This was posted on RB before , but this article has lots of pics at link spread across three pages.
US aerospace company, AeroVironment, has revealed its high-tech hummingbird-like "nano aircraft".
The remote control craft has a 16-centimeter wing span, and can record sights and sounds on a video camera in its belly. The craft is in development for the US military. At this stage, it is still not clear if it will be advanced enough to see active service. AeroVironment says it can perch on a window ledge, and gather intelligence without attracting the attention of the enemy.
The craft can hover and move quickly in almost any direction, a capability that officials want in a small aircraft for intelligence gathering and reconnaissance.
#3
This type of configuration is called an ornithopter. It is a very inefficient method of flight, I bet the battery gives it about 2 minutes of flying time at best. The biggest problem I see is with such a tiny r/c craft is dealing with wind. When there is so little mass, unless the air is almost perfectly still the vehicle will be buffeted about and virtually uncontrollable. Gyroscopic stabilization adds weight and only helps up to a certain point. On a windy day this thing would just blow away.
#8
Biologically-based flight for UAVs has been a top research priority for a number of years. Hummingbirds are the most difficult to replicate, hence their use as a proof of concept.
However, while larger versions could carry more power, this form factor has its own advantages. Among them is noise camoflauge .... the quiet whir of the machine isn't all that more noticeable than the whir of a real hummingbird.
Note also the conops that includes "perch on a window ledge", which does not draw down the battery at anything like the power use of flight. These prototypes are sufficiently small that a squad could carry multiples, charging some while using others.
Mohammed Ghannouchi, Tunisia's interim prime minister, has resigned, as security forces clashed with protesters in Tunis, the capital, who were demanding some of his minsters be removed. Ghannouchi made the announcement on state television on Sunday, saying that he had thought carefully before taking the decision and that he had the support of his family.
"I am not running away from responsibility ... This is to open the way for a new prime minister," he said. "I am not ready to be the person who takes decisions that would end up causing casualties."
Hours later it was announced that Beji Caid Essebsi, a former minister, would take over the premiership. Essebsi was foreign minister under Habib Bourguiba, Tunisia's president after independence,
Ghannouchi has led the country since Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, Tunisia's former president, fled Tunisia on January 14, following a popular uprising. But Ghannouchi was a longtime ally of Ben Ali and, though he pledged elections to be held by mid-July, protesters have called for him to step aside.
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/27/2011 14:37 ||
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#1
"don't kill me!"
Posted by: Frank G ||
02/27/2011 17:06 Comments ||
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Hundreds of US, British and French military advisers have arrived in Cyrenaica, Libya's eastern breakaway province, debkafile's military sources report exclusively. This is the first time America and Europe have intervened militarily in any of the popular upheavals rolling through the Middle East since Tunisia's Jasmine Revolution in early January. The advisers, including intelligence officers, were dropped from warships and missile boats at the coastal towns of Benghazi and Tobruk Thursday Feb. 24, for a threefold mission:
1. To help the revolutionary committees controlling eastern Libyan establish government frameworks for supplying two million inhabitants with basic services and commodities;
2. To organize them into paramilitary units, teach them how to use the weapons they captured from Libyan army facilities, help them restore law and order on the streets and train them to fight Muammar Qaddafi's combat units coming to retake Cyrenaica.
3. The prepare infrastructure for the intake of additional foreign troops. Egyptian units are among those under consideration.
That last will give the Egyptian army something more interesting to do than conquering Coptic monasteries or plotting the invasion of Israel.
#1
Don't forget that Egypt and Libya fought a brief border war back in 77. The Egyptians rolled across the border, but not very deep, in response to Kadaffy's provocations, as well as support for a plan to assassinate Sadat (Daffy was pissed at Sadat about the peace treaty with Israel). They thumped Libya pretty good.
Yes, I am an old spook, I remember things like that.
I put the salt pic in the text because the source is Debka. The US putting advisers into Libya? It could happen, I suppose, but it would require Obama to make a decision, something he isn't too good at. Perhaps Mr. Gates leaned on him some, or Gates and Hilde did a little tag team.
Not saying it couldn't be true, and if true I don't want all this blabbed all over the New York Times tomorrow, but I'm a little skeptical.
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/27/2011 11:38 Comments ||
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#3
If, if, if this is true it is a big mistake. I'd give debkafile a weak F6.
#4
It is one of those situations that "If it isn't true, it should be."
If for no other reason than to quietly protect the oil infrastructure from destruction by anybody, so that it can be turned over to whoever wins. Saddam made a huge pain in ass by blowing up Kuwait's oil wells.
The foreign forces could also send any loyal Libyan military elements radio signals advising them that the game is pretty well over, so they shouldn't foul up and do something stupid, that would get a lot of them killed and their officers hung. Essentially, "go ahead and defend your base, but do not go slaughtering your own people."
Included in this batch I can imagine a lot of serious snipers as well, to do counter sniping in the cities, as needed.
Lastly, to establish a covert "beachhead", for various purposes, including the evacuation of foreigners, and the flow of weaponry and supply. Making friends with the people at this time could pay handsome dividends later.
#6
Probably much in the way blind people reach out for points of reference.
Anyway, you gotta love the 'Burg. You realease an article, and when you check back on it, it has already found a picture and some appropriate snark. :-)
#7
Moose, I usually agree with the way you think but I think you're missing one point about paying off dividends. Arabs don't see things that way - if they did where is all the discount Iraq oil and Iraqi - American oil contracts. The lybians will take the assistance and then auction their gains to the highest bidder. I've given up on the lot of them.
#8
Silent naval blockade and no-fly zone, just telling those who need to know. Iranians in the Sahel make an interesting target, perhaps for the Nigerians with a little help.
[Arab News] Rebels controlling northern Ivory Coast have seized a town in government territory and said on Friday they were still advancing, raising the prospects of a return to open war.
