#Transatlantic China | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

usafphantom2 · 3 months

Text

Col. Cobb’s fired on by a Mig 25

Operational missions.

First let me assure you; we never broke President Eisenhower's promise to cease overflying the Soviet Union. We remained over international water - 12 mi offshore.

All of my operational flying was from Kadena, Okinawa. Area of interest was Vietnam; Korea; Vladivostok, USSR; China. Later, we flew transatlantic & return from Seymour Johnson, NC supporting the Israel Arab war. After I left the program, the SR flew from Mildenhall, England & Bodo, Norway.

We already touched on missions against Vietnam & the only night mission.

Today let's cover "north missions".

Take off, refuel & head into the Sea of Japan; between Japan & south Korea. Accelerated to operational speed - 3.20. Head directly at Vladivostok. headquarters of USSR air defense; and test/r & d of new radar & intercept development. 2200 mph guaranteed to light up all the radar & intercept systems they had.

A Mig-25 interceptor squadron was based just outside of Vladivostok the "holy grail" of the soviet air defense system was to shoot down an SR71.

Turn north up the Sea of Japan & make a U-turn back down the USSR coast (12 mi offshore) with ELINT & SIGINT recorders going full bore. Photo cameras looking oblique into the USSR , updating the interceptor air order of battle. Head south east till past Vladivostok then turn slightly left then right to cross Korea at the DMZ. Photo cameras updating N. Korea force readiness to resume hostilities against S. Korea.

Continue down the yellow sea coast of China. All sensors evaluating China's threat to Taiwan. Turn left- decell & land at Kadena. I flew this profile several times during the 4 years i flew ops missions. One of these got very, very thrilling. Southbound, passing Vladivostok, Reg (my RSO) announced

"We've got a fighter locked on - it's gotta be a Mig-25"

"Our DEF is blanketing all beautifully."

"Oops - he just fired - - we've got a missile locked on"

"Our def has shifted to its missile magic"

"There - lock's broken. Missile's back in search”

"That's weird - sounds like the missile's locked on - but not locked on us"

"he's gone - coming up on the "s" turn to the DMZ".

Fast forward to late 1976 Col.Cobb retired from the Air Force.

I'm retired! Learning that retirement means no days off; no vacation; no holidays; big pay cut.

I find the aircraft TV channel & history channel. Lots & lots of SR71 films. I avidly watch at every opportunity. In my den, glued to the TV & today's SR71 show, & who do I see comparing the mig-25 with the SR71??

You're right - - Lt Victor Belenko!

He was totally gobsmaked; his Mig-25 burned up the engines getting to Mach 3 yet the SR's cruise speed was greater than 3.0.

He's the one who said that the Holy Grail of soviet air defense was to shoot down an SR.

He told of how they would pre-position ahead of the SR's radar track and had to zoom up to get a lock on & fire their missile.

He stressed how quickly & precisely they had to perform because the window of opportunity was so very short.

Their target was traveling at 3600 ft/sec. Faster than a speeding bullet.

He described in detail how precise the post firing breakaway had to be executed to avoid getting shot down by their own missile; talking as though they found this out the "hard way".

Man talk about intense attention - - I'm quickly mentally replaying that tape from the inter-phone - -

"We've got a fighter locked on - it's gotta be a Mig-25" "Our DEF is blanketing all beautifully."

"Oops - he just fired - - we've got a missile locked on"

"Our def has shifted to its missile magic"

"There - lock's broken. Missile's back in search

"That's weird - sounds like the missile's locked on - but not locked on us"

(What did the missile lock onto? Could it have been the Mig-25 itself? – we’ll never know) Chris Cobb gave this article to myself Linda Sheffield this is the first time it’s been published. 1/24/24

@Habubrats71 via X

12 notes · View notes

vaultsexteen · 16 days

Text

language in the NCR

the NCR's Official Languages consist of formalized versions of the three most spoken languages i.e. English, Spanish, and Chinese. these are used in official broadcasts, publications, and legal documentation.

other languages that were spoken by the various immigrant populations of California (Tagalog, Arabic, Korean, Japanese, Hindi, Vietnamese, Persian, etc, etc) might have some official support, depending on the locality. this also extends to newer "tribal" languages.

there are various ways Californian laypeople speak that aren't confined to official languages though:

various regional dialects of the three big languages that vary per NCR state. people have various dialects between Redding, Junktown, and Klamath, for example.

the Shi have a distinct way of speaking Chinese that differs from many Chinese speakers that live in the Republic. the Shi would have an easier time understanding a person that was plucked from pre-War China, for one.

there's a trading language constructed from the Big Three, but also incorporates many of the unofficial & tribal languages, that naturally evolved out of the Hub. it's interchangeably called trader/merchant/caravanner speak or just Hubspeak. a kind of funny/derogatory way to refer to someone that speaks this is to say that they talk like a caravan driver or brahmin rustler.

people from big, Vault-originated locales like Shady Sands and Vault City have a standardized, flattened way of speaking (think of an NCR equivalent of a transatlantic accent) that immediately outs them as a city slicker.

#fallout meta #meta

5 notes · View notes

realjaysumlin · 3 months

Text

A Brief History of Slavery That You Didn't Learn in School - The New York Times

Henry the navigator sent ships to Africa and the new world in search for gold and other commodities and to spread Christianity to the world. Christianity at one point in time was enforced on Europeans before being forced on people outside of Europe.

Slavery in Africa started in the 1400s and transported to the new world under indentured servitude almost 200 years before the transatlantic slave trade took on a new identity. Black slaves were not only people of Africa but everywhere Black Indigenous People inhabited like India and the middle east.

If Black people were not religious the Muslims and Christians enslaved dark skin humans to all parts of the world. The quest for slave labor and the seizure of new lands and the resources that the dark skin humans had became a mission for dark skin humans to be slaughtered from earth or to force them into slavery.

Australia and other parts of the South Pacific experienced the same fate as all dark skin humans worldwide. China and Japan were no exceptions to these atrocious acts created by Europeans.

