Jim McCaskill

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North Bay, Ontario
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Movies, shows, seasons, and episodes I plan to watch.

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My favorite TV shows and movies.


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The Cold War was a period of geopolitical tension between the Soviet Union and the United States and their respective allies, the Eastern Bloc and the Western Bloc, after World War II. The period is generally considered to span the 1947 Truman Doctrine to the 1991 dissolution of the Soviet Union. The term "cold" is used because there was no large-scale fighting directly between the two superpowers, but they each supported major regional conflicts known as proxy wars. The conflict was based around the ideological and geopolitical struggle for global influence by the two powers, following their temporary alliance and victory against Nazi Germany in 1945. The doctrine of mutually assured destruction discouraged a pre-emptive attack by either side. Aside from the nuclear arsenal development and conventional military deployment, the struggle for dominance was expressed via indirect means such as psychological warfare, propaganda campaigns, espionage, far-reaching embargoes, rivalry at sports events and technological competitions such as the Space Race.

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World War II, also known as the Second World War, was a global war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. The vast majority of the world's countries—including all the great powers—eventually formed two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis. A state of total war emerged, directly involving more than 100 million people from more than 30 countries. The major participants threw their entire economic, industrial, and scientific capabilities behind the war effort, blurring the distinction between civilian and military resources. World War II was the deadliest conflict in human history, marked by 70 to 85 million fatalities, most of whom were civilians in the Soviet Union and China. It included massacres, genocides, strategic bombing, premeditated death from starvation and disease, and the only use of nuclear weapons in war.

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Cops, Criminals, Lawyers and Vigilantes

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The Vietnam War (Vietnamese: Chiến tranh Việt Nam), also known as the Second Indochina War, and in Vietnam as the Resistance War Against America (Vietnamese: Kháng chiến chống Mỹ) or simply the American War, was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vietnam and South Vietnam. North Vietnam was supported by the Soviet Union, China, and other communist allies; South Vietnam was supported by the United States, South Korea, the Philippines, Australia, Thailand, and other anti-communist allies. The war, considered a Cold War-era proxy war by some, lasted 19 years, with direct U.S. involvement ending in 1973, and included the Laotian Civil War and the Cambodian Civil War, which ended with all three countries becoming communist in 1975.

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World War I, also known as the First World War or the Great War, was a global war that lasted from 1914 to 1918. Contemporaneously described as "the war to end all wars", it led to the mobilisation of more than 70 million military personnel, including 60 million Europeans, making it one of the largest wars in history. It is also one of the deadliest conflicts in history, with an estimated 9 million combatant deaths and 13 million civilian deaths as a direct result of the war, while resulting genocides and the related 1918 influenza pandemic caused another 17–50 million deaths worldwide.

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The Iraqi conflict is a long-running armed conflict that began with the 2003 invasion of Iraq by a United States-led coalition that toppled the government of Saddam Hussein. The conflict continued as an insurgency emerged to oppose the occupying forces and the post-invasion Iraqi government. The United States officially withdrew from the country in 2011, but became re-involved in 2014 at the head of a new coalition. The conflict is still ongoing as a low-level insurgency.

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The War in Afghanistan stems from the United States invasion of Afghanistan on 7 October 2001, when the United States of America and its allies successfully drove the Taliban from power in order to deny Al-Qaeda a safe base of operations in Afghanistan. Since the initial objectives were completed, a coalition of over 40 countries (including all NATO members) formed a security mission in the country called International Security Assistance Force (ISAF, succeeded by the Resolute Support Mission (RS) in 2014), of which certain members were involved in military combat allied with Afghanistan's government. The war has afterwards mostly consisted of Taliban insurgents fighting against the Afghan Armed Forces and allied forces; the majority of ISAF/RS soldiers and personnel are American. The war is code named by the US as Operation Enduring Freedom (2001–14) and Operation Freedom's Sentinel (2015–present);it is the longest war in US history.

