Welcome to FBNC's 1st July morning International news here are today's outstanding news Democrats take aim at the US's new $264 billion ICBM amid search for cash to boost the military Democrats take aim at the US's new $264 billion ICBM amid search for cash to boost the military Democrats take aim at the US's new $264 billion ICBM amid search for cash to boost the military US Coast Guard Considering Arctic ‘FONOPS’ to Counter Russian Presence at North Pole Satellite Images Show India-China Troops Just 150 Metres Apart in Eastern Ladakh in February 2021 Can An Indigenous Iron Dome Air Defense System Shield South Korea From The Missiles Of Kim Jong-Un? Trump supporter warns CNN reporter of 'civil war' if former president not reinstated 'soon' Amid debates over how much funding the US military needs to counter China and Russia, Democratic lawmakers have taken aim at a major new nuclear weapon, the Ground-Based Strategic Deterrent, to pay for other priorities. The GBSD, work on which began during the Obama administration, will replace the Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missile, which has been in service since the 1970s. Cost estimates for the GBSD are close to $100 billion for acquisition and $264 billion over its lifetime, which is set to run to the mid-2070s. Northrop Grumman received a $13.3 billion contract for the weapon in September.
GBSD proponents say the Minuteman's service life can't be extended, but Garamendi has said Air Force officials "confirmed" it could and has argued for a GBSD pause until the mid-2030s. With that pause, over the next 10 years "some $37 billion could be saved That money could be spent on other priorities, such as more warships, new weapons like hypersonic missiles, as well as artificial-intelligence and cyber capabilities, Garamendi said. Current military leaders and Democratic and Republican lawmakers say it's necessary to maintain all three legs of the nuclear triad: ICBMs, submarine-launched ballistic missiles, and air-launched weapons. "The recapitalization of the entire triad, to include the GBSD, is critical to our nation's security," Milley said, adding that with a delay of 12 to 15 years, "you'll have a gap in the land-based leg."
At a press conference Thursday, Republican Sen. Jodi Ernst said the US "cannot trade" a GBSD pause for additional funds. "For too long and many administrations, we were not as focused as we should have been on those modernization efforts, and it has set us much further behind than we should be," "If we delay for a dozen years, it would be extremely hard to catch back up. If we look at Russia, China, Iran's activities and what they want to do with enrichment, we can't afford that."
Bilateral relations between Russia and the US have not changed two weeks after the Geneva summit, it will take at least several months to see a thaw in relations, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said in an interview with Rossiya-24 television on Tuesday. Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said in an interview with Rossiya-24 television on Tuesday. Bilateral relations between Russia and the US have not changed two weeks after the Geneva summit, "Questions do remain as to Russian-US relations. Certainly, things cannot change in Russian-American relations within two weeks. You know, [this is] like a neglected disease: you begin to take medications, and the effect is seen only in a few days.
Here, too, we need to wait a certain number of months before we feel some kind of not even a thaw, but at least a modest tendency towards the emergence of constructiveness in our bilateral relations," The issue of bilateral relations worries Russian nationals, and questions for the Direct Line with President Vladimir Putin include this topic, The Russia-US summit, initiated by Washington, took place in the Swiss city of Geneva on June 16 Putin and Biden discussed the state and the prospects of further development of bilateral relations, the issues of strategic stability, as well as international matters, including cooperation in the fight against COVID-19 and regulation of regional conflicts. After the Geneva summit, the sides agreed to return the Russian and US ambassadors to Washington and Moscow respectively. Russia tested the readiness of its air defence systems in Crimea, the peninsula it annexed from Ukraine in 2014, as Ukraine and NATO countries held military drills in the Black Sea, The Sea Breeze exercise, which began on Monday, follows a rise in tensions between NATO and Moscow, which said last week it had fired warning shots and dropped bombs in the path of a British warship to chase it out of Black Sea waters off the coast of Crimea.
