#Central cabinet secretary

[read-marx-and-lenin]

Hi, I’m sorry to bother you. I’ve been attempting to unlearn what I’ve been taught about the DPRK from western outlets, but I’ve gotten stuck on a facet that you can, perhaps, speak to. As is often harped on here in the west, there seems to be a dynastic quality to the leadership, namely the Kim family. Now the fixation that the people have on their leaders I can understand, we can observe the same kind of obsessive fervor in many countries in the west (especially the US). I guess I don’t fully understand the political structure of the DPRK, nor the people’s relations to it. I apologize for the vagueness of this question, and thank you very much for your time.

It is understandable that most people will have no idea about the political structure of the DPRK, and the title of "Supreme Leader" can be confusing if you don't understand how the DPRK's government works.

The political structure of the DPRK is based around democratic centralism, similar to the USSR. Kim Jong-un was elected to the positions of general secretary of the Worker's Party of Korea and president of the State Affairs Commission, which grants him the honorific title of "Supreme Leader" and makes him the representative of the state. However, he is not the head of government. That would be the premier, Kim Tok-hun (unrelated to Kim Jong-un, Kim is simply a very common surname in Korea.) Kim Tok-hun also serves as the vice president of the State Affairs Commission.

The highest organ of the DPRK, meanwhile, is the Supreme People's Assembly, which is a multi-party legislature that votes on laws and constitutional amendments and is responsible for electing both the Premier and the President of State Affairs, among other positions. While there are multiple political parties in the DPRK, the Worker's Party holds a privileged position under the constitution. So while the position of General Secretary does not confer any formal governmental powers, it is still a powerful political position in the country.

The Premier is the head of the Cabinet, which is the administrative and executive body of the DPRK. While the SPA creates laws, amends the constitution, and decides the budget, the Cabinet administers the implementation of them.

The SAC directs the orientation of state policy in the DPRK. While they do not write laws directly, they can issue directives to guide the SPA in determining which laws to write. However, the SAC is ultimately accountable to the SPA and not above it. The SPA is responsible for electing the SAC in the first place and has the authority to recall its members. So while the SAC is not directly elected by the people, it does not hold greater power than the SPA whose members are directly elected.

Members of the SPA are elected by all citizens 17 and older alongside members of local assemblies (compare governors vs senators in the US.) Elections are conducted via secret ballot. Anyone has the right to run for election regardless of party affiliation, which is why there are multiple parties represented in the SPA as well as independent members.

You can read more about the DPRK governmental structure in the DPRK constitution here:

[txttletale]

how do ml's reconcile with lenin going for a bigbrainhaver hierarchy which just so happened to place him at the tippy top? most of the things he's quoted for writing make a kind of sense in that longwinded academic philosopher way, but, like, russia went from having a revolution against monarchy to having a monarchy, essentially, and what folks do tends to align with their desires, yeah? wouldn't that make everything he said, idk, suspicious?

we reconcile with this because none of this is even remotely true. lenin did not 'happen to be placed at the tippy top' but was in fact elected by the soviets, who worked in a very simple electoral system by which workers and peasants would elect representatives to their local soviet, who as well as administering local services would also elect members to higher bodies. the quote unquote bigbrainhaver hierarchy system in question was as follows:

The sovereign body is in every case the Congress of Soviets. Each county sends its delegates. These are elected indirectly by the town and county Soviets which vote in proportion to population, following the ratio observed throughout, by which the voters in the town have five times the voting strength of the inhabitants of the villages, an advantage which may, as we saw, be in reality three to one. The Congress meets, as a rule, once a year, for about ten days. It is not, in the real sense of the word, the legislative body. It debates policy broadly, and passes resolutions which lay down the general principles to be followed in legislation. The atmosphere of its sittings is that of a great public demonstration. The Union Congress, for example, which has some fifteen hundred members, meets in the Moscow Opera House. The stage is occupied by the leaders and the heads of the administration, and speeches are apt to be big oratorical efforts. The real legislative body is the so-called Central Executive Committee (known as the C. I. K. and pronounced "tseek") . It meets more frequently than the Congress to which it is responsible-in the case of the Union, at least three times in the year-passes the Budget, receives the reports of the Commissars (ministers), and discusses international policy. It, in its turn, elects two standing bodies: (1) The Presidium of twenty-one members, which has the right to legislate in the intervals between the sittings of the superior assemblies, and also transacts some administrative work. (2) The Council of Peoples' Commissars. These correspond roughly to the Ministers or Secretaries of State in democratic countries and are the chiefs of the administration. Meeting as a Council, they have larger powers than any Cabinet, for they may pass emergency legislation and issue decrees which have all the force of legislation. Save in cases of urgency, however, their decrees and drafts of legislation must be ratified by the Executive Committee (C.I.K.). In another respect they differ from the European conception of a Minister. Each Commissar is in reality the chairman of a small board of colleagues, who are his advisers. These advisory boards, or collegia, meet very frequently (it may even be daily) to discuss current business, and any member of a board has the right to appeal to the whole Council of Commissars against a decision of the Commissar.

—H.N. Brailsford, How The Soviets Work (1927)

you might notice that the congresses of soviets were not directly elected -- this is because they were elected by local soviets, who were directly elected, in a process that many people have given first hand accounts of:

I have, while working in the Soviet Union, participated in an election. I, too, had a right to vote, as I was a working member of the community, and nationality and citizenship are no bar to electoral rights. The procedure was extremely simple. A general meeting of all the workers in our organisation was called by the trade union committee, candidates were discussed, and a vote was taken by show of hands. Anybody present had the right to propose a candidate, and the one who was elected was not personally a member of the Party. In considering the claims of the candidates their past activities were discussed, they themselves had to answer questions as to their qualifications, anybody could express an opinion, for or against them, and the basis of all the discussion was: What justification had the candidates to represent their comrades on the local Soviet. As far as the elections in the villages were concerned, these took place at open village meetings, all peasants of voting age, other than those who employed labour, having the right to vote and to stand for election. As in the towns, any organisation or individual could put forward candidates, anyone could ask the candidate questions, and anybody could support or oppose the candidature. It is usual for the Communist Party to put forward a candidate, trade unions and other organisations can also do so, and there is nothing to prevent the Party’s candidate from not being elected, if he has not sufficient prestige among the voters. In the towns the “ electoral district ” has hitherto consisted of a factory, or a group of small factories sufficient to form a constituency. But there was one section of the town population which has always had to vote geographically, since they did not work together in one organisation. This was the housewives. As a result, the housewives met separately in each district, had their own constituencies, and elected their own representatives to the Soviet. Here, too, vital interest has always been shown in the personality of every candidate. Why should this woman be elected ? What right had she to represent her fellow housewives on the local Soviet ? In the district next to my own at the last election the housewife who was elected was well known as an organiser of a communal dining-room in the district. This was the kind of person that the housewives wanted to represent them on the Soviet. Another candidate, a Communist, proposed by the local organisation of the Party, was turned down in her favour.

[...]

The election of delegates to the local Soviet is not the only function of voters in the Soviet Union. It is not a question here of various parties presenting candidates to the electorate, each with his own policy to offer. The Soviet electorate has to select a personality from its midst to represent it, and instruct this person in the policy which is to be followed when elected. At a Soviet election meeting, therefore, as much or more time may be spent on discussion of the instructions to the delegate as is spent on discussing the personality of the candidates. At the last election to the Soviets, in which I personally participated, we must have spent three or four times as much time on the working out of instructions as we did on the selection of our candidate. About three weeks before the election was to take place the trade union secretary in every department of our organisation was told by the committee that it was time to start to prepare our instructions to the delegate. Every worker was asked to make suggestions concerning policy which he felt should be brought to the notice of the new personnel of the Moscow Soviet. As a result, about forty proposals concerning the general government of Moscow were handed in from a group of about twenty people. We then held a meeting in our department at which we discussed the proposals, and adopted some and rejected others. We then handed our list of pro¬ posals to a commission, appointed by the trade union committee, and representing all the workers in our organisation. This Commission co-ordinated the pro¬ posals received, placed them in order according to the various departments of the Soviet, and this co-ordinated list was read at the election meeting itself, again discussed, and adopted in its final form.

—Pat Sloan, Soviet Democracy (1937)

Between the elections of 1931 and 1934, no less than 18 per cent of the city deputies and 37 per cent of village deputies were recalled, of whom only a relatively small number — 4 per cent of the total — were charged with serious abuse of power. The chief reasons for recall were inactivity — 37 per cent — and inefficiency — 21 per cent. If these figures indicate certain lacks in the quality of elected officials, they show considerable activity of the people in improving government. The electorate of the Peasants' Gazette, for example, consisted of some 1,500 employees, entitled to elect one deputy to the Moscow city soviet and two to the ward soviet. For more than a month before the election every department of the newspaper held meetings discussing both candidates and instructions. Forty-three suggested candidates and some 1,400 proposals for the work of the incoming government resulted from these meetings, which also elected committees to boil down and classify the instructions. These committees issued a special four-page newspaper for the 1,500 voters; it contained brief biographies of the forty-three candidates, an analysis of their capacities by the Communist Party organization of the Peasants' Gazette, and the "nakaz," or list of "people's instructions," classified by subject and the branch of government which they concerned. At the final election meeting of the Peasants* Gazette there was literally more than 100 per cent attendance, since some of the staff who for reasons of absence or illness had not been listed as prospective voters returned from sanatoria or from distant assignments to vote. The instructions issued by the electorate in this manner — 1,400 from the Peasants' Gazette and tens of thousands from Moscow citizens — became the first business of the incoming government.

