Tag Archives: Julius Caesar

February 19, 2022 · 18:14

Direction of education

I have been contemplating a separate direction of optional IP. You see, the studios are all focusing on the ‘next big thing’, to seemingly achieve that they tend to go towards the big successes and hope that they have one more slug to deliver. This is not a bad plan, but there is an equal danger on that larger stage not meeting expectations. This is not some curse, it comes from expressions like ‘it rains on the just and unjust alike’, ‘dress for success’, and that list goes on. Yet when we look back, what did Star Trek look back on? What inspired ‘Dallas’, ‘MASH’ and several others? Then I remembered something, something I saw 45 years ago and it still comes up in my mind every now and then. It was a series called ‘Once Upon a time’ and it ran for a long time. It was originally called “Il était une fois…”, a French educational program created by Procidis.

It is time to dig into such a corner (not that corner). You see, we forget that those who inherit the world might not vote, but they are a powerful group and the big wigs seem to forget that THEY too were young once. Consider Marcus Aurelius, the fifth of the good emperors. He died in 180 AD, he was also a philosopher who wrote Meditations, a source for his own guidance and self-improvement. Some still call it a literary monument to a government of service and duty. I was taken aback when I read [6] “to disbelieve the professions of sorcerers and imposters about incantations and exorcism and the like” written by a person who died 1600 years before BS Puritans decided to burn 14 women at the stake in Massachusetts Bay for witchcraft (Salem). All whilst these puritans optionally were afraid of women who merely needed a good fuck (optional speculation). In the end 19 people and two dogs were burned, 1600 years an Italian told them the truth of the matter, and it is time that historic figures more in a life like setting are the stuff of inspiring on TV and not cartoon like. I have nothing against cartoons, yet it is time for the next generation learn on how inspiring, innovative and generation crossing these greeks and Italians were. Some of the Italian practices are still in use 2000 years later. Julius Caesar started encryption by coding his messages. Aurelius wrote a guide that still inspires today. And that is before we consider Homer, Aristotle and a few others. History needs to teach and the classrooms aren’t getting it done, so it is time to give them a hand and the streamers are always looking for new IP, but they seemingly forgot to what the past achieved and what could be possible. Everyone wants another Game of thrones, yet those under 14 needs to be prepared for the future and a good grasp of history is the way to go. If I can create a way to create a concept of burning down a nuclear reactor using an invention from 1900 by Mr Perzy I, what could the next generation achieve when they get a good grasp of Homer, Pythagoras, Gauss and Hilbert, how good could this world end up being? There are of course no guarantees, but considering that the Pentagon cannot be relied on to properly vet translations, people elect a person as president who seemingly is proud on ‘I grabbed her by the pussy’, we seem to ignore basic knowledge and it goes beyond mathematics, or basic philosophy. As I personally see it the media (TV) has forgotten to educate, it is all about the wow, the numbers and the profit and there is every chance at least one generation is coming up short, and we get that it is not all fun and all Game of Thrones, but we need to do more, or streamers should do more to offer a wide interesting scope of educational programs. We could rely on the Squid games to control the population but is that the way big wigs want to go at present? They need numbers for circulation, for ratings and when you decrease the population by X, those numbers would never be reached. Now an argument could be made that certain ratings are easier met when you only have 78% of the population to work with but that requires math, does it not? 

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January 23, 2022 · 18:07

As I slice and dice

Yes, if you are a Microsoft lover and you thought the previous article named ‘In the beginning’ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2022/01/21/in-the-beginning/) was all there is you are in bad luck. I needed time to get the next part in chime. You see, the antagonists are important, but so it the way we deal with them. Weapons matter (in all kinds of occasions) as such I wanted a new setting, not some Diablo copy and it helps setting up the gaming IP, the more unique an IP is, the easier it is to get a nice exclusive IP for Amazon and Sony. 

So in this setting I wanted a whole new direction. A direction that we seemingly forgot about. In the first setting we start with a dagger. The dagger can be imbued (needs to be) to be a more efficient weapon against a major demon class, and as we upgrade it from level one all the way to level 4, the weapon will get a whole lot more powerful. Yet there are also gradients here. I wanted to set the first level to 5 demons, so 5 demons will have to shed something, or we cut it out of them and in level 2 we need more, there is an idea to get 5-25-30-55. I also wanted to reward tenacity, so if you go in one stretch, the cost would be a little higher, but you can go from 5 in level one to 35 to level 4 and skip levels 2 and 3. It is but a simple thought and it ups the gameplay too. 

You make money by selling items and I wanted to avoid to a larger degree chests (not completely), so the kills will give you items that you can sell and in that premise the alchemists will be more important. So this is the first demon class. What about the second demon class?

In this I thought that upgrading a level 4 dagger to a level 0 Dirk might be an idea. 

As such we get the balance of Dagger – Dirk – Short-sword, and after that we need a second weapon. 

I am still considering versions of a morning star, a roman Pilum and a few other weapons, yet in the end, you will have 2-3 weapons, so there are two parts, you need two weapons and you need to think strategically, which Diablo took from the equation (it never really had any clear strategy). As such we have a new environment, we have different enemies and we have the need for different skills. I personally believed that support skills were where it was at. Healing, tracking and vision skills are the path to nice powers that aid in the challenge to finish the game. More important, as each level (area) is better cleared, the towns will open up more stores and more options. 

