Category Archives: Military

When the joke is on us all

We all have moments where we imagine that the dice is cast, yet we play roulette, we think we have the numbers down, yet did you know that the roulette number sequence is different in Europe compared to America? These are all elements in a play of high stake gambling. That same setting returns when we look at the Guardian article ‘Campaigners head to court to stop arms sales to Saudi Arabia’. The article (at https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/apr/06/campaigners-court-bid-to-stop-uk-arms-sales-to-saudi-arabia) holds two sides (apart from it being partially a joke in my eyes). You see, I have no issue with people who have the principle of being against weapons. That is their prerogative. What does bug me is that these same people will suddenly blame the government for all kinds of issues and they will scream that they want higher taxes for the rich, ignoring the fact that they are the cause of several issues that are the consequence of some faulty misdirected version of ideology.

So even as I am happy to step in and take over the arms trade to Saudi Arabia, mainly because I do not have the luxury of walking away from a multi-billion pound deal, you see the rent is due next week and I would like a nice mince pie after I pay my rent, the £3,576,229,000 will enable me to get both. OK that amount would not all be mine, but 20% could be and that is still £715,245,800.

My entire pension issue solved overnight. The article takes us a step further. With: “The UK court case comes amid the continued fallout from the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, who was tortured and assassinated by Saudi agents“, I am fine with that step for the mere reason that there are too many question marks in that case. The evidence on several levels is missing proper scrutiny, the fact that Turkey has other agenda’s in play is ignored, and the involvement of Iran in all this is ignored on several levels. I am not stating that things did not happen, there is clearly a massive lack of proper scrutiny and people like the Campaign against Arms Trade are fuelling my opportunity and I am fine with that, if stupid people enable me to become wealthy, why would I oppose?

How Come?

Well, we are decently certain that something happened to Jamal Khashoggi, yet to what degree can government actions be proven? That is the issue, there is no evidence and as such can you, or should you stop dealing with a sovereign nation with a lack of evidence? In addition, in the other direction, we have seen a massive indecisive move towards Iran whilst Iran fuelled activities go on in Europe, October 2018, January 2019, covering Denmark, France, Netherlands, and the UK. Yet over at that point, we see an utter lack of actual actions (merely considerations).

Does it matter?

Well that is in part the question, we can accept that Campaign against Arms Trade wants it all to stop, but what is ignored is that merchants have markets and the UK cannot evolve next level defences if they cannot be sold. So whilst places like Saudi Arabia are still opening their internal market to have quality defence gear, places like the UK, Russia and America are looking to sell defence solutions to places that can afford them (Saudi Arabia, Egypt, UAE, Taiwan, South Korea and a few more players), yet the well is drying up, more and more countries have their own solutions and the size of the cake is getting smaller.

The next part is seen where we get Andrew Smith of Campaign against Arms Trade giving us: “This case could set a vital precedent and end UK complicity in the worst humanitarian catastrophe in the world.” In that I respectfully disagree, the catastrophe was that too many people sat on their hands for too long, the fact that Yemen is not just the Saudi-led coalition, the other side, the terrorist side is more than Houthi fighters, it includes Hezbollah as well as Iranian forces, by leaving that out, we see an unbalanced stage and in all this we see a deterioration of events, so even as we accept (to some degree) “civilian targets in Yemen have regularly been hit“, in addition we need to accept the Human Rights Watch who gives us clearly: “Houthi forces have repeatedly fired artillery indiscriminately into Yemeni cities and launched indiscriminate ballistic missiles into Saudi Arabia. Some of these attacks may amount to war crimes. Houthi attacks have struck populated neighbourhoods in Yemen, having a particularly devastating impact on Taizz, Yemen’s third largest city.” There is more than one player, yet these focus groups have merely looked at the Saudi side and that needs to stop, not because of what they are trying to achieve, but because the actions are much larger then they proclaim and there are two sides. In addition to what was given we need to consider the fact that Houthi forces have been staging some of the events. Al Jazeera gave us more than once: “The war has been at a stalemate for years, with the coalition and Yemeni forces unable to dislodge the Houthis from the capital, Sanaa, and other urban centres.” This indicates that the Houthi forces are in-between the population, with 16 million on the verge of death by starvation, is inaction even a problem?

Yet, from one point of view, I do not mind. If I get the option, I will sell it to the Saudi government and I will send Andrew Smith an authentic Fortnum and Mason hamper, just so that he knows I appreciate him enabling me to write a multi-billion pound invoice. Of course, the optional impact that the UK faces if the profitability of Britain’s largest defence company, BAE Systems is set to zero. I feel certain that Andrew Smith can explain it to the thousands of workers out of a job if I am given the assurance that I can get a much better margin by selling the Saudi government 47 Mikoyan MiG-35, complete with training and proper service level agreements. That puppy is a direct superior option against the Typhoon, the Super Hornet and a few others; my upside is that if I get Saudi Arabia on board, I am likely to get additional requests from Pakistan and at least three other governments.

So at that point, how exactly did Campaign against Arms Trade achieve anything (other than making me filthy rich and I will thank them in person for that). In this day and age where the markets and economies cannot take these hits, it is the ability of Andrew Smith that Europe fears, you see commerce is at the heart of the matter, and at this point, any nations bringing in bad news will stop being an asset, that is the Wall Street premise we all signed up for in 2005 when things started to get bad, we never corrected for any of it.

Distasteful like a Vegan

We can all consider where our ethical boundary is, yet in all this, we seem to forget that any sovereign nation has the right to self-govern, Europeans with their gravy train, ECB and shallow morals seem to have forgotten that. In all this having commerce allows diplomats to find a path that steers some nations away for certain practices and that path will be denied to them soon thereafter. Consider that I am all about profit and the Campaign against Arms Trade allowed for that change, how did they achieve anything? Because the UK misses out on have a dozen billions a year less? How many projects and funding issues will dry up the year after that starts? We have settings and measurements, most do not deal with terrorists, most do not sell to individuals, and the Campaign against Arms Trade is starting to allow for the return of those markets.

Sidestepping into art

Consider John Wyndham’s 1951 novel The Day of the Triffids. Some saw the movie, some read the book. Yet what happens when the sequel is a direct horror story? What happens when the sequel gives us the stage where the Triffids land on a planet ruled by vegans and vegetarians? How scared will they be (the Triffids that is)? This relates to the setting we have, you see, we seem to push towards everyone becoming a vegan and vegetarian (non-weaponised), because that is what their norm states, yet what are we going to do about the hunters (lion), the carrion eaters (Hyena) and other non-vegetarians? What do we do when people have certain norms and will not be told by anyone how to act? Is that such a weird issue?

You merely have to look at football hooligan UK to see that part of the equation, and there is no end in sight. It is a shallow connection, I agree, yet that is the ball game, someone wants to pressure towards an ideology whilst the other players are not interested. Now that does not invalidate the ideology, yet the fact that the reasoning is one sided, whilst the entire economic premise requires selling to other governments is a factor that cannot be ignored.

Who are we to dictate rules and manners? I get it, by denying the Saudi government one’s own screwed up values is all good, yet when the act does the opposite of what they are trying to achieve, can we agree that the action is not that bright? I am not comparing the Saudi people with either the Lion or the Hyena. I am merely stating that there is more than one option and that is fine for all concerned. How can any nation, most of them either dealing with their own levels of corruption, or facilitating to massive corporate tax evasion, as these elements also impact whatever was to be part of a government budget, do we have any business impeding the other paths that were available? Consider that we were treated only a month ago to ‘HMRC’s first probes into corporate tax evasion facilitation‘, the stage where we are seeing “HMRC has confirmed that it has opened its first investigations into the corporate criminal offence of failure to prevent the facilitation of UK tax evasion, using new powers to tackle corporate fraud contained in the Criminal Finances Act, introduced in the wake of the Panama Papers leaks“, an event that is close to 15 years late. How can we see the actions of a group stopping billions the UK government desperately needs? Don’t worry, in the end I might be ecstatically happy regarding their act, I am not so certain the British people will love the impact of what Campaign against Arms Trade invoked to happen. We can see that there is a lot that needs fixing, I am not sure that international arms trade to other governments no less is a first problem to solve, not with the competition and not with much larger issues in play.

And it is here where we see the delusional part of Andrew Smith, with “BAE’s solution will always be the same: it wants to sell more weapons, regardless of the atrocities they are enabling. Wherever there is war and conflict, there will always be companies like BAE trying to profiteer from it“, we get to see just how whacked his view is. Well, to be honest, he is allowed to have that view, it just does not add up. You see, the actual premise is: “BAE’s solutions are designed to keep Britain safe. Yet the development will cost 155 billion, to assure the top state of defence for the UK, who will only buy for up to 100 billion requires additional sales to global governments who could need that solution, even as the US buys a lot, it is not enough to fill the gap and that is where other nations come in. There is the Netherlands, Germany, Norway, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Oman, Thailand, South Korea, Taiwan and a few others.“ In addition Andrew Smith seems to forget (or he does not care)that others like the US, France, Italy and Russia all have solutions to sell, so we need to ensure our survival for the need of growing British defence and keeping it as high as possible. This part is extremely important, because whoever has the best deals with places like Saudi Arabia is also in the best position to aid and guide international development in places like that. As Saudi Arabia is about to become a 5G powerhouse, that path is more and more important for everyone. Consider the impact if Campaign against Arms Trade is successful. Do you think that British Telecom has a chance in hell to grow the 5G options to the degree they could if their portfolio is auto rejected in several Middle Eastern nations, or only accepted at a mere 2% margin? Commerce is so intertwined in so many ways on a global level that the entire premise Campaign against Arms Trade is to regarded as too ideological, whilst ignoring common sense; it would be nice if this was a setting where there was only the US and the UK, yet there is a strong defence field that includes Russia and China, whatever the UK loses, China and optionally Russia will gain and in that regard, how did that help the British people?

The fact that we see a one-sided part against Saudi Arabia, whilst there is a large and utter denial (or silencing) on the acts from Hezbollah and Houthis firing Iranian missiles into the Saudi population is not mentioned. The article (at https://www.caat.org.uk/campaigns/stop-arming-saudi) gives more, yet leaves the atrocities of the Houthi and Hezbollah terrorists out of that equation, that part alone should be cause for concern. The small fact that at present there is no evidence, evidence that could stand up in court giving us a clear path that the Saudi government murdered Jamal Khashoggi, is also part of concern. As I stated earlier in other articles, I am not stating that they are innocent, I am stating that the evidence has gaps, large ones and the conviction through some political hacks came via a CIA report stating ‘high confidence‘, which is not the same. When did we allow the courts to decide on ‘confidence‘? The fact that the acts in all this (Yemen and Jamal Khashoggi) from both Iran and Turkey is largely ignored is making the entire stage even more appalling.

Yet, I will thank Andrew Smith in person when I get to deliver the goods making me rich, I do however expect him to be not so appreciative of it all in the end, even less so when others with no scruples at all (like myself) start delivering goods instead of BAE Systems, and deleting the job security of 83,200 employees? Well, it is ideology, is it not? They will just have to find another job.

 

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Saudi Arabia stands alone

I have seen hypocrisy in my time, people selling others down the river for the mere pleasure to afford their share of cocaine and hookers, or as they state it themselves, extra bonus for a family house. The benefit of selling whatever needs be short to afford a lifestyle their ego demands yet, it is a style usually preserved for CEO’s and higher.

It is not always the case, not 100%, sometimes people get ahead because they know someone; they have friends in housing, perhaps a police commissioner who gives them the goods in advance. These things happen. That is not corruption; that is at times merely a small advantage and we can agree that no hard was done, these things just are.

