FATCA, the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act, may impose significant penalties on U.S. taxpayers holding "foreign financial assets" with an aggregate value exceeding $50,000 who fail to file a Form 8938 with the IRS by April 17, 2012. FATCA's reach is broader than you might think, as "foreign financial assets" include:

  • Foreign equity awards, and/or
  • An interest under a foreign pension or deferred compensation plan.

An affected individual must attached Form 8938 (Statement of Specified Foreign Financial Assets) to his or her annual Form 1040 tax return. Any individual who is required to file a U.S. income tax return for the year, including U.S. citizens, resident aliens, and certain nonresident aliens, is required to file a Form 8938.

FATCA was part of the Hiring Incentives to Restore Employment ("HIRE") Act, which President Obama signed into law on March 18, 2010. The IRS finally published proposed regulation under FATCA in February 2012. (A more publicized provision of FATCA requires foreign financial institutions to disclose any funds they hold on behalf of U.S. taxpayers (FBAR).)

Under FATCA, it is strictly the employee's responsibility to make the required filing. However, companies with a multinational and mobile workforce should consider alerting their employees to the possible filing obligation, if they have not already done so. The penalty for a failure to file Form 8938 could be up to $10,000, with a maximum penalty of up to $50,000 for a continuing failure to file. 

On April 4, 1944, the Battle of Kohima (around the town of Kohima in northeast India) began, which, together with the Battle of Imphal, was the turning point of the Japanese "U Go" offensive into India in 1944 in the Second World War. The Imphal-Kohima campaign (in Burma), is said to have been the worst defeat in Japan's history, and is often referred to as the "Stalingrad of the East". The battle ended on June 22 when British and Indian troops from Kohima and Imphal met at Milestone 109, ending the siege of Imphal. Kohima has a cemetery of 1,420 Allied war dead maintained by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission.The cemetery lies on the slopes of Garrison Hill, in what was once the Deputy Commissioner's tennis court, which was the scene of the "Battle of the Tennis Court." The epitaph carved on the memorial of the 2nd British Division in the cemetery has become world-famous as the Kohima Epitaph. It reads:

When You Go Home, Tell Them Of Us And Say,For Their Tomorrow, We Gave Our Today

The verse is attributed to John Maxwell Edmonds (1875–1958), and is thought to have been inspired by the epitaph written by Simonides to honor the Spartans who fell at the Battle of Thermopylae in 480 BC. (Go tell the Spartans, stranger passing by, that here obedient to their laws we lie.)