World News Archives - Page 2 of 14

8 min read

Baltimore – Conspiracy House…?

Michael Cessna March 29, 2024

In the early morning hours of March 26, 2024, the container ship MV Dali lost all power and steering as it attempted to depart the Port of Baltimore, heading to Colombo, Sri Lanka. Drifting with the current of the Patapsco River, and influenced by inertia, the massive ship rammed the southern support tower holding up the Francis Scott Key Bridge (also known as the “Key Bridge”). The impact resulted in the more or less instantaneous collapse of the bridge’s main span onto the ship’s bow, and causing several highway maintenance workers (working the night shift to repair potholes on the bridge) to fall into the frigid waters; tragically, although two of the workers were rescued, another six are missing and presumed dead, as of this writing (March 29). There is conjecture as to whether anyone else went into the water, as there may be other vehicles under the wreckage.

Given that less than ninety-six hours, as of this writing, have elapsed since the incident, very little hard information is available concerning the details of what actually happened. From all appearances, however, it appears that the crew and the harbor pilots aboard were caught completely by surprise. Given that, they appear to have done everything they could to try and mitigate the disaster; the ‘Mayday’ call issued by one of the harbor pilots almost certainly saved dozens of lives, by getting Maryland law enforcement and transit authorities to lock the US Highway I-695 toll booths prior to the impact.

The MV Dali is a container ship of middle size, as international cargo carriers go, being rated for just under ten thousand Twenty-foot Equivalent Units (TEU); in practical terms for the layman, this equates to carrying the equivalent of about 5,000 semi-truck trailers as cargo; in contrast, the EVER GIVEN, which grounded and blocked both directions of the Suez Canal almost exactly three years ago, on March 23, 2021, is one of the largest container ships in the world, clocking in at over 20,000 TEU’s. The Dali is homeported in Singapore, but is currently under lease to the MAERSK line, one of the leading shippers in the world, and was operating with a crew of 22 from India. Despite very ugly comments from certain sectors, nothing appears to have been wrong with the crew’s performance. Similarly, the ship was in good repair, having been inspected at previous ports of call, as well as in the Port of Baltimore itself. Singapore is very careful about keeping vessels it has granted a flag to, to maintaining a high standard of operations and repair.

Perhaps inevitably, the sun had barely risen over the accident scene before speculation began to run wild online, with breathlessly frenetic claims ranging from insurance scams to cyber hacking, to an attack by “Insert Foreign Entity Here”, to a “Black Swan”/“false flag” event sparked by “Insert Portion of the US Government Here”. While many, if not most, such ideas border on the demented, given the events of the preceding two or three decades – depending on where the counting begins – they do need to be looked into, at some realistic level.

That is what we will now proceed to.

Conspiracy – or Accident?

The first thing to understand is that maritime accidents happen all the time. The Dali itself had a docking accident in 2016, and there is the EVER GIVEN incident referenced above. There was actually a ship grounding in 2022 in Baltimore…things happen all the time and sometimes, they happen in the worst possible places.

This incident is almost certainly just as it appears: a devastating and tragic accident, occurring at precisely the worst place and time…

However…People jumping to a conspiratorial view of this incident are not necessarily kooks and weirdoes – although there are, of course the obligatory “occult” explanations that are…”inventively creative” is probably the best term.

There seems to have been nothing wrong as the Dali was towed away from the dock by Port of Baltimore tugboats. The ship was escorted by tugs to make a tight U-Turn as it left dockside, and began to build up speed; this is a completely normal procedure for most large vessels when leaving port. Neither was its acceleration to c.8 knots (9 mph/15 kph) unusual for its position in the Patapsco River’s channel. Likewise, the tugboats disconnecting as the Dali completed its U-Turn unusual; again, this is completely normal procedure for leaving port.

The problems begin as the ship neared the bridge. Videos of the ship approaching the bridge clearly show its lights shutting off, followed it beginning to drift. The Dali displaces nearly 149,000 tons, is nearly 1,000 feet in length, and stands nearly 100 feet from the surface to its highest point. Losing power to engines, steering or both, renders ships of this size completely at the mercy of both wind and current, as is shows by the ship immediately beginning to drift in the current. The crew apparently tried an emergency restart on the ship’s generators, producing the cloud of smoke seen in the video, and a momentary restoration of power…By then, however, it was too late, as the power failure occurred as the ship was less than a mile from the bridge – ships this large cannot stop on a dime, and by the time power was restored, it was far too late to correct the drift.