Loyalists of Laurent Gbagbo, clinging to power after an election most of the world says he lost, confirmed the fall of Zouan-Hounien in an overnight attack and said they would fight to take it back.
"We're in the process of re-organizing ourselves," Yao Yao, head of operations of the pro-Gbagbo Front for the Liberation of the Greater West militia told Rooters by phone from the region.
The small, remote town lies in western Ivory Coast near the forested border with Liberia and is not on a key axis, but the fighting there marks a major escalation.
UN Secretary-General the ephemeral Ban Ki-moon warned that festivities this week in the main city, Abidjan, and in the west have taken the world's top cocoa grower closer to the brink of a new civil war.
Rebel front man Ouattara Seydou said the New Forces had been attacked from Zouan-Hounien and were moving south to another town held by Gbagbo loyalists.
Ivory Coast's spiral back toward a war fueled by ethnic animosities follows an election last November which Gbagbo's rival Alassane Ouattara is almost universally recognized to have won.
Gbagbo, in power for more than a decade, has refused to leave the presidency of once prosperous Ivory Coast, which has been split between north and south since a 2002-03 war.
He has so far retained the support of most of the armed forces and, in Abidjan, can also rely on the "Young Patriots," often violent youth supporters who erected roadblocks and set fire to buses and taxis on Friday.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/27/2011 00:00 ||
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[The Nation (Nairobi)] Across sub-Saharan Africa, countries weary of repression, poverty and corruption look north to the revolutions sweeping the Arab world with hope, while the strongmen that lead them look on with unease.
From Angola to Zimbabwe, a long list of African countries have been under the iron grip of one man for over 20 or 30 years.
But are the yawning gap between wealthy elites and the hungry masses and years of repression south of the Sahara enough to unleash a wave of popular anger as seen in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya?
"The popular revolt in North Africa will inspire sub-Saharan Africa from Angola to Burkina Faso, from Nigeria to Eritrea to take the torch of freedom, defy the consequences and march forward," says leading Nigerian rights and political activist Shehu Sani.
"So whether the popular uprising will happen in southern Sahara is not a question of if, but when."
However Sani and other observers agree that while the kindling for revolution is stronger in sub-Saharan Africa than north Africa and the Middle East, ethnic and religious divides make it hard to form a common front.
North Africa enjoys "homogenity in terms of race, culture and religion -- all these make it easier to mobilise as opposed to sub-Saharan Africa where there is fragmentation," says Nigerian academic Eze Osita.
Despite these differences opposition leaders across the continent are calling for their supporters to follow the Arab example and revolt while rulers scramble to contain the fallout. Equatorial Guinea enforced a "media blackout" on events surrounding the fall of the Tunisian and Egyptian leaders.
In Angola, an anonymous call for a mass protest saw the ruling party -- in power since independence in 1975 -- warn that "serious measures" would be taken against protesters.
In Zimbabwe, where 87-year-old Bob Muggsy Mugabe ... who turned the former Breadbasket of Africa into the African Basket Case... has ruled since 1980, a former politician and 46 other people were nabbed at a meeting discussing the protests in Egypt.
Even in less repressive countries such as Mozambique or Burkina Faso, and lauded democracies such as South Africa and Senegal ... a nation of about 14 million on the west coast of Africa bordering Mauretania to the north, Mali to the east, and a pair of Guineas to the south, one of them Bissau. It is 90 percent Mohammedan and has more than 80 political parties. Its primary purpose seems to be absorbing refugees... , poverty, unemployment or lack of electricity have sent protesters to the street.
Key to the fall of the Tunisian and Egyptian presidents, observers say, were the use of social networks to mobilise youth outside of traditional parties and unions, as well as the neutral attitude of their armies.
In sub-Saharan Africa armies are often subservient to the powers-that-be and the reach of the Internet is much lower than in the Maghreb.
In Uganda, where President Yoweri Museveni has been in power since 1986 and was recently re-elected under dubious conditions, the army "is highly partisan and often behaves like a political militia," Frederick Golooba Mutebi, a professor at the Makerere University Institute of Social Research, told AFP.
However, The infamous However... Takavafira Zhou, a Harare analyst, warns that the Arab uprisings may have another effect -- giving strongmen a chance "to increase dictatorship to consolidate their position in power."
Posted by: Fred ||
02/27/2011 00:00 ||
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#1
If you waiting on Obama to demand that Robert Mugabe or Jaboc Zuma to "step down" as he has Kadofi and others, you may have a long wait in store. They think alike, act alike, and share a common samevoeging, a bond and belief.
#2
Anyone with half a brain - dictator or not - can only come up with one set of lessons for aspiring leaders from recent news reports. 1) Oppress any mass demonstrations FAST and hard, with live ammunition. 2) Shut down any avenues of communication in the following order: a) Twitter, b) Facebook, c) the Internet at large, d) cell phone carriers, e) other telephone lines.
But then I've never read Machiavelli. He may have already covered all this.
#5
I reside in a Sub-Saharan nation and do not see this type of revolt as likely or probable in this region. First - most of the educated people have left. There is a leadership vaccum and folks here tend to rally behind a person - not an idea. Second - lack of interwebs connection. Mobile phones alone won't get 'er done. Third - ethnic/tribal (yeah I said it - tribal) divisions. Fourth - regime preservation is job one for the intel/security services. They can focus all of their efforts in crushing any movement before it gets going. Most people here can't spell revolution let alone put one together.
Posted by: Bangkok Billy ||
02/27/2011 8:45 Comments ||
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...but not many can afford them.
You just have to convince the foreign 'intelligence' agencies that you may have some. Has the same effect with less mess.
