Serious Cyber-Attacks in Progress.

 Over the past few weeks there have been a number of high profile computer system outages.

In the USA the NOTAMS system was down that halted commercial flights for a while.

In the UK, the Royal Mail halted international post for over a week because they were hacked with a ransomware attack. 

There have been instances of other computer outages reported across the Western World. And a lot more that didn't make it to the news.

This is serious. The West is being attacked by foreign actors. Maybe not directly, but online through cyber attacks. I expect that attacks against the USA, Germany and the UK will ramp up now we've all announced we're sending battalions of tanks to Ukraine. The number 14 isn't a coincidence. 14 is a standard NATO tank battalion. The USA is sending around 30 tanks, which probably means 28 tanks and maybe a couple to cannibalise for spares. Because Ukraine doesn't have the same logistical support Western armies have.

I do wonder actually how many of those 14 Challenger 2 and 14 Leopard 2 tanks will actually roll out onto the plains of Ukraine and how many will still be rolling 3 months after deployment. Because they break down. A lot. And they take quite a bit of ongoing maintenance.

Anyway, that's not the subject of this piece.

Cyber attacks are at a high at the moment. The only reason you haven't been attacked is the hackers don't think you are relevant. Although even small companies are getting clickware emails. We know the originators come from Russia. Whether state-sponsored actors, or a group of nerds in a cellar in St. Petersburg pissed off at Western support for Ukraine.

I hope all the important infrastructure companies and the NHS (remember their big cyber attack a few years ago?) are on full alert and have decent backups and cyber security in place.

Right now I'd be ramping any weekly backups up to daily or two-daily secure offline/off site backups. Because even losing a week's worth of data can be crippling to a company.

And you will have to wipe all of that week's data as you will have to completely wipe all your PCs and start again. The more regularly you do backups, the more relevant the data and the less work is involved in recreating it once the systems have been restored.

Europe Moving to War Footing on Energy.

 There are many stories coming out of Europe on how they hope to get through the winter without Russian Gas. A lot of it is reading like Europe is slipping into some sort of emergency war footing.

Switzerland is making it an offence to have your thermostat above 19 degrees, Germany have halted the destruction of coal fired power stations, the French are un-mothballing their nuclear reactors. 

The EU seems hell bent on doing some destructive taxation for some reason, rather than helping the situation. They want to cap the profits of renewable and nuclear producers whilst simultaneously doing a windfall tax-grab on  fossil fuelled energy providers. I'm not sure how that helps exactly. But I suppose it is doing something about the situation.

I have sneaking suspicion the near future is a dark place. Big wars have started over less. The fight for resources whether it's energy, oil, gas, diamonds, minerals, has always ended in war.

If Putin keeps the taps turned off, then how desperate could Europe get? Could Europe make a land-grab for the Russian gas fields so they control the energy for themselves? Well, the gas fields of Russia are thousands of miles behind the Russian border. So safe for now. 

Except, there's a left-field option: what about China?

Let's surmise the crash of the West due to energy supply causes the impending crash of China too. If people in the West are paying all their disposable cash to energy suppliers, then there's nothing left for the producers of tat in China.

China could be looking at a black economic hole and the shock of Covid has been bad enough. 

China may think it has the resources and manpower to slice Russia in two and push from Mongolia to the gas fields of Siberia. It's a straight run. albeit around 1500 miles, which is half the distance from Ukraine. 

They have the technological upper hand over Russia, they have vastly more numbers in manpower, they have parity in the numbers of aircraft but importantly have a better technological edge over Russia and have better drone and stealth technology (stolen from the Americans).

These are delicate times at the moment and all bets are off regarding if and where full-scale war may break out. 

If Putin were smart, he'd pull back to pre-war lines or at least offer to do so as some sort of peace deal. Because at the end of this winter Russia and the rest of the world may not exist as it does today.

Russian Sanctions: Targeting Innocent People.

 Okay, I understand sanctions against a government, restricting their ability to (for instance) procure weapons, or finance, or basically to dramatically affect their ability to do the things that governments do.

