Is the UAE taking combat warship lessons from Israel?

 

Some years ago, I said about the Israeli Navy:

I like the Israeli approach, which crams lots of hitting power into even small hulls (see, for example, its Sa'ar 5 class corvettes, which as far as I know are the most heavily armed ships of their size [just over 1,000 tons] anywhere in the world, and on an armament-per-ton or tons-per-weapon basis might be the most heavily armed warships since the age of the dreadnought).

That approach has since been epitomized even more in Israel's Sa'ar 6 corvettes, almost twice the displacement of the earlier Sa'ar 5's, but even more heavily armed.  There are probably more weapons and weapon systems aboard a Sa'ar 6 than aboard any two, or even three, typical NATO frigates.

I thought about this when reading an article about the new Falaj 3 class "patrol boats" of the United Arab Emirates.  Their displacement is only about 670 tons, but they've packed an awful lot of firepower into that small hull.

Photos of the United Arab Emirates’ Falaj 3 class patrol boat are a reminder that a vessel doesn’t need to be a corvette or even a frigate to be armed like one. At a little over 200 feet long, the Falaj 3 is officially designated an offshore patrol vessel (OPV), but it boasts a weapons suite that would be impressive on a missile corvette and, in some respects, even a light frigate. In fact, at around 670 tons full load displacement, and a crew of just 39, it may be one of the most heavily armed warships anywhere in the world for its size.

OPVs are generally built for constabulary duties rather than high-end naval combat. Their primary missions include enforcing exclusive economic zones, countering piracy and smuggling, fisheries protection, search and rescue, and humanitarian assistance. As a result, they typically prioritize endurance, seakeeping, and low operating costs over heavy armament. Many Western designs in this category carry little more than a medium-caliber gun and a handful of remotely operated weapon systems, with no dedicated anti-ship missiles or significant air-defense systems.

The Falaj 3 takes a very different approach, as is immediately apparent from these photos.

Forward sits a Leonardo 76mm OTO Super Rapid gun equipped with the STRALES guided ammunition system, giving the ship a weapon capable of engaging everything from surface targets to fast-moving aerial threats ... Directly behind the gun is an eight-cell vertical launch system loaded with MBDA VL MICA surface-to-air missiles. This ‘fire and forget’ missile can intercept targets at a range of up to around 12 miles and at altitudes of up to 30,000 feet.  Further aft is a 21-cell Raytheon Mk 49 launcher for the RIM-116 Rolling Airframe Missile (RAM), giving the vessel a second, independent layer of point air defense. Most OPVs are fortunate to carry an adapted man-portable air defense system, if they have any dedicated air-defense system at all.

The offensive fit is equally notable. Four MM40 Exocet Block 3C anti-ship missiles provide over-the-horizon strike capability, while two 12-cell Low-cost Guided Imaging Rocket (LOGIR) guided rocket launchers offer an inexpensive way to engage drones, uncrewed surface vessels, and fast attack craft without expending much more costly missiles ... Completing the package are two Electro Optic Systems (EOS) R400-M 30mm remote weapon stations and two 32-barrel Rheinmetall Multi Ammunition Soft-kill System (MASS) decoy launchers, providing close-range firepower and survivability against incoming guided weapons, respectively.

There's more at the link.

I entirely agree with a powerful weapons load-out like that.  It remains a perennial worry to some naval observers (including me) that so many corvettes, frigates and destroyers in US and European service are relatively lightly armed for their size.  There isn't enough depth to their defenses, particularly if they face a swarm of incoming drones or missiles.  If they miss even one, they may suffer severe, disabling damage.  They can't even reload missiles at sea, meaning that in a serious engagement, they'd shoot themselves dry in a relatively short space of time.  After that . . . they're expensive targets.  (Compare them to their equivalents in the former Soviet Union and/or the Russian Navy today.  The Russians have not forgotten the lessons of history, and arm their ships accordingly.  See, for example, that nation's Steregushchiy and Gremyashchiy classes.)

I hope the example of the Falaj 3 class of patrol vessels is studied, and spreads.  We live in an increasingly dangerous world, particularly the ocean passages through narrow straits like Hormuz, Bab-el-Mandeb, etc.  To defend them, we need larger numbers of considerably more powerful vessels than have so far been employed.  Air power has its place, of course, but in the end ships at sea are like infantry on the ground.  You need them to take and hold strategic areas.

Peter

Things are getting interesting in narco-Mexico...

 

According to a report in the Atlantic (paywalled, but an archived version is here), the politicians in Mexico who have for years - probably for generations - been bribed and/or cajoled and/or threatened by the drug cartels into turning a blind eye to their criminal activities, appear to be changing their tune.

(BIAS WARNING:  The Atlantic is notoriously anti-President Trump and routinely criticizes the policies and actions of his administration.  This article appears to be unusually positive, despite that reservation.)

... the governor of the strategically important border state of Baja California was just caught on tape offering to become an FBI informant. The remarkable thing here is that she would not be the first; the list of current and former Mexican officials and drug traffickers who have offered to cooperate with the U.S. government is now lengthy.

. . .

Since his second term began, Trump has periodically threatened military action inside Mexico, alluding to air strikes or operations that would “take out the cartels.” Mexican officials have repeatedly rejected the possibility. “There will be no invasion of Mexico,” President Claudia Sheinbaum said last year. But quietly, Mexican officials have discussed what it would mean if they were attacked by their neighbor and largest trading partner. Would it be a special-forces operation, like the one that seized former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro? A drone strike on a fentanyl lab? Some Mexican officials are reading books about the Mexican-American War, searching for historical precedent.

Because the threat of military intervention is so dramatic, not enough attention has been paid to a type of intervention that is already taking place, one that could pave the way for strikes. In a break with long-standing precedent, American prosecutors have used informants to pursue members of the Mexican government, apparently “moving up the food chain,” as one U.S. official described it to me ... Several former Mexican officials facing U.S. charges have turned themselves in, apparently agreeing to cooperate with authorities to reduce their sentences. Dozens of newly extradited drug traffickers, too, are believed to be cooperating. Their accounts appear to have allowed U.S. investigators to build cases against members of Sheinbaum’s Morena political party. At least four have been indicted. Many more have had their visas revoked.

It’s a high-risk escalation in the Trump administration’s fight against narco corruption—and possibly also a pretext for a unilateral attack. Trump could use evidence of the government’s links to organized crime in an attempt to justify using force in Mexico. This week, the Trump-appointed head of the Drug Enforcement Administration, Terry Cole, gave a speech describing “the deadly connection between cartel networks and the Mexican government.”

“They are one [and] the same,” he said.

. . .

Last week, the State Department designated two lesser-known drug cartels—the Juárez Cartel and Los Viagras—as “foreign terrorist ⁠organizations” and “specially designated global terrorists.” Some within the Trump administration believe that those designations would offer some kind of legal authority for an attack, though international-law experts largely differ ... The campaign against cartel leaders has been so successful that, even if the United States wanted to decapitate a drug-trafficking organization, it’s unclear whom they would target.

There's more at the link.

This has mostly been taking place "under the wire", so to speak.  We've known for years that the entire government structure of Mexico - local, regional and national - is corrupted by drug money from the cartels, who effectively run most of the country.  However, if the cartel leaders, and political leaders, are rendered ineffective (or imprisoned), what's going to happen to the social fabric of Mexico?  So much of it is cartel-corrupted (including almost every element of the police and armed forces, the emergency services, etc.) that ordinary citizens have learned to live without most of the social structure we take for granted.  If the replacement structures of the cartel are suddenly removed, will Mexico survive in its present form?

I think there are three possibilities.