—Anna Louise Strong, The New Soviet Constitution (1937)

does this mean that the soviet project was some utopian perfect system? no. there were flaws in the system like any other. it disenfranchised the rural peasantry (although not, i would like to add, to any extent greater or even equivalent to the extent to which the US electoral system disenfranchises the urban working class) -- the various tiers of indirect selection created a divide between the average worker and the highest tier of the executive -- and various elements of this fledgling system would calcify and bureaucratise over time in ways that obstructed worker's democracy. but saying that it was 'a monarchy' is founded in absolutely nothing except the most hysterical anticommunist propaganda and tedious orwellian liberal truisms.

even brailsford, in an account overall critical of the soviet system, had to admit:

Speaking broadly, the various organs of the system, from the Council of Commissars of the Union down to the sub-committees of a town Soviet, are handling the same problems. Whether one sits in the Kremlin at a meeting of the most august body of the whole Union, the "C.I.K.," or round a table in Vladimir with the working men who constitute its County Executive Committee, one hears exactly the same problems discussed. How, be-fore June arrives, shall we manage to reduce prices by ten percent? What growth can we show in the number of our spindles, or factories, and in the number of workers employed? When and how shall we make our final assault on the last relics of illiteracy? Or when shall we have room in our schools, even in the remotest village, for every child? Was it by good luck or good guidance that the number of typhus cases has dropped in a year by half? And, finally, how can we hasten the raising of clover seed, so that the peasants who, at last, thanks to our propaganda, are clamoring for it, may not be disappointed?

—H.N. Brailsford, How The Soviets Work (1927)

genuinely, i think you should take a moment and think about where you learned about the soviet union. have you read any serious historical work on the topic, even from non-communist or anti-communist sources? because even imperialist propagandists have to make a pretence at engaging with actual facts on the ground, something which you haven't done at all -- and yet you speak with astounding confidence. i recommend you read some serious books instead of animal farm and reflect on why you believe the things you believe and how you know the things you think you know.

[neptunesnxpple]

Benimaru Shinmon x m! Reader

18+ only

Pairing: benimaru shinmon x m!reader

18+ only no minors please

Summary: You're Chapter 7's secretary and Central issues out new uniforms. I wrote this over a year ago, no proofreading

Tags: NotSFW, m x m, reader in a skirt, handjobs, cumeating, vanilla and gentle, there's a bit of a build up

“Central is issuing new uniforms,” Maki handed you a small package, “they said that even though you’re not going out on missions, appearance is an important part,” she gave a reassuring smile at that, but it did little to soothe your unease about the situation. Part of why you picked the seventh was the lack of adherence to company policy or standards. They were a little more liberal in their application of those mandates, but it seemed not even you could escape the crushing hand of central. You thanked Maki, shutting the door to your small home and tearing into it on the table. You doubted it would be as comfortable as your loose pants and soft shirts but there was no point in fighting it.

Benimaru rarely had time to sit around the station, he had his morning routine, part of which included checking in on the townspeople and making sure nothing was out of the ordinary. If he had the time he’d settle in for a cup of tea and a light breakfast, maybe some light training. Today he was a bit ahead of schedule, sitting in a spare room and window watching. There was still some paper work that needed to be filled out about the most recent incident, but he had to wait for you to get here in order to submit it officially. Ever since the first sent over a Secretary his days had been peaceful, all that loathsome paperwork was no longer his problem.

You unlocked the front door, taking careful steps and trying to stick the landing with each one. The package included tea party heels, something you’d never tried before. You turned on the lights and began opening the blinds as you went from room to room, the station was always quiet in the morning. Guessing from the time, you still had half an hour before the young master Benimaru would be in. Your estimation was dashed when you opened the sliding room to your ‘office’, a spare room that overlooked a small garden,

“Young master,” you greeted, surprised, “did you already finish your morning walk?” Benimaru gave you a thorough look, stopping back down at your thighs. expressionless.

“What are you wearing?” It came out harsher than intended. You shifted self consciously.

“Maki stopped by to drop off the central issued uniform for secretaries. She assured me that this was the correct one,” you responded, watching him carefully for a response. Aside from the heels you were in a short mini pencil skirt with matching slits in the side, so high up you had to find new a pair of boxer briefs that wouldn’t peak out from under it. A well fitting button up that had ruffles lining the button column. The fabric laid smooth over your flat chest. You supposed male secretaries were rare, and were on the fence on sending a message to central asking for an alternate outfit. A heavy silence fell over the room and you wished you had. “I could ask for a replacement if you would find that more acceptable.” Benimaru finally broke his state, turning towards the window and setting his tea cup on the table.

“That won’t be necessary. This one should do the job just fine.”

You sighed in relief at that sign of approval and finally set foot in the room itself, setting your bag next to the table and checking the filing cabinet for yesterday’s unfinished business. You sat across from him, working quietly, enjoying the gentle breeze and fresh air for the neighboring window. It was beautiful outside. You’d have to take your lunch outside. Every now and then you felt a pair of eyes on you, drinking you in, but whenever you looked he’d be focused on something else. Must have been your imagination. Perhaps an hour into your shift, the young master left.

Several hours later you were wrapping up, setting aside your current stack of documents and stretching back. With all the destruction, you had a lot of filing to do. Notification of damages, repairs, associate costs and outcomes. You had to attach dated photos and make sure to send a copy. But for now, lunch. As if on cue Benimaru appeared in the doorway,

“Are you taking your lunch break?”

You nodded, holding onto the table as you struggled to stand. You almost got a handle on the heels on your walk over but after a long time sitting down you had to get readjusted. You legs wobbled with each request forward, struggling to stay upright as you bent over to pick up your bag,

“Yeah, I think I’ll sit outside today. Do you need me for anything?” You shakily adjusted your bag over your shoulder, reaching the edge of the table and spreading your hands out as you walked in case you needed to catch yourself. Benimaru watched you, amused with the scene in front of him. By the time you got to the door, you felt as if you had just ran an entire yard. Not the small stretch of a room. You gripped the wall.

“No, I think I’ll go out with you.”

“Oh, cool,” you said, not really listening. It took all your attention to focus on staying upright. You wobbled on ahead, hand on the wall, before hearing an exasperated sigh. And suddenly, your feet were off the ground.

“By the time you get outside, your break will be over,” a deep voice explained. You felt the rumbling of his chest vibrate against your back, warm and soothing. You tensed, holding your bag on your stomach like an otter and not trusting yourself to say anything for fear of your voice cracking. He set you down on a partially shaded bench like a sensitive house plant. This was a much gentler side that you rarely saw. You cleared your throat to regain some composure,

“Thank you,” you smiled, hands shaking slightly.Your legs warmed in the sun, not used to getting this much exposure and finding that you quite liked it. The heels could stay too if that meant your young master would carry you from place to place.

“Don’t mention it. Mind if I sit with you?” He was sitting before you could answer, spreading out as if on habit alone, before noticing you scrunched to one side and reeling it in. He scratched at the side of his head, “so this is the new secretary outfit then?”

“Mhm,” you muffled between bites of rice and veggies.

“I won’t tell if you choose not to wear this. You should know by now that we don’t play by central’s rules.”

“I know, but I don’t want to cause anymore trouble for you guys. You already have enough on your hands, and I doubt you could find a secretary as flexible as me.” You definitely picked up way more of the report writing than was required, but Benimaru made up for it where he could. He’d bring you food, mostly, and if he saw you working too hard he’d send you home. Even though you technically worked for central and not just the seventh, he was a pretty cool supervisor.

“That’s why I want to make sure we keep you around. Seriously, you don’t have to wear... that.” You rested your utensil on the edge of your lunch box.

“If you don’t like it, I can change. I don’t mind either way.”

“No! - no it’s not that, I just thought,” he trailed off, leaning away from you now. You usually didn’t see him so impassioned. Or uncomfortable. Desperate to fix the situation you offered your lunch to him,

“Would you like a bite?” You held out your chopsticks, the sharp look of surprise on his face making you wish you didn’t. This was just getting worse. This look was something completely different and unknown, he seemed almost- flustered? You felt the heat rise to your face. With you leaned over your skirt had ridden up further, exposing the bulk of your thighs. You watched as he looked down at the food, catching sight of your thighs, and eyes widening. You blushed, pulling the skirt in vain as the fabric remained taut and unchanged. You gave up, accepting it for what it is. To your surprised he leaned over and took the bite you offered.

