Mike Pence Says His Role Model Vice President is Dick Cheney

Republican vice presidential nominee Mike Pence discusses his VP role model and his debate prep on “This Week.”

Let’s stop pretending what he ( Pence) is talking about. Cheney was the “grownup” in the relationship and Bush was the “spoiled kid”.

We can see from where Mike Pence is coming from. He will have to run the country and become the commander-in-chief, because, like Bush, Trump isn’t up to it. He is not completely ignorant, but stupid.

Bush, in a stupor, had to have his Chief of Staff run the war in Iraq, because he, Bush, thought it was about another Crusades.

My guess is that Pence will continue the war against Islam, while ignoring Nixon’s connection to Globalization, while Trump moves America towards authoritarianism. #fail

Source: Mike Pence Says His Role Model Vice President is Dick Cheney

The F-35 Stealth Fighter May Never Be Ready for Combat

Last month the Air Force declared its variant “ready for combat,” and most press reports lauded this as a signal that the program had turned a corner. But a memo issued from the Pentagon’s top testing official, based largely upon the Air Force’s own test data, showed that the declaration was wildly premature.

It might be that the Air Force is fighting a different war than the one the Pentagon is fighting. So the rules of Orientation are different in each battlespace. A fighter jet like the one the Pentagon wants most likely positions and postures itself differently than the one the Air Force wants

I mean the F 35 has shown the ability to shoot down rockets. It is basically what makes it a 5th Generation fighter. This ability comes from the fact that the F 35 is similar to a flying saucer (except when the Pentagon attaches ordinates outside the mass of its symmetrical planes) and the Air Force has a plan to use them as such. How you fight rockets with an Airplane, you can’t, as I am sure the Pentagon knows well. How you fight rockets with an F 35 is anyone’s guess.

Of course to use them properly they must position them as close to the target (the target the F 35 wants to hit) as possible. Incoming rockets move at something like 22,000 mph, so the F 35 would need some time to do some real maneuvering to swat them out of the sky before they reach the target.

Just guessing. I could be wrong.

Source: The F-35 Stealth Fighter May Never Be Ready for Combat

Sherman Remarks – HHRG-113-FA18-Wstate-Gartenstein-RossD-20130710.pdf

I came by this pdf by way of zenpundit:

As the Wall Street Journal has reported, the Jamal network operates camps in Libya that include training for suicide missions, has demonstrated proficiencyin smuggling fighters, and also has connections to European jihadists.

It was in a statement of one of those before the congressional committee, but: “and operates out of Afghanistan” should have been included, as the number 2 behind the still dead OBL, in my estimation, operates out of Afghanistan. It wasn’t coincidence that Afghan fighters were in the Bengali attacks.  I wonder why the location of the Jamal network wasn’t included in the expert’s statement? Are those .so-called “Conservatives” going to need to pay attention to Afghanistan, again?

Could it have been a given, and not worth mentioning, or is the missing location of the center of the Jamal network explained better somewhere else in the statement?

via Sherman Remarks – HHRG-113-FA18-Wstate-Gartenstein-RossD-20130710.pdf.

Egypt: The Opposition’s Next Steps

Now the question is whether Tamarod and the other elements of the former opposition can avoid the kind of fragmentation and divisive infighting that played a significant role in catapulting the Muslim Brotherhood to power in the first place.

Anyone going into Morsi’s position will find it hard not to seen as a Neo of the Middle East. Egypt is positioned at the center of any Arab movement. So until the Arab Spring has passed, Egypt will function as a moment of inertia.

Unlike a center of gravity, a moment of inertia follows a different “axis”, a so-called z-axis. It’s the same axis Neo followed in the movie “Matrix”.

Update: And, I should add, Neo followed the land-line in the movie, at least when leaving. That line represents the z-axis.

via Egypt: The Opposition’s Next Steps | Stratfor.

The Strategic Advantage in Fighting on Only One Front

“It is a concern to me, it’s a concern to any veteran, anybody in the military,” Hagel said during his first appearance on Capitol Hill since being confirmed as defense secretary.

