Category Archives: Military

North Korea Missile or Satellite Launch?

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IAEA on North Korea

Countdown to Launch: New Activity at the Sohae Horizontal Processing Building

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Editor’s Note: With North Korea’s recent notifications to the International Maritime Organization (IMO) and International Telecommunication Union (ITU) that it would launch an “earth observation satellite” between February 8 and February 25, 38 North has initiated a series of brief imagery analysis updates to closely follow developments at the North’s Sohae Satellite Launching Station (“Tongchang-dong”). This is the first of these updates.

Activity at the Horizontal Processing Building

Recent commercial satellite imagery indicates that the level of activity at the Horizontal Processing Building at the Sohae Satellite Launching Station (“Tongchang-dong”) is suggestive of preparations for a space launch and supports North Korea’s announced launch window of February 8 through 24. During past launches, this building has been used to receive the various rocket stages. Once received, they are assembled in the horizontal position to test all connections, perform final testing of subsystems and prepare the stages for mounting on the launch pad. Specifically, on February 1, there are nine vehicles present, of which two are likely to be buses. Compared with only one vehicle present on January 25, this level of activity is similar to that seen prior to the previous launch in 2012 and is suggestive of launch preparations.

At the nearby covered rail station, the shed roof obscures the view of any activity within. On February 1, a small utility pole (i.e., for lighting or communications) has been erected near the northeast corner of the shed.

Figure 1. Increased activity at the Horizontal Processing Building and rail station. 

Image includes material Pleiades © CNES 2016. Distribution Airbus DS / Spot Image, all rights reserved. For media licensing options, please contact thirtyeightnorth@gmail.com.

Image includes material Pleiades © CNES 2016. Distribution Airbus DS / Spot Image, all rights reserved. For media licensing options, please contact [email protected].

No New Activity at the Launch Pad

Recent imagery indicates no significant changes at the Sohae launch pad since last viewed on January 25. The work platforms on the gantry tower remain folded forward, with the environmental covers in place, obscuring any activity that might be taking place within. It is also not possible to see whether a space launch vehicle (SLV) is already present within the utility platforms.

No personnel or vehicles appear present elsewhere on the launch pad or in the fuel/oxidizer bunker. The rail-mounted transfer structure, which will likely be used to move the various rocket stages from the underground station or the stationary processing building to the launch pad, remains at the south end of the pad adjacent to the stationary processing building. Although there is no activity indicating an imminent launch, the gantry tower and launch pad complex appear to be in a condition capable of conducting a launch within the announced launch window of February 8 through 24.

Figure 2. Environmental covers still obscure any activity that might be taking place inside the gantry tower.

Image includes material Pleiades © CNES 2016. Distribution Airbus DS / Spot Image, all rights reserved. For media licensing options, please contact thirtyeightnorth@gmail.com.

Image includes material Pleiades © CNES 2016. Distribution Airbus DS / Spot Image, all rights reserved. For media licensing options, please contact [email protected].

Low Activity at other Key Launch related Facilities

Recent imagery indicates a still low level of activity at other key facilities likely to be involved in a space launch when compared to January 25. Specifically:

  • There are no significant changes at what is believed to be the launch control building. The structure appears to be in good condition. Activity at this facility should increase as the launch date grows closer.
  • No activity is noted at the building North Korea has previously identified at the Satellite Control Building. On January 25, there were five vehicles present in the two buildings in the VIP housing area. By February 1, only one vehicle is present. Extended vehicle activity in this area—seen prior to the 2012 launch—could mean that scientists and engineers are present.
  • There are no significant changes at what is believed to be the National Aerospace Development Administration (NADA) Auditorium between January 25 and February 1, although the adjacent helicopter pad had been cleared of snow. Guests, dignitaries and workers would view the launch from this location.

Vertical Engine Test Stand Appears Ready

Activity noted at the vertical engine test stand during the last month indicates that an engine test could be conducted at any time and with little prior notice. There are no significant changes noted at the vertical engine test stand between January 25 and February 1. The rail-mounted environmental shelter remains immediately adjacent to the test stand. No personnel are visible and there are no indications that an engine test has recently taken place. The complex appears capable of conducting a test at any time.

Figure 3. Engine test stand appears ready for use. 

Image includes material Pleiades © CNES 2016. Distribution Airbus DS / Spot Image, all rights reserved. For media licensing options, please contact thirtyeightnorth@gmail.com.

