Who rules the world now?

Noam Chomsky full length interview:

Published on 14 May 2016 - Cathy Newman's full interview with Philosopher Noam Chomsky. From Trump and Clinton, to climate change, Brexit and TPP, America's foremost intellectuals presents his views on who rules the world today.

MH17 - may cooler heads prevail :

All Parties Involved to Blame for Malaysian Aircraft Disaster in Ukraine?

Published on 19 Jul 2014 | Larry Wilkerson: Why weren't commercial flights banned over an area where aircraft had already been shot down?

Mapping Drone Proliferation: UAVs in 76 Countries

The main international agreement that controls the transfer of drones is the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR)

A new US Congress report on the proliferation of drones has confirmed a huge rise in the number of countries that now have military unmanned aerial systems.  The US Government Accountability Office (GAO) has published an unclassified version of its February 2012 report on the proliferation of UAVs.  The report examines both the proliferation of UAVs, commonly known as drones, and examines US and multilateral controls on the export of drone technology.  

The report states that between 2005  and December 2011, the number of countries that posses drones rose from 41 to 76 (see here for full list).

(Countries that have drones according to GAO report)

According to the report:

“The majority of foreign UAVs that countries have acquired fall within the tactical category. Tactical UAVs primarily conduct intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance missions and typically have a limited operational range of at most 300 kilometres. However, some more advanced varieties are capable of performing intelligence collection, targeting, or attack missions. Mini UAVs were also frequently acquired across the globe during this period.”

It should be noted that currently only the US, UK and Israel are known to have used armed UAVs.

The report goes on: “Currently, there are over 50 countries developing more than 900 different UAV systems. This growth is attributed to countries seeing the success of the United States with UAVs in Iraq and Afghanistan and deciding to invest resources into UAV development to compete economically and militarily in this emerging area.”

While the report fails to highlight the danger of growing drone proliferation to global peace and security it does emphasize the danger of drone proliferation to “US interests”.  The report states that “the use of UAVs by foreign parties to gather information on U.S. military activities has already taken place” and “the significant growth in the number of countries that have acquired UAVs, including key countries of concern, has increased the threat to the United States.”

Despite this, the report states “the U.S. government has determined that selected transfers of UAV technology support its national security interests”, thus highlighting the contradiction at the heart of current arms control measures.  ‘Private sector representatives’  told the reports authors that “UAVs are one of the most important growth sectors in the defense industry and provide significant opportunities for economic benefits if U.S. companies can remain competitive in the global UAV market.”

Table 1: US drone sales Fiscal Year 2005-2010

source here | Sept 18,2012  >>>

Aging US nuclear arsenal set for multibillion-dollar revamp.

This 28 March, 2004 composite image shows the LGM-30G Minuteman intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) (L) and the LG-118A Peacekeeper missile(R). (AFP Photo/US DOD)

Washington is set to shell out hundreds of billions of dollars over the next decade to overhaul its aging nuclear arsenal. The daunting task comes as Capitol Hill is faced with $1.2 trillion in federal budget cuts over the same period.

Despite nearly two decades of avoiding costly and politically unpopular modernizations of the American nuclear weapons complex, the Washington Post reports that plans for a full-scale overhaul of the country’s arsenal are underway.

The modernization of the US nuclear weapons complex – which includes an inventory of some 5,113 warheads, their strategic delivery systems and production facilities – has been conservatively estimated at $352 billion over the coming decade by nonpartisan think tank the Stimson Center the Post reports. However, that figure could rise, especially if the hugely vital but publicly undervalued task is put off any longer.

But in an age of asymmetrical warfare, where the Pentagon is facing massive cuts to its conventional force, spending hundreds of billions to refurbish the country’s nuclear arsenal is a tough sell as the United States remains embroiled in the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.

Further complicating matters, Congress is facing an astounding $1.2 trillion in automatic, across-the-board cuts to the federal budget over the next ten years under the highly contentious 2011 Budget Control Act (BCA).

Apart from slashing 9.4 per cent from defense discretionary funding – $54.7 billion from the Pentagon for fiscal year 2013 alone – a further 8.2 per cent cut in non-defense funding is also slated, bringing the 2013 total to $109 billion.

That Washington will be forced to cut 11.1 billion from Medicare as billions more are allocated to the nuclear arsenal could be a bitter pill for many Americans to swallow.

In fact, for fiscal year 2013, the Obama administration has already requested nearly $7.6 billion in funding – a five per cent increase from last year –  for weapons activities in the Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), which oversees the US nuclear stockpile and production complex, the Arms Control Association reported in August. Ironically, bad management, poor planning and waste on the part of the NNSA have been blamed for the exorbitant projected costs of modernization.

But the billions Obama has requested for the NNSA is only the tip of the nuclear modernization iceberg, as tens of billions will be necessary to renovate nuclear bombs and missiles, not to mention developing new technologies, replacing delivery systems and upgrading facilities.

