Miscellaneous And Off Topic Subjects

[Dr. Strangelove]

Trump's latest conspiracy theory about the NY Times proved so baseless that the newspaper responsible for it (the wildly pro-Trump Washington Examiner) had to completely retract and rewrite its article.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/06/21/trumps-latest-accusation-media-fbi-collusion-is-flimsy/

[Jeff Buchanan]

On our boys "dreaming of defending the Straights of Hormuz" ....... actually, I come from view that 2 year mandatory military service could benefit American society. But it will never happen and probably shouldn't for a lot of good reasons. It's not 1950 anymore. In the proximate years after WWII, patriotism ran high and conscription was a minor nuisance for high school graduates. Some embraced military service, did their 2 years and went on to get jobs or go back to school, often on generous VA benefits. That was then. During the Vietnam war the draft, the prospect of having to participate in it, drastically altered society's perception of universal conscription. So, end of story. I'd rather see the nation's youth learning the value of discipline and physical fitness in the military than learning how to play video games, text on their phones and hang out.

On the two stories emerging after the drone shoot down. Frankly, I think there is as good of a chance that the drone shoot down and the events following it were scripted as they were the result of a bumbling CIC being advised by an equally stupid inner circle. The press has been littered with this post events take so, it must be true as illusions are created by repeating an interpretation of events without basis of fact.

Look, it frustrates me that commentators on TV, without any knowledge or experience with military operations, the chain of command and how orders come down it, come to conclusions such as, "that the president pulled back from strikes that had been ordered and were enroute to the target demonstrates a shocking level of confusion and miscommunication at a very high level."....... "the fact that the president is actually tweeting about the decision making process is bizarre (implies stupidly disclosing high level decision making process); never done by a previous president" ...... "that the president made the decision to abort the strikes in response to a late question he asked about how many people would die runs contrary to what normally happens when the president is briefed on options. There is always a collateral damage assessment given with each option."

These kinds of statements are wild speculation yet they are turned into fact based observations that are intended to paint the picture of a WH and executive, mainly the president himself, confused and in disarray - the standard line that because it has been repeated since Trump took office must be the correct one. I don't know if it is or isn't. But I damn sure know in the context of what goes on in the Situation Room of the WH when there is an attack on the US or it's interests globally, what kind of information is available to him, who gives them and how the president is given options, what kind of interchange takes place across the table where members of the NSC sit, how orders come down and elements tasked with executing them do so. Aside from actually sitting in the Situation Room, I know and understand the role of the players and how all the other stuff happens.

Despite claims to the contrary, in my experience, this entire process is pretty damn well organized. IMO, how events are being framed by the WH may not reflect what actually happened at all. In fact I'm certain it does not reflect the whole story with absolute accuracy ..... and there is a reason for that. So, haters can guffaw about this all they want to as I'm certain the notion that Trump is an idiot and he is surrounded by idiots advising him resonates. And to be clear, as in most depictions of events after the fact, there are plenty of versions. I'm not claiming my depiction of them is absolutely the only correct one but rather, I'm advocating to be aware of the reality that those providing these various depictions usually have an underlying motive or agenda and as such they may not perfectly reflect reality. In this case, it goes both ways.

[Ghengis Jon]

Conservative group to launch attack ads against Biden during the debates, as JB is perceived as Trump's greatest re-election threat. Don't they realize that if they label Biden as a racist, they risk syphoning away a large segment of Trump's base?

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-biden/u-s-conservative-group-to-launch-attack-ads-against-biden-during-democratic-debate-idUSKCN1TN08S

[froot loops]

[froot loops]

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[Jeff Buchanan]

We learned today from a Trump statement that there was a "manned aircraft with 35 people aboard that Iran chose not to shoot down." ....... "A very wise choice .... we appreciate that," he said.

Good chance it was an EC135, the USAF's venerable SIGINT and COMINT collection platform. I'm sticking with my interpretation of events that this entire operation was some kind of probe or the EC135 would not have been in the air and around the drone, initially identified as an MQ-4C Triton version but later confirmed by US CENTCOM that it was a (BAMS-D) a prototype version of the RQ-4A drone built for the USN. It matters because the pay-loads are different. BAMS-D (Broad Area Maritime Surveillance) versions don't have the SIGINT package (and would not have had a COMINT package), just a bunch of radar sensors, some cameras and different types of radars.

