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The Winds are Shifting
The Winds are Shifting
How do you define terror? Perhaps, because of the way the term has evolved in the English language, one wouldn’t call the west ‘terrorists’ per se, but ‘we’ are certainly spreading terror and terrorizing very large groups of people. Yeah, bring on the tanks and parade them around town. Add a marching band that plays some war tunes.
The ‘official’ storyline : at the request of the US, Gibraltar police and UK marines have seized an oil tanker in Gibraltar. The super-tanker, 1000 feet (330 meters) long, carrying 2 million barrels, had stopped there after sailing all around the Cape of Good Hope instead of taking the Suez canal on its way, ostensibly, from Iran to Syria.
And, according to the storyline as presented to and in the western press, because the EU still has sanctions on Iran, the British seized the ship. Another little detail I really appreciate is that Spain’s acting foreign minister, Josep Borrell, said Madrid was looking into the seizure and how it may affect Spanish sovereignty since Spain does not recognize the waters around Gibraltar as British.
That Borrell guy is the newly picked EU foreign policy czar, and according to some sources he’s supportive of Iran and critical of Israel. Them’s the webs we weave. He’s certainly in favor of Palestinian statehood. But we’re wandering…
Why did the tanker take that giant detour along the African coastline? Because potential problems were anticipated in the Suez canal. But also: why dock in Gibraltar? Because no problems were anticipated there. However, the US had been following the ship all along, and set this up.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Germany Orders 100 Tanks To “Ensure Troops Are Ready To Respond To Russian Assertiveness”
Germany Orders 100 Tanks To “Ensure Troops Are Ready To Respond To Russian Assertiveness”
With Jean-Claude Juncker demanding a Unified European Army, it appears Germany is wasting no time in simultaneously boosting its own economy with warfare spending and comforting a ‘fearful populace’ with more military might. As Reuters reports, Germany plans to procure more than 100 additional Leopard 2 tanks, increasing its total Leopard 2 tank inventory by a whopping 45% a government spokesman said on Friday, as it seeks to ensure its “troops are ready for action in response to concerns over recent Russian assertiveness.”
Germany plans to procure more than 100 additional Leopard 2 tanks, a government spokesman said on Friday, as it seeks to ensure its troops are ready for action in response to concerns over recent Russian assertiveness.The decision to restock its military comes as NATO tries to hasten the response time of its rapid reaction force following Russia’s annexation of Crimea last year and conflict in Ukraine.
“The ministry has decided to raise the upper limit for the future to 328,” a defense ministry spokesman told a regular government news conference on Friday, confirming a report by German magazine Spiegel.
Just before the end of the Cold War, in the 1980s, the then West Germany had more than 3,500 tanks. Now, seventy years after World War Two, it has just 225. As a result soldiers have to share tanks and heavy equipment across different units.
Given NATO’s new goals on flexibility and rapid reaction time,Germany has to ensure that it can deploy troops with the correct equipment to the right place in a short period of time, the spokesman said. “This can only succeed if the equipment does not need to be first moved around through the country,” he said.
The Leopard tanks are made by Krauss-Maffei Wegmann (KMW).
So harbinger of S&P algos euphoria-inducing WWIII? Or just another Keynesian public works spending project?
Ukraine “Truce”? Tanks Are Rolling In Poland As NATO Plans Permanent Eastern European Bases
Ukraine “Truce”? Tanks Are Rolling In Poland As NATO Plans Permanent Eastern European Bases
With Ukraine, Germany, and France all expressing their concern this morning about “conflict escalation” between pro-Russian separatists and the Ukraine military, the so-called “truce” appears to be hanging by a thread of semanticism (despite OSCE’s please for respect of the cease-fire and the demarcation line). Today’s triple whammy of ‘escalation’ appears more focused on the non-Russian side as first, France begins sending tanks into Poland; second, Ukraine shifts its tanks to the front-line; and third – and potentially most inflammatory for Putin – NATO has confirmed plans to create permanent command centers in Eastern Europe. Putin has not responded yet but reports of ‘nuclear bombers’ flying above the English Channel “with transponders turned off,” suggests the sabre rattling continues.
Ukrainian civilians are being evacuated:
- *UKRAINE EVACUATED 1,000 PEOPLE FROM DEBALTSEVE YDAY
- *7 CIVILIANS DEAD, 4 WOUNDED IN DONETSK REGION IN 24 HRS: POLICE
- *11 SERVICEMEN ALSO INJURED IN MILITARY CAMP BLAZE, IFX SAYS
The OSCE is calling for the truce to stand…
- *OSCE’S DACIC SAYS MAXIMUM EFFORTS MADE TO END UKRAINE VIOLENCE
- *OSCE CALLS FOR CEASE-FIRE, RESPECT FOR DEMARCATION LINE: DACIC
- *OSCE’S DACIC SAYS NO ONE CONSIDERING NEW UKRAINE PLAN FOR NOW
Everyone is “concerned”
- *POROSHENKO, MERKEL, HOLLANDE DISAPPOINTED BY MINSK TALKS
- *POROSHENKO CALLS FOR RUSSIAN REACTION TO UKRAINE TALKS FAILURE
- *UKRAINE, GERMANY, FRANCE CONCERNED ABOUT CONFLICT ESCALATION
Leaders call for immediate “cease-fire” to fighting in east Ukraine after speaking on the phone today, AFP says, citing the French president’s staff.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
US Army Sends 100 Tanks To Eastern Europe To “Deter Russian Aggression” | Zero Hedge
US Army Sends 100 Tanks To Eastern Europe To “Deter Russian Aggression” | Zero Hedge.
The ink on Barack Obama’s Chuck Hagel termination letter hasn’t dried yet but already the US president’s new, and seemingly far more hawkish advisors, are having their warmongering presence felt. Case in point: the Eastern European theater of (Cold) war, where Military.com reports that the new Army commander in Europe plans to bolster the U.S. armored presence in Poland and the Baltic states and keep rotations of U.S. troops there through next year and possibly beyond tocounter Russia. Lt. Gen. Frederick “Ben” Hodges, who replaced Lt. Gen. Donald M. Campbell earlier this month as commander of U.S. Army Europe, said the Army was looking to add about 100 Abrams tanks and Bradley Fighting Vehicles to the forces in Eastern Europe.
These U.S. Army M1A2 Abrams tanks are part of the European Activity Set,
a combined-arms battalion-sized set of vehicles and equipment pre-positioned
at Germany’s Grafenwoehr Training Area. Markus Ruachenberger/U.S. Army
“We are looking at courses of action for how we could pre-position equipment that we would definitely want to put inside a facility where it would be better maintained, that rotational units could then come and draw on it and use it to train, or for contingency purposes,” Hodges said in a briefing from Vilnius, Lithuania.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
