RSS- Supreme Court oral arguments to be heard on April 25 about presidential immunity for official acts
- Nasa’s Voyager-1 sends usable data from deep space
- The Wondrous Oak
- Three Seas Summit: Vilnius 2024
- Tit for tat until it all goes boom
- Deadly H5N1 avian influenza strain detected on mainland Antarctica
- “BYD is launching its next-gen Blade EV battery soon with more range and even lower cost”
- Iran launches air attacks on Israel
- ISW on the developing Ukrainian defense industrial base and Russias strikes on the Ukrainian energy infrastructure
- Britain? Kaput! By Walrus.
See the picture of Blair, Clinton and the new Bernie Madoff / Mark Rich brilliantly named Fried-Bankman.
Time for a caption contest anyone?
I’ll go first: “Former UK Prime Minister and United States President meet with the Lolita Express jet engine mechanic off tarmac.”
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2022/11/ftx-appears-political-ponzi-scheme-running-dollars-politicians-ukraine/
Many people following this conflict have been expecting Russia to establish an air superiority and air dominance early on.
This failed to happen. In fact, despite flying a number of daily sorties, the bulk of Russia’s air force has been strangely absent.
Ukrainian air defences certainly have a role in this, however there are other factors contributing to this.
Tom Cooper offers some answers in his interesting series of posts on air war over Ukraine.
https://medium.com/@x_TomCooper_x
Assuming you have access to a nausea specialist and are not a hyper militaristic Russian orthodox black hundreds member or jingoist of ultra baroque tastelessness, waste, and afficionado of transcendental banality and dictator worship, check this out:
The main cathedral of the Russian military.
https://youtu.be/uX57HWfxpuQ
I couldn’t make it all the way through. But I’m betting if you make it as far as I did you will no longer question how it is that a country and leadership that poured good money and talent into that monstrosity of perverted faux religiousity doesn’t have “air superiority.” In fact you’ll laugh that you ever thought to ask such a question.
Was it a Cia or Mi6 dirty trick that inserted the part about how they not only very nearly went ahead with painting a huge fresco of Stalin (Saint Alin, I guess) but … hold on now … they almost added next to Stalin’s fresco portrait a portrait of His Nibsovich himself! Ha ha! Brilliant!! Why hold back? After all look at Jeffrey Epstein, Prince Andrew, Bill Clinton, Alan Dershowitz, etc etc. Let’s have a contest. Ok. One freso of Robert Macnamera in a Washington DC cathedral for one fresco of Stalin in a Russian Military Cathedral. No? You insist we include Dubya? All right, then you need to include ..
What’s that, Corporal Ivan Ivanovich, no carbine oil, no uniform, no bullets or kevlar? Are you some sort of heartless unfeeling atheist and perverted heretic? Was Mother Russia really to provide you with equipment and leave out making a magic cupola to hold votaries when the amount of material used to make it was too much by exactly 1xyz grams and when we looked it up it turned out that in precisely the year 1xyz AD year of our lord our noble princes scored a divine victory on the field of glory? What about the frescoes of Generalissimo Stalin in his cute white tunic?
But that’s not the half of it. It’s just such egregious bad taste. They saw us our Tammy Faye and Jimmy Swaggert for rubes with drive through mega church and raised us a state funded ultra mega hyper militaristic baroque tasteless death cult mausoleum disguised as a cathedral. Ok lets. See. You accept crypto?
Thank you borko for this great link. Reading several more of Tom Cooper’s articles, he brings up a point that has been nagging, and that brings me to ask:
“makes as much sense as NATO supplying 14 different artillery systems, 50 different types of vehicles, and about a dozen of different air defence systems to the ZSU: nothing better but making logistics more complex in the middle of a war…” (https://medium.com/@x_TomCooper_x/ukraine-war-3-november-2022-967227cc944f)
So as I’ve been watching all these various weapons systems going to the war fighters in Ukraine, my first thought is those are some damn smart guys to handle all this variety. But then, what else might working so many different weapons systems also cause to the way the war is being fought. Even though some might share ammo supplies, the training, maintenance and capabilities surely differ considerably. That would seem to create weapon systems bubbles of supply, maintenance, performance and skills.