But... what's going on with sanctioning ordinary Russian citizens? 

What have they done that is illegal? For instance, Nikita Mazepin, the Formula 1 driver. He's lost his seat in the car at the Hass F1 team. He's now had his assets seized. But what has he done that is illegal? What is the lawful excuse for seizing his assets? Just because he is Russian? Isn't that unfair? Isn't that unlawful?

I could understand IF he was a Russian minister with direct influence over Putin, or benefitting directly from the action of government in some way.

But I draw the line at unpersoning someone just because they are Russian. Some wealthy Russians have not made their fortunes in Russia, have not benefitted from the Russian government and have no influence over government decisions. So why are the West targeting them unfairly?

Remember, the West supposedly hates Putin because he is a dictator. He's been in government for over 20 years. He's benefitted financially vastly during his tenure. His government is corrupt. So I can understand sanctioning the government.

But I can't for the life of me understand why ordinary Russian citizens are being persecuted in this way. It is vindictive and unfair.

Why not sanction the German government that paid billions to Russia for Russian Gas? They have had a far bigger contribution to the Russian government's coffers than ordinary Russians have. 

How hypocritical is it of Europe to exempt energy supplies from sanctions, supplying billions of dollars in funds to Russia for their gas, while at the same time impounding Russian-owned superyachts, businesses and bank accounts?

You really do have to ask if the ends really are the justification for the West's actions. Because otherwise we would resolutely cut off ALL funding to Russia. NOW.

The "Unpersoning" of Russia: Coming to Rebellious Citizens of The West Soon?

I write the following article with no inference of support for what the Russian government is doing in the Ukraine. I have to spell this out lest someone uses this as a tool to mark me as some Russian sympathiser and uses it to deplatform me or denigrate my opinions.

The number of measures taken by the West against Russia is unprecedented... or is it?

The sanctions against Russia have moved far from the usual removal of trade and access to finance for the country or government, but is now extended to individuals loosely connected to the government.

Private Citizen's Bank accounts have been frozen, superyachts and private airplanes seized, insurance cancelled, Russian Sports people have been thrown out of competitions, Russian backed or owned teams, with no connection to the Russian government and not financed by them have been thrown out of competitions. For instance the G-Drive team have been thrown out of the World Endurance Championship. 

It's ridiculous, especially when the individuals involved have no connection to the Russian Government. It's unprecedented, because previously sanctions have only ever been used against government ministers, not independent private individuals.

But don't think this strategy is new or limited to a few millionaires. Western governments are using this newly introduced tool of financial blackmail against people in their own countries that protest against government policies.

Literally a couple of Weeks ago, we saw members of the Ottawa Truck Convoy Protest have their Bank accounts Frozen, be Threatened with having their insurance cancelled and having their children taken away from them. 

A Cafe owner that dared to go against the Local Government in Ottawa and served Truckers has had his business closed down. He's been given notice to quit.

These authoritarian measures have only recently started to be used as a tool to induce compliance. They are unprecedented against national governments and ministers, let alone individual citizens.

So, where are they coming from? The World Economic Forum. 

The people behind the great reset are the people now behind the overreach of the Western Governments. Canada is the first to push the boundary against it's own citizens, because the majority of the Canadian cabinet have links to or are members of the WEF. Klaus Swab, the founder of the WEF has stated publicly in interviews that the majority of the Canadian cabinet are members of the WEF.

And I thought Common Purpose was a threat to Western freedom. 

The WEF seems to have a more direct affect on democracy and the rights of individuals in the West.

Freezing bank accounts of people you disagree with is fundamentally wrong. In the West we have the right to protest, the right to air grievances in public. This is not a right that any Western government has the authority to deny.

But here we are. Private Russian individuals with no connection to the Russian government are having their bank accounts frozen and their assets seized by Western governments, under no lawful or legal authority. And no-one is challenging this egregious act of illegality and immorality.