I have always believed that we need to do something when something wrong is done. Yet, what happens if we get played? What happens when there are too many questions and we see governments act on half-baked information? That is at the core of it all. This all started three days ago when I decided to write (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2019/03/28/because-skills-lacked/) ‘Because skills lacked?‘, It was all about the arms embargo for Saudi Arabia, enforced by Germany making both the UK and France uneasy. Yesterday (at https://www.politico.eu/article/germany-extends-saudi-arms-embargo-with-concessions-to-allies/) we saw that it was extended by six months, even as concessions have been given to UK and France, the issue is actually much larger and it is time to call for evidence.

In the first, my emotional response to issues is the question whether Agnes Callamard knew what she was doing. You see, Al Jazeera (at https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/02/rapporteur-khashoggi-murder-perpetrated-saudi-officials-190207171824211.html) gave us a few things, issues repeated by many news casters. First there is “her three-member team had access to part of “chilling and gruesome audio material” of the murder obtained by Turkish intelligence agencies“, it is important we see no establishment of identity, we see no mention on authentication as that is unlikely to happen. Then there is “Woefully inadequate time and access was granted to Turkish investigators to conduct a professional and effective crime-scene examination and search required by international standards for investigation“, as well as “US intelligence agencies believe Prince Mohammed ordered the assassination“, and finally there is “His body has yet to be found“.

Her report might end up being more likely than not a failure (I have not read the full report as I have not been able to obtain it at present, and I might not be able to until the presentation this upcoming June. The initial issues seen at present are (with a lot more when we dig deeper):

  1. The authenticity of the tapes have not been verified, Turkey has been facilitating to Iran to the largest degree (who is in a proxy war with Saudi Arabia), in addition several published quotes give a different light of the activities of Turkey (see previous blogs on the matter).
  2. As I mentioned, there is an issue on Turkey and Iran, making Saudi Arabia a little hesitant to give any credibility to Turkey. In addition to all this, the Consulate is Saudi grounds, It is Saudi territory, as such Turkey has no rights on those grounds. Three weeks after the event refused to share all Khashoggi evidence with Saudi Arabia. If it was actual evidence sharing it would not have impacted the evidence, the fact that it was not shared implies optionally that it did not exist. In effect the Saudi prosecutor did not have access to all evidence.
  3. Are those the same US intelligence agencies that vowed that there were WMD’s in Iraq? What evidence did the US intelligence submit? When we consider the Washington Post, we get: “the CIA examined multiple sources of intelligence, including a phone call that the prince’s brother Khalid bin Salman, the Saudi ambassador to the United States, had with Khashoggi, according to the people familiar with the matter, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the intelligence. Khalid told Khashoggi, a contributing columnist to The Washington Post, that he should go to the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul to retrieve the documents and gave him assurances that it would be safe to do so. It is not clear if Khalid knew that Khashoggi would be killed, but he made the call at his brother’s direction, according to the people familiar with the call, which was intercepted by U.S. intelligence.” I am not stating that this is false or inaccurate, yet the parts ‘according to the people familiar with the matter‘, as well as ‘he made the call at his brother’s direction, according to the people familiar with the call’; these two parts call doubt into the complete stage.
  4. The absence of a cadaver also implies that there is no forensic evidence of any kind (at present or ever).

These four parts do not make Saudi Arabia innocent, yet the guilt cannot be established to any definite degree. I am not trying to twist anything, anyone on a jury in a capital crime knows that the establishment is ‘beyond all reasonable doubt’ and that cannot be proven, even manslaughter cannot be proven at present. Consider that there was a beating, perhaps interrogation with a heavy hand; can we see evidence that this was the case? The audio is not evidence by itself, the simplicity is that we do not know whether the tape is a fake, is there any way to tell that the person in discomfort was Jamal Khashoggi? I have not heard the tape, I cannot tell, how was Agnes Callamard able to tell? In addition, if Turkish intelligence is so good, how did they get the body away and out of sight? The fact that the Turkish intelligence remained clueless should be an answer by itself. The newscasters go all out to contain people on their page, so when the Daily Mail gives us (at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GD06WLJH3Wk) ‘Khashoggi’s body parts carried into Saudi Arabia’s consul residence‘, what evidence is there that it was what they claim it to be? I cannot even tell whether they are carrying trash or books, let alone optionally part of a cadaver. CNN at least used the optional word ‘may’, there have been so many speculations, that and the fact that the Turkish government seemingly did not share all the evidence makes this a lost case.

And now for Germany

So in a stage where something went optionally wrong, yet no way to tell how far it actually goes, the Germans started an embargo on a non-event. There is no conviction, there has been no court on the matter, but for Germany it was enough to set the stage for the embargo. For me it is great, I need a second income and I will happily sell any weapon system to Saudi Arabia if that pays the rent. I see no problem to sell any weapon system to the Saudi government that I can lay my hands on. It is the simple application of American entrepreneurship: Ca$h is king!

So when I see: ‘Riyadh denies the powerful prince had any involvement, alleging “rogue” Saudi elements acted on their own accord‘, I am not willing to dismiss it, the optional evidence does not allow me to do so. In addition, “A confidential report prepared by Kroll, a large private security firm, for the Saudi public prosecutor found that none of the WhatsApp messages exchanged between Prince Mohammed and his top aide, Saud al-Qahtani” I see the reinforcement of that part. I wonder if the actual people who optionally caused the passing of Jamal Khashoggi will ever be found, the media made that close to impossible and Turkish posturing helped in the event, the fact that they have the most incarcerated journalists in the world does not help their attempts for the limelight and the Turkish use of the New Zealand tragedy is further evidence still that the Turkish government cannot see the difference to posturing and doing the right thing, making all the evidence they present even less valued and requiring more and more scrutiny to optionally see it as valid and not tainted.

It is the simple application of the Evidence Act 1995. When we look towards Ellis v Wallsend District Hospital 17 NSWLR 553, we see that it was: ‘open to a Court to disbelieve evidence tainted by hindsight‘, it is not about the case, but on the state of the evidence and there is a massive wave of actions giving a large rise to the fact that evidence is optionally tainted. I use the word optional as it would be to a judge to state it to be so, but the quotes and the application of what is not presented makes it optionally so. Time is the tainting factor on all the evidence. The Washington Post adds to this when the readers are treated to: “The accepted position is that there is no way this happened without him being aware or involved“, ‘Accepted position‘? By what standard, what definition and on what premise and applied evidence is that? The overall usage of ‘people familiar with the matter’ makes the issue worse. The stage of manslaughter and higher requires ‘beyond all reasonable doubt‘, whilst in the current state it is becoming less and less likely that the Torts premise of ‘is it more likely than not‘ would be reached.

And that is the foundation of Germany to stage an embargo? Well, if that is to be the case, than for the next 6 months I will try to find a way to supply weapons to Saudi Arabia. I have rent to pay, taxes to pay and I need a wardrobe as well as a new desktop (and iPad), all these things cost money and I have no issues to sell to most governments if the opportunity arrives.

As the media is showing us how Saudi Arabia stands alone, all whilst they seem to overlook the Iranian actions, they are ready to pound others whilst there is a lack of evidence, seems odd does it not? Although, according to the Hollywood Reporter, people in Saudi Arabia have nothing better to do than hack the phone of some Amazon CEO and gives us: “Our investigators and several experts concluded with high confidence that the Saudis had access to Bezos’ phone, and gained private information. As of today, it is unclear to what degree, if any, AMI was aware of the details” less than a day ago (at https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/jeff-bezos-investigator-claims-saudi-arabia-behind-leaked-texts-1198348). I have absolutely no idea where that came from, it is not like that guy Jeff Bezos is a famous person, is he?

So is it about that optional famous person, the event, the leak, or is it about the new application of ‘several experts concluded with high confidence‘, exactly like the CIA used. It is a claim that cannot be vouched for; cannot be proven (or disproven) and no evidence is there, but the finger needs to be pointed at someone and the FBI learned the hard way on how blaming North Korea on Sony events was a bad idea. It is basically the Dutch building fraud example of: ‘Dat meen ik mij niet te herinneren‘, which means ‘I don’t think I can remember that‘, the trained response of a politician facing governmental scrutiny in a commission. That is the one sentence they had down perfectly (the Dutch denial version of a 5th amendment), and we see it applied in too many fields. So especially as it impacts larger government concerns, it seems that we need to take a look at the application of evidence towards assigning blame and guilt. Although, if this gets me my retirement fund of $24,445,000, so that I have a golden parachute. I would personally like to thank the German government, as well as the participating media for being this short sighted.

Saudi Arabia does not stand alone, there is always a person willing to facilitate to any government. It was the basic lesson Mossack Fonseca left the people on a minimum income, when a firm is facilitating within the confines of legal structures for 45 years, do you think that governments did NOT know? Give me a break, they merely played the flustered emotional card to keep the people at peace, in the end nothing changes and a new player takes over from the previous one.

The EU grave train provides one way or another, yet in the end it will provide and not to the people the taxpayers believe it does, on the larger international scale, especially in light if so much evidence failure, it was up to all of us to ask the hard questions but the media prevented it, the emotional curve are all the shareholders and stake holders required.

I think I will start Chapman Calibre Ballistics (CCB) and offer my services to the Saudi Arabian Defence Forces procurement division, so that others will readily confuse my acronym it all with either Child Care Benefit or China Construction Bank, giving the media more things to blame China for, because that is apparently how the game is supposed to be played.

 

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Because skills lacked?

You have heard it, you have read it (in trashy novels), the lady waiting for an orgasm lets the plumber have a go because her man just can’t get it up, or comes before her oven warms up, so the croissant tastes as natural as it can be, like wet dough and tastes like nothing you would ever want to try.

But there is the plumber and he has loads of lead in his pencil so the problem is solved. Yet, what happens when it is not merely a domestic inconvenience?

That is the part we see in Politico a mere 4 hours ago. When we see ‘German divisions over Saudi arms embargo upset EU allies‘, the article (at https://www.politico.eu/article/german-divisions-over-saudi-arms-embargo-upsets-eu-allies/), here we see the foundation with: “Germany imposed an embargo in October after the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi but the measure has annoyed France and Britain, whose giant arms makers require German components that are now banned“. The issue is not that Jamal Khashoggi is still alive. He optionally left with a headache and was lost somewhere. The problem is that there is no evidence, not evidence that holds up in court and the players all know this. Moreover, there is no evidence (other than circumstantial) that it was done on orders of a government, in this case the Saudi Royal family. That is at the crux, so the entire ban is on other merits. We could argue that America likes to push, with an optional setting of growth of billions as Germany stopped the processing of commerce. If there was actual evidence, it would be a different matter. The fact that an ally of Iran who is in a proxy war with Saudi Arabia has been taking the limelight with accusations and innuendo, but this has not been met with evidence. The fact that most players know this and continue on the present path is a much larger concern.

It becomes even more of an issue when we see: “whether to extend or lift its ban on arms’ exports to the Middle Eastern country, which is also a leading participant in the war in Yemen” we see even more issues. Even as we saw a few hours ago ‘Saudi Airstrike Said to Hit Yemeni Hospital as War Enters Year 5‘, the people to a much larger degree are kept in the dark on ‘Yemen’s Houthi say ready to strike Riyadh, Abu Dhabi if coalition moves on Hodeidah‘, ‘Yemenis rally in support of Houthi to mark war anniversary‘, as well as ‘Arab coalition neutralize Iranian officers, dozens Houthis in Yemen‘, outside of a few select reporting sources as well as Reuters, the people are kept in the dark regarding these events. The fact that the news has been this one sided for well over a year is more than despicable. It is a stage where the players are all stopped form resolving the issues. The fact that Houthis have been delaying talk after talk and not committing to any resolution option, stopping humanitarian aid is at the heart of the problem and that is the overwhelming evidence that Iran is directly involved, including Iranian officer, currently posing as cadavers.

