The radio monitoring world is nerdy rather than political, and when ideology shows up it’s almost always right-wing: crew-cutted middle-aged white guy thinking. But in general, it’s off the table.
This week, however, Monitoring Times‘ “Utility World” blog asks the interesting question: What happened on June 26?
The short version, for those who TL;DR or aren’t interested in radio geekery: the transmissions being heard indicate either an unusually large exercise, or preparations for war.
Subject: Camels, Toilets and Other Funusual Gifts from Oxfam!
FUNUSUAL?
I immediately hear Tom Jones singing “It’s not funusual to be starving in a waaaar…”
Ad banner seen on Myspace today.
o/~ do they know it’s smoke break anywaaaaaaay o/~
The Counterterrorism blog has a chilling update on Pakistan. If this and similar reports are largely true, the American people are in for a big surprise. My guess is that most of it is accurate, because similar reports keep popping up.
They’re one coup away from a nuclear-armed and unapologetically pro al Qaeda regime that could trash Afghanistan, re-start the Kashmir war with India, and provoke China into God knows what. Invading and subjugating such a nation is probably impossible and would require the cooperation of nearly the whole world.
The news from Pakistan is a Le Carré mess of garbled signals and spooky tidbits. It’s pretty clear from everything you can see that bin Laden and Omar live there and are protected, that their “tribal areas” are not in any way governed, and that Musharraf is the classic doomed dictator trying to play both sides of a losing game.
And nukes. If Seymour Hersh is to be believed, Bush Sr. just barely kept Pakistan from attacking India with nuclear weapons during a particularly bad time in those two countries’ relations. Personally I’d much rather worry about a nuclear Iran than about a place that’s barely a nation and dominated by mobs and “tribes” owning nukes and F-16s.
I wonder how much bourbon they go through in the Pentagon when they play out these scenarios.
Things just haven’t been the same since Keyzer Soze flew his book depository into the Reichstag Towers.
— torgo_x
I have more to say but it’ll take a bit of writing and I’m not sure how well it will come out.
My greatsomething grandfather Jacob arrived in the American colonies from Darmstadt-Hesse, Germany in about 1750 as an indentured servant. His brother Sebastian apparently bugged out and headed home at the end of his service, but Jacob liked it enough to stay in “Pennsylvanian Dutch” country with the other Germans. My family has had a presence in Lancaster County since, and in Ohio.
Family legend was that Jacob served in the Revolutionary War. My brother confirmed this a few years ago doing genealogy. I decided to take it a step further and contacted the National Archives’ Military Records Department. If you’re the relative of a U.S. veteran you can get anything they have, as far back as they have it, at a reasonable price. So, for $17 I requested and got Jacob’s records: the index card in his file and two pay stubs indicating his service and what he got for it. It looks like the pay was a bit late, but he got interest on it. There may have been a land donation, too. And of course, citizenship, since that’s not an issue when you’re on the startup team. Scans are below the cut, or in this flickr set.
Shot at 19th & Newport in Costa Mesa, CA today. Shiny clean trucks without anything in the bed, and big V-8s.
Saw Tom today, for the first time in more than 20 years. I went to high school with him and I think saw him once after that. In the meantime he’s had a few careers and is currently fully employed saving the world. This is a damned good thing in that the world is in need of saving and Tom is both smart and on the side of the angels.
I tried to explain some of the more recent features of our locale including Mortgage Bro ‘n’ Ho Culture, the Vanguard Nice Christian Kid Death Star Attack, and the deadly affluenza of drugs and alcohol among the Kids These Days. Not sure if I was sufficiently descriptive.
I went away with the happy feeling of having reconnected, some good stories from both of us, and a sticker that says COALITION CONVOY / STAY BACK 50 METERS / DEADLY FORCE IS AUTHORIZED in English and Arabic. I think that is going to go on the laptop. I’ll leave the rest of the storytelling to him, if he chooses to tell the stories.
On the way over there I was listening to Indie 103 (which I’m liking more and more) and it was Steve Jones’ show. It was a crazy reunion show at that because Jonesy had John Lydon on the show and they were bullshitting and laughing about the Sex Pistols days. Best quote was from Lydon: “And we were very confused, as one ought to be.”
Anyway they wrapped up the show as I was driving from the shrink’s office to meet Tom at Kéan. Just as I drove past my alma mater, all decorated with happy cheerleader girls doing the splits, the radio spat out “God Save the Queen” and I realized that this was something like my 25th anniversary of driving past that high school blasting that song on my car radio.
As Tom said, “that still works.”
A Soldier’s Declaration
I am making this statement as an act of willful defiance of military authority, because I believe that the war is being deliberately prolonged by those who have the power to end it.
I am a soldier, convinced that I am acting on behalf of soldiers. I believe that this war, upon which I entered as a war of defense and liberation, has now become a war of aggression and conquest. I believe that the purpose for which I and my fellow-soldiers entered upon this war should have been so clearly stated as to have made it impossible to change them, and that, had this been done, the objects which actuated us would now be attainable by negotiation.
I have seen and endured the sufferings of the troops, and I can no longer be a party to prolong these sufferings for ends which I believe to be evil and unjust.
I am not protesting against the conduct of the war, but against the political errors and insincerities for which the fighting men are being sacrificed. On behalf of those who are suffering now I make this protest against the deception which is being practiced on them; also I believe that I may help to destroy the callous complacence which the majority of those at home regard the continuance of agonies which they do not share, and which they have not sufficient imagination to realize.
— Siegfried Sassoon, July 1917.
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