The rest of your lunch was eaten in silence, and when it was time for you to wrap up he lead you carefully along the stone path back to your office. The rest of the day was fairly uneventful, there was no additional reports to submit so you spent it on some housekeeping. Organizing the space, tidying up lose ends. By the end of the day, you propped yourself up on the edge of the table and took of your shoes, feet throbbing. This new uniform might take some getting use to. The warm orange glow of the sunset cast a loving light on the room and garden in front of you. You enjoyed the peace while you could. You straightened when you heard the door slide open, Benimaru stepping in. He took pleasure seeing you wrapped up in the golden light, propped up against the table. He stepped forward.

“You’re free to leave,” he stated. He tilted his head when he noticed your shoes on there floor, your feet dangling free.

“I’m a little sore,” you explained, shifting to slide off the table. Before you could finish the movement you were cut off by his large body in front of yours, towering over you. You froze in place.

“For all you work you shouldn’t have to walk home in pain,”

“Its really no problem, I’m sure I’ll get used to it,” you smiled, already aware that the young master wasn’t going to take no for an answer. Still you were startled when he dropped to his knees, taking one of your feet in his hands and beginning to rub deep circles into your arch. Once again you stiffened. Before melting completely on the table, slouching and reaching your foot out more for his ease. After the day you had you weren’t going to complain. He repeated the process on your other foot, and then began worked on your calves. Rubbing the muscle and relaxing the tense tissue into something more malleable. You laid back on the table, closing your eyes. Maybe this uniform wasn’t so bad.

He rubbed his hands over your meaty thighs, giving a test squeeze and enjoying the way his fingers dipped into the soft flesh. He was thankful you were on your back to avoid so you didn’t see the excited gleam in his eye. He stood up, settling himself between your legs. His hands ventured up from the sides of your legs to the side of your stomach, pressing in and massaging circles on your stomach with his thumbs. You shuddering, and without much thought you felt yourself get hard. You arched off the table when one of his hands pressed against the small of your back, the buttons on your shirt straining to hold. You couldn’t resist hooking your calves around the back of his legs, pulling him closer and slowly shifting against him. To your pleasure you felt him beginning to grow excited as well, a breathless gasp escaping his lips. Embolden you pulled him in tighter, pressing your erections together firmly as you rocked against him. Bravely you reached out, running a hand over his clothed abs and feeling the muscle definition underneath it.

He hooked his arm under your back and pulled you upright, reaching his free hand under your skirt and playing with your cock through the thin almost sheer like boxers underneath. Your fingers dug into his back, unable to avoid gasping and a small moan spilling out. Your legs tightened around him, hiking your skirt up more and allowing him to slip your cock out of your boxer briefs. He wrapped his other arm around you fully, supporting you and keeping you from wriggling.

Your threaded your fingers in his hair, dipping him down for a kiss. You felt his breath on your cheek, hot and needy, intoxicatingly so. Reluctantly you separate your mouth from his, pressing your foreheads together and fumbling to get your hand in his pants, a deep hunger settling over you. Too hazed to figure it out you made a noise of displeasure,

“Help,” you pleaded.

You felt him let out a hushed, amused laugh. He let go of you for the first time since his entering the room, slipping his thick penis out of his pants. Embarrassingly, you felt your mouth water, feeling the weight of it in your hands and the soft skin. He nestled back between your legs, feeling at home between them despite being a new sensation all together. The two of you felt each other, stroking in unison and nuzzling into the crook of the others neck. A comforting warmth settled over you, feeling his dick throbbing in your hand and his grip on you tightening as he came on your thighs. Not long after you came into his hand, moaning and body jerking to life under his guidance. The two of you stayed, stilled and holding onto one another for a lengthy amount of time. When you finally let go, you heard a groggy, gravelly voice speak up,

“Sorry about the mess,” he gestured to your thighs.

“Oh, uh, don’t wor-“ you choked on the last word as he returned to his knees, licking the cum off the insides of your thighs. You let out a pathetic whine, overstimulated and your half hard cock twitching with interest. You allowed him to lap up his mess before pushing him back, flushed, “I don’t think I can take anymore,” you admitted. He nodded, a softness in his eyes. On wobbly legs you hopped down, this time there was no heels to blame. You really didn’t want to shove your aching feet back into that tight shoe, even after the massage. Sensing your hesitation, Benimaru picked up your shoes.

“I’ll take you home. Or, you could spend the night in the station. With me.”

The idea of not having to leave sounded enticing, and after considering it you gave a nod,

“I think I will,” you lifted your legs and he scooped you up, taking a lesser travelled path to his small captains room, and setting you down in the entry way. It wasn’t decorated beyond what was needed. Dark blue sheets and bedspread, a dresser, just the essentials. Still it looked inviting and you found yourself curled up in his bed before you realized what was happening. You made a mental note to expand your work wardrobe.

[zvaigzdelasas]

The IB affair (Swedish: IB-affären) was the exposure of illegal surveillance operations by the IB secret Swedish intelligence agency within the Swedish Armed Forces. The two main purposes of the agency were to handle liaison with foreign intelligence agencies and to gather information about communists and other individuals who were perceived to be a threat to the nation.[...]

The story was immediately picked up by many leading Swedish dailies.[3] Their revelations were that: •There was a secret intelligence agency in Sweden called IB, without official status. Its director Birger Elmér was reporting directly to select key persons at cabinet level, most likely defence minister Sven Andersson and Prime Minister Olof Palme. •The Riksdag was unaware of its activities. People with far-left views had been monitored and registered. •IB agents had infiltrated Swedish left-wing organisations and sometimes tried to induce them into criminal acts. •There were Swedish spies operating abroad. IB spies had broken into the Egyptian and Algerian embassies in Stockholm. •The IB co-operated extensively with the Central Intelligence Agency and Shin Bet, in contrast to the official Swedish foreign policy of neutrality.[...]

In the following issues of Folket i Bild/Kulturfront the two uncovered further activities of IB and interviewed a man who had infiltrated the Swedish movement supporting the FNL, Vietnamese National Front for the Liberation of South Vietnam - at this time the FNL support network was a backbone of the radical opinion - and among other things, visited Palestinian guerilla camps in Jordan. The man worked for IB and had composed reports that, it was surmised, IB later passed on to the Israeli security services which resulted in the camps being bombed. [...]Swedish authorities claimed they were unable to locate him to stand trial. In 2009, he released an autobiography of his years in IB[...] He also confirmed that he had been transferred from IB to the Mossad, an Israeli intelligence agency, immediately prior to his exposure.[...]

The magazine had information from a previous employee of IB, Håkan Isacson, who claimed that IB had broken into the offices of two political organizations: the FNL Groups, a pro-North Vietnamese organization, and the Communist Party of Sweden, a Maoist political party. This concerned a Jordanian citizen and a stateless citizen. A wiretap was installed in the latter case. After this uncovering, the defense minister did admit that IB engaged in espionage outside of Sweden and infiltrated organizations within Sweden, including wiretaps. Evidence was put forth in 1974 that IB had built up a large network of agents in Finland, which included the Finnish foreign minister Väinö Leskinen. This network's main mission was to gather information regarding the Soviet Union.[...]

In November 1973, Prime Minister Olof Palme denied any link between IB and the Social Democrats. However, according to the memoir of ex-security service chief P.G. Vinge, Birger Elmér had regular contact with Palme and made his reports regularly to the Social Democratic Party secretary, Sven Andersson.[...]

Jan Guillou, Peter Bratt, Håkan Isacson and the photographer Ove Holmqvist were arrested 22 October 1973[2] by the Swedish Security Service on suspicion of espionage. On 4 January 1974 each was sentenced to 1 year in prison. Bratt and Guillou were both convicted of espionage; Isacson was convicted of espionage and accessory to espionage. After an appeal, Guillou's sentence was commuted to 10 months. The Swedish Supreme Court would not consider the case.[4][...]

In 2002 an extensive public report, named Rikets säkerhet och den personliga integriteten (Security of the Realm and personal integrity), was published on the operations of IB. This report clarified the details of the case, but it did not have any legal impact. To date, no member of IB has ever been indicted, nor has any politician or government official, despite the revelation of widespread extra-constitutional and criminal activity.

[girlactionfigure]

🔅Sunday night - ISRAEL REALTIME - Connecting to Israel in Realtime

❗️SCHOOL REMAINS SUSPENDED.. nationwide, public and private, all grades and daycare, including special ed.

❗️HOME FRONT COMMAND RESTRICTIONS REMAIN IN EFFECT at least until 23:00 Monday.

❗️IDF CALLS UP 2 RESERVE COMBAT BRIGADES.. to Gaza.

❓EVERYONE WANTS TO KNOW.. what and when will be Israel’s response, and will that trigger a response from Iran and/or Hezbollah?  We don’t know, and there are no hints so far.  However, Israel cannot operate with schools shutdown and many businesses operating remotely, for very long.

▪️PM - SHUT UP!  Netanyahu and the Cabinet Secretary instructs government ministers not to make statements and hold press interviews on the subject of Iran.

▪️7 YEAR OLD HIT WITH SHRAPNEL, LIFE IN DANGER.  In the Negev the girl's aunt in a painful interview.