Yet these same players are eagerly lining up to see commerce (read: profit) go to their places of residence as 5G, construction as well as consultancy projects are raking in billion after billion. For example the intrusion detection market (the market that opposes people engaged in discrete entry and removal operations) was a mere $3 billion last year and is expected to be at $5 billion in 2020. In this light, whilst they are vying for a slice of that cake against the Netherlands, Australia, France and Canada, why is Germany optionally allowed a piece of that cake? If they cannot act on evidence, how could their intrusion system seen as reliable? When did you last buy an intrusion detection system that gave the alarm on the foundation of ‘hunch expected‘?

It would be a different setting if clear evidence and clear evidence beyond all reasonable doubt was delivered. The CIA gave a mere ‘highly likely’ that Saudi Royals were involved, highly likely? They gave much more certainty on WMD in Iraq and none were ever found, so at this point I think it is important to see that there is a much larger play being made against certain players, whilst their opponent (Iran) is given the clear marks in too many places; it is more than buttering the bread of opportunity, it is the core foundation of staging deception against certain people on a global scale.

  1. You can fool some people all of the time.
  2. You can fool all people some of the time.
  3. You cannot fool all people all of the time.

Several players have moved between stages 2 and 3, trying to set the surroundings so that they can try to get option three in play and it is important for us all to realise that this should not be catered to and we need to make certain that those trying this approach are pushed into the limelight, showing us their faces and their identities.

Even as the deadline to lift the ban does not come until Sunday, we need to see that there needs to be an account with markers on both sides of the balance and we should be told on the names of those involved. The embargo in its initial stage is an issue, but to some degree it makes sense, or better stated we understand that it happened. Yet at this stage as there is clear no evidence, at that point impede any government of tools for their defence is an issue and it also shows that Saudi Arabia is well placed to grow their own defence systems. Personally I should advice the KSA to consider buying Remington arms as it is up for sale cheap and it would also give them a global export item (not the worst idea to have), from there on, as Saudi Arabia grows more options we will suddenly see players like Germany suddenly do a 180 degree on their own actions and try to ‘smooth things over’, yet at the core of that form of diplomacy, could any player have any faith in their value as an ally, especially as the foundation was not set on something called ‘clear evidence’?

Politico gives one more gem that has larger implications. With: “both countries signed the Treaty of Aachen in January in which they agreed “to develop a common approach for arms’ exports” that applies to all joint defense projects” we see a larger issue, even as the stage was set on common sense, the polarisation in the EU at present shows that what was common sense is now stopping nations to do proceed on their common sense and value of commerce. If the evidence was clear it might have been a topic of debate, now without that it is a cinder block of discontent on two (read: four) players with skin in the game. Germany by itself, up against the commerce needs of the UK and France and Saudi Arabia as a victim of wrongful applied leverage through a treaty that did not require proper evidence to support the openly given embargo. At what point was that not clearly looked at?

You see, it goes beyond the openly seen parts. The fact that in all this the questionable part of Turkey in all this was kept below the surface and the fact that the EU players have been catering to the ‘needs’ of Turkey in all this plays a much bigger part, giving a stage of selective discrimination for the needs of the businesses of the EU in a much larger degree. It is seen in in one way (to some extent) in the Jerusalem Post, a paper that is decently obvious in their anti-Iran writing. Yet the stage we see with: ‘Germany Refuses To Disclose Iranian Attempts To Buy Nuclear, Missile Technology‘, it almost reads like ‘where there is smoke, there is a huge fire‘ which is obviously not the case, yet the stage where Germany is unwilling to disclose the materials optionally releasing Iran from blame is still a larger issue. If proven that it was the case, it would show the German government as hypocrite in their embargo of goods for Saudi Arabia, all whilst there is a clear proven case that Iran is involved in a proxy war with Saudi Arabia, it is actively engaged in support of Houthi fighters in Yemen and foundational acts that Iran is not allowed to make are being made. These elements alone should be evidence to ban Germany from all Saudi Projects (an exaggerated move mind you), but the fact that this is not out in the open, proves to some extent the points of view that I am giving here. The article (at https://www.jpost.com/Middle-East/Germany-refuses-to-disclose-Iranian-attempts-to-buy-nuclear-missile-technology-584512) also gives us: “FoxNews.com reported on Germany’s concealment of important data that could establish Iranian regime violations of the 2015 nuclear deal – formally called the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) – and sanctions targeting the Islamic Republic’s missile program“, the fact that we see the EU keeping out of the light the evidence of an optionally failed JCPOA as well as the face that the EU is still protecting a stage that has failed is voice to even more issues (like the gravy train for those on the JCPOA committee), the fact that the media is not taking this into the light (proving or disproving) is a much larger issue still.

It almost reads like the story of a man who could not get his business done, so he hopes that the other interested party has a desire to read William Shakespeare and markets all the attention and optional needs in that direction, so that the actual issue can be ignored. The analogy fits to the extent that whatever there is, it is not a marriage, it is not a relationship, merely a sliding acquaintance, and that is the foundation for less and less. In finality getting back to the Iran situation, the mere setting of “The Post reviewed a German intelligence report from 2018 that wrote, “Iran continued to undertake, as did Pakistan and Syria, efforts to obtain goods and know-how to be used for the development of weapons of mass destruction and to optimize corresponding missile delivery systems.”” has nothing to do with the actual embargo and the reasoning, yet as the reasoning of the embargo is not set on evidence, the continued support and protection of Iran makes even less sense and as such we see embargo’s, accusation all linked to evidence that is not there.

It becomes even worse soon enough. It is a side that no one has looked at, but got some illumination only 15 minutes go. It is a book by Russell Muirhead and Nancy L. Rosenblum called ‘A Lot of People Are Saying‘, it is a book about conspiracism targeting democratic foundations. We might think it is a laughing matter, but it is not. The problem is not that people think that there is a conspiracy, the actions of the media themselves are partly to blame, the sides I exposed today. Issues that can be easily provided for through merely seeking the web and reading the newspapers, is a stage that shows the unbalance, the discrimination of one and the hiding of another party in all this, the media is part of it. Merely digging into the events that surround American Big-Pharma, the events on Khashoggi, the ‘protection’ of Turkey and Iran, the non-reported acts of Hezbollah in Yemen, as well as the issues shown in the last few days regarding Huawei. There is a much larger play based on commerce, profit and greed and the media is merely a tool to be exploited, whether the party has the word ‘news’ in its name or not.

We need to start looking without blinkers and see the whole playing field, not one that is merely being reported on for the need of emotion, lacking clear information. If certain ways are not amended, the matter will only get worse.

We can make it a tale of adultery, or a tail of incompetency, yet the foundation remains, we set in place core values and then reset the stage through presentations and require the presentation to be accepted on face value innuendo, ignoring the originally required evidence levels to be adhered to, and the media? Well, in one specific Dutch case, the event involving Mohamed Lahouaiej-Bouhlel in Nice got the front page, yet when White extremists attacked a Mosque; it was all about a racer taking a selfie, on the front page, which should be evidence enough and make my case for me. How much longer until the people are given the factuality of the world, not the perception the media gives us by making sure there is no space left to report on 50 kills and 50 non-fatal injuries. And it goes further than that; we could argue that Google is supporting that point of view. Consider the two mentioned events. Google represents the two events in a very different light, diminishing the danger of one and embossing the other, the media and digital media has gone that far out of balance, was it merely because skills lacked, or because they want the lacking skills shown so that perception shifts, I will let you decide that part.

 

 

 

 

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When the numbers are…..

So what happens when the numbers are up for reporting? Samsung now joins Apple with the setting of: “Samsung has issued a surprise profit warning, blaming a slump in memory chip prices and slowing demand for display panels. It is the latest sign that technology firms are facing tougher times amid a global economic slowdown“. The article (at https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/mar/26/samsung-surprises-market-with-first-quarter-profit-warning) is all about image and not incorrect mind you, yet has anyone considered the stage where they are both losing massively against Huawei? There is a reason why a Samsung $1899 and an Apple $2365 lose against the Huawei Nova 3i ($499). Yes, technologically they both are slightly more advanced, yet with a difference of $1400 and $1900 the technological difference is way too small to take the expensive option. The phone was strikingly advanced on many levels. From my less than a day P7, I have moved to a 2 day battery Huawei Nova 3i and I am loving the speed and added options, options that might have been a little luxurious to the basic user, yet as my P7 passed away due to a dead battery and a 24:7 service that almost lasted 4 years (a missed target by 6 weeks). I had no option but to find the cheapest realistic solution and only Huawei catered to that. With the previous phone over proving its value there was no competition. So when I see ‘technology firms are facing tougher times amid a global economic slowdown‘, we see the impact of ‘overpriced’ in a time of dire budgeting that is missed in several plays and fields. We do not have that much to spend nowadays. Even now, working casual hours I hope that I will have a nice birthday (in 5 weeks) by treating myself to a yummy Nintendo Switch for my birthday, my one little treat in almost 2 years. It is the reality for many people and the number of people having to move into such a budget push s increasing, so even as all of them (including Huawei) are moving to 5G foldable phones, he pricing will make them not an option for close to 60$ of the people, or it is done under hefty locked down telecom contracts. Samsung had that benefit 1-2 years ago when a wave of people needed a new phone. Now we see that the bulk of these people are unwilling to make another $1900 jump, it cools down to a phone bill and a $79 extra a month to look cool and the people are realising that realism and pragmatism is the only way forward in mobile land, especially as the empire of 5G is coming and the next wave of phones will not support both 4G and 5G, that is the reality.

We might give light to: “Weaker smartphone sales and fewer orders from data-centred companies such as Amazon and Google have led to a glut of memory chips and sent prices sliding“, yet we forget the impending changes, changes that are noticeable in patent land. Even as they are all walking the walk, we see that the patent changes are pushing towards generic hardware and the distinguished changes that will be pushed through by using specifically designed software. It sounds weird, but part of it was introduced through software and video games. As a game was sold, we see that people could buy an additional season pass for all the additional gaming parts, yet in more than one case we learned that the ‘added’ software was already on the software but required a code to unlock and mobile phones are moving into this changed atmosphere at this very moment. I believe that all manufacturers will be changing the setup by not having 4 models, but one model that has the 4 elements unlocked through codes. It makes sense in a few ways. Having one hardware option is easier and cheaper and having the software set and staged to unlock the ability buy a code has been the corner stone with places like IBM for the longest of times. GEOINT software solutions have had them as well for close to a decade and telecom devices are up for that very same change in the near future.

I also believe that this will be the final push to amend international patent laws to make software a patentable item as well. So even as we are given “Samsung was forecast to make a 7.2tn won (£4.66bn) operating profit between January and March, less than half the 15.6tn won a year ago. Sales were expected to fall to 53.7tn won from 60.6tn won a year ago“, we see that the push for generic hardware to be a lot more generic soon enough. In addition, there is a danger of a cartel push as Apple and Samsung have elements both needs (displays with one and software with the other), we see that those who were riding that wave will have added value soon enough. Huawei is on that same wave, especially in 5G and now that the alpha will be containing the Huawei OS, we see a first stage where Android will be losing some market share. I wonder if Samsung will make a deal to kick Google in the nuts (for Android bolts only), yet that stage is now in view with some clarity. There is no way that this is a given, but the stage is open for it and that puts the light in a different setting. Everyone is making some speech on how ‘Smart Switch’ is all about on transferring files, yet the entire setting could equally apply to set the stage of moving Android devices towards iOS, and even as there are a few videos on it, we see a lack of IT places looking deeper at this. Some make fun, some are quirky, yet there is an undeniable stage that there is a push both externally and internally to make Samsung an iOS solution, whether straight out of the box, or conversion, Android will be under attack from more than one direction in the next few years.

