With the administration taking a tough economic line vs Iran, China and Russia tensions are bound to rise. What will that look like?
The armies of shadow
Chronic conflict in the global world.
Sea hunt
In 1970 to 1980 trained dolphins killed 2 Russian frogmen who were putting limpet mines on a US cargo ship in Cam Ranh bay in Vietnam.[19] Subsequently, Russian PDSS frogmen were trained to fight back against trained dolphins. In an incident on the coast of Nicaragua PDSS frogmen killed trained anti-frogman dolphins. Arrival of underwater rifles and pistols seems to make the trained animal threat less.
Wikipedia
But the dolphins struck back.
Though the Navy declines to discuss the classified program in detail, former Navy trainers of the dolphins say the animals are being taught to kill enemy divers with nose-mounted guns and explosives.
NYT
Anyhow, look who’s interested in swimmer attack technology. Iran.
“Just a few years ago, Ukraine restarted training the animals for military purposes, though it may have been close to phasing it back out just before Russia’s annexation of the Crimean peninsula last year. In any case, Russia helped itself to Ukraine’s stable of combat dolphins after Moscow took over Crimea. And four Ukrainian military dolphins had actually ben sold to Iran and transported by air in 2000, according to the BBC.”
Tech Billionaire To Joe Rogan: ‘The Left Has Won The Culture Wars. Now They’re Just Driving Around Shooting Survivors’
And just think. All this time the population was worried about neo-Nazis holding conventions in some low rent venue.
“[They need to] realize that these social media platforms are picking the next president, the next congressmen — they’re literally picking — and they have the power to pick, so they will be controlled by the government.” …
“The most powerful people in the world today are the people who are writing the algorithms for Twitter, Facebook and Instagram because they’re controlling the spread of information. They’re literally rewriting people’s brains. They’re programming the culture.”
Red State
So was it a race all along between the Chinese Commies, the Western PC socialists and radical Islam for who’d get to rule the world? All those people on TV — did they know?
Or is the case that this human rule, this man-made narrative that will last a thousand years is no more proof against reality than Ozymandias? The biggest fear of those who are writing the algorithms for social media is that someone else is writing the algorithms of the world.
Incident in the Gulf
There was a scripted outcome that fell apart. The IRGC tried to ad lib but flubbed its lines. The open source evidence points to an attempt to goad the Trump admin into escalation in the belief that would damage the US politically. The fish weren’t biting that day but they’ll try again.
It seems that those who planned the attack believed that at least one ship would sink and that they could valiantly rescue the sailors. …
In addition they likely hoped the ship would sink with the evidence aboard, including the unexploded mine. …
The Iranians didn’t stop trying to get hold of both ships until June 14. An Iranian tugboat reportedly approached the Kokuka and even wanted to push it back towards Iranian waters before the Bainbridge interceded.
The problem with hybrid operations is complexity. The Iranians were aiming for political and media effects not simply kinetic ones. The scenario called for valiantly forcibly rescuing the survivors. That meant the explosive couldn’t be too big. But it proved too small.
Modern warfare as it exists, less resembles WW2 than the rocket attacks from Gaza into Israel or the shooting up of Sri Lankan “Easter worshipper” churches. The objective isn’t geographical features but column inches, invitations to talk shows, followers on Twitter.
The goal of modern war is not the conquest of a state but its takeover by means of assisting to power the domestic political force most congenial to the attacker. “Collusion” is not the exception but the entire point.
In fairness this is exactly the game America is playing against Iran. It doesn’t want to conquer the territory but ensure that a “moderate” and/or “reformist” faction comes to power in Tehran. It would be silly to think China and Russia are not trying the same stunt on Washington.
That’s why the cry “sappers are in the wire” is still valid even though it’s a different kind of sapper and a different kind of wire.
https://pjmedia.com/richardfernandez/theyre-coming-through-the-wire/
One of the reasons things are so confused and upsetting is that the media, which heretofore stood off to one side as chroniclers of the kinetic battle, are now one of the combatant arms. They are the panzer columns of modern hybrid war, along with the social media platforms.
Coming through the wire
China’s attempt to virtually dominate the world.
The delusion of diversity
What happened to free speech at universities?