There is a secondary need to set the stage in a few more ways, in one part as I hate linearity, in the second part if we have more challenges the game would end up getting a much wider acceptance. I want to create a game that honours Diablo, not copy it. Diablo was a game I loved forever ever since the first one came out in 1997, there was Diablo 2 and Diablo 3 broke the mould, so I want to honour it, not copy it. We honour what we love, and I am merely making sure that Microsoft learns the hard way what a total of 68,000,000,000 can cost them. Especially when independent designers use my ideas for free mind you, and only when it is for Sony and Amazon Luna releases. Even if little old me can make sure that Microsoft realise that there is a larger station outside Microsoft, it would have been worth it. Like I stated in the previous article, Microsoft can only win if there is a dartboard and I fail to hit 180 points 470 times, only then would they optionally win, and I have a few more ideas coming. So take notice of this new approach to weapons and I will also give an alternative consideration to armour. In the first there is the idea that leather and pelts make for much stronger protection, in the second I would want to set the stage that imbued metal in the armour would hurt them, but that comes at a price as it would only protect against one major class and two minor classes attached to the major class (see previous article), you see we cannot make it too easy and as you might want to get all protective at the first class, the larger station is that you can never protect against all (a military certainty discussed by Julius Caesar at length). And we must respect the classics, should we not?

So here is the idea of weapons and a little about armour. I will try to come back soon and give you the larger setting of the environment and how levels are set, you can figure out how to program it, I will not do all your work, but the ideas might help set the station, so good Luck and may the one using this find and gain great fortune (and piss of Microsoft in the process).

Enjoy the day!

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April 5, 2021 · 17:30

The stage is the play

Famous words given to us by William Shakespeare, but are they actually true? I am not debating the insight or wisdom in this, but in a stage with Alien life, how far does it apply?

I have been working on Keno Diastima again and a few things were bothering me, well bothering is not really the right word, or the right sentiment. The stage became debatable, or perhaps shallow was the better definition. I needed a larger stage and the stage became the play. SO I decided to look back at some of the earliest original writings. There was Sun Tsu (the art of war) at 490 BC and the two works by Julius Caesar at 60BC, they are important because there was pretty much nothing of that calibre before that in their fields and their dome of influence. For me I focussed on Bellum Gallicum and on Bellum Civile. I wanted to avoid an intersection of ‘oriental thinking’. They are original as they were all ahead of their time and they set a stage that is still used today, the works were that good. It was an important stage because in any alien encounter we need to know where THEY are at and it is not some kind of wisdom puzzle, when we get visitors from the Sombrero galaxy it is not for mere tea and crumpets, there is a larger stage and that is what I needed to focus on.

I will not divulge too much, or set the stage too open, because it might still be a work of art to some stage (book, movie, TV series, etc), as such I cannot reveal my entire hand, but consider the use of Caesar, the fact that he wrote the two books in an age where writings were utterly rare and the idea that he was heading the battle in Thessalia, in a stage where the cavalry of Pompeii vastly outnumbered the one Julius Caesar had, all whilst the infantries were close to equally matched, still Pompeii missed out and lost that decisive battle, numbers matter, especially in a stage where two generals are grounded experienced veterans, in a stage when communication between parties was set in hours, not minutes or seconds. That part matters too, even as we look at our not so smart phones and forget that part altogether. 

My mind remained in brooding mode and I was starting to think things through, I was aware of the reasoning of the other side (trust me, you do not want to go there), but how and why are we reacting? Is it wishful thinking that they like tea and crumpets? It is not completely unrelated though, especially when you consider the building that once was in a place now known as Islam Abad (Iran) I think, if the right satellite looks in a proper way, they would see something that is odd, the evidence should still be there, even now 5500 years later, the evidence is still there, and I am covering that in something else, but that I keep under wraps for now, when I realised what I had found, when my mind perceived a stage that is almost undeniable I started to work on one part and in the back of my mind, my brain started to work on Keno Diastima, even the Greek part has meaning in ways that boggles the mind (well, at least to some degree). 

So as we consider the stage, the stage we are shown, what happens when it all goes topsy turvy? What happens when we become (have been for a long time) our own worst enemy, how will others react? How can we see the failings of us when we ignore what was in front of us the entire time? That is the stage I am digging through, because in all that mud a few nuggets can be found and I want to find them, they need not be there, but the mind can create them and as they are close enough to some presumptive truth, I am on the right track to create actual nuggets, not chicken, or pyrite, but golden nuggets, hoping that I can turn them to platinum bars (complete with a coca cola on the rocks), I an not driving a vehicle, as such I can have my coke on the rocks, so there!

Yet in the back of the mind, the two stations are more and more complete and soon there is a line between us and the Sombrero galaxy. Bioware, eat your heart out! What was once written can be written again in different ways, so as we see “The greatest enemy will hide in the last place you would ever look”, as well as “Experience is the teacher of all things”, two truths that have been out there for well over 2000 years and now I am trying to set an entirely new stage to part of that, or basically, I am incorporating the stage for 16 people on a space station, and in all that, what happens when we become our own worst enemy? 

The University of Melbourne published Farrago, there we see “The space that fills the gap between us and those stars, is perceived by us to be empty. From a conceptual standpoint, this is a perfectly valid definition, yet from a scientific perspective we can do better”, they are correct in more ways then one, they cannot see beyond a certain spectral point and the equipment that we design has similar limitations, we see in frequencies, yet an event 5500 years ago showed us at one point that we are limited by ourselves, and we forgot what we experienced, so at that point, what are we not seeing? We merely observe the parts we can see or measure, yet what happens when we mis out because we are focussing on a ruler, all whilst we need to use a version of a spatial Inclinometer, one that also measures spatial radiation, we never did that, did we, because we were never there, but evidence of that still exists, yet as we reach the limit of our expanded imagination, we forgot to push those boundaries and that in part made us our own worst enemy, a stage where the play is us, the stage was not the play, it was to show us the boundaries of the play of us. 