My question is, do these “weapon system bubbles” affect the way that the Ukraine Army must deploy and fight? Would the, perhaps, enforced fracturing of these different bubbles be giving the Army a new paradigm for fighting as a gift of circumstance?
Multiple weapons systems needing their own materiel? That’s why God created computerized inventory management systems. The Ukrainians appear actually to be pretty good at that sort of thing.
Thanks Peter
It has been a long time since I operated an inventory management system. Developing software, I did get a chance to work on one. I’m sure they’ve gotten better, but there is so much more involved in managing the inventory than just the software accounting. My point is that these weapon systems may be creating an opportunity to operate in units based on weapons characteristics, thus fracturing the standard formations that may have been “by the book.” The Ukrainians seem to be doing a great job of reconnaissance and exploiting Russian weak spots. The experts here know how that works, and I was just wondering if those operations may be enhanced by having traditionally cohesive units further compartmentalized due to the above circumstances.
cobo
I think that already happens when the system is operated by logisticians like we have. Very dedicated folk who dedicate their lives to this kind of work. In the US Army the system pushes re-supply of all kinds forward quite aggressively in combat, writing it off as it reaches the combatant units.
Thank you Colonel, I ran the PLL (Prescribed Load List) for our Tac Site, Improved HAWK, D Battery 2/62 32 AADCOM. The Army material supply system was already quite well thought out and capable, late 70s. One problem of course, among many, does the physical reality match the digital reality. I have a friend here in Livermore who developed a hazardous material tracking system that relied on barcode verifications to address the problem of matching realities, used then by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and Boeing. Another friend developed the training and certification programs for FormFactor, whose technology revolutionized chip fab testing. His system of training and certification, or something like it, would be needed to augment the material supply tracking to know who has been trained on what, and where all that material now stored is and where are those men – simple enough, certainly doable in software. Perhaps the systems now are rocking this. If not, I know guys who can put that together. The part that I’m wondering about is what effect the use of so many different weapon systems might be having on the conduct of the operations, if any.
Probably some but that is one of the costs of coalition war.
Interesting take on the ‘air war’ or lack thereof over Ukraine. Russia has been, along with Putin, done in by graft and cronyism of the worst kind once again the same way his yes men assured him Russian soldiers were well trained and ready to go with all the best designed Russian equipment available. Tom Cooper may expand on this question in his next piece, but I wonder…just how much Russian hardware and now aircraft does China have in its arsenal? How confident can China be in their own capabilities with Soviet/Russian assets in whatever numbers they have?
I think folks will get a kick out of this take on Trumps big announcement of the 15th. This is in song and worth the listen.
https://youtu.be/9jWaqFWcgKg
“Livestream cameras in Washoe County vote-count area went dark for 8 hours. Here’s why.”
Just kidding, the safest, fairest, right wing extremist free election since the 2000 mules one.
https://www.rgj.com/story/news/politics/elections/2022/11/10/livestream-cams-washoe-county-vote-count-area-went-dark-heres-why/10661538002/
“Washoe County has been at the forefront of trying to innovate election transparency…”
“Staff badge reports have also been pulled to ensure that no one entered the area during that time, with none found. ”
Yeah, like no one came in beforehand and stayed behind? No, that’s a conspiracy threory!
Congrats on yet another astounding come from behind victory.
This election integrity is an uphill fight – good that you all are seeing it through…
kj,
not at all. I’m going to start giving classes in obeying the ‘rules’ of the rules based order. The first rule is to harvest more ballots than your opponents. Remember, I didn’t make the rules, I’m just teach’n how to obey ’em.
