Mentatul

Category: Conflict

News about conflicts.

  • “Helping” Developing Countries – The Mastery of Abuse

    “Helping” Developing Countries – The Mastery of Abuse

    The way superpowers and developed countries have spent money in order to „help” developing countries is often highly questionable. The „help” ranges from plaine naive to ruthless neo-colonialism.

    What adds insult to injury is that more often than not, the problem was caused by those „helpful” nation-states in the first place. This is a very complex topic that, for now, I will not debate. I’ll just give you the information along with a few short comments.

    Before that, however, I’d like to mention that this is not meant to disregard the many efforts that did work well for developing countries, particularly in the field of agriculture, human rights and social development.

    Arbitrary Border Creation, or How to Plant the Seeds of Destruction

    Take a close look at the shape of borders of countries such as Iraq^, Syria^, Libya^ and Egypt^ to name a few. There are quite a few straight lines. Why? It’s so easy for leaders to draw straight lines to partition territory they’re bickering about. But when they draw a straight line between communities that share the same religion or put vastly different cultures in the same bucket, bloodshed should not come as a surprise.

    Then again, those that planted the seeds of destruction probably knew what they were doing. A couple of dictators later though, millions of people worth unimaginable potential have been lost (and billions of dollars in profits from the sale of weapons have been gained).

    China’s Belt and Road Initiative

    A wonderful example of neo-colonialism^ is China’s BRI:

    https://edition.cnn.com/2018/12/31/asia/china-kenya-belt-road-bri-intl/index.html^

    The Great Western Empire (my own name for it) is of course always quick to attack China’s expansionist plans. Perhaps it’s just jealous that China is trying to beat it at its own game.

    The $100 Laptop That Wanted to Change the World (and Miserably Failed)

    Once upon a time, an idealist computer scientist^ hoped that giving poor children laptops would improve their chances of success in a world where technology plays an ever-increasing role. We will never know if he was right, because the project failed (not with a bang, but with a whimper):

    https://www.theverge.com/2018/4/16/17233946/olpcs-100-laptop-education-where-is-it-now^

    To be honest, I disagree that throwing plastic and silicon at developing countries would be more helpful than investing in better training for teachers and a large number of social advisors to begin tackling major social issues such as corruption and toxic social stratification (I’m all for diversity, but not at the expense of the value of life).

    The Weapon Trade

    Recently, I became aware of a company that sells watches made out of metal extracted from confiscated weapons. Their marketing says that buying such a watch “supports peace”. One of their commercials shows Kalashnikovs being destroyed, because of course that’s the only weapon in the world:

    https://www.triwa.com/se/page/triwa-x-humanium-metal-pre-order

    Pardon me for going: “yeah, destroy the weapons made by the previous superpower so that you can sell new ones”. After all, there’s a lot of people banking on conflict in such nations; there’s fewer and fewer countries on Earth engaged in active war and the weapons industry can’t just die… right?

    Oil

    No comment.

    https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/12/south-sudan-150-women-girls-raped-12-days-181204074727376.html^

    https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/12/journalist-south-sudan-181214094915498.html^

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  • The “No First Use” Nuclear Weapons Policy

    The “No First Use” Nuclear Weapons Policy

    The title says it clearly enough. A “no first use” pledge might work much better than threats if we want to advert a nuclear war with, for example, North Korea. Given the size of the country’s army, even a conventional weapons conflict would have devastating consequences on the Korean peninsula. But a “no first use” pledge would probably prevent that as well, since it could include something like “no state will use nuclear weapons as long as its territorial integrity is preserved”. Here’s an article that describes all this in more detail:

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2017/10/16/if-trump-wants-to-prevent-nuclear-war-with-north-korea-a-no-first-use-pledge-might-work-better-than-threats^

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  • Trump, Putin and Cold War 2.0

    Trump, Putin and Cold War 2.0

    I present you with one of the best geopolitical analysis articles I’ve read in the past couple of years. It’s also quite a long read. But if you care about the conflict between the world’s superpowers, this will be an excellent use of your time since it’s also very well written.

    The text goes in ample detail regarding cyberwarfare and how Russia has become a force to be reckoned with in the field of social media manipulation. You will also learn why it was possible for Russia to influence the elections in the United States. In turn, this will make it clear that democracy is facing a threat as a result of the intense polarization affecting many societies on Earth.

    This polarization is a result of people having become disillusioned with the establishment (both political and economic). Unfortunately, everybody stands to lose when power is transferred to irrational, perhaps even sick individuals.

    In the article below, you will also be presented with valuable historical information that will help in understanding the current geopolitical situation.

    http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/03/06/trump-putin-and-the-new-cold-war^

    Even though the text is written from an American point of view, I found it to be quite balanced. Of course, I’m aware that this judgement is based on my ideological preferences. In any case, there’s a lot of useful information to be extracted from the text, which is why I highly recommend it.

