Much like U.S. special operations forces, Russia has its own elite troops that shine during special missions like counterterrorism and hostage rescue.
“Spetsnaz,” or special purpose, is an umbrella term for special ops in Russia and other eastern Bloc states. These elite troops traditionally fall under the GRU [intelligence service], FSB [security service], and other ministries, in addition to the traditional military structure.
Regardless, they are the “core of the best trained men the Soviet Union, now the Russian Federation, could produce,” according to SOFREP.
In this video, we get a sense of what these troops are capable of. Though it is worth pointing out that this was produced in Russia and isn’t exactly an impartial look at this force.
China has been implementing a system that looks something out of George Orwell’s 1984 called a social credit score. Yet, it has been widely accepted across the territories it operates in and applauded by the population. How can something that on paper sounds terrifying be championed by the public? Is it propaganda or does it really work?
You instantly know who will never pay back a loan
It’s hard to trust people, its harder to trust civilians when you’re a vet. We’ve all been burned by a friend or family member who needed money and tugged at our heart strings. So, we came to their aid only to be met with excuses. Now, I’m not talking about those who are genuinely having a hard time and it is hard to say when they will actually be able to pay you back. No, I’m talking about those who willingly misled people with no intention of ever paying you back. There’s a reason they couldn’t go to the bank and you should be able to know why. It’s a loan, not a gift, especially if it’s interest free.
The police can identify criminals easier
Surveillance is not uniquely communist or capitalist. Federal agencies already know everything about you. In the United States, it may not be actively observed by a person but if the need arises to investigate what you’ve been up to, the U.S. Government sure as hell has logs on your data. VPNs and The Onion Router network won’t help you against Uncle Sam. He practically invented the game of surveillance.
Using a system that knows where everyone is at all times is only a threat to criminals. If you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear. Contrary to popular belief, Joseph Goebbels did not come up with the phrase, we did. Upton Sinclair used it in 1918 in The Profits of Religion: An Essay in Economic Interpretation. The Social Credit System can reduce both violent and white-collar crimes by action or deterrent.
The government will reward you for being a good citizen
Once the person had enacted the “honest” behavior, which happened in all the “positive” reports we analyzed, the narratives ended with a virtue cascade. Take, for example, cases in which individuals found and returned lost property to an owner. Here, all four cases assigned to the topic “return lost property to owner” ended by further attributing “self-discipline”, “helpfulness”, “care-taking for others”, and a “sense of responsibility” to the protagonist as part of a virtue cascade.
University of Munich, How China’s Social Credit System Currently Defines “Good” and “Bad” Behavior
Veterans are a selfless group of people, albeit, not always approachable. We have a moral compass that points true. Veterans have integrity. The public trusts us. Veterans are law abiding citizens, even if we get into mischief from time to time. The Social Credit System rewards people who donate money to charity, return lost items to the police, and engage in selfless acts of heroism. The SCS shows who is trustworthy, honest, and hardworking. Many of the virtues valued by the CSC are virtues that beat inside the hearts of veterans anyway.
You can better gauge if someone is a potential spouse
Divorce rates for military members who have been deployed are higher: It’s 12.52% for those in the U.S. Navy, 8.9% in the Marines, 8.48% in the Army and 14.6% in Air Force, according to Armed Forces Health Surveillance Branch data.
Marketwatch.com
When I was in Afghanistan, I could only use the satellite phone once a month when it came to the patrol base if we were lucky. I could either call my mother or my girlfriend. They lived together while I was deployed so I could call one and speak to them both. Most deployed troops do not have the luxury of such an arrangement.
We’ve all heard the horror stories of cheating spouses. Some of you reading this may have been victims of disloyal spouses. Looking at your spouse’s Social Credit Score can give you peace of mind. When you see hers plummeting because of immoral behavior, you’re going to know why in real time.
When dating someone and getting to know them you can scan them and see immediately if they’re going to screw you over. Only unethical people would be opposed the system. With a quick scan you can see if your tinder date is just using you to score a meal or if they’re financially independent. A profile on your phone will show you if they’re in soul crushing debt or have a prison record.
You get priority access to privileges and reputable companies
As a model citizen you will get privileges like favorite interest rates on loans, first class travel tickets at better prices, rentals without a deposit and much more financially speaking. For employers, it works better than a background check. For investors, the government will show you how reputable a company is and if they’re operating in good faith. Consumers can avoid companies that are dishonest about their food safety protocols, fraudulent, and downright illegal.
A Social Credit Score is actually a good idea in theory. The system is about trust – but verify.