Russia's Black Sea fleet was cited by Interfax as saying it had deployed around 20 warplanes and helicopters, including Su-24M bombers, as well as S-400 and Pantsir surface-to-air missile systems in the readiness tests. "The Black Sea Fleet is doing a number of things to monitor the actions of ships from NATO in Sea Breeze 2021," Moscow called for the Sea Breeze military exercises to be cancelled before they began, Sea Breeze 2021 will last two weeks and involve about 5,000 military personnel from NATO and other allies, and around 30 ships and 40 aircraft. U.S. missile destroyer USS Ross and the U.S. Marine Corps will take part. Russia last week warned Britain and the United States against "tempting fate" by sending warships to the Black Sea, and said it would defend its borders using all possible means including military force. The US needs to expand its operations in the Arctic to counter Russia’s presence there, That could include “freedom of navigation operations” (FONOPS) like the US uses to challenge maritime claims of other nations of which it does not approve. US Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Karl Schultz told the conservative think tank the Brookings Institution in Washington, DC.
“Presence equals influence in the Arctic. And right now ... we're woefully lacking as a nation in terms of our capacity,” The region is home to considerable natural resources, including an estimated $1 trillion worth of minerals, one-third of the world’s liquefied natural gas (LNG), and rich fishing grounds - much of which has remained untapped due to the harsh climate, permafrost and sea ice. It also holds great travel potential as an alternative to the Suez Canal or Cape of Good Hope.
As climate change increases the region’s average temperatures and sends the ice into retreat, global powers are looking to the Arctic as the next place to make their claims - or head off the claims of others. “The Arctic could be one of those potential places for future Freedom of Navigation Operations if they’re not a responsible actor up there,” Days after India moved 50,000 troops to its border with China, satellite images emerged showing that Chinese troops were just 150 metres away in February from the Indian military in Eastern Ladakh. The images on Google Earth show tents and housing for soldiers at an altitude of 17,000 feet in the Rezang La area of South Pangong. Israel’s Iron Dome has displayed great efficiency when it was able to intercept more than 90% of rockets fired by Hamas militants over the Israeli population. The Iron Dome was recently in the news for its remarkable performance in the Israel-Palestine clash. South Korea has approved a $2.56-billion project to develop an artillery interception system, similar to Israel’s Iron Dome Air Defense System. The weapon system will act as an effective defense against North Korea’s long-range arsenal, Almost 52 million people live in the Seoul metropolitan area, the capital of South Korea.
Towards the end of last year, the government of South Korea had released the defense blueprint which called for the development of a “Korean style Iron Dome”, which is competent enough to defend Seoul and key facilities, Reuters said in its report. On June 28, a committee chaired by Defense Minister Suh Wook, gave the nod to the project to develop an interceptor system similar to the Israeli Iron Dome with some of its own technologies. The project is expected to be completed by 2035, the Defence Acquisition Program Administration (DAPA) said in its statement South Korea has said that this interceptor system is expected to be one step ahead in defending the country’s core facilities and key military and security infrastructure against the long-range artillery threats posed by North Korea, While Pyongyang does not comment much on its military deployment, military officials believe that around 1000 artillery pieces, including 240-mm rockets with multiple launchers, are deployed along the Military Demarcation Line separating the two Koreas. Most of these are aimed at Seoul and the metropolitan area. Back to Iron Dome, this is a typical air defense missile battery consists of a radar unit, missile control unit, and several launchers, all located at the same site. On the other hand, Iron Dome is built to deploy in a scattered pattern. Each launcher, containing 20 interceptors, is independently deployed and operated remotely via a secure wireless connection, with each Iron Dome battery being capable of protecting an urban area of approximately 150 sq. km, according to The EurAsian Times.
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has appealed to U.S. President Joe Biden's administration to lift or waive all sanctions on Iran as agreed under a 2015 deal aimed at stopping Tehran from developing a nuclear weapon. Guterres' appeal to Washington comes amid talks to revive the deal - known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action Iran has refined uranium up to a purity of roughly 60%, far above the deal's limit of 3.67% and much closer to the 90% suitable for atom bomb cores, though it maintains that it seeks only civilian nuclear power and could quickly reverse its moves if Washington rescinded sanctions and returned to the 2015 deal Guterres said: "I continue to believe that a full restoration of the Plan remains the best way to ensure that the nuclear programme of the Islamic Republic of Iran remains exclusively peaceful."
