Bernanke Ponzi Scheme to Collapse U.S. Dollar

Prophecy Of Judgment Coming to Australia - Prophet Dr. Owuor

Putin: I envy Obama, because he can 'spy' and get away with it

"I envy Obama because he can spy on his allies without any consequences," said Putin when asked about how his relations had changed with the US following Snowden’s espionage revelations.

During an annual question-and-answer session with journalists, Putin praised Edward Snowden’s actions, saying that he was working for a “noble cause.” At the same time he accepted the importance of espionage programs in the fight against global terrorism, but said the NSA needed guidelines to limit its powers.

“There is nothing to be upset about and nothing to be proud of, spying has always been and is one of the oldest professions,” said Putin.

Referring to the vast amounts of metadata gathered on citizens by the NSA, Putin said it is impossible to sift through all of that information. It is “useless” to look at the analysis of spy agencies because it is the opinion of analysts and not facts and as such can be misleading.

“You need to know the people who analyze them, I know, I did it,” said Putin, harking back to his career as a KGB agent.

The Russian president described Snowden as a “curious character” and said it was not clear why the former CIA contractor had decided to blow the whistle on the NSA’s international espionage program at such a young age.

Russia is not working with Snowden and has not received classified documents from him, Putin said. The whistleblower has been allowed to reside in Russia but only on the condition he does not “engage in anti-American propaganda.”

Snowden fled to Russia from Hong Kong back in June after leaking a trove of classified information on Washington’s espionage activities. He disseminated the documents to international media outlets who published them in articles blowing the whistle on the NSA’s espionage activities.

The spy revelations triggered massive diplomatic backlash and have had an adverse effect on the Obama administration’s foreign policy. Europe in particular reacted angrily after it was found that the NSA had been monitoring high-ranking political figures, including German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

The European Parliament’s Committee on Civil Liberties and Home Affairs met Wednesday to discuss what action the EU should take in the wake of the spy revelations. Glenn Greenwald, the former Guardian journalist renowned for publishing Edward Snowden’s leaks, testified at the meeting. Greenwald claimed that the NSA’s activities had nothing to do with the fight against terrorism and are instead aimed at the elimination of privacy worldwide.

“What a lot of this spying is about has nothing to do with terrorism and national security. That is the pretext. It is about diplomatic manipulation and economic advantage,” said Greenwald.

In the wake of the spy scandal Washington has defended the NSA, saying their work has foiled over 50 terror plots in the US and EU.

RT

Companies Racing To Develop Biometric ‘Smart ID’ Systems

A new ‘Smart ID’ card, BluStor, aims to “eliminate hacking and identity theft” – using a combination of voiceprints, fingerprints and iris readings and connecting to mobile devices via Bluetooth, so an app can confirm a user’s ID instantly.

The card stores biometric details for users, and connects to BluStor’s Secure Mobile Briefcase app, which checks fingerprints, iris scans or voiceprints against the ones stored on the card, according to a report by Biometric Update.

“That input is compared with the user’s biometric files stored on the BluStor card. If the offered biometric does not match the stored file, the SMB remains locked,” the company says. The app can be used to lock devices entirely, or to lock folders of sensitive data. It can also be used as an entry system, an ID card, or to store medical files, the company says.

The app works on both Android and iOS, and will be available for testing in Spring 2014. The full version will launch in Fall 2014.

The card connects to nearby devices via Bluetooth 4.0, and stores up to 8GB of data – the U.S. government has already expressed interest in using the cards for storing medical data, BluStor claims, and a Middle Eastern country is interested in using the system for national ID cards.

BluStor also sugggests that the cards could be used for remote employee authentication – allowing home workers to access sensitive data freely. The cards also have room for file storage for email, medical records or work files.

Technology Tell said in its report, “The BluStor Secure Mobile Briefcase idea is pretty genius, and it also has widespread application across quite a number of fields and industries. But most importantly, it provides consumers with a way to secure their mobile devices without the use of a pin or password.”

The high-capacity cards allow the biometric details of a user to be stored in full on the card, and are encrypted with high-grade AES encryption. BluStor claims it is “virtually impossible for a hacker to gain access to a user’s device.”