For example, upgrading just one of the seven types of weapons in the stockpile, the B61 thermonuclear warhead, is likely to cost $10 billion over five years, the Pentagon estimates. Another $5 billion will be needed for the W78 bomb, while $4 billion will go towards the W76.

A $7 billion “life extension program” is also being proposed to keep the Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missiles safe, secure and reliable until 2020, despite plans to develop a new generation of ICBMs.

As for delivery systems, the SSBNX, a new submarine currently being developed to replace the Ohio-class ballistic missile submarines, is slated to cost a whopping $100 billion dollars, the Congressional Budget Office reports.

Up to $60 billion has also been projected for the development of an as-yet unnamed long-range penetrating bomber.

As for the facilities, renovating the buildings and laboratories connected with the nuclear production complex could cost a further $88 billion over the coming decade.

At a time when Washington is lacking in either political or financial capital to sink into the country’s nuclear weapon’s stockpile, passing the modernization buck is simply not an option.

Ironically, US President Barack Obama won the Nobel Prize in 2009 after declaring “America's commitment to seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons” to a jubilant crowd in Prague in April of that year.

Although a subsequent 2010 Nuclear Posture Review posited the United States was prepared to reduce its nuclear arsenal to 1,000 warheads or fewer, Obama’s bold dream for a nuclear-free world is no closer to materializing two years on.

Gen. James E. Cartwright, the retired vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and a former commander of the United States’ nuclear forces, proposed reducing the total arsenal to 900 warheads, with only half of them deployed at any given time.

“The world has changed, but the current arsenal carries the baggage of the Cold War,” he told The New York Times in an interview this past May.

And while the Obama administration remains unwilling or unable to determine just how large of a nuclear arsenal the US needs to achieve its strategic aims, Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney has lambasted it for signing the New START treaty with Moscow, which reduces US and Russian deployed strategic warheads and delivery systems.

Under these circumstances, the US might not get the nuclear weapons arsenal it can afford in these harrowing economic times, regardless of who takes the White House in November.

Source  here >>>

SELLING DEMOCRACY & PEACE TO THE WORLD :

US arms sales hit record levels

Published on Aug 26, 2012 by AlJazeeraEnglish : US weapons sales hit a record high in 2011, according to a congressional report. The country sold $66bn worth of arms last year, tripling the number it sold in 2010. The previous record was $31bn in 2009. The report said that the sales were driven by countries in the Gulf region, where tension centred around potential military action against Iran has been building. The biggest customer for the US arms industry was Saudi Arabia, according to the report. All in all, the US sold 78 per cent of the world's arms in 2011. Russia was a distant second, with $4.8bn in arms sales. Al Jazeera speaks to Richard Weitz, the director for the Centre for Political-Military Analysis at the Hudson Institute in Washington DC, about the significance of the latest revelations.

F-35 pilots left blind.

The ill-fated F-22 fighter jet isn’t the only aircraft that has the Pentagon scratching their head. A new report published by the US Government Accountability Office reveals that the insanely expensive F-35 plane has its fair share of problems too.

As the US Air Force tries to examine the culprit behind the dozens of reported incidents logged onboard its fleet of F-22s, its allegedly more advanced sister plane isn’t sitting too pretty either. According to the GAO’s annual report on the F-35 (pic), the future of the program pegged at costing the Pentagon more than $1.5 trillion over the next three decades is up in the air. The planes, on the other hand — well, not so much.

At the center of the controversy keeping Air Force officials scrambling for explanations is a state-of-the-art visor that is supposed to provide pilots with up-to-the-second information about the aircraft’s every move. The report says that the visor is "integral to the mission systems architecture,” which is now being jeopardized because the headgear isn’t providing pilots with the right information. The problem seems to be with the visor’s inability to counter the turbulence the planes encounter during their mission that move them at upwards of 1,200 miles-per-hour, which is instead creating an error being called “display jitter,” described as “the undesired shaking of display, making symbology unreadable.”

Since the F-35 is expected to operate in tandem with a correctly calibrated visor, these jitters aren’t just causing headaches for the pilots expected to wear them. The website Foreign Policy reports that since the system relies on working headgear, the Pentagon is now developing a replacement piece that is expected to add another $80 million to the program’s price tag, which has already exceeded the estimated cost by around $1 billion.

Although the F-35 isn’t expected to be up and running until 2018, the actual launch date might be even later. The GAO’s report reveals that the plane also has been documented to have problems with landing in tight spaces and the software that helps power it is in desperate need of an upgrade. Then there is another issue involving the craft’s tailhook, which, if corrected, might cause even more problems to arise. If redesigned, the GAO says that "other aircraft structural modifications may also be required,” skyrocketing the completion cost to even more astronomical numbers.

