The Symbiotic Travelers Ch 09

The symbiotic Travelers

The New Frontier

BADSAM

It is July 9, 1946, the two syngeneic beings are still living in Boston. Yaphet has quit working in the defense plant. She now stays home and makes wicker baskets for a local hardware store. They are sold on consignment; Julia gets 50 percent of the sale. James is a writer for the Boston Globe newspaper.

"I got that new map of the United States you wanted, Zlatex," Yaphet informs her extraterrestrial consort as he comes in from work. "It came in the mail this morning. It has all 48 states on it. We can replace it with the other one we have that only has 33 states on it."

Using their handheld personal mobile communicators, they record the dates of each state's entrance into the Union in SAM, the simplified automatic mainframe computer processor.

Kansas became a state on January 29, 1861; West Virginia on June 20, 1863; Nevada on October 31, 1864; Nebraska on March 1, 1867; Colorado on August 1, 1876; North and South Dakota on November 2, 1889; Montana on November 8, 1889; Washington State on November 11, 1889; Idaho on July 3, 1890; Wyoming on July 10, 1890; Utah on January 4, 1896; Oklahoma on November 16, 1907; New Mexico on January 27, 1912; and Arizona on February 14, 1912.

They hang it on the wall in the living room of the two bedroom, single bath house they are renting. They mark it with stickpins of all the places that they have lived since they arrived in Boston on February 3, 1766, from the planet Herth. They arrived in Cuba in 1782 after staying in New Orleans for a few days. In 1786 they moved to Saint Augustine, then in 1792 to Pensacola, and to Mobile in 1794. They stayed there for 13 years until 1807, when they moved to New Orleans.

After staying in the Crescent City until 1815, they lived in Alexandria, Louisiana for 15 years and then in 1830 they moved to San Antonio, Texas. Next, they stayed overnight on a remote stretch of land in the middle of Texas. Then they set up shop in a Native American Indian trading post for 23 years. In 1849, the U.S. Army named the town that eventually built up Fort Worth.

They sold the trading post to a retired army colonel in 1859 and moved to Fort Stockton but only lived there a couple of weeks before moving to Fort Davis for nine years. In 1868, they moved to Tucson after living in El Paso for a few weeks. Eleven years later, they started living in Phoenix, where they stayed for nine years before moving to Fort Yuma in 1888.

But after 13 months, they arrived in Otay Mesa and lived there for several years until 1898, and then in Chula Vista for about a month. In March 1898, they moved to San Francisco but in 1899 they set out for Sacramento.

In 1919, they moved back to New Orleans and stayed there until 1933, when they decided to live in Washington, D.C. After living there for six years, they moved to Chicago in 1939. Finally, they moved back to Boston in August 1945.

When they sit down for supper, Zlatex tells his extraterrestrial lover about a story he is working on for the Boston Globe. It is about the formation of the United Nations

On June 12, 1941, delegates of Great Britain, Canada, Australia, the Union of South Africa, New Zealand and of the exiled governments of Belgium, France, Czechoslovakia, Greece, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Poland and Yugoslavia met in London. They signed the Declaration of Saint James Palace, a joint statement of goals and principles, that expressed their vision for postwar order. It was the first statement by the Allied Powers articulating a vision for a postwar world. It was also the first step that led to the eventual establishment of the United Nations.

It stated the Allies' pledge to continue the war against Nazi Germany and Italy and it inaugurated principles that would serve as the basis of a future world peace. The Declaration had three objectives.

First, all the nations confirmed their alliance to one another, and pledged to assist each other in the war against both Italy and Nazi Germany to "the utmost of their respective capacities."

Second, they pledged that none of them would enter into a separate peace agreement with any Axis Power and that there would be no lasting peace until the threat war was extinguished.

Third, they were all steadfast to the principle of peace based upon the "willing

cooperation of free peoples" whereby "all may enjoy economic and social security."

President Roosevelt made the establishment of the United Nations to replace the defunct League of Nations as his highest postwar priority.

