Captain Lindermann who eventually exclaimed in frustration, ” I shall not allow my ship to be blown out from under my ass!” At 05.55 she returned fire. Meanwhile, aboard the Hood Admiral Sir Lancelot Holland and Captain Ralph Kerr were desperately trying to manoeuvre their ship into a position where they could bring all its guns to bear. To do so under fire made her vulnerable.

At 06.00 the Hood was hit by a shell that made the entire ship shudder. Moments later she was hit again by a shell that penetrated the magazine. A massive explosion followed that broke the ship in half. She sank in just three minutes. Of the crew of 1,418 only 3 survived. No bodies were later found floating on the water, they had all gone down with the ship. 

Both the Bismarck and Prinz Eugen now concentrated their fire on the Prince of Wales. which continued the fight for a while before, out-gunned and damaged, she was forced to send up a smoke screen and disengage. She had, however, scored three hits on the Bismarck despite many of her guns having malfunctioned. Her Captain John Leach, had also had a lucky escape when a shell, which did not explode, had torn through the bridge and killed all on it except him and one other.

Significantly, the Bismarck’s fuel supply had been hit and she was leaking oil at an alarming rate. A Sunderland Flying Boat reported the leak back to the Admiralty. Admiral Tovey aboard the battleship King George V now ordered the cruisers HMS Manchester, HMS Birmingham, and HMS Arethusa into the Denmark Strait in case the Bismarck made a run for port. He also ordered the battleships HMS Ramilles, HMS Rodney, HMS Revenge, the aircraft-carriers HMS Ark Royal, HMS Victorious, and numerous cruisers and destroyers to join the chase.

At 22.00 the Bismarck was attacked by torpedo bombers launched from HMS Victorious but little damage was done. But then at 03.00 on 25 May, all contact with the Bismarck was lost. There was panic in the Admiralty that she was about to escape the trap that had been set for her. A frantic search began. During the day a radio intercept indicated that Lutjens had ordered his ships to make for the French port of Brest. She wasn’t spotted again until 10.30 on 26 May, and the news wasn’t good. She was 790 miles from her destination but at her current rate of progress she would be within Luftwaffe protection in less than 24 hours and there were no British ships stationed in her way. The only chance was to slow her down.

The cruiser HMS Sheffield was dispatched to shadow her but came under an intense barrage which killed 3 men and was forced to withdraw out of range. Meanwhile, Admiral James Somerville, in command of Force H ordered Torpedo Bombers from HMS Ark Royal to attack the Bismarck at once. The first attack failed when the inexperienced pilots attacked the Sheffield by mistake. The second attack found its target however, and 2 torpedoes struck the Bismarck, the second hitting its rudder shaft. The damage was far worse than was at first feared, and by 21.40 Lutjens was reporting that his ship was unmanoeuvrable. Fast running out of fuel and now effectively unable to steer the Bismarck had become a sitting target.

By daybreak on the 27 May, the British Capital Ships had caught up with the Bismarck. They found her alone, Lutjens had ordered the Prinz Eugen to make her escape at 16.14 the previous evening during an exchange of salvoes with the Prince of Wales, and helplessly going around in circles. As the battleships Rodney, Repulse, and King George V closed, Captain Philip Vian’s destroyer flotilla constantly harassed the Bismarck, flitting in and out of range, launching torpedos, and illuminating the great ship with star shells. At 08.47, having closed to within 10 miles of its target the Rodney opened fire, moments later the King George V did the same. The Bismarck returned fire.

At 09.02 , a 16 inch shell from the Rodney struck the Bismarck full-on killing hundreds of men and causing extensive damage. Moments later the bridge was hit and utterly destroyed almost certainly resulting in the death of Lutjens and Lindermann. Still the Bismarck fought on however, under the command of the Gunnery Officer Lieutenant von Mullenheim. By now the British cruisers had closed to within range and had opened fire.

With its gunnery control centre destroyed, von Mullenheim ordered the Bismarck’s guns to pinpoint their own targets and fire at random. It was no longer an ordered defence but a desperate struggle for survival. The hits were coming thick and fast, explosions were occurring in every part of the ship, and body parts, the dead, and the dying were strewn over its decks, but no order had come to abandon ship, the fight continued.

By 10.00 the Bismarck was ablaze from stem to stern and dead in the water but she had not struck her colours, so Admiral Tovey ordered the firing to continue. In desperation the Bismarck launched her torpedoes one of which exploded near the Rodney slightly damaging her, the only time in history that a battleship has tried to torpedo another.