The card is the brainchild of Finis Conner, a serial entrepreneur who launched Seagate in 1979, and launched the first 5.25-inch drives for Mac computers, “About two years ago, there was a combination of technologies that had arrived primarily to service the mobile device market, and that was in the form of Bluetooth 4.0 high-performance low-power devices, ultra-thin polymer batteries,” he told Biometric Update. “ I pulled my guys together again and we designed a solution, which is the BluStor platform.”

Biometric ID has become a hot topic this year, after Apple’s adoption of a fingerprint reader on its iPhone 5S, and as cloud services require users to memorise more and more passwords. Last week, Ericsson, the world’s largest mobile network company, predicted that the technology would be “mainstream” in 2014.

ESET Security Researcher Stephen Cobb says, “Successful implementation of biometrics in a segment leading product could bode well for consumer acceptance. I have been a fan of biometrics as an added authentication factor ever since I first researched multi-factor and 2FA systems 20 years ago.”

Credit to Welivesecurity

Watcha Gonna Do When They Come For You?

Are you ready for the coming tyrannical crackdown and the complete evisceration of our constitutional liberties? Have you taken the proper precautions that will ensure the safety of you and your family? It is not likely that very many of us have taken the any meaningful steps to maximize our chances for survival in what will prove to be humanity’s darkest days. Will it be possible to avoid detection and prevent yourself from being taken into custody?

When the DHS bus rolls into your neighborhood, are you prepared to deal with what lies ahead? Let’s assume for a second that Obama attempts a third false flag in the past several months and is successful. Subsequently, martial law is fully declared. I have always said that the order of things to come will be false flag events, followed by martial law and culminating in WWIII.

Phase One: Preemptively Removing Dissident Leaders

Using history as an example, if a martial law government determined that the population might rise up, it would be prudent to remove the potential dissident leaders. The Gestapo and the KGB employed the same tactics in which they would arrive at a residence at 3AM, initiate a forced entry into a home, move to quickly gag and bound the family, quickly usher them out to a waiting vehicle and quickly transport the targets to a remote location for final disposition.

How do you know if you are a potential target for immediate elimination once martial law is declared? The short answer is that you cannot be certain. Former NSA agent, the late A.C. Griffith stated that we are all assigned a threat matrix score and categorized on the NSA’s ability to track your movements, rate your web surfing habits, track your proximity to other known dissidents through cell phone movement matching and quantitatively and qualitatively monitor your electronic communications. Everyone of us has a threat matrix score which is assigned by the NSA. What we do not know is how we compare to everyone else and what will be the cutoff point which would increase the danger for some. Certainly, former military leaders who have been shown the door by Obama are at extreme risk because of their potential to organize guerrilla forces. Key members of the alternative media would be another primary target as well those people who would immediately fill an opposition leadership role after the removal of the original opposition leaders.

For the people taken in this matter, along with their families, the survival rate will be very low. For those dissidents who manage to avoid being taken in the initial purge, your facial image will be uploaded to every traffic and security camera plugged into the NSA system. Detection and arrest will be short-lived except for those who have help or are located in very remote areas.

Phase Two: Mass Roundups

If you are unlucky enough to be located in an area to be considered to have the potential to mount a resistance against the unfolding tyranny (e.g. high number of registered gun owners, high number of veterans, Tea Party members, etc.), mass round ups will be conducted.

In what form will the roundups take place? This is an easy answer. In the aftermath of the Boston Marathon Bombings, martial law troops invaded Boston and provided us with the DHS version of roundups. The DHS oppressors came in the early morning hours. The perimeter of a city block was sealed off by ground troops and an armored personnel carrier. A dozen, or so, storm troopers would approach a house and empty the house of its inhabitants without allowing any time to change or the opportunity to bring any personal items. The troops would start on opposite sides of the street with one group working a north-south directional seizure of residents, while the other group would work in the opposite direction. Therefore, if anyone attempted to run, they would be pushed toward the other group of soldiers coming in the opposite direction. This happened over and over again in Boston. The arresting troops were supported by a heavily armed personnel carrier.