1. Mexico will collapse into a "failed state", with widespread chaos and anarchy.  It will be almost impossible for business to function without paying massive bribes to local strongmen, but those strongmen will be at war with each other, so that an effective regional or national government simply won't be possible.
2. Mexico will limp along as it does at present.  The cartel structures will continue to use their financial wealth (very considerable, having amassed it over decades) to buy the cooperation of the civil authorities.  However, the competition between cartels to take over those resources will devolve into civil war in parts of the country, and will likely spill over into the southern United States.  I'd expect southern California, Arizona and New Mexico to become very dangerous areas, even more so than at present.  (I daresay Texas will probably cope better than they do, because Texas law enforcement authorities aren't handcuffed by liberal politicians who'll do everything in their power to restrict them.)
3. Mexico may break into several smaller nation-states, based on divisions that go back centuries.  Don't forget, "modern" Mexico was "created" out of a series of revolutions and civil wars that imposed unity out of the barrel of a gun, and killed anyone who argued with the concept.  With the number of guns in circulation there now, it'll be harder to impose authority in that way.

I could be completely wrong, of course.  Time will tell . . .

Peter

True dat

 

Healthranger observes that most people have no idea about how the world functions - or why it's that way.

While I am blessed to be able to interview some of the smartest people in the world, I remain aghast at the utter lack of knowledge among the "ignorant masses."

• Most people don't know a thing about food ingredients.
• They don't know where energy comes from.
• They don't know where their own organs are located in their own body.
• They don't know how mechanical things work, not even at a basic level (like combustion engines).
• They don't know basic first aid or emergency medicine for self-treatment.
• They are completely clueless when it comes to geography.
• They don't know what money is. (And they certainly don't understand compounding interest.)
• They don't know how computers work, or how storage devices function.

The average person is a walking biological shell of cognitive emptiness. And their lack of fundamental curiosity prevents them from ever making the effort to learn anything that matters.

But they are total experts in fashion, sports and celebrities, of course. They know all the latest trends pushed by shallow influencers, but they have zero knowledge of what's happening in the world and why their life is becoming more difficult by the day.

There's more at the link, and in the comments that follow.  Worthwhile reading.

I've noticed the same thing (although not among most of my readers, who wouldn't waste their time on my scribblings unless they shared my interest in when, where, who, how, why, etc.).  It really is frightening to listen to some of the terminal inanities spouted by some of our politicians (on both sides of the aisle - Republicans have idiots among their number, just as Democrats do).  That applies particularly to the Kumbaya school of international relations . . . "If we just leave Iran/Russia/China/North Korea/wherever alone, they'll leave us alone!  After all, everyone wants peace!"  Yeah.  Riiiiight.

What to do about it?  There's the rub.  I have no idea how to make people understand when they're not interested in understanding.  All one can do is "preach to the converted", sharing ideas and concerns with those who are prepared to think for themselves, and then take whatever steps are possible to protect ourselves from the ignorance of others.  On the other hand, that stores up troubles of its own.  Remember Aesop's fable about the ant and the grasshopper?  Jim Quinn updated it to reflect modern times.  I suspect his is more accurate than the original!

Peter

The Saudi nuclear program: what else did anyone expect?

 

I'm cynically amused by the brouhaha over the US deal with Saudi Arabia to help that country develop a peaceful - underline, peaceful - nuclear energy program, including (it seems) enriching nuclear fuel.

Consider the facts of the current situation, in no particular order.

• Saudi Arabia bankrolled much of Pakistan's nuclear program, including its nuclear warheads and missiles.  It's long been rumored among "those in the know" that Pakistan has guaranteed Saudi Arabia that it can have nuclear warheads at twenty-four hours' notice, in an emergency.
• Saudi Arabia has bought Chinese ballistic missiles that can carry nuclear warheads.  By strange coincidence, they're the same type of ballistic missiles that Pakistan has in its nuclear silos.  Odd, that . . .
• Iran has launched missile attacks on Saudi Arabian territory from the north, using cruise and ballistic missiles.  Its Houthi allies have done the same from Yemen in the south.  That would be enough to make any nation a little paranoid.  What if the Iranian Revolutionary Islamic Guard, or whatever it calls itself these days, were to figure out how to put nuclear payloads on those missiles - either a full-blown nuke warhead, or a "dirty nuke" using conventional explosives to spread radioactive material around, say, Riyadh or a major military base?
• Israel has for decades maintained that it will neither confirm nor deny that it has nuclear weapons.  Anyone with two working brain cells to rub together is quite confident that they have more than a few, almost certainly including major thermonuclear weapons.  See my comments in these pages from time to time concerning the so-called "Vela incident".
• Given those various and sundry realities and threats, it was obvious that Saudi Arabia was going to go ahead and greatly expand its nuclear program(s).  It didn't really have any choice but to do so, if it was to survive in an environment like that.

That being the case, why is anybody surprised that President Trump would try to get involved with Saudi Arabia's plans and help them along?  Saudi was going to do it anyway.  We could have sat there and criticized, or expressed concern, or whatever - which would have bounced off Saudi's national interests like water off a duck's back.  This was a case of making the best of two very difficult and unpalatable choices, and I think the President acted wisely.  I'm sure he, and the US establishment, would rather not have made that choice, but as I said earlier, this was going to happen whether or not we were involved.

As for the fat-headed reports that the President was/is at odds with his Energy Secretary over what was done, and how it was done . . . yeah, right.  As if any Secretary in the President's cabinet is going to land a surprise like that on his boss's desk, without so much as a "by your leave"!  Sure, there may have been friction in the give-and-take between the White House and the Energy Department, but what else is new?  The very fact that the Energy Secretary still has his job is sufficient evidence that any such friction was relatively minor.

I'm also enjoying outraged suggestions from the left that the President is trying to stretch the agreement in new ways by pressuring Saudi Arabia to accept the Abraham Accords in exchange for US nuclear help.  There's nothing new in this:  President Trump has been trying to persuade Saudi Arabia to sign on to the Accords ever since he took office.  It might be a very useful talking point to mention that if Israel finds Saudi Arabia diplomatically cooperative, some of the former's nuclear warheads may no longer needed to be targeted at the Arabian peninsula.  In Saudi's position, I'd find that a very thought-provoking consideration . . .

Overall, I think America joining Saudi's nuclear program as a partner nation has far more positives than negatives.  It will also make Iran rethink its nuclear ambitions, given that the existing Saudi-Pakistan nuclear relationship might put them between two actinic fires, so to speak.

What's next in the Middle East?  Your guess is as good as mine . . . but it's likely to be "interesting", in the sense of the fabled ancient Chinese curse!

Peter

So much for the New York City property market...

 

This news is several days old, but it only caught my eye yesterday.

Months before New York City approved a historic two-year rent freeze, Google co-founder Sergey Brin quietly exited a struggling real estate fund at a steep loss.

In December, Brin sold his stake back to A&E Real Estate, the fund's manager, for six cents on the dollar, according to documents obtained by Bloomberg.

The fund holds 5,900 rent-stabilized apartments, with Brin's stake being valued at roughly $79 million, a drop in the bucket when viewed next to his $280 billion net worth.

"A&E bought out one of our long-term investors, who was willing to accept six cents on the dollar on their original equity investment to divest itself from the New York City multifamily sector," a company representative told Bloomberg in a statement.

"The simple and deeply troubling fact for renters is that institutional capital – both equity investors and lenders – are fleeing New York City’s rent-stabilized apartment sector," the A&E representative continued, according to Bloomberg. "They understand New York is in a doom loop."

There's more at the link.

Think about that for a moment.  Working backwards from "Brin's stake being valued at roughly $79 million" at the sale price - i.e. at six cents on the dollar of his original investment - that means he originally invested about $1.3 billion in the real estate fund.  He's lost almost all of that money, thanks to New York City's cratering real estate market, undermined as it is by the socialist communist policies of newly-elected Mayor Mamdami.

