L’homme en mouvement, de l’auteur Patrick Straumann.
A biography generally tells the story of a person who has made an impact on his or her environment and society. Why, then, take the time to write a book about the existence of a completely unknown individual, who passes through life like a ghost?
Paul Reichstein, “l’homme en mouvement (the man in motion)”, is the enigmatic great-uncle of the author, journalist Patrick Straumann. The latter has carried out an extensive research to find out more about this “black sheep” of the family.
Why “black sheep”? Because Paul was born into a talented family, one of whose brothers, Tadeus (nicknamed Tajik), even won the Nobel Prize in collaboration with two Americans for having succeeded in isolating cortisone. His other brothers all went on to earn degrees that launched them into life. Except Paul, who is interested in everything, but quickly tires of one subject or one place.
Paul was born in Kiev in 1905 and spent his youth in Switzerland, specifically Zurich. He went everywhere, but only briefly. We find him in Russia, where he witnessed the return of the survivors of the Chelyuskin icebreaker . He worked in a tractor factory during the Stalin era and also became a mountaineering instructor where he climbed very high mountains for the glory of the Stalinist regime. (See also “Les alpinistes de Staline” on my blog).
He also joined the US Navy as a soldier. He managed to be expelled twice from Switzerland, did a stint in prison, sailed the Pacific Ocean working for the merchant navy, sold land and cabins in Anchorage, Alaska, and worked for several months in a mine in Chile, before making a detour to Australia.
He was hospitalized for accidents in Rochester, Oakland and Yokohama. We also follow him to San Francisco, Baltimore, Palm Springs, the banks of the Volga, Pusan, Seoul, China and the Philippines.
He died in 1995 and, having outlived all his brothers, there were only a dozen people at his funeral who didn’t know what to say about this elusive “man in motion”.
In 140 pages, the author succeeds in painting a generous, non-judgmental portrait of this great-uncle. Paul’s troubles and wanderings make this man very endearing.
Click on the link for more biographies on my blog.
After all, it’s quite possible to have the right to photograph without having the right to publish. You also need to know the nuances between editorial and commercial distribution, as well as how to obtain written authorization where applicable.
There are also nuances between the privacy laws of the following two groups: the first made up of Quebec and France, and the second made up of the rest of Canada, the United States and the majority of Western countries.
In addition, a distinction must be made between the person who is the main subject of the photo and those who are merely incidental to it. The laws also change depending on whether the photo is taken from a public or private place. Finally, there are always exceptions to each category. As you can see, nothing is simple in this area…
The author uses case law to flesh out his points. He also discusses the limits of police and security officer powers, and what is legally permissible on Facebook and other social networks when it comes to disseminating an image.
He also elaborates on the difference between patrimonial, moral, integrity and authorship rights. He even expands on the changes to copyright before and after November 7, 2012. A section of the book tells you how to detect if your images are being used illegally, and how to request corrections and compensation.
Finally, Francis Vachon uses the last sections of his book to show us how to obtain photos legitimately, and sometimes free of charge. He also shows us how to protect ourselves from a lawsuit.
In short, a book full of vital information for the amateur and professional photographer, as well as for all social media users. Many of these users are full of good intentions, but can find themselves in trouble pretty quickly for inadvertent negligence.
Frédéric Pierucci is a senior executive at Alstom, a gigantic French energy company. Thanks to a US extraterritorial law (FCPA Foreign Corrupt Practices Act) which allows the US government to prosecute any foreign firm targeted for corruption, he was arbitrarily arrested in 2013 as he got off the plane in New York.
Pierucci had not received any money from these operations, but he was aware that Alstom was targeted for embezzlement and that the company used “intermediaries” to secure contracts. He was incarcerated for months, and Alstom finally abandoned him, believing that the Americans would be satisfied with the imprisonment of this high-ranking executive. Pierucci must now try to extricate himself from the quagmire into which he has been plunged.
A page of the graphic novel “Le piège américain”.
Even if he is not directly implicated in the bribes, the American justice system wants to pressure Pierucci into revealing details that would incriminate Alstom’s management, including CEO Patrick Kron. Pierucci’s harsh judicial treatment is also intended to intimidate the firm’s other top executives, showing them what awaits them if they do not cooperate in rectifying past mistakes.
The primary aim seemed to correct unfair schemes that were damaging American companies and, by the same token, to obtain very substantial monetary compensation. The operation was a success: the effects of Pierucci’s arbitrary arrest paved the way within a few years for the sale of a strategic Alstom subsidiary to General Electric, its main competitor.
