Author: Graham J.

Recommended Reading (2010-02-01)

Posted by

– Australia and the UK have begun talks for collaborating on a future ship design. (via Kings of War)

– Perhaps the backlash to an overreaction works both ways? Danes have the highest casualty rate in Afghanistan of any NATO contributor, yet half of Denmark supports their continued deployment, with only one-third demanding withdrawal. Thanks to the cartoon ‘scandal’, even the socialist party supports the war. Would provoking the Islamic world into further overreaction unite the west?

– A new entente cordiale?

– How much of the al Shabab-al Qaeda merger is real? How much is to put on a public face? For al Qaeda it’s a win; it proves a continued relevance for the organization. Not entirely sure of the benefits to al Shabab…

– John Bowen on the Western fear of an Islamic invasion. Americans are blunter about it, Europeans decry its insidious nature. Again, no monolithic culture to be mindful of. Characteristics. As Bowen says, the gap is one of differing religiosity.

Outside the Box

Posted by

3

Foreign Policy just ran an article on “The World’s Most Bizarre Terror Threats.” A collection of five ‘wacky’, ‘zany’ (note: those are not actual quotes), potential terrorist threats, they’re pretty roundly dismissed by Kayvan Farzaneh. Unfortunately, a quick ruling-out of these threat vectors is not something to be taken lightly. It was said that 9/11 was “unimaginable” and that the use of commercial airliners to strike American landmarks was an inconceivable event.

Yet, Tom Clancy described such a scenario in the Jack Ryan novel Debt of Honor – which he wrote in 1994. It must have seemed pretty crazy at the time. After the conclusion of a shooting war between Japan and the United States, a disgruntled JAL pilot – whose brothers were killed during the war – crashes his 747 into the Capitol Building during a full joint session of Congress, decapitating the federal government in one fell swoop.

Continue reading →

Recommended Reading (2010-01-31) – SUNDAY Edition

Posted by

Sorry for the increasing number of pauses. I’m doing my best to keep up…

– A couple interesting videos on augmented reality, both Japanese (natch).  Good has the real-life example, the N Building in Tokyo. Kitsune Noir features an art piece called “Augmented (hyper)Reality.” Shades of Blade Runner.

– Absolutely everyone has to read The Whig Interpretation of History. If we’d all just do that, then Joshua Foust wouldn’t have to remind us that not everything historical is an appropriate allegory:

It’s bad enough that writers think it’s witty to jump from 326 B.C. to 1200 A.D. to 1842 and assume that’s all history has to offer; when they look at unrelated wars and try really hard to draw parallels, I sometimes wonder if they just hate the very concept of understanding something.

– The banality of jihad.

Continue reading →

Recommended Reading (2010-01-27)

Posted by

– With the State of the Union tonight (/tomorrow morning local time), it’s a good time to review the myth of the independent voter. And no matter what device you plan to watch on, you’ll be able to stream it here.

– Kotaku has a piece on how a cover system (as opposed to run-and-gun) has revolutionized the first-person shooter.

– Indiscriminate bigotry: Europeans hate Muslims or Jews. In America, if you hate one you hate them both.

– Finally! We get LASERS!

– As long as were talking tech, there’s finally an exoskeleton in the prototype phase.

Just Do It Yourself

Posted by

Rapidly spreading around the internet right now is Chris Anderson’s article in Wired, “Atoms Are the New Bits.” Anderson talks about the spread of small-scale garage manufacturing, thanks to the advent, miniaturization, and drastically falling prices of 3D printers and the like. Works on the level of resilience, decentralization, sustainability… a win-win for everyone.

It’s definitely got me excited for the coming microindustrial revolution (or is it an industrial microrevolution?). I may very well need to invest in a MakerBot.

A garage renaissance is spilling over into such phenomena as the booming Maker Faires and local “hackerspaces.” Peer production, open source, crowdsourcing, user-generated content — all these digital trends have begun to play out in the world of atoms, too. The Web was just the proof of concept. Now the revolution hits the real world.

In short, atoms are the new bits.

Not everyone is quite so excited. But Joel Johnson might be the only naysayer. He does have a slight point – outsourcing some manufacturing to China is nothing new. Shlok Vaidya likes it except for the emphasis on China, and has further reading for you. John Robb loves it, of course (and is even more concerned with the business implications). Bostonist is proud of local Local Motors.

I know what I want for Christmas.

On the Purpose of Armies

Posted by

Via War is Boring:

In September 2008 two Dutch army squad leaders and their soldiers refused to go out on what Radio Netherlands describes as “a risky reconnaissance patrol” in Uruzgan, Afghanistan. The platoon leader responsible for the mission was allegedly guilty of  “excessively authoritarian behavior.” “[H]e was prepared to accept fatalities on the patrol,” Radio Netherlands reports.