It is up to Samsung to decide what path they want to be on and it is their right. Yet in this, when we see the long term options, as well as the optional changes that are coming, is another scenario still an option. when we realise ‘patent protection can be obtained, for example, for inventions implemented by computer programs‘ in places that originally denied software patents, is a larger change. It sets the stage for generic telecom hardware faster and more direct, whilst with the stage of software setting the device to its options, unlocks a much larger field, upgrading of hardware, opening options on hardware will all become commercial tracks holding customers under corporate grasp for a much longer period of time. In addition, switching out of a contract could come with additional costs and an optional cost of switching, and element consumers are not ready for, or better stated, the cost of doing business will be lacking larger size of awareness in all this. Even as I foresaw that change 3 years ago, I am still amazed that they got here so fast. I had expected this move in 2-3 years, yet as it seemingly shows, there is every indication that the next wave of phones might have some of these solutions already in place.

It also implies that there is an optional danger of phones and bricking, or jacking. As people want to get things cheap, they will at times rely on ‘friends’ having a solution that gives them options they never paid for and in the process their phone will be jacked in other ways too. When they find out the cost of doing business too late, they end up with a brick and have to buy new hardware, or factory reset at a cost.

All that from a mere loss of revenue tale?

No, not really, the numbers have been out for a while, yet the dependency of Samsung on their displays, and the income warnings will open the field to make the shifts that were in the wind a lot sooner and to appease shareholders, we will optionally see that hardware move faster. The US trade wars made it essential for Huawei not to be caught with their pants down, so they have been working on their own OS for a year, with a much stronger push in the last 6 months. In addition, the parts I casually mentioned yesterday, we now see (source: The Guardian) give us: “a financial app claiming to be “the most significant change in the credit card industry for 50 years”, and also extended sections on an app that will curate the best of international magazines, and a new range of video games“, this is a form of financial facilitation that goes beyond normal facilitation. In addition we see the shaky fields of data information that an American firm like Apple has never had any access to, as such the people signing up for it with a few baubles (read: perks) will find that their financial history and future will be up for scrutiny by all kind of sources that they are not aware of at present or in the immediate future. A change that will impact finances on a global scale, so whilst we see nations with encryption bills and all kinds of ‘national security’ poohaa, we see the people just signing over their data like it is Facebook day zero. As Apple sweetens the deal by linking options as streaming and gaming, we see new levels of facilitation that we had not seen before and all that intersects with new mobile modes and new stages of generic device hardware now depending on device software in the near future.

So whilst we all seem to think that this is a ‘great’ idea, some might not have noticed “the use of the Apple TV app for navigating and curating content from theoretically rival streamers, including Amazon Prime, HBO, Showtime, and, strikingly for UK viewers, BritBox, the planned new BBC/ITV product“. The younglings might not catch on, but this is a new level of localisation. Just like Netflix does not globally release events, we see levels of localisation (Europe, America, Asia, and Australia) and in the other part we will see this more localised. the foundation is a return to a local, national release of issues, an issue we have been aggravated by in the past when movies had a local release date, so like America had Star Wars Episode one, the Dutch population had to wait well over 26 weeks to see that movie, now we see a danger to return to an optimised marketing driven releases on Gaming, TV shows, movies and services as digital marketing prepares algorithm that optimises the value of whatever is released, wherever the market took them. That stage is not a given, but the elements give rise to the danger of it and even when we get some memo through any shady media corporation (Sony 2012), the outcome is less clear when there was a seeming miscommunication. The fact that none of them gave light to the fact that the Terms of Service is a legal binding contract and a memo is a piece of paper that can be rewritten at any given moment.

And as it is all to be patented, the larger corporations will now do whatever they like and open markets will be niched or denied entry. So even as we are given: “While both companies have blamed China’s slowdown, Apple and Samsung are also facing fierce competition from numerous rivals around the world, including firms in China that can match their hardware quality and produce cheaper phones“, we might notice that he name Huawei (and Oppo) are not specifically mentioned. As I personally see it, it will not be about restraining their access, it will be to deny the smaller firms as start-up contenders, when they cannot compete in any way, those markets will be pushed towards other players and for now both Samsung and Apple will be dependent on what Huawei has for the next 3 years, after that the bigger ones will have caught on. And that part is not sitting still either, Forbes revealed three days ago: ‘Samsung Suddenly Launches Galaxy S10 Ultimate Edition‘, where one of the important quotes is: “the Galaxy S10 5G delivers key upgrades in almost every area and for a significantly lower price than expected“, the Key Note?

It was not suddenly, or ill conceived, the partial plan that Huawei was too much of a danger was a given a year ago. I believe that it was never about: ‘surprises market with first-quarter profit warning‘, it was not about the profit warning, it was about knowingly taking a hit. The entire “for a significantly lower price than expected” is a hit, a hit taken to lower the advantage of Huawei and the setting for a stage for a much longer time. It is a brilliant move and Samsung knows and has seen the impact of taking a loss in the teeth now to gain the upper hand in the long term play and it is well played. The elements are clearly in the field, yet we see very little reporting on that and as the commitment is give, the long term profit is there.

There is a second part to this. The Verge (at https://www.theverge.com/2019/3/26/18282700/apple-vs-qualcomm-patent-infringement-iphone-import-ban) implies it (does not say it is so), yet when we see: “A US trade judge has found Apple guilty of infringing on two Qualcomm patents related to power management and data download speeds. As a result, the judge — International Trade Commission Judge MaryJoan McNamara — says some iPhone models containing competing Intel modems might be blocked from shipping from China, where they’re manufactured, to the US“, we will soon see a very different situation, when the hardware/software part is distilled and separated, we see a setting where a generic device could not be hindered and until software evidence is given linking the two, we see the setting where the verdict would be quite different indeed. the second part is given through: “The two companies previously had an exclusive licensing arrangement for the iPhone to use Qualcomm-made modems that are integral to bringing mobile devices online. In recent years, Apple has brought Intel into the fold as a modem supplier, and it appears that decision has had cascading effects that have led to today’s complex web of lawsuits. Qualcomm has also made the blockbuster claim that Apple effectively stole its technology and gave it to Intel, violating its patents in the process” the statement is not new, we have seen it, yet the tactic of generic device that is patented software driven would make for a much harder case for any player like Qualcomm to win. Depending on the hardware and the links to Samsung, QUALCOMM would be in a much tougher position, in addition the contracts would be dangerously precise, so either there would be an 800% increase in contracts, or a smaller amount of messy ones, which would reveal massive holes making the contract a lot less effective.

Contract Shmontract

Part of this is not seen, but a speculated change that Cnet reported almost two weeks ago. With “The Japan Fair Trade Commission this week cancelled a cease-and-desist order from 2009 that affected Qualcomm licensing in Japan, effectively declaring that Qualcomm wasn’t guilty of the charges against it. JFTC officials said the decision is “unusual,” according to a report from Nippon, and that this is the first time it’s revoked a cease-and-desist order since 2012“. I believe that the change that I speculated on is part of this. The larger layers are stopping to bicker over crumbs. In the stage of the generic device solution, we see a setting where Samsung and QUALCOMM would be the cornerstone of EVERY device produced lowering the cost of making and therefore driving overall profits for all of them. These contacts and cases are just in the way, so expect to see a lot more ‘amiable’ solutions to be posted in the news broadcasters in the near future. Yet the partial danger is missed, when 5 players set the 80% stage, what innovations will we miss out on? More important, what levels or which amount of choices will be denied to consumers?

The numbers as we see them are merely the start of much larger changes. Players like Huawei are not out of the race as their power is in another angle and they can still hold a much larger slice of cake in all this, with their victory in Europe they are still in the race, especially as the US has never been able to prove any issue of national security, so as the US is going that part alone (for the most) we will see more shifts towards protectionist solutions like the Generic software locked devices making that solution a much larger stage for profits for those players. So even as we laugh at people like Randall Stephenson (AT&T CEO) giving us: “Huawei is not allowing interoperability to 5G — meaning if you are 4G, you are stuck with Huawei for 5G,” he said during the speech. “When the Europeans say we got a problem — that’s their problem. They really don’t have an option to go to somebody else” a person who is flogging 4G LTE as 5G Evolution is telling us about a stage that players like IBM have played for decades, so he is calling a Chinese firm to be the same as players like IBM? How was that news? Yet when he is asked on why 5G Evolution is not, he is seemingly dragging his feet. Or perhaps he has already addressed the Verge giving us: ‘Study confirms AT&T’s fake 5G E network is no faster than Verizon, T-Mobile or Sprint 4G‘

Why does THAT matter?

Well that is the hindsight of all this. you see when the switch is complete we will get new issues on hardware versions bought and how the software will employ the wrong connection symbol, because that too is the impact of what you buy, the issue of profit will come with additional dangers of miscommunication of your own device. That too will be a future impact we all face, so there are intentional and unintentional (cause and effect) issues in play soon hereafter. The impact rises a lot faster, even now we might think that Samsung is on top with at present 1166 patents, yet when we see China where ZTE and Huawei combine 1629 patents, we see a trailing 794 patents and QUALCOMM with a mere 730 patents, this now optionally indicates (optionally as it remains to be seen where the crunch is) that QUALCOMM requires a solution that opens the market, not close it off, in one side the Japanese change opens their options and their larger need to be part of the generic devices becomes an essential step for them and now we see the predicament for Apple, they do not get mentioned in that part at all. So either Apple is already on another horse (the generic solution), or we see that Apple is in a lot more upcoming hardship than we realise and these are December 2018 numbers. the fact that Inter Digital Technology Corp (18 patents) is on that list and Apple is not makes for a much larger issue and so the previous Apple marketing noise of preferring to trail on 5G could be seen in a very different sight. And when we accept previous news from Apple Insider: ‘A 5G iPhone will cost Apple about $21 in licensing fees to Nokia, Qualcomm, and others‘, implies that Apple waited for much too long and now they are dependent on the other players making a much larger case for the future of Apple to be towards the generic devices, where they optionally will hold the software patents. It is speculative, yet based on the insight of the information that is for the most readily available, so when the numbers are up, they are not on the rise, they are merely up for review and scrutiny and in that light, we see that the first impact of a decrease of 50% from the trillion dollar value they held was not even close to the most negative view the people can hold.

There will be a larger scrutiny over the next three years, what is definitely up for the bulk is that the power of 5G will be Asian to a much larger degree, the fact that the US has faltered in this field shows that there is a lot more hardship on the horizon in the future. That part is seen when we consider Forbes giving us: “Our telecommunication industry never arrived at a single competitive standard for 5G technology, and our efforts to get allies like Britain and Germany to reconsider their support for Huawei, have been ineffectual. At the Mobile World Congress last month, the efforts were pathetic“, which now opens the doors on why on earth America remained complacent in the international needs for this long a time, perhaps hiring capable engineers might have been a first step. It is too late on several steps and the comment ‘leadership from the Trump administration will be essential‘ from Forbes should be regarded as a statement from a most prestigious BS department, Trump did not fail, the failure started before the Obama administration and their lack of success in that department merely increased the losses that America will face.