The First Officer aboard the Bismarck, Hans Oels, now began to rush around the ship ordering everyone to leave their posts and abandon ship. Some have also suggested that he ordered the water-tight doors opened to scuttle the ship, but as she was already a burning hulk that could not possibly be boarded and was already sinking, there didn’t appear to be much point.  We shall never know for sure because soon after a shell struck the ship that killed Oels and around a 100 other men. 

At 10.20, Admiral Tovey ordered the cruiser HMS Dorsetshire to close and finish the Bismarck off. She fired 4 torpedoes 2 of which hit. At 10.35 the Bismarck capsised and began to sink by the stern. She disappeared beneath the waves at 10.40. The Dorsetshire and the destroyer HMS Maori now moved in to pick up survivors. Just 114 men out of a crew of 2,200 were recovered from the water and many of these had terrible wounds. At 11.40 the rescue mission was abandoned when U.Boats were reported to be in the area leaving hundreds of men struggling in the water to drown.

The destruction of the Bismarck was a serious setback to Erich Raedar’s plans to use his surface fleet in a proactive way and the focus of German naval operations soon switched to Admiral Karl Doenitz’s U.Boat fleet.

The Royal Navy had nipped-in-the-bud a serious threat to its Merchant Marine and avenged the loss of the Hood. It was a morale boosting moment during the darkest days of the war and proved once again the dominance of the Royal Navy’s surface fleet in the North Atlantic. It would never be so challenged again.       

Little boy atomic bomb in question is “The Little Boy” which was launched by the United States Military (U.S.). Little Boy was already prepared on July 31, 1945.

On August 2, Hiroshima is determined as the main target of U.S. military in Japan. The attack it self eventually performed on August 6, 1945, while Japan remains adamant never to surrender to allied forces in World War II.

This atomic bomb dropped from a Boeing B-29 Superfortress named Enola Gay. U.S. bomber piloted by Lt. Col. Paul W. Tibbets.

Dropped from a height of approximately 31,000 feet, the atomic bomb was exploded at 8:15 am Japan time on August 6, 1945. The bomb exploded when it reached an altitude of 550 meters.

Little Boy has a length of three meters wide and 71 centi-meter and weighs approximately 4000 pounds. The explosion of the bomb was equivalent to 15,000 tons of TNT-type explosives.

Bomb in reference to former U.S. President Frank D Roosevelt, being able to make the damage as far as distance of 13 kilometers per side.

Nearly 60 percent of the buildings in Hiroshima reportedly destroyed in the blast. Casualties caused by the bomb blast was originally known to reach 118,661 civilians, but the number is rectified to about 140,000 of the population of Hiroshima which reached 350,000 inhabitants.

Three days later, ie on August 9, 1945, the U.S. dropped the atomic bomb re-named “Fat Man”. This bomb is much larger than the size of Little Boy. Fat Man himself referred to as the former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill. Fat Man weighs 4050 kilograms and dropped into the city of Nagasaki. The level of devastation caused by this very large bomb.

Area approximately 6.7 kilometers of hilly area of ​​ Nagasaki, reportedly destroyed luluhlantak. 74,000 citizens of Nagasaki was reportedly killed by a bomb.

While the survivors have to finish their lifetime because of suffering from deadly diseases because of the radiation caused

How I wish all these desire were in my hand to make

How I wish I had total control without another’s stake

But, there is always a somebody needed to assist me acquire my desires

The major problem is identifying and selecting the right people

The right people are all around me but are hard to find

That is what makes accomplishing goals quite difficult

To you, Be careful of those you take as friends, partners or associates

They can be either the builders or destroyers

Make you or unmake you

Therefore, be very careful and extra vigilant

Open your eyes widely

Good people, be EXTRA VIGILANT!!!

The “Falklands War” series continues with the controversy of the sinking of “The General Belgrano”  The “General Belgrano” was an Argentinean Navy battle cruiser that was dispatched to join the 1982 Falklands war over the sovereignty of the “Malvinas or Falkland Isles”

The Naval cruiser “General Belgrano” was originally an American built cruiser that saw action in the Second World War.  She was built in 1938 just prior to WW2.  Originally named the “Phoenix” she displaced 12,242 Tonnes.  She was over 608ft long.  The ship had 15x 6” guns, and 8x 5” inch guns.  She also had many types of anti-aircraft guns.  The cruiser was capable of 32.5 Knots at full power.  Her crew compliment was typically 1,100 sailors.