And as we go forwards, there will be people stating the list of original writers, but that was never the issue, Thessalia was. It was the place where the play showed a shift of borders, you can read it in Bello Civili, the set stage we see is “The book was for a time lost, but was rediscovered in Italian city archives in the Middle Ages”, it was found, but parts were missing, the papal powers feared the missing passages, did no one ever wonder why? I cannot tell how much is missing, but a part was omitted and another side of Thessalia optionally shows that. It is speculation, but when we consider a commander like Pompeii, a person as veteran as Julius Gaius Caesar was, did you actually believe he had no records? A stage with two sides, two sides of coins, not the same coin, but the same currency and that is where we see the play, the stage of Keno Diastima, not one coin, not more coins, but two distinct currencies, and the second currency we forgot about, but it was here all along. You merely have to open all eyes, we need to focus not with one mind, but with at least two. 

The stage is not the play, it defines the edges of the play, it makes all the difference.

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March 25, 2021 · 03:33

The brain race

I am not sure how familiar you are with the ‘race brain’, yet mine went nuts two hours ago. It was a set of circumstances, the first was Dragon Quest Builders 2, I restarted the game only to fall over on the second island (again). As I learned to ‘follow’ the orders nearly precisely I got a bit further, but I was thwarted by the game makers who got overconfident and that is where the wheels came off the car, or was it the train went of the rails? It is almost a crossing between a close question and an open question. If you confine yourself to closed questions, you tend to miss the desired direction, and when you confide in the response of open questions you go in EVERY direction, except the right one. It is a shame really, because the game (island 1) was heaps fun, you are in a stage where the second island seems fun but frustration sets in too quickly and you go nowhere, a game that relies on fun and delivers, at least the first 2 hours, after that it goes nowhere. But that set my brain in motion, or better stated it went into overdrive. As I was relaxing I looked at the new Hogwart Legacy trailer for PS5, within seconds my mind was devising all kinds of trails to make the game ‘better’, and I could not stop it. 

A game that I have not seen yet, I have not played yet and I am already trying to improve on it, 

In one part with an adaption (or DLC) that gives a setting that a group of four one in each house are linked, an idea that has links to an old WW2 movie, but the stage never left me and now it delivered something different. It seems a silly way to waste time, but my brain would not stop. My mind went on towards the stupidity of EA and their sport games. You see, I do not agree with some voices, Their packs are not gambling and I, for the life of me cannot understand why EA is not on the offensive. 

To understand this, you need to see the stage devised by Julius Caesar, I believe it was in De Bello Gallico, he stated that a soldier is in attack, in defence or awaiting response and each links to the other, as such the attack can move to defence or anticipation, defence can move to anticipation or take the offence and so on, as all three states are covered the soldier that can move between the three without pause and move from any stance to attack, that will be the winner. EA seems to be unaware of this option and seems to be between defence and anticipation only. It is a choice but it will be the stage that always and forever leads to losing. I came up with an idea to take the offence in this. Of course as all marketing costs, it might not be cheap but it beats getting slapped around by those giving voice to idiots spending $12K on packs for a $55 game, that is more than ludicrous and the media is eating it up, something they can flame and no one is asking the questions that matter, not even the legal department of EA, or at least they do it in a way no one can hear.

Even the Times gave us 3 days ago ‘YouTube stars ‘lure Fifa gamers into gambling’’ (at https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/youtube-stars-lure-fifa-gamers-into-gambling-dwk8tcx3g), a stage that beckons response but it seems that EA remains largely silent. So as we get “The company behind the Fifa football video game has been accused of using “exploitative” marketing techniques to lure children into gambling”, so where is the response and the campaign by EA? I wonder where they are? You see, loot boxes are not gambling.

Why?
To call it gambling you need to consider that you lose your money, this would only happen if you buy a loot pack and the only thing you get one card stating ‘Thank you!’, but that is not the case. In my case (NHL19), I get a free pack every 8 hours, then each pack has also coins and a token, there are each month 3 packs that can be gotten with these tokens and they are three good packs. Beyond that you get non trade-able cards and the coins can be used to buy or bid for items in the auction part. When you hit a milestone (some small achievement, you also get options for packs and in some cases a specific player.

Within a month I had all 30 arena’s, all NHL home and away jerseys and in three months I also had all the NHL goalie masks and a ton of other stuff, I never spend a dollar on this. One site tells me that FIFA21 does not offer this, I am not sure about NFL21, so why not? It would solve all issues for EA. You see, people are staring blindly on the alleged gambling, but the stage of gambling is never truly properly investigated. You see when we gamble we see two options. The first is ‘play games of chance for money’, but that stage has the unwritten law that you can lose and this never happens, you always get cards, common, uncommon and one rare card. The second version of gamble is ‘take risky action in the hope of a desired result’, that part too is not met, because the desired result is always the same, one rare card, several uncommon cards and the rest are all common cards. This stage is not the one we consider because the outcome is always the same. What most people forget is that in FIFA 21 (allegedly) we see “30 official leagues, over 700 clubs, and over 17,000 players”, if that is correct, there is every chance that there are 2,000 rare players, which means that any rare card has a 0.05% chance of coming out, so if you want Messi, Beckham or Ronaldo you need to get really really lucky and lets face it, every club in the world wants these three players. But that part is close to never considered, and when we go back to the adult idiot spending $12,000 on packs, that person need to get his credit score adjusted to -15000. Is there an issue? Perhaps there is and I think that EA made a few blunders on several levels, but that does not make it gambling, and as we never see anyone receiving a pack with only a thank you card, the stage of gambling is, as I personally see it never reached. 

