Archive
Iran to Display New Ballistic Missiles
Iran plans next Tuesday to show off a new set of ballistic missiles built recently within its borders, the country’s Fars News Agency reported (see GSN, March 1).
Military equipment “including some vessels, ballistic missiles and new ammunitions will come into use on the occasion of Khorramshahr Liberation Anniversary,” Iranian Defense Minister Ahmad Vahidi said on Wednesday, referring to Iran’s 1982 victory against Iraq in a southern coastal city.
The nation’s military would soon formally receive the new missiles, Vahidi said.
Iran’s missile manufacturing systems have advanced significantly over the past 10 years, according to the media report. The Middle Eastern nation tested an antiship ballistic missile in February (see GSN, Feb. 10).
Iran’s Revolutionary Guard last October received the third variant of the Fateh 110 ballistic missile, and another version of the weapon was due for testing soon, Fars reported. The Fateh 110 is a short-range, solid-fuel weapon suited for firing from a mobile launcher. The missile has sophisticated command and guidance mechanisms, the news report said (see GSN, Sept. 22, 2010; Fars News Agency, May 18).
Iran’s Shahab 3 ballistic missile is the greatest source of worry for Western countries, Deutsche Presse-Agentur reported. The weapon has a 1,240-mile range and could strike any point in Israel (Deutsche Presse-Agentur/Monsters and Critics, May 18).
Pakistan’s Gilani visits ally Beijing amid US rift
BEIJING (AP) — Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani begins a visit to Beijing on Tuesday with old ally China looking more attractive after the U.S. killing of Osama bin Laden further strained Islamabad’s ties with Washington.
The sentiment is mutual, with China now in the process of shoring up its relations with Islamabad, Afghanistan and several other Central Asia states in step with an expected diminished U.S. presence as it winds down military operations in Afghanistan.
For Pakistan, Beijing represents an uncritical friend ready to provide aid, investment and military assistance. To the leaders in Beijing, ties with Pakistan and other countries in its neighborhood offer a bigger diplomatic footprint, better access to resources and a larger stable of allies to challenge U.S. supremacy.
Although Gilani’s four-day visit starting Tuesday was planned well in advance, it comes at a critical time for his country’s relations with the U.S., which have been thrown into crisis over the American raid that killed bin Laden in the northern Pakistani city of Abbottabad on May 2. Pakistan has called it a violation of its sovereignty and threatened to retaliate if there are any similar operations in future.
While American politicians served up withering criticisms over Pakistan’s failure to find bin Laden’s hide-out – or the possibility that officials were protecting him – China offered welcome Read more…
Chinese space plans cause military jitters
China has announced plans to put its own space station in orbit by 2020. The 60-tonne construction will be one-seventh the weight of the ISS and will focus on scientific experiments. However, military involvement with the project is causing concern.
Beijing’s Space City research center is opening its doors to the media, as China has announced its intention to build a rival to the International Space Station.
While some see Chinese advances in space travel as a potential threat, the country’s officials are keen to stress the spirit of co-operation, which they say is behind China’s space program.
“We are looking forward to co-operating with other countries in the field of space exploration,” said Yang Liwei, Vice Director of Manned Space Engineering Bureau. “We are also looking forward to having more countries join this club, so we can promote the common goals of mankind.”
For the moment though, the Chinese space program is doing very well on its own.
Since becoming only the third country in the world to send a person in to space, in 2003, the Chinese also carried out a space walk in 2008 and the Read more…
Israeli forces open fire at Palestinian protesters
Jon Donnison in Ramallah: “Palestinians are feeling emboldened and inspired by the uprisings elsewhere [in the Middle East]”
Israeli forces have fired on groups of protesters at borders with the Palestinian territories, Syria and Lebanon.
Reports say that at least 12 people have died and dozens more have been injured.
In one incident, thousands of Palestinian supporters from Syria entered the Golan Heights, Israel says.
Palestinians are marking the Nakba or Catastrophe, their term for the founding of the Israeli state in 1948.
Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians fled or were forced out of their homes in fighting after its creation.
Responding in a televised address to Sunday’s violence, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he hoped “calm and quiet will quickly return, but let nobody be mistaken, we are determined to defend our borders and sovereignty”.
Impetus
Clashes have been taking place at four separate borders or crossing points – at Erez in Gaza, near Ramallah in the West Bank, on the Golan Read more…
India’s Army Could Receive WMD-Resistant Gear
Russia announced that it would provide its military with these suits earlier this month.
India’s army could receive new gear designed to provide protection against chemical, biological or nuclear materials, the Press Trust of India reported on Wednesday (see GSN, April 26).
Kanpur’s Defense Material and Stores Research Development Establishment “has developed a new NBC or nuclear-biological-chemical suit that would be proved effective against any kind of dangerous weapons or chemicals and protect soldiers from any sort of attack,” agency head Arvind Kumar Saxena said.
“The organization [has] developed the chemical attack-resistant suit, but the suits necessary for the nuclear and biological war situation has not been prepared,” the official said. “The work on the biological suit is likely to be completed by 2013, whereas the preparation for the Read more…
‘Drone strike’ kills several in Pakistan
 |
| The high number of civilian casualties in drone attacks have caused anger in Pakistan [File:EPA] |
At least five people have been killed after a suspected US drone fired two missiles into a vehicle in Pakistan’s North Waziristan, local security officials say.