    [ax_meta lnimgurl=’http://mentatul.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/01936-TrumpPutinColdWar-Thumb.jpg’ lnimgw=’250′ lnimgh=’250′ title=’Trump, Putin and Cold War 2.0′ desc=’I present you with one of the best geopolitical analysis articles I've read in the past couple of years.’]

  • Amid Souring Relations, Russia Pulls out of Nuclear Treaty

    Amid Souring Relations, Russia Pulls out of Nuclear Treaty

    During the past few weeks and months, there have been some worrying rumblings among the world’s superpowers. We’ve witnessed a serious degradation of relations between Russia and the USA, while China is slowly but surely pursuing its own agenda.

    Part of a process of rebalancing itself in the planetary power-play, Russia has recently been involved in military exercises^ together with China. This sends a clear message that the Eurasian superpowers are waking up to the fact that they share more points in common than just the massive landmass they occupy. These military drills were held in the contested waters of the South China Sea. There, the USA has been involved in arbitration between other claimant nation-states. But the balance is quickly shifting^, even as Philippines’ human rights violator^ and political wildcard Rodrigo Duterte cares little about the meddling of far-away USA^ in regional matters.

    Last week, Vladimir Putin and Turkey’s Tayyip Erdogan held a joint press conference announcing a revival in economic collaboration^. Turkey has the second largest army in NATO. Rarely have I seen so much rebalancing of powers in the space of just a few months.

    From its side, the USA is launching all sorts of diplomatic efforts in an attempt to contain Russia. The first step was to halt collaboration on Syria^ (as marginal and ineffective as it was). Next, the US together with its close allies^ threatened to drag Russia to an international court for war crimes^ (as if Americans hadn’t blown up hospitals and ruined enough countries in the past).

    What should worry us most though, is the stench of atomic war that started to make itself felt. A few weeks ago Russia pulled out of an important agreement aimed at lowering the nuclear weapons stockpile of the two superpowers:

    http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/04/world/europe/russia-plutonium-nuclear-treaty.html?_r=0

    It may be tempting to condemn Russia as a warmonger, but actually, at least one of its motivations for quitting the agreement is quite reasonable. The USA hasn’t kept its end of the bargain. Instead of totally disposing of its plutonium by using it in power plants, the US is considering stashing it at a nuclear waste disposal location. Granted, the Americans have helped Russia get rid of quite a bit of plutonium through the years. So, as always, the situation isn’t black or white but rather a gloomy shade of gray.

    This is not the first time^ in recent memory when Russia has brought its nuclear arsenal into the spotlight. However, it’s quite repugnant that they stooped so low as to allow TV anchors^ to spew crude nuclear propaganda into the minds of their viewers; that’s the sort of antics one would expect from North Korea. Sadly, I feel like Russia might have been pushed in this direction by what it perceives as continued advances into its sphere of influence by NATO^.

    Here’s another enlightening synthesis regarding Russian-American relations:

    http://www.businessinsider.com/us-russia-relations-trump-syria-2016-10?r=US&IR=T&IR=T^

    All in all, what’s happening is quite sad. You’d expect more from the 21st century than superpowers squabbling over petty differences while covertly (or not) fueling the destruction of Syria and many other developing countries (Libya, Iraq, Yemen, Afghanistan and the list can go on). Insatiable greed is a sign that a species hasn’t yet made peace with the barbaric traits of its survival instinct.

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  • Flight MH17 Was Indeed Downed By A Russian Rocket

    Flight MH17 Was Indeed Downed By A Russian Rocket

    It took a couple of years, but finally the Dutch have completed their investigation concerning the Malaysia Airlines flight MH17. The plane crashed in Ukraine during the Russian intervention there a bit over two years ago. There were no survivors:

    http://www.businessinsider.com/animation-of-mh17-hit-with-buk-missile-2016-7^

    Here’s a video too, by the Dutch Safety Board^.

    Surprise! Not…

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  • Cyber-Warfare is Scary

    Cyber-Warfare is Scary

    When we read in the press about “hacking”, it’s mostly about software-based attacks. It may be about exploiting a vulnerability to reveal passwords or attacking an insecure computer. Then there’s the entire social-engineering aspect to it, which is basically hacking a person’s mind (can also be seen as a person’s software).

    Cyber-warfare^ has been defined as “actions by a nation-state to penetrate another nation’s computers or networks for the purposes of causing damage or disruption”. Serious confrontations are also going on between corporations, with industrial espionage being one of the main drivers. Unlike in real war, because a single individual can take on an entire nation through the use of clever hacking, the boundaries between these “size categories” are blurred.

    In addition to the myriad ways a target can be hacked through software, there’s something far more insidious and dangerous that can happen. Hardware-based attacks:

    https://www.wired.com/2016/06/demonically-clever-backdoor-hides-inside-computer-chip/^

    What the article above explains is how tiny hardware back-doors can be baked inside any integrated circuit. It’s not news that this is doable, but what is news is that it’s way too easy to achieve and almost impossible to detect. Even in the case of the highly advanced computer processors that are inside all our devices. Apparently it can be done by a single (well trained) person working inside the factory that manufactures the chip.