I think it is significant that this is the only news I found coming out of Fox News, but maybe I just didn’t look hard enough. I guess Fox couldn’t find anything more important coming out of the House Armed Service’s committee than this one issue, who deserves a medal more, those with or without “skin” in battle.

Taking medals away from someone that actually might have earned them is not something I imagine Fox wants to be behind of. Fox better hope Hagel doesn’t come to the conclusion that someone fighting in a Nintendo environment needs to be reward with this medal, as someone in the Service that Hagel talks about in this quote did. If they do deserve it, then Fox should ask why.

As it is, anyone getting the “Nintendo Medal” with Hagel as the top administrator will deserve it. Fox should figure out why he/she would deserve such a medal, before they get on the wrong side of  the strategy behind the giving out of this medal.

But then Fox is owned by someone that wasn’t, if I understand correctly, born or raised  as a North America. Apparently their owner wants America to follow the Rightwing Conservative principles of another nation, in another hemisphere.

The nation he was or still is a citizen of has gone from calling China a totalitarian nation to aggressor nation, and now an assertive nation. It kinda makes me wonder what the Fox’s owner thinks of his own nation, as their Conservative principles change.

It doesn’t appear that China has changed all that much, at least in structure. The Right is a structure, not a culture, and China doesn’t appear to be changing its structure anytime soon.

It also appears that China’s culture is going to need more time for change. China is a very complex culture in which change doesn’t culturally seem to happen, unless there is a revolution. China’s structure is geared towards stopping revolutions.

But then, Fox’s owner is not a North American. He is Australia by culture, so what would he know about strategy anyway?

I think North American people’s advantage has always been that they think more strategic. After reading “Empire of the Summer Moon, I think strategy has always been the North’s advantage, as it presents itself to the world historically.

To that end, I never really understood the significance of Lincoln’s strategy, of using people from both sides of the aisle to fill some of the executive positions within his administration. That was until I watched this hearing on CSPAN yesterday.

The strategy that Lincoln used has the advantage of using an executive, such as Hagle, from the opposition  positioned as a handle to a lever that pushes against the force of the opposition and the POTUS forces as well. Kinda of a twofer.

In the House yesterday, Hagel not only tore into the Republican Chairman of the House Armed Service Committee, who wanted Hagle to take something like a 100 billion more dollars, but Hagle also tore into the smug Democrat who thought Hagel was a force pushing Democratic issues as well. The Republicans and Democrats both got their asses kicked.

In politics, the enemy isn’t in front of the POTUS, but positions themselves behind the leader. The people infront represent an image of change, as the image of Hagel in front of the POTUS.

Lincoln’s strategy handles those behind the POTUS (today they are called Democrats) as well as those in front of the POTUS (today they are called Republicans). Hagel with Dempsey at his side, tore up the House yesterday and made mincemeat out of all who were in front of him.

I would like to see him do the same in the Senate.

Really? The Republicans want to come out on the side of spending more money at the expense of our civilian society, while at the same time the Democrats want to come out on the side that says spending cut aren’t hurting our military, as our civil society takes a pass on having to make any sacrifices?

All Hagel and Dempsey are asking for is time to reposition our forces. I mean everyone realizes that Iran is in Asia, right?

When falling back to a defencive position, as our resources go bye-bye, there is some advantage to be had in having to defend only one front, and that front should be “pivoting” across the Pacific.

The Pacific is the position our debt is centered in. This center can be called a pivot point. While Boehner has come out in favor of paying our debt, I am not sure the Red States agree with him.

I mean, if they really want to secede from the US, aren’t they independent of the debt? If the Red States what to take advantage of our nukes and not pay back our debt, who’s to stop them, Obama?

Oh, right! If they did secede it wouldn’t be their decision, but that ain’t going to happen now, is it.

via Hagel Decision on ‘Nintendo Medal’ Expected Next Week – Fox News.

The U.S. is running out of fancy planes to send to Korea

It would appear that if U.S. muscle-flexing is to continue, military planners will have to come up with something more creative than dusting off the latest hangar trophies.

If you’re like me, and has watched the Iraq and Afghanistan through the portal called the internet, then the advances in the military hasn’t been in its fancy technology, but by the leadership that is represented by the military.