#8
actually Machiavelli covered how a "prince" ought to act when beset on all sides by potential enemies and intrigue w/in his own kingdom. Machiavelli was actually for individual rights, hated the ruling Medici family and dispised the use of mercenaries (the condottieri)...discourses on Livy was his treatise on republicanism. He is often the most misunderstood political philosopher of all time. The left always invoke him as a dictator - most have no fucking clue what he actually thought.
[Al Arabiya] A Facebook group is calling for the overthrow of Swaziland's king, Africa's last remaining absolute monarch, through protests inspired by the revolutions in Tunisia and Libya.
Known as "The April 12 Uprising!!!" it promises, "all hell will break loose in Swaziland" on April 12 2011 when "a hundred thousand men march into the country's city centers to declare a democratic Swaziland free of all royal dominance."
April 12 is the date in 1973 when political parties were banned, a ban still in place under King Mswati III.
Modelled on Facebook groupings in Tunisia and Egypt, the "April 12th" group says the winds of change will sweep through Swaziland next as "there is a large population of politically and economically disenfranchised people living under a dictator".
"We are a pro-democracy group. We are not at all affiliated to any political party or formation" the group's founder, Jahings Dada told AFP.
With fewer than 500 members, the Facebook group is still far from its 100,000-strong target. The majority of people in this impoverished nation do not have access to the Internet.
Dada says the group also has street organizers in major centers recruiting people on the quiet. He only fears the authorities' reaction.
"The only misgiving I have about starting this group is that I know Mswati will send his soldiers to beat and kill protesters. It's a given," Dada told AFP.
Roughly one billion rand ($142 million, 103 million) of the current budget has been set aside for the police and army - roughly equivalent to the health budget in this country which has the worst AIDS epidemic in the world).
"Yes, we are spending a lot on the army but we are not anticipating what is happening in North Africa to come here," Finance Minister Majozi Sithole told journalists, "however, the army is there to avoid such situations."
The Swazi police have a history of crushing protests. Last year Swazi police nabbed nearly 50 activists to prevent pro-democracy demonstrations.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/27/2011 00:00 ||
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Russia has agreed to build energy-starved Bangladesh's first nuclear power plant, which will generate a total of 2,000 megawatt of electricity.
Bangladesh's decades-old gas-fired power plants are unable to generate enough electricity for the country's 150 million people. Businesses complain that the shortages interfere with production.
Bangladesh's Ministry of Science said Russia will train staff to operate the plant, supply uranium rods and take back the spent fuel.
That sounds like the package they sold to Iran, not a good omen...
The Bangladesh nuclear deal is the latest of a string of global agreements to build new reactors, driven by concerns over the long term prices of oil and gas, as well efforts to cut carbon emissions.
Because when you you vote politicians in who spend like drunken sailors to buy your vote, and then you refuse to vote them out, and then when they have spent all your money, and all your neighbors money, and any money you and your neighbors and your kids might have, and that they might have ever had, and you still don't vote them out, then you get what you voted for. Time and time again.
Dying cancer patients have been refused costly life-extending drugs on cost grounds despite a Government promise to end the "scandal" forever.
Their requests have been rejected by regional health authorities who were accused of operating covert "blacklists" to restrict dozens of treatments to save money.
An investigation by The Sunday Telegraph has uncovered more than 80 cases in which desperately sick NHS patients have been refused the cancer drugs their doctor sought, in the four months since a £200 million fund was introduced to stop health authorities rationing treatments.
The fund was a key move by the Coalition so that those suffering from cancer would never again be refused drugs on grounds of cost.
Ministers were responding to years of anger over a system which meant patients were unable to secure life-extending drugs because central NHS rationers had decided the treatments were not "cost effective".
Announcing the fund last summer, Andrew Lansley, the Health Secretary, promised to end "the scandal" of cancer patients being refused the drugs that their doctors sought, because of restrictions by the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE).
A £50 million stopgap version of the fund was launched in October, before the annual £200 million investment starts in April.
But this newspaper's investigation has raised serious concerns over its operation, including:
* At least 86 cases involving terminally-ill patients being turned down;
* Extreme variations in access to drugs, with one NHS region promising free access to more than three times as many cancer treatments as another;
* Local policies so restrictive that in many parts of the country, consultants are expected not to even bother asking for drugs which are not on the "priority lists".
In its first four months, the fund has paid for approximately 1,300 patients' drugs -- even though research last March suggested up to 20,000 cancer patients' lives were being shortened each year by drugs rationing.
The Government has allowed each NHS regional health authority to set its own rules about which drugs are put on priority lists, creating a postcode lottery across the country.
If treatments are not on the list, patients and their doctors have to fight harder to justify why they should get them.
Bureaucrats have created complex structures, leaving terminally-ill patients to spend their last months fighting for drugs which could increase their survival.
The policies say every possible funding route for drugs must be exhausted before the NHS will even consider dipping into the fund.
Cancer charities warned that some NHS authorities were attempting to "drive a coach and horses" through the Government pledge.
They fear the £50 million fund may actually end the financial year underspent because of the restrictions.
Andrew Wilson, chief executive of charity The Rarer Cancers Foundation, said: "We are deeply concerned that health authorities are creating really restrictive policies which go entirely against the spirit of the fund -- which was that clinicians would be able to decide what treatment their patients need.
"Some organisations are effectively operating blacklists of drugs, while others are making every patient go through lengthy bureaucracy to apply as an exceptional case, when in fact they are a cancer patient requiring treatment should be sufficient. The way some of these organisations are operating drives a coach and horses through the principle of the scheme."
In most parts of the country, if a patient requires a treatment such as Avastin for bowel cancer -- which NICE says is too expensive -- their doctors must first apply to see if their primary care trust will fund it as an "exceptional case".
If that is refused, as would normally be the case, a separate application is then made to request authorisation from the cancer drugs fund -- and if that too is refused, patients and doctors are left to attempt an appeal.