The Philippines and the Island of Fuji along with many other island nations where dark skin humans lived were brutally slaughtered by the hands of European explorations.

Slavery itself is of European origin before slavery as we know it ever took shape to the rest of the world. The first exploration actually is the human out of Africa and once again by Africans during the age of ship building.

#black love #black positivity #black africans #black history #science #evolution #science side of tumblr

5 notes · View notes

dreaminginthedeepsouth · 6 months

Text

[mike luckovich]

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

October 31, 2023 (Tuesday)

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

NOV 1, 2023

Today, Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin testified before the Senate Appropriations Committee about the need to fund military aid to both Ukraine and Israel, along with humanitarian aid to Ukraine, Israel, and Gaza and increased U.S. border security, rather than accept the new measure from extremist House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA). Johnson wants to split off funding for Israel into its own bill and couple it with cuts to the Internal Revenue Service. Those cuts would dramatically decrease tax audits of those with the highest income and thus decrease revenue for the U.S. Treasury; they are popular with Republicans.

Johnson and other extremist Republicans have made it clear they are not interested in continuing to help Ukraine fight off Russia’s invasion.

Blinken and Austin got strong support not only from Senate Democrats, but also from many Senate Republicans, including Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), who explained why it is important for the United States to “help Ukraine win the war” in a speech at the University of Louisville where he introduced Ukraine’s ambassador to the United States, Oksana Markarova.

“If Russia prevails, there’s no question that Putin’s appetite for empire will extend to NATO [the North Atlantic Treaty Organization], raising the threat to the U.S. transatlantic alliance and the risk of war for America. Such an outcome would demand greater permanent deployment of our military force in Europe, a much greater cost than the support we have provided to Ukraine. And of course, Russian victory would embolden Putin’s growing alliance with fellow authoritarian regimes in Iran and China.”

“So this is not just a test for Ukraine,” McConnell said. “It’s a test for the United States and the free world.”

But at the Senate hearing, protesters from CodePink, the group that describes itself as “a feminist grassroots organization working to end U.S. warfare and imperialism,” had a different agenda. They held up their hands, covered in red paint, with the word “GAZA” written on their forearms, repeatedly interrupting Blinken and calling for an end to funding for Israel, citing what the organization calls “Israel's genocide of Palestine.”

Over the weekend, as Palestinian militants continued to fire rockets into Israel and skirmish with Israeli troops, Israel began to push into northern Gaza in a ground operation U.S. officials said had been changed from the originally planned massive Israeli ground offensive to “surgical” strikes that would hit high-value Hamas targets but spare Palestinian civilians.

That advance was accompanied by even fiercer airstrikes than previous ones, and today an attack on a Palestinian refugee camp appears to have caused significant civilian loss. The Israeli military said the attack “eliminated many terrorists and destroyed terror infrastructure,” with underground Hamas installations collapsing and taking adjacent buildings down with them.

From the time of Hamas’s initial strike against Israel on October 7, the Biden administration has been keen to stop the crisis from spreading. President Joe Biden was firm in his repeated declarations that the U.S would stand firmly behind Israel, warning “any country, any organization, anyone thinking of taking advantage of this situation, I have one word: Don’t. Don’t.”

To deter militants backed by Iran, the U.S. moved two American aircraft carrier strike groups into the region. After repeated drone strikes against U.S. forces in Iraq and Syria, on Wednesday, October 25, Biden warned Iran that the U.S. would respond if Iran continued to move against U.S. troops. On October 27 the U.S. carried out airstrikes against munitions stockpiles stored at two facilities in eastern Syria linked to militants backed by Iran. Secretary of Defense Austin emphasized that the U.S. actions were “precision self-defense strikes” and were separate from the conflict in Gaza.

Drone attacks on U.S. troops in the area have increased, and the Institute for the Study of War assessed today that Iranian-backed militants, including Lebanon’s Hezbollah, “are creating the expectation in the information environment that Hezbollah will escalate against Israel on or around November 3.” The U.S. today announced it is sending 300 additional troops to U.S. Central Command, whose responsibility includes the Middle East, Central Asia and parts of South Asia, to protect U.S. troops from drone attacks by Iran-backed militant groups. Air Force Brigadier General Pat Ryder told reporters the troops are not going to Israel.

In addition to trying to hold off Iran from expanding the conflict, the U.S. has been trying to support Israel’s right to respond while also demanding that Israel follow the rules of war. The U.S. has firmly condemned the October 7 attack by Hamas on Israeli civilians as “an act of sheer evil.” That evil included the taking of hostages—which is a war crime—including U.S. citizens.

But, all along, the administration has warned Israel that it must not violate international law in its retaliation for the attack. On October 18, in a remarkable admission, Biden advised Israelis not to be consumed by their rage. “After 9/11, we were enraged in the United States. And while we sought justice and got justice, we also made mistakes.”

Responding to the October 7 massacre, he said, “requires being deliberate. It requires asking very hard questions. It requires clarity about the objectives and an honest assessment about whether the path you are on will achieve those objectives.”

Despite the administration's warnings, while international eyes are on Gaza, according to the United Nations, settlers in the West Bank encouraged by the policies of Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu have killed at least 115 Palestinians, injured more than 2,000 more, and forcibly displaced almost 1,000. The United Nations and the International Committee of the Red Cross are concerned that Israel’s pursuit of Hamas militants has led it to commit war crimes of its own, enacting collective punishment on the civilians of Gaza by denying them food, water, and electricity as well as instructing them to leave their homes, displacing well over a million people.

While the U.S. says it does not trust the numbers of casualties asserted by Hamas, it believes from other sources that there have been “many thousands of civilian deaths in Gaza thus far in the conflict…. Way too many.” Today the National Security Council’s coordinator for strategic communications, John Kirby, reminded reporters: “We aren’t on the ground fighting in this war. There’s no intent to do that…. [T]hese are Israeli military operations. They get to decide what their aims and strategy are. They get to decide what their tactics are. They get to decide how they’re going to decide to go after Hamas.

“We’re doing everything we can to support them—including providing our perspectives, including asking them hard questions about their aims and their strategy and—the kind of questions we’d ask ourselves.”