The leadership represents a total top-down to bottom-up advancement in the mobilization of forces. To me it is highlighted in what took place in Benghazi on the anniversary of 9/11. If you want symbols to represent the future, then this is it. Benghazi represents the look in the future of the US military.

And the biggest news there was that the US Marines came under fire by Afghan forces, as there were some in the vicinity of the fight, and created another front in the WOT. No wait! that is exactly what didn’t happen.

I am sure any other administration would have quickly brought to bare a Marine expeditionary force on those who took part in the killings, or would have been crucified for not taking action against those people who killed Americans in Libya  not this administration.

As I have said before, Afghanistan represent the center of a religious movement, which is why it is a strategic position for our troops to be in. We have learned how to fight Afghans, and the best way to do that is to let them go back to their country, and bring the 15th century with them.

I mean it doesn’t look like, or the opposition party would have taken advantage of it, that any of the Americans who died could have been saved by an expeditionary force.

They all seemed to have ventured out of the network that was protecting them, and apparently the network really wanted these guys alive. In fact some of those in the networked died also, which is kind of a big deal.

So what has Benghazi to do with Korea, you may ask?  Well the world has now seen the military might that the US military is able to bring to a fight over the skies of Korea, so now where is the leadership?

Well maybe here:

Fact: South Korea is the world's only country where, in wartime, its military is commanded by a foreign (US) general. http://t.co/YZoCrRDBoX

— Tim Shorrock (@TimothyS) April 2, 2013

via The U.S. is running out of fancy planes to send to Korea | FP Passport.

The Seriousness of Betrayal

Kuok’s sugar empire was eaten by the fat vampire’s family abruptly. Imagine, a world renowned international trade business personality, what humiliation he received in return for his single-minded help all this while for his own country & government? And Najib would never think that the consequences of offending the Sugar King will be so serious.

Betrayal is serious enough to change economies of the world. What this article is describing is the betrayal of the Malaysian leaders towards the Overseas Chinese in the person of Robert Kuok.

This Act of betrayal not only clarified Kuok’s position in Malaysia, for Kuok, it caused him to reposition his advantage in the world. As the article suggests, he seems to have gotten the better position than what the Malaysian government ended up with.

But then two things should be understood. One, at the time of the betrayal, Kuok was positioning himself from outside the OODA loop (a time-step following the process of Observation, Orientation, Decision and Action) of Malaysia, while being Malaysian. His position before betrayal was ambiguous in that he was both Chinese and Malaysian.

While I don’t judge the position Kuok was coming from, his position represents a betrayal of the Malaysian OODA loop. In other words, as a Oversea Chinese, Kuok was coming from, and his resources were going towards, a position that was not within the environment of the Malaysian society, therefore a betrayal.

Second, while I have to assume Kuok’s dealings with the people of Malaysia was fair, his position represented a “extra” force inside the Malaysian society. Because of its economy, a society can be called a distribution of energy in which the sum of the forces is zero. So combining the two (the distance of the position Kuok’s coming from, which is China, and the force representing Kuok as the sugar king) in betrayal, energy was created.

Energy is defined as force at a distance and the distance China represents is easily defined in betrayal. The force is in the potential that the “Sugar King” created.

A OODA loop represents a distribution of energy, as the economy of the society distributes itself in time-steps. Kuok, by being what is defined as an Oversea Chinese, was trying to distribute the energy of the Malaysian OODA loop in more than one direction (in step with both the Malaysian and Chinese culture). In physics, this represents a “betrayal” of energy, if judged by no other reason.

The sum of the forces that are inside a society that make up a OODA loop is zero, if that society is stable. With Kuok’s position of a great magnitude and being, at least partly, outside the OODA loop of the Malaysian society, the forces were not zero, and an “extra” force developed in the form of betrayal. Betrayal being a form of energy.