Image includes material Pleiades © CNES 2016. Distribution Airbus DS / Spot Image, all rights reserved.

For media licensing options, please contact [email protected].

Homs. Syria: Today

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Context: New York City in 2014 had an estimated population of 8.49 million. Today in Syria, 11 million people have fled the country. Starvation is everywhere.

Iran and Russia have been long time friends with Bashir al Assad and both rogue countries continue to prop up Assad.

Every world leader is responsible for this and to blame. 5 years of Bashir al Assad, years of Islamic State, years of al Nusra. Russia continues to bomb those fighting against the Assad regime with wild abandon. This is 2016, how can a modern day holocaust be so real. No one can fully estimate the death tolls, 200,000 or 500,000?

 

 

 

What are the prospects for anyone to ever return? How can this be rebuilt?

Homs: Homs did not emerge into the historical record until the 1st century BCE at the time of the Seleucids. It later became the capital of a kingdom ruled by the Emesani dynasty who gave the city its name. Originally a center of worship for the sun god El-Gabal, it later gained importance in Christianity under the Byzantines. Homs was conquered by the Muslims in the 7th century and made capital of a district that bore its current name. Throughout the Islamic era, Muslim dynasties contending for control of Syria sought after Homs due to the city’s strategic position in the area. Homs began to decline under the Ottomans and only in the 19th century did the city regain its economic importance when its cotton industry boomed. During French Mandate rule, the city became a center of insurrection and, after independence in 1946, a center of Baathist resistance to the first Syrian governments.

Large parts of Syria are reduced almost entirely to rubble after five years of civil war.

As attitudes and policies towards refugees harden across Europe, a video has emerged that exposes the utter devastation Syrians are fleeing from.

Revealing in detail the consequences of the country’s five-year civil war, the drone footage shows the piles of rubble ruined buildings that Homs – previously Syria’s third largest city – has been reduced to.

While the video reflects the utter desolation in a city that was once home to more than 650,000 people, peace talks aimed at ending hostilities remain frustratingly unproductive.
The video that shows the Syrian peace talks cannot come soon enough
Arguments over who should or should not attend the negotiations overshadowed the continuous damage wrought in a war that has seen over 11 million Syrians flee, more than half the country’s entire population.

The video was shot by Alexander Pushin, a cameraman for Russian state television.

While his drone footage from Syria has been described as propaganda designed to promote Russia’s military involvement in the country, the startling scale of devastation it exposes is beyond question.
Even as news emerged of nine people who died attempting to reach the relative safe haven of Europe, anti-refugee sentiment appears to be growing across the continent.

Denmark recently introduced legislation that permits the seizing of refugees’ valuables, which drew comparisons to the treatment of Jews by Nazi Germany.
Sweden is rejecting applications from 80,000 people who sought asylum in the Scandinavian country last year, while Finland also intends to expel 20,000 of the 32,000 applications received in 2015.

Angela Merkel announced recently that Syrian refugees would be expected to return to the Middle East once the conflict is over, while British Prime Minister David Cameron dismissed those living in the squalor of Calais’ “Jungle” as “a bunch of migrants”.

Starting in 2011, the ongoing conflict in Syria pitches Bashar al Assad’s regime – aided by Russia – against a multitude of different and competing factions, including Islamist group Isis and associated militias.

The language of a continent that once appeared to welcome refugees no longer appears so accommodating, despite the evidently dire situation in Homs, Damascus and other Syrian cities reduced to ruins over the last five years.

Finally, Hillary’s Security Clearance in Jeopardy?

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Humm –> Expect to undergo one or more interviews and often a polygraph as part of the clearance process. These steps are used by investigators to get a better understanding of your character, conduct and integrity. You might also have to answer questions designed to clear up discrepancies or clarify unfavorable data discovered during the background investigation. The ultimate goal is for government security personnel to determine your eligibility for a clearance, a decision based on the totality of the evidence and information collected.

August of last year: Intelligence community wants Clinton’s security clearance suspended

WashingtonTimes: Security experts say that if Hillary Rodham Clinton retained her government security clearance when she left the State Department, as is normal practice, it should be suspended now that it is known her unprotected private email server contained top secret material.

“Standard procedure is that when there is evidence of a security breach, the clearance of the individual is suspended in many, but not all, cases,” said retired Army Lt. Gen. William Boykin, who was deputy undersecretary of defense for intelligence in the George W. Bush administration. “This rises to the level of requiring a suspension.”