▪️NETHERLANDS - AVOID TRAVEL TO ISRAEL.

▪️UNITED AIRLINES CANCELS FLIGHTS to Israel, though perhaps just for today or a few days.

▪️GAZA.. IDF forces built an engineering bridge over Wadi Gaza (south of Gaza City in the central region of the Gaza Strip) to allow IDF vehicles to easily cross from north to south and back.

🔅MENTAL HEALTH HOTLINE in English for Olim, Lone Soldiers and their families. Tikva Helpline by KeepOlim , call if you are struggling or anxious!  074-775-1433.

🔹GPS JAMMING ACTIVE - SET ALERT APPS TO CITY - instead of “current location”.

🔹Homefront Preparation Instructions: https://www.oref.org.il/12490-15903-en/pakar.aspx  (Link valid only in Israel.)

🔸DO NOT FORGET OUR WOMEN AND BABIES -> https://www.israelhayom.com/2023/10/31/these-are-the-captives-held-by-hamas/

[mariacallous]

Despite an ongoing eleventh-hour attempt to secure a cease-fire in Gaza, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said on Monday that Israel’s war cabinet had unanimously decided to proceed with its military operation in the southern Gaza city of Rafah, which Israeli officials say is Hamas’s last major holdout. 

Even as top United Nations officials have warned that a Rafah invasion could push the 1.5 million Palestinians who have encamped there over the border into Egypt—essentially making resolving the conflict impossible—Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant told Israel Defense Forces (IDF) troops on Sunday that an invasion is imminent. 

And early Monday, the Israeli military began preparing the battlefield with airstrikes on Rafah, signaling a possible imminent ground operation; it also ordered 100,000 Palestinians—just a fraction of those sheltering in Rafah—to evacuate to an Israeli-established humanitarian zone along the Mediterranean coast. 

If Israeli troops do advance into Rafah in an attempt to eradicate the four Hamas battalions believed to be there, experts say they will face a battle-hardened enemy that has the ability to fight and resupply through a vast network of tunnels, all while Israeli troops try to get tens of thousands—if not millions—of civilians out of the way. 

In other cities where the IDF has fought since this war began, such as Khan Younis, troops were able to move neighborhood by neighborhood, sector by sector, clearing out people as they needed to. But larger masses of people will likely be forced out this time as the IDF moves in. “Rafah is going to fundamentally look a bit different,” said Jonathan Lord, a senior fellow and the director of the Middle East security program at the Center for a New American Security, a Washington-based think tank. It “isn’t quite as clean, necessarily.” 

The Hamas battalions fighting in Rafah are “fairly indigenous” to the area, Lord said. They rely on the Philadelphi Corridor, a dense network of tunnels. The Israelis have tried to put in a subterranean wall to block Hamas’s use of the corridor but haven’t been successful.  

“Hamas is most likely dug in and prepared to fight from emplaced positions where they have access to tunnels and resupply and the ability to exfiltrate and escape and move around,” Lord said. “That becomes a little bit harder in some of the improvised humanitarian areas.” 

Michael Mulroy, a former U.S. deputy assistant secretary of defense now working with Fogbow, a group helping to set up the aid pier in Gaza, said the Israelis have told NGOs that the evacuation will take about 10 days, though aid groups believe it could take substantially longer. Mulroy said the operation could shut down border crossings into Gaza for up to three to four weeks. Rafah, which borders Egypt, is home to the only border crossing into Gaza that Israel does not directly control.

And it’s not clear that the Israelis have set up enough temporary housing, hospitals, and security to make the evacuation workable. The Israeli government has begun setting up 40,000 tents in Mawasi, a beachside area where there are less likely to be Hamas tunnels, but humanitarian groups say that number is far short of what is needed. 

“The immediate conclusion is going to be, what are you going to do with all of these people?” said Bilal Y. Saab, an associate fellow with Chatham House in London and a former U.S. defense official.

Hamas might also want civilians in the way, analysts said, and could even potentially impede their exit. Some former military officials are even worried that the militant group could take human shields.

“You need to reduce the number of civilians in there,” said Kenneth McKenzie, a retired Marine general and the head of U.S. Central Command until 2022. “The fact of the matter is, Hamas will try to make that not happen. Hamas has no interest in evacuating civilians, regardless of what they say.” 

Mulroy said the Israelis will need at least two divisions, a paratrooper and an armored element, alongside smaller detachments of artillery and special operations forces. But there are still high-level tactical arguments taking place between the Netanyahu and Biden administrations about how the campaign would be conducted. 

“It’s going to be a multidimensional fight,” McKenzie said. “They’re going to have to fight underground, they’re going to have to fight on the surface of the Earth, they’re going to have to fight in the low-Earth atmosphere, because Hamas will probably fly lots of drones. Israel will certainly fly drones. It’s going to be another tough, bloody, ugly fight, which Israel will have lessons learned from their fights [in northern Gaza]. Hamas will have lessons learned from the fights up north. Both sides will apply them.”

In a phone call with Netanyahu on Monday, U.S. President Joe Biden reiterated his opposition to a Rafah ground operation, and White House national security spokesperson John Kirby said Israel had not yet provided the United States with a comprehensive plan for its operations in Rafah. 

“The U.S. would like to see [Rafah] as more of a surgical, intel-driven probe with reconnaissance [to] find the mass of Hamas fighting militants and then streamline your combat power directly to it,” Mulroy said. “The Israelis—at least from what I know—are [planning for] more like a Fallujah-type, mass movement, block-to-block fight,” he added, referencing the pitched urban battles that U.S. troops fought in Iraq following the 2003 invasion. 

Whether Netanyahu and his war cabinet will end up being receptive to Washington’s wishes or instead choose to forge ahead and do things their own way remains to be seen. But experts aren’t holding out much hope.

“Have they actually decided to further alienate the Americans?” Saab said. “We keep telling them, don’t do it, and [Netanyahu] is about to do it.”

[upsettingandunfortunateclasshate]

The full membership list of the men-only Garrick Club reveals its central position as a bulwark of the British establishment, featuring scores of leading lawyers, heads of publicly funded arts institutions, the chief of MI6, the head of the civil service, and King Charles.

Members also include the deputy prime minister, the secretary of state for levelling up, the chief executive of the Royal Opera House as well as Richard Moore, the head of the Secret Intelligence Service, and Simon Case, who as cabinet secretary is the prime minister’s most senior policy adviser and the leader of nearly half a million civil servants.

Made public for the first time by the Guardian, the club’s closely guarded membership book lists a supreme court judge, five court of appeal judges, eight high court judges, about 150 KCs, dozens of members of the House of Lords and 10 MPs, plus heads of influential thinktanks, law firms, private equity companies, academics, prominent actors, rock stars and senior journalists.

The ruling class

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Edward Helmore at The Guardian:

Pete Buttigieg, Joe Biden’s transport secretary, introduced himself to Democrats at their convention earlier last month in unusual fashion. “I’m Pete Buttigieg and you might recognize me from Fox News,” he told the crowd in Chicago.

The comment drew laughter, but beneath it was a certain truth: in the final two months of the 2024 election, politicians and campaign aides are less siloed in their ideologically aligned media bubbles in an effort to poach potentially persuadable voters. Buttigieg said he is proud to go on conservative outlets to speak on behalf of the Harris-Walz campaign because their arguments and facts might not otherwise be aired to that audience. So too have the Democratic governors Gavin Newsom, Josh Shapiro, Wes Moore and Gretchen Whitmer, and senators Amy Klobuchar, Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, John Fetterman and Chris Coons also dropped in on the network. Meanwhile, Trump campaign adviser Corey Lewandowski has been on MSNBC’s The Beat with Ari Melber, and JD Vance on CNN. Presidential hopeful Kamala Harris told CNN she would find a place in her cabinet for a Republican if elected. In an election that is likely to turn on a small number of undecided voters in a handful of swing states, and considering that the Harris-Walz campaign has been on a bus tour of heavily Republican, mainly pro-Trump rural Georgia where there aren’t many votes to get, the cross-border forays into enemy TV territory makes sense.

“We have so many hyper-close elections in swing states that even if you only get a point or two that you take away from Republicans and put in your column can be the 10,000 votes that give you that swing state,” said the University of Virginia political analyst Larry Sabato. The same is true for going on a cable news station holding perceived political biases. When Buttigieg goes on Fox News, Sabato says, he is “not just addressing Republicans, but also getting Democrats indebted to him for the unpleasant task he’s performing”. But the media too likes to play the game – albeit for different reasons. The issue of the media, and its perceived political biases, has become a central campaign issue in the US and there is a deep public hostility to journalists. For the more partisan television networks like Fox and MSNBC, there is an advantage to having people from the other side on – as it may somewhat defuse accusations of one-sidedness.

The Guardian has a solid article on why Democrats appear on Fox “News” (and also why Republicans appear on CNN and MSNBC). Pete Buttigieg has become the king of Fox appearances for a Democrat for a reason.