The Danish film ‘A War’ is about an officer who had to make a hard decision under fire and the legal charges he faced when he returned home. It’s an unflinching look at military families, the strains of separation during deployment, and the unforgiving nature of commanding troops under fire while wrestling with restrictive rules of engagement.
The film has been nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film and will be released in limited theaters starting February 12.
It seems like North Korea is always coming up with a new kind of threat to the South. It seems that way because it’s true. Threats are a constant reminder of the nuclear missiles and conventional rockets that would destroy the South Korean capital of Seoul within 30 minutes of a war’s outbreak.
Now South Korea is letting the North know just what will happen if Pyongyang tries to make good on any threats.
In short, the South says “bring it.”
KM-101 105mm artillery firing exercise of Republic of Korea Army 6th Division (ROK photo)
The Republic of Korea’s military developed a plan to destroy North Korea, starting with the Northern capital of Pyongyang, in the event of a nuclear attack, a ROK military source told Yonhap News Agency on Sept. 10th.
“Every Pyongyang district, particularly where the North Korean leadership is possibly hidden, will be completely destroyed by ballistic missiles and high-explosive shells as soon as the North shows any signs of using a nuclear weapon. In other words, the North’s capital city will be reduced to ashes and removed from the map,” the source said.
When the North tested a nuclear device for the fifth time, the South released the descriptively-titled “Korea Massive Punishment and Retaliation” plan.
The cold weather traning of the ROK Army Special Warfare Force (ROK Army photo)
The South is trying to target the North Korean leadership, letting dictator Kim Jong-Un know just how his life will end if he launches a first strike.
South Korea has an arsenal of surface-to-surface ballistic missiles that can reach ranges up to 1,000 km. The weapons are intended to be a nuclear deterrent for South Korea, which doesn’t have its own nuclear arsenal.
Korean Missiles called Hyunmoo 2A and 2B are both ballistic missiles, meaning they deliver multiple warheads at predetermined targets. The Hyunmoo 3 is similar in design to the U.S. Tomahawk cruise missile, but carries half the conventional payload and has half the operational range.
A Hyunmoo 3 cruise missile.
The name “Hyunmoo” in Korean means “Guardian of the Northern Sky.” Fitting for such a defensive and deterring strategy.
“The KMPR is the utmost operation concept the military can have in the absence of its own nuclear weapons,” the South Korean military source told Yonhap.
Most people will never get to experience a flight in an F-16 fighter but this awesome GoPro video gives a little taste.
Produced with footage from the 35th Fighter Squadron out of Kunsan Air Force Base in South Korea, the video shows pilots as they trained in Alaska last year. It has everything: barrel rolls, air-to-air combat, low-level flight, and live fire at a range.
The squadron was in Alaska to take part in Red Flag Alaska 15-1, a training exercise that allows pilots to sharpen their skills in the air.
“The greatest takeaway from this exercise is being able to fly with other air frames that I don’t normally get to fly with at Kunsan,” 1st Lt. Jared Tew told Air Force public affairs. “And the challenges that RF-A brings are what makes me a better pilot.”
China is at it again, starting off the first 100 days of the Biden Presidency with a number of cyberattacks aimed at shaking American businesses, local governments and even those agencies with their own interests in what happens inside the Chinese government.
The latest round of Chinese attacks on American data services was one of the most advanced hacks yet, especially in terms of the measures taken to evade detection. This time, the hackers weren’t necessarily targeting the Department of Defense or critical infrastructure, they were targeting individuals with information China would consider valuable.
A hacking group called Advanced Persistent Threat 5 (or APT5) is the culprit in the latest round of attacks according to Charles Carmakal, chief technology officer of Mandiant, a division of FireEye. FireEye has routinely aided the U.S. government in its cybersecurity efforts and has detected or thwarted a number of high-profile attacks in the past decade.
Charles Carmakal, chief technology officer of Mandiant, a division of FireEye (LinkedIn)
“This looks like classic China-based espionage,” Carmakal told the Washington Post. “There was theft of intellectual property, project data. We suspect there was data theft that occurred that we won’t ever know about.”
Though the defense department was a target of this round of hacking, a number of other U.S. government agencies were, along with some critical defense contractors. The attacks began in June of 2020 and may even be ongoing. The Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), acknowledged as much in an April 2021 alert.
This time, the flaws exploited by Chinese hackers were inside of Pulse Secure virtual private network servers (VPN) that allow remote working employees to access company servers while offsite.
Hackers also got into hardware devices near the victims’ locations, and renamed their servers to mimic those of current employees. Hiding in plain sight with a common name and the accounts of persons they just hacked is what made the intrusion so difficult to detect.