One underhanded and disingenuous tactic used by various “conspiracy theorists” (as opposed to “conspiracy analysts”) is to make assessments based on sped-up versions of the video. This kind of gaslighting warps the perspective of the unwary and/or inexperienced viewer; it is very much the kind of behavior that gives “independent researchers” a bad name.

But…the timing of the power loss is frankly suspicious, as it occurred at precisely the worst possible moment, where the crew and pilots would have essentially no way of diverting – much less stopping – the vessel, preventing an impact with the bridge.

Likewise, there is nothing unusual about the ship being able to knock the bridge down. The Francis Scott Key Bridge began construction in 1972, and opened in 1977. Commercial ships were far smaller in those days, but even so, a large vessel ramming the bridge supports head-on – deliberate or not – would almost certainly cause a catastrophic collapse; this would be the case with most bridges in the world, then as now. If there was a serious fault in the bridge’s design, it was in the near-total lack of protective “dolphin” barriers to protect the bridge supports, which certainly allowed the Dali to strike the support tower directly.

Comments have questioned what appears to be a “dynamite charge” exploding at the moment of impact, directly above the bow of the ship. In reality, this was a power cable running along the top of the bridge girders snapping, throwing off a shower of sparks as it separated…It was not an explosive, nor was it a thermite [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermite] charge – that is not how those things work…

…Still, the timing remains highly questionable. Based on the notion that this was a deliberate act of sabotage, we will now look at potential “Who’s” and “Why’s”.

Who?

Assuming that this was a deliberate act, one in which the ship’s control systems were hacked or sabotaged in some other way, the first question to ask is “Who” would carry out such an attack?

The number of groups around the world with the capacity to hack a commercial vessel at precisely the right time and place to cause significant damage is almost too large to calculate. At the same time, such a “hostile foreign entity” would have to have very precise and highly detailed intelligence on the vessel and the Port of Baltimore in order to carry out their attack effectively. While certainly difficult, such a potentially hostile foreign entity could well have such a capability.

The next potential culprit, unfortunately, consists of any number of factions within the power structures of the United States Government, itself. This is, sadly, a significant possibility, given the relentless exposure of the openly hostile and highly illegal actions carried out by various groups within the US Government over the course of the last seventy-odd years, if not more, actions that range from COINTELPRO, to Project Megiddo, to the Library Awareness Program, to any number of operations carried out in the aftermath of the 9-11 Attacks.

Why?

The next question to answer – or at least try to puzzle out – would be “Why?”

For a hostile foreign actor – whether a state like Communist China, North Korea, Russia, etc., or some flavor of terror group – shutting down a major US oceanic port for one or two months (the initial estimate of the time needed to clear the channel of debris to allow the Port of Baltimore to reopen), especially given the presence of a four-ship squadron of the Department of Transportation’s “Ready Reserve Fleet” (RRF) which supports the US Navy around the world, is definitely attractive. At the same time, while certainly a serious situation for strategic operations, this is actually not that critical of a problem, as there is redundancy built into the RRF for such situations.

What is much more serious, is the effective closure – even if temporary – of one of the busiest commercial ports in the world. Currently, projected losses are estimated at some $15 billion dollars per day, as well as closing access to the largest port importing cars into the United States. Added to this is the potential impact on the jobs of some 8,000 people in Baltimore, if not more. Overall, this is not a blow that Baltimore can easily deal with, as the port has been the only economic engine keeping the city financially above water.

Clearly, these results are highly desirable for any foreign actor.

Conversely, there is the notion of a deliberate act engineered by factions within the US government. While this possibility cannot be reasonably dismissed out of hand, it is difficult to see what they gain would be.

A simple insurance scam is rather pointless, as is the idea that delaying the ship’s cargo delivery to Sri Lanka is of such importance that it would require crippling a large vessel and blocking a major port. Similarly, staging such an incident to divert attention away from any number of ongoing political, legal, military or social issues currently plaguing the United States is hard to grasp, as even the “alternative media” is still talking about many issues besides this disaster…

Follow-throughs…?

…In both circumstances – a foreign enemy or an internal one – the telling question is the lack of “follow-on” attack[s]. When the Imperial Japanese Navy completed its raid on the US military bases at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on December 7, 1941, it did not stop there. The Japanese military capitalized on its devastating strike, and launched a series of massive offensive operations throughout China and the Western Pacific region simultaneous to their attack. This is common throughout history – one does not commit to a major attack on a location without an immediate follow-up attack, singly or in quantity. The expenditure of assets – financial and military – simply is not worth the effort is there is no follow-on operation to capitalize on a successful strike.