Patients refused include those seeking Avastin for advanced bowel, breast and brain cancer, Tyverb for breast cancer and drugs to treat tumours of the bladder and kidney.
NHS authorities said they had turned down requests because they did not think there was enough evidence patients would benefit from drugs their doctors sought. In other cases, they were refused help because their medical history did not match the precise criteria drawn up by trusts.
There is also concern over the "postcode lottery" in availability of drugs.
NHS North West has cited 22 drugs which should normally be funded -- while NHS South Central, spanning five counties from Oxfordshire to the Isle of Wight, lists just six treatments which would automatically be allowed.
The policies are so restrictive that in Yorkshire and the Humber, just 82 patients have been given funding. Yet across the East of England, with a similar population, 201 cases were funded.
Even those areas which seemed to have the most generous policies have tightened their belts as end of financial year approaches.
In the North West, which had backed the use for Avastin for some advanced breast cancers, and Glivec for cancer of the stomach, says patients who have not been given funding will now have to wait until April before their cases are even considered.
Several have changed their rules even in during the four months since the fund was set up, so that several patients in London were denied drugs under one set of criteria, only to have their cases reconsidered all over again as their health declined.
Mike Hobday, head of policy at charity Macmillan Cancer Support, said he was "very worried" by the findings of the investigation.
He said: "Every cancer patient should get the drugs their doctor recommends, regardless of what type of cancer they have, or where they live.
"A few extra months towards the end of a patient's life can mean the difference between seeing a child get married or graduate."
Barbara Moss, 56, from Worcester, became one of the most high-profile cases to be refused drugs by the NHS after she was diagnosed with bowel cancer.
After doctors said that without Avastin she would only live for a matter of months, her 86-year-old mother gave her funds to pay for the drugs.
More than four years later, the former schoolteacher is "climbing mountains and enjoying every moment" of life.
Her case, featured in The Sunday Telegraph, was among several to trigger a public outcry about the way NHS rationing decisions are made, resulting in a Conservative party election manifesto pledge last year to set up the £200 million drugs fund.
Health Minister Anne Milton said: "Since October, more and more patients are being treated with life-extending drugs that they wouldn't have got under the previous system. Demand for the fund will vary across the country; we set up the fund in order to balance out existing variation in access." Because when there's no money, there's no money.
Humans love money. It motivates them. That's why they call it money.
You may be able to beat it out of them for a while, but in the long run, you'd better not debase the meaning, lure, value, and reward of money. Continued on Page 49
#2
almost sounds like "death panels" or some such. Soooo Palin was wrong, huh?
Posted by: Frank G ||
02/27/2011 19:20 Comments ||
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#3
The NHS limits its expenditures on medical care one way, the USA uses other methods. Avastin therapy costs $8000/month but the manufacturer is said to have limited each patient's annual outlay to $55000. "Every cancer patient should get the drugs their doctor recommends" Nice utopian thinking. Who's going to pay for it? Is there no limit?
#4
The problem is... the cure is really simple. Create enough alcaline environment in the body and use a slight cyanide poisoning (apricot kernels) and the cancer will go into remission. Of course, the pharma does not want you to know that, about baking soda and apricot kernels. They got a big stake in the chemotherapy and they don't mind if some hapless individuals die needlessly, as long s their margin (a hefty one at that) is preserved.
The gummint disease industry, on the other hand, sees an opportunity for social engineering.
On Friday night an angry motorist mowed down a group of about 150 people on bicycles riding for Critical Mass in Porto Alegre, Brazil. The motorist accelerated his vehicle directly through the group of riders, injuring about 20 riders and sending 8 victims to the hospital ER with at least one victim still remaining hospitalized in serious condition.
"The lawyer called us saying he represents the owner of the car and the owner was driving the car at the time of the facts. He said he would present the client to provide information on what happened," said delegate Gilberto Almeida Montenegro.
The owner of the car is reportedly 47-year-old Ricardo José Neif.
(Itar-Tass) -- Russia will restructure and rearm its 18th Machinegun and Artillery Division on the Kurile Islands, Defence Minister Anatoly Serdyukov said.
The minister is on a two-day trip to Kamchatka and Vladivostok.
"In part, the purpose of this trip was to see how the machinegun and artillery division will be integrated into the forces deployed in Vladivostok, Sakhalin and Kamchatka," Serdyukov said on Saturday, February 26.
"The grouping will change its structure: it may actually be slightly reduced by a small number of people," he said. But "it will be reinforced with the newest communication and electronic warfare systems and radars," he added.
"It will most likely be deployed in two compounds on two islands -- Kunashir and Irutup," Serdyukov said. "That will be quite enough," he added.
The 18th Machinegun and Artillery Division is the only such permanent readiness unit in the Russian Armed Forces. Its regiments are stationed on Kunashir and Iturup and armed with tanks, armoured fighting vehicles, artillery systems, air defence and anti-tank systems, and machineguns.
Russia may build up its military presence on the Kurile Islands if faced with a security threat, State Duma Defence Committee Chairman Viktor Zavarzin said earlier.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/27/2011 00:00 ||
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Is Russia afraid that Japan will get feisty?
The Yalta Agreement explicitly handed over control of the Kurile Islands to the USSR. Of course Japan (obviously) was not a party to the Yalta Agreement. And Russia had never previously owned the Kurile Islands. And Russia, by entering the war against Japan, violated the SovietJapanese Neutrality Pact. But C'est la guerre; War was a remedy that Japan chose.
Posted by: Mike Ramsey ||
02/27/2011 8:35 Comments ||
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#2
Out of curiosity.. have Kimmie or the ChiComs claimed the Kuriles too?
