Secret War
How many troops does the US have in Africa and what percentage of those deployed are engaged in a secret war, run from Stuttgart, Germany (HQ AFRICOM)?
“THE UNITED STATES has fought more than a dozen “secret wars” over the last two decades, according to a new report from the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University’s School of Law.
Through a combination of ground combat, airstrikes, and operations by U.S. proxy forces, these conflicts have raged from Africa to the Middle East to Asia, often completely unknown to the American people and with minimal congressional oversight.
“This proliferation of secret war is a relatively recent phenomenon, and it is undemocratic and dangerous,” wrote Katherine Yon Ebright, counsel in the Brennan Center’s Liberty and National Security Program.
“The conduct of undisclosed hostilities in unreported countries contravenes our constitutional design. It invites military escalation that is unforeseeable to the public, to Congress, and even to the diplomats charged with managing U.S. foreign relations.”
These clandestine conflicts have been enabled by the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force, enacted in the wake of the September 11 attacks, as well as the covert action statute, which allows secret, unattributed operations, primarily conducted by the CIA.”
Primer for City People
So for those that don’t know much about Bovines ie: cows/bulls and even bison this is for you.
If you are not sure where baby cows come from, here is a cows nest. As you can see the eggs in this particular nest are all white. White eggs generally mean that the cow being born will either be a beef cow or a dairy cow that will only produce white milk. But if the eggs are brown (Which is rare) you will end up with a cow that is used solely for the production of chocolate milk.
Identify the Experimental Aircraft
Identify the US Navy Aircraft
Bullet Points:
* Pfizer is looking for guinea pigs to experiment on with their new and improved flu vax. I’m sure they’d give you lunch money if you agreed to help with their experiment.
* Cleo’s Tomb – The massive tunnel was discovered by an Egyptian-Dominican archaeological research team from the University of Santo Domingo in the area of the Temple of Tapozeris Magna, just west of Alexandria, Egypt’s Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities announced last week.
* Tiger Eyes – In Roman times, the so-called ′Tiger Eyes′ small white stones that were placed among the stones on the road so that they could be seen at night.
* Always take a critical view of what you read. If the subject is of any importance, take the time to learn the detailed facts behind the headlines, and bear in mind that the people writing those headlines and stories may have agendas of their own to push, sometimes unconsciously.
A quote from 1965:
“The media’s the most powerful entity on earth. They have the power to make the innocent guilty and to make the guilty innocent, and that’s power. Because they control the minds of the masses. The press is so powerful in its image-making role, it can make the criminal look like he’s a victim, and make the victim look like he’s criminal. This is the press, an irresponsible press. It will make the criminal look like he’s the victim and make the victim look like he’s the criminal. If you aren’t careful, the newspapers will have you hating the people who are being oppressed and loving the people who are doing the oppressing.” – Malcolm X.
I’ll bet you never thought I’d be quoting Malcolm X, did you?
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What could this mean?
*
Map
Map of languages of the Eastern Roman Empire, ca 500 AD.
It is slightly off – Greek advanced a bit higher in Italy and a bit further west on Sicily but it is a good map overall.
errata: Firstly, Turks did not arrive in Anatolia until the 1000s. This map is 500 AD. Please read carefully.
Secondly, Modern “Macedonia” [Slavic] was a creation of Tito, and “Macedonian” is the Western Dialect of the Bulgarian language. Makedonia is a Greek region and genuine ethnic Macedonians are Greeks. This is why Alexander spread the Greek language and religion.
Lastly, I am aware that South Slavs did not exist in the Balkans at this point. I did not make this map.
I was reading about the distribution of languages in the Eastern Roman Empire and came across this map. It’s illustrative of what is out there and why you have to read carefully.
Parting Shot
Identify the Experimental Aircraft:
Boeing Bird of Prey
Identity the Aircraft:
McDonnell F3H Demon
Surly, you get a pass with #1 because the YF-118G is called the Bird of Prey. #2, yes, F3H-2N Demon.
“…and stop calling me Shirley!”
Imagine trying to name a plane the “Demon” nowadays?
-Kle.
You name it the “Kamala” and everyone would know that’s the same thing.
tiger eye…smart. and if you don’t have nvg’s you can paint a white stripe on the trees or posts facing your position. then you can see when something crosses in front of the stripe even on the darkest nights….how many troops in africa? at least 2000 national guard at the moment, due to rotate back home any day now after a year in several east african shit holes like eritrea. funny use of national guard, is it not?
Today, anyone who has a perimeter to watch should have some form of NVG. However, I will caution that ACTIVE night vision gives somebody with passive night vision a point of aim.
