₦airaland Forum

He should be released as soon as possible.

Those contradicting his confession needs to understand that as a field operative you are literally on your own during operations.

It's for this reason you must be discreet as possible that no one should have a slight hint about you as a federal agent.

Secondly him blowing his own cover by confession is a way of buying himself leverage, in the sense that any attempt on his life won't go unpunished because his agency is bigger and more sophisticated than the movement.

That alone have put off any form of harm the mob would want to inflict on him.

Thirdly the agitators must be guided because here's a fact

This igboho guy can be taken down and the Yoruba leaders can be used as leverage in calming down the people from agitating.

Reason for this is because west is the least armed region of the country.

West also have military leaders in top echelon of power in various outfit.

Igboho must be guided and remove his foot from the gas pedal because at this rate it's will be the special section unit that will be used on his case.

Bettykeys:
Unfortunately, Christians in Nigeria are not aware that the number of Christians in Israel are not up to 3%

Majority of religion in Isreal is Jews with approximately 75% in population

It doesn't matter because I won't support a religion that killing to them is like drinking pure water.

When you work in the security and intelligence field then you would truly understand the mindset behind those utilizing a religion to destroy fabrics of society.

Ellalam54:
I'm now on

You are surely one hungry hacker.

Never knew hackers did marketing promotion for their services which is majorly termed as crime.

One fact everyone missed was the death of solymanie..

His death was a significant blow to any proxy war that www gonna be waged against Israel.

Assuming he was still alive, this fight would have started morphing into something too hot to handle for isreal.

With Syria still licking it wounds from it's civil war also.. the chances favors israel.

But we do hope this crisis ends soon because the damage on the civilians would exceed the aim and purpose.

chatinent:
The Nigerian DSS is less equipped.


An agency like that in advanced countries have a satellite in space monitoring their country, with drones in mid sky, in stealth mode always, which can stay up for months.


We have nothing!

What year did you serve?

And where did you camp?

What was your code for endurance trek?

If you can answer, your statement is valid.

If otherwise then its hear say.

Nigeria's problems are more complex than we think and everyone is working over time to stabilize it.

When it comes to crimes against the state, higher level of investigation is required which ropes in the DSS.

The DSS operatives are as trained as any other domestic intelligence services in the world. Meaning they posses the same technical ability to conduct investigation and bring the culprits of serious crimes to a halt.

There is a department x within the agency whose focus is on serious crimes like bank robbery, kidnaping and risk to the lives of VIPs.

Within department x are designated signals intelligence specialist with capacity and capabilities to comb through every signals communicated between telecommunication mast and mobile devices, stretching from meters to kilometers.

In addition as an intelligence agency a complex network of informants or assets are utilized in strategic location, covering a wide area from commercial activities location to religious center's to transportation hubs.

Now unknown gunmen enters an area, executes an operation and leaves.

The frequency of their operations is so close that it makes the investigation work of the DSS easier. Easier you say? Yes because there are known narratives that have been tested over time and this unknown gunmen activities shows a good percentage of such narrative.

The question now is how are these unknown gunmen operating with efficiency under the watchful eyes of the DSS?

In trainings and field experiences the cases of unknown gunmen points mostly to highly trained security personnel rouge or foreign interference by proxy.

My hypothesis
The decommissioned SARS operatives were trained by the British metropolitan police( sophisticated police in the world)

Now imagine highly professional officers with skills and capabilities who weren't amongst the rouge ones, but had to suffer the same faith of decommissioning.

Then we add dismissed military personnel with assault mindset

When you add both groups you have a recipe for disaster.

Because all that is needed is for an ex experienced case officer from military or ex intelligence agency to harness the skills of the decommissioned officers in serving interest groups with financial power.

Russia had this problem were you had almost all men of youth trained for war but had little field encounter..

They knew it was a recipe for disaster because oligarchs were utilizing them for their crime operations.

As they say in the dirty murky world of intelligence, there is more to what meets the eye.

Mr critic make una go direct your own..

I enjoyed the fight scenes, regardless of the storyline.

MK doesn't have a storyline so why is everyone slamming their heads about storyline.

I was there purely for the fight scenes and brutality, and I wasn't disappointed.

Shikena

UGM are decommissioned SARS operatives.

Primary target is Rivers State...

Attacks on the east is to build a narrative so that the launch towards Rivers will be justified.

Other narratives is why don't we just clamp down on them all, so that the quest of agitation is totally suppressed.

UGM is meant to heighten the tension, while FG is meant to be the sweeper...
They don't want another insurgency taking shape in form of agitation.

Haven't you asked why DSS haven't taken action since the crime is a interstate crime.

frankdre:
Another one: BOMBSHELL

NUHU RIBADU, FORMER EFCC BOSS,

WROTE-;

Bandits”” were created by Gen Mohammadu Buhari Rtd to oust Jonathan
Bandits are not Boko Haram nor Herdsmen

It all started in April 2014 when Mohammadu Buhari assembled his ardent supporters, promoters and strategists to determine how to remove President Jonathan Goodluck. Prominent amongst them were El-Rufai, Gen Danbazo (Rtd)……..