It will come to you next, mark my words. Compliance will be required  or you will have your money and assets removed from you. It's happened to protesters in Canada. Other Western governments will use the same template for "inconvenient" individuals.

Protest at your peril.

Eco-Loons deem Ukraine War Climate Catastrophe ignoring the Human Cost. #ClimatePsycopaths

Last week Senator John Kerry (remember him? I though he'd died) was interviewed on American TV saying that the Ukraine war is a climate catastrophe. Talk about getting your priorities wrong!

Lets not dwell on the thousands of human lives that have already been lost on both sides, nor the overt aggression of a country that has already threatened to use Nukes if the West gets involved.

Nukes: thaw there's a fucking ecological disaster to get worried about! Mind you I bet the Eco-Loons would cheer as the nuclear winter reverses global warming whilst the radiation sickness kills them. 

Fucking eco-loons see everything through a single prism. Such a narrow bandwith of ideological small-mindedness. There's a whole spectrum of issues they should be dealing with, but no. The environmental cost is what is the priority. 

Right now homes are being devastated, people are being displaced and being made homeless. The refugees are fleeing Ukraine. Note how the refugees are mainly women and children? You know, like real refugees? Not 20-something men. Ukrainian men have stayed behind to fight.

But nope, climate loons are still worrying about diesel fumes and nitrous oxide emissions.

You know these people are Psychopathic. They have no empathy with the human victims involved in the conflict, they have no animus against the aggressor. In fact, they would gladly sacrifice millions of human lives if it meant the climate is saved. Such is their psychopathy. 

They are the sort of people that cheer as granny freezes to death because she can't afford to heat her house. The sort of people that buy an electric car and are happy to price everyone else out of car ownership.

Psychopath is too fancy a name for them. Cunts.

Retirement and Systemic Fragility

 Well, I've come to that point in my life where I'm starting to sort out pensions and stuff. Yeah, I'm THAT old.

One of the many deferred pensions I have is from ICL (Now Fujitsu) when I worked for them back in the 80s/90s.

Maybe there's an amount of Rose tinting going on, but looking back they were pretty good times. I gave ICL 8 years of my life and despite not being rewarded in monetary terms (I was one of the Mid-80s intake that replaced high paid engineers with young, willing but lower paid staff) the crack at work was always good amongst the ordinary workers. Management was another thing entirely, the company mired in office politics. That's partly what killed them as a manufacturer. I saw the writing on the wall and left a couple of years before the manufacturing facility in the UK was sold off and closed down.

And that's what brings me on to systemic fragility. Because ICL eventually became Fujitsu and now only focuses on software and services. It doesn't make anything any more. Even the arm of ICL in India, ICIM (International Computers India Manufacturing) eventually became Zensar Technologies and only deals in software and services.

The hardware is now all made in Taiwan or China. Or the components that make the systems are made there. 

Which is a problem. A bloody big problem, strategically. 

Because if ever China decided it would like to have a pop at invading and occupying Taiwan, the supply of chips for computer systems would dry up overnight. We've all seen the issues with car manufacturing with shortages of certain chips halting production and that was just because the chip makers had to ramp up production after the lull from Covid. 

Just think what the impact would be if we couldn't get ANY chips from Taiwan. Where else would we get them from? China? Er, I don't think so if they're the one invading Taiwan.

Just think what the effect would be globally if the West went to war with China. What would happen if the global supply of things China makes (virtually bloody everything) stops. 

In fact would we be able to manufacture the weapons needed to attack China? Because even though the technologically advanced chips for the weapons systems might be made in the West for security reasons, the ancillary chips, the ones that don't require high-level security are supplied from Taiwan.

Transistors, capacitors, resistors, all the high-quality (not the cheap Chinese crap) are mostly made in Taiwan. 

I hope weapon manufacturers are looking at their supply chain, or have already looked at it and started to use robust and secure methods of supply from inside their own country.

It doesn't have to be Taiwan. Russia has signed a pact with China, so if it kicks off over Ukraine, we could see China invading Taiwan at the same time to produce a two-front conflict thereby making it more difficult for the West to commit serious numbers into the fight. China could instead just stop exports to Western countries in solidarity with their Russian friends. 