The “General Belgrano”

Argentina purchased the “Phoenix” as war surplus in 1951, for the cost of $7.8million.  In 1968 she was fitted with the British made “Sea-Cat” missile system.  In 1982 she was considered old but she was still a potent enemy to the “British Naval Task force” that had been dispatched to protect the Falkland Isles and land the British invasion troops.

On April 26th 1982 the “General Belgrano” and two destroyers named the “Piedra Buena” and the “Bouchard” were dispatched to take up positions around the Falkland Isles.  On April 30th the Nuclear powered British Royal Navy Submarine “Conqueror” detected the General Belgrano heading on a direct course for the Falkland Isles. 

H.M.S. “Conqueror”

Previously Britain had declared a 200 nautical mile exclusion zone around the Islands.  By May 2nd the General Belgrano was still outside the exclusion zone but it was making steady progress to the Falklands.  Commander “Chris wreford-Brown” signalled the British cabinet of the General Belgrano’s position relative to the Falklands.  The British cabinet along with the “Iron Lady, Margaret Thatcher” gave the order to attack the “General Belgrano”!

Margaret Thatcher the ”The Iron Lady”

The commander of the Nuclear submarine “Conqueror” plotted his firing solution and fired 3 Mk8 Mod 4 conventional torpedoes at the unsuspecting cruiser.  The torpedoes had an 800lb warhead filled with “Torpex” explosives, the time was 15.57 on May 2nd 1982.

Torpedo no1 exploded 10ft from the front of the bow of the cruiser, this explosion was such that it completely tore off the bow of the cruiser and the bow sunk immediately.  The bulkheads and water-tight doors held, and no casualties were sustained by the first torpedo explosion that ripped off the ships bow.

Torpedo no2 hit the General Belgrano at 2/3rds down from the missing bow.  The torpedo just missed the heavy ant-torpedo armour.  The second torpedo exploded in the “Aft machine shop” which in turn ripped a 20ft hole in the side of the cruiser.

The devastating explosion carried on upwards through two mess halls and finally excited through the upper deck ripping a 60ft hole in the deck.  275 men died instantly in the huge explosion.  The explosion also destroyed the ships electrical power which in turn meant no distress signals could be sent by the crippled cruiser.  Torpedo No3 missed the cruiser and slightly grazed an attending Destroyer.

The loss of the electrical system on the cruiser meant the sea-water pumps wouldn’t operate.  The General Belgrano quickly began taking on water and listing alarmingly to port.  At 16.24hrs (20 Mins after the attack) “Captain Bonzo” ordered the crew to abandon ship, they took to life rafts, as the darkness of evening descended.  In total 323 men lost their lives in the sinking.

The final moments of the “General Belgrano”

There was outcry around the world at this loss of life.  The British prime minister “Margaret Thatcher” was grilled on national T.V. over the decision to attack the “General Belgrano”   There was much controversy over the 200 mile exclusion zone and the fact that the Argentinean ships were outside the exclusion zone.

What wasn’t made especially clear at the time was the exclusion zone was meant for neutral shipping and civilian travel.  The exclusion zone was in no way a boundary for Argentinean war-ships.  An enquiry was held after the war was over and the courts decided the sinking of the General Belgrano was not an illegal act of war as a state of war was declared by both sides in the Falklands war.

In my opinion loss of life on this scale is always shocking and will get a huge outcry from a proportion of the general public on both sides of the conflict.  What is documented fact is the General Belgrano and its escort of two Destroyers were dispatched to intercept the British Task Force and if possible sink it!

There were thousands of people waving the British Task Force off from the docks, to engage the Argentinean invasion troops and the Argentinean fleet.  These same patriots were enraged when the Royal Navy did exactly what it should do,which was engage the enemy and sink it!

War is a terrible thing it comes with loss of life that’s why diplomatic channels are always tried first before an armed conflict happens.  I feel strongly that we shouldn’t criticize our armed forces and leaders for doing exactly what we pay them to do.

Lord Banks

This caliber was available only in the anti-aircraft gun Flak 18 ( “8.8 cm Flak”), a tank and antitank gun system were much smaller size – the specialists thought that the 37 -, 45 – or 50-mm caliber is sufficient. But the practice of war, demanded to adapt the anti-aircraft gun for other tasks, the most important of which is the struggle with the enemy tanks, which ultimately led to the ACS Jagdpanzer Tiger (P) “Elefant”.

All this – it is well known. Where interesting events of 1940, episodes remaining unnoticeable on the background of successes of the Wehrmacht.