A decision was reached to consult Miyatti Allah cattle breeders association for assistance to boot Jonathan Goodluck out of office. Consequently, the National Chairman of Miyatti Allah was engaged to bring in foreign mercenaries. Within a month, 2,000 Fulani fighters were brought in from Mali, Senegal, Niger Republic, Chad, Libya to name but a few. Further 4,000 fighters were stationed in Niger and Chad on standby.

On arrival, they were assembled in Kaduna under the sponsorship of El Rufai and were addressed by various Northern Leaders including the Sultan of Sokoto, Gen. Muhammadu Sa’ad Abubakar (Rtd) etc.

Specifically, Gen Buhari in his address told the fighters that “the British handed Nigeria over to us the Fulanis at independence. The land (Nigeria) belongs to us. We must reclaim what belongs to us.”He added that at the event that Jonathan Goodluck worn the election, the Fulani machinery must fight until they regain control of the country. He assured them that the Nigerian Army was behind them.

The mercenaries received initial training from the Commandant of the Nigerian Defence Academy and were sent to 6 camps in Ekiti State, Benue State, Katsina State, Kaduna State, Zamfara State and Borno State.

In the camps, brand new pick-up trucks, generators etc were provided them. Nigerian Airforce helicopters were used to provide them essential supplies like food, water, drinks and even arms and ammunitions.

Evidently, Jonathan Goodluck lost the election in 2015 through a well orchestrated election organised by INEC under a Fulani Chairman, Professor Jega. Gen Buhari (Rtd) was sworn in as the president. This saw the emergence of a Fulani president through a dodgy election hence the planned violent war was averted.

Contrary to expectation, the mercenaries in the various camps were abandoned, no more food and essential supplies. The relationship between Miyatti Allah, El Rufai (now a State Governor) and Dambazo broke down. El Rufai arrogantly declared that they were not needed anymore and they should go back. Consequently, the killings in Kaduna commenced as a warning to El Rufai but it did not bother him. He declared that he had paid the people carrying out the killings and they did not want to stop. The Nigerian police did not bother to call Gov El Rufai to give further clarification on this.

The Mercenary at the various camps decided to go about to find food for themselves by robbing people, going into farm lands and kidnapping. Miyatti Allah made several efforts to contact El Rufai and Dambazzo to appeal to them to provide money to return these fighters to where they came from. All efforts proved abortive. The mercenaries at this point vacated their organised camps and took to crime.

The criminal gangs which emanated from these mercenaries were at this point described as “Bandits” in order to differentiate them from other notorious terrorist groups like Fulani Herdsmen, Boko Haram etc.

Following the untold destruction and killings which the Bandits carried out especially in Katsina and Zamfara, the Northern leaders in conjunction with officials of Nigerian Government requested Miyatti Allah to intervene and remove the Bandits from Nigeria. Miyatti Allah returned demanding 150 Billion Naira to settle the Bandits and evacuate them. The Government turned the offer down and restricted itself to the payment of 100 Billion Naira.

Shamefully Godwin Emefiele raised 100 Billion Naira for the settlement as a condition for his re-appointment as the Central bank Governor.

Miyatti Allah collected the money and purportedly distributed it but nothing changed.

In a bid to control the damage, President Buhari directed that RUGA initiative be setup to create colonies for these fighters in every state in Nigeria.

My questions are:
1. Should Nigerian communities accommodate these criminal elements?
2. Why has El Rufai not been called to clean up the mess he created?
3. Does this explain the President Buhari’s silence?
4.Is this conspiracy of the North gone wrong?
Nigerians think for yourselves?

Written
By
DSP Nuhu Ribadu

Sent as copied.

This piece can't be denied or confirmed

When the CIA via the USA state department stated Nigeria would divide by 2015, the basis for that was based on activities mentioned here.

As a former employee in an organization something of such entered our department.

We knew Mali and Senegal had a quiet a number of seasoned fighters due to their evacuation by the French forces prior to this time line.

And news also got around that France used it's leverage against Niger in having any form of interference because of the Dynamics experienced in Mali.

On one hand such Intel was already making rounds with foreign delegates in Nigeria, so as to prepare evacuation of our own citizens within a stipulated period of time.

One thing that struck me was the low level of Intel sharing with Nigeria and Hardware sales was at a all time low

This brought up some hypothesis that compromise had eaten deep into all levels of the Nigerian government.

When you weigh that and you weigh the Nigerian intelligence services counterinsurgency and counterintelligence records you put up a rating of very cautious.

At the same time certain information was shared on a bypass basis with independent chain of command to reduce the effectiveness of any sought of auxiliary warfare that would be to taking place the same time as the war against Boko Haram.

Here is a take, the focus of terror in sub shara Africa is focused on Nigeria so far...

All world powers agree that it must be contained within this region for easy elimination over time.

The question now is how will the organism survive this high temperature with different culture of virus, bacteria and fungi present...

At this point Russia is the only capable partner due to its quick evolution of countering terrorism outside its region, that can aid Nigeria in this fight.