Posted by: Water Modem ||
02/27/2011 14:59 Comments ||
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#3
All the Japanese have to do is wait the Russians out. The next 20 years are going to get COLD, and the Russian weapons will be hard to operate. Most of the Russian soldiers sent to the Kuriles and other Far Eastern bastions come from the areas south of Moscow, and don't fare well in the cold. Expect the areas around the Kuriles to get down into the -50F - -60F range. The Russians have taken possession of something they're not up to holding, and things will not turn out well. The Russians sent there to live hate the place. I'm sure the troops feel likewise.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
02/27/2011 15:55 Comments ||
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#4
The Russians are rather famous for not giving a crap what their soldiers think.
#5
I'm sure many in Russia would love to get revenge for their PORT ARTHUR + TSUSHIMA DEFEATS at the hands of Japan [1905 Russo-Japanese War], BUT IMO THE KURILES DISPUTE IS ABOUT CONTAINING/ISOLATING RISING CHINA + [post-US?]FUTURE CHIN POWER.
* PEOPLES DAILY FORUM > [South Korea] SIX-PARTY TALKS OUT OF THE QUESTION UNTIL NORTH KOREA'S URANIUM ISSUE ADDRESSED. Seoul demands clarity + specificities as per the intent of DPRK's Uranium, Plutonium NucProgs.
HMMMM, HMMMM, wehell, IIUC KIMMIE = DPRK DOESN'T WANT TO OPENLY SAY OR DESCRIBE SUCH IN FRONT OF CHINA.
Again, SOUTH KOREA > has a vested interest in preventing any Chin takeover of NORTH KOREA.
One for make good simil arguments also for the interests of JAPAN, TAIWAN, RUSSIA, + PHIL.
* TOPIX > NO MUCLEAR LIMIT [limits]:CHINA.
ARTIC = Beijing Officials denote that Expansion of China's Military Power is both INEVITABLE + NATURAL, + that China will NOT accept any FOREIGN/EXTERNALLY-IMPOSED LIMITS OR CONSTRAINTS TO ITS CAPABILITIES.
Lest we fergit, 2011-2020/2025 > US POWER + INFLUENCE AROUND THE WORLD WILL BE SERIOUSLY CHALLENGED BY VARIOUS CAMPS. This Decade thru 2025 may MAKE-OR-BREAK OWG-NWO + "GLOBALISM".
9-11 + GWOT = Among other, is WAR FOR PRO-US-VS-ANTI-US OWG-NWO [Global Domination].
Once again letting their mouths write a check their butts can't cash.
North Korea threatened Sunday to attack South Korea and the United States, as the allies prepared to start annual joint military drills manoeuvrs Pyongyang says are a rehearsal for an invasion.
The North has routinely issued such war rhetoric against South Korea and the U.S. The latest warning, however, came nearly three weeks after the rival Koreas failed to reach a breakthrough in their first dialogue in months.
Tensions on the Korean peninsula rose sharply last year over two deadly attacks the sinking of a South Korean naval ship blamed on the North and a North Korean artillery barrage that killed four people on a front-line South Korean island. North Korea denies it was involved in the ship sinking, which killed 46 South Korean sailors.
On Sunday, the North used harsh rhetoric against South Korea and the U.S., calling their joint drills a "dangerous military scheme."
"Our military and people will take stern military countermeasures against the American imperialists and the (South Korean) traitors' group, because they are challenging us with aggressive military action," the North's military said in a statement carried by the official Korean Central News Agency.
It accused South Korea and the U.S. of plotting to launch "limited war" and topple Pyongyang's communist government. If provoked, the North will start a "full-scale" war and turn Seoul into a "sea of fire," the statement said.
Earlier Sunday, the North's military warned that it would fire directly at South Korean border towns and destroy them if Seoul continued to allow activists to launch propaganda leaflets toward the communist country.
In a separate statement carried by KCNA, it accused South Korean activists and lawmakers of flying balloons carrying hundreds of thousands of leaflets critical of North Korea's government, one-dollar bills, DVDs containing corrupt animation files and other materials on the North's most important national holiday, an apparent reference to leader Kim Jong Il's 69th birthday, which was Feb. 16.
It was unclear whether activists have launched more balloons since then and if they plan additional leafletting in coming days.
The South Korean Defence Ministry confirmed it had received the North's warning. A ministry official said South Korea's military keeps a close watch on North Korean military movement. The official spoke on condition of anonymity, citing department rules.
Defence Minister Kim Kwan-jin told parliament Friday that North Korea may launch new attacks this spring and that South Korea's military was ready to cope with any types of hostilities.
On Monday, South Korea and the U.S. are to launch drills aimed at rehearsing how to respond to any potential emergency on the Korean peninsula.
About 12,800 U.S. troops and some 200,000 South Korean soldiers and reservists will take part in the drills, which will last 11 days and involve computer war games, live-firing exercises and other field training, according to the U.S. and South Korean militaries.
Pyongyang has called the drills a preparation to invade North Korea, though South Korean and U.S. officials have repeatedly said the manoeuvrs are purely defensive and that they have no intention of attacking.
After weeks of tension following November's bombardment of the island, North Korea pushed for dialogue with South Korea and expressed a desire to return to stalled international disarmament talks on its nuclear program.
Military officers from the two Koreas met earlier this month but failed to produce any progress, with both sides accusing the other of rupturing the dialogue. North Korea later threatened not to hold any more military talks with Seoul.
The two Koreas are still technically at war because the 1950-53 Korean War ended with an armistice, not a peace treaty. About 28,500 U.S. troops are stationed in South Korea to help deter potential aggression by the North. Bling it on, pipsqueak.
#1
See also YONHAP > NORTH KOREA THREATENS TO FIRE [aimed shots]AT SOUTH KOREAN BORDER FACILITIES [e.g. Imjin Pavilion], believed by Pyongyang to be involved in sending propanganda leaflets into the DPRK.