“The department does not comment on individuals’ security clearance status,” the official said.

Mrs. Clinton is the front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination. A campaign spokesman did not reply to a query, but she did get a vote of support from a key congressional Democrat.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, the top Democrat on the Senate intelligence committee, said Thursday there is no evidence Mrs. Clinton herself sent classified information and that the emails now under scrutiny were not marked classified at the time she sent them.

Clinton’s Security Clearance Is Under Scrutiny

Bloomberg: Now that several e-mails on Hillary Clinton’s private server have been classified, there is a more immediate question than the outcome of the investigation: Should the former secretary of state retain her security clearance during the inquiry? Congressional Republicans and Democrats offer predictably different answers.

The State Department announced Friday that it would not release 22 e-mails from Clinton’s private server after a review found they contained information designated as top secret. U.S. officials who reviewed the e-mails tell us they contain the names of U.S. intelligence officers overseas, but not the identities of undercover spies; summaries of sensitive meetings with foreign officials; and information on classified programs like drone strikes and intelligence-collection efforts in North Korea.

The FBI is investigating the use of Clinton’s home server when she was secretary of state, which the bureau now has. The New York Times reported in August that  Clinton is not a target of that investigation. We reported in September that one goal is to discover whether a foreign intelligence service hacked in.

 

Representative Adam Schiff, the ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said Clinton should not lose her security clearance for receiving information that was not marked classified at the time. “I’m sure she does hold a clearance, and she should,” he told us.

Representative Mike Pompeo, a Republican member of that committee who also has read the e-mails, told us, “It’s important, given all the information we now know, that the House of Representatives work alongside the executive branch to determine whether it’s appropriate for Secretary Clinton to continue to hold her security clearances.”

Senate Intelligence Chairman Richard Burr told us the decision lies with the White House. “I think that’s up to what the National Security Council is comfortable with,” he said.

Burr, who has also read all 22 e-mails, said Clinton should have known to better protect the information they contain. “They are definitely sensitive,” he said. “Anybody in the intelligence world would know that the content was sensitive.”

His Democratic counterpart, Senator Dianne Feinstein, who also read them, told us that Clinton didn’t originally send any of the e-mails and that they were largely from her staff, although she did sometimes reply. Feinstein said the intelligence community is being overly cautious by designating the e-mails as top secret.

“There’s no question that they are over-classifying this stuff,” she said.

Clinton’s discussion of classified programs on an unclassified e-mail system is hardly rare. The issue, called “spillage,” has plagued the government for years. It can apply to anything from a spoken conversation about intelligence programs outside of a secure facility, to printing out a document with classified information on an unsecure printer.

Still, it is forbidden. The State Department’s Foreign Affairs Manual says “transmitting classified information over a communication channel that is unauthorized for the level of information being transmitted” is a “security violation.” Such violations must be investigated by the State Department’s own bureaus of human resources and diplomatic security. Punishment can vary from a letter of reprimand to loss of security clearance, according to the manual.

When asked about the status of Clinton’s security clearance, State Department spokesman John Kirby said: “The State Department does not comment on individuals’ security clearance status. We will say, however, that generally speaking there is a long tradition of secretaries of state making themselves available to future secretaries and presidents. Secretaries are typically allowed to maintain their security clearance and access to their own records for use in writing their memoirs and the like.”

The Clinton campaign declined to comment.

During the Obama administration, it has not been automatic for officials to lose their security clearance while an investigation is underway. Just last week, the Washington Post reported that the chief of naval intelligence, Vice Adm. Ted Branch, had his security clearance suspended because he is wrapped up in a Justice Department investigation into contracting corruption. He has not been able to read, see, or hear classified information since November 2013. Branch has not been charged with any crime and continues to serve in that post.

But when then-CIA director David Petraeus came under FBI investigation at the end of 2012, his security clearance was not formally revoked. After he resigned, his access to classified information was suspended, according to U.S. officials. In that case, Petraeus had provided notebooks with highly classified information to his biographer and mistress Paula Broadwell, whose security clearances did not permit her to receive it.

Unlike Broadwell, officials familiar with the e-mails tell us that Clinton and her e-mail correspondents were cleared to receive the information that has been classified after the fact. Steven Aftergood, who heads the project on government secrecy for the Federation of American Scientists, told us, “It’s entirely possible for information to start out as unclassified and to be classified only when the question of public disclosure arises.”

