by Owen | 1246, 12 Apr 24 | Foreign Affairs, Military, Technology | 0 Comments
If this isn’t a statement about the burden imposed by government bureaucracy, then I don’t know what is.
The laser was originally expected to be operational by 2032, but new reforms intended to speed up government procurement of weapons mean that it will now be ready five years earlier.
by Owen | 1006, 30 Mar 24 | Foreign Affairs, Politics | 0 Comments
China has one of the most ubiquitous and aggressive surveillance machines in the world. There is no way this is happening without the support of the CCP.
There have been more than 22,000 encounters of Chinese nationals at the southern border since Oct. 1, a massive increase from the 2,176 encountered in federal fiscal year 2022 and the 450 encountered in fiscal year 2021.
[…]
The man’s account on Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok, shows his family in China on the way to the airport. He said he collected information from online sources to learn how to make it to the U.S., including information about routes, border navigation and ways to dispose of information to avoid having your origin traced. Additionally, many people “vlog” about their journey on Chinese social media apps to get in contact with other Chinese nationals already in the U.S. who can help find them jobs and a place to live.
He said his family left China in January and traveled first to Thailand (with a transfer in Bahrain) before going through Morocco (with a transfer in Spain), Ecuador, Colombia, Panama, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Honduras, Guatemala and Mexico.
by Owen | 1002, 30 Mar 24 | Foreign Affairs, Military, Politics | 0 Comments
Good.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The U.S. in recent days authorized the transfer of billions of dollars worth of bombs and fighter jets to Israel, two sources familiar with the effort said on Friday, even as Washington publicly expresses concerns about an anticipated Israeli military offensive in Rafah.
The new arms packages include more than 1,800 MK84 2,000-pound bombs and 500 MK82 500-pound bombs, said the sources, who confirmed a report in the Washington Post.
Washington gives $3.8 billion in annual military assistance to Israel, its longtime ally.
The package comes as Israel faces strong international criticism over its continued bombing campaign and ground offensive in Gaza and as some members of President Joe Biden’s party call for him to cut U.S. military aid.
by Owen | 2103, 21 Mar 24 | Foreign Affairs, Politics | 0 Comments
This is a disgrace. That’s not a ceasefire. It’s a surrender.
On Thursday, the United States ended decades of stalwart support for Israel in the United Nations Security Council, submitting a draft resolution that calls for an immediate ceasefire between Israel and Hamas in Gaza.
The U.S., which negotiated the language of the proposed resolution with the governments of Egypt and Qatar, seeks to have the Security Council vote on it on Friday.
An earlier version of the resolution that was circulated earlier in the day Thursday linked the cessation of fighting with the release of hostages held in Gaza by Hamas, the Associated Press reported. The latest revision, however, makes no such precondition for “the imperative of an immediate and sustained cease-fire.”
In February, the U.S. was the only nation on the Security Council to veto a similar resolution, saying that calling for an immediate end to military hostilities would imperil hostage negotiations.
by Owen | 0742, 21 Mar 24 | Foreign Affairs, Military | 0 Comments
Ya know… there is a way to prevent this. Hamas could surrender.
The doctors warned about a potential “bloodbath” with “apocalyptic” consequences if Israel carries out its planned invasion of Rafah, a southern city by the border with Egypt where over 1.5 million displaced civilians are currently taking refuge.
“This is probably the worst crisis that can happen within this war,” Sahloul said.
[…]
Although international leaders, including U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, have publicly shared their concerns, a senior Israeli official told ABC News on Wednesday that “there is no world” in which Israel does not go ahead with its Rafah offensive, a military operation they claim will destroy the last battalions of Hamas left in the south.
The doctors affirmed that the situation is already dire and called for a cease-fire.
Frankly, Israel’s care to provide paths to safety, warnings, and humanitarian care for civilians as they prosecute the war is admirable. They do it at great risk to themselves and knowing that their enemy would not – has not – do the same for them. Hamas has a long history of using civilians as shields. There is one reason that civilian Gazans continue to be in the middle of a war. That reason is Hamas.
by Owen | 0738, 18 Mar 24 | Foreign Affairs, Politics | 0 Comments
“Foreign policy was not, therefore, a contest of good vs. evil. To condemn negotiations as appeasement, Kennan told a Princeton University audience early in October, was to end a Hollywood movie with the villain shot. To entrust diplomacy to lawyers was to relegate power, ‘like sex, to a realm in which we see it only occasionally, and then in a highly sublimated and presentable form.’ Both approaches ignored the fact that most international conflicts were ‘jams that people have gotten themselves into.’ Trying to resolve them through rigid standards risked making things worse. Evil existed, to be sure: the Soviet regime reflected it, as had Nazi Germany. Sometimes you had to fight it, sometimes you had to deal with it. The important question was ‘what sort of compromises we make,’ not how to ‘escape altogether the necessity of making such compromises.'”
by Owen | 2010, 17 Mar 24 | Foreign Affairs, Politics | 0 Comments
It’s laughable but carries a warning we should heed.