FireEye has a long history of exposing high-profile hacks from state actors. In 2015, the company discovered Chinese hackers exploiting vulnerabilities in Microsoft Word and Office applications as well as Adobe Flash Player. In 2016, it discovered a vulnerability in the Android mobile operating system that allowed hackers to access text messages and phone directories.
The cybersecurity firm was also a target of hackers itself in 2020, when state-funded hackers stole the FireEye toolkit. FireEye had to then begin to fight its own software, releasting tools to make the use of its toolkit more difficult in cyberattacks.
Tech. Sgt. Bryan Dauphinais, 103rd Communications Flight cyber transport journeyman, analyzes simulated cyberattacks during exercise Cyber Yankee at the Windsor Locks Readiness Center, Windsor Locks, Connecticut, July 30, 2020. The exercise connects Guardsmen throughout New England with state and federal agencies, and has them work alongside critical infrastructure utilities to combat simulated cyber attacks from threat actors. (U.S. Air National Guard photo by Staff Sgt. Steven Tucker)
Most importantly, FireEye detected the 2020 SolarWinds attack and reported it to the National Security Agency (NSA). The SolarWinds attack allowed hackers to breach multiple government agencies, grant themselves privileged access to their networks. This attack was allegedly conducted by hackers working for the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service, or SVR.
In response, President Biden implemented seeping sanctions on the Russian economy upon taking office. There is no word yet on retaliation against China from the Biden Administration, the White House has only commented that it was aware of the situation and was monitoring it closely.
The most recent cybersecurity breach by APT5 is the third detected attack in 2021, all suspected to have links to China’s Communist Party. One of the previous two attacks hit 30,000 Americans in small business and local government, the other targeted tech giant Microsoft.
The U.S. Navy is now recruiting enlisted servicewomen to serve on submarines in 2016.
This move will take the 2011 decision to integrate female officers into the submarine force one step further, assigning female chief petty officers and senior petty officers to co-ed crews.
Navy officers are reportedly optimistic about the transition process — even despite a video-taped shower scandal that took place aboard the USS Wyoming — one of the first subs to be assigned female officers in late 2011.
In his 38 years of service before becoming the Supreme Commander of the Allied forces during World War II, Dwight D. Eisenhower had never been in combat.
It was never his plan to avoid combat; in fact, he was considering giving up his commission because he thought he’d hit the glass ceiling of his military career. He felt like he was being held back, but in actuality, he was being groomed. In 1941, he was unproven, but he had the recommendation of great men such as Pershing, Conner, MacArthur, and Krueger, who believed he would make a good commander.
This American Heroes Channel video shows Eisenhower’s rise to the top commanding spot during World War II.
By all accounts Lucas Kinney was born and raised into a life of western privilege. His dad, Patrick Kinney, was an assistant director during the filming of blockbusters like “Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade” and “Braveheart.” Lucas’ parents got divorced when he was in the British equivalent of elementary school, and his stepdad took his mom and him to places like Saudi Arabia and Egypt where he went to the best private schools and got into theater and music.
Lucas returned to England to attend Leeds University but dropped out after a year and went to Vienna where, according to his mother, he was radicalized into Islamic extremism. Now he’s featured as an al Qaeda spokesman in an anti-ISIS video shot in Syria.
In the video Kinney demonstrates outrage at atrocities committed by ISIS fighters as well as an impressive command of Islamic terms. What makes the video even more amazing is that a few years ago he was a devout Catholic who was seriously thinking about becoming a priest.
Now Kinney’s mom, Deborah Phipps, is afraid her son is going to be killed by a drone strike ordered by British Prime Minister David Cameron. And in what could be the most warped parental matrix of all times, she told the Daily Mail, “I’m glad he’s associated with al Qaeda rather than [ISIS], but obviously I worry.”
Yeah, al Qaeda is a parent’s preference over ISIS — sort of like preferring that a kid smokes crack instead of shooting heroin.
After winding down their day at Mojave Viper, these bored Marines did what they do best (besides shooting things): Make fun of their leaders.
This Marine lance corporal made sure his brief was one worth remembering by parroting every dumb cliche from every safety, libo, and release brief ever. Check it out below, but be warned that there is a lot of profanity.
The Royal Marines apparently hold unarmed combat displays to engage with the public on “Poppy Day,” the British Commonwealth version of Memorial Day. And the display the Marines put on is pretty impressive.
This 2015 demonstration was held at the Waterloo station in London and featured four Marines fighting and a few announcing, answering crowd questions, and collecting funds for Remembrance Sunday.