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The Israeli–Palestinian conflict is one of the world's most enduring conflicts, with the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip reaching 54 years of conflict.[5] Various attempts have been made to resolve the conflict as part of the Israeli–Palestinian peace process.[6][7][8][9]

Public declarations of claims to a Jewish homeland in Palestine, including the 1897 First Zionist Congress and the 1917 Balfour Declaration, created early tension in the region. At the time, the region had a small minority Jewish population, although this was growing via significant Jewish immigration. Following the implementation of the Mandate for Palestine, which included a binding obligation on the British government for the "establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people" the tension grew into sectarian conflict between Jews and Arabs.[10][11] Attempts to solve the early conflict culminated in the 1947 United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine and the 1947–1949 Palestine war, marking the start of the wider Arab–Israeli conflict. The current Israeli-Palestinian status quo began following Israeli military occupation of the Palestinian territories in the 1967 Six-Day War.

Despite a long-term peace process, Israelis and Palestinians have failed to reach a final peace agreement. Progress was made towards a two-state solution with the 1993–1995 Oslo Accords, but today the Palestinians remain subject to Israeli military occupation in the Gaza Strip and in 165 "islands" across the West Bank. Key issues that have stalled further progress are security, borders, water rights, control of Jerusalem, Israeli settlements,[12] Palestinian freedom of movement,[13] and Palestinian right of return. The violence of the conflict, in a region rich in sites of historic, cultural and religious interest worldwide, has been the subject of numerous international conferences dealing with historic rights, security issues and human rights, and has been a factor hampering tourism in and general access to areas that are hotly contested.[14] Many attempts have been made to broker a two-state solution, involving the creation of an independent Palestinian state alongside the State of Israel (after Israel's establishment in 1948). In 2007, the majority of both Israelis and Palestinians, according to a number of polls, preferred the two-state solution over any other solution as a means of resolving the conflict.[15]

Within Israeli and Palestinian society, the conflict generates a wide variety of views and opinions. This highlights the deep divisions which exist not only between Israelis and Palestinians, but also within each society. A hallmark of the conflict has been the level of violence witnessed for virtually its entire duration. Fighting has been conducted by regular armies, paramilitary groups, terror cells, and individuals. Casualties have not been restricted to the military, with a large number of civilian fatalities on both sides. There are prominent international actors involved in the conflict. A majority of Jews see the Palestinians' demand for an independent state as just, and think Israel can agree to the establishment of such a state.[16] The majority of Palestinians and Israelis in the West Bank and Gaza Strip have expressed a preference for a two-state solution.[17][18][unreliable source?] Mutual distrust and significant disagreements are deep over basic issues, as is the reciprocal skepticism about the other side's commitment to upholding obligations in an eventual agreement.[19]

The two parties currently engaged in direct negotiation are the Israeli government, led by Naftali Bennett, and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), headed by Mahmoud Abbas. The official negotiations are mediated by an international contingent known as the Quartet on the Middle East (the Quartet) represented by a special envoy, that consists of the United States, Russia, the European Union, and the United Nations. The Arab League is another important actor, which has proposed an alternative peace plan. Egypt, a founding member of the Arab League, has historically been a key participant. Jordan, having relinquished its claim to the West Bank in 1988 and holding a special role in the Muslim Holy shrines in Jerusalem, has also been a key participant.

Since 2006, the Palestinian side has been fractured by conflict between two major factions: Fatah, the traditionally dominant party, and its later electoral challenger, Hamas, which also operates as a militant organization. After Hamas's electoral victory in 2006, the Quartet conditioned future foreign assistance to the Palestinian National Authority (PA) on the future government's commitment to non-violence, recognition of the State of Israel, and acceptance of previous agreements. Hamas rejected these demands,[20] which resulted in the Quartet's suspension of its foreign assistance program, and the imposition of economic sanctions by the Israelis.[21] A year later, following Hamas's seizure of the Gaza Strip in June 2007, the territory officially recognized as the PA was split between Fatah in the West Bank and Hamas in the Gaza Strip. The division of governance between the parties had effectively resulted in the collapse of bipartisan governance of the PA. However, in 2014, a Palestinian Unity Government, composed of both Fatah and Hamas, was formed. The latest round of peace negotiations began in July 2013 and was suspended in 2014.

In May 2021, amidst rising tensions, the 2021 Israel–Palestine crisis began with protests that escalated into rocket attacks from Gaza and airstrikes by Israel.

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