This article reflects the feelings of that betrayal, from the Chinese perspective. This paragraph taken from Overseas Chinese in Wikipedia probably best describes the way it is in Malaysia:

Ethnic politics can be found to motivate both sides of the debate. In Malaysia, Overseas Chinese tend to support equal and meritocratic treatment on the expectation that they would not be discriminated against in the resulting competition for government contracts, university places, etc., whereas many “Bumiputra” (“native sons”) Malays oppose this on the grounds that their group needs such protections in order to retain their patrimony. These are carried out through affirmative actions. The question of to what extent ethnic Malays, Chinese, or others are “native” to Malaysia is a sensitive political one. It is currently a taboo for Chinese politicians to raise the issue of Bumiputra protections in parliament, as this would be deemed ethnic incitement.^[53]

As Wikipedia explains, the Oversea Chinese represents a small minority in the society of the shared economy, but because of the content of the Chinese character of the Oversea Chinese, they represents a large part of the economy in Malaysia.

To give this another perspective to view from, the Oversea Chinese would represent the top 1% of the American economy. The “extra” forces the Oversea Chinese created in the Malaysian society would be similar to the force created if the “1%” in America shipped the manufacturing jobs Overseas to China, and created a consumer economy to replace the manufacturing economy destroyed (construction/destruction).

It could be that in time-steps, betrayal goes in both directions, but may only be Observed by looking backwards. If that is true and we only see betrayal in one direction, it might be important for those who feel betrayed to look in both directions, as you might see yourself as well as the other guy.

Much easier said than done.

via China and Malaysia: Sugar and frozen durian « China Daily Mail.

Iran Said Ready to Talk to U.S. About Nuclear Program

The United States and Iran have agreed for the first time to one-on-one negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program, according to Obama administration officials, setting the stage for what could be a last-ditch diplomatic effort to avert a military strike on Iran.

Probably too little, too late.

“It has the potential to help Mr. Obama make the case that he is nearing a diplomatic breakthrough in the decade-long effort by the world’s major powers to curb Tehran’s nuclear ambitions, but it could pose a risk if Iran is seen as using the prospect of the direct talks to buy time.“

That said, there is probably not much time to buy.

via Iran Said Ready to Talk to U.S. About Nuclear Program – NYTimes.com.

Saudi Arabia tells its citizens to leave Lebanon over kidnappings

BEIRUT—Saudi Arabia has ordered its citizens to leave Lebanon immediately, citing fear of kidnappings by Shiites angry over rebels in Syria taking prisoners from Lebanon and Iran.

via Saudi Arabia tells its citizens to leave Lebanon over kidnappings – thestar.com.

Does this pass the smell? test RT @NeilBhatiya: @Galrahn official reason is fear over kidnappings http://t.co/s2pCCnYX

— Raymond Pritchett (@Galrahn) August 15, 2012

It doesn’t have to smell like a meatball, one just needs to remember which side you’re on. #civilwar

Mac Owens on the forgotten dimensions of American civil-military relations: Strategy

For soldiers, this focus, especially as articulated by Huntington in The Soldier and the State, which provides an “ideal” formula for maintaining civilian control while also keeping the military strong, means that they will tend to focus on operational factors — how to fight wars — at the expense of strategy, the purpose for which a war is fought. In other words, they may fail to connect operational art, at which the U.S. military excels, to political goals.

The bold type was mine and was added for emphases.

via Mac Owens on the forgotten dimensions of American civil-military relations | The Best Defense.

Strategy is really not the purpose for which wars are fought, it’s an attack.  In combination with a purpose, it is the attack.

An attack is a movement across a gap in forces, for whatever purpose it was that drove those forces from one side of the gap to the other.

The purpose (WMD) creates the potential energy needed for the attack to start, but the attack itself first starts in the mind, and that is where strategy starts.

Whose mind is not important. All that is important in strategy is winning or losing. Purpose is either good or bad, and is tied up in the tactics or planning of the war. Strategy is not a judgment, but an attack with two outcomes.

I suspect Strategy usually starts from a military person, because all strategy has a end, way and means, and it is usually the military person who thinks of the ways (logic) and means (resources) of war, because an attack means war to most people in the military.

In CMR, Strategy can either come from a civilian or military person, because it starts with a vision with two ends, the end at the beginning and the end of the war.

That is one basic reason it is important to have a successful and productive CMR , because the attack can start from anywhere, with for-whatever-purpose forming the force needed to win.