The Marines showed how they could sneak up on armed guards and take them out:
It’s like being attacked by an ultra-violent spider monkey. (GIF: YouTube/Ministry of Defence)
They displayed a masterful and nuanced way to kick someone in the chest:
This probably didn’t hurt. Especially not when his head landed off the mat and on the tile. (GIF: YouTube/Ministry of Defence)
And, of course, they choked a dude out and then took a selfie with him:
Pics or it didn’t happen. (GIF: YouTube/Ministry of Defence)
See more of the Royal Marines’ awesome moves in the video below:
Answering an air support call for the first time is a gut wrenching experience, and it’s something fighter pilots will never forget. All of the flight hours and training boils down to their first life and death test, a test that will become routine on deployment. 1st Lt. Bart “Lefty” Smith describes his first time:
I mean that’s something that I heard about that people talk about, but something that you never know until you’ve actually felt it. Till you hear gunfire going off in the background over this guy’s radio, and you drop a bomb and it stops. And, he picks up and they get their stuff together and they’re like, ‘okay, we’re going to get on with the exfil.’ That’s a feeling that people have talked about, but having felt that is pretty amazing.
The video is over 14 minutes long, but the first four minutes sums up the stressful experience.
Check it out:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ayEY-wy_o-8
Now: How good are you at identifying military aircraft? Take the quiz
NASA announced its target date for the first powered, controlled helicopter flight on Mars as no earlier than April 8, 2021. The 4-pound helicopter, named Ingenuity, is attached to the belly of the Mars Perseverance rover which landed on the Red Planet on February 18, 2021. Perseverance is en route to a designated “airfield” where Ingenuity will attempt the historic flight. Upon successful deployment, Ingenuity will have 30 Martian days (equivalent to 31 Earth days) for its test flight campaign.
Engineers prep the Ingenuity helicopter for its trip to Mars (NASA)
“When NASA’s Sojourner rover landed on Mars in 1997, it proved that roving the Red Planet was possible and completely redefined our approach to how we explore Mars. Similarly, we want to learn about the potential Ingenuity has for the future of science research,” said Lori Glaze, director of NASA’s Planetary Science Division. “Aptly named, Ingenuity is a technology demonstration that aims to be the first powered flight on another world and, if successful, could further expand our horizons and broaden the scope of what is possible with Mars exploration.”
Powered, controlled flight on Mars is significantly more difficult than it is on Earth. The Red Planet’s gravitational pull is about one-third of Earth’s and its atmosphere is 1% of what Earth’s is at the surface. Additionally, the surface of the planet receives only half the amount of solar energy that the Earth receives during the day. Conversely, Martian nights can be as cold as -130°F which poses a serious danger to exposed electrical components.
Ingenuity stowed onboard the Perseverance rover on the surface of Mars (NASA)
Luckily, the engineers at NASA have designed Ingenuity specifically for the Martian skies. The helicopter had to be small and lightweight in order to hitch a ride on Perseverance. Engineers also fitted it with internal heaters to keep it from freezing during the night. To test its capabilities, Ingenuity’s systems were subjected to performance trials in vacuum chambers and test labs in NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory which simulated the conditions the helicopter would face on Mars.
“Every step we have taken since this journey began six years ago has been uncharted territory in the history of aircraft,” said Bob Balaram, JPL’s Mars Helicopter chief engineer. “And while getting deployed to the surface will be a big challenge, surviving that first night on Mars alone, without the rover protecting it and keeping it powered, will be an even bigger one.”
When Ingenuity attempts its historic flight on Mars, it will carry another piece of aviation history with it. On December 17, 1903 the first powered, controlled flight took place on Earth. On the dunes of Kill Devil Hill near Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, Orville Wright flew 120 feet in 12 seconds at the controls of Wright Flyer. He was joined by his brother, Wilbur. The Wright brothers made a total of four flights that day, each longer than the last.
Seconds into the first powered, controlled airplane flight in history by the Wright brothers (Public Domain)
A piece of the material that covered the Wright Flyer’s wing is now carried aboard Ingenuity. The small swatch of fabric is wrapped around a cable with insulative tape underneath the helicopter’s solar panel. Another piece of Wright Flyer material was carried by the Apollo 11 crew on their historic flight to the Moon in July 1969. The astronauts also brought a splinter of wood from the Wright Flyer with them.
“Ingenuity is an experimental engineering flight test – we want to see if we can fly at Mars,” said MiMi Aung, project manager for Ingenuity Mars Helicopter. “There are no science instruments onboard and no goals to obtain scientific information. We are confident that all the engineering data we want to obtain both on the surface of Mars and aloft can be done within this 30-sol window.” Stay tuned to NASA’s social media for updates on Ingenuity’s historic flight.
An illustration of the Perseverance rover and Ingenuity helicopter on Mars (NASA)