The League of Nations was the first worldwide international governmental organization whose principal goal was to maintain peace throughout the world. It was founded on January 10, 1920, at the Paris Peace Conference that ended World War I. The main organization ceased operations on April 18, 1946, when many of its components were relocated into the new United Nations.

The League's main goals included preventing wars through disarmament and collective security and solving international disputes through peaceful negotiation and arbitration. It also included the fair treatment of indigenous inhabitants, minorities, prisoners of war and the prevention of human and drug trafficking. The Covenant of the League of Nations was signed on June 28, 1919, as Part I of the Treaty of Versailles, and it became effective with the rest of the Treaty on January 10, 1920.

The League of Nations had its origins in a speech of President Woodrow Wilson in January 1918 that outlined his ideas for peace after the carnage of the "War to End All Wars." He envisioned an organization whose goal was to stop conflicts before they ended in war. He made an ominous prediction, "

I can predict with absolute certainty that within another generation there will be another world war if the nations of the world do not concert the method by which to prevent it

."

The Second World War began a generation later on September 1, 1939, when Germany invaded Poland.

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Within five years of the end of World War II, the Korean War began on June 25, 1950, when South Korea was invaded by North Korea. The offensive action of North Korea was supported by both China and the Soviet Union.

After the Japanese surrender, Korea was liberated from their occupation but divided along the 38th parallel. The United States stationed armed forces in the southern part in support of a capitalist government. The U.S. government's role was multifaceted. It aimed at global stability and focused on diplomacy, security, cultural collaboration and economic partnership with the South Korean government.

The Soviet Union occupied the North and established a communist government.

Both the South Korean and North Korean governments claimed to be the lawful authority over all of Korea. Border clashes increased along the 38th parallel throughout the late 1940s. Finally, on June 25, 1950, the North Korean People's Army, using troops, supplies, artillery and tanks supplied by the Soviet Union, invaded South Korea. Within a few days, they were able to capture Seoul, the capital of South Korea.

The United Nations Security Council passed a resolution condemning the invasion and called for military support of South Korea. The Soviet Union did not vote on the resolution; their delegate was absent due to a boycott.

A United States led alliance of sixteen countries provided troops, supplies, artillery and tanks, for defense, with the South Korean and U.S. governments contributing the bulk of it. President Harry S. Truman called the conflict a struggle against communist aggression and mobilized American forces under the U.N. banner.

The Korean conflict developed into a bloody stalemate, with major battles and devastation, before ending in an armistice on July 27, 1953, without a formal peace treaty. The 38th parallel still divides the nations of South and North Korea.

Both Zlatex and Yaphet are appalled that the leaders of the nations of the world cannot see "the handwriting on the wall." Each and every war mankind has entered into is worse than the preceding war. Each war is bigger and more involved and more violent than the last one, to the point that now even innocent wives, mothers, children and infants have become victims of the aggressive warmongering belligerents. They cannot see that by continuing this type of behavior, it will only lead to utter destruction for everyone.

The two syngeneic beings have been living in Philadelphia since June 30, 1953. They cannot understand why the leaders of the world cannot see that there must be security for all, or no one will live in security.

Yaphet complains to Zlatex, "Why can't the world leaders take the advice of Klatuu, the alien from the 1951 science fiction movie we watched recently, "The Day the Earth Stood Still," directed by Robert Wise and staring Michael Rennie, Patrica Neal, Hugh Marlowe and Sam Jaffe?"

Towards the end of the movie, Klatuu gave an ominous warning, "The universe grows smaller every day. There must be security for all, or no one is secure. It is no concern of ours how you run your own planet. But if you threaten to extend your violence, this Earth of yours will be reduced to a burned out cinder. Now, we do not pretend to have achieved perfection, but we do have a system and it works. Your choice is simple: join us and live in peace or pursue your present course and face obliteration. We shall be waiting for your answer. The decision rests with you."

Zlatex answers her, "There system was easy. They had Gort, the all-powerful robot that would destroy the Earth if they extended their violence. Earthlings don't have that."