We really as a country need to look more seriously at security of supply. Not just for goods that require security of supply, but also energy. We need to have an independent energy supply because the Russians could turn the gas tap off any time they like and we would be absolutely fucked.

National Security.

 National Security is a phrase that seems to have been demeaned in the current global age. Open trade, free movement of people, reliance on global supply lines, offshoring of manufacturing.... all foster a sense that the Nation State is no longer important.

But Brexit was a push back from the people to say that no, the Nation State concept isn't dead and we'd rather like to be independent rather than be subsumed in some unaccountable political machine.

Now the Nation State and especially National Security is coming to the fore.

I could go for the obvious issue of illegal immigrants crossing the channel, but I won't.

Instead I'll go for security of supply. The pandemic showed how reliant we were on China for the simplest of things. Paper Masks, for godssake, couldn't be made here?

Now it seems that Western Europe is reliant on Russia (yep, those people we still point nukes at), of all people to supply gas. And guess what? Yep, the Russians are playing silly buggers with supply and have reduced the amount they are supplying to Europe. Who would have thought that would happen? Er, everyone with common sense! 

I mean, it's not like they have form... they've restricted supplies of gas to other countries when they wanted to make a point, or effect regime change, or just to show who's the boss. Worryingly it's usually a precursor to some military action by the Russkies. Will Ukraine get the full invasion treatment now that Russia has established a decent land bridge between Russia and Crimea? 

We really need to be working on security of energy supply. Right now we take a small amount of natural gas from the North and Irish seas, but that's not enough now that we have swapped coal-fired power stations for gas-powered ones. In fact we haven't just replaced the coal-fired capacity with gas, but we've also added more to provide a backup for renewable sources. We are hugely reliant on  imported gas now.

So Russia supplies gas to us and we also top up using LNG tankers.

We've also reduced the storage of gas in the UK. The gasometers that used to be a feature of every town to help during fluctuations of supply have been removed over the decades so that we now only store gas in it's liquified form at the point of delivery. Distributed storage like that worked wonders during wartime because we didn't have all our storage in a single vulnerable storage facility. 

Because the supply of gas from Russia has so far been reliable, we've become complacent and reduced storage capacity alongside centralised storage. Big mistake.

We now need a huge push to guarantee security of energy supply. It's in the national interest to do so and do it quickly. Obviously energy supply is now in the hands of private companies so they need incentives to build the storage infrastructure. Not through loading tariffs on top of bills (they are going to rise sharply in the short term anyway), but instead reduction of tax for companies that build storage facilities. 

We also need to start looking at nuclear. Not the old Magnox reactors, or the now old-fashioned PWR reactors. But instead on cleaner future nuclear reactors. China is already well advanced in looking into Thorium reactors. We should be looking into them as well. 

Just what is the Atomic Energy Authority for otherwise? Billions are being spent on Fusion research, but we need cheap and relatively safe and clean fission reactors now, not pie-in-the sky fusion reactors in decades from now, by the UKAEA's own (in my opinion wildly optimistic) estimate, they will have a fusion reactor working by 2040. 

We'll be frozen to death by then. 

What this boils down to is a lack of strategic leadership. A failure to plan ahead,. see the long game and ensure the security of the UK in all aspects.

The plentiful supply of energy has made successive governments complacent and lazy and we really need top start asking serious questions about national security of energy provision.  Fuck the greenies, we need stable, secure energy supply and we need it now. Granny will be frozen to death waiting.

M.I.6 Former Head Sir Richard Dearlove Speaks Sense.

This is one of the best and most measured interviews of someone linked to government I've seen in a long time.

Some interesting points. He aligns with my views on Brexit and everything else in this interview, which is no surprise. Free from the shackles of government and I presume happily retired and independent financially he is free to speak sense rather than any government line.

He was pretty critical of the government line when it came to the dodgy dossier regarding Iraq and has always talked sense in my book.

There's nothing more to say really.