Blog

About Bloody Time They Let Him Go…BUT…

About Bloody Time They Let Him Go…BUT…

About Bloody Time,” the common Aussie utters to the news that Assange is now free.

They are letting Assange go free, to return to Australia. The condition was that he had to reach a plea deal. Admit he was guilty. A compromise that removes a man from his legal limbo, releases him from the worst of British prisons and allows him to be with his family. What does it mean for the future of journalism? Can a government now pick and choose which authors, podcasters, journalists it likes and seeks to prosecute under its own laws. Let’s not forget that Assange is an Australian citizen, being pursued by the US government using its own laws for a man who was not on their soil when he received the information, he was not even the first to publish it and now he resides in prison in the UK. Is it just American exceptionalism or will it be possible for other nations to do much the same? Can any offended national government pursue anyone in the world ‘legally’ now?

“The end has not arrived”, Australian politician Barnaby Joyce warns over the conditions of the plea deal, “We still need to be cautious.” Assange must plea to the felony charges on US soil. There is still a risk to him. If the US nabs him on their soil. Then what? The Australian government will flip up it’s skirt and present it’s rear again. Memories of 1975 and Whitlam lingering in every Australian PM’s mind, though the current viceroy to the US empire is not Gough Whitlam. He is just another flab in a suit that promises other peoples money, an Australian PM through and through. The rest of the world will do what? Say some words?

With nations like the Ukraine conjuring up enemy lists, executing some of those on it, journalists that it deems as misinformation agents we can see the malicious nature of government in its pursuit over the control of information. Will nations openly act as the Mexican narco-terrorists have and pursue journalists with murderous intent, dare I mention how the Saudi Kingdom brutally murdered Jamal Khashoggi. Not to mention the US assassination of Anwar al-Awklai because of words he wrote and said, they even murdered his teenage son. Both US citizens. In Palestine the IDF has made it a practice of killing journalists who are sharing the reality on the ground in that genocide. It’s all so normal to see another dead journalist along with rows of murdered babies.

It is a dangerous place for those reporting on injustice and war. Those who dare to represent the innocent and speak up against power, those who expose the violence and horrors. This has always been the case, no amount of legalese or civilised back patting has changed any of that. Now, we see a plea deal made between the most famous journalist in history with the same government that he had he helped expose murdering Reuters journalists and civilians in Iraq. Assange’s crime is journalism. A precedent may be set where governments can negotiate and agree to co-operate when it comes to punishing, imprisoning and killing journalists. Information and freedom of speech suffocated all the more.

They say the pen is mightier than the sword. The sword takes life, the pen only reports on it. Those who wield the sword and serve the masters of death and tyranny will eagerly stab any and everything that they are paid to. The people, the billions who feel powerless are mightier than the sword wielders and their masters. History is rife with the common person refusing, standing up and like cowards the armed and trained flee, those who are protected by them cower and hide. The journalists, the reporter, writer and those sharing the truths of savagery are just putting words to paper and on screens. What is done with that information is for the reader, those who are informed and aware. The truth can only inspire rebellion and revolution, the spirit needs to already exist.

The Gordon Gecko communists pretend to hate corporations, yet most seek work inside of them. The anti-fascists are happy to work for the government. Many kid themselves that they care about justice, yet when injustice is before them they shrug. Most claim to know politicians lie and are corrupt yet believe the promises and vote in each election. The curtain between us and the mad wizard is not emerald green but clear plastic, we can see him dancing in the nude. Yet we continue to follow that yellow brick road regardless.

Assange is now free. But are we?

June 2024

The Continuing US Icebreaker Fiasco

icebreaker

There will be no more new US icebreakers.

There is no capability in the manufacturing base.

There are no industrial design talent stacks or ability to build icebreakers that work under government contracts. The shipyard throughput is a little above zero.

The Arctic is a Russian lake.

What’s my evidence?

Coast Guard and Navy estimates of PSC procurement costs have increased about 39% since the April 2019 PSC program contract award. Another oversight issue for Congress concerns schedule delay in the PSC program. The Coast Guard originally aimed to have the first PSC delivered in 2024, but the ship’s estimated delivery date has been delayed repeatedly and is now expected to occur no earlier than FY2029.