If a man as economically savvy as Mr. Brin walks away from a $1.3 billion investment, writing it off as unrecoverable, what are smaller investors to think?  Can they afford to follow his example?  For that matter, can they afford not to follow his example?  Makes you think, doesn't it?

If I were unfortunate enough to live in or near New York City, or have money invested there, after hearing that news I'd be taking steps (rapid ones) to move myself and/or my money somewhere (anywhere!) else . . . before I lost all my investments, too.

Peter

Not such apex predators

 

I had to laugh at this blog post from fellow South African expatriate Kim du Toit.  He and I see eye to eye on many issues (not surprising, given our similar backgrounds).

This morning he wrote about an article titled "One Super Predator in Africa Instills More Fear Than Lions".  The super predator, of course, turned out to be humans.  We use brains and tools to conquer our environment and the nasty things that we find there.  We've done it for millennia, and will doubtless go on doing it until the extinction of our species and/or the entropy death of the universe.

Kim doesn't mince his words.

We are, in the animal kingdom, like marshmallows.  Pork-flavored marshmallows, to be precise, just the thing to make lions sharpen their claws before putting on a dinner napkin.

So why do these dangerous animals think that we are the apex predators?

Because we don’t fight fair.  As though fighting for one’s life, or hunting down food requires us to be all Marquis-of-Queensbury types;  what foolishness.

**** that.  If a pride of lions wants to target a few humans for brekkie, well… say hello to an A-10 Warthog or an Apache attack helicopter, and let’s see who’s really the apex predator, Fluffy.

Click over there to read the whole thing.  It's giggle-worthy . . . and true, too, for the most part.

Of course, if one of those predators catches you alone and unarmed in the bush, you're toast, but that's your fault.  Being a successful apex predator requires remaining on the apex, so to speak.  Step off it, and there will be consequences.

Peter

Yet again, a command economy is derailed by human greed

 

We've seen innumerable examples, from local, state and national governments all over the world, that human greed and malfeasance can undo any amount of good that might otherwise be achieved.  It looks like a fundamental element of the human condition.

It seems that the latest country to discover (yet again) the truth of that statement is China.

In late May Chinese leaders travelled to the Zhoushan National Oil Reserve and discovered the nation’s strategic oil reserves weren’t there. For over a year, the disruption of oil supplies from Venezuela and Iran had left Chinese oil reserves reduced. Despite that, government documents indicated that China still had 1.2 billion tons of oil reserves. That’s equivalent to 8,756,117,022 barrels.

China’s strategic oil reserve, to the surprise of the government officials who went to verify the reserves in May, was instead composed of water, sludge, various debris and overflow from nearby sewer lines.

. . .

What happened to Chinese oil? It was soon discovered that corrupt government officials and oil reserve personnel had sold the oil and pocketed the proceeds. The local buyers were often operators of small, locally owned refineries that turned the oil into commercial products that were sold throughout China. Most of these oil criminals then fled, often leaving China for sanctuary states that would welcome any affluent Chinese and their new wealth. The only winners were a few conniving Chinese and the Americans, who continued to dominate the global energy system.

. . .

The theft of China’s strategic oil reserves is only the latest of several recent awful discoveries of massive corruption impeding the ambition of its leader, President Xi, to conquer Taiwan. The last one concerned military corruption in building equipment to invade Taiwan, and was discovered in 2023. Missile fuel tanks were found to be filled with water, missile silo lids could not be opened, and the protective concrete missile silos themselves were so defective they might as well have been made of wood. The air force and navy lacked sufficient spare parts for even a week of operations against Taiwan and many aircraft and naval vessels were outright inoperable. This postponed the earliest possible date for the invasion of Taiwan from 2025 to 2027.

The non-existence of China’s strategic oil reserve will probably have the same effect ... There are at least major possibilities that a Chinese invasion of Taiwan has been postponed for another two years, to 2029, and perhaps indefinitely due to further discoveries of calamitous-scale corruption.

There's more at the link.

I've been unable to confirm this article from Strategy Page through independent sources.  Other reports at about the same time don't mention missing oil reserves - only that the reserves exist.  Is the situation as bad as Strategy Page believes?  I'm not sure . . . but the history of corruption in government enterprises that has come out of China over the past few decades would suggest that there's no smoke without fire.

If true, this might help to explain why China has not been extremely vocal in its reaction to developments spearheaded by the USA in Venezuela and Iran.  If it didn't have the reserves to allow it relative independence of action, that would certainly put a crimp in China's style.

Will we ever know the truth?  I suspect it'll be carefully censored and filed away.

Peter

An "angry bear" opines on the soaring stock market - and what may bring it down

 

We've met Jared Dillian before in these pages.  He's an investment adviser and analyst with a highly respected track record in the industry.  He's not a happy man these days.

You should never let your emotions get in the way of investing, but I am starting to get angry at this bull market ... You want my thoughts—I will give you my thoughts. But the one data point that you should know is that the stock market is now the most overvalued in history, more so than 2000 or even 1929.

. . .

My friend Helene Meisler tweeted recently that if you weren’t around for the dot-com bubble, now you know what it was like in the dot-com bubble. The difference being that so many more people own stocks this time around. It is estimated that 62% of Americans own stocks. If we have a 50% bear market, it’s going to be Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome. We are really going to be questioning the wisdom of plowing all our savings into the stock market via 401(k)s. Let’s hope that doesn’t come to pass because the consequences would be too terrible to contemplate, but knowing markets and karma, that is probably exactly what is going to happen.

. . .

I mean, the consensus view is that all this [AI] capex is going to go to waste, so maybe the out-of-consensus view is that it is actually needed. This is one of these situations in which I am glad I am 52 years old. The internet was also the future of the human race, but capitalism being what it is, there was overinvestment and malinvestment, and eventually supply caught up with demand, and everything crashed.

It looks like a tiny blip on a log chart (which is one reason why I hate log charts), but trust me, the crash was no fun. I lived through it and barely held on to my job. This time is no different. This time is never different! Whether it’s railroads, industrials/utilities, the Nifty Fifty, Japan, or any other bubble. The difference is that this one is bigger than all of them, and it looks like it’s not stopping.

. . .

Back when I was at Lehman in 2006, I’d drive out in the country and take pictures of all the housing developments under construction that were completely vacant and then send them out in my Bloomberg messages. Maybe I should take a road trip and take some pictures of all the data centers under construction that will be Spirit Halloween stores in a few years.

I ordinarily don’t like to write rants. I like to write reasoned, thoughtful pieces. But I’m currently on a plane to Minneapolis, and S&P futures, which opened lower (because oil was up), just ripped to new highs… again. It’s truly incredible that the market goes up every day. It will be equally incredible when it goes down every day because that is what it felt like in 2002. A bear market without end.

There's more at the link.

I'm afraid I agree with Mr. Dillian.  Stock market prices have been soaring into the stratosphere year after year, without any sound economic underpinnings.  It's all been a leap of faith.  "The Fed will provide!"  Well, what happens when the Fed can no longer provide?  What happens when the economic consequences of the Iran war begin to bite?  What happens when international market turmoil makes it clear that, despite all the positive punditry from paid opinion writers, the emperor has no clothes, and nothing is or can be guaranteed?

The very real dangers confronting any and all Western economies aren't limited to the Iran war.  Ambrose Evans-Pritchard focuses on China, and points out:

Europe's leaders are waking up to the terrifying danger that China could obliterate much of their industrial base within less than a decade, shattering the old political order and the EU project itself.

The Rhodium Group says the Chinese Communist Party is digging in its heels, doubling down on a strategy of systemic over-investment and over-reliance on exports that cannot be absorbed by the rest of the world, and certainly not a Europe already in semi-slump.

The original "Made in China 2025" plan a decade ago targeted a clutch of specific technologies. Beijing is now expanding this into an "industrial policy of everything": cars, machinery, chemicals, pharma, software, AI, you name it.