The information is not that hard to come by, most of it can be to some degree distilled form the patent waves, waves lacking in the US and that lack now shows the downturn in an age where activity would have been everything, which is good for Sweden with their Ericsson as well as Finland with their Nokia, so let’s end this article with:

Nokia 5G -yhteydellä on tieto tulevaisuus (it would have been too easy in English or Swedish)

 

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A political Chucky

I love cricket, I played it and loved it. That is as long as I was not bowling. There is no point in handing 10 overs to the opposition when Chucky (me) is bowling and I am happy that I am not considered outside of the field or batting. Some things should not happen, so, what do you do when your own party (the conservatives) considers chucking as a valid tactic in a game where it has been an illegal action?

That is what the Guardian (at https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/mar/24/tory-islamophobia-row-15-suspended-councillors-quietly-reinstated) informs us on in ‘Tory Islamophobia row: 15 suspended councillors quietly reinstated‘, and the fact that it is openly and ‘quietly’ done implies that my own party does not seem to grasp the educational need of the matter. We have all made ‘questionable’ considerations. I have on occasion noticed a lady who had an amazing * (assterix). I did not state that out loud, but optionally whispered it as softly ass possible (pun intended). It gets us to the old situation ‘If you are alone in a forest and no woman can hear you, are you still wrong?‘

So, when we see: “More than a dozen Conservative councillors who were suspended over posting Islamophobic or racist content online – with some describing Saudis as “sand peasants” and sharing material comparing Asian people to dogs“, when we see this, this is not whispering. This is loudly proclaiming, shouting even as it happened online. This is stupidity of a whole new level and there needs to be an investigation. It is not merely for the norm of the PC of it all. This has business impact. We can consider that the Middle East will be funding hundreds of billions in business decisions and the UK would want as much of it as possible. And in that is Mohammed Amin wrong? When we see the chairman of the Conservative Muslim Forum for the publication of set of formal disciplinary processes that far off? When discrimination is condoned to the degree that it is, should we not expect a much larger impact? When we see Islamophobia and anti-Semitic issues, we need to remember that there is a larger impact. If parties are rejected from consideration, it shows that political players are dismissing optional best solutions from the political arena because they are wearing filtering glasses, implying that the cost of doing business is optionally increased due to unacceptable practices and as the article implies that it has transpired 15 times, we see a systemic failure of a political engine that besides doing things wrong is optionally transgressing into the field of criminal acts. So even as James Cleverly claims that that swift investigations was made, the stage of quietly adding them back to the party gives light of more than Islamophobia, it gives light to the acceptance of racism within the party and that is not a good thing.

There is no doubt that there is a lot of emotion regarding the Middle East, yet anti-Semitism and Islamophobia will never solve it, it merely polarises issues beyond repair. I wonder what happens when Huawei and Saudi Arabia complete their initial setting and Saudi Arabia becomes a 5G powerbroker? Some analysts made the claim that there will be 30 million subscriptions in the Middle East by 2024. I believe that to be wrong, Huawei is not the only player and Ericsson is showing to be almost as capable as Huawei (driving competition and innovation), giving Saudi Arabia an option to drive partnerships to nations including the UAE, Oman and Egypt. OK, we admit that Egypt is Africa, yet the light that Saudi Arabia could grow subscriptions towards 60 million upwards when they get to include Egypt, and set the stage for Telecom growth a lot wider than that. A speculative step is seen in the Arab News on March 4th. When I looked at the complete language regarding Saudi Arabia’s Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Adel Al-Jubeir, I noticed that the statements were precise (read: too precise). So when I saw: “ruled out restoring diplomatic relations with Syria or reinstating Damascus to the Arab League without progress on a political process to end the eight-year-old war“, as well as: “Riyadh will also not take part in any reconstruction efforts until stability is restored in Syria“. Yet in this, 5G and creating options for communication is not reconstruction, or political progress. Yet it facilitates for both when the innovative players are allowed for a push towards global 5G considerations and it is my believe that Adel Al-Jubeir could use it to set an increasingly larger stage for the KSA.  I admit that my speculation is based on text (and interpretation) that is super thin, you could not skate on it, but you might lie down on it and cautiously create forward momentum. In light of the optional growth all over the Middle East and Africa, Saudi Arabia (read: Huawei business partners) are all gaining an advantage that allows for multiple conversations on a much larger board. The direct impact being that the setback for American corporations will increase larger and faster.

The 5G push would also allow options towards Jordan and now we see that Saudi Arabia (via Huawei and Ericsson) has created a much larger bond for future options for all these players. Now we see an optional line through Saudi Arabia to Oman, Egypt, Jordan, the UAE and optionally Yemen to follow. A big chunk of the Arab league, basically the big 5 all connected in 5G together making one voice more and more powerful. And with every victory there, the US gets pushed into becoming less and less relevant in 5G in that same wave. In that stage, when we see these steps unfold, do you really think that keeping racist and Islamophobic politicians is serving anyone’s purpose other than fear mongering and extremism?

So when we see the Guardian quote: “When CCHQ has been made aware of the small number of such cases we have acted swiftly, suspending members and launching immediate investigations, in sharp contrast to other parties” my issue here is that it is the exact party line that James Cleverly gave us. It sounds like a Microsoft sound byte, a claim made when they cannot solve a problem and they need it to be put into a drawer for well over a full upgrade. The fact that the Guardian treats us to: ‘quietly reinstated‘ gives rise to a systemic failure, one that can cost the UK many opportunities down the line and should we allow for that?

The Middle East is currently actively investing funds in excess of £1.4 trillion (not billion) on numerous projects in constructions, ICT, telecommunications and infrastructure, do you think that the UK has a chance of scoring any jobs when these contractors ask for a clarification on the application of ‘sand peasants‘? I also wonder what we will find when we read the transcripts and investigation papers regarding the 15 members that had been ‘quietly reinstated‘. How loud are we allowed to be when we look into this? The UK has enough worries with new Brexit fear mongering and a non-accountable ECB as Europe is about to get several trillions deeper in debt (because they found a miracle formula that explains it all. source: Bloomberg), digging our own graves by not acting against racism and discriminating phobias seems to be a problem we can avoid from the start.

When one of these Middle Easters investors asks feedback from Miqdaad Versi of the Muslim Council of Britain, what would these people hear? Quietly allowing chuckies to be set up as bowlers whilst we know that they will (through inadequacy, insensitivity and lack of professionalism) optionally knowingly instigate an illegal play is not common sense at all.

Any cricket captain should know better than to allow any chucky to bowl, but that is exactly what is seemingly happening right now.

 

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When politicians rely on terrorism

Something really bad happened in New Zealand last week, no one denies that. The impact and repercussions are staggering and will be for some time. Yet he politicians need to wake up and take a long hard look into the mirror. That is the view that ABC News left me with yesterday. The article (at https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-03-19/new-zealand-facebook-christchurch-shooting-video-sheryl-sandberg/10915184) gives us ‘New Zealand PM Jacinda Ardern leans on Facebook to drop Christchurch shooting footage‘, I get it, it needs to be deleted, everyone (99%) agrees on that. We were also told on the day after the event “Facebook said it had removed 1.5 million videos from its platforms within the first 24 hours of the shootings and was removing all edited versions of the video, even if they did not show graphic content“, even as we see the added “Facebook and Alphabet Inc’s YouTube said they were also using automated tools to identify and remove violent content” yet still we hear: “Ms Ardern said despite those assurances, the “graphic” vision was still available online“, it becomes time for Jacinda Ardern to wake up and take a long hard look at the state of the situation. I get it, she is in a really bad place having to deal with it, yet the political lack of common sense is now becoming an issue. As I wrote the day before this article (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2019/03/18/media-out-of-bounds/) in ‘Media out of bounds‘: “This is seen with the Twitch statistics that report “As of May 2018 there are 2.2 million broadcasters monthly“, that comes down to 72,330 streamers every day, there is no technology that will monitor it; there is no AI that could intervene. That solemn common sense moment makes the involved politician part of the problem, not part of the solution. Consider that out of all 0.000138% uploads one is optionally an extremist (this implies one extremist every day), so the number ends up being 0.000003% is optionally too dangerous. We cannot get politicians to put in the effort of keeping up a decent information system that is 75%-80% efficient and they demand 99.999997% efficiency from technology platforms?” That was one source. Now add the YouTube statistics (Jan 2019) “300 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every minute! Almost 5 billion videos are watched on YouTube every single day” and in addition when we consider that 17 minutes out of 300 hours represents a mere 0.00944% and that is one instance of a total of video’s that is 1440 times the total daily uploaded size, the chance of finding it becomes harder and harder. More important, more changes imply a different digital footprint. That is besides certain tricks that I will not name here. So 100% is scanned, mostly automated. Yet to find that one video places like Google would require an additional 2500 staff members to be hired, and that is YouTube alone. The burnout factor will be massive. That is before someone figures out the solutions that the Mafia employed in the 80’s and 90’s against wiretapping, when that is applied to digital media the manpower solution will fall apart. And it does not end with her, because she at least is up in arms to deal with something that happened on her watch, in her domain. It is the ABC quote: “Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison said he wanted world leaders to discuss how they could crack down on social media companies to prevent similar videos from being spread online.” It is my question on how idiotic any Prime Minister could get. We do not see the state: ‘he wanted world leaders to discuss how they could crack down on people uploading terrorist video, preventing them from being spread online‘, he goes straight for the tech firms whilst simple top line reports show the delusional state of some of these politicians. The problem has gotten to be too large. Yet according to some news Brenton Tarrant acted alone, so how exactly is all this possible? the issue is a much larger one and it is time for the politicians to do more than to merely nod their heads, they need to become active in hunting down these elements, but that does not look too good on their resume, so like confused sick puppies, they do what was done in 1934, they find a scapegoat and blame those people, so how did that work out in 1934?

I hereby also demand clear presentation of evidence regarding the statement: ‘Social media platforms ‘unable or unwilling’ to take action‘, it becomes even worse when we see: “if the site owners can target consumers with advertising in microseconds, why can’t the same technology be applied to prevent this kind of content being streamed live?” It almost feels like a discussion with a surgeon stating: “Listen, I took out your gallstones, so I reckon that it will be the same with Overian/Testicular cancer, I will just cut out the bad part, OK?” It is not the same, it is something entirely different. The fact that every minute 18,000 minutes of video is uploaded, which is merely YouTube, makes the issue a very different part. When we add the mobile uploads directly to Facebook, Twitch and the two Chan channels that number becomes close to horrendous. For the most, whatever solution you want to employ, there will be a way to diffuse the effectiveness of the digital solution making matters worse every second.

In all this, the media is making matter worse. This is seen with: “In one email exchange New Zealand police requested an American-based website preserve the emails and IP addresses linked to a number of posts about the attack, but were met with an expletive-filled reply. In a reply posted on the site, its founder described the request as “a joke” before calling New Zealand as a “s***hole country” and an “irrelevant island nation”” (at https://www.tvnz.co.nz/one-news/new-zealand/us-website-labels-nz-s-hole-country-refuses-help-police-in-christchurch-terror-attack-investigation), let quality hackers have a go at them, see how they like that.

