RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17306/china-space-power

“China is taking steps to establish a commanding position in the commercial launch and satellite sectors relying in part on aggressive state-backed financing that foreign market-driven companies cannot match.” — US-China Economic and Security Review Commission in its 2019 Annual Report to Congress.

“Chinese and Russian space activities present serious and growing threats to U.S. national security interests. Chinese and Russian military doctrines also indicate that they view space as critical to modern warfare and consider the use of counterspace capabilities as both a means of reducing U.S. military effectiveness and for winning future wars.” — U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III, written testimony prior to his confirmation hearing. Space.com, March 19, 2021.

“The PRC continues to strengthen its military space capabilities, despite its public stance against the weaponization of space…. the PRC is developing electronic warfare capabilities such as satellite jammers….and China probably intends to pursue additional ASAT [Anti-Satellite] weapons capable of destroying satellites….” — Pentagon report about China’s military capabilities, Military and Security Developments Involving the People’s Republic of China 2020.

Given the chance, China will also move ahead to use space to dominate not only the US but also the rest of the planet. Any defense budget cuts or flatlines in the in the US military budget — or any monetary transfers out of it — should be regarded as suicidal.

Shortly after becoming president in March 2013, Xi Jinping made his ambitions for China’s space power clear. “Developing the space program and turning the country into a space power is the space dream that we have continuously pursued”, he said. “The space dream is part of the dream to make China stronger”. China aims to become the world’s leading space power by 2045: “China will become an all-round world-leading country in space equipment and technology. By then, it will be able to carry out man-computer coordinated space exploration on a large scale,” wrote China Daily in 2017.

One cornerstone of China’s space program is the Beidou Navigation Satellite system (BDS), a global navigation satellite system that provides positioning, navigation and timing, in addition to data communication. The People’s Liberation Army created the program in order not to be dependent on the US-controlled GPS network. “In recent years, the PRC has actively sought to promote the image of Beidou as a civilian-led program intended primarily for commercial and scientific purposes,” stated a report by the Jamestown Foundation. “However, the program is under overall military direction, with the PLA in charge of Beidou’s senior-most program management organizations,”

Beidou is also known as China’s “Space Silk Road”, which expands China’s land-based “Silk Road Economic Belt” and sea-based “21st Century Maritime Silk Road” — better known collectively as the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) — into space. Beidou makes participants in the Belt and Road Initiative dependent on China for precision navigation and other space based services. According to a report by Malcolm Davis from the Australian Strategic Policy Institute in 2017:

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2021/05/being_a_journalist_in_iran_is_one_of_the_worlds_most_dangerous_jobs.html

According to the United Nations, May 3 was World Press Freedom Day. That makes this a good time to stop and contemplate how dangerous it is to be a real journalist in Iran. There, a journalist takes his life into his hands if he tries to report facts with honesty and transparency. This regime has no qualms about using repression, censorship, and imprisonment to control the flow of news. Put simply, there is no press freedom in Iran

Although Iran has always been a dangerous place for journalists in the past decade it’s become increasingly risky to try to report the truth there. It is common for journalists and bloggers across Iran to be summoned, arrested, and sentenced to prison for expressing facts and real news.

Because the Iranian regime, like all tyrannies, is inherently unstable and it is currently facing serious economic problems, the mullahs are terrified that real news could act as a spark in a society on the verge of explosion. The last thing they want is another uprising such as the ones in 2018 and 2019. One way to try to deter uprisings is to cut off the Internet and sensor news, which it did during the recent uprising in Balochistan.

Even without the Internet, though, Iran fears those people within the country who may tell the truth. Reporters Without Borders ranks it as one of the world’s most oppressive countries for journalists:

Iran is still one of the world’s most repressive countries for journalists, subjecting news and information to relentless control. At least 860 journalists and citizen-journalists have been prosecuted, arrested, imprisoned and in some cases executed since the 1979 revolution. 

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17347/g7-cliches

The real bad news, however, is that the London conference failed to develop a coherent and mutually agreed analysis of the international situation, without which no serious policy-making is possible. The Americans came to London with a set of clichés used during their presidential campaign last year, notably the catch-all “America is back!”, but were unable to say where that “back” was or whether it was necessary to go there.

They also talked a lot about “multilateralism” without making it clear what it was they wanted to be multilateral about. Multilateralism is a method of doing things, not the substance of policy. You could do both wise and foolish things multilaterally. The Libyan disaster resulted from President Barack Obama’s “leading from behind” multilateralism. The latest example of foolish multilateralism is the cut-and-run policy the Biden administration is marketing on Afghanistan.

What seems clear is that both China and Russia are trying to project power in a 19th-century colonial style… Putin’s strategy… copying General Paskevich’s warning: “to keep the land you grabbed today, you will have to grab more land tomorrow.”

Does anyone believe that, short of a shock-and-awe operation, Kim Jung-on could be leashed in without help from China? And could the G7’s habitual cat-and-mouse game with the Khomeinist regime in Tehran produce positive results while Russia plays cheerleader for the mullahs?