The administration appears to be trying to defend Israel’s right to self-defense in the face of a massacre that took the lives of 1,400 Israelis, while also trying to recover the hostages, get humanitarian aid into Gaza, and prevent U.S. ally Israel from committing war crimes in retaliation for the attack. It is also insisting there must be a long-term plan for Israel and the Palestinians. To that end, it is throwing its weight behind the long-neglected two-state solution.

On October 27, U.S. Representative to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield echoed Biden’s statement that “there is no going back to the status quo as it stood on October 6th. We must not go back to the status quo where Hamas terrorizes Israel and uses Palestinian civilians as human shields,” she said. “And we must not go back to the status quo where extremist settlers can attack and terrorize Palestinians in the West Bank. The status quo is untenable and it is unacceptable.”

“[W]hen this crisis is over,” she said, “there has to be a vision of what comes next. In our view, that vision must be centered around a two-state solution. Getting there will require concerted efforts by all of us—Israelis, Palestinians, regional partners, and global leaders—to put us on a path for peace. To integrate Israel with the region, while insisting that the aspirations of the Palestinian people be part of a more hopeful future.”

The current crisis might have made that two-state solution more possible than it has been for a generation. Neither Hamas nor Netanyahu’s government supports a two-state solution, but other leaders in the region, including Jordan’s King Abdullah II and Egypt’s Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, say they do.

Hamas has little support outside of Iran, and up to 80% of Israelis blame Prime Minister Netanyahu for the October 7 attack. His leadership of a right-wing coalition has shielded him from corruption charges even as his attempts to gain more control over Israeli society sparked the largest protests in Israeli history, and there is no doubt the attack and his response to it have weakened him dramatically. At a news conference yesterday, a reporter asked if he would resign.

The recent peace talks in Egypt excluded Hamas, Iran, and Israel. Instead, the organizers invited Mahmoud Abbas, the head of the Palestinian Authority that oversees the West Bank. President Biden, Secretary of State Blinken, and National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan have been meeting with officials from Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Jordan. On Friday, Blinken will travel back to Israel to meet with officials there, after which he will make other stops in the region.

—

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

#Heather Cox Richardson #Letters From American #War #Israel Hamas war #Gaza #Blinken #diplomacy

8 notes · View notes

thepastisalreadywritten · 18 days

Text

It was bound to happen sooner or later: a guest on the BBC’s Antiques Roadshow presented an artefact, which derived from the slave trade – an ivory bangle.

One of the programme’s experts, Ronnie Archer-Morgan, himself a descendant of slaves, said that it was a striking historical artefact but not one that he was willing to value.

‘I do not want to put a price on something that signifies such an awful business,’ he said.

It’s easy to understand how he feels. The idea of people profiting from the artefacts left over from slavery is distasteful.

Yet, as Archer-Morgan said, it is not that the bangle has no value: it has great educational value.

It should be bought by a museum and displayed in order to demonstrate the complex nature of slavery and as a corrective to the narrative that slavery was purely a crime committed by Europeans against Africans.

The bangle was, it seems, once in the possession of a Nigerian slaver who was trading in other Africans.

It’s a reminder that slavery was rife in Africa long before colonial government.

It could also remind us that, though slavery was a global institution, the country that led the world in the rebellion against this barbarism – and played a bigger role than perhaps anyone else in its eradication – was the United Kingdom.

Britain did not invent slavery.

Slaves were kept in Egypt since at least the Old Kingdom period and in China from at least the 7th century AD, followed by Japan and Korea.

It was part of the Islamic world from its beginnings in the 7th century.

Native tribes in North America practised slavery, as did the Aztecs and Incas farther south.

African traders supplied slaves to the Roman empire and to the Arab world. Scottish clan chiefs sold their men to traders.

Barbary pirates from north Africa practised the trade too, seizing around a million white Europeans – including some from Cornish villages – between the 16th and 18th centuries.

It was in fear of such pirates that the song ‘Rule Britannia’ was written: hence the line that ‘Britons never ever ever shall be slaves.’

Even slaves who escaped their masters in the Caribbean went on to take their own slaves.

The most concerted campaign against all this was started by Christian groups in London in the 1770s who eventually recruited William Wilberforce to their campaign, and parliament went on to outlaw the slave trade in 1807.

British sea power was then deployed to stamp it out.

The largely successful British effort to eradicate the transatlantic slave trade did not grow out of any kind of self-interest.

It was driven by moral imperative and at considerable cost to Britain and the Empire.

At its peak, Britain’s battle against the slave trade involved 36 naval ships and cost some 2,000 British lives.

In 1845, the Aberdeen Act expanded the Navy’s mission to intercept Brazilian ships suspected of carrying slaves.

Much is made about how Britain profited from the slave trade, but we tend not to hear about the extraordinary cost of fighting it.

In a 1999 paper, US historians Chaim Kaufmann and Robert Pape estimated that, taking into account the loss of business and trade, suppression of the slave trade cost Britain 1.8 per cent of GDP between 1808 and 1867.

It was, they said, the most expensive piece of moral action in modern history.

The cost of fighting the slave trade cancelled out much, if not all of Britain’s profits from it over the previous century.

There are those who continue to demand reparations for slavery from the UK government and other western powers, yet they rarely, if ever, acknowledge Britain’s role in all but eradicating the evil of the transatlantic slave trade, a cause on which we spent the equivalent of £1.5 billion a year for half a century.

Britain’s role in hastening slavery’s extinction is a remarkable achievement.

It’s astonishing that we have forgotten it almost entirely in the 21st century.

It would be difficult to find anyone in the world whose ancestral tree does not somewhere extend back to a slave-trader.

Huge numbers of us, too, will have been partly descended from slaves.

Britain should not minimise or deny the extent to which it traded slaves to the colonies in the early days of Empire.

But it is also important to remember the thousands who served and died with the West Africa Squadron while seizing 1,600 slave ships and freeing some 150,000 Africans.

We must examine and remember everything about the history of the slave trade, including the forces – moral and military – that eventually brought it to an end.