Yes, it is a peculiar use for the National Guard (state troops).
not everybody can afford them. i “acquired” mine but they are second/third generation. still effective, but i find the naked eye better except in total darkness. i really wish i could afford a good thermal….my brotha from anotha motha cw4 just texted me he’s feet dry back in the good ol usa. i haven’t the heart to tell him it’s not the same place he left a year ago. so we’ll go eat drink and be merry, not discuss serious issues, for tomorrow we face death once again. well, he does, i’m retired. then again, are we ever really retired?
True about deployed to Africa. Met a guy at the range a couple months ago who’d been there.
I rhink, at least 500 years earlier, that Aramaic was spread much further, both to the south and the west.
Yes, I think that’s a fair assertion. There was an ebb and flow of empires wherein culture (and DNA) was exchanged.
“What could this mean?”
“John has a long mustache”
“The long sobs of the violins of autumn wound my heart with a monotonous languor.”
Molasses tomorrow will bring forth cognac
“Berce mon coeur d’une langueur monotone” or “cradle my heart with a monotonous languor” signalled the invasion was about to begin.
The Purple Fish Swims At Midnight….
The chair. Now I have a Beethoven earworm. Nice. Truly sad to think how many who have no clue.
It’s important to recognize these things.
Bullet points. The amount of effort that the Egyptians gave to the burial sites of their leaders just staggers me. From pyramids to things like this tunnel just imagine the level of effort to just move all that rock.
Pfizer can continue to look until the cows come home as far as I am concerned.
Interesting info about the tiger eyes, I did not know that. The short sections of Roman road that I walked in England did not have them (probably heisted as souvenirs) but are certainly a good idea. So is the white paint, I will have to keep a gallon or so of white paint handy for when civilization breaks down.
We were landing in Africa in austere locations way back in the early 90s, but it is a strange use of the National Guard. It seems anymore that the Reserves and National Guard are just adjuncts of the active duty force. For example my son is in the Reserves but has deployed 6 times, each time for a “year” that is in reality 14 months. When I originally entered the AF back in the early 70s the Reserves were only supposed to be used during great need, like if WW III happened and it is hard for me to get rid of that mindset. Today the Reserves and National Guard just seem to be ways to save a little bit of funding since they only have to be supported when they are activated and don’t cost near as much on the retirement end.
X2
Thank you (all) for your service.
Glad I wasn’t drinking anything when I read about the bovine nest…
You all be safe and God bless.
Be careful not to step in those cow nests.
And don’t milk the bulls.
My brother in law threw a strap that held the milking machine over the bulls back one hungover Sunday morning and after he picked himself out of the gutter the boss gave him Sundays off. And I thought every one knew brown cows made chocolate milk! It’s unfair to mislead city people, many even think meat comes from the supermarket, why would we need to butcher a cow?
Bill Gates meat (woke meat) does come from a factory and is delivered to your neighborhood store where bun boys buy it
Blue areas on the map: Greek was the language and text of the learned, even as Romans pushed eastward.
This I believe was a major factor in the rise of Christianity in the East, as Biblical texts were compiled in Greek, though not without a few hiccups. Hebrew and Aramaic had fallen into disuse.
The Faith was subsumed by the Latins which eventually led to the schism between Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic branches of Christianity. (By this time the Hebrews were in the shade of the Empires struggling for dominance.)
The rise of Islam brought a new and rather unexpected player to the table. Moslems invaded and converted vast territories, disrupted trade and effectively separated the Eastern from the Western empire.
Due to religious differences the Empires were unable to unite against the Moslem tide which prevailed for the next thousand years. With some difficulty they were pushed out of Spain and defeated in Eastern Europe. They retained control of North Africa and most of the Middle East.
But they are not done yet…
I think that Islam has fired its bolt. That’s not to say that the religion is finished, but the days of expansion are in the past.
Unless you’re talking about London, San Diego or Michigan
England, France, Germany, Scandinavia.
Iceland.
USA in general.
Washington DC in particular.
Torrance, CA.
Torrance??
I used to live there. Don’t recall a greater than average number of Mohammedans
https://www.bing.com/maps?q=torrance+ca+mosque&cvid=b27f667f7cc24b27b2293728d8d58835&aqs=edge..69i57.9502j0j1&pglt=641&FORM=ANNTA1&PC=U531
You lived in Torrance? Gee…we might have been neighbors!
I lived on Meyler Street. and attended 223rd St. Elementary School. It’s now called Meyler Street Elementary but it’s located on 223rd. Grades 3-4-5. Grades 1-2-3 in Mesa, Arizona. I moved during 3rd grade.