"You're right. But Earthlings do have atomic weapons. And they can obliterate everyone and most of the other living things of this planet with them. Then about the only thing left will be bacteria, rats, roaches, flies and those vermin that eat carrion."

"Well, let's hope that mankind brings peace to everyone before that happens," Zlatex retorts.

After the Second World War ended, the Soviet Union began installing satellite governments. It promoted the spread of communism to North Korea and formed an alliance with China. The United States followed a policy of containing communism and assisted Western Europe in its economic recovery. Both the Soviet Union and the United States instituted "military alliances" aimed at detaining each other, starting the Cold War.

The Cold War was an era of geopolitical mistrust and striving for ideological dominance between the two superpowers and their allies. It was called the Cold War because there were no actual military engagements. It began in the late 1940s and continued until the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991. It saw the nuclear arms race whereby both nations stockpiled numerous nuclear weapons, used propaganda campaigns, espionage and technological oppositions such as the Space Race and sports competition in order to "maintain an upper hand" over the other.

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It is the evening of September 9, 1956, the two symbiotic beings are home watching their black and white television. They are watching Elvis Presley sing Love Me Tender, one of Yaphet's favorite songs. They both love Rock-N-Roll and frequently go to the University of Pennsylvania to attend sock hops in its gymnasium. She is taking courses at the university, about a fifteen minute drive from the house they are renting in Philadelphia. She registered for a major in Earth Science. Zlatex is a part time student there, taking evening classes. He registered for a major in Political Science.

They enter everything they learn into SAM, the Simplified Automatic Mainframe computer. Zlatex is happy that America is gradually catching up to where they were when they were living on Herth. Although he knows it is still years in the future, he is looking forward to the day when they have air conditioning, computers with keyboards, screen pointer devices, printers and flatscreen color televisions in every home, and everyone has a personal mobile communicator.

This past February they bought a 1955 Bel Air Chevrolet station wagon. It is baby blue with white leather seats. They traded in their other automobile, a 1943 Chevrolet pickup truck, which they had traded in for a 1932 Ford pickup truck they bought new. It is the fifth automobile that the two syngeneic equivalents have owned. Each time they purchased a car they paid cash for their vehicle and entered the info into SAM. Neither of them wanted to risk borrowing the money because a credit check might reveal that they are alien beings.

They documented the sinking of the SS Andrea Doria into SAM. In a thick fog, on July 25, 1956, the luxury liner collided with the MS Stockholm off the coast of Nantucket, Massachusetts. She immediately began to take on water and started a severe list to her starboard side, leaving half of her lifeboats unusable. However, the ship stayed afloat for about eleven hours before taking her final plunge. This plus the calm, appropriate behavior of the crewmembers, improvements in onboard communications, and the quick response of other ships in the area, helped to avoid a disaster similar to that of the Titanic in 1912. Only 46 people died of the 1,660 passengers and crew that were aboard.

They recorded into SAM the dates Alaska and Hawaii were admitted into the Union. On January 3, 1959, Alaska became the 49th state and on August 21, 1959, Hawaii became the 50th state. Yaphet purchased another map with all the states on it. The two syngeneic beings then took down the other map and put the new one up in its place.

On May 1, 1960, a United States U-2 spy plane was shot down while conducting photographic aerial reconnaissance deep inside the Soviet Union. It was flown by American pilot Francis Gary Powers and hit by a surface-to-air missile. After parachuting safely out of the airplane, Powers was captured and sentenced to ten years in a Soviet prison for espionage. He served twenty-one months, and then he and a U.S. graduate student, Frederic LeRoy Pryor were exchanged for Soviet KGB Colonel Rudolf Abel.

Frederic Pryor was an innocent pawn who got caught up in the Cold War. He was studying in Berlin during the partition of the city in 1961. He was imprisoned in East Germany for six months before being release in the prisoner swap.

The U-2 incident occurred during the tenures of Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev and President Dwight D. Eisenhower.

At first, the U.S. government denied that it was a spying mission, claiming that the airplane was a weather research aircraft and not a military spy plane. But the Soviet government knew that that was a lie because they not only had the airplane, but they also had some of the espionage camera equipment.