Their containment of terrorism in central Africa republic proves they have adapted well from the past failures in Angola, Mozambique and few others during the fight against apartheid in southern Africa.

Once again its good information is coming out, it's up to you the consumer to connect the dots and make sense of it.

10k for tips in this buhari era is heartless my friend.

Type of games you placed bet on no show, you remind me of one bet365 guy that always come on here.... `Always showing account balance but never the games or at least giving hints on what to do

`OK` guys I will teach you guys some tennis inplay techniques for 50,000.... sorry I meant 1000

In early 2021 there was an ominous setback for Iran. For the first time, a European (Austrian) court convicted an Iranian diplomat, Assadolah Assadi, of terrorism for his role in organizing the murder of Iranian dissident exiles in France. The weapon to be used was a bomb, which would have caused many deaths, including French bystanders. After his July 2018 arrest in Germany, Assadi claimed he had diplomatic immunity even though he had recruited three Iranian expatriates, who had become Belgian citizens, to carry out the planned Paris killings. The court pointed out that diplomatic immunity does not apply to criminal acts.

After a trial, Assadi was convicted of attempted murder and terrorism and sentenced to 26 years imprisonment. His three Iranian Belgian recruits got 18 years each and lost their Belgian citizenship. The trial was embarrassing for Iran because it brought out so many details of Iranian misbehavior, especially while using their diplomats in Europe.

The Assadi case was one of a number of setbacks Iran has suffered in Europe lately. Iran had promised, several times since the 1980s, to halt such violence against Iranians who had fled to Europe. In most of Europe Iran has run out of second chances. This reckless Iranian diplomatic in Europe is driven by political struggles back in Iran.

In 2018 the radical faction of the Iranian religious dictatorship (in power since the 1980s) managed to regain some of the powers they lost in the 1990s by making a mess of their overseas activities. Back then an Israeli assassination campaign against Iranian agents in South America and the exposure of Iranian illegal activities in South America, Europe, and elsewhere became a diplomatic liability. The Iranian radicals, largely from the IRGC (Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps) were forced out of many high government jobs in order to make peace with European nations and achieve a ceasefire in the clandestine war the IRGC had been waging against Israel (and Jews worldwide) for nearly a decade. The more moderate members of the religious dictatorship also feared that the IRGC radicals would trigger another ruinous war which, given the decade-long war with Iraq in the 1980s the country could not afford. For most Iranians, the 1980s war was a defeat to them, at least by Iranian standards.

The IRGC had been created to protect the religious dictatorship, not put it in more danger. No IRGC men were punished for the 1990s overseas “wet work” (assassinations) since the religious dictatorship still needed its own separate army to protect the 1980s religious revolution that mobilized the country to halt the Iraqi invasion. In 2018 it meant the IRGC Quds Force was again looking for prospective recruits among the pro-Iran foreigners as well as terrorizing Iranian exiles who were the most vocal and effective in their criticism of the Iranian government and its IRGC assassins. The Quds Force was allowed to do whatever was necessary to silence the outspoken Iranian exiles.

This was especially important in light of the many defeats Iran has suffered since the 1990s because of Mossad (the Israeli intel agency) and, to a lesser extent, American intel agencies. Israel and Iran have, since the 1980s, been trying to infiltrate each other with spies, assassins, and saboteurs. Israel has been very successful while Iranian efforts have largely failed. The main reason for this is the large number of Iranian Jews who fled Iran since the 1980s and brought their cultural awareness and language skills with them. There were very few Israelis willing to defect to Iran and help spy against Israel. In addition to their cultural knowledge and language skills the Iranian Jews brought with them links to Iranian Moslems back in Iran who were opposed to their religious dictatorship and willing to work against the Iranian government, often without necessarily knowing they were working for Israel.

The U.S. was another matter because Americans had less personal experience with Iranian terrorism and violence. All those Iranian Jews brought first-hand accounts of what the Iranian religious dictatorship was really like. Many Americans have become fans of radical, anti-American politics and were more tolerant of misbehaving Moslems. There was another problem. While the Israelis had access to Iranian Jewish immigrants, Iran had the loyalty of an even larger pool of Arab Shia in the Middle East, Europe, and Sunni and Shia Arab citizens of Israel. The Israeli Arab pool yields few promising recruits and most who do sign up end up in Israeli prisons, or a morgue somewhere. These are small victories for Iran and they make the most of it in their propaganda.

Using these foreign “assets” had risks. For example, in 2013 an Iranian expatriate in Belgium was arrested for trying, at the behest of Quds, to set up an espionage and sabotage network in Israel. Quds offered the guy a million dollars if he could help plan and carry out terror attacks inside Israel. This spy was arrested and insisted that he was the victim of an Iranian extortion scheme to force him to spy. Whatever the case, Quds had failed again. What was interesting this time was that the arrested man had a brother who worked for Iranian intelligence and helped arrange for Quds Force to meet and recruit his brother in Belgium. Despite many precautions, undertaken on the advice of his Quds Force handlers, the newly recruited spy was detected by Israeli counterintelligence and was observed taking photos of the main airport in Israel, the American embassy in Israel, and at least one intelligence facility. Arrested in September 2013 while trying to leave Israel, the Belgian-Iranian spy eventually, after prolonged interrogation, provided many details of his work for Quds Force.