Know exactly where it is, but you were there way before my time in SoCal…
=TW= there are mosques all over SoCal. There was one built right down the street from my home in Corona, California before I moved to Arizona. I’ve blogged about some run-ins with the new locals. All homes in the area were sold to Mohammedans including mine. They offered top dollar. I’m guessing that somewhere around half had a jihadi mindset. They learned that I did too and then they left me alone. I had always walked around strapped. When they moved in, I wore the Kimber 1911 cocked and locked on the outside of my clothing.
Does that represent an expansion of Islam? I guess, but there were a LOT of different churches with different faiths on Ontario Blvd. Some were more obnoxious than the Mohammedans.
PS – Other than loading with JHAWG ammo – hollowpoints dipped in a polymer containing pig fat – their presence didn’t change my CCW status. Their tag line was “put ham into Mohammed”.
Heh! “Peace thru pork.”
Dang it, Larry, I wish I had known you when you were local.
Ok, Malcolm, what’s your battle plan to have the poorest 13% of population conquer the rest?
The amount of effort that the Egyptians gave to the burial sites of their leaders just staggers me. From pyramids to things like this tunnel just imagine the level of effort to just move all that rock.
Raise taxes high and waste it on “religion” to prevent the upper-middle class from saving and investing that wealth in practical works and becoming independent from government. Wouldn’t want an industrial revolution to start inspired by Hero’s steam engine, it’s disruptive. Much better this way with our family being god-kings and you being peasants. If you don’t take that wealth away funding war or internal “improvements”, say because you have an intervening ocean that’s expensive to project power across, investments compound until you get America. Oops.
The secret wars are *not* a relatively recent thing.
They go back to at least the early 1900s (remember the Fruit Wars?) and before that, instead of using regular troops we just used companies of filibusters as cat’s paws.
Not saying that I approve, just that it never changes. The US has statistically always been at war. Now, we’re at war essentially everywhere.
-Kle.
^^ Indeed.
It’s like being nibbled to death by ducks. And there are lots of ducks.
(Not to mention the nibblers within our borders.)
The “Global War on Terror” should begin at home.
I note with fascination that the Wikipedia entry for Malcolm X capitalizes both “Black” and “White” when those words are used as racial descriptors. Compare this to the official style guides of The Press (such as AP) today where only “Black” is capitalized but “white” is lower case.
“loving the people who are doing the oppressing”
Mainstream Evangelicals? Malcolm X has a message for you….
Maybe “Brother Malcolm” was correct about the Press. (But that’s not what I believe, of course. I denounce anyone who claims that our news and information sources are controlled by a hostile “elite” who are inimical to the average American, and especially to heritage Americans. It would be a slander to say that the Press holds Christianity in contempt. Distrust of the Press is Hate Think and sedition. It’s like the last days of the Weimar Republic all over again. JUST like it!)
PS I didn’t come up with the Weimar comparison. When Musk first offered to buy Twitter, some Twitter employee (apparently unironically) whined “this feels like we’re sitting in a cafe at the end of Weimar period.” That was doubtless one of the useful idiots and not an “elite”. Though to be fair, the actual “elites” have a shocking lack of self awareness themselves.
I don’t know where the present loonies in the intellectual establishment and particularly, the media have this newfound love for the Weimar Republic – a floundering, corrupt, broken Germany, oppressed by foreign actors. Inflation was far more rampant than it is here today. and the capacity of the Weimar government’s structure to curb that did not exist. Post WW1 Germany was a horrible place to be.
Honest historians today understand that the punitive Treaty of Versailles inevitably led to a reaction in Germany that set the table for WW2. The weak Weimar Republic all but was created by the allies, post-Kaiser (cousin of the King of England), and led to the appeal that a number of rabble-rousers had to the general public. After it all shook out, the marginally competent but well-managed Hitler ended up in charge.
There is absolutely no comparison that can be made between the Weimar Republic and 2022 America.
One problem is the limited supply of honest historians, both absolutely and as a proportion of all historians….
2022 America: not economically, thank heaven. But let’s see where 2023 and 2024 take us. Socially, the decay in 2022 America is at least as bad, I’m guessing. The deviance of Kander and Ebbs’ “Cabaret” was in the demi-monde and on an estate. That was the 1930’s of K&E’s imagination. Today in the US it’s in our elementary schools: transvestism, abortion, teaching of anal sex, the list goes on — and all this to prepubescent children. The Master of Ceremonies controls mainstream culture.