Thursday’s raid was the third such attack reported in the tribal district near the Afghan border, which Washington has dubbed the global headquarters of al-Qaeda, since US commandos killed the group’s leader, Osama bin Laden, in a Pakistani city near Islamabad.
“A US drone fired two missiles on a militants’ vehicle in the Datta Khel area of North Waziristan,” one Pakistani security official told the news agency AFP. “Five militants were killed.”
Another local official confirmed the strike and the toll, saying: “The target was a pick-up van.”
Intelligence reports from the area said the dead included “foreigners” – a term normally used for Afghan Taliban, Uzbek fighters or Read more…
Now, a spy plane that can be flown with or without a pilot!
A new intelligence and surveillance aircraft that falls into the category of an Optionally Piloted Vehicle (OPV) with its ability to be flown robotically or with a human pilot on board was unveiled recently.
It is claimed that the Firebird will allow the U.S. military to simultaneously gather real-time high-definition video, view infrared imagery, use radar and eavesdrop on communications, reports the Daily Mail.
Incredibly, it has an interface like a memory stick that can be plugged into a PC without the need for additional software.
Measuring 34ft-long and 9.7ft-high, the twin-tailed plane can reach a maximum altitude of 30,000ft and has a maximum flying time of between 24 and 40 hours, depending on its configuration.
Its wing span is 65ft and it has a pushed-propeller at the rear of its fuselage.he Firebird, which performed its first flight in February 2010, was designed and built in California’s Mojave Desert by Scaled Composites and unveiled yesterday by U.S. aero defence firm Northrop Grumman.
The aircraft was designed with the certainty of cuts in U.S. defence spending in mind.
“Firebird addresses future budgetary constraints by combining the best of our piloted and unmanned systems,” said Paul Meyer, a spokesman for Northrop Grumman.
Rick Crooks, Firebird program manager, described it as an adaptable system that is highly affordable because of the number of different missions that can be accomplished in a single flight.
The Firebird will be demonstrated in public from May 23 to June 3. It is currently unclear how much it will cost. (ANI)
Our Fear-Based Society and the Resultant Loss of Liberty
What do the Patriot Act, X-ray scanners and “enhanced” pat downs at airports, our new healthcare system (I hate calling it “Obamacare” because he’s just a puppet like all Presidents), Roosevelt’s “New Deal,” and all other government programs have in common? They’re all sold to us by politicians as a means to keep us safe: safe from terrorists, safe from the bad insurance companies who will uninsure you when you get sick, safe from economic hardships.
Notice, if you will, that these sort of programs get passed by our government when something bad happens that affects the psyche of the entire US. 9/11 happens and we get the PATRIOT Act, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and a host of other anti-liberty, supposedly pro-safety, laws and agencies; the Christmas Day underwear bomber detonates a small bomb setting himself ablaze and we get body scanners and “enhanced” pat downs at airports; the economy hits the skids and it’s the perfect time to pass sweeping healthcare “reform” because everyone’s concerned they will lose their job and their healthcare.
As Rahm Emmanuel famously said, “You don’t ever want a crisis to go to waste; it’s an opportunity to do important things that you would otherwise avoid.”
However, I would argue Ben Franklin’s perspective is the healthy one. In 1818, he wrote: “They willing to give up essential liberty for a little temporary safety, deserve neither and will lose both.”
Benjamin Franklin was a wise man; a student of history. He studied — as all the founders did — the toll this forfeiture of liberty for Read more…
Is our debt to China a national security risk?
China is the largest foreign holder of U.S. debt (with estimated holdings of $1.16 trillion) — and, according to a newly proposed U.S. military spending bill, this constitutes a national security concern for America.
The 2012 Defense Authorization Bill proposed Monday by Rep. Howard McKeon, the California Republican who chairs the House Armed Services Committee, includes a section on China. Why would China feature in a 2012 military budget? The answer is leverage. As the AFP noted, the question the bill poses is whether “Beijing could draw a military advantage from its status as a major U.S. creditor.”
There is some precedent for this concern. In early 2010, as Reuters reported, senior Chinese military officials urged that China sell some U.S. government bonds as a punishment of sorts for Washington having sold arms to Taiwan (although the threat was not Read more…
Pakistan Prime Minister to warn US over Osama bin Laden raid
Pakistan’s prime minister will on Monday warn the United States it will defend its air space if American forces mount another raid on terrorists suspected of hiding inside the country.
Yusuf Raza Gilani will seek to restore some dignity in an address to the nation after the humiliation caused when American forces killed Osama bin Laden at a compound close to Pakistan’s main military academy in Abbottabad last week without alerting Pakistan.
A senior government source close to the prime minister said while Mr Gilani will take an aggressive stand to shore up the government’s position.
The source said: “The Prime Minister will say that the United States should not have bypassed Pakistan. We have made a huge contribution in fighting terrorism. We’ve arrested close to 100 al-Qaeda people, including Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.
“We’ll take appropriate action if any further violation takes place. We will defend our air space by any means we have.”
He will say that Washington’s decision to launch the raid without consulting Islamabad had plunged military and political relations Read more…
![[Most Recent Quotes from www.kitco.com]](https://i0.wp.com/www.kitconet.com/charts/metals/gold/t24_au_en_usoz_2.gif)
![[Most Recent Quotes from www.kitco.com]](https://i0.wp.com/www.kitconet.com/charts/metals/silver/t24_ag_en_usoz_2.gif)
crisisboom
CRISISBOOM 
You must be logged in to post a comment.