A typical probe operation would involve taking photographs of potential targets while hoping those targets will light up with their acquisition and target tracking radars along with activating command and control data and encrypted voice links. It's a troll but you'd not expect the military units/sites that are being surveilled are going to shoot down the drone. They could though ......and Iran did. The US script that followed actually was framed as it was allowing public (me) interpretation of the actual events and what it means. Here's my take:

First, it was something more than a routine surveillance mission for Golden Hawk otherwise the Iranians would not have engaged as they'd probably been watching these kinds of surveillance flights for at least a few months. Surveilling a potential adversary in anticipation of a shooting war is usually a prelude to it so, it's an escalation that the Trump administration authorized US CENTCOM to undertake. Orders to carry it out went down the chain from there. Planners planed, maintainers maintained and aircrews prepared.

I suspect that incursion into Iranian airspace was purposeful although denied by the US. It appears to me Iran got the wreckage or at least it looked like they did. They've released a video showing it. A water landing of the debris seems unlikely and it probably wouldn't have floated making recovery difficult. So, the drone was either heading for or turning toward the Iranian coastline before it was shot down such that after it was hit, the trajectory of the wreckage carried it over land.

Typically, the way an engagement by a SAM battery of a possible airborne threat goes down, is like this: a low frequency surveillance radar at a different location from the missile battery site picks up the threat. A human evaluation of the target is undertaken and usually per protocol the next sequence in the engagement starts. There's a period of observation - where is the threat headed? The Iranians say they used radio transmissions to alert what they thought was a threat - if they actually did this, it might mean they didn't yet know it was a drone. There are rules of engagement and these are applied by humans at a Command and Control level facility also not at the same site as the surveillance radar or the missile site. All these units - surveillance, early warning radars, C&C units and the missile batteries themselves - are linked by data and voice systems. All these signals, radar, data and voice, can be monitored by an EC135 and analysts aboard know exactly how to interpret them.

I doubt the Iranians knew the target they were watching was a drone. If they did, they have some sophisticated intel capability at their disposal. OTH, the Russians, who are always on station around US ships, airfields and ports, may have had the capability to determine what the target was and passed it to the Iranians. The drone and EC135 operating together would have been able to piece all this together, importantly gathering a whole bunch of useful intel. The public isn't going to be privy to any of this and it's why I have such a hard time listening to know nothings in the press speculate about it. I know something about this shit so ......

Let's say that the Iranians didn't know the target they were tracking was a surveillance drone. For all they knew it could have been an armed, manned aircraft or it could have been an armed, unmanned drone. Their rules of engagement might call for an engagement if the hostile target turns toward the coast (I would speculate that was the case here). If that happens the C&C unit commander will authorize the missile battery by voice or data link, to acquire the target. The battery's acquisition radar pops up and if the threat continues to be evaluated as such (by the C&C commander who's following this), the fire control radar pops up. A data link or voice signal, cleared to engage comes from the C&C commander. There are likely fail-safe provisions here. No clue what those are. At this point, EC135 analysts listening to all this know the drone is a target and is likely to be engaged. The final proof that the drone is going to get hit (assuming everything is working at the missile battery properly and the missile get's off the launch rails) is the homing signals (IR or RF) pop up from the now airborne missile's internal guidance system. Boom. All this happens quickly but it occurs in identifiable sequences with identifiable RF signals, radar, data links and voice (if present) associated with each of them.

Now, the series of enemy electronic signals in this singular engagement can be disrupted in any number of ways to make it harder for the bad guys to have a successful shoot down. None of the possible electronic warfare options appear to have been undertaken..... at least to protect the drone. Can't say if steps were taken to protect the EC135. Doubt if they were necessary because they probably weren't a target and were somewhere else out of the missile battery's acquisition radar's window. At least we don't know if they were a target. Seems unlikely. Something else of note The Golden Hawk is a high altitude drone. If the drone had been operating at an altitude that intelligence sources believed the Iranians didn't have the capability to shoot that high, that the drone was downed just compromised that capability although at a pretty high cost to the US - about $220m.

