Archive for the 'War' Category
Iraq’s Foreign Militants ‘Come from U.S. Allies’
November 23rd, 2007Via: Guardian: Around 60% of all foreign militants who entered Iraq to fight over the past year came from Saudi Arabia and Libya, according to files seized by American forces at a desert camp. The files listed the nationalities and biographical details of more than 700 fighters who crossed into Iraq from August last year, […]
U.S. Military Demands Return of Signing Bonuses from Wounded Personnel
November 21st, 2007Via: kdka.com: The U.S. Military is demanding that thousands of wounded service personnel give back signing bonuses because they are unable to serve out their commitments. To get people to sign up, the military gives enlistment bonuses up to $30,000 in some cases. Now men and women who have lost arms, legs, eyesight, hearing and […]
Chinese Sub Pops Up in Middle of U.S. Navy Exercise
November 11th, 2007There are a few navy.mil readers who haven’t been blocked from reading Cryptogon… So, any guesses on why that Chinese sub didn’t show up on active sonar? (Not holding my breath for a response.) Update: The Story Appears to be Over a Year Old Via: Daily Mail: When the U.S. Navy deploys a battle fleet […]
Military Releases Heavily Redacted Report on Directed Energy Weapon Accident
November 10th, 2007Don’t microwave me, bro! Via: Wired: Seven months after an airman was burned in a test of the nonlethal heat beam, the Air Force has released a heavily redacted version of the mishap report that reveals few details about what happened. The military has bent over backwards to demonstrate to the public that the Active […]
Chart: The Cost of the War in Iraq vs. Spending on Solar Energy Research
November 10th, 2007In The Power Crisis Mythology, the 40% Efficient Solar Cell and the Cost of the War in Iraq, I wrote: Spectrolab, Inc., a subsidiary of Boeing, has developed a solar cell technology that has a conversion efficiency of 40.7%. They accomplished this with a grant from the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory. […]
U.S. Military Veterans Constitute a Quarter of America’s Homeless
November 8th, 2007Via: AP: Veterans make up one in four homeless people in the United States, though they are only 11 percent of the general adult population, according to a report to be released Thursday. And homelessness is not just a problem among middle-age and elderly veterans. Younger veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan are trickling into shelters […]
Lockheed Martin Co-Developing System to Predict Stability of Nations
October 31st, 2007Sounds like a plugin level task for the SEAS system. Via: Washington Business Journal: Lockheed Martin Corp. said Wednesday that a team lead by its Cherry Hill, N.J.-based Advanced Technology Laboratories has won a $1.3 million contract to develop a system for predicting crises and the stability of countries. The contract is for the first […]
It’s the Oil
October 26th, 2007Via: London Review of Books: Iraq is ‘unwinnable’, a ‘quagmire’, a ‘fiasco’: so goes the received opinion. But there is good reason to think that, from the Bush-Cheney perspective, it is none of these things. Indeed, the US may be ‘stuck’ precisely where Bush et al want it to be, which is why there is […]
Putin Comments on Bush: “Running Around Like a Madman with a Razor Blade”
October 26th, 2007This comment might be a bit of a tipoff into strategic thinking inside Russia. Mainly, that Bush is nuts. Stark raving, speaking in tongues, doolally nuts. (Los Angeles Times: Straitjacket Bush: The President’s Warmongering Remarks on the Iranian Threat Suggest He Is Psychotic) Seriously. International Relations assumes “rational actors.” Putin’s comment could mean that the […]
Trillion-Dollar War: Afghanistan and Iraq Set to Cost More than Vietnam and Korea
October 24th, 2007Via: Independent: President George Bush will have spent more than $1 trillion on military adventures by the time he leaves office at the end of next year, more than the entire amount spent on the Korean and Vietnam wars combined. There are also disturbing signs that Mr Bush is preparing an attack on Iran during […]