The current G7 position could only persuade Beijing and Moscow to set their differences aside and promote a low-intensity global war against the democratic world.

Even if the so-called G7 group of industrial democracies is no longer as powerful and/or relevant as it was when it was first launched more than four decades ago, it is still capable of making a difference on the global stage where a difference is necessary. It is therefore good news that the group, consisting of the US, Canada, Britain, Germany France, Italy, and Japan managed to convene a face-to-face conference of its foreign ministers in London, the first in two years.

The ministerial conference, also attended by the European Union foreign policy spokesman, had the task of preparing the agenda for a full summit of the seven nations, again in Britain, next month. The planned summit will provide Joe Biden with his first foray into the international arena as US President.

While the holding of the London conference was good news, it also contained an element of bad news. To start with, the British host tried to promote one of Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s many brainwaves by inviting India, Australia, and South Africa as guests with a wink and nod in the direction of the Commonwealth.

https://asiatimes.com/2021/05/eurasian-anti-west-alliance-didnt-have-to-happen/

The Russian pessimist says things are so bad they can’t possibly get worse; the Russian optimist says, “Don’t worry, they will!”

If Western leaders think that Russia and China are aggressive now, the Russian-Chinese alliance now emerging will be a nastier combination than most Western observers can imagine.

It doesn’t have to happen, but probably will, given the West’s toxic combination of aggressive posturing and inherent weakness. The former tempts China to use force, and the latter causes China to think that it can get away with using force.

Case in point: On May 6 the hawkish Chinese policy site “Observer” (guancha.cn) led with a 5,000 word screed by Russia’s “Eurasianist” ideologue Aleksandr Dugin, the inspiration for younger officers in Russia’s military and intelligence services who think that Vladimir Putin is too soft on the West.

That should alarm Washington, although I doubt anyone in the White House took notice.

Western commentators demonize Putin, and distract attention from the fact that Russia’s long-serving president is a centrist figure by his country’s standards.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17336/china-pollution-climate

If China were serious about reducing emissions, that intent would have been evident from its new five-year plan for the years 2021-2025, released in March. This plan, however, has been described as containing “little more than vague commitments to tackle carbon dioxide emissions.”
As the Wall Street Journal wrote in an editorial in February, initiatives like this explain why “Beijing loves Biden and Paris”. They allow China, in the words of the editorial, to get “a free carbon ride” — meaning unfettered economic growth at a time when China is looking to become the world’s dominant economic and technological power.
How much will fulfilling President Biden’s climate accord pledges actually cost and for what actual benefit to whom, and how much of a further edge will it actually give to China?
At a time when China is so obviously saying one thing and doing another, and clearly not fulfilling its share of the world’s commitments to reducing CO2 emissions — as the world’s second-largest economy should — increasing America’s climate pledges sends all the wrong signals. What China and others see is that no matter what it does — even if it deceives the world and continues its predatory behavior — the US is willing to reduce its own competitiveness, leaving China a thick red carpet to become the world’s dominant superpower, the very role to which it aspires.

Communist China, in 2020, built over three times as much new coal power capacity as all other countries in the world combined — the equivalent of more than one large coal plant per week, according to a report released in April by Global Energy Monitor.

Also in 2020, China’s CO2 emissions rose by 1.5% while those of most other countries fell. Although, in 2020, the world retreated from coal, these retirements were eclipsed by China’s new coal plants.

Even before China built those new plants, it was already the world’s biggest emitter of fossil fuel carbon dioxide (CO2): In 2019, China was responsible for almost 30% of CO2 emissions — roughly twice the amount emitted by the US, then the second largest emitter. China, the planet’s primary coal consumer, already has the largest concentration of coal plants globally; in 2020, it produced 3.84 billion tons of coal, its highest output since 2015. In addition, China, in 2020, imported 304 million tons of coal, up 4 million tons from 2019.

According to the International Energy Agency, “79.7 percent of China’s emissions came from coal in 2018 compared to 70.6 percent in India, 25.8 percent in the United States, and 27.9 percent in the European Union” and “Since 2011, China has consumed more coal than the rest of the world combined.”

Despite being the world’s reigning climate polluter, China keeps virtue signaling, falsely marketing itself as the champion of the environment. “We should protect nature and preserve the environment like we protect our eyes, and endeavor to foster a new relationship where man and nature can both prosper and live in harmony,” said Xi Jinping at the recent Leaders Summit on Climate hosted by U.S. President Joe Biden.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17341/iran-drugs-terrorism

While Israel is seeking to dissuade the Biden administration from rejoining the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran… Tehran’s mullahs and their Lebanese Hezbollah terror proxy are busy drowning the Arab countries with drugs.