[justforbooks]

Hassan Nasrallah

Ruthless head of Lebanon’s Hezbollah who led his movement for more than 30 years

Hassan Nasrallah, the head of Hezbollah, has died aged 64 in an Israeli bomb attack on the movement’s HQ in Dahiyeh, Beirut. His death came after 11 months of conflict between his fighters, based in Lebanon, and Israel.

On 7 October last year Hamas militants from Gaza entered Israel and killed more than 1,200 people. The next day Nasrallah ordered cross-border bombardments on Israel, and a limited conflict of attrition followed. This month Israel dramatically escalated matters by assassinating Hezbollah leaders, infiltrating the group’s security apparatus, hitting tower blocks and sabotaging pagers, walkie-talkies and arms silos, while rebuffing US calls for a ceasefire.

Over three decades Nasrallah, politically astute and often ruthless, transformed his Shia Muslim community, the largest yet most marginalised of Lebanon’s 18 sects – Muslim, Christian and Druze – into Beirut’s powerbrokers. His “party of God” also grew from a local militia into a disciplined body active elsewhere in the region.

Adored by supporters, Nasrallah was essential to Hezbollah’s success. His state-within-a-state runs schools, clinics, scout troops, support for farming, an alternative banking system, armed checkpoints, prisons, radio and TV stations and telecom networks.

Central to Hezbollah’s ethos is muqawama – resistance to Israel and its allies.

Hezbollah claimed credit when in 2000 Israel ended its 18-year-long occupation of southern Lebanon. The militia armed Palestinian factions during the second intifada of 2000-05 (the first having come in 1987-93); it trained Houthi rebels in Yemen and Shia factions in Iraq and Bahrain.

Nasrallah’s fighters became the most powerful non-state military in the Middle East. Hezbollah’s estimated 60,000 troops and 150,000 Iranian-supplied rockets eclipsed Lebanon’s national army.

In July 2006 Hezbollah fought a month-long war with Israel, with more than 1,100 dead on the Lebanese side, and more than 160 Israelis killed. Once hostile Sunnis hailed Nasrallah as the restorer of Arab pride. Their mood changed when in 2012 his forces joined President Bashar al-Assad and Iran in an internal Syrian war that killed half a million mostly Sunni civilians.

In October 2019 many Shia joined protests against him after gross mismanagement led Lebanon to the brink of bankruptcy. Foes blamed Nasrallah for overseeing the same corrupt political system he had once condemned.

Despite championing the Palestinian cause, Hezbollah did little to ease insufferable conditions for Palestinians in Lebanon. Then in August 2020, there was an explosion caused by 2,750 tons of ammonium nitrate in a part of Beirut harbour under Hezbollah control.

The blast killed 218, rendered 300,000 people homeless, and caused billions in damage, leading demonstrators to hang Nasrallah in effigy.

Hezbollah had a turbulent role in other aspects of Lebanon’s domestic affairs. It was the only civil war militia that had been allowed to keep its weapons after fighting ended in 1990. Nasrallah became Hezbollah secretary general in February 1992, the day after Israel assassinated his predecessor, Abbas al-Musawi.

He was re-elected in 1993 and repeatedly thereafter. Nasrallah rejected UN calls to disarm after Israel withdrew in 2000 and prevented Lebanon’s army from guarding the southern border.

In 2005 a car bomb in Beirut killed Lebanon’s former premier, Rafik Hariri. UN investigators named Hezbollah and Syria as likely culprits. Two months later massive “cedar revolution” protests forced Syrian troops out of Lebanon after 29 years of domination.

Yet Nasrallah choreographed a pro-Syrian alliance with Michel Aoun, a Christian former renegade general newly returned from exile in France. Hezbollah scored well in June polls, and two members joined the cabinet for the first time.

When Lebanon’s pro-western prime minister, Fouad Siniora, rejected Nasrallah’s demand for a blocking veto, Hezbollah shut down parliament for 18 months. In May 2008 Hezbollah gunmen crushed opponents in Beirut, Sidon, Tripoli and Aley – contradicting Nasrallah’s promise never to attack fellow citizens. Still, many Lebanese adored him for defying Israel and affirming their dignity.

Others resented his outsized influence. They said he was an Iranian proxy who killed enemies, including Shia intellectuals, brought starvation to besieged Syrian towns, and recreated the schisms of Lebanon’s 1975-90 civil war. That conflict, and especially the Israeli invasion and occupation of 1982, inspired the young cleric to choose a political path.

However, the greatest impetus was Ayatollah Khomeini’s 1979 Islamic revolution in Iran. As the Lebanese analyst Saleh el-Machnouk put it, by 2020 Lebanon had become a “mafia-militia nexus [where] Iran uses Hezbollah as a subcontractor”.

Born in Bourj Hammoud, then a mainly Christian Armenian town, Hassan was the eldest of nine children of Mahdiyya Safi al-Din and Abdul Karim Nasrallah, a grocer. Hassan devoured Islamic texts while his siblings played football. When war erupted in 1975, the family fled to their ancestral village of Bazourieh, near Tyre. Hassan joined Amal (“hope”), the mostly Shia movement that opposed traditional elites, whether Shia, Sunni or Christian.

In 1976 the penniless 16-year-old left for the famous Iraqi Shia seminary in Najaf. Al-Musawi, a fellow Lebanese exile, became his mentor. After Iraq expelled Lebanese students in 1978, Nasrallah studied with Al-Musawi in Baalbek, in the Beqaa Valley, and joined Amal’s politburo.

By 1982 younger Shias such as Nasrallah were deserting Amal for Khomeini’s camp.

Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guards based in Lebanon turned these radicals into Hezbollah. Its affiliates conducted suicide attacks in 1983 that killed more than 300 US and French peacekeeping soldiers. They later fought Amal and kidnapped westerners such as Terry Waite for the benefit of Iran.

In 1989 Nasrallah moved to Iran to study at the seminary in Qom. Back in Lebanon, in 1991 he grudgingly accepted the Syrian-backed Taif power-sharing accord that formally ended the civil war. A month after he became secretary general of Hezbollah, it was accused of killing 29 people at the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires; in 1994 another assault on an Argentinian Jewish communal centre claimed 85 lives.

Hassan never stood for election; instead, the speaker of parliament and former rival, the Amal leader Nabih Berri, conveyed his views to the world. Nasrallah admitted Tehran was Hezbollah’s chief sponsor. Nonetheless, foreign intelligence claimed that the party benefited from narcotics traffic, an illicit diamond trade and millions more from expatriate tycoons.

Nasrallah cemented his image as a consensual national figure with Maronite Christian clergymen. He promised not to impose theocratic rule on a religiously diverse and often secular public and arranged for Hezbollah to contest elections between 1992 and 2022.

He displayed a dignified response when his son, Mohammed Hadi, died fighting Israelis in September 1997. Nasrallah helped Lebanon’s national army crush a revolt by Sobhi Tufaili, an anti-Iranian populist and first secretary general of Hezbollah, four months later. He tutored Al-Assad before the latter became Syria’s president in 2000. He also returned from Israel 29 Hezbollah captives and 400 Palestinian prisoners in 2004.

Often, however, the moderate facade would slip. Nasrallah praised Holocaust deniers and in 2001 reportedly called Jews “miserly and cowardly”.

In 2008 Nasrallah’s de facto deputy, Imad Mughniyeh, was blown up in Damascus. After that the leader avoided public appearances, and coordinated regional strategy with Qassem Suleimani, Iran’s external operations chief, himself killed by a US drone strike in 2020.

After another two-year shutdown of parliament, Hezbollah ensured that it elected Aoun as president in late October 2016. Following Lebanon’s economic meltdown, however, Nasrallah’s coalition lost its majority in assembly elections in 2022. That same year Hezbollah agreed a maritime and gas field demarcation agreement with Israel. But showing solidarity with Hamas after 7 October, and so displacing 65,000 Israelis in the north of the country, led to his death.

Nasrallah’s wife, Fatima Yassin, and their children Jawad, Ali and Mahdi, survive him; his daughter Zeinab died in the same blast as him.

🔔 Hassan Nasrallah, political leader, born 31 August 1960; died 27 September 2024

Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at Just for Books…?