Vladimir Putin was always going to claim his fifth term as president with a landslide, faced with three other candidates all rubber-stamped by the Kremlin.
But when election officials said results gave him more than 87% of the vote, he said Russia’s democracy was more transparent than many in the West.
In truth no credible opposition candidate was allowed to stand.
We laugh and scorn Putin because we believe this to have been an illegitimate election. Without the consent of the governed as conferred through a fair and legitimate election, Putin’s office lacks legitimacy. Putin lacks legitimacy.
The same is true in America. As our elections become slipshod and the current administration is attempting to imprison bona fide political opponents, our leaders and our government becomes illegitimate. We are not yet near the laughable status of a Russian election, but it’s a spectrum – not a point.
by Owen | 2007, 16 Mar 24 | Foreign Affairs, Politics | 5 Comments
Huh. It’s almost as if Israel is a sovereign nation fighting an existential threat and isn’t concerned with the ravings of a senile American president and his domestic political concerns.
WASHINGTON — The White House is considering options for how to respond if Israel defies President Joe Biden’s repeated warnings against launching a military invasion of Rafah without a credible plan to protect Palestinian civilians, according to one former and three current U.S. officials.
The discussions are taking place amid growing concern in the administration and frustration among congressional Democrats that the president’s pleas will simply be ignored. Israel this week inched closer to initiating an incursion into the southernmost city in the Gaza Strip.
“Time and again, President Biden calls upon the Netanyahu government to take certain actions, and for the most part, time and again, [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu ignores the president of the United States. And so I think that makes the United States look ineffective,” said Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., in an interview.
by Owen | 1848, 14 Mar 24 | Foreign Affairs, Politics | 0 Comments
He hasn’t done enough to screw up our country so he has to meddle in Israel? If a foreign leader were calling shots in America, we’d be livid. Rightly so. What’s Hebrew for, “go f*** yourself?”
US Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer has called for new elections in Israel, accusing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of prioritising his “political survival” above the country.
Mr Schumer, a Democrat and the highest-ranking Jewish official in the US, said Mr Netanyahu had “lost his way”.
He warned that huge civilian casualties in Gaza risked alienating allies and turning Israel into a global “pariah”.
It is a sharp escalation in US criticism of Mr Netanyahu’s government.
by Owen | 0800, 11 Mar 24 | Foreign Affairs | 9 Comments
I do seem to remember that our president said there would be a ceasefire by today. No?
RAFAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — Palestinians began fasting for Ramadan on Monday as the Muslim holy month arrived with cease-fire talks at a standstill, hunger worsening across the Gaza Strip and no end in sight to the five-month-old war between Israel and Hamas.
[…]
Hamas is demanding guarantees that any such agreement will lead to an end to the war, while Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to continue the offensive until “total victory” against the militant group and the release of all the remaining hostages.
The war began when Hamas-led militants stormed into southern Israel on Oct. 7, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and taking around 250 hostage. Hamas is still believed to be holding around 100 captives and the remains of 30 others following an exchange last year.
[…]
The United States and other countries have begun airdropping aid in recent days, but humanitarian groups say such efforts are costly and insufficient. The U.S. military has also begun transporting equipment to build a sea bridge to deliver aid, but it will likely be several weeks before it is operational.
A ship belonging to Spanish aid group Open Arms carrying 200 tons of food aid was expected to make a pilot voyage to Gaza from nearby Cyprus, though it was not clear when it would depart. Israel says it welcomes the sea deliveries and will inspect Gaza-bound cargo before it leaves Cyprus.
The ship in Cyprus is expected to take two to three days to arrive at an undisclosed location in Gaza. The food is being supplied by the World Central Kitchen, a U.S. charity founded by celebrity chef José Andrés, which said contruction work on a jetty in Gaza began Sunday. Once the ship reaches Gaza, aid will be offloaded by a crane, placed on trucks and driven north.
And do you notice that, once again, it is the Americans and the Europeans extending their money and their hearts with humanitarian aid? Where are the lorries and air drops full of aid from Egypt? Saudi? UAE? Iraq? JORDAN!? Syria? Lebanon? Libya? Algeria? Pakistan? Qatar? Kuwait? Turkey? Indonesia?
Are all of those countries willing to watch their Palestinian brothers die for the cause? Yes. Yes, they are.
by Owen | 0743, 11 Mar 24 | Foreign Affairs | 1 Comment
The US has deployed Marines to evacuate its embassy in Haiti as local gangs continue to attack state institutions.