Iranian efforts like this have been going on for most of the last decade. For example, back in 2007 Israel revealed an Iranian effort to recruit Israelis of Iranian origin to spy on Israel. Up until then, Israel had detected at least ten Iranian attempts to recruit Israelis as spies. This was possible because, although Iran wants Israel destroyed, Iran still allowed Israelis of Iranian origin to return and visit family. There are still about 8,000 Jews in Iran and nearly 150,000 Israelis of Iranian origin. Since 1948 most Jewish Iranians have left Iran, most for Israel. Each year there are still some Israelis returning to Iran to visit family or old friends. The classic method of recruitment used by the Iranians was to threaten kin in Iran with harm (imprisonment, torture, death) if the Iranian Jew who was now an Israeli did not supply information. Some of these Israelis reported the Iranian recruiting attempt to the Israeli government and that led to more and more vigorous Israeli counterintelligence efforts against Iranian attempts to set up espionage and terror operations inside Israel.

Iranian Israelis continue visiting Iran, although it's common knowledge that Iran is not a hospitable place for Jews, Israelis, or Westerners in general. Israelis usually go to the nearest Iranian embassy (usually Turkey) to take care of the paperwork. While applying for an Iranian passport, they are questioned on what they do for a living, and what they did while in the Israeli armed forces. Some Israelis have reported this to their government, and the Iranian espionage situation has been watched carefully for some time.

Because of this Israeli scrutiny, Iran is now going after the many Iranians who have fled to the West during the last few decades. Using threats or offers of money to recruit them as intelligence operatives is not easy. Iran seeks out expatriate Iranians who have been successful legitimate international businessmen as this allows them to travel a lot without alerting Israeli counterintelligence. These Iranians usually know all about the Quds Force activities against them. The Internet has been a very popular way for all expatriate Iranians to stay in touch and share information about opportunities, and new dangers. Quds operatives are always offering both to Iranians outside of Iran.

Israel has been doing the same thing and has apparently been more successful at setting up espionage and sabotage operations in Iran. This has annoyed the Iranians a great deal, as has the Israeli skill at foiling Iranian intel and terror operations against Israel. This is a war that is far from over. The Iranian religious dictatorship and their Quds Force agents are poor losers and keep trying, no matter what the cost to Iran or anyone else.

It's a rat snake not venomous to humans but only rats.

I think Nigerians need more education on how the ecosystem works

if this true then it's a big shame on the armed forces.

Here is a very very true fact airstrikes are very ineffective if intelligence coordination leading to it is bad

Airstrikes with the coordination of intelligence assets on the ground are efficient meaning there would have to be a deep infiltration of the ESN network by DSS assets or Nigerian army assets.

If this campaign results in casualties of civilians then we would expect to see a full-blown insurgency where surface-to-air missiles would be used. That's because the east has the capacity to arm themselves

Diogo2019:
Earn $1000 $BTN for free here

https:///BitNumeral_bot?start=r0005729805

GTFOH you scammer.... you just dy distribute malware for remote access.

Those of you that have BTC wallets and those that wanna venture in shine your eyes cuz some of these corner corner links na malware that enables remote access

I am making this known to the public because the majority of referral links concerning BTC and cryptocurrencies have been tested on customized security software and some turn out to be RATs. The icing on the cake was when a neighbor which I thought was a good friend referred a link thinking I was ignorant because they believe am just a marketer, Not knowing I have been in the security field for over 9 years.

Please guys take precautions ok because the bad apples will always try spoiling the good ones.

nthony10:
China, China, China

The fact remains that they are going the Soviet Union way where the system will collapse. In this case it will be massive. Yes they have huge capital reserves, yes they control most international institutions, but a system that manipulates figures, seeks to control the citizenry with an iron fist, have a nonexistent judicial system, engages in aggressive expansion of their territory, allows millions to die just to prove a point cannot sustain the grip on power. It will always collapse.

Learn from history.

China and Russia have a deadly history of revolutions, its for that reason they seek to run a police communist-style government where dissidents are totally suppressed and focus diverted from the inefficiency of the ruling party.

China's global dominance quest is far from reality because they need the west's very wealthy block along with large markets such as India to trade to totally cooperate for any form of global financial domination to even happen.

China has lost major battles with world powers such as Japan and superpower Russia, that fear is still embedded in their psychic which is the reason why they don't wanna engage the USA in any form of kinetic war.

And the west would rather let blood flow than give you power on a platter of gold...

A good example is the corona pandemic, china was busy selling propaganda via safety gear diplomacy during the peak especially to the west but the west called them out. As we can see the chinovac vaccine turned less effective and only purchased by Chinese allies mostly with and a total of 15 nations.

India in turn is now the largest exporter of vaccines to nearly 130 nations. Proving a point that credibility will always outdo propaganda.

Despite the west's shortcomings, credibility and rule of law always stand out.

The point is propaganda always runs out of steam and this is oxygen to china Communist Party in ruling china.