China is pursuing this ruthlessly, aiming to capture a larger share of global value added with vertical control of the entire lifecycle.

It is moving towards autarky in its home market while undercutting the West in its own market and in third countries – everywhere and in every product. It devours foreign technology without releasing its own. The Rhodium Group said the foundations of G7 manufacturing are under comprehensive threat.

The "China Shock 2.0" is bigger and more sophisticated than the original China Shock in the 1990s and early 2000s, which flooded the world with cheap goods and wiped out swathes of blue-collar manufacturing in the West.

America bore the brunt of the first shock. The pauperisation of the Midwest Rust Belt set the stage for Donald Trump.

This time China cannot dump its excess capacity on the US market so easily because of trade barriers. The tsunami is instead being displaced into the softer target of Europe. It is hitting with even greater intensity. China's trade surplus hit a record 1pc of global GDP last year. No country has ever reached such an imbalanced position in modern economic history.

Again, more at the link.

My wife and I aren't rich.  Right now, our savings - and some extra debt through a second mortgage - are funding medical care.  Assuming all ends up that ends well, we'll have to rebuild our savings, but I tell you right now, with the stock market as it is, we won't be putting one red cent into it.  I want a store of value that will retain its value in a stock market slump, and for me that means precious metals.  Even before that, I want to make sure we have enough of the essentials to survive a severe, prolonged economic downturn.  If you want a useful list that most of us can use, click over to Lawrence Person's Battleswarm Blog and see his helpful list from last November.  It makes a good start to review our preparations.

Want to invest in something that is likely to offer a reasonable return on investment in the short to medium term?  Look at domestic essentials that may be in short supply during a prolonged downturn, and lay in a supply of them as trading material.  Baby diapers.  Feminine hygiene essentials.  Soap.  Toothpaste.  Basic, essential canned food.  Flashlights and battery powered domestic and camping lanterns.  Think of what your family can't live without, and you've got the start of a useful investment list, right there.

Am I a pessimist?  I don't think so.  I'd rather call myself a realist.  Regular readers will know that I, and many others, have been uneasy about our economy for years, if not decades.  The numbers have been getting worse all that time, and now they're getting worse a lot faster.  Forewarned is forearmed.

I'll leave the last word to an astute observer.  Click the image to be taken to the original post on X.com, and read the more than 600 replies (so far).

Word.

Peter

A military procurement nightmare: Britain's Typhoon fighter and its successor

 

In a long and very detailed article, Lewis Page argues that "Britain’s next-generation fighter jet is a disaster in the making".  He goes into detail on the background to the present project, and the aircraft that have preceded it in Royal Air Force service.  It's far too long an article to reproduce here, so I've selected as an example just one cost comparison between the current front-line aircraft of the US and UK air forces.

The Eurofighter Typhoon, as flown by the RAF, is the most expensive tactical aircraft ever built by the human race. When the last Tranche 1 planes are gone next year (disposed of with half their lifetime hours unused) the RAF will possess 107 aircraft.

Recent statements reveal that the size of an RAF front-line squadron has fallen from 12 to “up to 10” jets. Officials have recently congratulated themselves that they typically have “65 to 70” Typhoons “available” nowadays for the seven RAF front-line Typhoon squadrons that exist on paper.

Some more Typhoons are in the training and test units but it’s clear that others, probably more than 20, are in a long-term un-flyable condition: in deep maintenance, with parts robbed from them to get others flying, or both.

Each of the 107 Typhoons, according to the National Audit Office, cost well over £215m to obtain in 2011 money, or around $355m (£264m) if we use contemporary exchange rates.

By comparison, the undisputed, most powerful fighter jet in the world is the US Air Force’s F-22 Raptor. Only 183 Raptors were made in the end, as opposed to the 600-plus Eurofighters so far.

But despite this much shorter production run and the fact that it is an entire generation more advanced than a Typhoon, the acquisition cost of one Raptor to the US taxpayer was somewhat lower than the cost of one Typhoon to the UK taxpayer. The Raptor throws into stark relief the almost unbelievably bad value for money offered by the Typhoon.

In short, the Typhoon was a procurement disaster.

There's much more at the link.  Highly recommended reading for aviation and military enthusiasts.

The article helps us understand why military hardware has become so expensive.  The deadweight of bureaucratic and political control interfered so much with the Typhoon's development, and the lack of vision among military leaders in making it a single-purpose rather than a multi-role aircraft, effectively doomed it to operational irrelevance for much of its service life.  Furthermore, the astronomical costs of not just each aircraft, but spare parts to keep it flying, wasted so much of the Royal Air Force budget that funds were not available for different types of aircraft, or urgently needed upgrades.  (For example, for the past two decades almost every major frontline strike fighter has had AESA radar, offering vastly improved performance over older types:  but the RAF's Typhoons are only now beginning to get one - and, at that, only enough to fit to less than half the fleet.  Without it, if they had had to fight against other modern fighters, they would have been at a huge disadvantage.)

I suppose we could draw parallels between Britain's fighters and the US Navy's ships.  The USN has had so many problems developing new designs that it's had to scrap almost all of them as being too complex and/or too expensive, after its "experts" had spent years gold-plating them and adding every feature they could think of.  It's now been forced to bodge together a "frigate" that is basically a slightly more heavily armed Coast Guard cutter, because the much more sophisticated Constellation class frigates have had to be abandoned due to their design becoming bogged down in excessive complexity.  Will something similar happen to Britain's proposed new fighter aircraft?  I think there's a very good chance that it will.

China is producing new aircraft and ship designs in multiples every year, and building them by the dozens.  One hopes that both Britain and the USA will wake up to reality and start moving faster . . . but if the politicians insist on sticking their oar in, that's not very likely.  Can Secretary of War Hegseth cut through the entrenched bureaucracy and layers of control that have bedeviled US military design?  That remains to be seen.

Peter

Another perspective on the latest Trump assassination attempt

 

A little late, perhaps, but worth repeating nonetheless.  From Peter Girnus, "a senior coordinating producer for the White House Correspondents' Association Dinner".

I was backstage at the Washington Hilton when the shots were fired.

The first thing I heard was not the gunfire. It was glass.

A champagne flute hit the floor of the International Ballroom at approximately 9:47 PM. Then a second. Then the sound that I have since been told was a 12-gauge shotgun, which from inside the ballroom sounded like a heavy door slamming in a parking garage. Then the Secret Service moved. They moved the President, the Vice President, the First Lady through the east corridor in under ninety seconds, which is protocol, which is practiced, which is the one part of the evening that worked exactly as it was designed.

Everything else was improvised.

I know this because I ordered the wine. 94 tables. Two bottles per table. 188 bottles of a Willamette Valley pinot noir that the Association selected in February after a tasting committee spent three meetings debating between Oregon and Burgundy. Oregon won. The budget was $14,200. I signed the invoice. I can tell you the vintage. I can tell you the distributor. I can tell you the per-bottle cost because I negotiated it down from $89 to $76.

What I cannot tell you is how 147 of those bottles left the building during an active shooter evacuation.

I can tell you what I saw. A correspondent from a network I will not name picked up two bottles on her way to the east exit. Full bottles. One in each hand. She was wearing heels and she did not spill. A man in a tuxedo tucked one inside his jacket the way you'd shoplift a paperback at an airport bookstore. A woman picked up a bottle, looked at the label, put it back, and took a different one.

She checked the vintage. During an evacuation. That's editorial judgment under pressure.

. . .

2,600 guests were directed to the exits by Secret Service agents, one of whom had just taken a shotgun round in his ballistic vest and walked to the ambulance on his own feet.

The agent's vest costs approximately $800. The wine that left the building was worth $11,172 at Association cost. At restaurant markup, roughly $29,000. The guests saved more in wine than the vest that saved the agent.