Conclusion

This last point is really the best argument in favor of this entire affair being a simple, tragic accident, one that is having an impact far outside its mechanical circumstances.

There are conspiracies aplenty in the modern world. It is important to carefully examine sudden events to see if ulterior motives are factors, and spell out such motives if they are identified…at the same time, it is equally important to not assume that a conspiracy exists where it does not. That requires careful and sober examination of the incident in question.

However, just because a conspiracy is not immediately evident, that does not prevent such a situation from being exploited by the unscrupulous…as has happened before.

Forewarned is forearmed.

*The Freedomist — Keeping Watch, So You Don’t Have To*

Illegal Shoots Illegal Trans Migrant

2 min read

Illegal Shoots Illegal Trans Migrant

Paul Collier March 21, 2024

An Illegal Alien allegedly shot another illegal alien and trans “woman” but won’t be charged for the alleged crime because the witness, the shot trans “woman,” won’t cooperate with authorities. The Illegal in question was already arrested for gun violations but let go. Now, thanks to an Obama-appointed Judge, this illegal can “legally” continue to possess guns.

Excerpt from PJMedia

… Yeah, no.

Early one mild morning last month, a transgender woman who recently migrated from Venezuela was waiting for a ride outside a Little Village nightclub when a driver pulled up and made an ominous remark in Spanish.

“Bad gay,” he allegedly said before firing three shots at the woman around 4:30 a.m. on Feb. 4. She was struck in the groin and both legs and left in critical condition, according to Chicago police records.

The suspect was a Venezuelan man — unnamed in various reports — linked by federal authorities to Venezuela’s El Tren De Aragua drug and sex trafficking cartel.

“While he had been identified as the gunman and police had recovered key evidence,” according to the Chicago Sun-Times, “including a shell casing and video of the Ford Explorer used in the attack — Cook County prosecutors wouldn’t bring charges.” The police explained that their “one witness who can positively identify the gunman will not cooperate any further.”

It doesn’t take much imagination to figure out why that might be. The shooter is on the loose and the only witness is a trans hooker who has already been shot three times.

But here’s the kicker. The suspect had been arrested just two days earlier in Austin and “hit with a list of charges, including felonies for illegally possessing a gun and ammunition.” But the judge there let him go, too.

U.S. Defense Tech is Failing Us

1 min read

U.S. Defense Tech is Failing Us

Paul Collier March 20, 2024

The National Security Innovation Base (NSIB) Report Card for America’s Defensive Tech was released this week, giving the sector alarmingly poor marks. The report suggests there are “major warning signs” the defensive tech industry has reached a critical fail point as innovation appears to have ground to a halt, with no signs the innovation advantage can be regained anytime soon.

Excerpt from www.washingtontimes.com

“Major warning signs” in the national security sector could hold back America’s ability to innovate at a crucial moment in the intensifying global competition with adversaries such as Russia and China, according to a report made public Tuesday.

The National Security Innovation Base (NSIB) Report Card, released by the Ronald Reagan Institute’s Center for Peace Through Strength, offers a deep dive into the overall health of American defense innovation. The Reagan foundation’s National Security Innovation Base Program said the report card examines “national security agencies and organizations, various research centers and laboratories, universities and academia, traditional defense ‘primes,’ commercial sector disruptors, venture capital and the innovative systems of American allies and partners” around the world, providing a comprehensive snapshot of the national security sector.

Have NATO Troops Entered Ukraine?

1 min read

Have NATO Troops Entered Ukraine?

Paul Collier March 12, 2024

The Polish Foreign Minister, Radoslaw Sikorski, is claiming NATO troops have already entered Ukraine. He made the statement after Russia warned that such a move would lead to direct confrontation.

The Minister stated, “NATO soldiers are already present in Ukraine. And I would like to warmly thank the ambassadors of those states that have taken that risk. Those who are those states know who they are, but you can’t disclose that, yes in contrary to other politicians I won’t list those countries.”