On the surface, this is clearly ridiculous. Deeper down, it actually stays pretty ridiculous, but nevertheless there’s an argument to be made here. I’m not going to make it, but without conscription (as is the case in Holland), the point is moot.

I know, I know – I sound precisely like a member of the “101st Chairborne.” Then again, I haven’t joined the armed forces. My point is that if you sign up for a military willingly – and I emphasize willingly – you should be equally prepared to accept the risks inherent to combat. There’s a different between a ‘risky’ mission and one that’s ‘suicidal’, and according to the reports I’ve seen, this is a clear case of the former. It’s a warzone. There are enemies out there. And that’s why you’re there.

The worst part is the assumption of universality. The squad leaders “are worried for other soldiers who may have to serve with him in the future.” One can only hope that other soldiers take themselves more seriously. And professionally. I’m trying really hard to refrain from using this to condemn the European fighting spirit in toto, but it’s certainly one more nail in the coffin of a confident, vigorous West.

Recommended Reading (2010-01-26)

Posted by

Up next: peak phosphorus

– Patrick Porter at Offshore Balancer refights World War II.

– As the state continues to hollow out (I’m officially two feet in the Robb camp), the citizenry will work to actively undermine its legitimacy, intentionally or not. We’re most like going to see examples like this of jury nullification widespread.

– Straight from the Moscow Times, 1/3 of Russian militiamen are alcoholics or psychopaths (and presumably often both).

– Fascinating story of an international criminal gang, ‘the Pink Panthers‘; a lot of jewelery heists, but not always. Playing by their own rules and using globalization as a means.

– And the absurd ROI rates found in the ‘global guerrilla’ phenomenon apply psychologically as well. Nate Silver compiled this data before, but the visual reinforces just how rare an incident on an airplane is.

Whither Arabic Science?

Posted by

It’s widespread knowledge that many scientific and mathematical fundamentals can trace their lineage to the ‘golden age’ of the Arab world. Our numeral system, refinements in geometry and astrology, and other stepping-stones on the path to modern science originated in the Middle East between the eleventh and fourteenth centuries. Of course, this period of

Austin Dacey has written an article called “The Decline of the Decline of Arabic Science,” in which he attempts to address the ‘withering’ characterization of Arab-Islamic science. According to the traditional description, the cutting-edge nature of Islamic thinkers began to peter out, until the West overtook the East by leaps and bounds. Instead, he writes, there was nothing preordaining our current state of physical knowledge.

A sort of ‘Whig interpretation‘ thus explains the Arab ‘failure’ to discover what the West eventually did. Happenstance, coincidence, and chance are the real underpinnings of modern science (and this actually begins to make even more sense when considering the chaotic behavior of sub-atomic particles and quantum mechanics). Which raises an even more intriguing question: in what other direction could science have gone?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uncertainty_principle

Recommended Reading (2010-01-22)

Posted by

Zach Galifianakis, the newest member of the New Zealand SAS

– Robert Manning calls out George Friedman for a preposterous set of predictions for a century from now. Included are such gems as a Russian breakup in 2020, a collapse of the EU, and the major global players are Poland, Turkey, and Japan. Ooph.

– Strike – Hold! has a great piece recalling the “1/21 Incident” in South Korea. I had no idea of its very existence before reading this. The infiltration route is now a park.

– The Chinese economy grew 8.7% in 2009. Either Gordon Chang is seriously wrong, or the Chinese government is getting creative with their bookkeeping.

– An interesting, if infuriating takeaway from the Massachusetts election:

In a somewhat paradoxical finding, a plurality of voters who switched to the Republican — 37 percent — said that Democrats were not being “hard enough” in challenging Republican policies.

– Foreign Affairs offers a reading list on fascism. Curiously absent: Vasily Grossman’s Life and Fate.

The Taliban: Now with 50% More Softness

Posted by

McChrystal’s population-centric counterinsurgency definitely appears to be working. Now the Taliban has adopted similar methods in order to recreate NATO’s success with the Afghan population.

A 69-point plan has been issued with restrictions and limitations on executions, prisoner-taking, the treatment of civilians, and other rules of engagement that are generally observed by the West. Definitely interesting that a long-term insurgency would start playing by the same rules as their opponent. Patrick Porter sees this as a reinvention along traditional Hamas/Hezbollah/jihadist lines.

How this might play out in the long run of course remains to be seen. Much like Americans, Afghans love a winner, but they’re much more overt about hedging their bets and backing the likely victor. That, in the end, may prove to be the most important factor of all.