***

How fully developed was Polarstern II’s design at the time that it was adopted as the parent design for developing the PSC design? How much of Polarstern II’s detail design and construction plan was completed at that time? Again, the US government is green-lighting concurrent technology inputs (not mature at time of design) and even worse, not completing the design before building begins. More extracts and further reading in the 2024 GAP study:

Article:

https://news.usni.org/2024/05/24/report-to-congress-on-polar-security-cutter-program-2

GAO Study:

https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/24682217/coast-guard-polar-security-cutter-polar-icebreaker-program-background-and-issues-for-congress-may-22-2024.pdf

My Substack

Email me at cgpodcast@pm.me.

Kyle Anzalone on the Tom Woods Show!

Our very own news editor Kyle Anzalone has hit the Big Time. Check out his first (but surely not last) appearance on the Tom Woods Show, where he discussed all the latest in foreign policy news, from the Middle East to Eastern Europe.

The Yemeni Mouse That Roared

houthi anti ship missile arsenal asef

The picture above is the anti-ship missile employed by the Houthi in Yemen.

American taxpayers have spent hundreds of billions of dollars on the world’s most advanced naval force.

The U.S.-led campaign against the Houthi rebels, overshadowed by the Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip, has turned into the most intense running sea battle the Navy has faced since World War II, its leaders and experts told The Associated Press.

Most intense US naval combat since 1945.

1945.

The Osa class is probably the most numerous class of missile boats ever built, with over 400 vessels constructed between 1960 and 1973 for both the Soviet Navy and for export to allied countries.

Per the Tarantul, built between 1979 and 1984, 13 ships of the type were built.

Here’s the naval threat from Yemen:

screenshot 2024 06 21 at 13 10 35 yemeni navy wikipedia

Need I say more…

https://apnews.com/article/us-navy-yemen-houthis-israel-war-7a9997f9d84ac669fae69ecf819913fb

My Substack

Email me at cgpodcast@pm.me.

American Zampolit: The Coprophilia Military Media Complex

dogsoldier2

The Modern War Institute at West Point, like the War on the Rocks website, has been institutionally captured by a curious hybrid of left-wing culture warriors and the neoconservative “war on the world” fetishists. I used to have great admiration for a considerable part of the intellectual heavy-lifting performed by magazines like the Army War College quarterly Parameters along with others but over the last decade there has been a shift of using these journals and websites not for critical renditions and examinations but over-priced sewing circles to provide public relations cover for whatever fashionable social science experiment they’re embarking on that day.

Much like the Zampolit political commissars in the armies of the USSR, this is no different. The apolitical nature of the western officer corps has been a positive attribute and this current alphabet people political jeremiad will destroy that barrier.

None of this ends well.

Keep in mind, all of this performative political theater is being done at the same time the various elements of the US armed forces are materially and intellectually stunted and atrophying. In this essay, we have fashionable intellectual gyrations to rationalize why affirmation and approval of people’s sexual peccadilloes and mental illness can never by confronted or condemned but only celebrated to avoid looking like a neanderthal. Yet another form of institutional rake-stomping to add to the quiver of a Sovietized acquisition system, a dysfunctional manufacturing base and a training regimen that prioritizes fanciful imperial conditioning of the mind over actual war-fighting skill-sets.

Increasing queer visibility in such a manner would be beneficial to public perception of the military and LGBTQ+ service members alike. It would demonstrate that although LGBTQ+ individuals share different interests and experiences, they are just as committed to the Army’s mission and contribute just as much as their straight colleagues to the organization’s success. To some, these changes may seem inconsequential, but they reflect a monumental shift in both awareness of and appreciation for the service of LGBTQ+ soldiers.

You will note this isn’t about acceptance but affirmation and approval. None of this has a single thing to do with making military formations win conflicts.

You can look through the mountains of officially produced military scholarship and journalism in the 21st century and you won’t find a single probe of the possible downsides of expanding the portfolio of combat to extra-masculine entities like women and alphabet people. I am receptive to any reader who can correct this and provide me with an officially sanctioned media item that assesses the issue with intellectual honesty from the last quarter century.