So how did I get there? 
Well my brain will not stop thinking things through in creative ways and it is reason for another case of insomnia. I watched the trailer of the Unholy (which looks awesome) and immediately my brain went towards a remake of Stigmata (a Rupert Wainwright gem), why? I have no clue, when my brain is in this mode it needs to run its course, which is keeping me awake pondering N+1 issues all whilst N was the maximum I could contemplate. So at present I am typing this whilst I am trying to calm down my brain by listening to the Mikado (Gilbert and Sullivan). 

The creative brain can be a curse, not an unholy one, but a curse none the less. So whilst we see what is next my brain (overzealously) adapted Hogwarts legacy before seeing the final product, I considered a new version of Stigmata, I am still contemplating a backdrop for ‘How to assassinate a politician’, which at present is set in the Hague and Amsterdam in the Netherlands and Riyadh in Saudi Arabia. Then there is the idea I had regarding ‘Keno Diastima’, here I believe they should nearly all be new actors, no famous people there, I will not say to much because the cliffhangers 2-3 and 3-4 will be brutal, which is how it should be. 

An idea came to mind on a prequel to ‘Soylent Green’ with Chris Hemsworth in the lead (almost 2 years ago), yet here I fear that the story is just not good enough, the setting is great but I feel that it would end up being some cult movie and not a real breaking movie, a stage that precedes near perfection is also a dangerous step to make and it could backfire in a horrible way, which is why my mind remains the great dangers. I considered the idea before (2019-2020), but I never figured out the part that matter, no matter how good the prequel is, the stage needs to go beyond something nice, and Richard Fleischer did set the stage in a phenomenal way. One can say it is like buying a raincoat to warn against the rain that has been going on for weeks, the flood will drown you long before the usage of a raincoat is validated. There are other idea’s and I wrote about them before, so I want to avoid repetition, but the stage will soon come that Hollywood will look in other directions for new idea’s. Outside of the Marvel and DC range and there have been so many really good idea’s, I merely wonder why that path was not traversed before by Hollywood, Bollywood or Nollywood. And as my brain is seemingly slowing down, I end today’s article and will try to get some sleep (one can dream, can one not?)

Consider the two sidelines that are hidden between the lines and contemplate why it was done, because there might be madness in my methods, but there is also methodology in my insanity, it is merely what we aim for and whether we realise what we were aiming for in the first place.

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February 25, 2021 · 11:45

A repetition of events

This is speculative, this is my view on the matter and it might be very very wrong, yet I see events take place and I have seen it all before, this is not a first. It has happened and it will happen again yet to be true I never expected Apple to be part of that equation. No matter how we consider the stage, no matter how we thing it will be alright. As I personally see it, it will not.

My insight started well over 30 years ago with a Dutch Company called ‘Infotheek’, an IT company when IT was a mere myth, it was rising and in that air it started to believe its own marketing. I saw some service person air anecdote after anecdote but never really managing anything, merely pushing the expectations of its boss unto the staff member on his watch and anyone not meeting presented and assumed expectations, that person was done away. They started buying companies and keeping the few stars that a company had and the rest, you guessed it, over time they were done away. It was slow enough not to raise flags, but the centre core was that they were purchasing revenue. I saw a pretty amazing sales star walking away from that. Even if I never realised it at the time, his name was Oscar, he had a sales routine and a calculator and he was doing tricks with the calculator and he was good, he really was. I never understood him, all I saw was some slick suited person with expensive sunglasses, but I was in services and happy to be there giving technical support. It was the golden age of Tulip Computers and I was aiding those users. Yet I saw Infotheek buying company after company, I saw people go faster and faster and it was my first view on ‘buying revenue’ but there were more later, when it became more common ground. These thoughts went through my mind as I took notice of ‘Apple buys a company every three to four weeks’ (source: BBC). The stage is similar, the problem is what path are they taking? Are they buying revenue “Apple recently delivered its largest quarter by revenue of all time, bringing in $111.4bn (£78.7bn) in the first-quarter of its fiscal year 2021”? Or perhaps it is a stage here they are accumulating cost to lower tax brackets? Are they merely looking for a cheap way to get the real jewels in a company, get the revenue and do away the rest? In this we need to consider the number one part, they are not doing anything illegal, yet the stage remains that the bought companies have a population of X, when within 2 years the population goes to X-45%, and when you see that this involves 100 companies, how many people will become unemployed? Even if we see “Most often, Apple buys smaller technology firms and then incorporates their innovations into its own products” we see a half truth, it is not the whole story. Yes, we accept that sometimes it is straight revenue like “Apple’s largest acquisition in the last decade was its $3bn purchase of Beats Electronics, the headphone maker founded by rapper and producer Dr Dre” and there is nothing wrong with that, but there is a larger risk that some people lose the foresight (or is that hindsight) that the Apple egg becomes like an actual egg, a hard outer exterior, but behind that it is space, empty space, not all of it is the joke (sorry read yoke) of the matter. A larger stage and in this case not some presented larger Dutch IT firm, but an actual behemoth that I set somewhere between $1,000,000,000 and $1,500,000,000 when that comes crashing down what will the impact be? And any firm that I in the stage of buying revenue is always heading for disaster and when it becomes someone buying another firm almost every month for 6 years that crash is close to a given.

You see, on paper it all looks nice, but incorporating new companies, re-schooling staff, educating staff on a new set of ideologies is a much larger task and the stage is alway in motion, the stage of confirming and checking whether the new people are on track of becoming images of the old people is a setting that takes time and when you buy a company every month the pyramid becomes unstable a lot faster than anyone realises and when that happens, good luck with finding support and services to your Apple product. In this there is one given, the sales people tend to forget about the services required and when they learn that their sales pipeline is stuffed because they forgot to give trust the larger stage of corporate valour it all goes pear shape rather fast.