That's priority.

. . .

I have produced eleven of these dinners ... I have never, in eleven years, seen a guest leave a $76 bottle on the table during an evacuation. I have also never seen a guest check the label first. Both observations are consistent. The bottle is worth taking. The evacuation is worth surviving. The instinct is to do both simultaneously.

188 bottles placed. 41 recovered. 147 unaccounted for. One agent shot. Zero guests injured. Zero bottles broken.

A free press for a free people. The press is free. The wine was $76 a bottle. They took it anyway.

There's more at the link.

Mr. Girnus' post on X (formerly Twitter) has so far attracted over 4,000 replies and comments.  Click over there to read them if you're interested.  I particularly liked his reply to one comment:

They took the wine at a pace that suggested familiarity with hotel evacuation corridors. That's not elite behavior. That's logistics under pressure. I've seen worse at a Marriott fire alarm in Phoenix.

Word!

Needless to say, my opinion of most alleged journalists has not been improved by this fiasco . . .

Peter

Are we looking at a world-changing series of events?

 

I haven't posted much by Peter Zeihan in recent months, because much of his work has disappeared behind a paywall.  I know many readers disagree with his perspective on geopolitics and economics, but I think he brings out a demographic emphasis that many other analysts lack.

In this video interview, about an hour and twenty minutes long, he postulates that many things that we've taken for granted, or assumed to be true, are not certain any longer.  Change is accelerating, and our perspectives need to take that into account.  If you want to look for specific issues, this is how the video breaks down:

0:00 Is China Really on the Brink?
6:19 Has China Been Lying About Their Data?
11:08 Can AI Save Us From Population Decline?
17:21 Can We Survive Demographic Collapse?
25:19 How Politics is Impacting Population Data
34:23 The Future of Global Energy
41:03 Are Electric Vehicles Truly Sustainable?
51:24 Where the Green Movement is Really Headed
01:03:40 How Technology is Impacting Modern Warfare
01:08:40 Could China Ignite the Next Global Conflict?
01:15:09 The Power Alliances Reshaping the World
01:18:50 Where to Find Peter

The video loaded correctly when I tested this before publishing this post.  If it doesn't (as sometimes happens), you can find it on YouTube.  Highly recommended - in particular, the second segment mentioned above.

Do you agree with his points?  If you don't, where do you think he's going wrong?  Let us know in Comments, and let's discuss.

Peter

The economy: order, counter-order, disorder

 

There's tremendous disagreement right now over whether or not we're careering towards an economic cliff, and about to fall over the edge.  Much of the evidence offered is convincing, but much is duplicitous propaganda designed to stampede us into precipitous action before we've had a chance to think things through.  If anyone says to you, "This is how it's going to go down!  Guaranteed!", I suggest you ask them what they're selling, because they're out to convince you to buy it.

Rather than advance my own views on our and the world's economy (which are and have for some years been negative, as regular readers will know, but for very different reasons than the Iran war alone), here are a few articles that caught my eye over recent weeks.  I suggest you read each of them, and make up your own minds.  I've included a few key paragraphs beneath each link.

1.  We’re on the brink of a global recession, but it’s not Iran we need to worry about

With the Strait of Hormuz impassable, a widespread inflation spike is looming, which would seriously damage the global economy.

Along with a fifth of the world’s oil and gas supplies, this dual Iran-US blockade also prevents a third of the world’s seaborne fertiliser feedstocks from reaching global markets.

That points to lower crop yields this summer – a serious energy-price spike with a food-price surge too.

A third of global helium supplies – which is is vital when making semiconductors – pass through the strait. Those chips, comparable in strategic terms to oil, enable trillions of dollars of downstream economic activity – from manufacturing to energy structures, wireless and computer data storage and defence.

On top of all that, multiple sovereign bond crises are brewing across the G7, as Western nations struggle with high fiscal deficits, tightening demographics and big government, while failing to constrain runaway welfare spending.

2.  U.S. Wheat Futs Hit Two-Year High As Wall Street Sounds Alarm Over Drought Shock

Hard red winter wheat climbed to a two-year high by the end of the week, as our coverage of the drought shock now hitting America's Breadbasket raises serious alarm bells on commodity desks.

The concern is not just reduced crop yields and quality. It is colliding with fertilizer shortages and elevated diesel prices, creating a broader inflationary transmission channel that could work its way through the food supply and translate into higher supermarket prices down the road.

3.  I Am Calling It Now: THE EVENT Has Happened

Michael Yon has spoken of "flash-to-bang"—that delay between seeing a distant explosion and feeling/hearing its shockwave. I witnessed this firsthand in Iraq. Out on the highway in front of COB Speicher, a massive car bomb detonated miles away. I saw the giant mushroom cloud rise first—a silent, horrifying spectacle—before the low, guttural bass thump finally rolled in. You feel it in your chest as much as hear it. The bigger the blast, the longer the delay when you're observing from afar.

That same principle applies here with the Strait of Hormuz. The "flash"—the initial explosions, ship attacks, blockades, and seizures—has already lit up the horizon. The "bang"—the full economic, energetic, and societal shockwave—is still traveling toward us. It will hit hardest in the months ahead as fuel shortages cascade into transportation failures, fertilizer disruptions, higher food prices, and broader supply chain collapses. Global food systems are already under pressure, and this energy crunch could tip vulnerable regions into outright crisis.

I know extremely hard times lie ahead for millions. In places like the Philippines, the challenges will be especially brutal—not just because of external shocks, but because of deep cultural and societal realities on the ground.

4.  The Economic Destruction of Trump’s War Goes Far Beyond High Gas Prices

A lot of economic pain has already been locked in by this war. But to really understand it, it’s necessary to keep a few important economic truths at the front of our minds.

First is the fact that the entire purpose of the economy is to produce goods and services that consumers value enough to pay for. All of the production happening anywhere in the economy is geared towards that end ... Every consumer good can be viewed as the end of a long chain of production stretching all the way back to the cultivation of raw materials like iron or timber, or the creation of basic components like resins or plastics. Economists call those basic capital goods at the beginning of the chain higher order goods.

. . .

And second, production takes time. That’s true for the production of any given good, but it’s especially true if we look across that entire chain of production. The higher order goods that are currently being produced won’t help bring about finished consumer products until months or even years down the road.

All of this is important to understand and keep in mind because the war with Iran is, so far, primarily impacting the production of higher order goods. And it goes far beyond oil.

And, to show how left-wing "thinkers" (you should pardon the expression) are relating economic issues to their own pet ideological hobby-horses, here's what a New York Times opinion columnist had to say about older people and the economy.  The original is behind a paywall, so the link goes to an archived copy.

Older Americans Are Hoarding America’s Potential

It is not ageist to ask whether older people should be required to give more to younger Americans and national priorities — it is critical to the future of our democracy and society. America needs to confront gerontocracy before the system collapses under the weight of its inequality and injustice.

Older Americans deserve a say over the future even when they might not live to see it. But they do not deserve the stranglehold over it they currently enjoy through overrepresentation in elections, which produces too many regressive policies and too many seniors in the highest offices.

Older Americans are owed the care that everyone else funds. Indeed, they should get more of it than they get now — including funding for long-term care at home or in nursing homes. But they also need incentives to give up accumulated housing, jobs and wealth.

Considering that I'm now numbered among "older Americans", that does not give me warm fuzzy feelings about my economic future under a progressive left government in this country, should one come to pass.  The above screed sounds more to me like "We're young!  We don't want to wait our turn!  Give us the keys to the kingdom right now!  And while you're handing them over, give us all your money as well!"  Greedy, much?

I'll give the last word to the inimitable Karl Denninger.

How Much Further?