Disposition of Family Members

Your family members will be separated by the authorities as a prelude to sending you to their detention facilities, and that means that men will go to one facility, and women will go to another. Children will have their own facility awaiting them as well. Remember, the state owns your children and they have declared so in their Agenda 21 documents.  In all likelihood, this will mark the last time you will ever see your family. How do I know this? Read the Rex 84 documents. The government tells you in plain language what they plan to do with you and your family.

Men, women and children will be taken from their homes to temporary holding facilities. All three groups will be separated, processed and sent to by rail or by bus to more permanent holding facilities.

The NDAA gives the authority for the President to arrest and detain as many people as he deems necessary without due process of law. This act allows for mass arrests and deportations to prison camps. When Obama signed this unconstitutional legislation, do you really think the government was never going to act upon this self-granted brand of tyranny?

 Executive Order 13603 and the Civilian Inmate Labor  Program gives the President the authority to incarcerate and conscript individuals into labor brigades in which they will be forced to work in slave labor units. Hitler did this in many of the death camps in which the inmates performed slave labor while they were being systematically starved to death. And where did Hitler get these wonderful ideas? He got the death camp ideas from the government’s treatment of Native Americans in what I call the ultimate Karma slap in the face, resulting from our past bad acts, as a nation. 

Again, can anyone present an alternative interpretation that makes any sense with regard to cumulative potential for the enactment of REX 84, the NDAA, EO 13630 and the Civilian Inmate Labor Program? Everyone of these documents, and several other government documents, speaks to the intent to mass arrest many Americans, enslave and eventually exterminate them. Before you roll your eyes and write to me in a spirit of denial telling me how crazy I am and how I am fear mongering (i.e. neurolinguistic term designed to discredit the evidence of a conspiracy), read each and every document, take notes and you will soon realize that you are watching the unfolding of something worse than what Stalin did to his people. And with the NSA surveillance spy grid, the American version of tyranny will be much more virulent than any other in human history.

Conclusion

There are only three ways that you can avoid being taken: (1) Be so remotely located that nobody would bother to look for you. However, you would have to be in place when the roundups started because the exits routes would be closed when the roundups begin; (2) Have friends hide you out. Yet, your friends and acquaintances are already known to the NSA; and, (3) Emigrate to a foreign country. Again, you would have to be in place at the time the roundups commenced in your area.

As an aside, I had a dream the other night that has caused me much anxiety. I dreamed that my family had relocated to Norway. One night, we were listening to the radio and heard about the civil war in America. We felt relieved until we heard that the UN troops were in our town looking for any Americans. I don’t necessarily believe in prophetic dreams, however, I do think Americans are going to be hunted down, particularly Christian Americans.

The next part in this series will examine what conditions will be like if we are taken and what would be our odds for survival?

Credit to The Common Sense

REPLACING THE AMERICAN DREAM WITH THE CHINA DREAM

By Paul McGuire

China is now the third nation to successfully complete a Lunar rover mission after the United States and the then-Soviet Union. China plans to establish a permanent space station by 2020 and then send a man to the Moon. China’s moon mission is viewed as a symbol of the nation’s rise as a global economic and military superpower, and while China reaches for the stars and Moon, it continues to grow its economy. 

Conversely, America is being systematically degraded from within by very powerful forces. The NASA space program has been crippled by budget cuts; our economy is intentionally being destroyed; and our military is being weakened. In addition, the American people and specifically the middle class, who built this nation, are being subjected to a psy ops program which seems intent on destroying America’s “can do” attitude, free enterprise, marriage, family and Judeo-Christian values.

TheLunar journey "once again lights up the China Dream," said a Xinhua editorial citing President Xi Jinping's slogan for Chinese advancement, but whilethe “China Dream” is being lit up, the American Dream has been exiled to the Gulags of an Orwellian State. The headline in Hong Kong’s Sunday Morning Post read “One Giant Leap for China,” which is a twist on the 1969 words of American Astronaut Neil Armstrong, the first man to walk on the Moon, who said “That's one small step for a man, one giant leap for Mankind.” Notice that even back then America was being programmed to see itself as part of a global community. There was no statement reflecting pride in the achievement of America. Yet China is openly boasting of “One Giant Leap for China” and the “China Dream,” while Americans are being brainwashed into thinking the American dream is evil.