    Such modifications are extremely hard to detect. It’s quite tempting to go a bit paranoid when thinking about how many of our mission-critical processors are manufactured in Asia. China has lately started to re-assert itself technologically and militarily. There was an age when airplanes and bombs would decide the fate of a war. That age is slowly fading away.

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  • Best War Buddies Australia & France

    Best War Buddies Australia & France

    Fans of the military industrial complex, rejoice. There is a new romance on the block. Australia and France are deepening their military relationship, under the auspices of a fat ship-building contract:

    http://www.skynews.com.au/news/top-stories/2016/05/02/turnbull-meets-french-pm-in-canberra.html^

    Contemplating world peace, the Australian decision-makers thought that a dozen submarines are totally worth $50 billion of their people’s work. On the other side of the world, the failing French economy is in dire need of a stimulus. After relations soured between NATO and Russia, France had to cancel a profitable warships-building contract, although the Russians will probably be getting the ships anyway by using Egypt^ as a proxy.

    Fifty billion dollars; it’s hard not to wonder what a different type of government could have done with this amount of money. Such an investment would be a game changer in any vital government branch such as education, healthcare, social services or research.

    For example, a country could offer a salary of $4000 per month, for ten years to a hundred thousand people. In other words, a country could allow a hundred thousand entrepreneurs experiment with ideas for ten years. I think that after a decade, the products and technologies coming from even a tiny fraction of those entrepreneurs would help Australia more than a dozen chunks of metal thrown in the ocean to pollute it.

    Unfortunately for its citizens (and fortunately for the French ones), Australia decided that it’s jolly time to protect its oceans from the legion of enemy ships swarming in it and around its shores. Except wait, the only serious threat to man around Australia are sharks. This makes me wonder what exactly is at play here. Is NATO cultivating an ally that might one day assist in the power struggle with a resurgent China?

    [ax_meta lnimgurl=’http://mentatul.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/00556-FranceAustraliaWarBuddies-Thumb.jpg’ lnimgw=’250′ lnimgh=’250′ title=’Best War Buddies Australia & France’ desc=’Fans of the military industrial complex, rejoice. There is a new romance on the block.’]

  • Not the Usual Sermon Against Terrorism

    Not the Usual Sermon Against Terrorism

    Of all the things I’ve learned throughout my life, I think nothing is more important than starting to have an understanding about the meaning of duality. For me, the very challenge of life is to reconcile the duality I observe with the oneness I strive for. Duality is not only about good and evil or about life and death. Duality is also about us and the others, and it is this aspect that I’d like to write a few words about.

    I think humans have a tendency to strive for perfection. In the same time, most humans know that they will never be perfect. It’s a correct conclusion, I believe, since only oneness can be perfect. As long as there is something missing from anything, neither side can be perfect. However, duality is only a temporary absence of perfection. And, as long as we are alive and playing our different roles, I believe we can learn from duality while waiting for perfection.

    Today, it is difficult to write about terrorism without touching on the subject of religion. But it is exactly religion that I do not wish to discuss on this website. Ever. This is because I believe that spirituality is a deeply personal experience. Words tend to sully it.

    So what can I say about terrorism without going into complex and endless diatribes on religion, politics or society? Not much, really. Just the simple truth that…

    It’s not easy knowing we’re imperfect. Smart, heinous people are aware of this and are harvesting the emotional pain caused by our discomfort. Through the use of psychological manipulation techniques, people are turned into stereotypes or, to use a more powerful word, drones. The terrorist drones are among the most difficult to understand, because they’ve been led to believe that they can prove their worth towards their Gods (and symbols of perfection) by tearing other people to pieces, by “imperfecting” them.

    If we’d have proper education and opportunity across the world, none of this would have come to pass. But we all know that, don’t we? And yet we sit in our comfortable bubbles, like the nice drones that we are. However, that may change at any point, especially if these obedient drones start turning into confident people. The best way to prevent this from happening is to cultivate fear and terror. And so, the great military alliances march on, playing with the money that should be invested in education, science and healthcare.

    And since this has been a Dissected News posting, here’s the two events that seeded my words.

    The terrorist attack in Pakistan:

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_Lahore_suicide_bombing^

    The terrorist attacks in Belgium:

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_Brussels_bombings^

    Seemingly unrelated, here’s how a traffic accident victim is being ignored somewhere in Asia:

    https://www.facebook.com/4Tuning.ro/videos/10154652045284056/?__mref=message^

    While terrorism is one of the most acute symptoms of a failed society, this last video I linked shows the systemic problem. It’s one of innumerable examples that illustrate the worrying degradation of our society. As long as we continue our journey in this way, our path will remain a bloody one.

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