Fred – documenting the troubles and the potential for such – it is important – next is to do something about it –
Reading up today on cleaning up the voter rolls –
“Integrity”.. In.Politics…Elections…? Hawah…
We went from Cuban Cigars on the Desk….and Mini Millionaires
To Diamonds…And Dopium…Flying Home From Asia..and Hungarian Billionaires..And Monopoly Funny Money..
And Vodoo Money Market Magic…To Buy All the Spices,,
Integrity…That was on Display….. Veterans Day..
JT.
Has anyone heard any reports of how NASAMS is faring against Shahed-136? I think that prop-driven cruise missiles like Shahed-136 have a bright future and I am wondering if fast moving missiles like Sidewinder and AAMRAM are going to have trouble hitting a small, slow moving, close to the ground, low heat signature target like Shahed-136.
Ideally you would not shoot them with missiles orders of magnitude more expensive than the drone.
Gepards and Shilkas however should be ideally suited for this task.
borko
Gepards and Shilkas require line-of-sight access to the target – something that low flying cruise missiles seem unlikely to provide in my untutored opinion.
I dunno.
JT
you have plenty of videos Ukrainians trying to shoot them down with their assault rifles. Line of sight usually is not a problem.
Here’s one account of Gepards being used to shoot down Shahed-136s.
https://www.bild.de/politik/ausland/politik-ausland/ukrainer-bejubeln-deutsches-system-dieser-gepard-schiesst-die-mullah-drohnen-ab-81796606.bild.html
borko
It’s a lot easier to spread Kalashnikovs around a wide area than Gepards. There are maybe 500,000 Kalashnikovs in Ukraine and maybe 50 Gepards.
Hey…Fellow Investigators or Spectators…..Did You Notice..??? What those Democracy
Saving Gizzard Wizards Did In The Land Of Aws…??
Well…For Thier Own Amusement..And Our Confuzement..They Proved they Can
And Will..Tamper with The Thermostat..and Put some Chill on the Hill..!!
How..Well..I Suppose its just a Conwincidence…But…There Are Five Key States
That Came into the Game….To Save Democracy…All Border States..N..S…E..W..
California…(The Twinky State)
Georgia…Peachy
Pennsylvania…(Spooky)and
Ariona and Nevada…No Cartels or Coincidences being Tourist Hangouts..Spreads.
Haha…Isnt Politics Stupid..Bunch of Old Kids..Still in Diapers…
JT
Following the crypto exchange FTX fail – it is likely to be M-E-S-S-Y
https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/11/12/ftx-crypto-wallets-see-mysterious-late-night-outflows-totalling-more-than-380m/
There is an investigation into the owner, Sam Binkman-Fried and the bankruptcy will likely open up quite a bit of information to the public.
https://www.coindesk.com/policy/2022/11/13/bankrupt-ftx-faces-criminal-investigation-in-the-bahamas/
Here is the Ukraine connection:
“Aid to Ukraine was backed by crypto exchange FTX, staking platform Everstake, and Ukraine’s Kuma exchange which will route donated crypto directly to the National Bank of Ukraine’ (from coindesk)
https://www.coindesk.com/policy/2022/02/28/ukraine-government-is-using-crypto-aid-to-purchase-critical-supplies/
https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/currencies/sam-bankman-fried-crypto-ftx-ukraine-russia-cash-war-donations-2022-2
FTX had a finger in a lot of pies, FTX (Binkman) turned to Binance (CCP owned) for bailout and that fell through…
This event is moving so fast it will be hard to keep up with it – news wise
One of the financial GURU’s I listen to said that the NFT market was always going to have an upheaval and that the reliable currencies will (likely) remain once it is settled out – I am maybe wishful thinking here but still hoping that some of the fiat currencies will live through this and we will be left with (hopefully) reliable fiat currencies and whatever is also reliable in the crypto/NFT
Interestingly – the blockchains will be useful in going after the war crimes attributed to Russia -that will be another story to ‘chase’
Hell-of-a-thing – this
kj
kj,
That’s a heck of a narrative:
CCP, Russia! Boy what a relief that its the usual suspects. But it leaves out the connections to D.C. and the party that Mr. Fried donated too, or what NGO dear ole mum (Barbara Helen Fried) started and a whole lot more.