China did not become an economic and military super power by accident. After the Communist Revolution in China, led by Chairman Mao, Rockefeller, Kissinger, Nixon and other member of America’s ruling elite made plans to transform China into the most powerful nation on Earth. Rockefeller praised China and especially its ability to control its people through a totalitarian state. This Council on Foreign Relations global elite wanted to transform America into China’s image because they do not believe in the inalienable rights given to us by our Creator. 

They believe themselves to be a kind of collective Creator, a Scientific Elite who have given themselves the right to rule our world with a pyramidal Illuminati god-king organizational structure. As such, they planned to reduce the economic and military power of America by installing a series of Presidents from both the Republican and Democratic parties along with a Congress that would impose Alive Toffler’s “Third Way” synthesis of Marxism and Capitalism upon America. One of the early champions of this “Third Way” was Newt Gingrich who was instrumental in selling America down the river through NAFTA, GATT and the North America Union.

The American Dream has always been a problem for the Illuminati globalists who run our world. The reason for this is that the American Dream was birthed from the Bible, which taught that Mankind’s rights come from the Creator and not the State. In addition, this Creator gives every man the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. The Illuminati Dream is derived from Plato’s concept of philosopher-kings, which wasinspired by his knowledge of Atlantis, which was ruled by ten god-kings. It is from Plato that the Illuminati developed their concept of a society ruled by a Scientific Elite, and this is the model for Chinese, Russian, and now American-style Central Planning-type governance. The “China Dream” is the dream the global elite want implemented, and so they must destroy the American Dream.

One of the ways the America Dream is destroyed is by destroying the belief that the average man can achieve his own dream if he works hard. Through Presidents like John F. Kennedy, the NASA space program embodied the essence of that dream, which was reach for the stars. Whatever the internal flaws of NASA, the NASA space program inspired millions of people to believe in Mankind’s ability to create a future worth living in. Today, that message is being destroyed with everything through Illuminati music videos, educational suppression of the right brain, and indoctrination in the slave-mentality ideologies of class warfare.

The America Dream was brought here by the Pilgrims and the Puritans who held the Biblical belief that Mankind originated in Eden where Adam and Eve were given rulership over Paradise. This is in complete contrast to the Pharaoh god-king model of a pyramidal society where the masses are forced to toil as slaves. 

The Pilgrims and Puritans also believed that men and women were created in the image of God and are not the product of random chance, evolving from the primordial ooze. As such they set out to be build a society where when men sought the face of the Infinite Personal Creator they could actually produce a world worth living in, even though they knew that life on Earth was temporal. That was the basis for the American Dream, and may God help us if America gives up its American Dream for the China Dream which is nothing more than the Illuminati nightmare.

Credit to News with views

Asian Trade Treaty Will Destroy America

By Alan Caruba

In the same way Obamacare was foisted on America by creating a 2,000-page law that Democrats in Congress never even bothered to read, a new treaty about trade with Asia is going through the same process and poses as great, if not greater, threat to our economy, our judiciary, and our sovereignty.

Secrecy and outright deception is the hallmark of the Obama administration and a proposed Asian trade treaty must be stopped.

It is the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and, writing on The Economic Collapse blog, Michael Snyder, notes that “This treaty has 29 chapters, but only 5 of them have to do with trade. Most Americans don’t realize this, but this treaty will fundamentally change our laws regarding internet freedom, health care, the trading of derivatives, copyright issues, food safety, environmental standards, civil liberties, and so much more.”

Snyder warns that “It contains a whole host of things that Obama would be unable to get through Congress on his own. But he is hoping to spring this on Congress at the last minute and get them to agree to this ‘free trade agreement’ before they realize all of the things contained in it.” This is a definition of governing by deception. It evokes the way Obamacare was put before a Congress that had not read it…and which passed by a straight party-line vote by Democrats.

The secrecy surrounding these treaty negotiations,” said Synder, “have really been unprecedented.” In fact, if Wikileaks had not secured access to the TPP draft there would be next to nothing known about it. It posted a 95 page, 30,000 word document that is a horror. Writing about it on his blog, Kurt Nimmo noted that is provisions for implementing “a transnational ‘enforcement regime designed to supplant national laws and sovereignty with a globalist construct. The TPP is by far the largest and most oppressive economic treaty devised so far.”