[thoughtlessarse]

An immediate arms embargo on Israel. When I met Scottish First Minister Humza Yousaf last month and he unequivocally backed such a move, the case was already overwhelming. Yet this week, the UK Foreign Secretary David Cameron doubled down – even as Gaza is razed from the face of the earth, the position was “unchanged”. It should not take the spilling of Western blood to make this point – given the mass slaughter endured by the Palestinian people, including more than 200 aid workers – but even the Israeli military killing three Britons working with World Central Kitchen hasn’t shifted the Government’s position. You can only imagine what would have happened if, say, Iran had blown up an aid convoy in similar circumstances. According to the Campaign Against Arms Trade, the seven aid workers were killed by a Hermes 450 drone, which is powered by a UK-made R902(W) Wankel Engine. That a leaked recording of senior Tory MP Alicia Kearns – the chair of the Foreign Affairs Select Committee – made clear that the Government had received legal advice that Israel is violating international humanitarian law, clear to anyone at this point who isn’t either deceitful or living in a parallel universe. That would necessitate stopping arms sales, as well as the sharing of intelligence. Yet the British government remains determined to continue its complicity with one of the great crimes of our age. […] The Israeli investigation was an absurd whitewash, suggesting a military which describes itself as amongst the world’s most advanced made a “grave mistake” by exterminating the convoy in these circumstances. Well, it gets so much worse. A fascinating piece of investigative journalism in The Telegraph – not words you often read me type – has a sensational finding. The most senior commander in the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) dismissed for his role in the attack is a hard-line settler in the West Bank who, in an open letter signed in January, demanded Gaza was deprived of aid. It demanded the Israeli War Cabinet and the IDF chief of staff “do everything in your power” to prevent “humanitarian supplies and the operation of hospitals inside Gaza City”. Here’s another astonishing detail: the retired military officer who led the investigation into the strike is the CEO of the defence firm that makes the drone missiles used in the strike. 

read complete article

[warsofasoiaf]

Do you think that there are any potential Trump cabinet picks that would not be terrible? Like mainstream Republicans hawks, anybody of McCain’s stature?

Marco Rubio as SecState is not a bad choice. Regardless of what you think of his political positions, he's served on the Intelligence Committee - he understands foreign relations and has the background and knowledge to act as a Secretary of State. Given Trump's focus on migration, someone who served as a de facto advisor on foreign policy issues in Central America is not an aberration. He is not someone completely out of his depth in this role.

Thanks for the question, Fang Reaver.

SomethingLikeALawyer, Hand of the King

[mightyflamethrower]

(America First Report)—Iran appears to be on the verge of attacking Israel directly. This will be the second time they have attacked this year following a series of drone and missile strikes on April 13. Rumors of war percolate as both sides have vowed to escalate beyond a single-day skirmish.

Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III communicated with his Israeli counterpart, Yoav Gallant, to reaffirm U.S. backing for Israel as tensions escalate with Iran and its proxies, raising the specter of a broader regional conflict following ten months of fighting against Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip.

During their conversation, Austin and Gallant discussed U.S. military positioning adjustments aimed at reinforcing defenses for U.S. troops in the region, supporting Israel’s defense, and deterring and defusing broader regional tensions, as per a statement from the Pentagon.

This discussion took place as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu informed a Cabinet meeting that Israel is already engaged in a “multi-front war” with Iran and its proxies.

Tensions in the region have reached unprecedented levels following the recent killing of a senior Hezbollah commander in Lebanon and Hamas’ top political leader in Iran. Both Iran and its allies have pointed fingers at Israel and threatened retaliation. Hamas has begun the process of selecting a new leader.

Netanyahu stated that Israel is prepared for any scenario. In a rare move, Jordan’s foreign minister traveled to Iran as part of diplomatic efforts, with the aim to quell the escalation.

Meanwhile, Secretary of State Antony Blinken reportedly informed his counterparts on Sunday that Iran and Hezbollah might launch attacks against Israel as early as Monday, according to Axios.

Gen. Michael Erik Kurilla, head of the U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM), is expected to arrive in Israel on Monday to coordinate preparations for the anticipated attack, according to the Times of Israel.

President Biden is also set to convene with his national security team in the situation room on Monday to discuss the Middle East situation, as reported by Reuters.

In Israel, some have prepared bomb shelters, recalling Iran’s unprecedented direct military assault in April following a suspected Israeli strike that killed two Iranian generals. Israel claimed that nearly all the drones and ballistic and cruise missiles were intercepted.

“For years, Iran has been arming and financing terrorist organizations across the Middle East, including smuggling explosives into Israeli territory for terror attacks against civilians,” IDF Spokesperson Rear Admiral Daniel Hagar said in a statement. “The IDF and ISA have already thwarted numerous attacks in which Claymore type explosives were smuggled into the country’s territory. We are determined to continue acting against Iranian terrorism wherever it may be.”

The war in Gaza was sparked by Hamas’ October 7 attack on Israel, which resulted in the deaths of approximately 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and the abduction of around 250 individuals. Israel’s ongoing counteroffensive has been brutal as they seek to completely eliminate Hamas, which has embedded itself among citizens of Gaza, using them as human shields.

The militant group Hezbollah and Israel have continued to exchange fire along the Lebanon border since the war began, with the intensity increasing in recent months. Hezbollah stated that its actions are intended to alleviate pressure on fellow Iran-backed ally Hamas.

[lboogie1906]

Mayor Howard Nathaniel Lee (born July 28, 1934) is a politician who served as Mayor of Chapel Hill, North Carolina (1969-75). He was the first African American mayor elected in Chapel Hill, and the first African American to be elected mayor of any majority-white city in the South.

He was born to Howard Lee and Lou Temple outside Lithonia, Georgia. He began his freshman year at Clark College, he graduated from Fort Valley State College.

He was drafted into the Army during the summer of 1959 and completed basic training at Fort Benning. He received medical corpsman training at Fort Sam Houston, before being stationed at Fort Hood. He organized two sit-ins in the town of Killeen to protest segregated public facilities. The second sit-in was reported back to Fort Hood, and he was stationed in Korea the next week.

He moved to Savannah, Georgia, where he served as a juvenile probation officer, and married Lillian Wesley (1962). They moved to North Carolina in 1964, where he earned an MSW from UNC Chapel Hill. He joined the faculties of Duke University and North Carolina Central University.

In February 1969, he announced his mayoral candidacy. The ensuing election saw a record 4,734 votes cast. He won by a narrow margin but was re-elected twice.

In 1976, He sought the Democratic Party nomination for Lieutenant Governor of North Carolina. He was defeated in the primary runoff. He was appointed as the Secretary of the North Carolina Department of Natural Resources and Community Development.

He was elected to the North Carolina Senate (1990-94 and 1996-2002). He concentrated particularly on issues affecting public education.

The North Carolina State Board of Education elected him as its chairman. He was appointed as the new executive director of the NC Education Cabinet. He had to give up his seat on the Board of Education. He served as a member of the North Carolina Utilities Commission. He and Lillian Lee were nominated as “Town Treasures” by the Chapel Hill Historical Society He founded the Howard N. Lee Institute, which “focuses on erasing the achievement gap and improving academic performance for minority males.”#africanhistory365 #africanexcellence

[usafphantom2]

IMAGES: F-15E land in the Middle East to confirm USAF's "enhanced" presence in support of Israel 🇮🇱

Fernando Valduga By Fernando Valduga 10/15/2023 - 11:52am Military, War Zones

The F-15E Strike Eagle fighter jets arrived in the Middle East on October 13, while the U.S. continued to strengthen its forces in the region, the U.S. Air Force announced.

The planes, which were deployed from the RAF Base in Lakenheath, in the United Kingdom, are part of a broader package of forces that were mobilized after Hamas' attack on Israel, including an increasing number of A-10 Thunderbolt II close air support aircraft and F-16 Fighting Falcon fighter jets.

TAP ARROW BUTTON TO VIEW☝️

"The aircraft's advanced systems and targeting capabilities allow U.S. forces to respond to any crisis or contingency and, if necessary, face and defeat opponents," the Air Force Central (AFCENT) said in a statement announcing the arrival of the F-15E.

The Pentagon did not say where the F-15E would be based. Its arrival comes a day after the Pentagon announced that A-10 Warthogs of the 354º Fighter Squadron of Davis-Monthan Air Base, Arizona, had arrived in the region, in addition to the Warthogs of the 75º Fighter Squadron already in the region.

U.S. officials said that U.S. Air Force F-35 Lightning II stealth fighters are among the additional capabilities that could be sent

“The U.S. military is committed to lasting security and protection throughout the Middle East,” said AFCENT commander Lieutenant General Alexus G. Grynkewich, in a statement of October 13. “By positioning advanced fighters and integrating joint and coalition forces, we are strengthening our partnerships and strengthening security in the region.”

U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III, who arrived in Israel on October 13, met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and the newly formed Israeli war cabinet.

Austin highlighted the "enhanced" presence of the USAF in the Middle East and the deployment of the USS Gerard R. Ford in the Eastern Mediterranean, according to a reading of the Austin meetings provided by the Pentagon Press Secretary, Brig. General Patrick S. Ryder.

The new U.S. assets aim to discourage Hezbollah, the Lebanese militant group, Iran or other groups from trying to escalate the conflict and show support for Israel, which had more than 1,300 citizens killed and other deeds held hostage and brought to Gaza. American citizens are among the dead and taken hostage by Hamas, says the U.S. government. The State Department announced plans to evacuate some American citizens from Israel.

“We have increased U.S. combat aircraft squads in the Middle East, and the U.S. Department of Defense is fully ready to deploy additional resources if necessary,” Austin said during a press conference in Israel on October 13.

In addition to the USAF fighters, the USS Ford also carries four squadrons of F/A-18 Super Hornet fighters, as well as electronic warfare and command and control aircraft. The aircraft carrier is also accompanied by warships carrying cruise missiles.