In this I am speculating on the past, perhaps Apple will be fine. Perhaps I am all wrong and my experience does not count. So basically I could be wrong, however GeekWire gives us ‘Chromebooks outsold Macs worldwide in 2020, cutting into Windows market share’ (at https://www.geekwire.com/2021/chromebooks-outsold-macs-worldwide-2020-cutting-windows-market-share/) a week ago. This does not mean that I am suddenly right. A 6 year tactic is not the stage that is seen in one article over one year that is optionally the weirdest year of the century. 

One does not imply the other but we need to take notice of both, especially in a stage where the 5G future is more and more likely to be a cloud based one and we cannot deny that the Chromebook is a pure cloud based solution. It is up to us all but when we consider that we need to realise that we too are wage slaves and service slaves and whatever hinders or threatens us will threaten all, a small truth that goes back to the age of Gaius Julius Caesar and for those who remember his name from the history books as a politician and a ruler, he was a general first, so he knows a few things, come to think of it, he set in motion some of the tactics that are till used 2 millennia later, all set before he became Dictator Perpetuo, think of that before we dismiss all of the facts and in this there are more facts, some are hidden in the story, it will be your puzzle of the day. In this I give you one small clue ‘Is Iteration in similarity the same as iteration and does that warrant consideration of the title iteration?’

Have a great day!

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November 22, 2019 · 12:46

Same competition with a typo

National Defence Magazine gave out an article a few hours ago where we see that the Middle East is expanding even further, the headline ‘UAE Looking to Expand Defense Industrial Base‘ is merely the introduction to a larger issue, an Emirati official gives that “The United Arab Emirates Ministry of Defence is making a push to beef up the nation’s defense industrial base“, in this Maj. Gen. Abdullah Al Sayyed Al Hashemi hands out a truth, he believes “It is not only important for the UAE, it is important for every single country that has … industry“, it is a truth, an undeniable one, even after we get the holistic fanfare in opposition by nations under the corporatocratic yoke (the EU) and the nations that already have one where they all claim that it is more bad than good, it is more diversifying that unifying, they all lie, plain and simple. A nation is only as good as its ability to have no opposition, or who is able to defend itself. Julius Caesar proved that point a little over two thousand years ago, we still see evidence of that every day when we are not averting our eyes, the State of Israel (with enemies of their state on at least two borders) have also shown that part, more important it showed the world what happens if those in denial get their way. We see evidence in two books that Julius wrote, the first is the conquest of Gaul, the second one was the Civil War, two kinds of wars yet his first rule of warfare applied both times. The Middle East is upgrading and with oil waning as a dependent force, the circle is set to defence, a first handheld against those in denial of what Iran is willing and able to do, even as there are larger tears in the statement “Al Hashemi said during a press conference that investments in defense technologies will help the UAE diversify its economy“, we need to acknowledge that these tears are surviving because of the truth in them, it might partially be seen in “UAE-based company Halcon received a $980 million contract award for a variety of ammunition“, yet we realise that one billion an economy does not make. Yet “As the UAE works to improve its industrial base, it will also need to ensure it sustains its current and future equipment adequately, he said, noting that contracts awarded during the show included a mix of spare parts and sustainment in addition to weapons sales” shows a much larger consultancy and service minded task is ahead of the UAE, it needs to be service minded and there is the facet that will drive home an additional 4-7 billion over the next 5 years alone, with optional entrenchment of various services down the road. The corporatocratic foundation of the EU is in denial, but they will soon see that the EU is about to lost 2-4 billion in revenue to Middle Eastern partners in the near future. I state here the word ‘partners’ as Saudi Arabia has been on a similar track for a few years now and they are both optionally in a stage to be in each other’s fairway soon enough. Even as we see that Saudi Arabia is more about manufacturing, we see the statement that Al Hashemi makes with “We have to keep that availability of services available to be able to maintain the same capability”

If National Defence Magazine (at https://www.nationaldefensemagazine.org/articles/2019/11/21/uae-looking-to-expand-its-defense-industrial-base) is correct with “The last day of the air show wrapped up with about $4.9 billion worth of contract awards over the course of the week“, we see that the UAE is heading for a lucrative next few years, it might not be enough, but it is a first version out of the oil industry and there is more on consultancy and services soon enough. Here we see the versions that matter; it was given by Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment Ellen Lord: “meetings would be held with industrial partners to discuss challenges. Saudi Arabia is focused on jobs and localizing production and manufacturing, she said, whereas the UAE is putting a premium on technology transfers“, yet ‘technology transfer‘ is basically a loaded canon, it should and will include consultancy and services, services on goods and people, making for a much larger stage, in addition, with 5G it is a larger manifest, the larger settings of armed forces and communications whilst 5G is not contemplated in the past seeks a much larger tenure of mobile hardware than we sought possible. People forget that the military have been pushing mobile technologies in the past and this will be pushed more and more. Not mobile industries that we rely on, but military point to point technologies on a 5G speed stream, it is not completely understood, some might run to the Raytheon pages and rely on “Lewis predicted that 5G will be foundational for new military technologies such as “robots, artificial intelligence and a number of advanced sensing devices.” Fast, reliable and strong communications are crucial to executing high-stakes military operations. The Trump Administration recently ordered a national spectrum policy to keep the U.S. in the lead when it comes to advanced wireless communications“, yet larger issues remain with limiting access to mobile technology and point to point systems, which in the case of rural warfare makes all the difference and even as we decide not to talk about it, we see that others (basically not the EU and not the US) are behind, they are lagging in 5G communication to a much larger degree and the UAE has figured out (well it was a known strategy really) that being ahead in services and consultancy solutions in armed response would be the ticket to go, did you really think that armed response is limited to weapons?