Holamic:
The problem is nobody is pay attention to what is coming cause china is buying into Africa already and so called leader allowed it.... another colonization is progress cause china is borrowing everyone money we all think is free... let wait and see what is next...

Africans aren't paying attention to the world powers as history has always pointed out. It's the same old script of quest and conquers.

Although Africa is prime enough to be used as a destabilizing agent by world powers against other world power perceived as threats. with the availability of firepower and ICT radicalization can be easily achieved and used as a weapon.

All they have to wait for is a miscalculation, something china would surely encounter here in Africa.

Culture is an essential part of conflict and conflict resolution. Cultures are like underground rivers that run through our lives and relationships, giving us messages that shape our perceptions, attributions, judgments, and ideas of self and others. wars, the ethnic tensions debate over abortion are a result of cultural conflict.

Miscommunication often arises due to the differences in cultures that exist that lead to people misunderstanding other cultural contexts. ... Conflict is triggered when there are cultural differences between individuals within an organization or through general interaction with one another.

A good example is the current herders and indigenes clash, bandits, and kidnapping. I use the word indigenes because the scope of the conflicts have gone beyond farms and is slowly creeping into the towns and cities.

Conflict resolution can be in combative or none combative forms. The none combative approach is the preferred option while the combative approach is the least preferred option.

The none combative approach of conflict largely employs the use of intelligence operation. because the use of intelligence gives both parties leverage when finding a resolution.

The use of intelligence should apply to the current conflict unfolding in Nigeria only this time citizens should be the drivers. This might sound conflicting because there are designated agencies for such operations, but the problem is there is a serious gap in the operational procedures of such agencies. Which have lead to the inability to tackle the situation head-on, narrative from an outside view is that the security apparatus in Nigeria lacks the skills and adaptability to new terrains such as jungle warfare. Similar situations in context is an intelligence report from the niger delta conflict, where inner creeks were inaccessible due to the risk of ambush by militants who knew the terrain more than the navy, and the conflict only reduced due to the amnesty program. As we can observe similar pattern is playing out

The same pattern is unfolding whereby bandits or whatever you wanna term them are using similar strategies of attack and retreat deep into the forest, Making it difficult for security agencies to engage.

What can the citizens do? transform the hunters of the local community into intelligence operatives via funding and training.

Secondly, the vigilantes can be Transformed into transport guards, whereby they identify routes likely to come under attack and then liaise with local hunters to set up a trap wire system for the bushes along those routes. The reason for this proposal is that there are pockets of vigilantes spread across various communities, so networking them into an entity via providing radio communications tools and other equipment will make them very effective.

How do you play into the ecosystem, you get trained on certain tradecraft in turn you pass similar information to your network of people thus creating a vast network of awareness. so when everything is harmonized we end up having an effective layer of the pro-active security-minded community.

Also, come together and fund these guys, vigilante serve out of the desire to keep their community safes. Due to gun restrictions laws bearing advanced firearms cant be achieved which is why intelligence operation training is the best solution at the moment.

Interested parties who want to understand how to use intelligence in planning trips should reach us via clicking on sslcypt and hit send message button we would respond to you.


You can beat the enemy without raising arms but rather with strategic actionable intelligence.

China looks forward to becoming the largest economy in the world during the next few years, and a military superpower a decade after that.
Longer-term the outlook is less promising. Time is not on China’s side. There are numerous examples of this. One of the more obvious is the shrinking Chinese workforce and population in general.

The overall population growth rate peaked in 2016 at 0.59 percent and has been declining ever since. There is a worse problem with the shrinking labor force because of the working-age population declining. All this began in 2014 and will continue for decades. The biggest problem, though, is the growing shortage of workers. As the population ages, all those one-child families means there will be more elderly than the economy, and the shrinking workforce can effectively support. Currently, there are ten working-age Chinese for every retiree. By 2050, there will only be two for each retiree.

At that point, retirees will comprise 30 percent of the population versus 15 percent now. Traditionally, children cared for their parents in multi-generation households. That model is dying out, and China is faced with huge pension cost increases at the same time they expect their economy to be the mightiest on the planet. But at that point, the largest single government expense will be the care of the elderly, and this will impose crushing taxes on those of working age. Many working-age Chinese are worried about this as there is no easy solution in sight. China tried (in 2013) to relax the one-child policy but the newly affluent Chinese are less eager than earlier generations to have a lot of kids.

To make matters worse there is not much in the way of pensions or health care for most of the elderly, to begin with. The government recognizes this is a real problem but does not, and will not, have the cash to deal with it. The population shrinkage is accompanied by another problem. Since the 1980s many of those couples forced to have only one child aborted child if it was a female because much more importance is attached to having a male heir. There are nearly 40 million more males than females in China and the disparity is growing.

These surplus males are coming of age, and the competition for wives is causing problems. Women are taking advantage of their scarcity but men are also going to neighboring countries to buy, or even kidnap, young women to be wives. This is causing ill will with neighbors, where females are enticed or coerced, often kidnapped by criminal gangs, to become wives of Chinese men who have no other options. It’s not just brides who are moving to China, foreign workers are being imported. These will not become permanent residents because China, like most East Asian nations, discourages that practice. There are still more Chinese leaving than foreigners entering as permanent residents. It’s these migrants, temporary or permanent, that will become increasingly important in the next few decades for dealing with the rapidly growing labor shortage.