The Forgotten War

6 min read

The Forgotten War

Michael Cessna January 19, 2024

There are wars, and rumors of wars, all over the world as 2024 dawns. Russia and Ukraine continue to bludgeon each other relentlessly. Israel’s war against Hamas grinds on, threatening to expand into the southern territory of Lebanon under the control of the Iranian-backed Hezbollah terror group. To the south and east, the Houthis in Yemen are waging a “pin-prick war” that has diverted some 12% of the world’s commercial shipping, forcing extensive delays and threatening to log-jam global trade on a scale that rivals the dislocations of the COVID pandemic, as their backers in Iran rattle their own sabers and threaten the oil export structure of the Persian Gulf.

Across the Red Sea from Yemen, wars rage in Sudan and Ethiopia, while Ethiopia’s own actions threaten wars with Eritrea and Somalia. To the north, Egypt and Jordan – for different reasons – are on the verge of internal collapse. Throughout the rest of Africa, nations struggle with internal, interminable and seemingly unsolvable issues, with many states facing continued attacks from radical jihadist militias. In Myanmar, the military government is clinging to power by its proverbial fingernails. In South America, Venezuela continues to threaten the annexation of Guyana, while Bolivia and Ecuador are the new battlegrounds in the war of the drug cartels.

Naturally, with all of these long-running – or suddenly appearing – conflicts, most of them remote, obscure and obtuse to outsiders, there are other conflicts that get lost in the shuffle…but those conflicts are no less important; in fact, many of them are not petty in any way, with the victims not simply being on the short end of the stick, but who were actively abandoned to the whims of ‘realpolitik’.

The war in Kurdistan is just that kind of conflict.

The wars and depredations inflicted on the Kurdish people for over one hundred years have largely been caused by the West, primarily Britain and France…but the United States hasn’t helped. And that war continues, not only against Syria and Turkey, but against Iran.

While the Kurdish nation has been noted as a separate and distinct people since the 11^th Century, when the term “Kurdistan” was noted by the Seljuk Empire, it was only after World War 1, and the last, vile gasp of debased European imperialism – the Sykes-Picot Agreement – that the real agony began.

Neither Kurdistan nor its people were given more than lip service by Britain and France. Bolshevik (Communist) Russia repudiated any Russian claims associated with the agreement after the revolution that unseated the Tsar, as they had far more pressing problems. The signatories, channeling previous agreements covering African and Asia, cavalierly split what they, themselves, knew to be ethnically Kurdish areas between themselves to rule. While subsequent, limp-wristed treaties “graciously” allowed for the possibility of a Kurdish state (despite several Kurdish states being organized from 1918 to 1930), the European powers threw up their hands in 1923, and washed their hands of the Kurdish areas, for the most part, with the Treaty of Lausanne, which made no mention of the region at all, condemning the Kurdish people to be split between what is now Turkey, Syria, Iraq and Iran. The Kurd’s only ally of significance was Winston Churchill, who argued for a separate Kurdish state, but his political influence in the 1920’s was very limited, compared to what it would become in later decades.

*Lt Col Francis R. Maunsell’s map, Pre-World War I British Ethnographical Map of eastern Turkey in Asia, Syria and western Persia, 1910. Kurdish regions are in yellow. Library of Congress.*

The 1920 Treaty of Sèvres was a draft treaty between the Ottoman Empire and the Principal Allied Powers. It was ultimately shelved because of Turkish non-ratification and was replaced by the Treaty of Lausanne. Map by User:Zero0000 CCA/4.0

But the Kurds wouldn’t give up.

The Kurds sent a delegation to the San Francisco Peace Conference of 1945, which would form the United Nations, to argue for an independent state; they were, of course, refused. But, armed Kurdish groups continually waged low-level guerrilla wars against the states they had been relegated to; the wars’ ferocity depended on how intense the ruling government’s programs to suppress Kurdish culture were at the time.

However, this would occasionally swing into full-on war crime territory, as happened in the Halabja Massacre of 1988, when the Kurdish village was attacked with lethal “war agent” chemicals weapons, primarily mustard gas, but also with a mix of nerve and blood agents. It is generally assumed that Saddam Hussein’s government was responsible for the attack, although allegations have long been made against Iran.

When the 1991 Persian Gulf War ended, US President George H. W. Bush made casual, off-hand remarks, that left many in Iraq – including the Kurds – believing that if they rose up to overthrow Saddam Hussein, they would get at least some help from the United States. Unfortunately for them, the Kurds in the north and Shi’a Iraqis in the south read far too much into the first Bush’s words, and were left stunned (assuming they lived) then they rose up…and the United States barely lifted a finger, seemingly completely surprised that the subject peoples of a brutal dictatorship might actually have the gall to rise up in armed revolt against said brutal government.

