IRAN - Iran could have enough launchers to send a salvo of medium range ballistic missiles that would overwhelm Israeli ballistic missile defense systems, according to a Wednesday report from IHS Jane’s. “Iranian television footage showed at least 26 TELs lined up in two rows for the event, which marked their purported delivery to the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) Aerospace Force, which operates the country’s ballistic missiles,” according to the report. The Shahab-3 is based on a North Korean design and is capable of striking Israel from Iranian territory.
SCOTLAND, UK - About ten years ago, a bit bored with my attempts to change the world, I decided to write a dystopian science fiction novel. The conceit of this never-to-be-written book was the complete collapse of privacy illustrated by the “supporters” that everyone was given when they had a child.
USA - As it established test plots for its genetically modified wheat, Monsanto Co (MON) imposed tight rules, such as forcing researchers to burn or ship back leftover seeds. It wasn’t enough. Almost a decade after Monsanto abandoned plans to sell a herbicide-resistant wheat variety, plants with that genetic makeup were found in an Oregon farm field, the US Department of Agriculture said this week. Inspectors are trying to determine how the strain turned up years later and how widely it may have spread. Development tests were allowed in 16 states. Scientists warn that such incidents are likely to persist...
RUSSIA - The Kremlin has upped the geopolitical ante by pledging to send a heavy aircraft carrier to the Mediterranean, as reported by Russian news agency Interfax. The carrier — named the "Admiral Kuznetsov" — is quite the beast, and word of its addition to the area of operations is just the latest in jockeying between the US and Russia. The carrier is the only one in Russia's fleet, so its deployment is an unmistakable signal of Moscow's seriousness about protecting their regional interests, some of which are directly tied to the fate of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and the Syrian port of Tartus.
MIDDLE EAST - Right now inside Syria, Hezbollah terrorist fighters – backed by the Syrian government, Iran and Lebanon – are fighting Al Qaeda, Hamas and Muslim Brotherhood terrorist fighters – backed by the US, Israel, the Eurozone, Saudi Arabia and Qatar.
USA - Systemic economic decline begets credit contraction, leading to deflation, currency wars and finally, physical war.
KUWAIT - Why should the citizens of one of the richest countries in the world take to the streets? Fed up with the paternalizing, incompetent leadership of the ruling family, a citizen's movement is waking in Kuwait, much to the fear of its neighbors in the Gulf.
VATICAN CITY - On his last full day of a troubled papacy, Benedict XVI bade farewell to his household staff lining up in the Vatican, greeting cleaners, drivers and gardeners, before stopping to exchange just a few words with a newly arrived fellow German.
UK - Internet search companies such as Google came under pressure tonight to block child pornography after a children’s charity said that the sites “fuel the fantasies” of paedophiles who then sexually assault children.
USA - Three-dimensional (3D) printers are quickly proving to be capable of creating just about anything out of little more than thin air, and that could be the military’s key to keeping an endless arsenal of drones at its disposal. Just as 3D-printed organs, pizza and even firearms are being made with the post-modern machinery, the United States military is eyeing the up-and-coming technology as a means to further their upper-hand on the battlefield. Recently, a decorated member of the US Navy made an argument for adding unmanned aerial vehicles and even munitions to the list of items that can be made with little more than a well-equipped printer and a few clicks of a mouse.
ISRAEL - Article co-written by retired generals James Cartwright and Amos Yadlin states that it would be preferable for the US, rather than Israel, to carry out an attack on Iran. A theoretical scenario for a military assault on nuclear sites in Iran by the end of this year was published on Wednesday by two former senior officers from Israel and the United States. The officers state that the international community must first exhaust non-military efforts to pressure Iran and conclude that, if an attack is necessary, it is preferable to come from America rather than Israel.
UK - Taxpayers are likely to have to pay millions towards the cost of policing the secretive Bilderberg meeting of the global elite due to gather in Hertfordshire next week. The clandestine meeting of royalty, prime ministers and business chiefs is taking place in Britain for the first time since 1998, sparking fears of "violence and disturbance" by protesters.
JAPAN - A strain of genetically modified wheat found in the United States fuelled concerns over food supplies across Asia on Thursday, with major importer Japan cancelling a tender offer to buy US grain.
CYPRUS - Following the improvised and very confused bail-in of the Cypriot banking system in mid/late March, one of the key requirements was to contain the liquidity within territorial Cyprus, and prevent the outflows of critical bank funding liabilities - ie deposits - abroad thus causing a waterfall cascade of ever increasing capital needs and bigger and better bailouts.
BEIRUT, LEBANON - Syrian President Bashar Assad said in an interview broadcast Thursday that he is "confident in victory" in his country's civil war, and he warned that Damascus would retaliate for any future Israeli airstrike on his territory. Assad also told the Lebanese TV station Al-Manar that Russia has fulfilled some of its weapons contracts recently, but he was vague on whether this included advanced S-300 air defense systems. More than 70,000 people have been killed in the 26-month-old Syrian conflict that has had increasingly sectarian overtones. Members of Syria's Sunni Muslim majority dominate the rebel ranks and Assad's regime is mostly made up of Alawites, an offshoot sect of Shiite Islam.