William Leonard, who oversaw the government’s security classification process between 2002 and 2008 as the director of the Information Security Oversight Office, told us this kind of “spillage” was common. “The bottom line is this, if you have the opportunity to pore through any cleared individual’s unclassified e-mail account, it’s almost inevitable you would find material that someone, some way would point out should be classified.” He also said that in Clinton’s case, “there is no indication that she deliberately disregarded the rules for handling classified information so I see no reason why she should not remain eligible for a security clearance.”

Nonetheless, Leonard added that Clinton’s decision to use the private e-mail server as secretary of state “reflected exceedingly poor judgment, and those that advised her on this did not serve her well.”

The FBI investigation may determine that neither Clinton nor her aides broke the law, but Clinton herself has said she used poor judgment. It’s an open question how that poor judgment will affect her access to state secrets, during and after the FBI’s investigation.

Libya, to Be or Not to Be, Mercenaries

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ISIS Recruits Poor Africans as Fighters for Libya with Cash Bonus

The Islamic State is offering people from Chad, Sudan and Mali up to $1,000 cash bonus to join its army in Libya.

The Islamic State is recruiting from three African countries, offering prospective soldiers up to a $1,000 signing bonus to swell its army in Libya, according to Libyan intelligence.

The Islamic State’s chapter in former Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi’s home town of Sirte is recruiting from Chad, Sudan and Mali, countries where typical wages can be as little as a dollar a day and where the sums offered by ISIS are very enticing.

Similar mercenaries from impoverished African countries were used by Gaddafi for his armies.

ISIS has controlled Sirte for a year and is believed to have raised an army of 2,000 to 3,000 fighters. Of these, 70 percent are believed to be non-Libyans.

“The majority – I cannot tell you exactly how many – are Tunisians, while the rest are made up mostly of Sudanese, Egyptians and then people from the Sub-Saharan countries stretching from Chad and Nigeria, along with a few from Algeria and the Gulf,” the head of military intelligence in Misrata, Colonel Ismail Shukri, told The Telegraph.

“Sadly, we have big open borders and long open areas, and through the routes for illegal immigration, we now have all this ideology coming through. That is one of the reasons why Isil has come to Libya.”

The Islamic State is also recruiting from the growing unemployed population in Tunisia, the International Business Times reported in January.

Gen. Dunford wants ‘decisive military action’ against ISIS in Libya

Washington (CNN)President Barack Obama’s top military adviser has begun to talk openly about stepped-up U.S. military action against ISIS in Libya as the terror group expands its operations in the North African country.

The U.S. wants to “take decisive military action” to “check” ISIS in Libya, while still supporting the political process to form a functioning government, Gen. Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters while traveling in Europe.

U.S. military reconnaissance flights over Libya and covert intelligence-gathering missions are now focusing sharply on tracking and locating ISIS’s growing presence in that country, according to a senior defense official.

Dunford hopes to develop recommendations in the next several weeks that would offer options for U.S. military action in conjunction with allies such as France, Italy and Britain, the official said.

At the same time, Dunford is working on recommendations for additional U.S. and coalition troops to help the Iraqis retake the city of Mosul in the coming weeks and months.

READ: United Nations warns of ISIS expansion in Libya

CNN was not present for the session with reporters, but Dunford’s spokesman confirmed the details of his remarks.

The chairman did not specify any U.S. military options. But other defense officials have made clear that they would involve targeting ISIS forces inside Libya, as well as possibly training Libyan forces outside the country to go back in and fight the group.

Concern has grown in recent weeks as the latest intelligence assessments show the number of ISIS operatives inside Libya could now number in the low thousands. The U.S. also believes some senior ISIS leaders have gone there.

ISIS fighters are going to Libya when they cannot get into Syria and Iraq, but some are also leaving those areas in the face of ongoing airstrikes and fighting against them in place like Raqqa, ISIS’ self-declared capital in Syria. The U.S. also is concerned that ISIS will make a move against Libyan oil installations in order to restore cash flow it has lost in U.S. bombings.

READ: Hillary Clinton’s other Libya problem

In November, the first U.S. airstrike against ISIS in Libya killed Abu Nabil, a senior operative. Now, however, the U.S. is privately pressing allies to also take more action against ISIS in Libya.