Here’s a lovely gem of gaslighting from 2020 in military journalism (no comments permitted of course).

Those barking seals you see clapping in the picture below are part of the political indoctrination and behavior you must demonstrate to have a professional career in today’s US military which must take a knee to whatever government supremacist totems and accredited victim groups are erected at the moment.

Commenter John Smith observes:

“[C]ommanders’ consistent public affirmation of LGBTQ+ support and repudiation of the “hetero-masculine” military culture…”

Everything from courage, bravery, sacrifice are often indistinguishable with masculinity and have been since time immemorial not just in the western world but across the planet that goes down the drain with this particular course of action.
Even by historic standards the inclusiveness of fighting forces only stretched far enough to include homosexual/bisexual men who regardless of their sexual proclivities embodied the values expected of a war fighter.
Also implicitly alleging the “heteromasculinity” of active duty service members as problematic and something to be eradicated to fit the preferences of a negligible minority at the expense of a serving majority reeks of the kind of partisan behavior that can upset the cohesiveness of a unit.

Commenter Patrick Smith summed it up nicely:

I actually thought this was a parody of what a woken institution attempting to meet recruiting goals might attempt or the author’s attempt to be academically accepted into current mainstream academic circles. That this is presented as a serious work of scholarly research is such a derogatory statement about the profession of arms, institutional management, and cultural descent of the national environment is unfortunately illustrative of where we are at as a nation.

Smith? Hmm, anonymity may be necessary.

The American imperial experiment is coming undone in myriad ways and this particular political seppuku is a wonder to behold.

LGBTQ+ Inclusion and Military Professionalism

My Substack

Email me at cgpodcast@pm.me

 

KC-46A Pegasus Refueler Failure Continues

kc46

One of the components of American strategic projection has been the world’s most prodigious and sophisticated aerial refueling fleet.

There are currently approx 400+ KC-135s capable of refueling two receiver aircraft at the same time in the current USAF fleet. The first operational flight was 1956. The last KC-135 was delivered to the Air Force in 1965. Of the original KC-135As, more than 417 were modified with new CFM-56 engines produced by CFM-International.

The newest KC-135 air-frame is 59 years old.

Fifty nine years old.

The retirement of the KC-135 has been anticipated and the replacement has been the disastrous KC-46A Pegasus Tanker Modernization Program which has had significant problems to include video control of the fuel boom difficulties and believe it or not, a refueling system that leaks fuel and the usual circus of missing deadlines so typical of DoD programs.

The Boeing KC-46A Pegasus has performed in the same way one would expect in the 21st century: over-budget, way past promised deadlines and rife with problems that should ground the aircraft.The next near-peer or peer contested fight will decimate the refueling fleet if the aircraft are used in the fight and the KC-46 is not ready for prime-time.

You are watching a unique capability die in real time. No one else on Earth has this. The upside is making imperial war-making even more problematic in the future.

According to the GAO report, the Air Force’s KC-46A Tanker Modernization Program has been further delayed because of issues with delivering wing aerial refueling pods and issues with the boom. The report notes that the program has already been delayed by 76 months (over six years).

The program is also at risk of continuing delays due to “ongoing problems with maturing three critical technologies related to the redesigned RVS—a set of visible and long-wave infrared boom cameras and the primary display.”

According to the DoD, “The KC-46A will be equipped with a modernized KC-10 refueling boom integrated with a fly-by-wire control system and will be capable of delivering a fuel offload rate required for large aircraft. Furthermore, a hose and drogue system will add additional mission capability which will be independently operable from the refueling boom system.”

https://simpleflying.com/us-air-force-kc-46a-tanker-modernization-delayed-wing-aerial-refueling/

My Substack

Email me at cgpodcast@pm.me

No Longer Born to Kill – Anti-War Blog

No Longer Born to Kill – Anti-War Blog

Recently Amazon removed the “Born to Kill,” from Jokers helmet for the film Full Metal Jacket. The words sit alongside the peace emblem on his steel helmet and makes for an iconic film poster. So it once did. The words perhaps too violent for modern audiences according to the corporate minds of Amazon or maybe it was just a stylistic choice. But also everything is meant to be child friendly now. The duality of man no longer stands to mean a thing, Stanley Kubrick’s visual representation of war and the brutality that it unleashes may some day soon receive it’s own editing.