It’s not just population growth that is slowing. A decade ago, it became clear that the years of ten percent a year GDP growth were ending. Not just because economic growth was slowing, but because the central government was finally forced to go public for the first time about the false economic data that provincial officials had been sending to the central government for decades.

Since 2014 Chinese officials became more open about the problem, and have gotten accurate economic information for such things as annual GDP and unemployment rates. Apparently, Chinese GDP has not been growing steadily at near ten percent a year for decades. Chinese officials do eventually (months or years later) get more accurate data and while Chinese GDP has actually been steadily growing over the last three decades, its annual growth actually varied from 5-15 percent. Chinese official policy was to keep everyone calm by issuing less variable annual growth rates. In short, the official numbers were doctored.

For more accurate and immediate indicators of economic activity, Chinese and foreign economists and business leaders use things like electricity production, railroad traffic, and similar data that cannot be manipulated by local officials to make their city or province look more successful. Many financial experts inside and outside China fear that all this official manipulation of economic data (an ancient practice in China, is masking some serious economic problems that could go sideways at any time, cause a banking crisis that would paralyze the economy for a while, and cause political chaos. It’s very much a crouching tiger and hidden dragon situation. This is an ancient phrase warning that behind seeming success and talent lurks the possibility of imminent disaster. Chinese are ever mindful of this sort of thing.

The affluence has not just reduced the birth rate but increased the drug addiction rate. China will not release official figures but it is estimated (using arrests, drug seizures, and such) that there are over 20 million addicts in China and that this is rapidly increasing. This is happening despite vigorous government anti-drug efforts. Arrests for drug offenses have increased more than ten times in the past decade yet the drugs keep coming in (especially from neighbors like Burma, North Korea, Thailand, and Afghanistan).

Since the Chinese Communist Party is under growing popular pressure to do something about the rampant corruption in China, and specifically in the Chinese Communist Party, it has been arresting and prosecuting a growing number of senior officials. New anti-corruption measures were announced in 2015, included more scrutiny of senior officials and large corporations, which are the ones that pay the largest bribes. For years most Chinese believed the anti-corruption effort was having little impact. But in the last five years, there are some believable indicators of progress. This comes in the form of declines in gambling (a favorite activity of corrupt officials) in Macau, where most of the legal gambling takes place. For the first time in over a decade, annual casino revenue declined.

It’s not just drugs and corruption the government is cracking down on. Visible dissent is also a major target. The government has rehabilitated some old Maoists and encouraged a new generation of communist zealots to find and crush criticism of the government. This includes an unauthorized discussion of corruption, criticism of communism, or the Chinese Communist Party. This thought control is becoming more of a nuisance to the Chinese, which is not good news for the government of the world’s largest communist police state.

Victory At Sea

While the situation is bad at home, Chinese prospects outside the country are more promising. For example, China is catching up with the U.S. Navy in terms of quantity and quality of warships. Put another way, the U.S. Navy has suffered a major defeat in its effort to keep the American navy larger and more capable than the Chinese fleet. The problem is that the Chinese are building new warships much faster than the United States can and improving them with new technology, much of it stolen from the Americans. The Chinese warships cost less than their American equivalents and are delivered on time. For decades the U.S. Navy has seen less and less of that sort of performance in the United States. Since 2000 the decline of American warship construction capabilities has become painfully obvious and is now acknowledged as a major problem. Despite that nothing has been done to fix the problems.

Currently, the Chinese fleet has in active service two aircraft carriers, 75 subs including seven SSBNs (nuclear ballistic missile subs), eight SSNs (nuclear attack subs), and 60 SSK (non-nuclear attack subs). There are 300 surface warships including 50 destroyers, 49 frigates, 71 corvettes, 109 missile boats, 94 small ASW (anti-submarine warfare) ships, and 17 gunboats. There are 75 amphibious ships including (in order of size) two LHDs, eight LPDs, 32 LSTs, and 33 LSMs. There are 287 support ships including 36 mine clearing vessels, 19 oilers (for refueling ships far from a base), 30 coastal oilers, 27 fleet supply ships (for resupply at sea), six troop means of transport and a lot of harbor, training and medical support ships as well as intelligence collection ships, hospital ships, and submarine rescue ships. The Chinese navy has also made arrangements with the operators of over fifty civilian cargo ships and ferries to make their vessels quickly available in the event of a major emergency.