Preparing for war with a powerful enemy – France, the German military advance into account, that will break heavily fortified border. Based on the experience of fighting the First World War, they were not really counting on the lethality of field artillery. What will be the result of attacks on bunkers and forts from the air, there were only guessing. Guarantees that the fire from the embrasures of bunkers with a thick reinforced concrete walls after they stop, no. We had to shoot at point-blank in the embrasures, and almost point-blank, as did the Soviet troops who stormed the Mannerheim Line. Turned out that the most suitable instrument of great precision and power is referred to “8,8 cm Flak”. In a matter of urgency it began to adapt to the fight against ground targets.

A special version of 88-mm anti-aircraft guns on the two-axle chassis Sd. Ah. 201 was a huge shield of armor in front and on each side – two short flaps support. The soldiers called the installation simply “Bunkerflak” because they were intended for destruction of land, rather than air targets, primarily bunkers “Maginot Line” and the Belgian fortifications along the Albert Canal. Armor-piercing shell weighing 9.4 kg was leaving the barrel at a speed of 795 m / s and flew 15 kilometers. Rate of fire – up to 15 rounds per minute. But a lot of weight – over 7t – allows you to bring a gun to firing position only by tractor, and an open area firing direct fire became deadly for the calculation of the gun before the first salvo has been made. Output was asking myself – need to do a self-propelled gun and the book. However, a tank chassis, a little fit for installation of heavy anti-aircraft guns, while the Germans were. But there were several different types of well-established and serially produced half-track tractors. On one of them, 12-ton Sd.Kf. 8, developed by Daimler Benz and was chosen. I must say it was a typical instance of the “Aryan” technology – weighing 12.2 tons, a huge (size 7350h2500h 2600 mm), powerful (the engine V-12 liquid-cooled Maybach HL 38 TUKRM 185 l.s./2500 rpm), fast (on the highway developed 51 km / h, while devouring up to 100 liters of gasoline per 100 kilometers). Giant lightly booked, covering the engine compartment and for the driver armor plates with a thickness of 8 to 14 mm. Instead of the body at regular cabinet set that same “8,8 cm Flak”, also covering her front broneschitom. “Growth” of the new ACS has reached 3225 mm! Reservation was not really perfect. Gun on the sides and rear armor is not cloaked, calculated on the platform of the tractor was in full view. Felling the driver less visible against the backdrop of a huge gun shield, was single and had no rear armor.

Booking engine compartment of the plane had bronelistov gap as between the upper and vertical plates, and between the front and sides for better circulation of cooling air.

ACS armor and armored shield gun snug grid, for which in combat invested to mask branch.

At the beginning of 1940 was built according to some sources 12, on the other – with 25 self-propelled guns, summarized in the 8-th individual heavy division. Then there are some issues – in literature, the unit is called an anti-tank ( “Panzerjager Abteilung”), though initially self-propelled guns clearly intended for firing on bunkers. But, of course, a target for them could well be French tanks “Char B 1 Bis”, which the armor is not impressed by the German tank and antitank guns.

Whatever it was, 8 th Division propelled “bunkerflak” was given a 2-Panzer Division, part of 19 Corps, whose commander was General Heinz Guderian, the firm and fast decision-making known as “fast Heinzen. May 13, 1940 part Guderian reached the river Maas. The general was not satisfied with the efficiency shelling and bombing of the French fortifications on the other side of the Meuse – as expected, the French continued to fire, preventing fording a river. And then the “fast Heinz” caused anti-aircraft guns. “Bunkerflak” lived up to its name – a few dozen shells, vsazhennyh directly into the embrasures, forced the French to capitulate. The infantry began to cross without interference on the other side of the Meuse.

8-th division was accompanied by 2-Panzer Division in all the battles of the French campaign, supporting and shielding the tanks “quick Heinz.” Long-barreled guns, self-propelled guns “division does not come near Gunship French tanks to the weaker German to a range of effective shots.

But war is war, so the loss bore and 8 th Division. The high silhouette of the ACS was an excellent target for the French gunners. At least two self-propelled guns were damaged during the march and burnt on the spot – 250 liters of gasoline in no way protected tanks – an excellent combustible material. Few of the nine crew members managed to escape.

In general, the French campaign in summer 1940 can be regarded as being the origin of the German self-propelled artillery. Then the fight went 38 ACS type SFL SIG 33 on the chassis of the tank Pz I, the first four batteries later became darlings of Wehrmacht soldiers ACS StuG III A, and, of course, as mentioned above, the heavy 88-millimeter, self-propelled guns, the ancestors of the famous “Elephant” .