The operation, which occurred early Sunday, serves as the latest sign of Haiti’s societal troubles, as locals in its capital continue to report the overwhelming stench of the dead.
Violence in the Caribbean country broke out out this past week, and has since threatened to bring down the local government.
Gangs across the country continue to unite, causing thousands to flee their homes.
Politicians across the region are scrambling for a solution, as dogs have been seen gnawing on the unaddressed dead, and bodies are burned in the streets.
The neighborhood around the embassy in the capital, Port-au-Prince, has been one of the hardest-hit, hence the recent operation. Its success was revealed in a statement from the US military’s Southern Command later in the day.
by Owen | 1124, 9 Mar 24 | Foreign Affairs, Military, Politics | 0 Comments
Why is this a revelation? We have a rogue nuclear power going to war against an enemy who difficult to defeat by conventional means. If the U.S. had not game played and prepared for the possibility of nuclear war, it would have been a derelict of duty.
In late 2022, the US began “preparing rigorously” for Russia potentially striking Ukraine with a nuclear weapon, in what would have been the first nuclear attack in war since the US dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki nearly eighty years before, two senior administration officials told CNN.
The Biden administration was specifically concerned Russia might use a tactical or battlefield nuclear weapon, the officials said.
I first reported US officials were worried about Russia using a tactical nuclear weapon in 2022, but in my new book, “The Return of Great Powers” publishing on March 12, I reveal exclusive details on the unprecedented level of contingency planning carried out as senior members of the Biden administration became increasingly alarmed by the situation.
by Owen | 1539, 7 Mar 24 | Foreign Affairs, Politics | 3 Comments
Hey, we’re broke. Someone else is going to have to pick up some of the tab for a while.
While an American role as the “world’s policeman” has become an increasingly contentious partisan issue, a majority of both Democrats and Republicans agree that the U.S. should not get more involved than it currently is in the ongoing conflicts between Russia and Ukraine and Israel and Hamas.
The poll shows that 4 in 10 U.S. adults want America to broadly take a “less active” role in solving global conflicts. Only about one-quarter think the U.S. should take a more active role, and about one-third say its current role is about right.
[…]
Where the U.S. should be focusing its international military resources is also a subject of debate, with Republicans and Democrats disagreeing over whether the nation should be taking a more active role in the war between Ukraine and Russia or the war between Israel and Hamas.
Among U.S. adults overall, there isn’t much appetite for a more active role in either conflict: Only about 2 in 10 U.S. adults say the U.S. should be taking a more active role in each war. For each, about 4 in 10 say the current role is about right, and 36% say the U.S. needs to take a step back.
But Republicans and independents are more likely than Democrats to say that the U.S. should dial down its support for Ukraine. About half of Republicans and independents want the U.S. to take a less active role in the war between Ukraine and Russia, compared to only 18% of Democrats.
by Owen | 1905, 3 Mar 24 | Foreign Affairs, Politics | 1 Comment
Dead Jews are a price that Biden/Harris is willing to pay for reelection.
Vice President Kamala Harris has broken with President Joe Biden to call for ‘an immediate ceasefire’ in Gaza.
[…]
‘Before I begin I must address the humanitarian crisis in Gaza,’ Harris said. ‘What we are seeing every day in Gaza is devastating.’
Citing the ‘immense scale of suffering’ in the war-torn nation, she stressed ‘there must be an immediate ceasefire for at least the next six weeks’.
‘This will get the hostages out and get a significant amount of aid in. This will allow us to build something more enduring to ensure Israel is secure and to respect the right of Palestinian people to dignity, freedom and self-determination,’ Harris said.
Her comments mark a departure from the more cautious approach so far favored by Biden, as he struggles to strike a balance between the US’ role as an ally to Israel, with growing international outrage over its bombing of Gaza.
I highly doubt that this is a break with Biden. This is a strategy for the Biden Administration to try to appease two conflicting Democratic constituencies.
by Owen | 0945, 24 Feb 24 | Foreign Affairs, Politics | 0 Comments
Of course the timing is intentional. Biden had three years to change this policy and chose this moment because his is bleeding Islamist support in the battleground states of Michigan and Minnesota. Biden doesn’t mind dead Jews in the Holy Land if it means him retaining power.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Biden administration on Friday restored a U.S. legal finding dating back nearly 50 years that Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories are “illegitimate” under international law.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the U.S. believes settlements are inconsistent with Israel’s obligations, reversing a determination made by his predecessor, Mike Pompeo, in the Biden administration’s latest shift away from the pro-Israel policies pursued by former President Donald Trump.
Blinken’s comments came in response to a reporter’s question about an announcement that Israel would build more than 3,300 new homes in West Bank settlements as a riposte to a fatal Palestinian shooting attack.