Back cover of the graphic novel “Le piège américain”.
The maneuvers also allow to obtain information that would otherwise remain confidential. This U.S. extraterritorial law works well and is used to attack numerous corporations around the world, including the German international group Siemens. Each time, the offender is obliged to pay substantial fines and must submit internal documents considered confidential or even secret to the prosecutor.
It’s hard to know who exactly will have access to these documents. Is it possible that agents (we won’t call them “spies” for the sake of politeness) are passing on trade-secret information to people working outside the U.S. Justice Department? Such actions would enable American companies to improve their competitiveness at little cost. But these are questions that the executives of the targeted companies are asking themselves.
Be that as it may, not everything in this story is squeaky clean. Author Matthieu Aron writes: “In autumn 2018, after Frédéric [Pierucci] was finally released, we finished our book. But again, it was not without difficulty. The day after we sent our manuscript to our publisher, my home was ‘visited’ and my computer disappeared. Simple burglars, spooks, or action by a foreign service? We’ll probably never know.”
The graphic novel “Le piège américain”, prix littéraire nouveaux droits de l’homme 2019.
My view on the subject.
China is watching and learning.
The effectiveness of this American extraterritorial law has not escaped the attention of China, which is planning to devise a similar law that would allow it to lay its hands on otherwise inaccessible information and archives.
Faced with these two behemoths, the United States and China, Europe has fallen behind, and it too will have to create its own law enabling it to extend its judicial power outside the continent. For no one is fooled: bribes to obtain contracts involve multiple countries. Prosecutions under extraterritorial legislation give access not only to large sums of money, but also to documents containing important data and possibly industrial secrets.
Another book on the graphic novel “Le piège américain”.
The Alstom experience will at least have had the effect of better preparing France for the moment when, a little later, the giant Airbus was targeted for malfeasance by the same American law. Airbus manufactures not only airplanes, but also many strategic military products protected by secrecy. This time, the widespread collection of the company’s confidential information was refused, without a French citizen being named as intermediary and the documents handed over to the Americans being reviewed to ensure that they did not contain military secrets or other information not directly related to the corruption charges.
Today, Airbus is a great success, selling more aircraft each month than Boeing, which is experiencing difficulties with the way it builds its aircraft. And we have every right to believe that senior management at Airbus has improved its business practices.
The comics ” 13h17 dans la vie de Jonathan Lassiter”.
“When you’ve got nothing left to lose, you can take all the risks…”. This is the sentence [translated] on the back of the comic strip “13 h 17 dans la vie de Jonathan Lassiter” (13:17 in the life of Jonathan Lassiter), which best sums up this French-language work published in 2023.
Jonathan Lassiter works as an insurance agent in Keanway, a small, remote town in Nebraska. Overnight, his wife leaves him, he loses his job and his wallet is stolen. In short, his life suddenly takes an unexpected turn. He has two choices: either he feels sorry for himself, or he changes. His chance encounter with Edward, a “distinguished, cultured and cynical” man, forces him to take a stand.
It was the quality of the graphics that caught my eye. This isn’t one of those publications where you wonder whether the design can be done in a month, and which pretends to be original through the absence of detail, and therefore of work. A great deal of effort went into this album, and it shows at first glance.
Back cover of the comic strip “13h17 dans la vie de Jonathan Lassiter”.
It’s got it all: the judicious choice of angles, the refined, masterful drawing, the skilful maintenance of atmosphere through well-dosed, under-saturated colors, the well-crafted script. This comic strip keeps the reader’s interest from start to finish, with no downtime.
The main character reminded me of the famous actor Vincent Price.
The graphic novel “Un tournage en enfer – Au coeur d’Apocalypse Now”.
The graphic novel “Un tournage en enfer: au cœur d’Apocalypse Now” takes us right to the heart of the creation of Francis Ford Coppola‘s famous film, brought to the screen in 1979. As the director points out, [my translation] “[…] we were in the jungle. There were too many of us. We had access to too much money and too much material, and little by little, we all went crazy…”.
It didn’t start well. Right from the start, the director was unable to convince well-known actors to get involved in his film. In turn, actors such as Jack Nicholson, Al Pacino, Robert Redford and James Caan refused to join the adventure. Coppola continues his research and interviews.
As readers, we go behind the scenes of the production and hear from those close to the filmmaker. Filming begins in the jungle of the Philippines, even though Coppola has no idea on how the film will end. This would haunt him throughout the production, causing him sleepless nights when he was already quite exhausted.
A page from the graphic novel “Tournage en enfer – Apocalypse Now”.
