Responding to Iran and the Houthis

To the people of the Russian federation Remember Chernobyl!

 

Only if hundreds of thousands of Russians demonstrate in the streets of virtually every Russian city and town soon, and continue do so, can they have any assurance that Vladimir Putin will not plunge them and the world into a horrific nuclear war. 

 

Seeing that tens of thousands demonstrated in Moscow was encouraging. The people of Russia must turn out in great enough numbers every day that arrests do not deter most other demonstrators. 

 

On, 21 August 2022, President Putin threatened the use of nuclear weapons in the Ukraine War! President Putin’s threat followed months of similar threats by lower ranking Russian officials, most notably, Dmitry Medvedev. Putin said he was not bluffing. I believe him. 

 

In all likelihood, Putin has already picked the date, the time, and targets of the attack. Here is how I see the start of Putin’s Nuclear War. 

·      Putin will soon hold “elections” in Donbas 

·      Within hours of those sham elections, the Duma will vote to annex Donbas,  the territory linking Donbas to Crimea, and the already annexed Crimea

·      Putin will demand that Ukraine remove its troops from “Russia”. 

·      Ukraine will refuse

·      Nuclear war of unknown magnitude will ensue

Apparently erroneously, I concluded long ago that the Soviet notion of “winning a [protracted] nuclear war” had died among the ashes and debris of Chernobyl. Putin’s speech on the 21^st has proven me wrong. 

 

At some point, a short-sighted Russian strategist apparently came up with the stupid notion of “Escalating [with nuclear weapons] to Deescalate” a war. A nuclear attack on Ukraine will amount to betting millions of Russian lives on an untried and idiotic idea. Putin appears to think the idea has merit. 

 

President Putin must have forgotten Chernobyl. Within a week of the •meltdown•, the Soviets went from denying anything had happened to asking for help from the west, from the whole world. The Soviets admitted they could not deal with the casualties, the mitigation, and the cleanup of Chernobyl — much less of nuclear attacks on cities. 

I recall that hundreds, if not thousands, of Western doctors and other experts went to Chernobyl to help the Soviets recover from the disaster. Embarrassingly, I cannot find the relevant statistics. Regardles, the people of Russia know that Chernobyl overwhelmed the Soviets. To state the obvious, if President Putin starts a nuclear war, Western doctors and other experts will not be going to Russia to aid with casualties or anything else.

 

Finally, I realize how easily I can ask Russians to turn out in Russia. Still, if 1000 Americans picketed the Russian embassy, Putin would simply snicker and continue his plans. Only people in Russia can influence this man.

 

 

 Protect Critical Infrastructure

President Biden should reallocate funds in his Infrastructure Bill from its lowest priority projects to hardening our nakedly vulnerable, most critical infrastructure (critical systems) against Cyber-attacks from the Public Internet. Some of the most critical systems: Electrical Grid, Water purification and distribution, and pipelines. Long ago, China had reportedly penetrated many electrical systems; and, “60 Minutes” showed the ••destruction•• via the Internet of a large generator in only a few minutes.

Private Wide Area Networks (Private WANs) can provide a fast, feasible, proven way to secure critical systems. If President Biden plans to spend two Trillion dollars on infrastructure, that should include helping all critical intrauterine utilities to quickly move those systems to private WANs—••NOT•• a single government network. That would quickly morph into the same mess we have today. Specifically:  

·       Move every critical system, including remote computers used to monitor and control the equipment, from the Public Internet to a Private WAN. This would a computer that cannot reach the Internet; not simply putting a second Network Interface Card in a computer attached to the Internet.

·       Copy every computer and server, prior to wiping the drive, “bit-buy-bit” for offline later penetration analysis.

·       Rebuild each computer and server from a blank drive to its proper configuration.

Recently, Admiral Charles Richard, Commander of the U.S. Strategic Command, was reported as testifying that nuclear weapons could become “the least bad option” in a war with Russia, China, or both. As war clouds gather, over Taiwan, North Korea, Russia, Ukraine, Iran, Lebanon, and Israel, critical systems need hardening against cyber-attacks more than ever; doing less could tie the hands of the President in a crisis.

In 1982, the bank for which I worked, and virtually every other bank, used a Private WAN, whether owned or leased, to operate every terminal and printer in every branch and office. This included processing virtually every financial transaction. I believe Public Utilities also used private WANs before the Public Internet became available; although, I have no experience in that industry.

Considering the testimony of Admiral Richard, please consider the following very plausible scenarios:

·       China:

o   China invades Taiwan.

o   The President moves to the defense of Taiwan.

o   China ••destroys•• every electric generator near the Mississippi River from Cape Giraudoux, MO to Cairo, IL,

o   China threatens to destroy every generator in the United States unless the President gives up Taiwan.

·       Russia probably can attack critical systems almost as effectively as China. That could allow Putin to use similar threats against an American intervention in defense of Ukraine.

·       Perhaps worst of all, the Mullahs in Iran might get the same attack capability. If successful, they conceivably could:

o   Attack Israel and follow the “China scenario” above.

o   Try to ignite a war between the great powers by launching an attack on one and “pinning the attack on” one or both of the others.

I do not want any President to have to consider either jeopardizing the entire electrical grid or using nuclear weapons in the face of aggression by any nation. Moving critical utilities to Private WANs could reduce the danger of any nation miscalculating American Resolve. Some other advantages of hardening infrastructure include:

Addressing a critical vulnerability earlier Presidents have ignored or kicked down the road.

• ·       Republicans might support the project, rendering the entire Bill bipartisan.
• ·       Having utility rate payers pay for most of the project over time by making low interest
       or no-interest loans to the utilities for, say, ten years.
• ·       Upon completion, the Project will leave America, our allies, our adversaries, the world,
       much safer.

 As always, comments invited.

DJ

President "Double Mask" Biden--Ha!

Current Biden Administration Border policies will make Cuomo’s slaughter of nursing home patients seem like a game of touch football!

President “Double Mask” Biden tells us, “For God’s sake, wear a mask!” Then he turns loose an average of 8,000 COVID infected illegals each month to mix freely into the United States population—no COVID test; no quarantine; no masks; presumably not even a normal temperature test! The Biden Oddminstration gives many unscreened illegals a bus ticket to the city of their choice, a cash stipend, and effectively says, “Go into our country and mix with our people.” (Note 1)

President Biden has a lot of nerve telling us to wear masks while unleashing upon us a deadly plague of unknown intensity and breadth! When massive deaths ensue, the President can say, “Tut! Tut! President Biden told you to wear a Mask! It’s all the fault of mask-resisting Republications.”

Maybe the cronies running President Biden have decided to swap “eternal plague” for “eternal war” in their very own 1984 “Take Over” Scenario.

 

(See HR-1 for details.)

 

Note 1: The best average value I have seen.  About 100,000 border crossings have occurred in recent months. Here is a link to two or more sets of positive percentages; I will stick with eight percent:
https://www.westernjournal.com/stunning-percentage-illegal-immigrants-dropped-off-texas-city-tested-positive-covid/