So how does the word of the shoot down get to the president? ....... again, unless you as a speculator have some intimate knowledge of how this goes down, and I do, or, at least I used to know and I doubt it's changed much, they should STFU. Of course they don't and we get fantasy made to sound like fact. Here's what I think probably happens: The on-scene commander was informed of the shoot down in less than 30 seconds and according to the level of his authority to initiate local action in response to it he either acts or pushes it up the chain. In this case I suspect the ROI denied the authority for the local commander to carry out a strike but you can bet he could prepare for one and new exactly which targets were on his authorized target list. On the local commander's orders, units on alert (another discussion) moved on to some higher alert level, possibly even getting loaded out with appropriate armaments, getting airborne, going into a holding pattern, ready to get clearance to carry out a strike on pre-planned targets once there are orders to execute them. Pilots have already planned for their targets, probably even flying them in a simulator weeks to months ahead of an anticipated launch (another discussion but the simulations are very realistic with regard to terrain, buildings, target locations and so forth). These days, not in my time, there's an airborne commander flying around in an E8 (another oldie, the venerable B707) using JSTARS for battle management. I can't say how all this works but it supposedly connects every thing and everybody allowing real time management of aircraft and targets.

With regard to passing information, there is strict protocol on how this works, who gets that information and the level of classification assigned to it. Initially, the shoot down report in the form of a military SITREP was compartmentalized and the NSC got that in less than an hour (maybe faster these days), option planning started, the NSC meets with the president in the WH situation room. Trump, once in the WH Situation Room, would have known most of what was in the SITREP within an hour of the shoot down, maybe much sooner. He gets his response options, there's a discussion among NSC members, questions are asked and the president decides. This strict protocol is there for a purpose - get it right the first time. It is for this reason that speculation that the president didn't know what potential collateral damage for each option would be or that he wasn't paying attention is laughable. He knew. How he elected to depict how he knew was meant to obscure how he knew thus preventing disclosure of the decision making process in such matters. Anyway, then orders go back down the chain to the waiting pilots who may or may not already be airborne (and under control of the local commander in the E8 JSTARS). If they were airborne and news of that was leaked, that's how we get reporting that the president cancelled the strike after it was underway. That demonstrates a lack of understanding of what I've presented to you here but didn't stop reporters from implying that the president launched the attack, then panicked and called it back. Utter fantasy. Paralleling that, the shoot down SITREP slides down the classification ladder to where parts of the SITREP could be released to a distribution list. That occurred in a matter of several hours culminating in an official statement from Pompeo who already knew what went down hours before because he sits on the NSC.

Enough!!!!

[froot loops]

Your boy Trump is part of the problem, he is painting a scenario that sounds different than what you are describing. He is the problem here. He is painting himself as the hero of the story where he gets the casualty estimates 10 minutes before and calls it off. I have no doubt of your familiarity with the chain of command, but part of the reason why McMaster was shown the door is Trump hated the formal stuff you speak of. There's numerous reports on how he doesn't read the briefs and wants the information brief to fit on a single page. All that stuff you speak of requires the president to buy into that, but if he doesn't the formalities that are mean to be guard rails are not going to be the same.

[Dr. Strangelove]

DOJ lawyer attempting to explain how detaining migrant children for weeks at a time with little adult supervision, no soap & toothbrushes, and having them sleep on concrete floors, still lives up to their requirement that they provide 'safe and sanitary" conditions. Part of the argument is that "safe and sanitary" is "so vague" that it should be left solely to the CBP to determine what it means. And in their determination soap is not something needed to be 'sanitary'.

Should point out if it's not clear for some, but this is ON APPEAL. One judge already ruled against the CBP, in this case that started under Obama. They were ordered to start providing soap and the CBP/DOJ said "hell no"

[Jeff Buchanan]

Well, you are right. I can't say I know how Trump might have changed things. I also tend to agree with you that "Trump may be part of the problem".........However, you are implying in this statement that, "he is painting a scenario that sounds different than what you are describing." .... and the one he is describing reveals he is a boob. Maybe, maybe not.

In the maybe not side of things (which we hear little of in the press, much more of the maybe he is a boob, hopefully confirming he actually is), there are a couple of things in the command and control realm that you never want to give an adversary insight into. One of them is how information gets to a decider at whatever level that decider is operating at. The other is how the decider decides - the process. None of us, and especially the press who is actively looking for a story that makes Trump look stupid and confused, knows either of those two things with any degree of certainty. I admit, I don't know how Trump gets information or decides but I have a pretty good idea having been a part of those processes not at the presidential or NSC level but at the CENTCOM level. I served as what's called a "Watch Officer." During my duty hours, I was responsible for reviewing message traffic - and I had security clearances to read all of it, including whatever came over so called "encrypted hot lines." My responsibility was to get the information into the proper channel and alert decision makers at my level (CENTCOM) as appropriate. To do my job I had to know a lot about how the entire system of command and control worked.