Amid testing of the fleet, the Air Force has already grounded around $400 billion worth of F-35 fighters no fewer than three times. Earlier this year, US Air Force Major General John F. Thompson, deputy Joint Strike Force Program executive officer, told reporters that the military vowed to see no further delays in the F-35 program that has so far been marred with mishaps. Both Britain and Australia had expressed interesting in purchasing F-35s from the Pentagon to be used in their own military, but in March asked for more time to consider the contract after the last slew of incidents had foreign air forces reconsideri

Full report RT  |  18 June, 2012

Billions spent perfecting a killing machine?

A military programme too big to fail

Uploaded by AlJazeeraEnglish on 26 Jan 2012 - The US military calls the F-35 the next generation strike aircraft. The F-35 is also the most expensive weapons program in US history.

But it is nowhere near ready.The programme, which was supposed to cost $233bn, has ballooned to an expected $383bn.

Eleven years after the launch of the F35, the military intends to conduct more test flights this year. But the current budget crunch will just put even more focus and pressure on the programme that one could say is too big to fail.

China : US hypocrisy, critical on human rights but happy to do business.

RT | 10 Dec 2010 - When it comes to human rights in China, the US talks tough but rarely takes action. But, the US is happy to do business in China.

"We are also here to remind our friends in the Chinese government that you cannot suppress the human spirit, that freedom yearns to express itself. Xie xie," Congressman Dennis Kucinich, a Democrat from Ohio, told the crowd amid applause.

But Washington's dependence on Beijing economically and its eagerness to sell billions of dollars in arms to Taiwan, Japan and South Korea highlight the US's hypocrisy when it comes to human rights.

Medea Benjamin, founder of CODEPINK and a peace activist who has worked on human rights issues in China, said successive administrations have selectively criticized human rights in China not only for moral reasons, but for defense dollars as well.

"The US military needs an enemy," Benjamin said."One of the things that the US wants to do is continue the arms trade, and selling $6 billion in arms to Taiwan is part and parcel of this fearmongerin. All that fearmongering is being used to create a stronger weapons industry."

Discussing American madness :: The Anti-American Manifesto.

'Re-distributed bailout would mean $350,000 per American'

"The Anti-American manifesto is addressing the fact that neither the Democrats nor the Republicans are able or willing to address the biggest problems facing the US today, which are the economy, the environment, healthcare and the wars," Rall told RT. "And now you have to ask yourself as an American do you want to tolerate the system that is unresponsive and not going to go anywhere or do you want to change it. The Anti-American Manifesto is not anti-American, it is anti the American government, or more specifically, this American government. We can do better and that's what I want to do."

Koreas clash :: South vs North

Korea's Clash 23/11/10 :

ComplexHoshi | November 24, 2010 - Footage of the artillery strike on the Yeonpyeong Island and the surrounding waters near the tense Yellow Sea border, with some 90 shells landing on the island

The attack resulted in the deaths of two marines and two civilians. Fifteen marines and at least three civilians were wounded.

'Koreas clash could turn into Gulf War III':

RussiaToday | November 23, 2010 - South Korea has admitted it fired artillery shells that triggered an early morning clash with North Korea. However it says it was part of a military drill and denied it was directed at the North. Earlier Seoul blamed the North for what it called an unprovoked shelling of its island. Pyongyang claimed the South had violated its maritime border during the military drills. Seoul has since threatened its neighbour with what it called 'enormous retaliation'. For more insight, RT talks to Glyn Ford, former MEP and author of 'North Korea on the Brink: Struggle for Survival'.

Koreas in border artillery clash.

The BBC's John Sudworth explains how the cross-border clash developed

South Korea says it has returned fire after North Korea fired dozens of artillery shells at one of its border islands, killing two marines.

The South's military was placed on its highest non-wartime alert after the shells landed on Yeonpyeong island.

Pyongyang accused the South of firing first. The Southern military said it had conducted exercises but shelling was directed away from the North.

This is one of the worst clashes since the Korean War ended, analysts say.

There have been occasional cross-border incidents since the conflict ended without a peace treaty in 1953, but the latest comes at a time of rising regional tension.

Continue reading the main story ::

THE MERCHANTS OF DEATH & DESTRUCTION - THE LEAGUE OF DOOM!

Top 5 arms exporters: who feels secure? Weapons piling up, enough to blow up Earth many times over rather than defend it.

The United States of America remains the largest exporter of conventional weapons in the world, according to the latest study by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). 

The U.S account for 30% of global arms sales, or about $7 billion per year, for the period 2005-2009, SIPRI statement says. From 2005 to 2009, the U.S. sold one-third of its arm exports to South Korea (15%), Israel (13%) and the United Arab Emirates (11%). The top U.S. military equipments included JDAM guided bombs and RGM-84L Harpoon-2 anti-ship missiles, delivered to South Korea, in 2008.

Read full report :


Vid below seems to conflict with latest report below: 

Saudi Arabia to do record $60 billion American arms deal

newsupload2010 | October 21, 2010