William F. Jasper, an author and a senior editor of The New American, calls the TPP “bigger and more dangerous than Obamacare” noting that “In November 2009, President Obama announced his intention to have the United States participate in a so-called trade agreement known as the Trans-Pacific Partnership. I say so-called trade agreement because 80 percent of the proposed agreement deals with a great many issues beside trade,” deeming it “an all-out assault on our national sovereignty.”

“It would unconstitutionally transfer legislative powers from the U.S. Congress, our state legislatures, and our city and county governments to multi-national corporations and unaccountable international bureaucracies at the World Trade Center.”

“Incredibly, it would also transfer judicial powers from our federal and state courts—which are bad enough—to globalist TPP judges are regional tribunals and the WTO.” The treaty would “confer huge advantages on foreign businesses and large multinationals, while at the same time putting companies that operate here in America—especially small and medium enterprises—at a competitive disadvantage. American businesses would remain shackled by the regulations of EPA, FDA, OSHA, etc. while their foreign competitors could operate here unimpeded by those same strictures.”

Writing for Reason magazine, Zenon Evans, warns that “Congress essentially gave up its constitutional authority to regulate commerce with foreign nations in 1974 with the introduction of a ‘fast track’ authority. This privileges the president to flip the bill-making processes on its head: The president introduces an international agreement that Congress votes on, but can neither filibuster nor amend. Although fast-track expired in 2007, the Obama administration has been pushing for renewal, specifically for TPP.”

“If the U.S. government were actually interested in promoting free trade,” said Evans, “it could entirely sidestep relinquishing legislative power to a hodgepodge web of nations. It could simply agree to lower tariffs in exchange for the same treatment. But, instead, we are facing a deal that would undermine the democratic process entirely, disenfranchising the voting public to whom our government is accountable.”

The secrecy surrounding the Trans-Pacific Partnership is a major warning against the harm this treaty would inflict on America and reportedly the fact that barely a handful of Congressmen have been given a look at its text is a warning that Obama does not want Congress to be fully informed. If they pass the TPP in the same way Obamacare was passed, the harm to the nation is incalculable.


Credit Factsnotfantasy.blogspot.com

From password-free email accounts to medicine made from DNA

In the very near future there will be machines that act just like humans, doctors will be able to eradicate cancers using your DNA and the password will finally die a death. 

That’s according to predictions from tech experts at IBM. 

The firm’s annual 5 in 5 report, which looks ahead at technology trends has, this year, focused on the development of smarter computers, phones and other machines. 

It predicts that ‘everything will learn’ from the data we store online, what websites we visit, where we go and how we act - and this information will be used for good, and not just for advertising purposes.

Scroll down for videos

In its annual 5 in 5 report, IBM has predicted that in the next five years, 'everything will learn'. For example, rather than having passwords, applications will be able to talk to each other to give and learn who a person is. It can then immediately identify unusual or suspicious behaviour and prevent identity theft

WHAT ARE IBM PREDICTIONS?

According to the annual IBM 5 in 5 report, in the next five years: 

The classroom will learn you - smarter classrooms will use cloud data to learn about students and identify learning disorders immediately

Buying local will beat online -  shops will combine the convenience of online shopping in physical stores and same-day delivery will improve. 

Doctors will routinely use your DNA to keep you well -  By using advancements in DNA research, doctors will be able to uniquely identify how a certain cancer or disease will affect a person. Treatments and medications will become more tailored and waiting times will drop. 

A digital guardian will protect you online - Passwords will be replaced by devices that learn who a person is, how they behave and what sites they use. They will grant access automatically to that person, but also be able to identify unusual or suspicious activity automatically. 

The city will help you live in it - Governments will be able to use data about its residents movements, needs and more to improve cities and towns, including schools and transport routes.

The report then breaks down the predictions into five categories and predicts that each of them will happen by 2018.  

For example, in five years, IBM predicts ‘security is going to become more agile’. 

Rather than having passwords for different devices, sites and sevices, all of these applications will be able to talk to each other to give a ‘360-degree view of a person’s data and movements.’ This means these devices will just know who someone is, without that person ever having to identify themselves. 