It wasn’t clear why Blinken chose this moment, more than three years into his tenure, to reverse Pompeo’s decision. But it came at a time of growing U.S.-Israeli tensions over the war in Gaza, with the latest settlement announcement only adding to the strain. It also came as the United Nations’ highest court, the International Court of Justice, is holding hearings into the legality of the Israeli occupation.
by Owen | 0723, 15 Feb 24 | Economy, Foreign Affairs | 0 Comments
Oof.
Japan’s economy dipped into a technical recession, after unexpectedly contracting again in the October-December period, provisional government data showed Thursday. High inflation crimped domestic demand and private consumption in what’s now the world’s fourth-largest economy.
The latest gross domestic product print complicates the case for interest rate normalization for Bank of Japan Governor Kazuo Ueda and fiscal policy support for Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida. It also means Germany took Japan’s place as the third-largest economy in the world last year in dollar terms.
Provisional gross domestic product contracted 0.4% in the fourth quarter compared with a year ago, after a revised 3.3% slump in the July-September period. This was way below the median estimate for 1.4% growth in a Reuters poll among economists. The GDP deflator in the fourth quarter stood at 3.8% on an annualized basis.
The Japanese economy also contracted 0.1% in the fourth quarter from the previous quarter, after shrinking a revised 0.8% in the third quarter from the second. This was also weaker than expectations for 0.3% expansion.
by Owen | 1802, 28 Jan 24 | Foreign Affairs | 1 Comment
While we should avenge the deaths of our own, we also shouldn’t take the bait. It is clear that with the escalations in Yemen and now here, that Iran is trying very hard to pull Western powers into another war in the Middle East. Iran wants to rally the Muslim nations and assume the ascendency of those forces. This is about an Iranian power play for supremacy in their region. Let’s not spill anymore American blood on it. But hey… I’m just a dude with a blog.
COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — President Joe Biden said Sunday that the U.S. “shall respond” after three American troops were killed and dozens more were injured in an overnight drone strike in northeast Jordan near the Syrian border. Biden blamed Iran-backed militias for the first U.S. fatalities after months of strikes by such groups against American forces across the Middle East since the start of the Israel-Hamas war.
[…]
With an increasing risk of military escalation in the region, U.S. officials were working to conclusively identify the precise group responsible for the attack, but they have assessed that one of several Iranian-backed groups was behind it.
Biden said in a written statement that the United States “will hold all those responsible to account at a time and in a manner (of) our choosing.” Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said “we will take all necessary actions to defend the United States, our troops, and our interests.”
by Owen | 2056, 19 Jan 24 | Culture, Foreign Affairs | 0 Comments
I truly pray that this is, or becomes, the prevailing view of Gazans. I fear, however, that it is a tiny minority.
“We are displaced here in Rafah and before that [we were] in Khan Younis. We have no money and no home, the unstoppable wars between Hamas and Israel have destroyed our lives.”
A businessman called Mohammed agreed.
“We have lived under unjust rule for more than 16 years. Hamas imposed heavy taxes on us and now they have dragged us into a devastating war in which we lost our property, money and homes,” he told the BBC.
“I used to live in a good house and work in trade. Now what will we do? The crossings are closed, the company has been destroyed, and the house is not fit for habitation due to the destruction.
“The worst thing that could happen to us is that we return under Hamas rule when the war ends.”
by Owen | 1908, 18 Jan 24 | Foreign Affairs | 0 Comments
He’s right. For all practical purposes, the Palestinians had their own state in Gaza. They were self-governing and left alone by Israel except on their borders. And look what happened… The Palestinians have demonstrated that they will never be satisfied until all of the Jews are dead and Israel doesn’t exist. That will not change if they are given a patch of land from which to launch attacks.
Israel’s allies, including the US – and many of its foes – have urged a revival of the long-dormant “two-state solution”, in which a future Palestinian state would sit side-by-side with an Israeli one.
The hope in many circles is that the current crisis could force the warring parties back to diplomacy, as the only viable alternative to endless cycles of violence. But from Mr Netanyahu’s comments, his intention appears quite the opposite.
During Thursday’s news conference, he said Israel must have security control over all land west of the River Jordan, which would include the territory of any future Palestinian state.
“This is a necessary condition, and it conflicts with the idea of (Palestinian) sovereignty. What to do? I tell this truth to our American friends, and I also stopped the attempt to impose a reality on us that would harm Israel’s security,” he said.
by Owen | 0931, 31 Dec 23 | Foreign Affairs, Military, Politics | 4 Comments
Um… we appear to be in yet another war. May our servicepeople stay safe.
Four vessels from Houthi-controlled areas in Yemen fired upon the Maersk Hangzhou and got within metres of the ship, the US military said.
Helicopters from nearby US warships responded to a distress call – and, after being fired upon, sank three boats “in self-defence”.
The crews were killed and the fourth boat fled the area.
