August 15, 2017
Still Not Actual Content: (but better than re-runs)
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August 14, 2017
Fire and Fury Appear to Be Delayed
It looks like Kim Jong Un has blinked.
I wouldn't advise Guam to take down these posters though.
At least...
North Korea has an unknown capacity to make highly enriched uranium. We’ve long noticed that the single facility that North Korea has shown off to outsiders seems smaller than North Korea’s newly renovated capacity to mine and mill uranium; we naturally wondered where all that extra uranium is going. (My research institute thinks it might be fun to estimate how much uranium North Korea enriches based on how much it mills, if you know anyone with grant money burning a hole in her pocket.)
I do take some bittersweet satisfaction in this excerpt though...
There was a common view that the North Koreans, well, kind of sucked at making nuclear weapons. That was certainly my first impression. But there was always another possibility, one that dawned on me gradually. According to a defector account, North Korea tried to skip right toward relatively advanced nuclear weapons that were compact enough to arm ballistic missiles and made use of relatively small amounts of plutonium. That should not have been surprising; both Iraq and Pakistan similarly skipped designing and testing a more cumbersome Fat Man-style implosion device. The disappointing yields of North Korea’s first few nuclear tests were not the result of incompetence, but ambition. So, while the world was laughing at North Korea’s first few nuclear tests, they were learning — a lot.
Do note that there was a post on this very blog positing that very thing 4 years ago.
" 'cause this blog's awesome."
We're ahead of the curve!
Lets hope this trend does not continue since we're also on record as suggesting that the China-India standoff is where things are more likely to go pear shaped. There is a further complication to this mess beyond the Pakistani factor...winter is coming, which may force the issue.
A further perusal of the archives for predictions we hope to botch reveals that we've been beating the drum about DPRK and Iranian cooperation for some time. We were doing so as early as three years ago*.
It's not like there's no support for this unwelcome hypothesis, see here, here, here, here, here, here and here.
There is a report here, (PDF) that has some worrisome revelations...
The emphasis is mine. The significance is alluded to in the first Jeffery Lewis quote above. The larger point regarding Iranian involvement is worrisome enough.
A delegation of Iranian nuclear experts headed by Mohsen Fakhrizadeh- Mahabadi, director of the Iranian NW project, was covertly present at thethird NK nuclear test in February 2013. This test was apparently based – unlike the previous plutonium-core-based field tests – on an HEU (highly enriched uranium) core nuclear device (as, presumably, were the fourth and fifth nuclear tests, which took place in 2016). In 2015, information exchanges and reciprocal delegation visits reportedly took place that were aimed at the planning of nuclear warheads. These include four NK delegations that visited Iran up until June 2015, one month before the VND was completed. It may be noted that in August 2015, a new gas centrifuge hall apparently became operational in the NK main uranium enrichment facility.
IF Iran and North Korea are cooperating to the point that Iran has access to a tested bomb design, then their "breakout time" is essentialy whenever they feel like it. Uranium enrichment is a chemical and physical process, not a nuclear one, so it is much easier to conceal as Lewis alludes to in his previously mentioned article. Iran is HUGE has its own uranium supplies and there's no telling what sorts of facilities they have squirreled away in the Zargos mountains. It is after all, not like we can inspect the place.
So one day, five or so years hence Iran just might shock people...
In any event, this has the potential for their first nuclear test not be a proof of concept exercize, but a simple confirmation that their by then considerable nuclear stockpile will go "bang" when they want it to. They have centrifuges that we KNOW about. If they ran reactor grade uranium through them, they could make 25 bombs a year.
But really....how bad could that actually be?
This is another area we hope not to be prescient on. We ran the math on that question some time ago in this click-baity assesment of a potential summer blockbuster plot and realized that they only needed 30 nukes to largely knock the world into the 7th century. far less actually, since that number includes a lot of ocean and icecap.
Alternatively, they might just be able to field a sizable nuclear arsenal without warning.
While we are on the subject of things that we hope to be utterly off base on it should be noted in reference to Pakistan's numerous tactical nuclear warheads that an ISIS or Al Quaeda affiliated group getting ahold of even a very small warhead or being sold HEU by....somebody (see above), to make their own that the potential for mayhem on a continental scale is worrisome. If an EMP were to leave Europe without power, given the current ethno-political tensions there, well....that could be very bad indeed.