All the above comes to 743 active ships with over sixty percent combat ships and the rest support vessels. That support force is the true mark of a major high-seas fleet. China is not just building a lot of new ships quickly, it is also sending them on unprecedented long voyages. This has been going on for a decade. There are so many Chinese naval firsts now because for most of China’s history there was an attitude that there was really nothing useful beyond Chinese borders. Some ships were built for trade, but not on a large scale and never with a powerful navy to protect them. Then China began liberalizing and modernizing its economy in the 1980s which led to lots of exports and even more imports of raw materials and items that China did not make. That justified a larger, sea-going, navy. China’s economic interests are now, for the first time, worldwide and so is its navy. As any naval historian can tell you, a navy becomes effective only by keeping its ships at sea a lot. That’s how Britain won and maintained global naval dominance from the 18th through the early 20th century. That was how the United States took over that role by the mid-20th century and that is what may happen with China sometime in the 21st century. Currently the Chinese expect their fleet to become dominant by 2040.

Covid19

East Asian nations, including, China kept their covid19 infection rate low. That had little to do with being a communist police state because democracies like Taiwan, Singapore, Japan, and South Korea produced verified results that showed how a disciplined response can keep covid19 infections and deaths and very low levels. China claims it suffered fewer deaths per capita and much less economic disruption than Western nations. The lower economic disruption is obvious. The death rate is less so because the government is not cooperating.

While exact Chinese covid19 infections and deaths data cannot be verified, the low losses in Taiwan and South Korea can be. China, claiming three deaths per million, admits it was not as effective as Taiwan (0.4 deaths per million) but did better than South Korea (29 deaths per million) Japan (52), or Singapore (5). The world average is 303 deaths per million and Western nations average a thousand dead per million. Reports from China indicate that Chinese covid19 deaths were much higher than reported. Even with that most Chinese were confident enough to go back to work, and large public gatherings like mass transit or movie theaters. To maintain this covid19 advantage China still sharply restricts Chinese from traveling outside the country and quickly quarantines any areas where more covid19 appears. These lower infection and death rates are the result of populations accustomed to acting in a unified and precise manner when confronting an emergency. It’s a cultural thing, which is one reason why for the last few thousand years East Asia contained most of the world population.

CHINA SKIRMISH WITH INDIA
Russian news agency TASS claims that mid-June 2020 fighting in southwest China (Tibet border with India) was more damaging to the Chinese than to the Indians. TASS reports 45 Chinese troops dead versus twenty Indian. The fighting took place on the shores of Pangong Lake. A 1996 agreement has troops from both sides entering disputed areas without firearms or explosives. The Chinese have taken to sending in their troops armed with wooden clubs and iron bars. This led to a battle on a ridge overlooking the Galvan River that was initially believed to have left at least twenty dead on both sides. Total casualties (dead, wounded, prisoners) were reported as at least fifty on each side. Currently, both Indian and Chinese troops are moving back from the border Ladakh (India) area where they have been confronting, and occasionally fighting each other since May 2020.

CHINA AND JAPAN FLASHPOINT
Two Chinese coast guard ships came into Japanese territorial waters (within 22 kilometers of one of the Senkaku Islands) and remained while attempting to force two Japanese fishing boats out of what China claims are Chinese waters. A Japanese coast guard vessel quickly arrived and the Chinese warships left. This is the fourth such Chinese intrusion off the Senkakus in 2021 and the first since China enacted a law authorizing their navy and coast guard to “protect” Chinese coastal waters off the Senkakus. Anticipating this, in early 2020 Japan established a military base on Miyako Island (between Senkaku Island and Okinawa).

The Miyako and Senkaku islands are between Okinawa and Taiwan. All three of these island systems dominate the seas between Japan and Taiwan and China has been making claims to some of these islands, especially the Senkakus, and indicating that all of these Japanese islands are actually Chinese. The new garrison on Miyako Island has 380 troops and is equipped with anti-aircraft and anti-ship missiles. Chinese naval ships have frequently entered Japanese territorial waters (within 22 kilometers of land) around the Senkaku islands and remained in Japanese waters for an hour or more. There have been over thirty of these incidents since 2017. Miyako Island is 210 kilometers from the Senkakus and Japan plans to put garrisons on more of these small islands.

February 8, 2021: The China Ministry of Public Security released reported that there ten million births in 2020. This is 15 percent less than 2019 and continuing a downward trend.

Major breakthrough in africa
China has continued to expand its dominant control of African raw materials. Currently, Chinese firms control about 70 percent of Congo’s mineral deposits and mining industry. Chinese state-owned firms own most of this, which includes substantial portions of the global supplies of copper and cobalt. Since 2012 Chinese companies have invested at least $12 billion in Congolese mineral assets.

Some of those billions go to enrich Congolese officials who make possible Chinese ownership and protect it from local or foreign interference. The eagerness to gain control of so much cobalt is driven by Chinese plans to become the major producer of electric vehicles. Congo is the world’s biggest cobalt producer, each year producing between 55 percent or 65 percent of the world’s total cobalt. Chinese companies control around 40 percent of Congo’s cobalt deposits and means of extraction.

Cobalt is critical as a stabilizer in rechargeable lithium-ion batteries. It takes about ten kg (22 pounds) of cobalt to manufacture an electric car battery. China is committed to producing electric vehicles (EVs) of all types. There is one type that has a particular political importance: the very small “city-town” mini-EVs that can go about 300 kilometers on one charge. The Chinese people want these, so the demand is huge.