Cost overruns followed, and the pressure on the director from financial backers increased. He was asked to complete his film as quickly as possible, which he proved unable to do. Coppola came to guarantee the required funds by pledging to pay off the debt himself if box-office receipts failed to reach $40 million.
In addition, it was taken for granted that the U.S. government would provide the helicopter gunships required for the film’s action. But in the aftermath of the Vietnam War, the interest of American politicians in such requests waned. The director had to turn to the then President of the Philippines, Ferdinand Marcos, to obtain helicopters and personnel, in return for certain fees and compensation. But these aircraft sometimes left the scene on Marcos’s orders to go hunting for the regime’s enemies. Coppola was falling behind again…
A page from the graphic novel “Tournage en enfer – Apocalypse Now”.
They thought that Harvey Keitel would be the ideal actor to play Robert Duvall. Many sequences later, the obvious becomes clear: the man just didn’t cut it for a number of reasons. On the verge of disaster, they urgently contacted Martin Sheen and beg him to replace Keitel. Multiple scenes had to be reshot with the new actor, and the delays and associated costs continued to mount.
All sorts of other pitfalls awaited the director and his crew throughout the shoot, including the language barrier with the Filipinos and a storm that destroyed the set. The widespread use of drugs and alcohol by staff and helicopter pilots didn’t help matters either.
The mosquitoes, the heat and Coppola’s constant demands took their toll on the actors. Martin Sheen fell seriously ill, and his brother had to be used for some of the secondary scenes. Rather than use only actors to simulate deaths, a staff member went to the morgue and returned with a corpse. This prompted the arrival of the police force, and the problem was solved with generous sums of money.
There were many other factors that delayed the end of the shoot and increased costs. Marlon Brando’s demands were a case in point. They managed to get him back on set for an extra day, provided that he received $70,000 more than planned.
Shooting finally ended in 1977. The team chartered a private plane to fly 381 kilometers of original film to the United States. Editing the film proved to be an ordeal. There was too much material to analyze. In 2001, Coppola presented a modified version of his original 1979 production. In 2019, he finally delivered a final 182-minute version, Apocalype Now “Final cut” , more than forty years after the initial release.
Earnings met the director’s expectations, and he ultimately won his bet. In all, the film generated $140 million from a total budget of $30 million.
The graphic novel “Jours de sable” by Aimée de Jongh.
The graphic novel “Jours de sable” is a historical reminder of the famous Dust Bowl which struck the central United States between 1930 and 1940. These were ten years of misery that inspired John Steinbeck for his work “The Grapes of Wrath“.
Add to these factors linked to the economic crisis and multiple epidemics, and we can understand the mass exodus of American households. They left everything behind, including many family members who died of dust-related respiratory complications. Most headed for the West Coast, but this massive influx of people only served to increase the region’s already high unemployment.
A page from the graphic novel “Jours de sable”.
The strangest thing is that, decades later, the climate changes experienced today in these same states could help to repeat the phenomenon, without it necessarily covering such a long period.
Author Aimée de Jongh uses fictional characters, but the scenario respects the reality experienced by the population. In her story, a young photographer leaves New York in 1937 to report on the Dust Bowl. He has been briefed on the subjects to be covered, but soon realizes that he is dealing with a human tragedy of unsuspected proportions.
The main character in the graphic novel tries to do his job in the sandstorm.
Asking suffering people who have lost everything to pose for the New York media was not as simple as he had thought. The situation becomes even more complicated when he gets to know these people and experiences their difficulties first-hand.
In addition to the deftly drawn panels that delight the reader, there are plenty of period photos gleaned from various museums, as well as official historical content. I loved this award-winning book.
The graphic novel “Super canon” from Philippe Girard.
With “Super canon— Le marchand d’armes qui visait les étoiles”, writer Philippe Girard offers us a high quality graphic novel, as much for the scenario as for the drawings and colour choices. For this work, he benefited from an author residency in Liège. He certainly enjoyed his experience in Belgium much more than his writer’s residency in Poland, where he had to fend for himself because the hosts hadn’t respected the scheduled introductions and appointments. At the time, he used his misfortune to produce a very interesting graphic novel entitled “Le Starzec — un mois à Cracovie”.
Graphic novel “Le Starzec – Un mois à Cracovie” by Philippe Girard.
“Super Canon” is based on a true story, that of Canadian engineer Gerald Vincent Bull. Of course, it’s impossible to retrace this man’s life step by step, so the author has created a character named Doctor Gerry.
