WORD OF THE DAY: contract, der Vertrag, un contrat; pacte, el contrato, leping, договор, 合同
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NEWS & COMMENTARY
economist.com how-spies-soldiers-and-the-public-should-use-open-source-intelligence
comment-terminer-la-guerre-d-ukraine
us/americans-can-sponsor-refugees-directly-under-program-launching-this-week
Some fella named Eric at the NSA
Some guy named Zhen, in a federal prison ought be glad. Because I know a private sector solution to Enforce these Contracts
russian-troops-flee-ukraine-war-taxi
Irans-protests-are-nowhere-near-revolutionary
taiwan-kinmen-matsu-outlying-islands-china-war-risk/
putins-comments-underline-growing-russian-concern-over-jet-tank-production/
“Следующая неделя будет "танковой" для Украины! Ряд Европейских стран примут решение о передаче нам тяжёлых танков. Немецкие Leopard 2А4 и Британские Challenger 2 смогут реально повлиять на ход боевых действий. Для проведения масштабной наступательной операции ВСУ необходимо 250-300 танков, сколько мы реально сможем получить ещё не известно, но в первой партии можно рассчитывать на 50-100 танков.” Alex Moss
Train your English listening comprehension & rest your eyes: https://www.economist.com/podcasts/2023/01/17/its-going-to-be-difficult-for-either-side-to-fulfil-the-wishes-of-the-other-turkiye-and-syria-to-talk
Ukraine wants German tornados, which are being retired. Expect nothing but obstructionism. Better to be happily surprised than bitterly disappointed.
will-russia-become-an-orthodox-iran Spoiler: Yes.
Mad Vlad and the coming Russian civil war. Sparks!
james-bamford-chinese-mole-fbi-cia-spy-network-gutted This isn’t true, but who cares about the truth when it’s inconvenient? Yes, there was a Chinese spy in the FBI. No, this is NOT why the ENTIRE CIA station in China was taken out back and shot dead by the Chinese government.
russia-ukraine-analysis-former-cia-officer-rolf-mowatt-intelligence-matters
Canadian-defense-minister-announces-transfer…
russian-federation/sanctions-russia-are-working
DEUTSCH
Analysis: German foreign policy can quickly be summarized as driven by two concerns. 1) don’t start another world war, that went very badly, twice. 2) build the national economy. This second policy is largely the reflection of the urgent post-war reconstruction. Both however play into the left/right political split typical of Euro-American liberal-democracy. The German mainstream left party is deeply “in bed” with Putin. Former Chancellor (the homologue of Prime Minister) is or was on the board of directors of Gazprom and/or Rosneft, to say nothing of his — and his party’s — private inestments in those two Russian national companies. Consequently, Germany was (and is) heavily dependent on Russian petroleum & gas. This all explains German reluctance to deliver any military aid to Ukraine. I would expect and predict nothing of military use from Berlin for Ukraine, and am still surprised Germany will (supposedly…) deliver Marder personnel carriers: I predict their deliveries will be delayed and actual German equipment delivered to Ukraine will be shoddy, sub-standard, poor quality. I hope to be wrong.
hundert-kilo-drogen-bargeld-machete-razzia-zahlreichen-wohnungen-in-berlin
bnd-mitarbeiter-unter-spionage-verdacht-ist-das-putins-bayerischer-doppel-agent
Pronunciation guide to Chinese dynasties: not only uses the proper Chinese characters she also properly pronounces them including using the right tones.
Her history though incomplete is roughly accurate so far as it goes.
Pinyin X always sounds like HS or HSH in Englihs (Wade Giles got that one right). Pinyin Q sounds like KTCH. Pinyin is an internationalized alphabet (pinyin X is from Russian, pinyin Z from German, pinyin NG from English is glottal pinyin N is from French is nasal NG. Xia is pronounced HSia not Zha.
Analysis: The sad truth is of course SARS II was genetically engineered (furin spike, NO RESERVOIR ANIMAL ever found, SCRUBBED WUHAN MARKET). People and people’s with nothing to hide don’t destroy evidence, refuse to share data, refuse to allow foreign inspectors and aid workers to investigate. There were TWO cover ups: one by the local party officials in Wuhan (who had no idea they were up against a bio weapon) the other by the national leadership (Xi Jinping “calling the shots”). The first cover up could be exposed only after the conclusion of trade negotiations with the USA (senior leaders in USA exposed to risk of viral infection) and also only after the Chinese lunar New Year, which is the Chinese equivalent to Christmas. The vast internal travel which normally resulted would have killed many many more Chinese people (as we now see…) and was at least averted, but China could not realistically at this point simply cancel all international flights, and so the myth of “China deliberately infecting the world” arose, pushed mostly by falun gong religious radicals who in my opinion are sincere, well intentioned, but not entirely grounded in reality with the usual pray the cancer away and donate all in tithes to the cult. Stupidity abounds.
Why did China do such intensive bio war research? Because China suffered serious biological warfare attacks from the Japanese Empire in World War II. Of course they fear more of the same and do defensive genetic warfare research!
However, despite TWO cover ups, it was a lab leak, not an intentional attack.
Now that all the greedy crapitalists have decided to get rich rather than have a global war we can start pointing it out quite clearly, including attribution, evidence, and Chinese people who may “defect” or “confess” or support their own government by bringing out the truth that it was not an attack and thus state responsibility ought not attach. The main focus should be on prevention and cure rather than laying blame, since sadly enough more people are dying this winter. It’s not like U.S. or Russian biological or radiological warfare never leaked or impacted innocents, and those wanting revenge on China can take grim satisfaction as the destroyed Chinese economy and popular protest led to the end of zero covid and consequent tens of thousands of admitted deaths. It’s simply sad and tragic, a sub-optimal outcome resulting from fear and distrust. But “the truth will out”. Hopefully all major states will renounce gain of function research since SARS II demonstrates that even an ideal bio weapon attacks all people, indiscriminately; any efforts to target Europeans and deselect Han Chinese clearly failed.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2023/01/18/lab-leak-theory-virologist/
“Why is the omicron variant apparently less deadly than the original Wuhan strain?
Because how do I force vaccinate hundreds of millions of people in a world facing rampant effective information war. Omicron 奥秘克戎。 (Secret Mysterious Conquering Weapon=OMICRON). This is Why you study languages.
zelenskyy-writes-letter-to-invite-chinas-xi-for-dialogue
The Chinese version of this song is better.
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