USG sends billions to Ukraine. Ukraine active in FTX. FTX owner donates millions to usual suspects. Nothting to see there. Nor where the other millions of dollars went either. You think the DOJ and the Democratic Party controlled Senate (surprise!) and Democractic controlled House (surprise!) are going to investigate any of this?
“Mind the Gap”, not just the recording on the metro you hear right after the warning about pickpockets when you are getting off at the Louvre.
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/ftx-held-just-900mm-liquid-assets-vs-9bn-liabilities-video-emerges-confirming-alameda-knew
https://twitter.com/WhaleChart/status/1591066619937423361
Thank you Fred – ya – this did seem like a narrative – and yes – the pieces are from (questionable) sources – know this will be spin – Spin – SPIN on the ‘story’ or ‘stories’ so expecting you all to take with a grain of salt (of condiment of choice) before consuming. IF it can even be consumed.
I did leave out the Biden Admin/Dem party money laundering portion – and YES – it sure seems to be so – Figured most of you that ARE watching this one will already know that.
All the crypto related ventures are (lately) new and ‘overnight’ as you put it so easy to slip a lot into that ‘mess of a party’
Bankruptcies tend to make financials public – I wonder if we will find any actual ‘altruistic’ transactions?
I noticed that VISA had cancelled a one month contract with FTX – (if accurate) wonder how large a $$ hit they took?
In the article I read the Ukraine connection was presented as ‘Propaganda” as i believe the author really had some strong emotions… Still – it is not at all unreasonable to expect people in difficult situations to use whatever currency is being traded.
That Zero Hedge list is ‘something’
kj
kj,
It wasn’t just the US taxpayers who were ripped off by the fraud. I’m sure the graft got spread far and wide.
Fred –
agreed – small pond, HUGE Ripples. The fallout has been happening for a while – the kids (I call them kids) on Benzinga have been sounding off about FTX for a while.
the FTX connections in the Bahamas is important – different laws there but theft is still theft, no matter the country – just the penalties (repercussions) are different.
I think we may have a few more surprises about what gets shook up by this…
(IMO) I am a wait and see, watch and learn sort, New ventures always have a ‘tumult’ of some sort. I watch for two things; when the new venture ‘peaks’ in value AND when the first really Bad Actor comes on the scene. After that tumult rights itself THEN the thing becomes more stable and predictable.
however: ‘Never underestimate a thief with friends
kj
Funding the ukr/rus war with crypto is old news.Used money from people worldwide to fund Western change management.Crypto peaked just before the war started.
All this only possible with globalisation.
Brilliant stuff
Starlink sparkles in the evening sky
Under trons watchful eye
anon,
The war is funded with our actual money. Crypto was just the mechanism to move the graft around.
Fred – this is an excellent synopsis who tf is SBF?
https://twitter.com/HowieBTC/status/1591528774050488320
Kj,
You didn’t bother to read the prior linked pieces?
I did read Fred – absolutely… it is an excellent write up.. Caroline Ellison’s admissions are deeply shocking.
Zero Hedge also linked the coinbase article about FTX, Everstake, Kuma and the Ukraine National Bank
https://www.coindesk.com/policy/2022/03/14/ukraine-partners-with-ftx-everstake-to-launch-new-crypto-donation-website/
My own concerns aside, this was really excellent innovation by Everstake; keeping an economic flow during a war is a heavy lift.
I am just not expert enough, nor informed enough to answer some of the questions I have. Obviously, there is a bankruptcy (filed by FTX and SBF last week) the bankruptcy and (criminal) investigation will expose much. I think we all will get answers over time –
kj
Zeihan says the wisest course of action for Russia now is complete withdrawal of most everything to the west of mariopol, including Crimea. He doesn’t think it will happen though. Very interesting map analysis. TTG would likely want to watch this. Also Col Lang though I don’t mean to imply he needs to. It clarifies quite a bit of the situation for me at least.