* SAME > CHANCES OF UPRISING IN NORTH KOREA SLIM BUT NOT RULED OUT: DEFECTORS.
IMO the Starving DPRK is reacting to the news that ROK PRESIDENT LEE MYUN BAK'S ADMIN is interested more in BILATERAL, INTER-KOREAN COOPERATION + CO-PROSPERITY, NOT [Costly, Near-term] RE-UNIFICATION = STATES MERGER.
Again, RISING CHINA can wait for a couple or few decades [2030-2050 maxima]to achieve its desired SOLE BASE RIGHTS ala the "FIRST ISLAND CHAIN", PARTICULARLY IN NE ASIA = NORPAC, In the absence of MASSIVE, ROUTINE = PER ANNUM FOREIGN ASSISTANCE FROM CHINA + UNO + US-WEST, etc, ITS DUBIOUS IFF STARVING NORTH KOREA = KIM DYNASTY CAN WAIT OR SURVIVE BEYOND THE 2015-2020/2025 TIME FRAME.
Given also that DPRK-Overlord China does not desire to see agz a NUCLEAR-ARMED JAPAN, SOUTH KOREA, OR OTHER IN EAST ASIA.
Lest we fergit, CHINA NETTERS/BLOGGERS > prefer for China to wage MAJOR CONVENTIONAL = [LIMITED?]NUCWAR IN EAST ASIA THAN TO SEE A RE-MILITARIZED, NUCLEAR-ARMED JAPAN ANDOR THE US MAINTAIN PERMANENT CONTROL OF TAIWAN.
Taiwan = "Warm Water" PLA Bastion in the Middle of East Asia + direct access into WESTPAC BETWEEN NORPAC [Japan] + SOPAC/SOUPAC [Philippines, Malaccas].
#3
Talk about phase lag---a decade or two. Well, they are at least better than us in that department. We have not started in our government.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
02/27/2011 14:15 Comments ||
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#4
The complaint against foreigners not bothered about learning the language/culture here is levelled against all foreigners be they Syrian, Polish or English, so don't pull that lever. The issue is ghettos, crime, turf wars, no-go areas fuelled by a nonsensical Political immigrant block-vote buying, a lá NuLabour, UK. Swedish Democrats will see a rise in seats in the coming years, theMSM here ridiculing them, painting them as the EDL is in Blighty, eh, Bright Pebbles. Fortunately, this has provoked serious question time within general spheres, with more people realising how a handful of people seriously put thier minds through the No 3 cycle in the washing-machine under the pretext of multi-culturarism, and then got rinsed. It hasn't helped the Krayon subscribers/underwriters with that fool with his kaboom in Stockholm recently. The burden of guilt for the past, weighing heavily on these good Nordic folk for the moment, may just revert to a level of Viking diplomatic truths, having seen all their good-will and hospitalities, customs, morals, etc, taken and trashed without even a "Tak så mycket".
#6
The migration issue could be fought by not allowing immigrants any unemployment or welfare benefits for sayyyy 10 -15 years?
Posted by: Frank G ||
02/27/2011 17:01 Comments ||
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#7
A little late for that, perhaps, Frank G. The rights to benefits are so good here, open to Thirld World abuse that should have been addressed way back before it became associated with collective punishment for the immigrants and good ol-fashioned Swedish ångst. But soon that stick will be broken and fascism will be all the rage. Sverige seems very Anglo-Saxon, at times, in the curve of time, but they will go Viking again.
#9
Or start billing the home country of illegals for the use of services.
enrolled in school? Bill Mexico for tuition.
Emergency room? Bill Mexico.
Need translators and public defender for court? Bill Mexico.
In jail for 20 years? Bill Mexico.
#10
Frank, Sweden's immigration policy was specifically designed to attract workers for industry. However, it colluded with the welfare state to bring about a rather different result.
Ireland's new government is headed for confrontation with Brussels after the country's ruling party was wiped out on Saturday by voters in a huge popular backlash against a European-IMF austerity programme.
This should be interesting. The more left-wing Fianna Fail is out after ruling for 60 years and the center-right Fine Gael is in but must deal with the fiscal mess.
The unprecedented and historic defeat, Fianna Fail's worst result in 85 years, makes the Irish government the first eurozone administration to be punished by voters in the aftermath of the EU's debt crisis. Voter turn-out was exceptionally high at more than 70 per cent, indicating public anger at the government and the EU.
Late last year, Ireland was forced to accept a £72 billion EU-IMF bailout to cover huge public debts that were ran up to save failed Irish banks.
The bail-out was designed to prevent financial contagion that threatened the existence of the euro, but according to economic forecasts, the cost of servicing Irish bank debt and the EU-IMF bank loans will consume 85 per cent of Ireland's income tax revenue by 2012, a burden that a majority of voters find intolerable.
[Pak Daily Times] Ireland's ruling Fianna Fail party suffered a crushing defeat in elections dominated by the economic collapse and an EU-IMF bailout, exit polls showed on Saturday, with the opposition poised to take power.
Prime Minister Brian Cowen's party, which has ruled Ireland for most of the last 80 years, slumped to its worst ever general election result with just 15.1 percent of the vote, the poll for state broadcaster RTE said.
As widely expected, the election has seen Dublin become the first government to fall as a result of the debt crisis in the 17-country eurozone. The main opposition Fine Gael party is set to form the new government and its leader Enda Kenny will be prime minister after it took 36.1 percent in Friday's election, although it failed to win enough votes to govern alone. Fine Gael is on course to take more than 70 seats in the 166-seat Dail, or lower parliament, analysts said.
