Browsing: All news

George S. Patton once said he did not measure a man’s success by how high he climbed, but by how high he bounces when he hits bottom. It is the kind of line that gets stitched onto motivational posters and read at the front of locker rooms, but stripped of the gloss, it is a hard-edged claim about failure. Anyone can look impressive on the way up, Patton is saying. The real measure of a person is what they do after they have been knocked flat, humiliated, and counted out.

What makes the line worth taking seriously is that the man who said it was describing something he had lived.

…we have ligit traditions if we want them…
Every now and then I hear about some vague connection between the USAF and the liquor Jeremiah Weed.
Though the USAF is better known for its anime swords, I guess they can up their game a bit by creating some legends of their own to justify a connection to a drink.
I’d prefer Robin Olds and a bucket of champagne vibe, but I’m not USAF, so that’s up to them.

What about the U.S. Navy? Sadly, General Order 99 took the wind out of our sails a bit, but I had a thought recently.
I ran into this pic. Just get a look at these ballers.

If you wanted to buy a physical barrel of oil on the global market, it would in no way be commensurate with what the speculated, paper price of that barrel is in the West Texas futures market (which has the price of oil per barrel considerably lower than its real, physical price).

That’s strange enough for most people to wrap their heads around.

Diplomatic efforts in the Middle East continue to stall as Israel and Hezbollah continue to fight in the Southern region of Lebanon. Despite initial efforts by the U.S. to broker a ceasefire plan between the two, Hezbollah and Israel continue to attack each other, even amidst threats from Iran to resume missile attacks against Tel Aviv.

The key issue right now is that Israel is determined to create a buffer zone in Southern Lebanon, where Hezbollah currently operates, and is attempting to remove the Iranian proxies through military means.

Merkava Tank Israel.

The war with Iran is causing a global oil shortage, but there are other economic impacts that most Americans rarely think about. Reports now suggest that motor oil shortages could be on their way if a deal isn’t made soon.

According to industry groups and economists, disruptions to oil and petrochemical supply chains in the Persian Gulf risk causing shortages of some of the most widely used motor oils in the United States. Prices are already rising, and executives across the industry say the situation could worsen significantly over the summer.

The Cold War could not have ended, and the Soviet Union could not have collapsed, without literary dissidents. Nobel laureates such as Andrei Sakharov, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, and Boris Pasternak demonstrated that their literature could raise worldwide awareness of Soviet totalitarianism and help bring about change.

Why are literary dissidents so vital for political change? They first offer hope amid a bleak, dystopian political environment. They put pressure on corrupt governments. Dissidents create heroes and role models.

Developed in the early 1980s by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and Lockheed Martin, the Sea Shadow was less of a working warship prototype and more of a concept vehicle-turned-floating testbed. Engineers wanted to see whether the same radar-defeating principles employed by Lockheed designers for the US Air Force’s F-117 Nighthawk long-range stealth bomber could work when applied to warship designs.

F-117 Still Looks Amazing National Security Journal Photo. All Rights Reserved.

F-117 Nighthawk in the Air Force Museum. Image Credit: National Security Journal.

In recent times, there has been a debate over how many B-21 Raiders the U.S. should procure. Some senior Air Force officials have argued that a large number of B-21s is needed to effectively deter China, while more cautious officials have argued that increasing the fleet size could be too expensive. Recently, however, the Air Force seems to be seriously considering plans to increase its bomber fleet. Officials from Northrop Grumman recently weighed in on the matter and expressed confidence in their ability to ramp up production should the Air Force choose to expand the fleet.

The Army has a plan in place for the service to carry out executions of military prisoners on death row, if execution orders are approved by President Donald Trump, officials confirmed. 
Called “Operation Resolute Justice,” the plan directs the Army to coordinate with the Federal Bureau of Prisons to transport inmates from Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, to Federal Correctional Institution, Terre Haute, in Indiana. The plans also call for the establishment of a viewing station for witnesses. An Army official confirmed details of the plan with Task & Purpose.

Summary and Key Points: In the early days of the invasion, Ukrainian soldiers were dropping grenades through tank hatches using drones anyone could buy online. Four years later, the country builds them by the millions — and they now carry out the overwhelming majority of every successful strike against Russian forces. The transformation has rewritten the rules of the war: cheap, swarming drones now do the work once reserved for artillery, attack helicopters, and Western missiles that Ukraine could never get enough of.

How Millions Of Ukrainian Drones Have Changed the War

Tu-95.