The absolute cheek of little people.

Shamed into doing something, though, the Bush administration launched “Operation Provide Comfort” to protect Kurdish refugees fleeing the Iraqi Army units not destroyed fighting the United States and its allies in Kuwait.

Quite unintentionally, this would be the first real break for Kurdish autonomy since 1918. The strict limiting of Iraqi military abilities against the Kurds left the northern people able to organize in safety, and begin building a formal military organization, the Peshmerga, from scattered guerrilla forces. While remaining in “recognition limbo” – without formal recognition as a sovereign state – the Kurdish authorities could not legally purchase military weapons on the open world market, forcing them to develop a “cottage industry” for making weapons, alongside reusing weapons captured from Iraqi forces when the government in Baghdad drags its feet on providing any, buying weapons on the black market and the occasional under-the-table crumbs offered by a scattering of Western states.

With the overthrow of Saddam in 2003, and the resulting upheaval in the aftermath, this organization became much more formalized and professional, at least compared to where it had been. It still has serious internal issues, a reflection of thirty-odd years of disordered and fragmented political organization, leading to a fragmented command and operational structure.

Kurdistan deserves better, not least because they have carried the United States water in the region with little return for their money. Kurdistan, from 2003 onwards, made themselves into a safe area for the US and its allies, doing what it could against Al Qaeda-aligned jihadist groups, for very little return.

Kurdistan remains split between four nations, with no prospect of real help from anyone else. Syria, still embroiled in its decade-and-a-half long civil war, has no intention of allowing its Kurdish regions to leave the country; the autonomous region known as “Rojava” formalized in 2018 is nothing more than a convenience for Bashar al-Assad’s government in Damascus.

The United States is unlikely to attempt to rein in the extreme excesses of Turkey’s operations in its own Kurdish areas, nor the northern parts of Syria and Iraq. This is because Turkey, as a member of NATO, is vital to European security…even as the Turkish state keeps expanding its influence throughout the world.

Likewise, Iraq is not about to allow its own Kurdish areas to actually leave, as that would remove a large oil-producing area from the country, fundamentally weakening the shaky government in Baghdad.

And then – there is Iran.

The mullahs in control of Iran view its Kurdish population as a useful foil that allows them to accuse any number of nations of trying to undermine them, while occasionally killing people wholesale to intimidate all of its ethnic minorities.

Now, however, with wider wars exploding throughout the region, as well as the rest of the world, the faint glimmer exists that the Kurds may soon have a chance to finally establish themselves as an organized state. The chances are remote, and it will be neither easy nor bloodless, but the chance is there.

The question is: Can the Kurd’s leadership come together to capitalize on the opportunity?

If they can, the United States should help make it happen – that’s not “imperialism”. That’s helping your actual friends, who have sacrificed to help you in the past, with no prompting.

Robbing Peter To Pay Paul

5 min read

Robbing Peter To Pay Paul

Michael Cessna January 12, 2024

It would seem that 2024 is off with a bang, if the Reader will forgive the pun.

Beginning on October 7^th of 2023, of course, Hamas launched its suicidal Don Quixote war with Israel, showing that the debased savagery of the Islamic State is alive and well. Shortly after, on October 13^th, Ethiopian Prime Minister Abey Ahmed announced what can only be termed a policy of “lebensraum” for Ethiopia, demanding free access to the Red Sea. And, as if on cue, the Houthi rebels in Yemen began attacking any unarmed commercial vessels they could draw a bead on in the nautical chokepoint of the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait, controlling the southern access point to the Red Sea.

Now, as the second week of January 2024 closes, Iran has entered the fray, seizing the oil tanker St. Nikolas off the coast of Oman, in the Arabian Sea, significantly widening the security problem – and potential naval combat area. Iran’s explanation for the seizure is a flimsy claim to Iranian ownership, a claim even flimsier than the excuse of the Houthi’s for attacking ships in the Red Sea.

Obviously, as we reported last week, all of this military action has begun to significantly impact world commerce, as increasing numbers of shipping lines abandon the critical Red Sea route, opting for the much longer transit around the Cape of Good Hope.

The question for most Readers is, obviously, “Where is the US Navy in all of this?” Good question.

