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July 2010

Julian Assange's internal monologue

Julian-Assange
 

oh yes I'm back oh yes I am.  in the spotlight.  look at me.  look at me.  no, don't look at me.  stop.  seriously.  okay now:  look at me again, look at me now, look at me forever.  i am gorgeous.  unreal how bloody beautiful i am, it were as if i was the forbidden love spawn of tim robbins and annie lennox. a perfectly unique bloody snowflake unlike any other bloody snowflake but still the biggest, the shiniest, the glowiest, the whitest, the most angular, the most vegetarian of all the snowflakes, the snowflake all other snowflakes aspire to fall after.  heed me.  nothing like me.  nothing like this chairman mao jacket.  
not since the 60's.  not since... 


Continue reading "Julian Assange's internal monologue" »


Some guys you just can't blow up

I love Marines and think everyone should have a squad or two. Here is one reason why.

Garst Lance Cpl. Edgar Jones, a combat engineer with the squad, found a pressure plate inside the compound and hollered to Garst, asking what he should do with it. Garst turned around to answer the Marine and stepped on the bomb.

“I can just barely remember the boom,” Garst said. “I remember the start of a loud noise and then I blacked out.”

Since Garst's improbable run-in with the IED, his tale has spread through the rest of the battalion, and as often happens in combat units, the story mutates, the tale becoming more and more extraordinary about what happened next: He held onto his rifle the whole time … He actually landed on his feet … He remained unmoved, absorbing the impact like he was muffling a fart in a crowded elevator …

What really happened even eludes Garst. All went black after the earth uppercut him. When he came to, he was standing on his feet holding his weapon, turning to see the remnants of the blast and wondering why his squad had a look on their faces as if they’d seen a ghost.

Marines in Company L think Garst is the luckiest guy in the battalion, and while that may seem a fair assessment, it was the enemy’s shoddy work that left Garst standing. The three-liters of homemade explosive only partially detonated.

Marines who witnessed the event from inside the compound caught glimpses of Garst’s feet flailing through the air just above the other side of the building’s eight-foot walls. The explosion knocked him at least fifteen feet away where he landed on his limp head and shoulders before immediately standing back up.

Not quite sure of what had just happened, Garst turned back toward the blast, now nothing but a column of dirt and smoke rising toward the sun.

“My first thought was, ‘Oh s---, I just hit an IED,’” he said. “Then I thought, ‘Well I’m standing. That’s good.’”

Garst’s squad stared at him in disbelief. The square-jawed Marine has a tendency to be short-tempered, and the realization that the blast was meant to kill him spiked his adrenaline and anger.

“It pissed me off,” he said.

He directed his men to establish a security perimeter while letting them know in his own way that he was OK.

“What the f--- are you looking at?” he said. “Get on the cordon!”

Beautiful.


ROE working & WikiLeaks still wanking

Here is a video on the topic of our ROE in Afghanistan. I would ask that the 91% who voted in Crush's poll saying they are too restrictive take another look at them. The idea has never been to show weakness or shrink from a fight we know we could win, it is to avoid alienating the locals and driving them into the Taliban camp. The study of our firefights shows that when we kill civilians we get more attacks against us than if we don't.

I also have a rant up at Big Peace about the WikiLeaks banditos of ass. The best description I have heard of them is internet vandals simply throwing shite against the wall to see if any sticks.


Dead Tangos in Waziristan

Looks like the world's deadliest mobile communications device UJp has been at it again.

The US carried out just its second Predator strike in Pakistan this month, killing 16 Taliban fighters in an attack on a Taliban compound in South Waziristan.

Several Predator or the more deadly Reaper unmanned strike aircraft fired five missiles at a "hideout" used by the Movement of the Taliban in Pakistan in the Angora Adda area in South Waziristan, Geo News reported.

All of those killed were Taliban fighters, Pakistani intelligence officials told Dawn. No senior Taliban or al Qaeda leaders have been reported killed in the strike.

Well done Uphonious, well done.


Canadian Jet Crash Yesterday

From reader Steve G:

Here is a video of a Canadian CF-18 fighter jet crashing Friday during practice for an air show in Alberta.  Apparently, he lost his right engine at slow speed and very low altitude, stalled out, and planted it on the airfield in a big ball of fire right in front of the news camera.  The pilot ejected just in time to get two swings in the chute before landing just outside the flame with no serious injuries.

 

Posted via email from blackfive's posterous


US troops captured in Afghanistan?

This doesn't sound good at all.

KABUL -- Two American soldiers went missing after driving off their base in Kabul on Friday afternoon, and the Taliban later claimed to have captured them in eastern Afghanistan, NATO officials said Saturday, the same day five U.S. troops were killed in the south.

The coalition launched a manhunt by ground and air for the two missing soldiers but did not immediately release information about their identities or what is known of their whereabouts.

"Every available asset is being brought to bear" to find them, said Lt. Col. Joseph T. Breasseale, a NATO spokesman in Kabul.

Afghan officials in Logar province, which borders Kabul to the south, said the soldiers were driving an armored sport-utility vehicle when they were captured in Matinai, a village in the Charkh district. A spokesman for Logar's governor, Din Mohammad Darwish, said the area is "totally under control of the enemy."