CNN reporter Donie O'Sullivan spoke with several supporters of former President Trump ahead of his first post-presidential rally on Saturday, many of whom told him they fully expect the real estate mogul to be reinstated before the end of the summer and warned of potential political violence in America if he is not. Many of the supporters who gathered for the Saturday rally in Wellington, Ohio, wore memorabilia and carried signs with slogans like "Trump won" and "Biden sucks" displayed across them. "It's about all of them, and 2020 and the next one," another woman told O'Sullivan about her "Trump won" T-shirt. O'Sullivan pressed the woman on the election's result, saying, "But he lost though in 2020, right?" "No!" she responded.
A third group of Trump supporters indicated before the rally that the one message they hoped to hear from the former president is that "he's coming back." Trump has reportedly been pressuring allies in conservative media and other confidants to push his claim that the election was stolen and suggest he will be reinstated as soon as August. There is no mechanism by which such a reinstatement could happen. "He's coming back soon, and you guys are going down," a Trump supporter in Wellington identified as Ron told O'Sullivan, "The military already knows it was a fraud. He won by over 80 percent."
"And what if that doesn't happen?" O'Sullivan asked. "We're going to be in a civil war because the militia will be taking over," the man responded. A self-described member of the right-wing Three Percenters militia group who attended the rally told O'Sullivan he was at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6,
At least six members of the Three Percenters have been charged with conspiring to attack the U.S. Capitol that day. About a dozen deaths in Washington and Oregon may be tied to an intense heat wave that brought scorching temperatures to the Northwest and caused one power utility to impose rolling blackouts amid heavy demand. The dangerous weather that gave Seattle and Portland consecutive days of record high temperatures exceeding 100 degrees Fahrenheit (37.7 degrees Celsius)
eased in those cities on Tuesday. But inland Spokane, towns in eastern Oregon and cities in Idaho saw temperatures spike. The National Weather Service said the mercury reached 109 F (42.2 C) in Tuesday in Spokane Meanwhile, authorities said multiple recent deaths in the region were possibly related to the scorching weather. that three men — ages 51, 75 and 77 — died after experiencing heat stroke in their homes. The heat may have claimed the life of a worker on a nursery in Oregon, the state’s worker safety agency, The worst heat wave on record in the Pacific Northwest has resulted in more than 1,100 people going to the hospital for possible heat-related illness as of Tuesday, About 9,300 Avista Utilities customers in Spokane lost power on Monday and the company said more planned blackouts began on Tuesday afternoon in the city of about 220,000 people. Two and a half years before her building collapsed into a pile of rubble, Champlain Towers South resident Mara Chouela dashed off the latest in a string of angry complaints about the development project next door.
Chouela, a board member of the condo association, wrote in a January 2019 email "We are concerned that the construction next to Surfside is too close," Workers were "digging too close to our property and we have concerns regarding the structure of our building," Just 28 minutes later, the official, Rosendo Prieto, responded that "there is nothing for me to check." as Eighty Seven Park, was directly across the border separating the town of Surfside from the city of Miami Beach, which runs between the two buildings. In the wake of the Champlain Towers South disaster, Eighty Seven Park is facing new scrutiny: Champlain residents had complained that construction the neighboring building would regularly cause their units to shake, according to friends and family members of the condo owners, as well as emails released by the town. There's no evidence that the construction of Eighty Seven Park, which took place between 2016 and 2019, contributed to the collapse.
A human rights group in Myanmar says over 5,000 citizens are in detention as the military continues to suppress protests against the coup that toppled a civilian government. The Assistance Association for Political Prisoners says 6,421 people had been arrested as of Tuesday, and 5,224 of them are still in detention. The military argues that detainees are treated in accordance with law, but the association says there are reports of widespread and systematic mistreatment aimed at extracting information from detainees. The association also says there were at least 24 deaths caused by torture as of Saturday. The military seized power on February 1, claiming irregularities in last year's general election. Protests are continuing across the country, although on a reduced scale. Some groups have taken up arms.