Stay tuned
The China hustle. But is it tragedy or is it comedy? The problem at the heart of this is information asymmetry. It’s like being on a used car lot with the odometers taped over.
Steele’s Shoddy Dossier
How the game was played.
Prosecutors and their power
But was the real-life Ms. Fairstein as scheming as the TV version? (She is played by Felicity Huffman, who was arrested in the college admissions scandal after filming was complete.)
NYT
Is the system capable of conveying unvarnished truth?
But it’s not just about 5 wrongly convicted teenagers in NYC who have lost their youth and lives. It may be about significant problems with prosecutorial misconduct.
It’s not about trade but the kind of world we want to live in.
If you watch from 12:00 on you’ll get the feeling the next global financial crisis may already be brewing in China. The 5G discussion is at 20:00. Spalding’s interview is a must watch. The words almost flood in. “I’d bet they’re asleep in New York. I’d bet they’re asleep all over America…”
“Your phone knows more about you than you could ever imagine. Where does that data go? It goes to the highest bidder.” …
“If you don’t even know who’s oppressing you, what good is a gun?” …
“You have to decouple. If you embrace China, you will lose.” …
“China’s waiting on the 2020 elections. That’s what the Communist Party has decided.”
A Mythical Form of Space Propulsion Finally Gets a Real Test
If it works call it the Epstein Drive.
Creating more vulnerabilities
The problem with making service providers responsible for content is it implicitly makes them responsible for political intelligence gathering and intelligence targets for hostile powers. Instead of gathering intel themselves enemy powers can just spy on the service providers.
Or worse it can create a business opportunity for social media service providers to sell political intelligence to foreign powers. Isn’t this exactly what Cambridge Analytica is accused of doing? Yet they are mere lice on the giant hound.
Crime of the Congo
I am rereading Arthur Conan Doyle’s “Crime of the Congo”, detailing little Belgium’s monumental atrocities in Africa, made famous in Conrad’s Heart of Darkness. It’s easy to understand in retrospect how Europe blundered into the Great War. It had lost track of reality.
Watching the way in which the media makes its own narrative today one wonders whether the seed of destruction lies not so much without as within.
The jury is still out
Political historians are still divided over the cause of Hillary’s 2016 shock loss. Was she blocked by an unseen 8 foot center? Or was she alone under the basket and missed?
Blood, sweat and fears
“America has faced huge challenges before, WWII and putting a man on the moon,” Warren said. “This environmental catastrophe bearing down on us may be the biggest challenge yet.”
Federalist
AOC denounces Manafort solitary confinement
This is all the reason why elections should mean “wait your turn till the next”. Manafort’s treatment may someday apply to his prosecutors. But people in power never realize this. “Happy Days” will never end. The money will never run out. The music will keep playing. Until it stops.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez sided with imprisoned former Trump campaign chief Paul Manafort saying he should be released from solitary confinement — though he is not currently in solitary confinement.
Washington Examiner
“Paul Manafort is being sent to solitary confinement in my district – Rikers Island. A prison sentence is not a license for gov torture and human rights violations. That‘s what solitary confinement is. Manafort should be released, along with all people being held in solitary,” the New York Democrat said.
AOC may have the wit to realize that the “revolution eats its own”. Madame Defarge is eventually called to mount the guillotine because by then it takes on a life of its own and must be fed … fed … fed.
Put down your keyboard now and step away from your computer
The Last Black Man in San Francisco
“The Last Black Man in San Francisco,” the debut film for both Fails and Talbot, is a lament for the exodus of black people from the city and the affordability crisis that is pushing out all but the rich.
NYT
People think they can manage complex systems only to discover it leads to unintended consequences. I am still waiting for a prominent historian to write a volume titled “Ooops”.
But environmentalists are constantly flying to conferences
The glaciers are melting, the coral reefs are dying, Miami Beach is slowly going under.
NYT
Quick, says a voice in your head, go see them before they disappear! You are evil, says another voice. For you are hastening their destruction.
To a lot of people who like to travel, these are morally bewildering times. Something that seemed like pure escape and adventure has become double-edged, harmful, the epitome of selfish consumption. Going someplace far away, we now know, is the biggest single action a private citizen can take to worsen climate change. One seat on a flight from New York to Los Angeles effectively adds months worth of human-generated carbon emissions to the atmosphere.