 

More...

• Are Facebook and Google buying cable networks to stop governments spying on them?
• People in vegetative states DO recognise friends and family: Brain scans reveal patients react emotionally to familiar faces

This so-called ‘digital guardian’ will be trained to focus on a person and learn how they behave to then be able to identify any unusual or suspicious activity; making identity theft a thing of the past. 

Elsewhere, IBM claims the classroom of the future will be able learn about each student over the course of their education to help them master the skills they need to meet individual goals. 

It will be powered by a system of sophisticated computers that study data about students stored in the cloud and will be able to immediately identify learning disorders, such as dyslexia, discover if any students are at risk from failing, or even bullying, and will suggest measures to help these students solve these problems. 

One of the more surprising IBM 5 in 5 predictions is that the high-street will bounce back and beat online shopping. 

According to the report, ‘buying local will become du jour once again.' 

IBM makes predictions about cyber security in five years' time

One of the more surprising IBM predictions is that the high-street will bounce back and beat online shopping. Retailers will be able to combine digital products and services with physical stores meaning shoppers can physically, or virtually touch and try on clothes before ordering them to arrive in minutes

 

IBM predicts local shops will fight back against online in 5...

Retailers will be able to combine digital products and services with physical stores meaning shoppers can physically, or virtually touch and try on clothes before ordering them to arrive in minutes. 

Services including Shutl are already making one-hour delivery a possibility, and IBM expects this to become even more popular. 

In medical terms, advancements in DNA research will help doctors understand how a tumour, for example, will uniquely affect each patient. 

Smart analysis will then be able to offer medications or treatments that can best attack that particular type of cancer in that particular individual, while reducing the time it takes to find the right treatment for a patient  ‘from weeks and months to days and minutes’. 

IBM predicts doctors will use DNA for personalised cancer care

In medical terms, advancements in DNA research will help doctors understand how a tumour, for example, will uniquely affect each patient. Smart analysis will then be able to offer medications or treatments that can best attack that particular type of cancer in that particular individual

The final prediction made by IBM is about smarter cities. The firm believes that in five years governments and councils will be able to understand, in real-time, how billions of events occur within a city or town. 

Computers will learn to understand what people need, what they like, what they do, and how they move from place to place and use this information to help develop transport routes, for example, or improve schools. 

'We know more now than any other generation at any time has known. 

Elsewhere, IBM claims the classroom of the future will be able learn about each student over the course of their education to help them master the skills they need to meet individual goals. It will be powered by a system of sophisticated computers will also be able to immediately identify learning disorders, such as dyslexia

IBM predicts that in five years classrooms will adapt to students

'And yet, we struggle to keep up with this flood of increasingly complex information, let alone make sense of the meaning that is inherent in the massive amounts of data we are acquiring at ever faster rates,' said Dr. Dario Gil, Director, Cognitive Experience Lab, IBM. 

'By creating technology that is explicitly designed to learn and enhance our cognition we will usher in a new era of progress for both individuals and for society at large.'

IBM believes that these changes will be fuelled by 'a new era in computing’ that will lead to 'breakthroughs that will amplify human abilities, assist us in making good choices, look out for us and help us navigate our world in powerful new ways.'  

In five years governments will be able to understand, in real-time, how billions of events occur within a city or town. Computers will learn to understand what people need, what they like, what they do, and how they move from place to place and use this information to help develop transport routes, for example, or improve schools

IBM predicts that in five years cities will help you live in them

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2525770/The-death-passwords-rise-high-street-treating-cancers-DNA-level-IBM-reveals-predictions-five-years.html#ixzz2nqNp4izw 

Chinese Admiral threatens to block US Navy

On Dec. 5, the U.S. missile-carrying cruiser Cowpens almost collided with a Chinese ship in international waters. The Cowpens was observing the maiden voyage of China's new aircraft carrier, the Liaoning (pictured above), when a vessel accompanying it cut across the Cowpens' bow less than 200 yards away, forcing it to change course. Chinese and U.S. sources agreed that this was the most serious incident between the two countries' navies since 2009, when Chinese ships harassed a U.S. vessel about 75 miles away from southern China's Hainan island -- but Chinese officials are speaking louder about it than their U.S. counterparts. After the story was first reported on Dec. 13, an unnamed senior U.S. defense official told the New York Times that the Chinese ship had been "particularly aggressive" and "unhelpful in trying to increase cooperation between the two navies;" other major U.S. media reports cite unnamed officials as well. But Chinese were willing to go on-record with their side of the story: Rear Admiral Yin Zhuo told the state-run People's Daily that the Cowpens had provoked the confrontation.