Ryder added that the U.S. was “accelerating security assistance to Israel, including precision guided ammunition and air defense ammunition.” Austin also "committed to deploy additional assets as needed".

The aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower was supposed to leave Norfolk, Virginia, on October 13, but its deployment was temporarily postponed, according to local media reports. The U.S. military did not say exactly where the Eisenhower and the warships accompanying him will arrive.

Israel responded to Hamas attacks with punitive air strikes in Gaza, and Israeli ground forces seem prepared to intervene, with a large number of Israel Defense Forces (IDF) positioning themselves near Israel's border with Gaza and issuing warnings to evacuate. Netanyahu promised to "s crush and destroy" Hamas.

During his visit, Austin signaled strong support for Israel.

“This is not the time for neutrality, or for false equivalences, or for excuses for the inforgible,” Austin said at a press conference on October 13. "Make no mistake: the United States will ensure that Israel has what it needs to defend itself, and Israel has the right to protect its people."

Tags: Military AviationF-15E Strike EagleUSAF - United States Air Force / U.S. Air ForceWar Zones - Middle East

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Fernando Valduga

Fernando Valduga

Aviation photographer and pilot since 1992, has participated in several events and air operations, such as Cruzex, AirVenture, Dayton Airshow and FIDAE. He has work published in specialized aviation magazines in Brazil and abroad. Uses Canon equipment during his photographic work in the world of aviation.

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[catdotjpeg]

Japan’s Supreme Court on Monday dismissed Okinawa’s rejection of a central government plan to build U.S. Marine Corps runways on the island and ordered the prefecture to approve it despite protests by locals who oppose the American troops’ presence. Monday’s ruling upheld a high court ruling in March that the central government’s plan and its instruction for Okinawa’s approval are valid. It will move forward the suspended construction at a time Okinawa’s strategic role is seen increasingly important for the Japan-U.S. military alliance in the face of growing tensions with China. Japan’s central government began the reclamation work at the Henoko area on the eastern coast of Okinawa’s main island in 2018 to pave the way for the relocation of the Marine Corps Futenma air station from a crowded neighborhood on the island. The government later found out about 70% of the reclamation site is on soft ground, and submitted a revision to the original plan with additional land improvement. The Okinawa prefectural government rejected the revision as insufficient and suspended the reclamation work. The ground improvement plan requires tens of thousands of pillars and massive amounts of soil, which opponents say would damage the environment. Okinawa Gov. Denny Tamaki has called for a significant reduction of the U.S. military in Okinawa, the immediate closure of the Futenma base and the scrapping of the base construction in Henoko. Tamaki said said he will not back down and continue with the demands despite the ruling. The Okinawa government will carefully examine the ruling to decide on a next step, he added. “The ruling is extremely disappointing because we had expected a fair and neutral judgement based on respect for the local government autonomy,” Tamaki told a news conference. The ruling nullifies an independent municipal decision and could even disregard their constitutional right to local autonomy, Tamaki said. “It deeply concerns me.” The Japanese and U.S. governments initially agreed in 1996 to close the Futenma air station, a year after the rape of a schoolgirl by three U.S. military personnel led to a massive anti-base movement. But persistent protests and lawsuits between Okinawa and Tokyo have held up the plan for nearly 30 years. Tokyo and Washington say the relocation within Okinawa, instead of moving it elsewhere as demanded by many Okinawans, is the only solution. Okinawa, which accounts for only 0.6% of Japanese land, is burdened with the majority of the 50,000 American troops based in the country under a bilateral security pact, and 70% of U.S. military facilities are in Okinawa. The Japanese government in recent years has increasingly stepped up its own defenses to deal with China’s growing assertiveness, triggering fear among Okinawan residents that they will be the first to be embroiled in a potential conflict. Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno welcomed the ruling and said the government hopes to achieve the complete reversion to Japan of the Futenma airfield and relieve Okinawa of the burden of shouldering U.S. military bases while providing a thorough explanation to the local community.

-- "Japan’s top court orders Okinawa to allow a divisive government plan to build US military runways" by Mari Yamaguchi for AP News, 4 Sept 2023

[mariacallous]

The U.S. secretary of commerce is recovering from a fractured tailbone, but she doesn’t know how it happened.

“I have no idea!” Gina Raimondo says with an exasperated sigh when I ask, before pointing to the donut pillow that she’s about to sit down on for our interview. She adds, “I’m only telling you because I don’t want you to think I’m weird.”

We meet late on a Friday morning in July in Raimondo’s office on the fifth floor of the Department of Commerce—one of Washington’s largest government buildings, located just off Pennsylvania Avenue and across the street from the White House complex.

For the past three-and-a-half years, the proximity between the two buildings has been more symbolic than ever. The Commerce Department has been thrust to the forefront of what is arguably President Joe Biden’s biggest geopolitical priority: winning the technological race against China and ensuring U.S. economic and military primacy.

That includes cutting off Chinese access to advanced semiconductor chips through ever-expanding export controls while also ensuring that more of those chips are made in the United States and allied countries; spearheading the development and regulation of artificial intelligence; and even looking ahead to the implications of advanced quantum computing through the National Institute of Standards and Technology.

As one individual put it at a recent gathering in Washington conducted under the Chatham House Rule, the Pentagon is probably “jealous” of the Commerce Department’s centrality to U.S. national security.

Raimondo acknowledged her department’s outsized influence but disagreed that the overriding sentiment is that of jealousy. U.S. Defense Secretary “Lloyd Austin has called me his battle buddy,” she said, adding that she sees herself as “connected at the hip” with the military and intelligence communities.

“We’re at the red-hot center of national security and economic competitiveness,” Raimondo said. “Some of that is because technology is in the middle of everything, and some of it, I think, is just the way in which I have managed this place.”

That centrality is why I wanted to sit down with Raimondo. I wanted to know more about how she balances the need to protect national security interests with the department’s mandate to promote U.S. economic growth and competitiveness—and her role in repositioning the department for those shifting priorities.

Raimondo’s familiarity with technology predates her political career. In 2000, she co-founded Point Judith Capital—the first venture capital firm in her native state of Rhode Island. The experience influenced her “a lot,” she told me.

“I like to be with entrepreneurs. I love it. I miss it. That’s what I did,” she said. She then lowered her voice to nearly a whisper, as if she was telling me a secret: “So many people in government just play it safe, worry about their job—you’re not going to get anything done that way. Don’t be afraid to speak up, don’t be afraid to try for something big. Have impact. Judge yourself on impact.”

Raimondo decided to take that approach into politics, being elected as Rhode Island’s treasurer in 2010 before becoming the state’s first woman governor in 2015. She served in that position until Biden named her to his cabinet—making it through the Senate confirmation process despite opposition from some Republicans who accused her of being soft on China.

It would be harder to make that claim now. Raimondo has been the target of Chinese hackers and memelords, who see her as the face of the Biden administration’s anti-China tech policies.

Some of them took that literally, superimposing her images on fake ads for Chinese tech giant Huawei’s new Mate 60 Pro smartphone, which was released during Raimondo’s visit to Beijing last year. The phone is powered by a relatively advanced 7 nanometer chip—designed and made in China—that was previously thought to be beyond Beijing’s capacity to build due to U.S. export controls.

“I was there. I saw the billboards; my face on the billboard with the Huawei phone—my kids sent me the [memes], saying ‘Mom, this is terrible!’ because it’s all over TikTok,” Raimondo said, mentioning another major Chinese tech platform that Washington is trying to ban. “They were not subtle.”

In keeping with Raimondo’s credo of judging oneself by impact, I asked what impact the export controls on China have had, and how successful the Biden administration’s “small yard, high fence” approach to cutting off Beijing’s access to critical technologies has been.

“I’m smiling, because yesterday I had a meeting with my team, and I’m pushing them hard to share data with me on the effectiveness of our export controls, and we have a little study ongoing where I’m trying to collect the data,” she said, “because that’s really the question you’re asking, like, ‘show me, show me.’”

That data is still a work in progress and hasn’t been made public yet, but Raimondo laid out her case for why she believes that the United States remains in the lead: China may have put a 7 nanometer chip in Huawei’s phone (the smaller that number, the more advanced the chip—the iPhone 15 Pro, for example, is powered by a 3 nanometer chip), but there still isn’t evidence that it can produce those chips at scale. And they’re a far cry from the 2 nanometer chips that will soon be made in Arizona by the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company—the global industry leader—thanks to subsidies from another big Commerce Department-led initiative, the CHIPS and Science Act.

U.S. artificial intelligence models are also more advanced than their Chinese rivals, which “wouldn’t be the case” if it weren’t for export controls on the chips needed to train those models, Raimondo said.

“However, I think it’s very dangerous to assume that it’s inevitable that we’ll stay ahead. I think that’s an arrogant viewpoint,” she said. “I feel good about where we are, but literally every single day, we should be on the edge of our seat.”

Determining the size of the yard—how many and what kinds of technologies should be subject to U.S. export controls to China—and the height of the fence—how strong those export controls should be—has been a challenge. It’s a tricky place to be in for a department whose official purpose is to be the “voice of business in the federal government” in a country that prides itself on the openness that fosters technological innovation. China, with more than a billion people, has been a coveted and lucrative market for U.S. companies for years, but it is also now undisputedly the United States’ biggest geopolitical rival.