By getting better intelligence on where ISIS is located in Libya and acting against the group, the U.S. hopes to put a “firewall” around its presence inside the country so it cannot expand further into Africa or move toward southern Europe, the defense official said.

Dunford’s remarks came as another top U.S. military leader weighed in on ISIS in Libya.

“There is concern about Libya,” said Gen. Joe Votel, head of U.S. Special Operations Command. “It can’t all be about Iraq and Syria.”

Votel has been nominated to take over Central Command, which is running the U.S.-led campaign in Iraq and Syria.

UK awaits outcome of Libya talks as it weighs military options

Downing Street waiting to see whether peace efforts succeed before joining US and France in calling for intervention

A British decision on whether to join western powers considering direct military intervention against Islamic State in Libya is likely to rest on whether long-running efforts to form a viable Libyan national unity government will materialise in the coming weeks.

The Pentagon and the French government have been pressing for direct action following a meeting in Paris last week, and Italy has said it would consider involvement. Downing Street said on Monday that no decisions had been taken regarding British troops and fended off questions about whether they would be deployed in a combat or training role.

The Ministry of Defence has not confirmed reports it is willing to send as many as 1,000 troops to the country, which has fallen into chaos following the violent overthrow of Muammar Gaddafi and allied air strikes in 2011.

Agreement on a Libyan national unity government was reached in December but so far has been rejected by rival Libyan parliaments, including the one recognised by the international community, in a dispute about ministries.

David Cameron will be reluctant to seek cross-party support in the Commons for further UK military action so soon after investing much political capital in winning support for airstrikes in Syria.

Passenger Aircraft Emergency Landing with Major Blast

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Plane Forced to Land After Apparent Blast Causes Hole in Aircraft

 

A photo taken inside a Daallo Airlines Airbus 321 that made an emergency landing after takeoff from Mogadishu, Somalia on Feb. 2, 2016.

 

ABCNews: A passenger plane bound for Djibouti was forced to make an emergency landing today, minutes after taking off from Mogadishu, due to a hole opening up in the plane after an apparent explosion, according to aviation experts.

On its Facebook page, Daallo Airlines, the national airline of Somalia, said in a statement that an Airbus 321 had “experienced an incident shortly after takeoff” from the airport in Mogadishu, Somalia.

View image on Twitter

“The aircraft landed safely and all our passengers were evacuated safely,” the statement said. “A thorough investigation is being conducted by Somalia Civil Aviation Authority.”

The hole in the plane’s fuselage reached from the ceiling to the floor, according to photos of the damage. The aircraft was carrying 74 passengers and crew, authorities said. A Somali aviation official said that two passengers had been slightly injured in the incident, according to the Associated Press.

The official, however, wouldn’t provide any other details regarding injuries and did not confirm reports that an explosion may have triggered the fire.

 

Passengers aboard the Airbus 321 said they heard a loud bang and then saw smoke. As the cabin depressurized, oxygen masks deployed. Some of the 74 passengers were forced to move to the back of the jetliner as the plane descended, according to the AP.

“I don’t know if it was a bomb or an electric shock — but we heard a bang inside the plane,” said passenger Mohamed Ali, according to the AP.

“The thing that’s most interesting to me is that if you look at the outside of the airplane, some force from within the airplane pushed the sides of the aircraft open. You can see how it’s peeled back and you can actually see the streaking from soot down the back side, which would suggest quite definitively that this was a bomb of some kind, probably something about a hand-grenade size that would have made this hole in the side of the airplane,” said ABC News aviation consultant ret. Col. Steve Ganyard.

In 2015: not necessarily related but in country:

Al-Shabaab Is a Known Terror Group

al-Shabaab, Somalia, Mogadishu

Heavy, in part: Al-Qaeda linked al-Shabaab recruits walk down a street on March 5, 2012 in the Deniile district of Somalian capital, Mogadishu, following their graduation. (Mohamed Abdiwahab/AFP/Getty Images)

Heavy, in part: Al-Shabaab has been identified as a terrorist group, and has claimed responsibility for several attacks since the Somali Council of Islamic Courts took over most of southern Somalia in 2006.

According to the National Counter Terrorism Center:

The group was likely responsible for a wave of five coordinated suicide car bombings in October 2008 that simultaneously hit targets in two cities in northern Somalia, killing at least 26 people.

The group also claimed credit for the 2013 attack on a Kenyan mall that killed 68 over the course of a two-day hostage crisis. Read more here.