“Israel is far more honorable than the drug-dealers…. [The drug dealers’] ultimate goal is to destroy Saudi Arabia by every available means. They are smuggling weapons and drugs to the Gulf states, but when they are confronted, they accuse the governments of these states of siding with Israel, and they raise the slogan of liberating Jerusalem, while their missiles are only targeting Riyadh and Mecca.” — Turki Al-Hamad, Saudi academic, Rai Al-Youm, April 25, 2021.

“[Hezbollah has become] a criminal organization whose danger has gone beyond the stage of terrorism and military operations…. The Hezbollah project has become the destruction of people through drugs.” — Mohammed Al-Maskary, Emirati writer and journalist, Al-Ain, April 27, 2021

“Hezbollah is increasingly dependent on the revenues from terrorist activities, drug smuggling and money laundering with Colombian, Mexican and Cuban cartel networks.” — Fahim Al-Hamed, Saudi writer, Okaz, April 25, 2021.

While Israel is seeking to dissuade the Biden administration from rejoining the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran — currently the subject of indirect negotiations in Vienna — Tehran’s mullahs and their Lebanese Hezbollah terror proxy are busy drowning the Arab countries with drugs.

Last week, Saudi Arabia’s ambassador to Lebanon, Walid Al-Bukhari, revealed that Saudi authorities recently foiled an attempt to smuggle large quantities of drugs from Lebanon. The smuggled drugs, he said, were “enough to drown the whole Arab world. The drugs were not meant to be distributed in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia only, but also in different parts of the Arab world.”

Al-Bukhari’s remarks came days after Saudi Arabia announced that it had thwarted an attempt to smuggle 2.4 million narcotic tablets into the Kingdom hidden in a shipment of pomegranates.

The smuggling attempt drew sharp criticism from many Arabs, who accused Hezbollah and Iran of exporting various types of drugs to the Arab world and other countries.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2021/05/missing-justuce-sarah-halimi-joseph-puder/

Seventy-six years after the Holocaust, in a continent drenched with Jewish blood, Jews still continue to be victimized in Europe, particularly in France. In recent decades, France has been a dangerous place for Jews, and as a consequence, many French Jews have moved to Israel. The murders that shook French Jewry were the gruesome Halimi murders, and there has been no justice for the victims or true punishment for the perpetrators.

The brutal murder of Dr. Sarah Halimi happened to be the second time a Jewish person named Halimi was viciously killed in Paris. The first was Ilan Halimi who was only 23 years old when he was kidnapped on January 21, 2006, by a gang called the “Barbarians,” comprised largely by Arab-Muslim immigrants. He was tortured and then died of his wounds. The French authorities in the case of Ilan Halimi, just like in Sarah’s case, did not attribute the murder to anti-Semitism. The murderers in both cases included Black Muslim men from sub-Sahara Africa (as well as Arabs from the Maghreb were involved in Ilan’s death). 

As ugly and upsetting as George Floyd’s killing was in Minneapolis, Minnesota, at least he received a measure of justice. The murder of Dr. Sarah Halimi’s in Paris, France, on April 4, 2017, was far more brutal, but justice in her case was not rendered. In fact, it showed the world that in France, even dogs get a larger measure of justice that was denied the late Dr. Halimi because of a deeply rooted anti-Semitism within the current French judicial system. No worldwide riots have however, taken place as the result of her brutal murder by a hate filled Muslim African immigrant from Mali, named Kobili Traore. The cowardly murderer shouted “Allahu akbar” as he attacked and tortured Sarah in her own apartment. Afterward, he proclaimed “I killed a “Shaitan (Satan).” The only reason Traore targeted Sarah Halimi was that she was the only Jewish person in the building located in the Belleville section of Paris. Aged 65, Dr. Sarah Halimi was the mother of three children.  

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/olympics-to-allow-a-male-weightlifter-in-the-female-category/

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has changed its rules, permitting a biological male to compete against women in weightlifting. Before transitioning in 2013, Laurel Hubbard competed in the men’s category.

The IOC’s guidelines require males to demonstrate that their testosterone levels have been chemically lowered. But messing around with testosterone levels does next to nothing to remove the innate male advantage.

Male puberty confers irreversible advantages. Adrogenization increases bone density and muscle mass. Moreover, the performance gap between males and females at the elite level is as much as 30 percent. As has been explained:

The 69kg male weightlifter hammers the 69kg female weightlifter on strength. Where are the females who are stronger than [the males]? How tall and heavy are they? The answer is, in Olympic weightlifting, they don’t exist. . . . The male 69kg Olympic weightlifting world record holder is 30% stronger than his female counterpart and lifts heavier than the female world record holder in the top weight category…

Males are stronger. The performance gap between male and female athletes is utterly astounding; it’s not a “gap”, it’s the Grand Canyon. Without sex-segregated sporting categories, the most wonderful 10.49s that female athletics has ever seen would be a footnote in history. We owe it to the female sports stars of today and to the girls who aspire to be tomorrow’s sporting heroes to fight for their right to take home gold.