Peter Zeihan: Beginning of the fall of Crimea
https://youtu.be/K9JfO_mI4oQ
This blog was recently of great value but has unfortunately begun to go off the rails and fall prey to conspiracy theories. It is evidence of how people with fairly good minds can lose sight of reality when reality becomes too unbearable. The comments especially. People who subscribe to the idea that a “true heavenly Jerusalem” is being established in Ukraine due to a crackpot idea that Israel will collapse within 2 years mixed with Arthur Koestler’s old idea about a midieval Khazarian empire (his book “The Thirteenth Tribe”) and several portions of Putin as a behind-the-scenes agent of the Great Reset. I guess they forgot that during the 19th century Crimean war, which also ended very poorly for Russia, the state of Israel did not exist. I guess Disraeli and Queen Victoria used their illuminati membership priveleges to aquire the updates to Nostradamus’s crystal ball software? Just a wild guess.
I don’t know how to contact either of this site’s esteemed hosts directly, so I will wait to hear from Joe Biden directly if after his meeting with Xi it is permitted to change my name from Fourth and Long to Fourth and Longerie. Why the Animus against closeted transexuals, Joe? What’s up with that? Do you expect to win in 2024 once that shoe drops? Overconfident, if so, in my humble opinion.
https://stansheppard.substack.com/p/big-picture?utm_medium=email
I don’t really want you to write me off the blog. Slug it out on the blog. That is why it exists. BTW, I have no idea of what you speak in all that business about a New Jerusalem.
It’s a semi-psychotic mental construction that is being circulated of late as an emotional defense against realities that are so unpleasant that minds invent alternative realities in which preferentially to live. In other words it’s useless on the face of it, but is diagnostic — people are losing it. The “ghost dances” of the Plains Indians come to mind along with a host of other maladaptive behaviors including various addictions.
My apologies for lack of clarity. My post was poorly formatted. You can find the “heavenly Jerusalem relocated to Ukraine” idea at this link within the blog I referenced in my post – and the responses to it which follow. It really isn’t worth your time, it’s just another example of ongoing delusions. It’s a pity, this Stan Sheppard fellow was writing some good stuff, I hope he pulls out of this tailspin. He continues on the path though with his post on the 13th on the same blog – “what if the Ukraine war was a soccer match?” He wants reality to make sense in ways that it simply doesn’t or refuses to.
https://stansheppard.substack.com/p/big-picture/comment/10418989?
Colonel, for several years out at the edge of conspiracy porn there has been the idea that Israel would prepare Russia, due to its vast resources, as the continent of choice after the United States has been used up. Sorry I don’t have references, but the new “heavenly Jerusalem” would sparkle it up a bit.
F&L How is Zeihan’s analysis different from what TTG and I have been saying? I like his level of detail. I would be glad to make him an author here.
I don’t think Zeihan particularly sees any farther or more deeply than you and TTG. His emphasis and direction are different though. He promotes his consulting business and books. He looks at the biggest of big pictures – demographics, energy and food consumption, tech developments, and geography. I think he probably worked for Langley, he’s a bit of a pointy head but not an outright boffin. He can be a bit hard to take at times, particularly when he giggles out loud about things such as “we can put 3 destroyers in the Indian Ocean and watch calmly as the population of China decreases by 700 million people by the year 2075.”
If I may interject, when Mr Zeihan says V Putin is authoritarian, I don’t believe he’s objecting to authoritarianism per se. Zeihan has a technocrat’s outlook: he doesn’t appear to believe ordinary people are smart enough to decide their own futures, or that democracy has a place in world affairs. His analysis of big picture problems is profound, but he feels more centralization, not less, is the cure.