So, like I said, I have a pretty good idea of how the communications on the military side should have worked and probably did. The rest is mere speculation and I continue to hold my interpretation of things is just as likely to be accurate as the press's. My gripe is that my interpretation of things that paints the president in a much different light, rarely get mentioned.

[froot loops]

[Ghengis Jon]

Wow. Former Navy admiral and Harvard doctorate Joe Sestak becomes the 25th Dem to toss his hat into the ring. The 3 three ring circus that was the '16 GOP is being dwarfed by a fast approaching 6 ring.

[Dr. Strangelove]

[Dr. Strangelove]

[Jeff Buchanan]

While the press rages on about the incompetence of the president and his advisers with stark warnings that this boob of a president and his advisers are leading the nation to an unwinnable war with Iran. More entanglements in the ME will ensue. What isn't getting any wide coverage is the impact of international sanctions on Iran's leadership.

Let's not forget Iran has been since 1979 an enemy of the US. Constant muttering of such threats as death to America and the recent language by Iran's military that threatens international shipping and US naval operations in and around the gulf to keep shipping lanes open aren't signs of a nation that wants to become a part of the international order. Put this reality in the context of the administration's stated goals with respect to Iran - no nuclear weapons - and it's hard to understand the media's obsession with creating the illusion of an administration confused, incoherent and unreliable.

What's the problem here? The message to Iran is crystal clear. State has publicly and unmistakably articulated what's expected of the Mullahs (the 12 Points). This predictably gets dismissed as unrealistic as a demand to negotiate with a knife to Iran's throat. Well, never mind that Iran has been fucking with the US and it's interests in the ME since they held fifty-two American diplomats and citizens for 444 days from November 4, 1979, to January 20, 1981. Since then, Iran has attempted to spread it's influence and governance via Islamic fundamentalist principals unremittingly, frequently threatening Israel with destruction and creating instability in the region through it's proxy forces.

So, give me a break. Get real about the threat Iran presents as a nuclear power in the ME. The sleazy group currently holding power there is the unreliable party. Give them a break and they will take it as is pretty obvious to unbiased observers during the proximate years following the signing of the JCPOA in 2015. This is not a treaty where signatories agree to comply with it's provisions. The entire story of this thing, the JCPOA, is immensely complicated. So is the after math up until the present.

The bottom line, IMO, is that Iran didn't agree to anything in 2015. The Trump administration has recognized this and In 2019, Trump refused to "re-certify" the agreement - another immensely complicated debate about why he wouldn't. Instead the press characterized it as a bumbling and provocative move that blows up the result of years of painstaking negotiations by the Obama administration with Iran to prevent if from developing a nuclear weapon. Well, open your fucking eyes people. Under the JCPOA that is exactly what Iran continued to do and there is ample evidence, most of it from the Israeli's, that is exactly what has happened.

So, let's back up and in the context of what I just wrote above and look at how the Trump administration has acted. Sanctions backed up by the potential for the use of military force if Iran continues to defy the international community's demand that it not pursue the development of nuclear weapons. What does Iran do? Gives the world the finger. So, yeah, we're just supposed to go, "OK, we don't want to get entangled in the ME," while the press mocks this administration's efforts to do something about Iran's fuck-off world posture.

Let's be honest here. The sanctions are working. Like every authoritarian Islamic theocracy, it promises wonderful re-distributive policies to the "downtrodden" who have suffered under whatever past governments, characterized as thieves of the nation's riches, brought to them. Non-sense. The Mullahs, who rap themselves in the writings of the Koran, horribly twisting those words to their benefit, are nothing more than the state's thieves they claimed to be ridding Iran of. Whatever.

Truth be told, the Mullah's are in trouble and know they are. Their economy, the one they rely on to pay for their social programs, isn't doing the job and the steps they are taking to allow it to sustain itself in the face of sanctions aren't working. https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/op...113442336.html. The people they pledged to bring improvements in their lives to are restless doubting the now seen as empty promises of the Islamic theocracy. This is nothing new as all socialist forms of government, including authoritarian Islamic theocracies, ultimately collapse on themselves. The Trump administration is just, correctly, IMO, hastening the fall of these fucks. Get with the program people.

[Ghengis Jon]

Waaaaaa. My donors need more corporate welfare! They deserve free money! Companies are suffering from high stock valuations, high productivity, large profits, steady growth - are you blind to their suffering?!?