Friday, April 17, 2020

NASA announces first SpaceX crewed flight for May 27

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US alerted Israel, NATO to disease outbreak in China in November — TV report

Times Of Israel.
US intelligence agencies alerted Israel to the coronavirus outbreak in China already in November, Israeli television reported Thursday.

According to Channel 12 news, the US intelligence community became aware of the emerging disease in Wuhan in the second week of that month and drew up a classified document.

Information on the disease outbreak was not in the public domain at that stage — and was known only apparently to the Chinese government.
Story here. 

Pundits on MSNBC have switched up their talking points.  They're saying that we must have a day of reckoning with China but for now we need to work with them.

In light of this report, we can assume that the timelines we've been fed are all wrong.

Why?

I'm guessing because the US govt doesn't want to reveal how solid our monitoring efforts are inside China.

It also explains why we didn't see stockpiling toward the end of the year.

That would have given away the game.  It would reveal that we knew that they had an outbreak inside their country (additionally analysts could have thought that the Chinese would be able to contain it).

Either way.

China needs to be made to pay.

A couple of other things come to mind.

1.  We heard early on (but haven't since) that their were two strains of this virus.  Is that still applicable?  Could that explain why we're seeing so many deaths in one European country and just a few in another?

2. 
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If this is true then the points of failure in the Coronavirus response are legion....



November?

US intel knew about this thing in November (assuming this is true).  I'm trying to remember when this blog got hot on the outbreak.  If I'm remembering correctly it was mid Jan....maybe toward the end.

I don't have access to the Chinese internet and I only use open source free nation media.

Thinking a bit more about this issue.  We'll never know the real truth behind this thing.

It would require us to access classified intel assessments of the situation that our agencies saw inside China in the Nov-Jan timeframe.

Those assessments could give a clue on how good our survelliance is.
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Open Comment Post. 17 Apr 2020





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South Korean Army buys armored and non-armored tactical trucks from Kia Motors



Story here.
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Rolling Airframe Missile Launch....Photos by Petty Officer 1st Class Andrew Gordon






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ARG MEU teams assure allies and deter adversaries....Video by Cpl. Gumchol Cho



Title correction on an otherwise "nicely done" video.  The title should read...the CURRENT (LEGACY) ARG MEU teams assure allies and deter adversaries.

The future ARG MEU will just be a bitched up raid force providing supporting fires for a sea battle they can't even reach to influence.

How are they actually proposing that the Marine Corps goes from a "force in readiness", "forcible entry from the sea" specialists, medium weight force that can flex up and down the spectrum of combat over to an island defense force focused on missile fire/aviation?

HQMC fucked up the future concept beyond recognition.
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Xi fears Japan-led manufacturing exodus from China



BEAUTIFUL!
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Thursday, April 16, 2020

LtCol steps into the breach. Says Special Operations Forces are "special" not "elite" (the wording is important!)

via Business Insider.
The word "elite" should never be used to describe SOF, because SOF are special, not elite.

While "special" and "elite" may be conflated in casual conversation, they do not mean the same thing. Elite implies better, whereas special is different. To say that SOF is better raises the question, for what purpose?

-------------------------

Not only is the "elite" description of SOF incorrect, it is potentially dangerous. Over investment in SOF at the expense of conventional military forces would cause degradation in priority mission areas, including those normally assigned to SOF. USSOCOM is guided by the "SOF Truths," the fifth of which states "most special operations require non-SOF assistance."

The mission that killed ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in Syria in 2019 and hundreds more like it could not have been possible without robust support from conventional ground, air, maritime, space, cyber, and logistics capabilities. Conceiving of SOF as elite could also lead to assigning SOF missions that would be better suited for conventional forces, which could lead to mission failure.

Furthermore, the term "elite" is dangerous because self-perceptions of elite-ness can lead to unhealthy hubris among SOF personnel. Those who feel elite may believe they are entitled to act outside the law, or that they are exempt from military standards of discipline.
Here. 

Wow.

This dude just fast tracked himself to his first star or he's effectively ended his career.

Either way this is a great read and touches on many issues that JSOC should take under advisement.

For better or worse, America has tired of these small wars.  SOCOM hasn't delivered the win and we appear to engaging in military operations just to engage in military operations.

Either our Special Ops Forces adapt to the changing environment or they'll find themselves cut back dramatically (probably not a bad idea...have thought for a long time that we have excess capacity).
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Che Guevara...war criminal?

This photo won the Pulitzer.
A priest giving the last blessing, to a Cuban peasant owner of his land, who refused to work for the Castrista Regime..
He was shot without the right to defend himself by order of "Che Guevara".
But this picture you'll never see on a t-shirt. via UncleSam'sMisguidedChildren Instagram Page...

Just wow.

I've never really dug into the Che Guevara story but I do see alot of 20 somethings wearing his face on their t-shirts.  I've seen posters hanging up in stores too.

I posted this without verifying it so it could be pure ka - ka...I don't know.  What I do know is that if this is true then this dude is a damn criminal...murder...bastard. Definitely not someone that should be celebrated. 

Just plain wow.  God bless this dude's soul.  I hope he's resting in peace.

This does bring up another issue.  This peasant represents so many.  The little guys always get steamrolled no matter who's in charge.  

 Orwell had it so right when he penned "Animal Farm".
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Trump's 3 phase reopening of the United States Of America...






Perfection.

Maybe not good for our European or Asian allies but perfect for the USA.

We have a plan.

Let's get going!
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China is feeling our pain...



I'd bet their economy shrank more than that! China will not escape the pain of this thing.  They can lie about the number of infected and killed but the economic data (internally) can't be denied even if they continue to lie to the world.

IF we had the right mindset and the strength of conviction to do the hard thing we would collectively see this as our moment to get our house in order and put them back in their cage.

I'm hopeful but confidence is not high.  Too many weak spirited souls.  Too many are infected not by the coronavirus by by normalcy bias.

So many want to return to the status quo that they can't see the possibilities for a positive rebalance of our relations with China.

Pity.

This crisis is giving us an opportunity.  We should seize it, not squander it.

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