Raytheon was on that horse in 2016 when it applied for licensing to test “U.S. defense contractor Raytheon Missile Systems wants a special temporary authorization (STA) from the FCC so that it can test a new broadband technology and see if it meets both the demands of a U.S. Department of Defense customer and the commercial marketplace“, some focussed on the delays and feedback we see “General John Hyten, commander of Air Force Space Command, called the GPS Operational Control System project a “disaster” due to escalating costs and delays. Raytheon told Reuters that it was still fully committed to delivering the modernized GPS ground controls envisioned and required by the Air Force” yet the story behind this (at https://apps.fcc.gov/oetcf/els/reports/STA_Print.cfm?mode=current&application_seq=69216&RequestTimeout=1000) is larger than you think. The size of the article is not what was used, not what is required, it is that their advantage has been smaller than anyone expected, basically there are indications (not evidence) that Huawei surpassed these applications or better stated, Chinese defence has a much better system more advanced out there and it did so no later than Q2 2017 (partial speculation), so not testing, but actively being used and the UAE is seeking a services based organisation allowing for access and servicing such equipment, or at least make a push in that direction. In that part some might recall the article by Liu Zhen, last January (at https://www.scmp.com/news/china/military/article/2184493/why-5g-battleground-us-and-china-also-fight-military-supremacy), there we see (read: read about) Zhou Zhaoxiong, a senior engineer at China Mobile IoT Company giving us “Military equipment embedded with communication devices can also form the internet of things, he added. The communication can take place from device to device, without satellites or early-warning planes, saving those limited resources for other uses and significantly lowering the cost of a military operation, according to a 2017 report in China Defence News, a mouthpiece of China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA)” it was not the stage of what was to come, but on what was achieved and it scared the US into all kinds of messes, we do know that communication in any war is essential and it seems that the Chinese have a larger advantage there.

This is the engine that the UAE will be trying to tap into, it is also the one direction that the US is really unwilling to give into, so there will be a much larger battle to come regarding what Americans will allow what others are allowed to do, and that is where they strike out in the Middle East, they are seeing opportunity in a defence setting where they optionally end up have the advantage, the EU cannot compete with the UAE because of their tight links to the US and their corporations and when we see the people that have links to the degree they have with the US, China is seeing a lager advantage to partner up with the UAE and the KSA, that is the larger fight we will see in the foreseeable future, and even as the US is showing a larger fight with Huawei, it is not the real fight and more people are starting to get on board with the larger stage, the US can no longer compete in more than one field and that is what is biting the US to a larger degree.

How does this matter?

Well that is simple, the UAE (and the KSA) have larger military needs towards manufacturing and servicing, as they ally to a larger degree there is a larger need serviced in military needs and that means two things, the escalation in the Middle East (regarding military hardware requirements) can be addressed on a near global base, giving both players a larger handheld on the global scene that is not oil based, beyond that it allows for a larger growth in the near future, with new optional partners over time we see a larger growth in the Middle East soon enough, it might ‘just’ be arms and weapons initially, but there is a larger foot for growth and it will push the Middle East (except Iran of course) to a much larger degree than expected. Yet there is also momentum to be considered, even as both the KSA and the UAE have strong ties to the US markets, there is a rift visible, the US internally created it and if it does not address this there is every indication that it will cost the US a lot more than it bargained for in the near future to come, I will let you consider those details, yet do not take too long, there are at least 4 markets where it applies to and in that regard I will leave you with one hint It was given out yesterday and the list is seen (at http://raytheon.mediaroom.com/2019-11-21-Raytheon-honors-54-suppliers-for-excellent-performance), can you see which two mentions should optionally not be there?

In some ways American ego does not falter in our view, it seems to have short term needs and that is where we see the first failure and that is where they should have though a little further than their noses (but that is merely my interpretation on the situation).

So have a great weekend! The weekend ends in 59 hours (for me at least) #JustSaying

 

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September 30, 2019 · 12:08

One step beyond

I waited for the news from more sources, the news that I got yesterday was too ridiculous. Even now, when I look at the ABC headline ‘Houthi rebels claim to have captured ‘thousands’ of Saudi troops in Yemen border fight‘ I am willing to ignore it. The force required to do that requires full and open cooperation of the IRGC, in addition, it would have required no less than 500 troops heavily armed. The news however kept on going and when I was treated to a video (at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WPa6HUxy11w) we see a lot of lose shoots, but there is no real evidence of the scope of the matter. That view is supported by the BBC, who gives us (at https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-49866677) “The video shows an attack on armoured vehicles, but there is so far no verification of the Houthi claim of a major military success“, as well as “But the video broadcast on Sunday instead shows what appear to be rebels firing at vehicles on a road. This is followed by footage of several burnt-out vehicles, as well as assorted light weaponry laid out on the ground and a group of men not in military uniforms marching down a dirt road“. It is presentation, yet not confirmation, claims we have seen often enough from Iran and from players like Hezbollah. And in all the Houthi response: “He said the evidence of the attack could not be shown for security reasons” reads just like it should be regarded as, as a joke!

Yes, traps and ambushes will get you some result, however the true victory over 2,000 men like that would have required Saudi Arabia to ignore the wisdom of Julius Caesar, who stated 2,000 years ago: “The first rule, whether you are engaged in war or not is to install defences against enemy retaliation“, that essential first would never have allowed for such a victory without hundreds of well-trained Iranian troops to support the Houthi soldiers out there. There are basic settings no matter where you are on the planet where an ambush would not have been prevented, but overall the damage would have remained limited.