It’s profoundly worrying that slavery evolved to be a near-universal phenomenon among human societies and inspiring that it came to be all but eradicated within a single human lifespan.

#Britain #slave trade #Antiques Roadshow #Ronnie Archer-Morgan #ivory bangle #artefacts #Rule Britannia #William Wilberforce #Aberdeen Act #slavery #suppression of slave trade #moral action #transatlantic slave trade #BBC

5 notes · View notes

pacificeagles · 2 years

Photo

https://pacificeagles.net/boeing-307-stratoliner/

Boeing 307 Stratoliner

In 1935 with design work for the B-17 well underway, Boeing decided to create a civilian airliner from the same basic design. Borrowing the wings, engines, landing gear and tail from the B-17 and marrying them to a new cylindrical fuselage designed to be pressurised, the new Model 307 promised much better performance than existing airliners. It could cruise at an altitude of 20,000ft, unlike contemporary planes that had to remain below 15,000ft. With the plane having the ability to fly higher than most weather systems, Boeing gave it the name “Stratoliner”.

Despite the advances promised by the 307, orders were relatively few. The first plane was destroyed when it crashed during a demonstration flight for Dutch airline KLM. Pan Am ordered two Stratoliners and later an additional four, and Trans World Airlines five. The first delivery was to the eccentric tycoon and adventurer Howard Hughes, who bought it for a round-the-world record attempt that was abandoned when Germany invaded Poland in September 1939. Pan Am took delivery of just four 307s before the war put an end to civilian aircraft production but TWA received all five that they ordered. These were named after native American tribes – Apache, Comanche, Navajo, Cherokee and Zuni.

With the outbreak of war in 1941 Pan Am’s 307s remained nominally in civilian service but were under the direction of the Army Air Forces’ Air Transport Command. These were assigned to fly on South American routes for the AAF. The five TWA planes were bought by the AAF and received the military designation C-75 but were flown by their original TWA crews under contract. These were assigned to ATC and initially flew two transatlantic routes: the northern route from Gander to Prestwick, and the southern one from Natal to Accra in the south.

For the first year of the war the C-75s were the only planes capable of nonstop transatlantic flight, although they had the pressurization gear removed and additional fuel tanks installed to make these flights more comfortable. These aircraft regularly flew ‘top brass’ across the Atlantic, including members of the Chiefs of Staff and Harry Hopkins, Roosevelt’s personal aide. A C-75 was also dispatched to China to collect the Doolittle raiders after all of their B-25s were lost.

In 1944 with sufficient numbers of purpose-built military transports available, the C-75s were reconditioned and sold back to TWA. They continued to serve the civilian market for years after the war, although seven were lost to accidents. One 307 serving with the French airline Aigle Azur may have been accidentally shot down by anti-aircraft fire during the Vietnam War in 1965.

Boeing C-75 Stratoliner Specifications

C-75

Boeing C-75 StratolinerRoleTransportCrew5: Pilot, co-pilot, engineer, 2 cabin crewPowerplant4x Pratt & Whitney R-1820-G102A (1,100hp)Speed215mph (cruise) 241mph (max)Ceiling23,300ftRange1,750 miles (internal)ArmamentOrdnanceDimensions74ft 4in (length) 107ft 0in (wingspan) 20ft 10in (height)Wing Area1486 sq.ft.Weight30,000lb (empty) 45,000lb (gross) Number produced5

#b-17 #Boeing #c-75 #stratoliner #Aircraft #Allied Aircraft #USAAF

74 notes · View notes

24newslive · 1 year

Text

US sanctions Russian oligarchs, Hungary-based bank

The new designations were coordinated between the US Treasury and State departments and the United Kingdom. Among those sanctioned are Russian oligarchs Alisher Usmanov and Roman Abramovich.

The United States and Britain on Wednesday announced new sanctions on 120 people and entities over Russia's war in Ukraine.

Among those sanctioned are Russian oligarchs Alisher Usmanov and Roman Abramovich, who are close allies of President Vladimir Putin.

The US also imposed sanctions on three top officials at the Russian-controlled International Investment Bank in the Hungarian capital, Budapest.

The new designations were coordinated between the US Treasury and State departments and the United Kingdom.

What do we know about the sanctions? Usmanov has been subject to US and European sanctions since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022.

The US Treasury has described Usmanov as having "at his disposal a wide network of businesses in financial safe havens and family members through which to conduct financial transactions, enabling him to potentially circumvent sanctions."

The State Department said it targeted the businessman's company, USM Holdings, and multiple firms under it.

Last year, German authorities raided several of the Uzbekistan-born oligarchs properties and his yacht.

Also targeted was the Patriot private military company, which the State Department said was associated with Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu.

China HEAD Aerospace Technology Co, a China-based satellite image reseller, was hit by sanctions for allegedly providing satellite imagery of locations in Ukraine to the Russian Wagner mercenary group.

Washington also hit firms based in Hong Kong, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates with sanctions, claiming that the companies had sold drones and electronics to Russia's defense sector.

US sanctions Russian-controlled bank in Hungary Among those sanctioned by the US were three officials of the Russian-controlled International Investment Bank (IIB) in Hungary.

This included the Russian nationals Nikolay Kosov and Georgy Potapov and the Hungarian national Imre Laszloczki. Kosov is the bank's former chairman and Potapov and Laszlocki are high-ranking officials on the institution's management board.

"The presence of this opaque Kremlin platform (IIB) in the heart of Hungary threatens the security and sovereignty of the Hungarian people, their European neighbours, and their NATO allies," U.S. Ambassador to Budapest David Pressman told a news conference in Budapest.

Pressman said that Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban had dismissed Washington's concerns over the bank.

"We have concerns about the continued eagerness of Hungarian leaders to expand and deepen ties with the Russian Federation despite Russia's ongoing brutal aggression against Ukraine and threat to transatlantic security," Pressman said.

"With this announcement, the United States is demonstrating that we will take action in response to Hungary's choices and to curb the access of Russia and sanctioned Russian persons to the international financial system."

NATO-member Hungary was one of the eastern European countries to secure exemptions on EU sanctions on Russian oil delivered by land or pipeline.