On reading the book, we realize the incredible talent of Gerald Bull, the scientist who revolutionized ballistics. We bear witness to his chequered destiny, tormented as he was between his youthful dreams and his boundless ambitions.
To balance his research budgets and keep his company afloat, he gradually transformed himself into an arms dealer. He offers his service to multiple states, including Canada, the United States, Israel, Iraq, Iran, China. In the process, he becomes the object of constant surveillance by many agencies and accumulates enemies.
A page from the graphic novel “Super Canon” by Philippe Girard.
We’re dealing with a genius who has purposely blocked any critical thinking about his weapons of destruction. He dreams of a powerful cannon to send satellites into space, but the intelligence agencies of other countries hold very different plans for his invention.
He naively believes that he will be able to serve several masters with divergent interests, without this causing him the slightest problem. It borders on childish reasoning, on wilful blindness in the pursuit of the high life.
My only reservation regarding the content concerns the first page of the story. I find an ambiguity about Iraq and weapons of mass destruction (box 5, page 3). This was indeed the initial fear raised by the United States, but repeated follow-ups by UN inspectors had shown that Saddam Hussein had no such weapons. The invasion of Iraq couldn’t be justified on such a basis. The invasion went ahead anyway, and none of these supposed armaments were found in Iraq. I would have liked the UN’s conclusions to have been mentioned. This would have allowed to establish the book’s scenario on a basis that left no room for doubt.
A page from the graphic novel “Super canon”.
Otherwise, one thing’s for sure: you’ll enjoy this extremely well-crafted graphic novel.
The graphic novel “La disparition de Josef Mengele” is a wonderful surprise for me, both in terms of the scenario and the graphics. Anyone interested in true stories will devour this book as it represents a goldmine of astonishing information on the life, or rather the survival, of the Nazi criminal in Latin America.
Who provides him with the money he needs? How does he protect himself? Does he lead the existence of a pasha? How does he behave abroad? Does his thinking on race show any sign of evolution, or is it still sclerotic? Why does Argentina encourage the arrival of these fugitive assassins?
For the general public, there are two categories of National Socialist criminals: the first concerns the names that received most media coverage at the Nuremberg Tribunal. The second involves Nazi criminals who fled abroad, thanks to political or family support. Josef Mengele belongs to both groups. He is holed up in Latin America and knows that several organizations are seriously looking for him, including Mossad.
How does he remain roaming for so long? It soon becomes clear that the Mossad is not only concentrating on Nazi criminals on the run. The book introduces us to some other priorities for the agency, one of which is very urgent: the elimination of former German scientists working in Egypt to create radioactive waste weapons designed to destroy Israel. The secret services must choose between Mengele, a past threat, or a more immediate danger. With limited resources, they have to adjust and deal with the most pressing situation.
Nazis were integrated into the new German government.
There is, however, a third category that the public has heard very little about, and which is also discussed in the graphic novel: these are Nazis who rejoined the new German government a few years after the end of the Second World War.
Indeed, the Allied powers of the time – the USA, Great Britain, France and the Soviet Union – administered the occupation zones of the German territory after the Second World War. But tensions between East and West grew rapidly. Each side accused the other of imperialist or communist expansionism.
To offer a better-organized resistance to the Soviet Union, Germany’s autonomy had to be quickly restored. The former Nazis had experience of governance that was immediately available.
If the Allies adopted the clear-cut position of preventing the Nazis from attaining essential functions in the public apparatus of the future Bonn Republic, then people with little or no knowledge had to be trained to carry out the more complex tasks. Time was short, as was the will to bring all possible war criminals to justice.
So, many Nazis found work in government agencies. One thing led to another, and some of these former Nazis recycled as government agents became part of the inner circle protecting the most prominent war criminals who had fled abroad. Josef Mengele benefited from this high-level support.
But several additional Germans, also in high places, acted in the opposite direction, striving to flush out the biggest criminals, at the risk of their own health and safety. One such person is introduced in the book: Fritz Bauer. This man contacted Mossad with information that eventually help to capture Adolf Eichmann. The latter went on trial in Israel and sentenced to hanging.
Eichmann and Mengele meet each other.
Mengele reads the newspapers and suspects that his end will resemble that of Eichmann. The graphic novel shows him as a hunted animal, talking to himself. His racist, backward-looking words drive away the individuals who could support him most in the last years of his life. He withered slowly and died on a beach in Brazil. But it was not officially known until 1985.
The book covers a period of several decades. It features a brief summary of Mengele’s actions as a doctor at Auschwitz. He is not alone, even if he remains very high-profile to the general public. A large number of scientific assistants carried out experiments on humans, including one who became rector of the University of Münster after the end of the Second World War.