Oliver Stone achieved a similar example of the complex nature of man in war with Elias, Barnes and Chris in his film Platoon. In Barnes we have the ruthless killer, perhaps the perfect warrior who is indifferent to the aims of the war other than in the killing of the enemy, civilians included. Elias is the paternal guide who instructs the youth, Chris how to live and survive. He wages the war with dignity and is the light of morality despite the wars darkness. Chris is the insert for the rest of us, the virgin taken into the jungles to be blooded and not die. As Chris remarks in the closing monologue, both men are fighting over the possession of his soul. It is a duality that marks the essence of the film itself.

Nuance is lost now, the subtext and layers that characters and moments may reveal seems to be expressed in Ahego face or like in Anime with thoughts screamed out so that the audience may be aware of what emotions are to be shed. Characters are cosplaying actors, defined by gender and costumes rather than any unique essence or dare I repeat the word, character. Underlying meaning and attention to detail slowly evaporated with slight edits and re-imagines. Joker can be both a killer, comedian and express a morality absent among his peers in Full Metal Jacket.

The violent sexuality of the soldiers as they penetrate the female Viet Cong sniper with their bullets likely too obscene to be seen by a culture that remains indifferent to real war. The re-enactment of the My Lai massacre in Platoon seemingly a fiction and not a representation of reality. Men of war can be complicated, comrades, smiling, gentle, kind, familiar and yet capable of such violence. The nature of war mutates morality into a series of objectives, above all survival. We are allowed to see the dramatisation of this in cinema, feel repulsed by it even aroused.

Cinema can be both pornographic and absurd, it’s extremes are meant to do more than just entertain or stand as art. The invoking of our thoughts and emotions is crucial to the very essence of character and story. Except both are becoming rare. The audience for the most part seems to have lost the will to explore outside of what lingers on a streaming service or the popcorn presentations that run through their minds like an amusement park ride they occasionally visit. The films that once did have substance now run the risk of becoming adapted for modern audiences, meaning edited so that child brains are capable of ‘enjoying’ them. But we don’t have a choice in the matter, outside of owning physical media. We are all condemned to be child like in our ability to discern what we can and can not watch. As always Helen Lovejoy screaming in the background, “Won’t somebody think of the children?”

Not everything is made for everyone, that is what makes cinema or art in general beautiful. We are taken into a world that is at times unrelatable but a depiction of what many have been forced to experience. We can sit as voyeurs or attach ourselves to a character, sharing in their moments. We need not agree with what they do. We see how situations may steer decisions and actions or even inaction. The random reckless violence of war taking a character we may be fond of or barely sparing our hero. Though they may survive, they never leave the war entirely.

War is repulsive in film, even when it’s complicated and made to seem glorious. We see the misery and fear, propaganda struggles to omit it from our senses. Then when we do have a film made as a statement, created to remind us of what war does to men and civilians, it no longer is sacred. Instead it can become another property to be hacked to pieces. Cynically this is not even done to preserve the status quo or even to promote the next war. It’s done because the audience themselves seems to have abandoned cinema, art and intellect. The corporate types respond accordingly and so here we are. In an age of immature spectators and those who are hungry, who do yearn for the truth in art and the credibility of nuance must look elsewhere.

Censors will do their thing for a litany of reasons, the coming years will see it for the most pathetic. They do it for you, to protect you from the complexity of the world. To be packaged in a safe and secure manner so that it does not offend. Art is meant to offend. Censorship and “dumbing” down cinema or art itself so that children or the easily triggered may enjoy it is in itself offensive. The wars will go on, the anti-war films however shall as always struggle to keep up.

June, 2024

Podcasts

scotthortonshow logosq

coi banner sq2@0.5x

liberty weekly thumbnail

Don't Tread on Anyone Logo

313x0w (1)

313x0w (1)

313x0w (1)

Pin It on Pinterest