On Tuesday, Hungary's Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto also said that Russian state energy company Gazprom had signed a new agreement with the government in Budapest allowing scope for more gas deliveries than already agreed to in long-term contracts, should they be necessary.

Much of the EU meanwhile imports little or no natural gas from Russia.

What did officials say about the sanctions? "The United States will continue to take action against Russia and those supporting its war in Ukraine," Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement.

He said this was in line with the G7's "commitment to impose severe consequences on third country actors who support Russia's war in Ukraine."

Brian Nelson, the Treasury's under secretary for terrorism and financial intelligence, said the US and its allies would continue to work to "disrupt evasions schemes that support Putin on the battlefield.

"We are closing the net on the Russian elite and those who try to help them hide their money for war," British Foreign Secretary James Cleverly said in a statement, adding that there would be "no place to hide."

2 notes · View notes

mariacallous · 2 months

Text

Over the past month, Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump stirred controversy by saying that a second Trump administration might not protect allies that are falling short in their contributions to the NATO alliance. He recounted a conversation with an unidentified NATO member in which he said, “You didn’t pay? You’re delinquent? No, I would not protect you. In fact, I would encourage them to do whatever the hell they want. You gotta pay. You gotta pay your bills.”

Trump’s statement predictably drew widespread condemnation and caused many panicked Europeans to contemplate a world without U.S. protection.

The more constructive response to Trump’s comments, however, would be for NATO members to acknowledge that Trump has a point. For too long, many allies have failed to live up to their commitments, and they will need to step up and do much more if the free world is going to deter China, Russia, and other rivals and achieve peace and stability in Europe and Asia.

Trump’s criticisms are not entirely new. U.S. leaders have been protesting inadequate European contributions to NATO for many years. In 2011, then-President Barack Obama’s defense secretary, Robert Gates, gave a major speech in Brussels, warning of “NATO’s serious capability gaps … the military—and political—necessity of fixing these shortcomings if the transatlantic security alliance is going to be viable going forward; and more broadly, the growing difficulty for the U.S. to sustain current support for NATO if the American taxpayer continues to carry most of the burden in the alliance.”

Unfortunately, Gates’s warnings went largely unheeded. After Russia invaded Ukraine in 2014, NATO members unanimously agreed to spend at least 2 percent of their GDP on defense within a decade. Following Russia’s further invasion of Ukraine in 2022, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said that 2 percent is increasingly a “floor, not a ceiling.” Yet by the end of 2023, only 11 of 31 NATO members had met the 2 percent threshold. In 2024, that number is expected to rise to 18, but that still means that more than one-third of the alliance’s members are shirking their responsibilities.

This is not an abstract discussion. Defense spending translates into concrete capabilities needed for transatlantic defense. In 2023, NATO agreed to new “regional plans” under which all members were given specific capability targets, but inadequate spending is resulting in capability shortfalls. In other words, NATO’s supreme allied commander does not have what he needs to properly defend Europe.

Many were outraged by Trump’s comments, but it is outrageous for countries to neglect their obligations in NATO and still demand the full benefits of membership. If one stopped paying monthly gym fees, one would expect access to be cut off; European defense should be treated with at least as much seriousness as Zumba.

If, God forbid, Russian President Vladimir Putin attacked NATO’s European members, why should American soldiers be expected to die to save European countries that shirked their responsibilities, weakened the alliance, and thereby tempted Russian aggression? NATO’s Article 5 security guarantee is important, but so too is Article 3, in which members promise to “maintain and develop their individual and collective capacity to resist armed attack.”

The flip side of Trump’s statement is that NATO members that pay their bills will be protected. Instead of condemning Trump, therefore, the more constructive path forward would be for all NATO members to simply step up and meet their defense commitments.

Savvy European officials are already following this script. At the Munich Security Conference, German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius and British Shadow Foreign Secretary David Lammy were among those who publicly validated American concerns and affirmed that Europe must do much more. Pistorius, for example, said that 2 percent will “only be the start of it” and that Germany “might even hit 3.5 percent. It depends on what is happening in the world.” Lammy said he “understands” Washington’s calls “for more equitable burden sharing” and would welcome “tough conversations” on this topic with “seriousness and respect.” In private conversations at Munich, several senior European officials confided that Trump is right.

Indeed, NATO allies are getting a bargain. The United States spends 3.5 percent of its GDP on defense and thereby accounts for more than two-thirds of all NATO defense spending. It is estimated that to meet the capability targets called for in the new regional plans, allied defense spending will need to increase to up to 3 percent. During the Cold War, the United States and its allies frequently spent more than 3 percent, and we recommend that NATO looks to set a new, higher floor of 3 percent at a future summit.

This is not just a matter of fairness but about meeting requirements for an effective global deterrence and defense strategy. The United States and its allies are entering a new Cold War more dangerous than the first. There is an ongoing war in Europe that could spill over into a direct NATO-Russia conflict. Iran is waging a shadow war against U.S. and allied interests in the Middle East that could escalate. Meanwhile, Chinese leader Xi Jinping has threatened to use force if necessary to take Taiwan. A major conflict with China in Asia would likely spread to engulf the Korean Peninsula and draw North Korea into the fighting. The United States and its allies in the free world, therefore, need the ability to deter and, if necessary, defeat China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea in overlapping time frames.

The United States remains the world’s preeminent military power, but it cannot do it all on its own. Washington already lacks the defense industrial base, and possibly the political will, to simultaneously provide weapons to its allies in Ukraine, Israel, and the Indo-Pacific.

The formula for an effective free-world deterrence and defense strategy, as one of us has argued in these pages, is threefold. First, the United States needs to increase defense spending and revitalize its defense industrial base. Second, like during the first Cold War, the United States needs to increase reliance on nuclear deterrence. And third, allies in Europe and the Indo-Pacific are going to have to step up big time.

Trump’s statements are scaring the free world straight. European countries now have at least three reasons to meet their defense spending commitments. First, it is the right thing to do. Second, they can tell a future President Trump that they are not freeloaders; they are doing their fair share and are worthy of protection. Third, in the highly unlikely event that the United States actually turns its back on NATO, they are better positioned to defend themselves.