The real problem for ordinary people in the economy is that anything that is unsustainable over a sufficient amount of time will blow up in your face.  But when will it blow up?  That's a more difficult problem.  For example we know that housing is largely locked up in a large part of the country -- indeed, most of it.  In those places where it sort-of-isn't there are other serious problems including property tax and insurance concerns that might as well have it locked up from a standpoint of actual affordability.  Add to this that many formerly thought of as "safe" professions which earn a nice wage, including computer science and medical, are rapidly being destroyed in terms of forward earnings capacity by both AI and foreign worker imports.  There are plenty of stories already of people living quite high on the hog having accumulated a lifestyle with mandatory monthly spend commensurate with $250,000 wages suddenly being laid off and finding no replacement for that wage at even half what they formerly made.  If you've managed to get yourself into a leveraged position with a forward requirement for such earnings and they disappear you're in very serious trouble indeed.

True dat.

Peter

"Pie in the sky" prepping - or, getting real about our chances

 

I'm a relative lightweight in the "prepping" world.  I have emergency food, water and other supplies to keep my wife and myself alive for a few months in a disaster situation, and (hopefully) enough to share with friends for at least the short term;  but that's based on "bugging in", staying in our home and not venturing far unless and until it's safe to do so.  We don't have a "bug out" location, or remotely stored supplies, or anything like that - it's simply unaffordable for us.

Nevertheless, I'm often surprised to hear from people who are very much in our situation that they have these grand plans to "bug out" to the sticks, establish a survival homestead from scratch, grow their own food, herd a few cows, steal a travel trailer from somewhere as a place to live, and so on.  Frankly, I think they have no idea at all of just how much effort will be involved in making that plan work.

Eaton Rapids Joe has put up a couple of recent blog posts in which he lays out precisely what skills and resources are needed (and vitally important) if one is to homestead successfully.  In the first article, "A man has to know his limitations", he looks at all the skills needed to successfully homestead (some required all the time, others for specific situations).  In the second, "Why 'Russian' Dachas all look alike", he examines what successful country farms have in the way of facilities and equipment, and also what they don't have (because it's either way too expensive, or too resource-heavy, or unnecessary).  Both articles, and both of the lists he provides, are well worth reading.  If, after reading them, anyone still thinks it'll be easy to set up an emergency homestead . . . well, you're probably going to learn the hard way how wrong you are!

Another aspect of the problem is that too many people stock up on "second-best" gear, food and equipment for emergency use, because it's cheaper and they can afford more of it.  Commander Zero discusses this approach with respect to firearms:

... if you need to resort to your hideaway stash becase you can’t get to your primary gear, then its safe to assume that your life has just taken a turn for the spectacularly ungood, agreed? So, in that time of (literally) existential crisis doesn’t it seem to make sense that you would want the best gear you can have?

It does, indeed, make sense.  That's a lesson I learned the hard way in Africa over many years.  If you know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that Mother Nature is a stone cold bitch who's out to kill you, wouldn't you want the best gear you can get in your emergency stash, to help you withstand her advances?  Quality can save your life.  Economy can kill you.  That applies to all our emergency preps, not just firearms.

(On a related subject, Commander Zero recently bought some land in the back country of Montana, and is beginning to set it up as a private retreat.  He recently blogged about his first weekend excursion to begin preparing it for use.  So many things went wrong that one can almost feel his pain, but he's not afraid to discuss all the mistakes he made, and what he's learned from the experience that he'll apply in future visits.  A very useful discussion, and a very useful reality check for the rest of us.)

Preparation isn't just physical.  One's outlook on everyday living - and what it costs - is a foundational element.  SNAFU links to a social media comment from a teacher who's complaining that she can't come out on $7,500 net income per month - while spending over $1,500 on a vehicle payment, and over $3,000 on rent!  Some commenters at his site question whether the original post is truthful, because the payments seem extraordinarily high, but he makes the very valid point that "Financial Education needs to be a REQUIRED course in school (along with NOT chasing luxury items to impress people that don't give a damn)".

On that subject, here's some brutally frank (and very truthful) advice from the TV series House Of Cards.  Kevin Spacey plays Frank Underwood, a highly immoral yet realistic politician.

Yes, that is brutal advice:  but in this world of easy-fulfilment dreams, hire purchase, leasing, and all the other debt instruments out there, it remains true.  If you're in debt, you're a financial slave to those who own your debt, and most of them will be utterly ruthless in coming after you to get what they're owed.  Being prepared for emergencies is as much about financial preparation as any other type of preparedness:  and one of the first and most fundamental steps in financial preparation is to get out of debt as far as possible.  As Spacey's character says, "The moment you get in debt, you're enslaving yourself until you buy back your freedom with interest."  Believe it.  It's true.

(Sometimes, of course, we can't afford not to go into debt.  We had to replace my wife's car in early 2022, because her old one had been driven into the ground until it was no longer viable.  The impact of COVID-19 had led to a drastic shortage of all types of vehicles, partly due to the reduction in dealer inventory, partly due to the shortage of used vehicles thanks to President Obama's "Cash For Clunkers" scheme, which scrapped tens of thousands of otherwise worthwhile cars.  We ended up buying a new car, and paying above the manufacturer's MSRP, because nothing else worthwhile was available to us:  and, to finance that very expensive purchase, we took out a loan.  It was a loan neither of us wanted, but under the circumstances, it was necessary.  Under such circumstances, one does what one must.  We bought an entry-level model without all the luxury features, and that helped lower the price and keep payments down.)

All of the above articles are food for thought.

Peter

Points to ponder about small handguns

 

With the seeming increase of random criminal violence in society, to say nothing of politically inspired unrest, I've been dealing with more than a few queries about the pro's and con's of carrying small handguns.  It's a complicated issue, and I thought I'd address some of the key points in this article.

First, as a general rule small handguns are harder to shoot well than larger handguns.  There are several reasons:

• The smaller grip is less easy to grasp firmly, draw smoothly, and get a strong firing grip, particularly for shooters with larger hands.
• Smaller handguns are typically carried in what's called "deep concealment", such as in a pocket or handbag.  That's logical, of course, since larger handguns would be hard to conceal in such places.  However, it's usually harder to get to such guns in a hurry, and then withdraw them and bring them to a ready position.  It's "fiddly".  To draw a larger handgun from a more accessible holster and bring it into a ready position is usually rather easier.  I strongly recommend using a holster even for pocket or handbag carry, to keep the firearm in a predictable position, ready to draw, and to prevent anything getting into the trigger guard and risking an accidental discharge.  (More on this later.)
• Smaller, lighter handguns transmit more recoil energy to the shooter than larger, heavier weapons.  As an example, try firing a .38 Special cartridge through a medium-size K-frame or L-frame Smith & Wesson revolver (or equivalent), then firing the same cartridge through a smaller J-frame snubnose revolver.  Do the same with a 9mm cartridge from a Glock 17 (full-size) or 19 (compact) pistol (or equivalent), and then through a Glock 43 sub-compact pistol (or equivalent).  The smaller, lighter firearm will always deliver heavier perceived recoil than the bigger weapon.  In some cases (for example, firing a full-power .357 Magnum cartridge from a Smith & Wesson 340 snubnose revolver, made with ultra-light-weight Scandium) you'll regret doing so after even one shot.  Hel-loooo, carpal tunnel syndrome!
• Because of their abbreviated sights and shorter sight radius (i.e. the distance between front and rear sights), smaller handguns are harder to aim accurately (unless you add better sights, which may render them bulkier and/or less easily concealed).  Furthermore, their light weight makes it more difficult to shoot them accurately, rapidly and repeatedly during a defensive encounter.  It's not impossible, but it's definitely more difficult than with a larger weapon.  If anyone doubts that, try the comparison for yourself at your favorite shooting range.  There's a reason early short-barreled firearms were known as "belly guns" - because that was the sort of range at which they were used.  One didn't need long-range sights to aim at a target across a card table or desk, or literally stick it into someone's belly, and let fly!
• Snubnose revolvers are typically slower to reload than small pistols, and both are more "finicky" than larger handguns, where the firearm and its replacement rounds (in a speedloader or a magazine) are easier to handle.