The centrist party's deputy director of elections, Frank Flannery, told RTE that if the exit poll was correct "it was an absolutely amazing and historic election". Noel Dempsey, a former minister in the Fianna Fail government, conceded that he would be happy if his party emerged with more than 20 seats, less than a third of its total in the outgoing parliament. "It's looking pretty grim, I have to say," he said. Fine Gael will need support from other parties or independents to form a government, and could turn to Labour, who secured 20.5 percent, according to the exit poll of 3,500 voters by Millward Brown Lansdowne.
Fianna Fail was the target of public anger over the debt crisis that crippled Ireland's once-vibrant "Celtic Tiger" economy and forced it to agree to an 85-billion-euro ($115-billion) bailout with the European Union and International Monetary Fund last November.
Cowen had conceded defeat even before polls closed, telling local media Friday as he cast his ballot in the central county of Offaly that his party would now "regroup". "I have always been proud of who we are and what we are. This organisation will come again," he said.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/27/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[11123 views]
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Paul Hellyer, the former Canadian Defense Minister, says UFOs are real and the U.S. military has weapons to use against UFOs and that aliens can help us learn about climate change. He adds he would probably get fired for his views if he was still Canada's Minister of National Defense today, but is adamant he has seen UFOs himself, according to reports in the Daily Mail, AOL News and the Barrie Examiner.
Hellyer says, "the reality is that they (aliens) have been visiting earth for decades and probably millennia and have contributed considerably to our knowledge."
He says UFOs are not the biggest secret in the world, the biggest secret he says is how a "handful of bankers" have "bamboozled" politicians for the past century to take control of the world's currencies by creating a monopoly on printing money. He adds the bankers are "very clever" in financing politicians and now control the political processes. All kinds of good stuff you would never have guessed at link.
Posted by: Jaiger Protector of the Bunions8239 ||
02/27/2011 9:15 Comments ||
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#7
they (aliens) have been visiting earth for decades
And Obama is an alien - he forgot that part.
What kind of weapons can you use against entities capable of either time-traveling or of transiting light-years of space? The Indians were far closer to the Europeans technologically, and they didn't have much luck.
#8
Hesays UFOs are not the biggest secret in the world, the biggest secret he says is how a "handful of bankers" have "bamboozled" politicians for the past century to take control of the world's currencies by creating a monopoly on printing money. He adds the bankers are "very clever" in financing politicians and now control the political processes.
Maybe the bankers are aliens?
Consume...conform... OBEY!!!
#14
...a "handful of bankers" have "bamboozled" politicians for the past century to take control of the world's currencies by creating a monopoly on printing money. He adds the bankers are "very clever" in financing politicians and now control the political processes.
Pssst! He means Jews!
I just read the guy's Wikipedia page. It's interesting reading... by which I mean KooKoo for CoCo Puffs.
#17
This kind of weird paranoia happens to those whose jobs involve some degree of healthy paranoia.
Every US president since Truman at some point has had fantasies of natural disasters, foreign invasion, and even UFO attack. So they end up making bizarre plans and schemes, and remaking those of their predecessors.
There *should* be a "classical" psychology experiment, in which a substantial number of people are sequestered, then shown "evidence" that UFO aliens are coming, by someone who looks authoritative.
While a percentage will get all peaceful and assume the aliens are benign, and another percentage will want to blast them immediately on arrival, the most important group are those that just go intellectually, emotionally, and physically inert when presented with the true unknown.
This is because such people would effectively shut down the economy for an indeterminate period, causing a massive collapse.
Only a minority would keep their wits about them and take the aliens at face value. Not a big enough group to keep our economy functioning.
#18
Dennis Kucinich to the white courtesy phone. Paging, Dennis Kucinich to the white courtesy phone.
Posted by: Secret Asian Man ||
02/27/2011 15:27 Comments ||
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#19
Ugh, got a sick feeling in my stomach this has to do with a bieber space flick coming out this summer. Has a pet mop for a sidekick, the ol boss played by kd lang.
#1
The governor had spared the police and firemen the cuts he was demanding of the rest of the state employees precisely to avoid this kind of thing. It's going to get interesting now.
#2
This is turning into a third world war in Wisconsin. I remember France with their riots.
Steal from the taxpayer. Political corruption, Union corruption, a tsunami of greed. Just what O needs to divert attention from himself. With media duplicity. Major layoffs in the works. Those who are wealthy have left if they are smart. Like Cuba in many ways, verbal now, guns and molotov cocktails next.
#3
The governor needs to stop especially the police unions from getting involved. This is done discreetly, by letting the rank and file police know that they had better halt their unions or they are going to be next on the platter.
It's the "lay down with dogs, get up with fleas", theory. Solidarity comes with a high price. As far as the firemen go, they can be threatened with widespread, non-union privatization. After a right-to-work law is signed.
#4
Push comes to shove...
let the traffic cops go... keep the detectives.
Posted by: Water Modem ||
02/27/2011 14:51 Comments ||
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#5
If the police join the protests, it would seem to me that the governor has no choice but to call out the National Guard. Public order must be preserved.
If any Guardsman refuses to go active because he is a member of the public employees union, he should be court-martialed.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
02/27/2011 16:31 Comments ||
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#6
Problem with calling out the National Guard is that Obama can trump: he can call up the Guard and make it subject to federal, not state, authority.
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/27/2011 22:49 Comments ||
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#7
hmm... well there is always the militia.... what was it? 700,000 hunters last season?
Posted by: Harry Thavith9398 ||
02/27/2011 22:56 Comments ||
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[Pak Daily Times] Pakistain Mohammedan League-Nawaz (PML-N) chief Nawaz Sharif ... served two non-consecutive terms as prime minister, heads the Pakistain Müslim League (Nawaz). Noted for his spectacular corruption, the 1998 Pak nuclear test, border war with India, and for being tossed by General Musharraf... said on Saturday that his party can steer the country out of the crises it is in. He said that the PML-N was making a revolutionary team for a revolutionary programme in the country, adding that "we will build a new Pakistain by mobilising the nation".