Khrushchev allowed Eisenhower to save face and possibly salvage to some degree, an upcoming peace summit between the two by laying the blame, not on Eisenhower, but on Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, Allen Dulles. He said that anyone who wanted to understand the U-2's mission should "seek a reply from Allen Dulles."

After John F. Kennedy was elected President, he asked Dulles about this. But Dulles withheld critical information from the President. He also gave him embellished assessments about the mission, including covert operations and reconnaissance and he gave him misinformation about the Bay of Pigs invasion. When Kennedy found out the truth, he fired the director of the CIA. Dulles never forgave Kennedy for that, and from then on, he sought for an avenue to have him removed from office.

It is Friday January 20, 1961, Yaphet and Zlatex are living in Charleston, South Carolina; James is a working as a writer for the Charleston Courier. He has been working there for eleven months. He has taken the day off to watch the Inauguration of John F. Kennedy. They are watching him take the oath of office as the 35th President of the United States.

They have listened to several of his speeches while he was campaigning for President. He has given them hope for the future of America and the world. He wants to establish peace throughout the world. His goal is to end war as a means nations use to settle disputes among themselves.

In his speech, Kennedy wrote down his thoughts, what he believed and what he wanted Americans, as well as the rest of mankind to do. "We observe today not a victory of party but a celebration of freedom, symbolizing an end as well as a beginning, signifying renewal as well as change... The world is very different now. For man holds in his mortal hands the power to abolish all forms of human poverty and all forms of human life...

"To that world assembly of sovereign states, the United Nations, our last best hope in an age where the instruments of war have far outpaced the instruments of peace, we renew our pledge of support...

"Finally, to those nations who would make themselves our adversary, we offer not a pledge but a request: that both sides begin anew the quest for peace."

On March 1st, less than six weeks after his inauguration, President Kennedy issued an executive order which established the Peace Corps. It's a pilot program within the Department of State. Kennedy wanted the Peace Corps to be a composed of trained American volunteers who would help foreign countries meet their needs for skilled manpower. The program was formally authorized by Congress on September 22, 1961.

The Bay of Pigs invasion on April 17-20, 1961, was a failed paramilitary action composed mainly of Cuban exiles, in an attempt to overthrow the government of Fidel Castro in Cuba. It was designed and backed by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and Richard M. Nixon while he was still the Vice President.

In late 1959 or early 1960, believing that Vice President Nixon would get elected President, Nixon and the director of the agency, Allan W. Dulles formulated the CIA backed Bay of Pigs invasion, aimed at bringing down Fidel Castro's communist government in Cuba.

The CIA operative George H. W. Bush is part of Operation Zapata, code name for the invasion. Bush has denied this although he has strong financial ties to Zapata Oil. Bush later became director of the CIA and then President of the United States.

Fidel Castro took control of the Cuban government on January 1, 1959. His forces overthrew the government of President Fulgencio Batista, who was backed by organized crime. When Castro took control of the government, he closed all the casinos, which were controlled by organized crime figures not only in Cuba, but also in Las Vegas and Miami.

In the 1940s and 1950s, Cuba became a magnet for gambling and nightlife. It attracted many wealthy vacationers from around the world, particularly from the U.S. This created an opportunity for organized crime figures who were deeply enmeshed in Cuban casinos, hotels and the tourism commerce that prospered there.

Batista, who ruled in the 1940s and again from 1952 to December 1958, emboldened this development. His second term as dictator was marked by corruption and repression of the Cuban citizens. He allowed organized crime figures to operate freely in exchange for bribes, kickbacks and other personal enticements. But the casinos were not just places for gambling. They also served as centers for money laundering.

After Castro took control of the government, he closed the casinos and forced organized crime figures to leave Cuba, marking the end of their involvement in Cuban gambling and influence in the government. In needs to be noted that Nixon had close ties with these organized crime figures. Also, President Kennedy and Attorney General Robert Kennedy were investigating many organized crime figures and their influence in national security, including Carlos Marcello, who was deported on April 4, 1961, as part of a crackdown on organized crime.