Another point is that smaller handguns are easier to lose.  That may sound silly, but I've seen it happen to three people I know.  One chose a small handgun to fit in her handbag.  She hung the bag on the back of her chair at a restaurant.  When she finished her conversation with friends and turned to pick it up, it was gone.  Another friend left a small handgun in a jacket pocket when he hung it up at a social gathering;  it was so light he didn't remember it being there.  When he reclaimed his jacket, the gun was gone.  There have also been cases where people have left firearms in a public toilet.  Larger weapons are more likely to be retained on one's person in a holster, and thus are less likely to be lost.

You'll need to practice more often to master (and retain mastery of) a smaller handgun than you will with a larger one.  That's why it's generally a bad idea to start your shooting education using a smaller weapon and/or a heavier-recoiling cartridge.  I've seen many novice shooters get frustrated and disillusioned because they can't master it, and give up.  If only they'd started with a larger, easier-to-handle firearm, they could have got the basics down pat and been given a thorough grasp of the fundamentals before trying a more difficult firearm.  That's what I usually do when teaching other shooters.

That leads to my first recommendation for a small (indeed, for any) handgun.  Make sure the gun fits your hand as well as possible before you buy it.  Handle different models, go to gun ranges that rent out firearms and use as many different models as possible, ask your friends to let you try their guns.  In particular, ladies, do not allow some idiotic male (yes, they're out there, as I'm sure you know all too well) to try to insist that this, or that, or the other firearm is right for you.  Make sure it feels comfortable in your hands, and that the sights come readily to your eye when you lift it to aim at a target.  Shoot several rounds through it to see how the recoil feels.  (Revolvers are easier to fit to your hand than pistols, because there are different grips available for them, and you can choose those that best suit you.  Revolvers also have Crimson Trace Lasergrips and similar products available for many models, which are an absolutely outstanding accessory for emergency, close-range shooting when you may not have space or time to line up the sights conventionally.  More about that later.)

As well as the gun fitting your hand well, see how the recoil feels to you.  If the grip is too small or too large for you to grasp it comfortably, the gun will move in your hand under recoil, forcing you to readjust your grip before the next shot.  This will slow you down and make it more difficult to hit your target, because you have to concentrate on something else.  The selection procedure outlined in the previous paragraph will apply also to choosing a caliber you can handle.  A heavy-recoiling round is probably not optimum in a small handgun unless you're a trained, experienced shooter and know what you're doing.  Choosing a less powerful, lower-recoiling cartridge (for example, a .38 Special instead of a .357 Magnum) is recommended for novice shooters, who can also choose a much lighter caliber if they wish (e.g. .22LR instead of .38).  Lighter calibers are less likely to stop a hopped-up attacker, but if they're what you can handle, you can learn to use them well enough to compensate for that handicap.  I promise you, a few .22's in and around the eyes will deter even the most aggressive assailant!

It's also useful to know that certain ammunition manufacturers make both heavier-recoil and lower-recoil rounds in a given cartridge or caliber.  A few examples:

• Hornady makes its 9mm 115gr. FTX Critical Defense round for standard use, but for those who can't tolerate heavy recoil, it also offers its 9mm 100gr. FTX Critical Defense Lite load.  The latter may not be as effective as the former, but it's still a viable option - and it has rather less "kick" than the former round.
• Black Hills Ammunition offers the Honeybadger "scalloped" bullet in two 9mm loads;  a 100gr projectile, faster and more energetic, and a 125gr. bullet, slower and less energetic (and offering lower recoil).  I prefer the latter load in small 9mm pistols, as it remains very effective despite being more controllable than its faster brother.
• Federal offers its 9mm HST defensive load in a 124gr. +P (i.e. high-pressure) round, and a 147gr. standard-pressure cartridge.  Again, the latter load recoils less energetically than the former.  Both are widely used by law enforcement agencies, which speaks highly of the HST range.

There are other manufacturers offering similar choices.  Do your own research, and choose the round that best fits your level of knowledge and experience.  I've been shooting for many decades, and I feel no shame in admitting that as I grow older and slower, I prefer a lower-recoil round in a smaller, lighter weapon.  Arthritis and heavy recoil are not very compatible!

One's choice of weapon should be directed by the threats one is likely to face.  If a potential attacker is likely to be alone (e.g. a nutcase on public transport), or one or two men hanging around outside a shop or bank or cinema, a smaller handgun may well be enough to deal with the problem.  If you're more likely to face an angry riot, with violence being offered indiscriminately by groups of feral protesters to everyone they meet, no handgun is likely to be sufficient, no matter how large it may be or how many rounds it may hold!

A small handgun is designed to be carried to deal with occasional threats that are not very likely to occur.  A more dangerous threat requires a tool more suited to deal with it - which is why police officers usually carry full-size service pistols holding anywhere from fifteen to twenty rounds, sometimes even more.  We, as civilians, can do the same, but we'd better know how to conceal them (to prevent others hitting us over the head to steal them) and use them (to protect ourselves and our loved ones).  If we look like a threat to others, they're likely to respond as if we are a threat.  Therefore, discreet carry and low-key behavior are more likely to protect us than a macho, manly swagger while displaying our supersized Felon-Stopper Magnum-Blaster Mark XVIII handgun!

If I leave the house, I'm armed as a matter of course.  I'll usually be carrying a small handgun that I can shoot well enough at short range to defend myself and/or my wife.  It won't be suitable for long-range use or to handle more than one or two opponents, because the odds of my facing such a threat are minuscule.  If I lived in a big city (particularly a so-called "blue" city where left-wing sympathies predominate, making the authorities "soft" on crime), that would not apply.  I'd be carrying something larger and more powerful, and have spare ammo available for rapid reloads as well.  If mob violence is a possibility, I'll always try to not be anywhere near there;  but if I absolutely have to be there, I'll be carrying more than a handgun.  When I travel, I take into account the environments through/in which I'm likely to pass and/or stay, and equip myself accordingly.  In other words, I arm myself to meet the threat(s) I'm most likely to encounter in a given place at a given time.

Another factor to consider is aiming a handgun under the pressure of an attack, or in a more widespread, confused situation such as a riot.  In a high-stress situation, with one's adrenaline pumping, it's very hard to aim accurately at a moving target while other people are obscuring the range and perhaps also threatening you.  For that reason, I highly recommend a laser sight such as a Crimson Trace Lasergrip for most revolvers.  Sight it in to cover the most likely ranges at which you may need it (I suggest 10 yards for a small gun), then train with it until you can bring up the weapon, put the dot on target, and fire an accurate round as fast as possible.  That'll generally be faster than trying to line up front and rear sights on a moving target.  Similar laser sights are available for some small pistols as well.  Shop around and see what you can find.

I usually don't recommend a red dot sight for a small handgun if deep concealment is going to be necessary.  They are very useful indeed, to be sure, but they stick up above the weapon and make it harder to draw it in a hurry from a pocket or inside a handbag.  You'll be surprised at how easily the sight can catch against clothing or nearby objects, slowing your draw quite drastically.  Its sight advantage may be less worthwhile than its other disadvantages;  you'll have to make that call for yourself.  My preference is usually to carry a handgun with a red dot sight in a holster on my belt, to minimize that problem.

While on the subject of deep concealment, I strongly recommend the use of either a double-action handgun (such as a snubnose revolver) that has a relatively heavy, long trigger pull, or a firearm with a safety catch that must be released in order to pull the trigger.  Both cases are to prevent something in a pocket or a handbag snagging on the trigger and accidentally discharging the gun.  This isn't an idle fear, either:  I can recall reading of several incidents where it's happened.  That's also a very good reason to use a pocket or handbag holster that covers the trigger guard, and prevents anything getting inside before the firearm is drawn.  Safety is a critical aspect of firearms handling that's too often honored more in the breach than in the observance.  Don't become an accidental discharge statistic!