Indeed, the largest recent increases in European defense spending occurred during Trump’s first term, and, given the energy generated by Trump’s recent statements, we would likely see another burst of European defense spending in a second Trump administration.

To be sure, the suggestion that the United States might “encourage” Russia to attack delinquent NATO members risks undermining deterrence, but Trump’s campaign advisors have said that this was an off-the-cuff remark that should not be taken as a literal statement of policy.

Salena Zito, a journalist at the Washington Examiner, famously wrote that we should take Trump “seriously, not literally.”

There is nothing more serious than deterring World War III. It is time to stop complaining about indelicate political rhetoric, and time to step up and defend the free world.

2 notes · View notes

voskhozhdeniye · 3 months

Text

Global economic contours are shifting inexorably towards the countries of global south. The U.S. and EU markets are less important to China, relatively speaking, than are the growth markets of the developing world. And for the developing world, China is a more important partner than most others. Trade and investment flows have been trending in this direction for some time already, aided by initiatives such as the BRI as well as the recently launched Asian free trade zone - the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership. The growing interlinking of Chinese capital markets with those of Saudi Arabia and the UAE are creating the new pipelines for capital flow between China and West Asia. The consolidation of a Eurasian economic sphere, including the energy-rich nations of West Asia, is creating new opportunities for value growth and flow. Trade growth is being complemented by capital circulation by way of investment flows denominated in national currencies. The ability to trade OPEC oil with national currencies is enabling these nations to evolve away from dependence on the USD. Economic decentering is one feature of the collective west’s displacement anxiety. The reality that its claimed military preponderance is more rhetoric than real brings a “hard power” edge to these anxieties. These material factors are buttressed by deep rooted Manichaean frames in which racialised exceptionalism is ever-present. This is most pronounced in the Millenarian zealotry that underlies American exceptionalism. The idea of decentering is bad enough; it’s made all the worse as the new centres are found in the Orientals of the “near- and far east”. Against this backdrop, we can expect the transatlantic neocons to intensify their attempts to hang on to what’s left of western colonial hegemony and American primacy. The neocon playbook has been to generate regional instability whenever and wherever it feels threatened. This “divide and conquer” strategy has played out in numerous “colour revolutions” and “coups” over the decades; in short, regime change operations aimed at installing pliable regimes. Colour revolution risks across Eurasia are likely to intensify over the next few years. China’s President Xi was prescient last year when he warned Shanghai Cooperation Organisation members of these risks. Additionally, preparations for proxy wars in Asia, borrowing from the Ukraine 2014-2022 playbook, are also likely to continue, as I have previously described. The Philippines is being groomed, as is Taiwan. As the US and NATO face defeat on the steppes of Ukraine, NATO has set its sights on becoming a global military force; and that means it will continue to seek ways of asserting a presence in Asia. Its attempt to secure a foothold in Japan was rebuffed by the French, but this is unlikely to be its last attempt to turn the “A” in NATO from meaning “Atlantic” to meaning “Asia”. The transatlantic neocons have been decentred, economically and geopolitically. Five centuries of colonial dominance, coupled with seven decades of American Primacy are coming to an end. This is doubtless a discomforting experience. Antonio Gramsci once observed: “The old world is dying, and the new world struggles to be born: now is the time of monsters.” Today, the monsters Gramsci spoke of are those that torment the collective west and its neocon political elite as they confront their anxieties of being displaced by a Multipolarity that is struggling its way forward. This is why the 2020s is the “decade of living dangerously”.

2 notes · View notes

aroundtheworldwithphillyfogg · 1 year

Text

November 23rd, 1872: The Pacific

There was a full complement of passengers on board, among them English, many Americans, a large number of coolies on their way to California, and several East Indian officers, who were spending their vacation in making the tour of the world. Nothing of moment happened on the voyage; the steamer, sustained on its large paddles, rolled but little, and the “Pacific” almost justified its name. Mr. Fogg was as calm and taciturn as ever. His young companion felt herself more and more attached to him by other ties than gratitude; his silent but generous nature impressed her more than she thought; and it was almost unconsciously that she yielded to emotions which did not seem to have the least effect upon her protector. Aouda took the keenest interest in his plans, and became impatient at any incident which seemed likely to retard his journey.

She often chatted with Passepartout, who did not fail to perceive the state of the lady’s heart; and, being the most faithful of domestics, he never exhausted his eulogies of Phileas Fogg’s honesty, generosity, and devotion. He took pains to calm Aouda’s doubts of a successful termination of the journey, telling her that the most difficult part of it had passed, that now they were beyond the fantastic countries of Japan and China, and were fairly on their way to civilised places again. A railway train from San Francisco to New York, and a transatlantic steamer from New York to Liverpool, would doubtless bring them to the end of this impossible journey round the world within the period agreed upon.

On the ninth day after leaving Yokohama, Phileas Fogg had traversed exactly one half of the terrestrial globe. The “General Grant” passed, on the 23rd of November, the one hundred and eightieth meridian, and was at the very antipodes of London. Mr. Fogg had, it is true, exhausted fifty-two of the eighty days in which he was to complete the tour, and there were only twenty-eight left. But, though he was only half-way by the difference of meridians, he had really gone over two-thirds of the whole journey; for he had been obliged to make long circuits from London to Aden, from Aden to Bombay, from Calcutta to Singapore, and from Singapore to Yokohama. Could he have followed without deviation the fiftieth parallel, which is that of London, the whole distance would only have been about twelve thousand miles; whereas he would be forced, by the irregular methods of locomotion, to traverse twenty-six thousand, of which he had, on the 23rd of November, accomplished seventeen thousand five hundred. And now the course was a straight one, and Fix was no longer there to put obstacles in their way!

It happened also, on the 23rd of November, that Passepartout made a joyful discovery. It will be remembered that the obstinate fellow had insisted on keeping his famous family watch at London time, and on regarding that of the countries he had passed through as quite false and unreliable. Now, on this day, though he had not changed the hands, he found that his watch exactly agreed with the ship’s chronometers. His triumph was hilarious. He would have liked to know what Fix would say if he were aboard!