The United States Navy is, unquestionably, the most powerful navy the world has ever seen. Disputing that statement is, frankly, ludicrous. The United States currently operates more aircraft carriers for fixed-wing operations than the rest of the world, combined…and this is before the various US Marine Corps aviation squadrons are added to its figures. It operates some seventy-six Arleigh Burke-class destroyers, regarded as the most capable destroyer class ever designed. Likewise, the US Navy maintains amphibious and supply forces that no other nation can match, giving it a truly global reach. It is not an exaggeration to say that a US Navy carrier battle group can deploy more firepower to a region than can be mustered by most nations’ entire militaries.

So – handling the Houthi’s, or even Iran, should present no great trouble for the United States, right?

Well…it’s complicated.

While the United States does, indeed, have a vast and capable military, like the armed forces of Great Britain before it, it has a major problem. It is not really a question of how good your weapons are; the greatest warship ever designed is completely useless if it isn’t where you need it to be, when you need it to be there.

The US military, and specifically the US Navy, cannot be everywhere at once. Aside from the chronic, military-wide problems with both recruiting and retention of personnel, the political leadership of the United States has, for the preceding forty years or so, almost uniformly failed to make even reasonably good choices in economic, military, social and foreign policy decisions. These failed policies have led to critically short numbers of personnel in almost all of the armed services, which translates into too few forces being available to deal with multiple threats. Indeed, while the US Navy, as of 2019, had some four hundred and eighty ships in commission, it could only deploy about two hundred and ninety.

What does this mean in the modern day, of January 2024?

As US and Western industry still struggles to supply the war in Ukraine, that situation is now worse, as the limited supply of ammunition is further divided to support Israel in its war against Hamas. Added to this, is the double threat from Iran and it’s Houthi proxies, a threat that is already damaging world commerce.

And then – there is Communist China…more on that, later.

Many people fail to grasp the impact of world shipping. Like it or not, everything you rely on is tied into global commerce in some way. Even if nothing you directly interact with physically transits the Red Sea, the major delays created will affect the prices of the everyday item you pay for. Likewise, the rising interest and insurance rates caused by the fighting will impact the Reader in a very real way, as those industries have to spread out the damage.

And then – there is Communist China.

A week ago, Communist leader Xi Jinping launched a purge of the upper echelons of the Communist state’s military leadership. While a relatively common practice among Communist states, it remains to be seen if Xi will go to the extent of other Communist dictators.

The end result of actions like this, is universally bad for the capabilities of a nation’s military forces, overall, as it significantly hampers military initiative, in favor of rigid obedience to political dogma – translation: Scare your military enough, and they will be too busy avoiding being shot by your political officers to fight your actual enemies.

However, there are many forms of warfare, and Communist China has learned that throwing money at a problem can make that problem either go away, or at least not bother it…and undermining an enemy while doing so is icing on the cake.

The bottom line? The West is failing. It is failing partially from it’s own success, but mostly from too many decades of throwing pasta at walls to see what sticks. The desire for profit beyond the dreams of avarice has led to a simultaneous weakening of Western industry, and to “good enough” levels of technological and industrial capacity leaking out to nations and groups who hate the West.

In a word: they hate you. It’s not so much that they hate you, personally – but they hate the society you grew up in, and are more than happy – and capable – of burning the world to the ground to spite you.

As of this writing, there are two hundred and ninety-seven days to the 2024 election. One way or another, you need a plan for what happens when we get there.

Assuming, of course, that we get there.

China’s Chips Rule America’s Seas

2 min read

China’s Chips Rule America’s Seas

Paul Collier January 10, 2024

The U.S. Navy has allowed its defense procurement to be infiltrated by the CCP, leaving America’s carriers dependent on Chinese computer chips to operate. The process of allowing the CCP to infiltrate America’s defense industry was a long one, one allowed by the treasonous DNC-CCP and its token opposition, the GOP-DNC.

A report from the data analytics firm Govini alleges China’s infiltration of our defense supply chain is so profound that we cannot hope to lock them out without completely dismantling and rebuilding the whole system. Again, remember, this was a slow process that happened under both DNC-CCP administrations and GOP-DNC administrations.

The report claims, “U.S. domestic production capacity is a shriveled shadow of its former self. Crucial categories of industry for U.S. national defense are no longer built in any of the 50 states. With just 25 well-constructed attacks, using any of a variety of means, an adversarial military planner could cripple much of America’s manufacturing apparatus for producing advanced weapons.”

From Forbes:

… over 40 percent of the semiconductors that sustain DoD weapons systems and associated infrastructure are now sourced from China. Second, from 2005 to 2020, the number of Chinese suppliers in the U.S. defense-industrial supply chain has quadrupled. And third, between 2014 and 2022, American dependence on Chinese electronics increased by 600 percent.