So if this truly matters, than you will give us all the name of that ‘American-based website‘, the people have a right to know, don’t they? What do you think happens to the funds of that ‘American-based website‘ when everyone is informed that they are supporting terrorism? Make sure that you repost that information on 9/11, let’s see how much of a shithole that place will be soon thereafter. And the news in Auckland gave us additional info I gave earlier. With “technology firms including Facebook, Google and Twitter – said it shared the digital “fingerprints” of more than 800 edited versions of the video“, yes 800 versions. This is not someone merely being sickly curious wanting to see what happened, 800 versions were made, and is the police still thinking that ‘the shooter acted alone’? There was a support system in place. I got that much within 12 minutes of reading the presented information (aka evidence). The 800 versions give rise to a sympathiser platform and still we see the overly less intelligent Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison trying to crack down on social media companies? Give me a break please!

I personally believe that certain politicians are trying to push their own social media agenda and to achieve that, they are conveniently looking at the options that Brenton Tarrant left at their feet. Yet when you look at the foundation of the numbers and the realisation that this extreme video is a lost smaller than 0.000003% of all uploaded videos (and that is merely founded on one day of videos, we should realise that there is an overreaction. Is it not interesting that over the last decade when it came to taxing these tech firms their diligence was a lot less (optionally 87.5446% less) diligent. Why do you think that was?

It is time to take a hard look at what is realistic and what is not and judge some politicians for their actions. In this specific case New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern gets a pass, as this happened on her watch in her yard. She gets to take it to emotional levels, yet we will watch for how long those buttons are being pushed, that seems only fair.

 

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Media out of bounds

This time I am at a loss. I know that discrimination and racism are entities that exist, yet until last weekend I had no idea that governments would be condoning it. There is absolutely no other way to see it. There is close to 0% of the educated world that does not know that something horrific happened in New Zealand last weekend, 50 lives were lost. So for the most, the entire planet is capturing the moment for their audience, their readers, or so one would think.

There were some rumblings via Al-Jazeera initially, but I was focussed on other matters. Yet when a friend gave awareness to a front page of what might be the biggest newspaper in the Netherlands, it is time to look at the issue at hand. So this large newspaper (large in size as well) decided to use 2/3rd of a page for a photograph of a formula one racer ending in 3rd position taking a selfie. Now in fairness, it is a Dutch racer, so there is national pride at play, but for a newspaper that always has been on the front seat to blow terrorist actions out of proportions (the emotional drive) to take this step is just insane. As such a 3rd position is more important than 50 dead Muslims killed by a Christian?

Because that is the setting!

The Daily Mirror made it worse by having in one instance the stage of an ISIS Maniac (a previous event), yet in the case of New Zealand it is an Angelic boy who grew into a mass killer. The images are also staged for maximum effect. So how islamophobic has the Christian world become?

Because if this continue we are merely one step away from the stage where niggers go into the back of the bus, and will anyone react when it happens to the busses in London and the trams in Amsterdam? If this upsets you, good you should be! You need to get angry because this is just insane; to allow for two measurements, one for Christians and one for the rest? Even as a Christian I find that method of measurement revolting.

At least the Sun gave the goods and a lot more, merely on the front page. It should be offensive for the Dutch Telegraaf to be seen as inferior to the Sun, yet they pulled it off that day. I have looked at hundreds of images of newspapers, plenty in languages I cannot read (and cannot state what they say), yet nearly all papers, except the Daily mirror, all saw a monster, a madman and a terrorist, none of them saw some angelic boy reference.

There is something wrong, it has been wrong for a long time, yet this event is probably the first time that the issue gets pushed to the foreground this clearly. I have stated several times (my personal point of view) that the media facilitates to their shareholders, their stakeholders and their advertisers in that order, beyond that the audience gets served. When we take that into consideration, I wonder which individual was so set on getting the Angelic reference printed, the Catholic Church perhaps? As for the Netherlands, a nation filled with business driven needs, the idea that the front page required a 2/3 page for a photo of a driver making a selfie is equally weird. In that view, was it so weird for me to make the claim that the actions in New Zealand are seemingly just the beginning?

This view is only enhanced when we see the Financial Times giving us yesterday (at https://www.ft.com/content/13227c90-487b-11e9-bbc9-6917dce3dc62) ‘Police believe New Zealand shooter may have acted alone‘; the reports in the last 36 hours contradict this strongly. The spread of the manifest, all set to the stage mere minutes from the attack, the stage of reloading, the setting of time until capture whilst the video and stills had been uploaded to a whole range of locations. So when I see: “Security services under pressure to explain why Brenton Tarrant was not on a watch list“, I see a much bigger issue. I think they are aware that he did not act alone, they have no way to find them at present and that is the larger issue. When Mike Bush gives the Financial Times: “He also defended the police response to the mass shootings on Friday, which saw 28-year-old Brenton Tarrant target Muslims praying at the Hagley Park mosque in central Christchurch and then drive about 5km to the Linwood Mosque, where he shot more worshippers“, I will not disagree. This is not something that New Zealand was prepared for, the fact that this person went to a second place is a larger issue and when we see: “within 36 minutes we had that mobile offender in our custody“, we see the issue. He ‘wanted’ to get captured (massive speculation on my side), more importantly in that time frame he could not have done the digital part. It shows that he was not alone in this; there was a support system in place. Another source gave us that this had been planned for two years. That might hold a truth, but the entire setting with the Bangladesh Cricket team a mere 50 meters away gives rise to slightly bad timing, this means orchestration. It is massively unlikely he had all those parts available. In this the politicians are making matters worse. This is seen with: “Technology platforms, including Facebook Twitter and YouTube, are also facing growing criticism from politicians over their failure to prevent the gunman live streaming the shootings on the internet and subsequently allowing the sharing of the video“. This is seen with the Twitch statistics that report “As of May 2018 there are 2.2 million broadcasters monthly“, that comes down to 72,330 streamers every day, there is no technology that will monitor it; there is no AI that could intervene. That solemn common sense moment makes the involved politician part of the problem, not part of the solution. Consider that out of all 0.000138% uploads one is optionally an extremist (this implies one extremist every day), so the number ends up being 0.000003% is optionally too dangerous. We cannot get politicians to put in the effort of keeping up a decent information system that is 75%-80% efficient and they demand 99.999997% efficiency from technology platforms? Politicians have become that delusional. And in addition, there is no way to get them all aboard, making it an exercise in technology discrimination, so in light of what the newspapers get away with, we see no validation on these politicians being loud to get some limelight.

The ‘evidence’ that he did not act alone is seen with “She also revealed that the gunman emailed a copy of a manifesto, which outlined his extreme right-wing, white supremacist views, to her office nine minutes before the attack began. She said it did not include a location or specific details that might have enabled authorities to respond faster. The manifesto was also sent to media groups“, the flaws and other parts showed that his agenda was not some clockwork orange, and the expression fits. When you consider “something bizarre internally, but appearing natural and normal on the surface” we see the larger failure. His actions, his manifesto and his preparations, bizarre on several settings, yet he raised no flags. This is not an attack on the intelligence groups (not this time anyway), yet to do all this, to not raise flags, that requires training and coaching. Even if he was super paranoid, the weapons and ammunition required would need all kinds of assistance (optionally from the criminal elements), but when someone buys all this hardware and ammunition, there is a trail, there are other paths that would have raised a flag or two, yet apparently he had none, this can only be done if others did part of that; an IT ‘friend’ setting up the accounts, the scripts and the stage of forwarding all the images and streams to multiple locations. Was the setting of the Cricket day predetermined? That might have been very likely, yet to know where they would all go for the religious service, how did he get that information? Too many elements cannot be answered with ‘lucky’. My point of view becomes a lot more acceptable when we see: “In the first 24 hours we removed 1.5m videos of the attack globally, of which over 1.2m were blocked at upload” and that was only Facebook, so they blocked less than half at upload, yet the amount of uploads and sharing gives rise to a much larger issue and even as we accept that many are not from extremists, merely from people forwarding what they saw, this was ONE channel. 4Chan, 8Chan, YouTube, Twitch, Twitter links, the list goes on and all can link to one another. This was more than being prepared; Brenton Tarrant had either direct support or a support system at his disposal. They are not the same yet at present the police and the Intelligence community cannot answer which is which. In that same light, I am not entirely sure if tightening gun laws will solve anything. It is so easy to look at guns and their laws, yet the oldest rule applies. Guns do not kill people, people kill people.

In this we must admit that PM Jacinda Ardern has a close to impossible task at present, not merely because of how rare gun violence is in New Zealand, it is the response that some of the media is giving. From my personal point of view some are facilitating to anti-Muslim events. I see the Dutch Telegraaf and the UK Daily Mirror as direct evidence of this. If there was a united front the news would have reported it as such, yet as one twitch was not stopped and 100% more in news coverage was able to give a presented minimised violence footprint, we can say that the technology platforms are a lesser concern than the media is currently showing to be.

It is in that same view that I oppose: “Terrorism experts said the Christchurch attacks showed there was a need for police to focus more on far-right extremism“, I oppose it because the statement is against one successful attack. The issue is not the person; most extreme right people tend to be dumb as fuck (a mere casual observation on American far right wing elements). The elements that made this a success is more important, the timeline, the hardware and the software shows that Brenton could not have done this alone, even if he did do most executions alone, someone taught him to remain under the radar; especially when it comes to the weapons, the ammunition, the IT requirements, the streaming and editing. He would have been on someone’s radar, the fact that he was not makes it a larger issue, not merely some extreme right issue. I can to some extent agree with Jose Sousa-Santos, director of the Strategika Group when I see “there may exist within the security and intelligence community an institutional culture in which Muslim, indigenous and activist individuals and groups are perceived to be the greater threat to national security than right-wing extremism“, yet that does not deter from the fact that Brenton should have been flagged at least once, the fact he was not gives rise to the larger concern of support towards his actions.

So in the end The Financial Times got a lot right, yet the title will remain under debate making it a much larger issue for Mike Bush and Rebecca Kitteridge for the foreseeable future.

 

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Darkness in Kiwiland

The end is nigh was my first thought. The one nation that has more sheep than people, the one nation where a mutant sheep would be the most dangerous creature to behold on either island now got their hands filled with terrorism, not any kind of terrorism mind you. In this case we see: “Forty-nine people have been confirmed dead after shootings at two mosques in the New Zealand city of Christchurch“, in addition we get “Christchurch hospital is treating 48 people, including young children“. So far we know that the victims are citizens form Pakistan, Turkey, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Malaysia and Saudi Arabia. Four were arrested, one is likely to be innocent, the three others are not, arrested with guns, and one has been positively identified. One of them is not merely a terrorist; he is an Australian making matters worse (for Australians that is). The Guardian (at https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/mar/15/new-zealand-shooting-what-we-know-so-far) gives us: “A man identifying himself as Brenton Tarrant, a 28-year-old born in Australia, posted online before the attack saying he was a suspect. He posted various images of what appear to be machine gun magazines and a link to what is being described as a manifesto for his actions.” It is not the end, merely the beginning. The Sun (at https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/8649326/east-london-mosque-attack-new-zealand-shooting/) gave us only three hours ago: ‘MOSQUE ATTACK London mosque attack – ‘Racist thug’ calls Muslim worshippers ‘terrorists’ in hammer attack hours after New Zealand shooting‘.

This is a growing concern. My personal view is simple, if I have no issue ending the lives of Hamas and Hezbollah terrorists, I will apply the same filter to Christian terrorists and white supremacists. In my personal book they are all equally unworthy. Yet I also look beyond and I was not alone in that. It is seen in the New York Times who gives us ‘The New Zealand Massacre Was Made to Go Viral‘, which is an opinion piece by Charlie Warzel. He (and others) give us: “The act of mass terror was broadcast live for the world to watch on social media” and more important he gives us: “A 17-minute video of a portion of the attack, which leapt across the internet faster than social media censors could remove it, is one of the most disturbing, high-definition records of a mass casualty attack of the digital age — a grotesque first-person-shooter-like documentation of man’s capacity for inhumanity“, as well as “what makes this atrocity “an extraordinary and unprecedented act of violence,” as Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern described it, is the methodical nature with which it was conducted and how it was engineered for maximum virality“.