“The rogue told me a lot of stories,” repeated Passepartout, “about the meridians, the sun, and the moon! Moon, indeed! moonshine more likely! If one listened to that sort of people, a pretty sort of time one would keep! I was sure that the sun would some day regulate itself by my watch!”

Passepartout was ignorant that, if the face of his watch had been divided into twenty-four hours, like the Italian clocks, he would have no reason for exultation; for the hands of his watch would then, instead of as now indicating nine o’clock in the morning, indicate nine o’clock in the evening, that is, the twenty-first hour after midnight precisely the difference between London time and that of the one hundred and eightieth meridian. But if Fix had been able to explain this purely physical effect, Passepartout would not have admitted, even if he had comprehended it. Moreover, if the detective had been on board at that moment, Passepartout would have joined issue with him on a quite different subject, and in an entirely different manner.

Where was Fix at that moment?

He was actually on board the “General Grant.”

On reaching Yokohama, the detective, leaving Mr. Fogg, whom he expected to meet again during the day, had repaired at once to the English consulate, where he at last found the warrant of arrest. It had followed him from Bombay, and had come by the “Carnatic,” on which steamer he himself was supposed to be. Fix’s disappointment may be imagined when he reflected that the warrant was now useless. Mr. Fogg had left English ground, and it was now necessary to procure his extradition!

“Well,” thought Fix, after a moment of anger, “my warrant is not good here, but it will be in England. The rogue evidently intends to return to his own country, thinking he has thrown the police off his track. Good! I will follow him across the Atlantic. As for the money, heaven grant there may be some left! But the fellow has already spent in travelling, rewards, trials, bail, elephants, and all sorts of charges, more than five thousand pounds. Yet, after all, the Bank is rich!”

His course decided on, he went on board the “General Grant,” and was there when Mr. Fogg and Aouda arrived. To his utter amazement, he recognised Passepartout, despite his theatrical disguise. He quickly concealed himself in his cabin, to avoid an awkward explanation, and hoped—thanks to the number of passengers—to remain unperceived by Mr. Fogg’s servant.

On that very day, however, he met Passepartout face to face on the forward deck. The latter, without a word, made a rush for him, grasped him by the throat, and, much to the amusement of a group of Americans, who immediately began to bet on him, administered to the detective a perfect volley of blows, which proved the great superiority of French over English pugilistic skill.

When Passepartout had finished, he found himself relieved and comforted. Fix got up in a somewhat rumpled condition, and, looking at his adversary, coldly said, “Have you done?”

“For this time—yes.”

“Then let me have a word with you.”

“But I—”

“In your master’s interests.”

Passepartout seemed to be vanquished by Fix’s coolness, for he quietly followed him, and they sat down aside from the rest of the passengers.

“You have given me a thrashing,” said Fix. “Good, I expected it. Now, listen to me. Up to this time I have been Mr. Fogg’s adversary. I am now in his game.”

“Aha!” cried Passepartout; “you are convinced he is an honest man?”

“No,” replied Fix coldly, “I think him a rascal. Sh! don’t budge, and let me speak. As long as Mr. Fogg was on English ground, it was for my interest to detain him there until my warrant of arrest arrived. I did everything I could to keep him back. I sent the Bombay priests after him, I got you intoxicated at Hong Kong, I separated you from him, and I made him miss the Yokohama steamer.”

Passepartout listened, with closed fists.

“Now,” resumed Fix, “Mr. Fogg seems to be going back to England. Well, I will follow him there. But hereafter I will do as much to keep obstacles out of his way as I have done up to this time to put them in his path. I’ve changed my game, you see, and simply because it was for my interest to change it. Your interest is the same as mine; for it is only in England that you will ascertain whether you are in the service of a criminal or an honest man.”

Passepartout listened very attentively to Fix, and was convinced that he spoke with entire good faith.

“Are we friends?” asked the detective.

“Friends?—no,” replied Passepartout; “but allies, perhaps. At the least sign of treason, however, I’ll twist your neck for you.”

“Agreed,” said the detective quietly.

#Around the World in 80 Days #Jules Verne #around the world in 80 dailies

26 notes · View notes

usafphantom2 · 3 months

Text

The MiG-25 Foxbat

In the late 1960s, the USSR revealed the existence of the aircraft that appeared to be the world’s deadliest fighter, the MiG-25 (NATO reporting name “Foxbat”). This aircraft could outrun any fighter in the air, and indeed any military aircraft other than the SR-71 Blackbird.

SR-71 T-Shirts

CLICK HERE to see The Aviation Geek Club contributor Linda Sheffield’s T-shirt designs! Linda has a personal relationship with the SR-71 because her father Butch Sheffield flew the Blackbird from test flight in 1965 until 1973. Butch’s Granddaughter’s Lisa Burroughs and Susan Miller are graphic designers. They designed most of the merchandise that is for sale on Threadless. A percentage of the profits go to Flight Test Museum at Edwards Air Force Base. This nonprofit charity is personal to the Sheffield family because they are raising money to house SR-71, #955. This was the first Blackbird that Butch Sheffield flew on Oct. 4, 1965.

Loaded with two R-40 missiles (NATO reporting name AA-6 ‘Acrid’), the Foxbat could reach 78,000 feet, but with its full complement of four missiles, it was limited to 68,900 feet. By contrast the Habu flew at cruise speeds above Mach 3 at over 80,000 feet.

Nevertheless, once an SR-71 Blackbird flown by Col. Darrel Cobb was fired on by a MiG-25, as Cobb himself recalls in this interview given to his son Chris;

The “holy grail” of the soviet air defense system: shooting down an SR-71 Blackbird

Col. Cobb’s SR-71 Blackbird fired on by a MiG-25.

‘Operational missions.

‘First let me assure you; we never broke President Eisenhower’s promise to cease overflying the Soviet Union. We remained over international water – 12 mi offshore.