The authors mention in passing the idea of a Fourth Reich pursued by Mengele and his ilk. In short, readers won’t get bored with this skilfully constructed graphic novel.
When they hear the name Mohammed Ben Salmane (MBS), most people don’t react, as they can’t associate him with anything. If they are told that it was he who had a journalist cut up into small pieces and stuffed into garbage bags in the Saudi Arabian embassy in Turkey, it resonates more.
The graphic novel “MBS— L’enfant terrible d’Arabie Saoudite” introduces us to the life of this implacable ruler who tries to forge links with the great powers. By negotiating his support with the United States, Russia, China, India, or France, he seeks to position his country as a major player on the world stage.
The book is also a very interesting first approach to the history of Saudi Arabia, especially with regards to the Saud family and its reign. We realize the importance of alliances and radical decisions by MBS if he wishes to attain supreme power and hold to it.
Back cover of the graphic novel: MBS L’enfant terrible d’Arabie Saoudite
Domestic and regional stability remains a top priority for MBS. Even if he wants to modernize society and appeal to young individuals, he must at the same time avoid upsetting the Wahhabi clerics too much. The latter enjoy ancestral prestige and have a marked influence on the way people behave and think.
When it comes to imposing his ideas, MBS hasn’t invented a thing. Like most rulers of the world’s major countries, he has learned to use the media and spares no expense to achieve the desired results.
Top managers of intelligence and news organizations know very well the limits within which they can operate. You won’t see any photos of MBS spouses, or articles that would enlighten the public about the nightlife of the leader and his friends.
This graphic novel maintains interest by interspersing surprising anecdotes with pertinent information accessible to all. As the back cover of the book states, “This ambitious prince happens to be our ally in the Middle East : oil, the fight against terrorism, Arab-Israeli peace, arms sales … we need him. But what price will we pay?”
These machines, which were not designed to operate from an aircraft carrier, would not be able to reach their targets and return safely to port for lack of sufficient fuel. All the pilots were well aware of this, and volunteered.
The fleet of sixteen aircraft, commanded by Jimmy Doolittle, successfully achieved its objective of confusing the enemy and showing that Japan remained vulnerable to surprise attacks. The Japanese wondered how it was possible that American bombers could have reached and hit their country. Where did they take off from? They know that the B-25 Mitchells were not designed to take off from an aircraft carrier, and that they were incapable of landing on one.
The genius of the operation laid in the combination of a number of highly risky decisions which, taken together, took the enemy by surprise. Firstly, as it was impossible to land the planes on the Hornet, they were installed with a crane, knowing full well that they would never return to the ship.
In addition, the captains were trained to take off over distances unthinkable for them, using a technique pushed to the extreme. The ship sailed at high speed into the wind, improving the headwind component so essential for such perilous maneuvers.
The pilots had to be extremely skilful to keep to the departure trajectory on a platform that moved from left to right in the middle of a storm. Buildings on the Hornet’s side had to be avoided at all costs, and the available gap between the wing tip and the ship’s tower was no more than two meters. Despite all the obstacles, all the B-25s managed to take off. It was to be a one-way mission to Japan.
Doolittle piloted the first B-25 to take off from the carrier. He had only a very small portion of the deck to work with, as there were still fifteen other bombers waiting their turn to take off. The second pilot to leave the deck narrowly avoided a water landing, as the aircraft sank slightly and a landing gear wheel touched the water. But the plane gained just enough speed to stay airborne.
Bombers and crews suffered different fates once the bombing raids on Japanese targets had been completed. The authors conclude: “The raid destroyed 112 buildings and killed 87 people, in about 6 minutes. […] The destruction of 15 of the 16 B-25s, unable to reach Chinese airfields for landing, was nevertheless to be deplored, the 16th B-25 having landed safely in the USSR. Also to be deplored was the accidental death of three airmen (planes 3 and 6) and the capture of 8 others (planes 6 and 16) by the Japanese, 4 of whom never returned home, 3 having been executed as “war criminals” and the 4th having died in captivity. Worse still, the Japanese took revenge on the Chinese, who had helped all the surviving airmen, by organizing the massacre of some 250,000 civilians in the Zhejiang and Jiangxi provinces then under their control. This was to leave its mark…”.
Landing and takeoff tests on an aircraft carrier, the Forrestal, were also made decades later for a C-130 Hercules. I tried to repeat the experience in flight simulation. The flight can be found in the “challenging virtual flights” section of my blog. As the Forrestal is not available in virtual mode, I used the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise.