There are two sides to that. Nothing is that well engineered off the bat. It implies that this was not merely staged; this was long contemplated on how to execute the event for maximum footage; to give rise to that I need to take you to the setting of a movie to illustrate the issue. The movie Russian Ark used 2000 actors, was shot in 32 locations in one place (the Hermitage), all were rehearsed; all were on queue including three complete orchestra’s. Yet the big element is missing, the entire 97 minute movie was done IN ONE TAKE. A titanic, almost impossible feat was shown by Alexander Sokurov. It was a stage that took months of preparations to get it all in one take. Now we go back to New Zealand. As we are exposed to ‘the methodical nature with which it was conducted and how it was engineered for maximum virality‘, some might consider the part behind this. That person was not alone in the planning; he had help and a decent amount of it. Apart from the shooting which most people can do in a video game, the setting of the locations, the actions taken as well as the stage of filming and making it stream live. All elements that one person needs to plan for, we should consider what was done ‘behind the screens’. If you ever get into a situation like that your body will be so pumped with adrenaline, the acts we see with “In minutes, the video was downloaded and mirrored onto additional platforms where it ricocheted around the globe. Screen shots were created from still frames of bodies and uploaded to sites like Reddit, 4chan and Twitter where they were shared and reshared“. The perpetrator could not have done this to that degree, as I said earlier; he had support and a decent amount of it.

We see part of that in Forbes through Thomas Brewster (at https://www.forbes.com/sites/thomasbrewster/2019/03/15/after-the-new-zealand-terror-attack-should-8chan-be-wiped-from-the-web/#5c2239e36263). Here we see: “Social media channels later struggled to remove copies of that stream, while his 74-page “manifesto” also spread from 8chan across the likes of Facebook and Twitter. Long known as a haven for extremist, right-wing thought, and a wilder version of the already unruly 4Chan, the 8chan forum has courted controversy in the past. In 2015, for instance, users of the fringe site started a campaign to boycott Star Wars because it had black and female leads. In the same year, child pornography appeared on 8chan, leading Google to delist it. Channels that appear to advertise child-abuse material remain live on the site today.”

Most people who want to get viral know of the machines available to them, some employ them for marketing and other options, yet what I see here is that this was an attack that had been thought through, I might go as far as speculating that he never expected to get away with it, as long as it hit the internet. That is seen when we look at the CNN quote: “there were just 36 minutes from the time police received the call about shots fired until they had the offender in custody“, I would contemplate that no police force in the world is that effective, but the readers might misinterpret that, and this is not about making some cheap jab at the police.

Part of my thought is seen to some extent in the Guardian (at https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/mar/15/i-couldnt-save-my-friend-carnage-leaves-christchurch-stunned).

It is the step list.

  1. Gunman parks in alleyway.
  2. He walks into the mosque through the front door then moves from room to room firing.
  3. Gunman leaves at least once to rearm.
  4. Gunman shoots people in the street, before driving off.

He rearms? I have walked around (in my far military past mind you) holding 4 FN FAL clips, each having 30 bullets giving me a 100+ kill option, and this guy rearms?

The final giveaway is: “the suspect said he had chosen New Zealand because of its location, to show that even the most remote parts of the world were not free of “mass immigration”.”

Something is not on the right rails, the man is guilty, there is no doubt about it, but all I see is ‘patsy’ (a murdering patsy mind you) he was used to start something. Even as the Guardian gives part of the Manifesto, as well as giving us “Tarrant describes himself as a “regular white man from a regular family” who “decided to take a stand to ensure a future for my people”. He said he wanted his attack on the mosques to send a message that “nowhere in the world is safe”“, as well as “The document says his parents are of “Scottish, Irish and English stock” and that he was born into a “working class, low-income family”. When he was young, he was “a communist, then an anarchist and finally a libertarian before coming to be an eco-fascist”, he says“. I disagree, someone like that seeking the limelight to this degree is not regular, now it does not mean that regular people do not seek the limelight, they tend to not kill 49 people to get there, and in all this even his political path is up for debate.

To go from a person who is part of a system of social organization in which all property is owned by the community and each person contributes and receives according to their ability and needs (by not killing people), so he moves towards the anti-authoritarian political stage that advocates self-governed societies (a view by self-governing people not inclined to kill others) and then he apparently becomes a libertarian seeking maximised freedom and autonomy, emphasizing freedom of choice, voluntary association and individual judgment again by not seeking violence. So basically he was rejected by all and became as he puts it an eco-fascist. That group will take any member as no one wants to be a member of that group in the first place. I don’t believe he has any significant level of intelligence. This all reads like a stage put in motion, the attack in London might link to it; it might merely be a coincidence of a few drunks being angry hearing about the New Zealand attack. I do however believe that the entire New Zealand event is giving rise that this might be larger and there are other players behind that event. The element that he was arrested in under 40 minutes, as well as the stage of “Screen shots were created from still frames of bodies and uploaded to sites like Reddit, 4chan and Twitter where they were shared and reshared“. Consider that 17 minutes needed to get downloaded to a device for uploading passed through for the screenshots, those and the movie needed to be uploaded, the timeframe does not match, he had support! The cyber specialists will have to look at the digital evidence on how fast and how evasive it was all done, more important there is every indication that there is a mirror to the dark web, implying now that this will resurface soon enough. In the next 15 hours the entire world will have woken up to the events in New Zealand and billions will be aware, after that I feel certain that the materials will surface again. It does not need to rely on Twitter, Facebook or YouTube, there will be other pastures sowing the fields of discord with the video and images. The small matter of the Cricket match, and the fact that the New Zealand and Bangladesh test would have been on in Christchurch gives rise to that thought too. It might be mere coincidence that the Bangladesh team was in that mosque, the luck might have been that he missed that group by mere minutes; the event could have been a lot worse if these players would have become victims as well. The BBC quote: “Bangladesh cricketers were “minutes” from being inside a mosque in which a fatal mass shooting in New Zealand took place, says team manager Khaled Mashud. Players and coaching staff were “50 yards” from the Al Noor mosque in Christchurch, when the shooting began” makes me think that this is larger than we can see at present. This was more than an attack; it was a planned strategy of slaughter and all the elements that I see is that a person like Brenton Tarrant lacks a massive amount of brain cells to do all this to the degree we are seeing at present, item three on that event list gives additional rise to my doubts.

I would want to state that Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Commissioner Mike Bush have a problem, yet I am not entirely convinced that this is merely a New Zealand problem. There is no way to tell, but I reckon in a few days the cyber dudes (as well as cyber dudettes) will have a better timeline and a better comprehension on what methods, what software and hardware was used to get this all maximised, it might reveal more over time, but we will have to wait for evidence on that. part of that is also seen when we contemplate ‘The suspects were unknown to the police‘, the planning part and the fact that no red flags were ever raised makes me think that there are more players involved, the viral part of the attack is partial evidence. I reckon that more evidence will come to light soon enough proving my point.

 

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Shrine of the Tooth Fairy

It has been almost three months since I wrote ‘One to the hospital, one to the morgue‘ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2018/12/17/one-to-the-hospital-one-to-the-morgue/), it was all about Interserve and new we see that not only did I see matters correctly. One of my finest diplomatic moments was seen with: “we see the mention of “limiting the cost issue by 1.8%, whilst adding debt reduction by 5% in two years’ time is exactly the message in a stage how we should read it, A Joke!”, oh and that is all whilst in those 7 months £300 million was added to the debt, is anyone waking up yet?“. The Guardian gives us less than 5 hours ago (at https://www.theguardian.com/business/2019/mar/14/interserve-shareholders-vote-restructuring-plan-emergency-meeting) ‘Interserve could enter administration as it fights for restructuring‘, we see that options are considered at the shareholders meeting on Friday, that whilst the actions see now could have been done three months ago. Inaction comes at a price but not for the decision makers who got paid for every day of inaction, and a lot more than the sum of most incomes of those about to lose a job (OK that was an exaggeration). And when we see: “their verdict at an emergency meeting on Friday on a proposal put forward by banks and hedge funds, which have offered to forego £485m of the company’s £631m debt in return for most of its equity, leaving existing investors with just 5% of the shares” I am actually more worried, not less. In the first what happens to the outstanding £146 million of debt? That remains apart from a loss of 95% on the shares for the ‘investors’. We should acknowledge “The US hedge fund Coltrane, the largest shareholder with a stake of nearly 28%, has been holding out for a better offer and may command enough support to derail the plan.” Yet when I also consider ‘on a proposal put forward by banks and hedge funds‘, we need to consider that Coltrane already put a safety net in place, they have not been sitting still for three months. That safety net is shown at the very end of the article with: “The US hedge fund is understood to have indicated that it would be happy to allow the company to go into administration and would seek to negotiate with EY to cherry-pick parts of the business to buy“, a non-solution for Coltrane will be a stage where they get all the cream of the herd and owning 28% of that non loss driving mess, we cannot really blame them can we?

In the article one other part stood out. When we see: “maintaining military bases in the Falklands” I wonder whether this is part of a much larger military contract, and if not, what were they thinking? I am not against military contracts, far from that, but to add one in the middle of nowhere, where their only lifeline are charters from Santiago Chili, as well as a military flights twice a week from Brize Norton (apart from some cruise boats every now and then). When you consider that the closest land is 800 Km away, and the flight from Santiago is 2200 Km, which equate to a flight from London to Libya, we see that this one project alone requires us to look into the depth of decision making. It connects to the larger whole. If we consider that the military contracts were lucrative, isolating them and making them a foundation would have made perfect sense. the fact that the military contract(s) are up for grab in an age when we see all the noise on Huawei and non-proven dangers, all while Interserve is screwing over military security through their decision cloud of non-clarity gives rise to a lot more questions on a several fronts, don’t you think?

And the fun does not end; when we see another source giving us both ‘Interserve calls for ‘positive thoughts’ ahead of crunch vote‘, as well as ‘Employees urged to use social media to say contractor is a ‘great place to work’‘‘, we see another path that is ignored. The source was the Financial Times (at https://www.ft.com/content/0be957a6-4663-11e9-a965-23d669740bfb), yet the missing part is that the board of Interserve put themselves too thin on the board whilst there were plenty of indications that they were risking too much. Like players in three card poker, betting too much, too often and not having the money to cover the bets. Unless you are the house with all the capital you cannot win that equation. Winning the lottery has better odds at that point. So when we see: “The power point presentation — seen by the Financial Times — suggests that employees share on Facebook or tweet “what a great place Interserve is to work and why,” or how we “continue to win bids and contracts and deliver an excellent service to our customers”” I see a different version. I see the board all paying at the shrine of the tooth fairy for pain relief 297 seconds before the root canal starts and the surgeon is all out of Triazolam. Optional the dentist has Flunitrazepam (read: Rohypnol), yet the patient could end up getting screwed in the process and live with a gap in their memory on whether it happened or not. It sounds harsh, but that is the setting.