It seems to me that the Houthi forces have been briefed by Iran to wage open war into Saudi Arabia, so no matter what story Yehia Saree (spokesperson for Houthi forces) gives us, unless he has video of a lot better quality revealing a lot more factual evidence, the only thing we see was an optional strike against a few vehicles using 2-3 RPG-7’s.

That would fit into the brief of Houthi activity and for those 500 kills, until the names are verified and checked, it could have been a mere mass murder site of Yemeni civilians, and that too remains an option. It is however a new step and it does not matter whether the kills were Yemeni civilians or Saudi citizens, the actions by the Houthis would not have been possible without serious Iranian support, that part is too often muddied away behind the screens. If we would have hi-res images of the weapons, there is a likelihood that we will see weapons that Yemen never had, in addition the video (at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jZw5taiYMqw) shows us (at 3:25) an ambush by 4 soldiers on an armoured vehicle, whilst no RPG’s were fired, whilst no firefight was going on, at best a few machine guns firing at an armoured vehicle, impact that the armoured vehicle might not even have noticed. Even as the ‘expert’ seems to believe it is confirmation, the shoots I see are separate takes of different moments, it is propaganda editing, if this was successful, we would get the full uncut version complete with brain matter on the dashboard. That is not happening, one reason is that the Iranian troops are not to be shown, the other shoots shows one vehicle in one shot and three vehicles with clear scorch marks from RPG impact, the Russian RPG-7 is merely the most likely weapon used (decent availability all over the Middle East). In addition, the ‘troop’ movement at 4:18 gives no evidence of any level that there are Saudi troops, optionally Saudi citizens, most likely groups of Yemeni civilians trying to get away from it all. The same is to be said from the group shot at 4:27, the chaos makes it most likely to be civilians and we see merely 2-3 dozen, for thousands to be moved the need for a huge military force would have been essential and nothing of the sort is visible.

What is a given that no matter how this plays out, the Saudi Government has a clear premise and as I personally see it a right to strike hard. And on a personal note, I would advise Saudi marksman to switch to the Accuracy International AX .338, good bang for the buck and it allows the marksman to efficiently thin the Houthi herd between 500-800 meters. OK, that might have been uncalled for, but you have to consider that there is a difference between presentation and war and it is time to give those ground troops more than a ‘packaged present’ from a plane. And if I can push forward British commerce at the same time, I will (Australia has zero quality long range rifles made in Australia), so I feel good about that element too.

Yet this is still madness and as such using the hit song from the band with the same name One Step Beyond applies, all the actions after the attack on the two Aramco sites are a clear path to open war, I believe that this was not an accident, I personally believe that Iran is actually scared at present, but their fear is founded on how many allies would step to the side of Saudi Arabia, this is a serious attempt to find fact in a sea of facts and fiction and Iran is uncertain at present, it knows that it can only lose, but the size of losses increases dramatically with every ally that Saudi Arabia gains in this open conflict. As the opposition against Saudi actions dwindles, so does the confidence of Iran and as their Nuclear deal is now at an end with 99% certainty, Iran has no carrot to use against the EU, it now has a much larger problem, because the oil impact took whatever sympathy vote they had in the EU away and now they need to see the state of affairs, how to prolong their options and as they realise that the west in general has no further interest in catering to Iran in any way, shape or form, the entire matter becomes a hazard play for Iran, that is as I see it behind it all, and as the NATO navy (UK and US) are now in the Sea of Dammam (Persian Gulf), the Iranian fleet options are almost completely out of the window and any actions will now add the UK and the US on the side of Saudi Arabia and they are not ready for that, if the IDF adds to that (because they have had more than enough of the IRGC) the entire matter comes to blow and Iran ends up having to concede in every field, moreover they will only be in a place to publicly admit to defeat, and after so many years the population will demand a massive national overhaul, which suits most players, but not the Iranian clergy, or the Iranian defence forces.

One step beyond is also what we are willing to do on removing the risk that is Iran, the bulk of all instability has been due to Iran and one of several; tools they have wielded: Hezbollah, they too will have a larger problem, with Iran out of the picture their actions stop and right quick, they will cry loudly on TV to get any UN deal whilst the IDF is not really in a mood to give them any options at all. These actions will lead to a larger stability to the Middle East with Saudi Arabia at the head of that table (which has seemingly been the best course of action for forever). It is time to strap on momentum towards resolving issues, not to maintain some balance of instability, we have had too many years (read: decades) of that.

The issue of the attack on Saudi grounds is still out in the open. There are disputed lands and there are non-disputed lands. Until there is a clear map on where the attacks are, we will see a clear path on how Saudi Arabia could and should respond. The harsh reality is that talks with the Houthi forces is without any hope of success, there are millions of Yemeni who have suffered on that and how we see the actions is up to all of us, yet to see what comes next, there is an interesting video that gives a really good timeline (at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=veMFCFyOwFI). Yet we see an underline, it gives positive visibility to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia as it used its wealth to create a strong infrastructure via roads making the nation almost completely reachable, giving them a huge opportunity to let the population grow, a part that always seemed missing in Iran (beyond Tehran) as I personally saw it.