Addressing a consultative meeting of party workers from Beautiful Downtown Peshawar, Hazara and Dera Ismail Khan ... the Pearl of Pashtunistan ... at Model Town, Nawaz said that his party's alliance with the Pakistain People's Party (PPP) would have remained intact had the ruling party resolved the masses' problems.
He said that scheduled power outages, unemployment, price hike and corruption had made the life of every citizen miserable. "We improved the image of Pakistain during our tenure in the past. We served better for defence, national economy, the education and health sectors," Nawaz claimed. He said that parting of ways with the PPP in Punjab was the inner voice of the party workers.
The former prime minister said that the PML-N's long march for the restoration of judiciary had proved that the nation was a standard-bearer of the constitution and justice, adding that the country would be rebuilt with a revolutionary spirit of the long march.
He observed that independent judiciary was performing its sacred obligation to purge the country of corruption. He claimed that educational revolution would be brought in the country to provide science and technology education to the youth as well as provide them maximum facilities in realm of research.
Recalling his achievements during the last tenure, the PML-N chief said, "We had created an atmosphere of investment through economic reforms", and added that there was no scheduled power outages in the country and we were in a position to export electricity.
"Pakistain would have become a superpower in South Asia if conspiracies against the PML-N government had not been hatched," he added.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/27/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[11127 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan
#1
Babelfish translator says: "It's my turn to steal Pakistan and foreign aid blind."
Posted by: Pearl Gleaper1127 ||
02/27/2011 17:55 Comments ||
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Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki gave government ministers 100 days to deliver results and eliminate corruption or be fired, the government announced after an emergency cabinet meeting Sunday.
The announcement follows weeks of demonstrations across the country by protesters angry about unemployment, poor basic services, corruption and a lack of freedom. At least 13 people died in protests Friday.
The prime minister said Sunday there would be investigations into the deaths to determine who started the violence.
The work of every ministry will be assessed after 100 days, al-Maliki vowed.
"Changes will be made based on these assessments," he warned. What are the chances that the Iraqi people will go back to napping by then? Just keep kicking the can down the road, Nuri...
Several companies (e.g., InterCell) are working on PA vaccines, and reports are fairly common in the medical literature. Problem is, PA exchanges plasmids (with itself and with other species) that allow it to become immune very quickly to a given vaccine. What the Iranians are saying they've done is pretty crude compared to reports in the medical literature these past ten years -- it's as if they haven't been reading along.
Sounds like propaganda to me, but hey, maybe they're on to something. AoS.
Iranian scientists have produced a vaccine that prevents the life-threatening infection commonly associated with severe third-degree burns, Press TV reported.
Pseudomonas aeruginosa is the most common bacteria infecting victims suffering from severe third-degree burn. The gram-negative blood-borne bacteria can eventually kill the patient.
"Usually most severe third-degree burn victims die from Pseudomonas aeruginosa infections," ISNA quoted Dr. Davoud Mehrbani from the Shiraz University of Medical Sciences as saying.
"Similar to tetanus, the extracted and deactivated forms of its toxin can be used for treatment purposes. We, therefore, separated the toxin of the bacteria, deactivated it and used its immunization properties," Mehrbani added.
The vaccine can prevent possible deaths particularly in individuals at risk of getting burned because of their profession.
According to the Iranian Ministry of Health and Medical Education, 96 percent of the nation's required medicine is being produced domestically.
Iran's Health Minister Marzieh Vahid-Dastjerdi says anti-Iran sanctions are the driving force behind the country's progress in the pharmaceutical industry.
The Department of Administration said the Capitol is in bad need of cleaning after 13 days of 24-hour occupation. Protesters have not trashed the building, but it has taken on the funky locker room aroma of body odor, sweaty feet and deodorant.
#2
Jerry Pournelle: The rule of law requires that everyone is subject to the law; and orderly government requires that everyone of whatever political persuasion submits to the orderly transfer of government. In the United States that premise is being reexamined: election results aren't important. What's important is that money be paid to state employees, and anything that gets in the way needs to be shouted down. Camp out in the Capitol if need be, but never allow the budget to be balanced on the backs of the union workers.
#3
The protesters have cleaned up quite a bit since Friday (probably because it looked bad on national TV).
The head of the Capitol Police just came out and said that they can stay again tonight - Channel 3 WISC - Madison
Not great, but it keeps the more violent and leftist folks (this IS Madison - 90 square miles surrounded by reality; where common sense goes to die) at bay, especially with all the cameras around.
Posted by: Mullah Richard ||
02/27/2011 21:15 Comments ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
Hundreds of US, British and French military advisers have arrived in Cyrenaica, Libya's eastern breakaway province, debkafile's military sources report exclusively. This is the first time America and Europe have intervened militarily in any of the popular upheavals rolling through the Middle East since Tunisia's Jasmine Revolution in early January. The advisers, including intelligence officers, were dropped from warships and missile boats at the coastal towns of Benghazi and Tobruk Thursday Feb. 24, for a threefold mission:
[Arab News] Rebels controlling northern Ivory Coast have seized a town in government territory and said on Friday they were still advancing, raising the prospects of a return to open war.
[Al Arabiya] A Facebook group is calling for the overthrow of Swaziland's king, Africa's last remaining absolute monarch, through protests inspired by the revolutions in Tunisia and Libya.
Paul Hellyer, the former Canadian Defense Minister, says UFOs are real and the U.S. military has weapons to use against UFOs and that aliens can help us learn about climate change. He adds he would probably get fired for his views if he was still Canada's Minister of National Defense today, but is adamant he has seen UFOs himself, according to reports in the Daily Mail, AOL News and the Barrie Examiner. 
Nawaz Sharif