“God did it”

“But, why?” I’d ask when I found Roger, my childhood pet rabbit, dead.

“God always has a reason for taking those close to us, sometimes he tests us” was my mother’s reply.

This was my first of many conflicts with God and his “mysterious ways”.

As I got older, I began to question the word of God more and more. I began to turn to science for answers and guess what? Science works! There are no grey areas, there are no “Oh…well…you know probably Gravity or something that did it, eh?”. In science, there is a straight answer, obviously some things are left open as science itself is still a fairly young practise, when it’s compared to religion, which has been in practise since approximately 1500BC with Judaism, Hinduism stretching back to near 2000BC. Additionally, numbers of religious followers have fallen, for example, the Christian population in the UK has fallen by 18 percent since 1942. Coincidence?

When I voiced my concerns to our church Vicar, I was given the almost annoying reply of “It’s all part of God’s design”. I was disgruntled at this as I was expecting a, what I would consider to be, more satisfactory answer.

My dilemma was not helped when my younger brother died at the age of nine, from a brain tumour. The cancer, my father told me, that your brother suffered, was not God’s will. Already angry that my brother had been unfairly taken from me, I felt that annoying conflict again. My mother had told me after my pet rabbit died that “God always has a reason for taking those close to us”, and then later after my brother died, my father told me it “was not God’s will”. How could I have known who to believe? I then decided to go to the local Vicar one last time and he said this: Death is a natural part of life. Sometimes God takes a person because they are sick – like your brother – other times because they are old, or more commonly it is because it is just that person’s time. My time will come and so will yours. God has a purpose for us all, and when that purpose is done, He will release our soul and let it ascend to heaven.

Still grieving my brother, I took what the Vicar told me and turned away from God. I felt betrayed, He had abandoned me and family; my brother. I had be been let down by God too many times in my life, I had seen him let other people around the world suffer, I remember the ignorant ponderings of a seven old as I asked my mother “why isn’t God giving the African people food?” and I’d get the same waffling and ultimately useless reply, “God works in mysterious ways”.

The Bible teaches that;

On the sixth day, God created the land animals and said “Let us create man in Our Image, after Our Likeliness” and he formed man from the dust in the ground and breathed into him life and man became a living soul. God created them in male and female and called the first male Adam, who called the first female Eve.

Man is a selfish and violent creature. It destroys all of that which surrounds him and then moves on to the next place and destroys everything there, and then moves on again, again and again. Man is a walking, talking, parasite – a virus. So God, then, can not be a great being if man was created in His image, can he? The God who took my Roger, the God who took my brother, the God who abandoned me.

God, the Creator.

God, the Omnipotent.

God, the Destroyer.

That’s really the best thing to do when it comes to relationships. Many of us will enter a new relationship and immediately start doing the comparison things. We will compare the way the “new boyfriend/girlfriend” acts to the way our ex’s have acted. There will always be some type of similarity between the present relationship and the past relationship. When you choose to end a relationship there should always be some time in between getting involved in a new relationship that will allow you to heal. Everyone will be hurt when just breaking up whether it was your decision or your ex’s decision. True love takes time to heal and it will never just happen over night. Some of us feel that the best way to heal from a break-up is to have a new relationship. For some that may hold to be true, but for others it’s not a healthy move to make. That’s how you will start to bring up things that have happened in your past relationship.

Bringing up your past relationships will ALWAYS ruin your present relationship. For me I want to know that I’m the only one on his mind everyday. I would not want to hear him always talking about his ex and all the good times or bad times that they had. Just focus on the two of us so that we can have a better relationship than your past one was.

There are times that your past relationship was a very bad one. One of you may have cheated, lied and was just plain out a bad person. Leaving those types of relationships can have a negative affect on the way that we view other relationships. We can think that everyone is the same therefore your new love really doesn’t even stand a fighting chance in the relationship. You will enter the new relationship with low expectations of where it may go. Whenever the two of your experience a disagreement you will probably find yourself bringing up all the negative things that happened in your past relationship. You’ll probably even start to compare your new love to your old love and that will right away become a red flag for your new love. Within a very short period of time you will have ruined a relationship that may have actually been the right one for you.

My advice would be to start the healing process before you jump into a new relationship. This would be the way for you to focus on what is going to make you happy so that the next relationship you have you’ll know how to make them happy.