The seriousness of the vulnerability of American weapons systems and munitions to Chinese supply and control is vividly illustrated by the number of Chinese supplied semiconductors on which they run.

According to Govini, the U.S.’ newest Ford-class aircraft carriers depend on over 6,500 Chinese-sourced semiconductors to operate. Many other U.S. Navy ships and aircraft are similarly dependent on thousands of Chinese semiconductors to function as instruments of U.S. defense and power projection.

The people who allowed this to happen are all enemy combatants, in this writer’s opinion, and should be facing capital offense charges for their crimes against the American republic, and that includes the Presidents who either did nothing to reverse this or facilitated it happening. No American President, no Secretary of Defense should ever have allowed the Chinese Communist Party to become involved in any way, shape, or form in our defense manufacturing.

They did this in exchange for wealth, for power, that was meant to only enrich their own lives and those of their families. They sold America to the CCP for a metaphorical bowl of soup. May God have mercy on their reprobate souls and may he give us Americans to take back the reins of power and lawfully bring to justice the men and women who were part of this seditious scheme.

Let us also remember that vengeance is the Lord’s, not ours, and if it is His will that no such power will come to Americans again then let us face our righteous judgment with joy in praise of Him.

The Lion Stirs – The Murky War Upsetting World Commerce

5 min read

The Lion Stirs – The Murky War Upsetting World Commerce

Michael Cessna January 5, 2024

In the week before Christmas of 2023, there are several large-scale wars going on, with several more potential wars in the making: Russia-Ukraine; Israel-Hamas/Hezbollah; the ongoing offensive of pro-democracy rebels closing in on the fascist junta in Myanmar/Burma; the never-ending battles across the African Sahel region, and the potential Venezuelan invasion of Guyana.

But, lurking in the background is another potential conflict, one that may be impacting and aiding the neo-con agenda: Ethiopia vs. Eritrea.

Ethiopia is unique in history, as the only African state that was never colonized by any European power. Although conquered and occupied by Italy in the years immediately preceding World War 2, that occupation was short-lived, as the country was fully liberated from Italian rule by 1943.

A truly ancient state, Ethiopia maintained its status as an imperial monarchy until 1974, with the Communist revolution that placed a brutal Marxist-Leninist government in charge of the country. This government would, in turn, be deposed in another revolution in 1989, as part of the wave of Communist states around the world that collapsed as the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact imploded, leaving Communist “economies” to wither on the vine.

In the aftermath of the Derg’s collapse, Ethiopia was left unable to stop a popular referendum in one of its most critical provinces – Eritrea – that resulted in that state becoming independent in 1993. While this may seem like a random “factoid”, it is actually of enormous significance.

Eritrea – long part of Ethiopia – occupies the coast of the Red Sea, and as such, was Ethiopia’s only access to world commerce…and after a series of wars in the 1990’s and early-2000’s, Eritrea has effectively blocked Ethiopia from using its Red Sea ports. With a population of over one hundred and seven million, Ethiopia ranks 13^th in the top fifteen nations in the world by population – and is the only one of those states that is completely landlocked.

This translates to Ethiopia being forced to pay exorbitant, even “extortionate”, fees to export its goods to market through its only access to the Red Sea, via the Port of Djibouti, which handles an estimated 95% of Ethiopia’s foreign commerce.

Ethiopia’s Prime Minister, Abiy Ahmed, takes this issue seriously…seriously enough, that he made statements on the 13^th of October of 2023, that explicitly underlined Ethiopia’s ‘right to access’ to the Red Sea. Understandably, this rattled every other nation in the “Horn of Africa”, all of whom are vastly outnumbered in both population and military capacity by Ethiopia.

These remarks came less than two weeks after the Hamas terror attacks on Israel that commenced on October 7^th. As a result, the wider world – obviously – paid little the comments little attention. But then, the Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen chose to insert themselves into that conflict on the side of Hamas, on October 19^th…clearly a coincidence, surely.

And then, on January 1^st, Ahmed dropped another bombshell, announcing that Ethiopia had inked a deal with the breakaway Somali province of Somaliland to use their port of Berbera to access the Gulf of Aden – well outside the current shooting gallery – reputedly in exchange of recognition of the breakaway state. This has obviously infuriated Somalia, which has never relinquished its claim to the province, despite the region being de facto independent since 1991 and the region’s independence being ratified in a referendum in 2001.