The more transmissible Delta variant has spread to almost every state in the US, fueling health experts' concerns about Covid-19 spikes. The variant is expected to become the dominant coronavirus strain in the US, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said. And with half the US still not fully vaccinated, doctors say it could cause a resurgence of Covid-19 in the fall just as children too young to get vaccinated go back to school. In Los Angeles County, the pace of Delta's spread has prompted officials to reinstate mask guidance for public indoor spaces -- regardless of vaccination status. The new, voluntary mask guidance is needed until health officials can "better understand how and to who the Delta variant is spreading," The Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine has shown to be 88% effective against symptomatic infections caused by the Delta variant two weeks after the second dose. Those who received only one dose have significantly less protection.
And Moderna's vaccine was found in lab experiments to work against new variants such as the Delta strain, Researchers used serum samples from eight participants taken a week after they received their second dose of vaccine. But the spread of coronavirus is outpacing vaccinations, the World Health Organization said. And the longer coronavirus spreads among unvaccinated people, the more opportunities it has to mutate into more troubling variants. Now the Gamma variant has been shown to be more resistant to vaccines and antibody treatments.
Last week, the WHO said even those who are fully vaccinated should wear masks in places with high rates of Covid-19 spread. Many states have not reinstated mask mandates for the upcoming school year, including New Jersey where masks will not be required "unless the district decides to make it protocol," Gov. Phil Murphy said Monday. Almost half of Australia’s population has been placed under lockdown as authorities face Covid-19 clusters in multiple cities across the country for the first time since the initial outbreak last year.
As the cluster in Sydney grew to 149 cases, authorities in Brisbane and Perth imposed snap lockdowns of three and four days, Sydney is in a two-week lockdown while Darwin is in a lockdown that is due to end on Friday The measures, including parts of regional Queensland, left more than 40 per cent of Australia’s 25.7 million residents under stay-home orders. States have also imposed various travel bans to restrict entry from hotspots. As authorities struggled to contain the various clusters, the federal and state governments have faced questions about their handling of the pandemic, including the slow pace of the vaccination roll-out and a failure to ensure vaccinations for all workers, who have contact with international arrivals and Covid-19 patients. As of Tuesday (June 29), just 3.4 per cent of the population had been fully vaccinated and 26 per cent had received one dose. Several state leaders have criticised the federal government’s management of the roll-out.
Some of the largest infrastructure projects under construction in China have started using robots. The projects include the world’s most challenging water diversion project, its tallest dam, a new futuristic city, and part of an expressway that the mainland Chinese government hopes will link Beijing to Taipei. Artificial intelligence (AI) has been used widely in China’s infrastructure boom, including in the construction of the Baihetan, the world’s second-largest hydroelectric dam, which was built within four years. But the main purpose of the technology was to coordinate the activities of human workers. However, driven by disruptive technology such as 5G, huge investment in infrastructure and rising labour costs, small but rapidly expanding army of construction robots has emerged in China.
Some working areas, for instance, were irregular shapes, and had obstacles that had to be avoided. Some experts have warned that increased use of robots could have a negative impact on society. Large-scale application of robots can “stimulate economic growth but destroy employment”, The Pentagon's report on unidentified aerial phenomena was released on Friday, sparking yet another round of speculation on the nature of over 140 strange objects that have been observed by the US military. NASA administrator, ex-senator, and former astronaut Bill Nelson said "Yes, I've seen the classified report. It says basically what we thought.
We don't know the answer to what those Navy pilots saw, they know that they saw something, they tracked it, they locked their radar onto it, they followed it, it would suddenly move quickly from one location to another", The administrator noted that he is awaiting reports from scientists, also adding that he had spoken with pilots after a briefing on the matter when he was still serving as a Florida senator. It may not necessarily be an extraterrestrial, but if it is a technology that some of our adversaries have, The official noted that so far, NASA's Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence programme has not discovered any "receipt communication from something that's intelligent". In the nine-page report, the government neither confirmed nor denied that the strange objects mentioned by the military could have been extraterrestrial in nature. These are FBNC's morning International news Thank you for watching See you in the next FBNC's morning International news
2021-07-02