The matter gets clear when we consider the quote in the FT: ““Value is being lost every day in Interserve,” said one person close to the board. “If we go through a pre-pack there is more noise around the business and it could take months for suppliers to understand.”“. A part I already clearly saw three months ago. There was no other path there. the view was clear (to me at least) when you looked into the projects that have been up for media presentation, whilst the bulk of all other matters would have been above 0, that would have been the strength of negotiation for Interserve, but it was not to be. Even as the government was steady and willing to award more projects, there should have been a clear path showing the last 12 projects and the gains made in those projects. It was not done, was it? On December 17th the Financial Times made a similar observation (at https://www.ft.com/content/a15ed306-ffaf-11e8-aebf-99e208d3e521), yet there they employed that awkward concept called diplomacy. They gave us: ““The government refused to bail out the company despite the number of contracts involved,” said Tom Sasse, senior researcher at the Institute of Government. “This exploded the idea that the government would always bail out the sector.” Austerity, initially the sector’s friend, has also been its undoing“, I personally believe that part of the board of Interserve were still in the delusional stage that ‘too big to fail‘ could optionally apply to them. The finicky part where the UK government is close to two trillion in debt (£1,900,000,000,000) seems to have been forgotten by everyone. It limits actions for all involved, and next to that the business model of Interserve was less supportive than a soaked tea towel, so go figure!

Next to that we also see: “Some contractors — such as Interserve — had been drawn into services through private finance initiative projects, which packaged up the construction with the service delivery” and that is where the Falklands come back into the limelight, the model of services without construction is a very different part in all that and only if there are long term settings in place, the Falklands does not fit that bill. Now, I can understand perfectly that Defence stated: ‘You can do that, if you also do this!‘ It makes perfect sense, yet that is not really shown in the larger picture and if the other projects are below zero whilst the service elements are still part of the costing, we see a shifted picture, implying that they are hiding behind the ‘recycling’ part, yet the overall image was not as rosy, it was flawed on a much larger scale. This is how I personally see it, and so far my view has been shown to be correct. So if the nightmare continues Coltrane gets all the cream (or the bulk of it) and they can continue, the rest is screwed in a massive way and there will be no Rohypnol available when the tooth fairy comes by stating: ‘Wide open please!‘

The news does not end there

Just hours ago, the Financial Times gives us (at https://www.ft.com/content/79f20d9a-463d-11e9-a965-23d669740bfb) ‘UK outsourcer Capita posts big fall in profits‘. It is not nearly a sign of the times, it is crunch time, and the service required from certain parties can no longer be afforded. So when we see: “outsourcer faced a decline in work from local authorities, underscoring the challenge of overhauling the business“, that was never ever a secret, the cash is close to gone. Other solutions need to be sought out and that was a given before Brexit started. Brexit will allow the UK to get back up stronger, but it will be after a nasty negative wave, there was never any doubt on that. I informed my readers of that clear danger for years. So this is not news, I never gave consideration to the impact on outsourcers (not my call of duty), but those who work in that field should clearly have been equally aware, that part can be proven without the shadow of a doubt. In all this, from my personal point of view, when we see a 5% drop in revenue, whilst we also get “pre-tax profits fell 26 per cent to £282.1m last year“, we see a more dangerous path in that. It means that the setting of service versus construction (or better the stage of basic profit) has not been correctly set by these players and it merely shows the dangerous path that Interserve has been on for the longest of times. This could have been clearly predicted on a few data mining pathways.

I am now making a speculative view on a speculative stage based on a data stage that might not even exist. I will pose questions to the data board of Interserve:

  1. Show all projects that yielded above £2 million profit
  2. Link to these all directly linked service projects
  3. Link to that all indirectly linked service projects.
  4. Now show final profits for these data trees.
  5. Add to this the elements staff required and cost of staff
  6. Set a separate tree for the Falklands with items 1 through 3, show that final financial result with staff cost continued over time.
  7. Show the other projects with cost, staff cost and total negative profit.

These seven questions will reveal a nightmare tree, the one Bonsai tree that will break your neck when you fall from it. That is the setting we need to have been mindful of. That is optionally the stage that could show the failing of Interserve and other outsources to a much larger degree; the overall mention of so much more revenue, whilst the entire profit part is back benched for too much and for far too long.

The issue of Interserve et al and their stage of what constitutes ‘sound business’ whilst the dangers of what is around the next corner is ignored by way too many shows a multitude of failures and the inaction from too many people gives rise to other levels of dangers that should not have been ignored, although at that time we cannot fault Interserve et al for ignoring those dangers to some degree, yet with the dangers already on their table ignoring them was not a good idea to maintain, or even a great notion to begin with, not with the livelihood of well over 45,000 people at stake.

 

 

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The assassin’s methodology

In the intelligence world methodology matters, it is actually a game maker in that setting. We seem to think that some parts were fabrication, we seem to hide behind the slogan ‘If it looks like Hollywood, it is fake‘, yet that premise is not quite accurate. In the 90’s there was a time where the Wetwork business had a massive shortage of recruits and volunteers. That all changed when someone decided to park a 747 in a building in New York, but before that there was a shortage. Those people worked all over Europe, usually in construction, often well-educated with a focus to be placed all over the EMEA region. They were often called Technical Account Managers (or Technical Consultants). Often not linked to a company, self-employed short term hires that got in did what needed to be done and left. It is that era where the strategic sense of segregation, isolation, assassination comes from.

To make another leap, some might remember the Austrian raid on its own intelligence service in 2018, if it was only that simple. When Reuters gave somewhere in May 2018 “That led some allied countries to fear that intelligence they had given to Austria might have been compromised“, if it was only that simple, the raid was 24 years late. The independent had part of it in 1994. It took me a while to find it, yet (at https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/russian-mafia-summit-in-austria-1425805.html) we merely see: “Russia’s crime bosses held an unusual mob summit in Austria last month to discuss gambling, contract killings and other shady business back home, AP reports. The daily newspaper Izvestia reported that ‘Participants (also) enjoyed an extensive cultural programme. They even went skiing in the Alps.’“, there were two additional participants, two elements that would be speaking to a few only; they were one senior plus one additional representative from the FSB. It was not what they did and where they went, those bosses got a clear message where not to go and who not to bother. They already had a spread system in place, from Katendrecht (Rotterdam harbour district) to Antwerp and Monchengladbach Germany, they had channels in place and they were making a bundle (read: serious amounts of cash). So for these Wetwork TAM’s to stay under the radar was quite the challenge over there. The Russians were almost everywhere. Yet it changed, somehow in 1997/1998 the Germans got the upper hand in Germany and cleaned the place up by a lot. Some of the Russians went underground, some merely changed positions; there was an impact. One of these moments was seen in the Dutch newspapers (at https://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/1997/07/29/man-ontvluchtte-moskou-politie-voert-onderzoek-uit-7362317-a714933), the case is larger than shown. What was not widely known was that there was some kind of an agreement between the FSB (read: former KGB people) and the Russian mafia itself. Germany got a handle on it somehow and even as the ‘evidence’ was staring them in the face, it was ignored. The firm Lorit was quite literally Tirol (his Moscow office) backwards. The newspapers at that point mentioned “Rozenbaoum kocht het huis in 1993 voor acht ton. Op het dak staan twee satellietantennes. Daarmee hield hij contact met zijn vrachtwagenchauffeurs die door Europa reden” which translates to: “Rozenbaoum bought the house in 1993 for 800K. There are two satellite antennas on the roof. He kept in touch with his truck drivers who drove through Europe“, it was 60Km from the German border and 92Km from the German base monitoring a lot of traffic. A lot more was going on, even then and as some issues were buried into miscommunication and a considerable amount of cases linked to the response: ‘I am unable to recall the precise details of those events‘, there were several indirect links to Austria, yet those were seemingly never proven.

How does this relate to today?

This relates to an article in ‘The Hill’ (at https://thehill.com/policy/technology/433497-trump-admin-threatens-to-withhold-intelligence-from-germany-unless-it-drops) 4 hours ago when we were introduced to: ‘Trump admin threatens to withhold intelligence from Germany unless it drops Huawei‘, so not only is the Trump Administration dumb and ignorant. not only have they not ever found, or produced any evidence that Huawei equipment was an actual security danger (not since 2012 have they given anything). They are now ready to alienate the one nation in Europe that had success against Russian operatives as well as against Russian organised crime (often linked to FSB priorities) and we are introduced to “The Wall Street Journal obtained a letter dated Friday from U.S. Ambassador Richard Grenell to Germany’s economics minister saying that intelligence sharing would be limited if Huawei or other Chinese vendors are allowed to participate in building Germany’s 5G network“, so in that one place where the CIA has been useless for the longest of times (an exaggeration, read: a little too often), they are now biting the hand that has been feeding THEM intelligence. So when I presented: ‘segregation, isolation, assassination‘, I did so for a reason, I have never seen a target do this to their own survival chances, which is a novel experience to read. Even as the Germans offer: “Germany says it has seen no evidence that Huawei had or could use its equipment to spy on its users and that it should be allowed to bid for the country’s 5G network if it meets security criteria“, we see clear evidence of the Americans remaining utterly stupid. If only they had adopted the speech Alex Younger (MI-6) had. We can argue against that, but the premise was at least sound, the Americans did not even bother with that part, they have not bothered with that part of the equation since 2012. This is what I would call the result of taking intelligence out of ‘intelligence services‘, it merely becomes a speaking stage of services to whoever is a competitor of Huawei (they must be a non-Chinese or Russian player though).

We have seen several actual experts on 5G voice the issue that leaving out Huawei will delay true 5G for years that is what is in play and the Americans need to wise up fast. This seemingly implies that America has additional losses to register, not only in technology, not only in cloud issues, the German intelligence data that is a lot more important than anyone gives it credit to is likely to stop flowing to the US and to other players, which is not a good turn of events. In addition, the collected information on lone wolves, intelligence France needs might end up in a holding pattern if wrong pressure is applied. If quality intelligence equates to time, what else will France (or the Dutch) lose out on? There is no way to tell, I cannot even speculate on that. The issue will however become a lot more clear if both nations will have to deal with successful actions by extremist groups, as well as lost revenue by certain ‘entrepreneurial Russian entities’, something that was always going to happen, but perhaps not to the degree these places might see in 2019-2020.

So whilst we give consideration of ‘U.S. officials are increasingly sounding the alarm over the potential for Chinese spying‘, all whilst Facebook is giving away the data for free, we see a loaded cannon and the US is aiming it at their own needs. The US has had almost 7 years to collect evidence and present this, it was never done. In addition some of the true top ranking experts in that field have not been able to present any evidence, and finally, the US credibility is just too low. Perhaps some remember US Secretary of State Colin Powell and his silver briefcase giving evidence behind closed doors on the evidence of WMD’s in Iraq. How did that end? Does anyone remember? So when it is merely ‘adaptable’ telecom equipment, they better show the goods. The Americans has thus far not done that and the utter complacency of US tech corporations have become a joke to say the least. In this age of re-engineering, to end up 3 years behind China requires a truly new level of stupidity (read: short coming) and it is time for the people to realise that. Once the evidence comes out that there is no evidence, make sure that people making bold statements (like former Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull) get their honours stripped, they facilitated directly against the needs of the Australian people and that should come at a price. Of course the US could clearly present the evidence and get that same former Prime Minister off the hook mind you.

I see merely cogs that are greased through nepotism, facilitation and the need for greed by some tech companies who could not get their ducks in a row in time. We really need to put the spotlights on those people too. In the end methodology is a simple approach, it goes from evidence, what we know, where someone will be, where something will appear and we act on that. The US fictive side in all this tends to go via the cloud solution called ‘delusion’ it has no grasp of evidence, it has no stage of reality and is merely the stage for people on what they desire whilst the do not have what the consumer needed in the first place, how was that ever an acceptable pasture to place your herd of needs?

 

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