Now, in the first week of 2024, the Houthi missile attacks and piracy have attracted the attention of major powers around the world, many of whom have joined “Operation Prosperity Guardian”, in an attempt to guarantee safe passage through the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait…albeit too late for world shipping giant Maersk, who announced on January 5^th that they were ordering all of their vessels not already in the Red Sea to divert around southern Africa’s Cape of Good Hope, to avoid the fighting. While this, alone, will cause serious disruptions to global trade, many more cargo carrier lines are virtually certain to not take the risk and divert their vessels, for the same reason as Maersk. This could easily lead to a reprise of the shipping disruptions that happened at the height of the COVID pandemic.

As a result, there are increasingly serious calls within Washington circles to attack Iran directly, as they are the Houthi’s major source of money and weapons. This would be a Godsend to neo-con chickenhawks desperate to finally get the United States into their long-desired war with Iran…

…Which brings us back to Ethiopia’s moves on its future access to the Red Sea.

Ethiopia has three options: they can a) maintain the status quo, with limited access to world shipping solely through Djibouti’s port; b) conclude their deal to access breakaway Somaliland’s ports; or – c) invade at least part of Eritrea, to capture at least that nation’s port of Assab.

Obviously, the status quo is not working for Ethiopia; if it were, there would have been no need for the deal with Somaliland. Djibouti’s port is increasingly limited in capacity, and has little physical room to expand operations, which will soon severely stunt Ethiopia’s economic output…Conversely, the deal with Somaliland risks war with Somalia, as recognition of Somaliland’s independence would almost certainly gut Somalia’s hopes at stabilizing their nation, which was only reunified in 2012. Somalia would have to launch a military campaign to invade the territory to bring it to heel, presenting Ethiopia with the option of going to war with Somalia in support of a breakaway province, something Ethiopia would be loath to encourage, considering recent history.

As well, invading Eritrea to capture Assab carries significant risks on its own, because – all other things being equal in the absence of the current conflict in the Bab-el-Mandeb – Ethiopia could well face a UN-led coalition of military powers “riding to the rescue” of what has been described as the “North Korea of Africa”.

None of these seem like viable solutions, on their own…Unless the world is focused on a different series of conflicts that would combine to divert attention away from Ethiopia “readjusting” the local map, and allowing Addis Ababa to present the world with a fait accompli in the aftermath of the Houthi’s inevitable neutralization, as well as the likelihood of a massive US-Iran war…

…While the foregoing may sound like the implication of a dastardly plot on Ethiopia’s part, it is not…well, mostly “not.” But, the timeline of Ethiopia’s rhetoric regarding its right-to-access to the Red Sea is certainly suspicious, and indicates some level of foreknowledge of events beginning ion October of 2023, and having active plans and options ready to go.

There are plenty of players in this global chess tournament, and too many “leaders” in the West – and elsewhere – are arrogantly blind to the knives in the dark, thinking that “bit players” cannot harm them.

…Rather like Britain, France and the United States from the 1950’s to the 1980’s.

Word to the wise.

Iran Escalates Red Sea Tensions

1 min read

Iran Escalates Red Sea Tensions

Michael Cessna January 1, 2024

The Islamic state of Iran has significantly escalated tensions in the Red Sea, by deploying the warship Alborz to the crucial Bab el-Mandeb Strait a day after US Navy helicopters drove off Iranian-backed Houthi pirates of Yemen following their attempted seizure of the Singapore-registered container ship Maersk Hangzhou, sinking several Houthi boats and killing an estimated ten pirates, on December 30, according to CENTCOM.

This also comes some 10 days after the Liberian-flagged tanker MV Chem Pluto was struck by a suspected Iranian drone while at sea, en-route from Saudi Arabia to India on December 23rd.

The Alborz, an Alvand-class frigate, was originally bought by the Imperial Iranian Navy in 1971.

The move by Iran raises the distinct possibility of hostile action between the Iranian vessel and the various, dozen-or-so warships of Operation Prosperity Guardian, assembled in late-December to counter repeated missile and boarding attacks on international shipping, claiming to be countering the Israeli response to the unprovoked attack on its civilians that began on October 7 by the Hamas terrorists operating in the Gaza Strip.

The Freedomist will continue to monitor the situation as it develops.

Updated at 5:50pm CST, with information and links to the attack on MV Chem Pluto.

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