On most days, a small, easily concealed handgun is all I need.  However, I take care to make sure I keep up my practice with it, so that if I should have to use it, I can be reasonably sure of solving my problem.

Peter

I see prison inmates are as determined as ever to "beat the system" - even if it kills them

 

I wasn't surprised to read this article the other day.

When guards at the Cook County Correctional Facility found 57-year-old inmate Thomas Diskin dead, slumped around his cell’s toilet in January 2023, investigators were left scratching their heads: There was no evidence of foul play or a fall that could’ve killed the prisoner.

The only thing out of the norm? Tiny strips of singed paper littered around his cell. 

“I said, ‘We need to test this and find out what’s going on with it,’” Cook County Sheriff’s Office chief of staff Brad Curry recalled about that moment, referring to the paper shreds. 

Eventually, a Pennsylvania lab would confirm that the strips were soaked in a synthetic cannabinoid called Pinaca, which proved lethal when Diskin smoked the paper.

Before authorities could stop it, other inmates were dropping dead under eerily similar circumstances. 

. . .

Guards ... began inspecting every single piece of mail that came into the lockup, looking for stains and discoloration that could indicate synthetic drugs on it, and ramped up random cell searches and surveillance.

But the strips of drug-soaked paper were sometimes so tiny, guards wouldn’t find them — and not even drug-trained police K-9s were able to sniff out the new synthetic cannabinoid they contained, Curry explained. 

. . .

When the mailroom got too hot with scrutiny, smugglers began dousing legal documents in drugs to make it look like they came straight from the courthouse.

They even put it on pages of thick books that came to the prison packaged as if they’d been sent straight from Amazon or a local bookstore. 

Just one 8×11 piece of paper full of the drugs could run up to $10,000 — a price tag apparently high enough to turn the heads of several money-hungry staffers — who ended up in cuffs for smuggling it to inmates, according to Curry.

There's more at the link.

Drug dealers have a huge financial incentive to get drugs into prisons, because security precautions make it much harder to get them to their customers.  Prices are thus often five to ten times more than "on the street", and sometimes - such as during a prolonged security lockdown - a lot more than that.

When I worked as a prison chaplain, one of our biggest headaches was the misuse of religious services materials by inmates and dealers trying to smuggle drugs inside through the chapel.  Bibles with certain pages soaked in drug solutions, then dried out;  "incense" that was nothing but (often very highly concentrated) drug powder;  bottles of liquid drug concentrate concealed inside statues or within niches carved out of crosses before they were assembled;  the list was endless, and was always expanding.  Many of us said that if the inmates we supervised would put one-tenth as much effort into hard, honest work as they did into illegal activities, they'd all be millionaires.  We had to institute a policy that religious goods could only be sent direct from the supplier (whom we had to approve beforehand) to the prison, without going through any other person, even the inmate's family.  That was the only way we could keep the problem within manageable proportions.

Even that wasn't foolproof, because some suppliers are not what they appear to be at first glance.  One of my favorite examples was the group of Rastafarian inmates who persuaded a relatively new prison staffer that they wanted to order some "holy oil of anointing" for their religious ceremonies.  She authorized the purchase, and a few days later happened to innocently mention it to a senior corrections officer.  He beetled his brows at her and issued special instructions to the Receiving Department.  When the "holy oil" arrived, it was sequestered until it could be tested.  Needless to say, it was high-test cannabis oil - doubtless of deep religious significance to Rastafarians, but not exactly in line with prison security regulations.  Police at the place of origin were tipped off, and they proceeded to take a deep and abiding interest in the supplier (to his subsequent profound unhappiness).

So, this most recent episode, as reported above, doesn't surprise me at all.  "Criminals gonna criminal", as I've heard more than one corrections officer put it;  and behind bars, they have all the time in the world to figure out new ways to "stick it to the man" and get around, over, under or through security precautions and procedures.  If they succeed, for a time their reputation in the prison will soar.  If they fail, the other inmates will have a good laugh at their expense - then everyone will try even harder to get away with it next time.

Prison work is anything but boring.  (Those who've read my memoir of prison ministry will recall Sam the Sex God, who had no need of illicit drugs to earn an automatic entry into the "anything but boring" category!)

Peter

So much for "unbreakable" codes...

 

Elon Musk dropped a bomb on the cryptocurrency market when he highlighted the impact of Google's recent announcement about the impact of quantum computing.

Elon Musk has added his voice to fears sparked by Google dramatically bringing forward its quantum computing timeline, putting almost $500 billion worth of bitcoin at risk.

"On the plus side, if you forgot the password to your wallet, it will be accessible in the future," Musk posted to X alongside a “conversation” with Musk’s Grok chatbot that said post-quantum migration for cryptocurrencies “is urgent now.”

Musk was responding to venture capitalist Max Reiff who summarized Google’s research as, “basically saying: ‘We’ve cut the quantum resources needed to break bitcoin’s encryption by 20x. We can now break it. We can prove it. We’re just not going to tell you how. We’ve slowed down research to give crypto a chance. You have until 2029 to figure out a solution. Good luck.’”

. . .

Earlier this week, Google’s Quantum AI team warned in a paper that the number of qubits required to break the cryptography protecting bitcoin and ethereum wallets is potentially as much as 20-fold lower than previous estimates.

“We’re setting a timeline for post-quantum cryptography migration to 2029,” Google’s vice president of security engineering Heather Adkins wrote in a blog post. "Quantum computers will pose a significant threat to current cryptographic standards, and specifically to encryption and digital signatures."

Venture capitalist Nic Carter, who has been sounding the alarm on quantum computing’s threat to crypto since last year, compared the quantum threat to the Manhattan Project, the top-secret U.S. government program that led to the development of nuclear weapons.

There's more at the link.

This is serious enough when it comes to cryptocurrency - any cryptocurrency.  There are no pieces of paper changing hands in cryptocurrency transactions.  It's all done electronically, with one's cryptocurrency holdings being held in an electronic "wallet" with a passcode to access them.  Until now, that passcode has been considered very secure in the face of current decoding/decryption technology.  However, quantum computers can tackle the decryption problem many orders of magnitude faster than present computers.  Once they're on the market, much that is cryptologically "secure" today will no longer be so.

Now, apply that to any other codes, cyphers, etc.  Literally any secret message at all will be subject to cryptological analysis and attack.  Top secret military signals, inter-bank communications about economic activity, diplomatic messages - any and all of them that use current encryption technology will be vulnerable.  Many believe that major actors in the field are already storing every encrypted message they can intercept, even if they can't read them, because when they can read them (with the aid of quantum computers) in a few years' time, they'll be a gold mine of historical information that can be used to analyze current events and predict future decisions.  Even so-called "one-time pad" or OTP encryption - seen until now as the only truly unbreakable code, provided that all requirements for their creation and use are strictly observed - won't be as secure if quantum computers can identify any failure to meet one or more requirements, and use that weakness to break into the code.  (However, quantum key distribution and other new technologies may step up to make the OTP even more secure.)

If Google's prediction is correct, a great deal that is now secret won't be for much longer.  That might be catastrophic in many ways.  On the other hand, James Howells might be happy at last!  He's the man who threw away a computer hard drive containing the key to a cryptocurrency wallet containing (he claims) about US $700 million in Bitcoin.  If he can recall the address of the wallet, the new quantum decryption technology might let him reclaim its contents . . . but only if someone else doesn't remember his story and get there ahead of him, locating the wallet, decrypting its key, and making off with the Bitcoin first!

Peter