Nvidia, the California company that designs advanced semiconductors that are essential to training artificial intelligence models, is making new chips that it can continue selling to China without flouting the export controls. And the Semiconductor Industry Association, a leading trade group, has urged the Commerce Department to “reduce burdens” on chip exports even as it praises efforts to bring semiconductor manufacturing back to U.S. shores.

“Excessive and unilateral export restrictions stifle the ability of American companies to compete with foreign competitors that do not bear the same export-related administrative and bureaucratic burdens,” the association writes on its website.

The Commerce Department’s initial export controls on semiconductor sales to China in October 2022 drew a critical line in the sand and set the tone for the Biden administration’s broader China policy. They were further tightened a year later to include a broader swath of chips, and additional restrictions are reportedly in the works.

“I struggle with this. It’s hard to know exactly where to draw the line,” Raimondo said. “I’ve tried hard to bring strategic thinking to the BIS so it’s not whack-a-mole,” she added, referring to the Commerce Department’s Bureau of Industry and Security, which oversees export controls. “That being said, China’s not standing still and technology’s not standing still, so when we learn that now they can take less sophisticated equipment or less sophisticated chips and maybe use more of them to do bad things, well, then we’re going to change.”

Could there be a point where the yard gets too big, and the fence gets too high? On the latter, it’s a firm no. “There’s not a point where the fence gets too high, because China is constantly trying to get around the fence,” she said. “Yes, the yard could get too big, [but] I don’t think we’re there yet, I really don’t. [Chinese President] Xi Jinping’s civil-military fusion strategy makes it hard, because everything’s militarized. He could walk into any company at every minute and take whatever he wants.”

Raimondo engages frequently with the executives and businesses working on artificial intelligence, chips, and other next-generation technologies—and by many accounts is popular with them—but she said that those conversations have increasingly been less rosy than one might expect. “It’s not easy for me to go to Intel, and Applied Materials, [and] Lam, and tell them I’m going to take away hundreds of millions of revenue,” she said, listing three leading U.S. semiconductor companies. “But sometimes commerce has to take a back seat to national security.”

That industrial policy approach, driven by technology and defined by competition with China, has set Raimondo apart from her predecessors.

“Previous Commerce secretaries have thought of themselves as the voice of business—I don’t think of myself quite as the voice of business; I think of myself as a force for economic competitiveness,” she said. “The dynamism of our economy directly relates to our ability to lead in the world,” she added. “It’s not a huge shift …but it’s enough of a shift to matter.”

Beijing isn’t the only place where Raimondo is the face of the Biden administration’s tech policies. She’s been front and center in building the global partnerships needed to help sustain the fight against China, racking up frequent flyer miles with trips to Southeast Asia, Europe, Latin America, and the Middle East.

“I’m very purposeful about my travel—the team doesn’t like it because we don’t do anything fun,” she said. “I’ve been to the UAE [United Arab Emirates] for meetings without staying in a hotel … we fly, we do a lot of work, we get back on the plane.”

She’s also been Washington’s lead representative at new forums such as the U.S.-EU Trade and Technology Council, aimed at aligning trans-Atlantic approaches to tech regulation, and the Indo-Pacific Economic Forum, which attempts to do the same with a dozen countries in that region. It’s emblematic of another one of the administration’s priorities: shoring up bilateral and “minilateral” relationships.

Raimondo said those relationships are indispensable. “If you’ve got the best idea in the world, really the most brilliant thing in the world, [but] you don’t have buy-in from a broad cross-section of people and you haven’t built coalitions, you will fail,” she said.

Building those coalitions has become easier in some ways and trickier in others. While most of the democratic world is increasingly aligned on the threat posed by China and the need to reorient supply chains away from the world’s second-largest economy, everyone wants those supply chains to run through their soil, and many countries are heavily subsidizing industries such as semiconductors to make it happen.

I asked Raimondo how she deals with concerns about a so-called subsidy race to the bottom.

“Open collaboration and discussion,” she said. “We literally sit down and say, ‘this is how we’re spending our money.’ … I’ve been pleasantly surprised [by] the extent to which other countries have been willing to sit down with us because they don’t want to waste their money, either.”

A shared recognition of the realities of the chip supply chain also helps. More than half of all semiconductors—and more than 90 percent of the most advanced ones—are made in Taiwan, the small island off China’s coast that is an ever-more-precarious geopolitical hotspot. “We as a world are so dangerously dependent on Taiwan that there’s room for duplication,” Raimondo said.

It’s a similar story on artificial intelligence (AI), not just with other countries, but also with the private sector as well. One example is the recent $1.5 billion investment by Microsoft into G42, the UAE’s top AI company, which included an “intergovernmental assurance agreement” that the Commerce Department was heavily involved with on the U.S. side, according to multiple sources who spoke to Foreign Policy on condition of anonymity. That agreement mandated, in part, that G42 remove Chinese technology from its systems, including equipment from companies such as Huawei and Chinese cloud computing firms, the sources said. Microsoft is now reportedly backtracking on parts of that deal due to concerns around G42’s exposure to China. (Microsoft declined to comment, and G42 did not respond to a request for comment.)

Raimondo declined to comment on that deal but pointed to the UAE as an example of the sort of carrot-and-big-stick approach that the U.S. is deploying. “With respect to advanced technology, yes, we want them to pick a side … because the power of this technology in the wrong hands, in the hands of a dictator or autocrat, is too great,” she said. “I don’t twist anyone’s hand—you pick the UAE or wherever—we have the best, we want you with us, you should be with us, but these are the rules if you want to be in our ecosystem.”

Could that lead to the kind of resentment that often accompanies U.S. actions abroad or unilateral efforts to build a consensus, even with allies and partners?

“I would say yes and no. I’m in the thick of this right now with the Japanese and the Dutch,” Raimondo said, referring to the two countries that have a virtual duopoly over the equipment used to make advanced chips. Last year, Washington struck a deal with both countries to restrict the sales of that equipment to Chinese companies, but a proposed further tightening of restrictions will reportedly exempt key allies, including both Japan and the Netherlands.

“When I talk to my counterparts from Korea, Japan, Europe, they are sensitive to denying national champions revenue, and I respect that,” Raimondo said. “But don’t do it because we’re asking you to. Do it to protect the people of your country.”

It’s a message that key allies thus far appear to be on board with. “They have their own national security interests to do it,” she said. “We’re in the same boat. Now, it’s a little easier because America’s economy is bigger, and we have a lot of companies, but still, at the end of the day, it’s country first, profit second.”

It’s been an action-packed three-and-a-half years, and Raimondo has the customary mix of regrets and satisfaction ahead of the Biden administration’s term ending in a few months with the November election. On balance, she feels good and is happy to celebrate some big wins.

“When I started this job, the Commerce Department budget was $9 billion, and because of our work with Congress and the president’s leadership, it’s now like $150 billion,” she said, referring to the total funding for the Commerce Department appropriated by Congress in fiscal 2021 versus the total resources available to the department now. The latter has been bolstered in large part by the $53 billion set aside for semiconductor manufacturing by the CHIPS and Science Act, as well as major investments in broadband access and the creation of nearly three dozen new “tech hubs” around the United States.

Raimondo rattles those off as a checklist that she intends to get through by the end of this year. “The chips team didn’t exist when I got here, and now I have 200 people working for me on chips who are some of the brightest minds in America,” she added. “We’re never done, and I’m not saying it’s perfect, but as I assess we are more secure than we were because of our efforts.”

Her main regret is one that she has repeated several times throughout her tenure, including previously to Foreign Policy: the need for resources and funding commensurate with the department’s vastly expanded purview. The Bureau of Industry and Security still has a budget of around $200 million, which is the “cost of one fighter jet,” she said, repeating an analogy she has used in the past. The bureau’s budget for its core export control functions has “been flat for more than a decade, and we need help—we need more.”

As she continues to work with Congress to get those funds, the bipartisan legislation passed so far and the global alliances that Raimondo has built are what she hopes will prevent a potential second Donald Trump administration from unwinding Commerce’s most impactful policies, she said.

“When you have a statute, that’s more durable than an executive order,” she said. “And then, honestly, the other thing is [that] I’m moving as fast as possible.”

Would she continue to serve in another administration if asked?

“I love this job—it’s been an honor of a lifetime to serve. President Biden is an extraordinary leader, and I would be honored to stay in the job,” she said, “but I won’t work for just any leader. I have to work for someone I believe in and who’s principled.”

Our conversation took place two days before Biden announced that he would not seek reelection, instead endorsing Vice President Kamala Harris for the Democratic Party’s nomination. But with rumors of that eventuality already surfacing, I asked if she’d serve another Democratic president.

“Yeah,” she said, matter-of-factly. “I think it’s a fantastic job, and there’s so much more to do.”

But she prefaced all that with a clear response barely a second after I asked my question: “I will not work for President Trump.”