It still seems likely that the next use of nukes in anger will involve a conflict on the subcontinent, but there are a lot more things that we hope the blog is wrong about.
* (note that tl;dr of a post also referenced a report that the Norks had developed miniaturized nuclear warheads...one that only became widely known recently)
" 'cause this blog ROCKS!"
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August 12, 2017
THE SECOND COMING
William Butler Yeats (1865-1939)
Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: a waste of desert sand;
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Wind shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?
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August 09, 2017
"HAH!" he thought to himself, before looking around, nervously hoping no one noticed his impolitic bemusement.
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August 07, 2017
Dispatch From the Disaster Department
My sister, you may recall has recently had a hernia operation. She can't pick my nephew up, which has vexxed him quite a bit. My nephew, it should be noted has JUST learned the level 0 skill "Barely Walk". Over the weekend, he decided to express his displeasure at not being carried by somehow unlocking the level 4 skill "Flying Tackle".
Ouch.
Anyway...after much agony and mad scrambling, my sister is now back (again) from the hospital. The prognosis is inconclusive. There may be stitches loose. If things don't improve in a few days she goes back under the knife.
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August 05, 2017
Meanwhile, on the Roof of the World
For two months now, China and India have been having a tiff over a Himalayan mountain pass. This is nothing new, a good deal of the border between the two nations is disputed and the two countries fought a war in 1960 over its exact position.
Now for the second time in three years there are large numbers of troops involved. Unlike the 2014 crisis, this is complicated by a third party and the fact that the diplomatic exchanges between the two most powerful players consist mainly of ultimatums.
OK. What happened? China also claims a parts of Bhutan. India has a defense agreement with Bhutan. While the China Bhutan border dispute was being reviewed by international bodies China marched into a Bhutanese mountain pass called Doklam (which borders India and China) and began building a highway (part of their New Silk Road project). India then sent in troops (as per their agreement with Bhutan) and forcibly removed the Chinese contractors and escorting soldiers out of Bhutan. Both sides have been moving troops into the area ever since and diplomatic exchanges have gotten more heated.
While this was going on, India has been rocked by a spy scandal involving their perpetual rival (and China's ally) Pakistan. In the last few days, Pakistan has just started poking along the Indo-Pakistani border and Kashmir is heating up again which is likely further unnerving India as they send troops north to Sikhim.
China India and Pakistan are all nuclear powers.
Kyle Mizokami goes over the impact of a China India war that escalates beyond the skirmish level.
A hypothetical war between India and China would be one of the largest and most destructive conflicts in Asia. A war between the two powers would rock the Indo-Pacific region, cause thousands of casualties on both sides and take a significant toll on the global economy.* Geography and demographics would play a unique role, limiting the war’s scope and ultimately the conditions of victory.
He notes that both India and China have "no first use" policies regarding nukes. However, in war, especially with high stakes, agreements get thrown out. (Remember use of Poison gas was forbidden by the Hague Convention in 1907. Parts of France are still uninhabitable today in part because of its use between 1915 and 1918 ).
Pakistan, something of a wild card in this affair, does NOT have a no first use policy and has expressed a willingness bordering on enthusiasm for battlefield nuclear bombardment. Once nukes start popping, anything goes.
The estimated short term impact of soot from a very limited exchange between India and Pakistan (low yields and only 100 detonations) is visualized here. It's comparable to a big volcano and could affect crop yields for a year.
An exchange that went all out between China and India or just India and Pakistan would be worse of course. This doesn't even touch on the extent of fallout affecting nearby countries or the incomprehensible suffering and slaughter that will result from a couple going off over Shanghai, Delhi, Mumbai or Hyderabad.
Mizokani's piece above notes that this could turn on naval action. (Ironic given the location of the dispute). A good chunk of China's trade passes through the Indian Ocean and India has a sizable navy. Furthermore, Aridhaman and Arihant, (India' two SSBNs) would be high priority targets for China, so you'd expect the Chinese to be taking measures in that direction if things were going to get serious.
With that in mind...
Chinese ships and submarines have recently shown up in the Indian Ocean.
Other Chinese Naval assets are now at China's new Naval base in Djibouti
China just purchased the rights to a Sri-Lankan port.
While all this was happening, the U.S. Japan and India recently conducted joint naval operations incase, for whatever reason, they have to fight together.