‘All of my operational flying was from Kadena, Okinawa. Area of interest was Vietnam; Korea; Vladivostok, USSR; China. Later, we flew transatlantic & return from Seymour Johnson, NC supporting the Israel Arab war. After I left the program, the SR flew from Mildenhall, England & Bodo, Norway.

‘We already touched on missions against Vietnam & the only night mission.

‘Today let’s cover “north missions.”

SR-71 print

This print is available in multiple sizes from AircraftProfilePrints.com – CLICK HERE TO GET YOURS. SR-71A Blackbird 61-7972 “Skunkworks”

‘Take off, refuel & head into the Sea of Japan; between Japan & south Korea. Accelerated to operational speed – 3.20. Head directly at Vladivostok. headquarters of USSR air defense; and test/r & d of new radar & intercept development. 2200 mph guaranteed to light up all the radar & intercept systems they had.

‘A MiG-25 interceptor squadron was based just outside of Vladivostok. The “holy grail” of the soviet air defense system was to shoot down an SR-71.

‘Turn north up the Sea of Japan & make a U-turn back down the USSR coast (12 mi offshore) with ELINT & SIGINT recorders going full bore. Photo cameras looking oblique into the USSR, updating the interceptor air order of battle. Head south east till past Vladivostok then turn slightly left then right to cross Korea at the DMZ. Photo cameras updating N. Korea force readiness to resume hostilities against S. Korea.

SR-71 Blackbird fired on by a MiG-25

‘Continue down the yellow sea coast of China. All sensors evaluating China’s threat to Taiwan. Turn left- decel & land at Kadena. I flew this profile several times during the 4 years I flew ops missions. One of these got very, very thrilling. Southbound, passing Vladivostok, Reg (my RSO) announced;

‘”We’ve got a fighter locked on – it’s gotta be a MiG-25″

‘”Our DEF [Defensive Electronic Gear, DEF. It Provided ground-to-air and air-to-air missile protection. Still Classified. Def systems were labeled DEF A,B,C,E and G. Later modifications to the DEF Systems resulted in DEF A2, C2, H and M systems. Nearing retirement of the SR-71, a programmable DEF labeled A2C could defeat all known threats to the Blackbirds] is blanketing all beautifully.”

Fedotov MiG-25RB altitude world record

‘”Oops – he just fired – – we’ve got a missile locked on”

‘”Our def has shifted to its missile magic”

‘”There – lock’s broken. Missile’s back in search”

‘”That’s weird – sounds like the missile’s locked on – but not locked on us”

‘”He’s gone – coming up on the “s” turn to the DMZ.”’

Fast forward to late 1976 Col. Cobb retired from the Air Force.

MiG-25 at risk of being shot down by its own missile

Cobb continues;

‘I’m retired! Learning that retirement means no days off; no vacation; no holidays; big pay cut.

‘I find the aircraft TV channel & history channel. Lots & lots of SR-71 films. I avidly watch at every opportunity. In my den, glued to the TV & today’s SR-71 show, & who do I see comparing the MiG-25 with the SR-71??

SR-71 pilot recalls that time his Blackbird flew so fast that he and his RSO landed at Kadena AB two hours before they took off from Beale AFB beating the sun

‘You’re right – – Lt Victor Belenko!

‘He was totally gobsmacked; his MiG-25 burned up the engines getting to Mach 3 yet the SR’s cruise speed was greater than 3.0.

‘Belenko is the one who said that the Holy Grail of soviet air defense was to shoot down an SR.

‘He told of how they would pre-position ahead of the SR’s radar track and had to zoom up to get a lock on & fire their missile.

‘Belenko stressed how quickly & precisely they had to perform because the window of opportunity was so very short.

‘Their target was traveling at 3600 ft/sec. Faster than a speeding bullet.

‘He described in detail how precise the post firing breakaway had to be executed to avoid getting shot down by their own missile; talking as though they found this out the “hard way.”’

Cobb Concludes;

‘Man talk about intense attention – – I’m quickly mentally replaying that tape from the inter-phone – –

‘”We’ve got a fighter locked on – it’s gotta be a Mig-25″

MiG-25

‘”Our DEF is blanketing all beautifully.”

‘”Oops – he just fired – – we’ve got a missile locked on”

‘”Our def has shifted to its missile magic”

‘”There – lock’s broken. Missile’s back in search.

‘”That’s weird – sounds like the missile’s locked on – but not locked on us.”’

What happened to the missile fired by the MiG-25 Foxbat at the SR-71 Blackbird?

What happened to the missile fired by the MiG-25? Could it have locked onto the Foxbat itself? Could the SR-71 DEF have deceived it? We’ll never know.

However, we can assume that given that SR-71 had a cruise speed faster than the top speed of the MiG-25’s Acrid missiles, the Blackbird simply outran the AA-6. There was no chance a Foxbat could conduct a tail-chase interception of an SR-71 (the MiG-25 couldn’t carry out a head-on intercept of a Blackbird too: in fact, the Foxbat’s radar and fire control system was not sophisticated enough to solve the problems of a head-on intercept at closing speeds that would exceed Mach 5).

Be sure to check out Linda Sheffield Miller (Col Richard (Butch) Sheffield’s daughter, Col. Sheffield was an SR-71 Reconnaissance Systems Officer) Twitter X Page Habubrats SR-71 and Facebook Page Born into the Wilde Blue Yonder for awesome Blackbird’s photos and stories.

This model is available in multiple sizes from AirModels – CLICK HERE TO GET YOURS.

Photo credit: Dmitriy Pichugin via Wikimedia and U.S. Air Force

@Habubrats71 via X

Linda Sheffield Miller

Grew up at Beale Air Force Base, California. I am a Habubrat. Graduated from North Dakota State University. Former Public School Substitute Teacher, (all subjects all grades). Member of the DAR (Daughters of the Revolutionary War). I am interested in History, especially the history of SR-71. Married, Mother of three wonderful daughters and four extremely handsome grandsons. I live near Washington, DC.

PREVIOUS « The story of when Clint Eastwood almost drowned after crashing in a US Navy Skyraider off the coast of Northern California