When Zeihan speaks of “the death of globalization” he narrowly means the end of comprehensive international free trade. When I speak of globalization/globalism I mean hyper-financialization, hyper-specialization, unrestricted flows of capital and labor, the weakening or abolition of national borders, the subordination of national laws to global rules, &etc; I get the sense that Zeihan is for these things, not against.
But if I have misunderstood him, please correct me.
That jibes with my perception. He either doesn’t understand the danger in his outlook but given his obvious high intelligence, more likely he’s simply on board with the age old trend in it’s most recent iteration. I’d add that there’s an aspect of the effusive, glib conman to him that disturbs me so much that I don’t much like him at all as say someone I’d consider having a beer with. His faux concern to have numbers available for donations to Ukraine is such obvious tent-evangelist hooey as to be a dead giveaway. I do sympathize with Ukrainians, don’t get me wrong, but Dear Peter – you don’t fool me one bit. Giggling over hundreds of millions of Chinese people perishing in one breath and then passing the hat for the poor Ukrainians? He was an orphan evidently. Maybe his human to human bonding capacities were impaired. Or maybe there’s something about people who abandon their own children that is hereditary. But no, as you indicate, “the little people” are not his concern. Could be because of their neediness, a child’s most fundamental attribute, which he hatefully though quite understandably associates with the bitterness of having to be raised by other people than his own parents and worse, the contemplation that in his most personally needy time, his own parents couldn’t find it in themselves to love him. I wonder if he will ever be able to fully recover from it. He certainly has in every practical sense.
Jim S..
Considering where the POTUS and Xi are..in Indonesa…for a three hour Meeting at the G20..and his Stop in Cairo…To Turn Green and carry Messages To Xi about “Trade”…Road…Bricks…Canals..Ports..Ships..or Chips..I would say the New World Order ..Is Electronically on Track…To Control The “Buy or Sell” ..That Creates The
“Hell”..
..That has Given The Power..To a Dark Lord..on a Red Horse..and Broken Seals,,
JT
TTG, I just finished THE MOON IS DOWN by Steinbeck which you recommended a couple months ago.
Wondering if it has been reprinted for Ukranians?
Were you able to find his collection of WWII dispatches?
“The flies have conquered the flypaper”
Al,
Glad you liked it. I think I mentioned that this was part of our required summer reading for the prep school I attended. The reading list was enclosed with the letter of acceptance along with an assignment to write essays on our readings.
I read Steinbeck’s account of the capture of the island of Ventotene. It was amazing writing for something that was just a newspaper war dispatch from the front.
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2022/11/breaking-reports-russian-missiles-hit-poland-border-town-ukraine-two-killed/
Comment: I wonder whether Russians aimed at Poland on purpose, or whether they just can’t rely on their targeting systems.
TTG, Steinbeck in his TRAVELS WITH CHARLIE, mentions still wearing the hat given him by a Britt torpedo ship’s Captain he sailed with in WWII.
Steinbeck was well into his 40s when covering WWII…close and personal!
Last fall I wrote a comment about foretelling the coming winter by looking at the woolly bears in the fall. The theory I had been given for how to do that was . . . the width of the central brown band on the woolly bear showed how long the coming winter would last. The closer the brown band started from behind the black head end, the sooner winter would start. The closer the brown band finished to the black tail end, the later that winter would end.
Here is a bunch of images of woolly bears . . .
https://images.search.yahoo.com/search/images;_ylt=AwrEt5Vllnpj0R02_LpXNyoA;_ylu=Y29sbwNiZjEEcG9zAzEEdnRpZAMEc2VjA3Nj?p=woolly+bear+caterpillar+image&fr=sfp
Well, this year I only saw one woolly bear, about 10 days ago. It was almost totally brown, just the tiniest little black head end and tiniest little black tail end. If I am following my directions properly on reading the woolly bears ( just the single only one I saw this time), then winter should start very early and end very late. Winter has already started very early, and if the last major snowstorm is sometime in May here in lower Michigan, I would call that ” very late” for here in lower Michigan.
So we’ll see.