On Dec. 16, an article in People's Daily Online, a website affiliated with the prominent Communist Party newspaper People's Daily, quoted Yin stating that the Cowpens had been "carelessly sailing" in an area where Chinese ships were conducting a drill, seriously affecting their safety in what Yin called a "severe violation of regulations." Because China had reported to international authorities that it would be carrying out a drill in that space, Yin argued, the U.S. ships should have stayed out of the way. "You can sail freely and we can too, but your freedom to sail cannot impact our freedom to sail," he said, according to the article. "The instant you interfere with our sailing, sorry, but we will block you." (A Pacific Fleet spokesman declined to comment on Yin's remarks.)

These words come amid efforts by China to assert its claim over a number of disputed territories in South China Sea and East China Sea. On Nov. 25, Chinese authorities established an Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ), in which China requires all foreign aircraft to report their presence, that extended over an island chain which the Chinese claim and call the Diaoyu, and which the Japanese administer and call the Senkakus. Through repeated confrontations with Japan and the Philippines, China has taken stronger stances in its territorial claims than it did in years past.

Yin's words also seem to show a more assertive China. But while the somewhat hawkish Yin is a credible high-ranking official, he is also actively engaged in China's domestic propaganda efforts, as is the People's Daily. The article featuring his quote was likely intended for a Chinese rather than international audience -- it is not available in English. It is also telling that Chinese media only commented on the incident after U.S. authorities publicly acknowledged it on Dec. 13. Still, that's more than a U.S. official was willing to say publically, even if Yin is preaching to the choir.



- See more at: http://blog.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2013/12/16/china_america__near_miss_pacific_cruisers#sthash.HZU0E4iO.dpuf

‘Satan’ Rocket Could Step in to Launch More Russian Satellites

The Dnepr, which is based on the RS-20 intercontinental ballistic missile (NATO codename SS-18 “Satan”)


MOSCOW, December 18 (RIA Novosti) – Russia could convert more of its RS-20 ballistic missiles to launch domestic satellites in place of other less reliable rockets, the commander of Russia’s Strategic Missile Force said on Tuesday.

Nineteen RS-20 missiles, known in the West as the SS-18 Satan, have been converted for use by ISC Kosmotras to launch mostly foreign satellite payloads since 1999. The converted missile is known as the Dnepr rocket.

“There have been recent proposals for the use of the Dnepr for launching our satellites in light of the problems with our other launchers,” Karakaev said. He added that while the decision was not his to make, the Strategic Missile Force was ready to meet the task.

A Russian Proton rocket exploded shortly after launch at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in July, showering the surrounding Kazakh countryside with 600 tons of blazing, highly toxic rocket fuel.

Proton launches were suspended for three months following the accident and Kazakhstan – which leases the Baikonur launch facility to Russia for $115 million annually – remains concerned about reimbursement for the costs of the cleanup effort.

Russia’s new Angara rocket, slated to provide launch services in multiple weight classes, has suffered a string of delays. Its first launch is currently scheduled for mid-2014.

The RS-20, first launched in 1973, is the most powerful ICBM in the world. The Strategic Missile Force is phasing out the weapon by 2018-2020, when it will be replaced by the new Sarmat heavy missile, Karakaev said yesterday.

The Dnepr is launched from Baikonur as well as a site in Russia’s Orenburg region.

Karakaev said the rocket’s use of highly toxic propellants was its only drawback. A Dnepr rocket crashed in Kazakhstan following an onboard failure in 2006.

A Dnepr rocket last month successfully delivered 32 satellites from 18 countries into orbit, breaking the previous world record for the number of satellites in a single launch, according to space industry analysts.

Credit to RIA Novosti