While unlikely to actually take sides in such a fight, the U.S.N. is heavily engaged in the Arabian Sea right now...
What happens when Brahmos missiles and their Chinese equivalents start flying around the U.S. ships in the area?
Do we continue operations against ISIS?
Do we run neutrality convoys and protect the tankers coming out of the Persian Gulf?
Does the fact that three submarine cables in the Arabian Sea have gone dead in as many weeks indicate something we should be concerned about?
There's more on this situation and the strategic incentives in play for both India and China here.
In other words, control over the Doklam plateau constitutes a "win-win†for the PLA; both a knife to India’s jugular and shield to blunt its sharpest spear. With existential stakes for Delhi, and Beijing posturing growing more uncompromising by the day, there’s no end in sight to the longest standoff at the China-India border in over three decades.
Hide all the Archdukes.
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August 04, 2017
Quick Update on My Walter Mitty Lifestyle
Art sans text by Ryu Iwamitsu whose site vanished about 10 years ago.
more...
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August 03, 2017
Is This Thing On?
It looks like the blog's automatic content generator is down.
I'm blaming Russian hackers.
While we try to figure out this manual input, here is something mildly disturbing by Shibuya Nozomi (who's got a book coming out on the 25th.)
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July 24, 2017
Asking the Important Questions
Daniel Jaquet is doing it.
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July 20, 2017
48 Years On
A year before I was born, no one alive had walked on the moon.
more...
If, a few years down the road, that again comes to pass, we will have on some profound level failed as a nation and as a species.
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July 19, 2017
I Must Admit, I Wasn't Expecting This
I wonder if, over the course of the next 86 days, we'll get any more of these.
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July 18, 2017
The Odds of Broadcasts From Ross 128
...are a million to one they said.
Ross 128 is a tad under 11 light years away, and is currently the 12th closest star to Earth. There are some (as yet unconfirmed) indications of a gas giant or brown dwarf in orbit around it.
More on this peculiar transmission here.
Art minus text by Iruka
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Train-Wreck, Parody or Brilliance?
I thought this had to be parody...DC is rebooting Snagglepuss.
This time it's gonna be gritty and relevant and totally surprising because the character is gonna be (get this!)...
Who'd have thunk it!?
HIM!?
That paragon of burly, lumberjack virility?
Heavens to Murgatroyd! This development is shocking, edgy and subversive to basically nobody.
What's more, in the reboot he's gonna be a gay southern gothic playwright.
Wait...
This could be BRILLIANT!
An effete' southern dandy who, by night, stalks the streets of Savannah as a tough as nails vigilante with a bobcat or panther motif. This could actually work!
Oh wait.
Oh dear GOD...there's going to be a Suicide Squad/Bananna Splits crossover.
OK. This appears to be yet another travesty.
Hmmm... it seems that nobody has thought to bitch, moan or whine about the perpetuation of gay stereotypes yet.
Are we sure this story is not a parody?
"In this day and age, how would you know...even?"
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July 16, 2017
Just When You Thought
...things could not get any worse.
...things could not get any worse.
THIS was posted.
On purpose.
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July 15, 2017
A Journey of Discovery
Banality slouches just below the fold. As compensation, here is a piece of art that has completely different implications depending on the intended perspective.
Art by Senji of the doujin circle Tegone Spike (Link NSFW).
more...
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July 12, 2017
"Shall We Take a Train to the Moon ?"
more...
One of The Brickmuppet's Crack Team of Science Babes notes that a bullet train will take 50 days, if it's no faster than an E-6.
I honestly never thought that Galaxy Railways might intersect with plausible space development in any meaningful way.
Now you may ask yourself, "What the hell is this all about?"
Well, this...
Better than a space elevator and doable with current tech.
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July 10, 2017
Today I Learned a New Word
INCEL
Is a peculiar word in that it is a term created by a particular social identity community specifically as a moniker for themselves and yet its definition is the near opposite of what they think it means as their identifying characteristic is not as involuntary as they assume.
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July 09, 2017
THAT'S IT!!!
"That's it!"
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July 06, 2017
Status Update
Ouch.
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July 05, 2017
Good News / Bad News
Banality resides below the fold. As is traditional, we are providing you with cheesecake as compensation.
Art by Ekakibito
more...
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