Now that the forces come to blow Iran is rightfully nervous (perhaps outright scared), no matter how brave a face they show, even now the outright support that Saudi Arabia is getting is making Iran even more nervous and to avert utter disaster they need to see if they get any real support (beyond Russia and Turkey), in this Russia might not be willing to get involved for the mere reason that its tactical position increases if this comes to blows, whilst the EU and US spend funds in this region, Russia could decide to stabilise their margin to a larger degree, and Russia is in it for the long game, a tactic that Iran no longer has at its disposal, as such it is my personal believe that Iran is trying to see how far it can go now and again they are reusing the tools at their disposal, which in this case are the Houthi forces in Yemen.

 

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August 10, 2014 · 18:42

The second exploitation

It is always nice to see business to take a look at others and see how they can profit. As The US had to increase its Intelligence spending from 2004 onwards, many of us saw the outrageous amounts that the taxpayer had to dish out for intelligence resources. The biggest drain was not the need for more men, but the simple fact that much of the Intelligence community went private and those intelligence officers who were making on average $72333 year, suddenly in the private sector were asking for $172333. It was a simple ask and demand issue. This has gone on for some time and now we see how others are picking up the idea.

It is Sky News who informed us (at http://news.sky.com/story/1310468/nhs-hospital-paid-1800-a-day-for-nurse) on something so outrageous, that for a moment I thought they had just copied and pasted news from the Telegraph (the truth is far more shocking).

The first quote should be a massive wakeup call “On May Day Bank Holiday this year a locum agency was paid more than £1,800 to supply a nurse for a 12-hour shift, new figures show“, so a group that does not get anywhere near such an income supplies more funds for one day then most nurses will ever make in a week. Can anyone please explain that to me?

I know that I had given the answer in the beginning of this blog, yet in my blog of June 19th ‘Concerning the Commonwealth‘ I wrote “if we look at the NHS, then staffing and expertise are also a worry, which is by the way a worry in many Commonwealth Nations. Most of these nations have well over 5% unemployed; can some not be re-schooled in the healthcare sector?” Of course, that was after the event and long before Sky News wrote their article, yet overall, just as we saw on the mismanaged 111 helpline; it seems that hospital resources are not budgeted correctly either. You see, when we look at budgets, we think of coin and cost. It seems that most people think in that same way. Yet, hours and staffing is also a budget we must keep. The fact that we for some reason suddenly need to pay 1800 pound for a 12 hour shift comes down to the cost of a full day plumber (or the equivalent of two QC’s).

Yet the article is also lacking, WHY was this action taken? Perhaps there were valid (or better stated a host of) actions that resulted towards this choice. So, not unlike the Telegraph, we should ask the questions in regards to these events as they are told to us. This is why I decided to hold on to this, as it was clear that there was more to this than meets the eye. My initial response: ‘Bad Sky News, bad!‘ (Especially as the health strikes were already going on).

It is now, today August 10th that I see an article of the Guardian that does more than just put the Sky News article to shame. I am not debating whether the article was true, but it seems that there are sides that certain people are never happy to inform the others about.

This part is now seen (at http://www.theguardian.com/society/2014/aug/09/former-nhs-carers-intensify-strike-over-pay). If I read this correctly then these people are making just above minimum wage, yet these people are doing intense work, needing to keep a mind of everything (especially physicians at times), whilst making no more than the brain dead fast food counter staff tends to make. How is this even close to acceptable?

Perhaps Sky News did stumble upon something, but they ignored the other side. So at 7 pounds, a nurse makes 280 pounds pre taxation. If that person was staying at a homeless hostel, she would lose out on 105, which gives her 175 to live on for a week, which is 25 pounds a day, take in consideration underground, busses and such, which makes for another fiver down the sewage (as they would rightfully see it). So how can ANYONE live on less than 20 pounds a day? Remember, this still needs to account for food, clothing and a few other items.

There is no denying that leaving the NHS in private hands is worse than just a bad idea. It could be the first onset of death for healthcare in the UK. As politicians have wasted in excess of 15 billion pounds on failed approaches to healthcare, why think that the private sector (a greed and profit driven entity) would do better to the cost and even more disgraceful, better to the people it is supposed to take care of?

The article has a clear quote that shows the danger people face: “Once they have squeezed out the state sector, and the third sector, we will then see prices rise; then we will see profits; then we will see these tax-efficient structures working.” This is a clear ‘divide and conquer’ approach, a method, might I remind the reader of that has been around Julius Caesar, so long before Nicola Machiavelli decided to become devious. Attached to this is that as more and more cost cutting solutions are born, ‘surviving’ on tax shelter operations, then the treasury coffers will miss out on a lot more, which will just force a system of checks and balances which is no longer depending on any balance, it makes for a massively unbalanced future for both the people and the state.

The part that gets me is the people behind the strike “Fifty carers for the disabled are staging one of the longest strikes in the history of the health service to secure a living wage for staff working in privatised services formerly run by the NHS“. Have these people on minimum wage figured out what politicians, who make a lot more than that are ignoring?

The danger is that when (not if) the healthcare sector collapses, the fallout will be unimaginable. Those deciding on cutting costs (which by itself is not a bad idea), should also consider the dangers that follows. Government has health and medical options because (for now) it is not driven from a profit point of view, which is at the heart of this situation, this is not about cutting cost or making profit, this is about breaking even or losing an essential part of support for the living. When we are left to the devices of that what brings profit, we see the first steps into culling a population. It will not happen because they are killed, it will happen because services are no longer available. Then what will the government do, and who will they have to pay, or more interestingly, how much will it cost the government then?

Is that in any way a lesser form of murder?

The question becomes: ‘If a Service Level Agreement is set between government and the private sector, can any of these parties be prosecuted for murder?‘

You the reader will laugh now, which is fine, but when we see the first casualty because of these changes consider my words and consider how that person would still be alive if certain steps had not been taken.

 

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