The deal the CCP makes with the Chinese people is they can have goodies if they don’t challenge the CCP dictatorship. The mini-EVs are a pay-off. Hence, the Chinese government wants to assure uninterrupted access to cobalt and other minerals used in producing electric devices. The world is paying attention to this because the price of cobalt has risen by 20 percent to about $35,600 a ton.

it will be fair to say the same complexity is occurring in the war on terror within and outside Nigeria.

Currently, the Nigerian state is weakened while at the same time it's growing into a fertile ground for the growth of Ikhwan.

The string-pullers of the terror group appear to have lost control compounding to challenges of the military establishment which is in dire need of an optimum level of professionalism to take back full control of the nations defense.

The poaching of the southern region is reinforcing the already existing narrative within different Islamic terrorist sects. This narrative is always born from the centuries born mindset of defending Islam via conquer and conquest.

In Kabul, there was another roadside bomb attack on the police. This one wounded two policemen and is one of a growing number of such attacks. The Taliban denies responsibility but Afghan police don’t believe that because the Taliban have often used “unclaimed” terror attacks in the past, and there is growing evidence that this is happening again as the Taliban continued trying to scam the Americans into leaving Afghanistan.

The Afghan president is trying to get the new American government to halt the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Afghanistan. This is essential so American logistical support can continue and enable other NATO members, like Canada, Norway, and Germany to keep their military training and advisory teams in Afghanistan. It appears that the Americans won’t be leaving because the Taliban have been regularly violating terms, they agreed to in February 2020, that were to enable the Americans to withdraw all their troops by May 2021. The Taliban deny these accusations and blame the Americans for violating the ceasefire.

Any agreements with Islamic radical or terrorist groups are unlikely to be kept. One might call this phenomenon the Ikhwan Factor, in recognition of its prominent role in the establishment and maintenance of the Saudi Arabian government and most other rulers of Moslem majority states.The Ikhwan were early 20th-century Islamic terrorists who worked with the Saud family to create the kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Current Islamic terror groups are similar to the Ikhwan. Current Islamic terror groups are similar to the Ikhwan. These groups justify their violence on the need to defend Islam against infidels (non-Moslems) or heretics (Moslems who don’t agree with the radicals).

The Islamic radicals cite Koran verses that support all the lies and broken agreements. Governments in Moslem-majority- nations understand this and realize that for their governments to survive, any Islamic extremist groups must be destroyed or expelled. The Saud family understood this when they struggled to establish their kingdom in the 1920s. One radical militia (the Ikhwan) refused to demobilize and kept invading neighboring countries in an effort to impose Sharia (Islamic law) on the population. The Saudis killed the Ikhwan leadership in the late 1920s and forcibly disbanded the militia. That brought peace with its neighbors and once more reminded all rulers of Moslem majority nations that the radicals cannot be trusted or tolerated. Since then, Saudi Arabia has used lethal force against any Islamic radicals that contest Saudi rule.

Most Afghans agree that the Taliban are no different from the Ikhwan, ISIL, or any number of Islamic fanatics doing whatever they want because they are on a Mission From God, and will not take orders from any lesser powers. Many Afghans learned this via painful personal experience and don’t trust the Taliban. Another reason for Afghans hating the Taliban is because the group has been under Pakistani control since its creation over two decades ago.

Another issue that does not get much attention in the foreign media is that the power of the drug gangs will increase with the Americans gone, so more heroin and opium will be exported to world markets. The Afghans understand that with the Americans gone the Taliban, Pakistan, and drug gangs can turn their attention to taking control of the Afghan government.

In the midst of all this are the warlords of northern Afghanistan getting ready for another civil war. The majority of Afghans not only oppose the Taliban, drugs gangs, and Pakistan but have made it clear that they, especially the Tajiks, Uzbeks, and Hazara in the north, are ready to resume the war with the Taliban that was going on in 2001 and only ended when the Americans came in to provide air support for this “Northern Alliance”.

In 2001 the Americans told Pakistan to decide if they would side with the Taliban and against the U.S. or turn on their Islamic terrorist creation. The Pakistanis lied and said they would stop supporting the Taliban. Pakistan had adopted the use of Islamic terrorist groups in the 1980s as a deniable weapon for attacks on India and any uncooperative government in Afghanistan. The Americans trusted the Pakistanis for over a decade but finally cut financial and military support for Pakistan and are still seeking ways to deal with continued Pakistani support for Islamic terrorists.

A basic problem with any Afghan peace negotiation is that a major faction, Pakistan, cannot officially be acknowledged. Pakistan continues to officially insist that it is not backing the Taliban and drug gangs.

Technically that is correct because it’s not the government of Pakistan, but the Pakistani military and its ISI intelligence service that support and maintain Pakistani interference in Afghan affairs.

It is important to note that, when Britain dissolved its Indian (including what is now Pakistan, Bangladesh, Burma, and Sri Lanka) colonial government, the new nations that emerged were quite different. One major difference was how these new nations handled their armed forces. India ensured that the military remained subservient to the elected government.

That did not happen in Pakistan or Burma (This explains the current coup that occurred in Myanmar, which is also called Burma) so their militaries frequently took control of their governments. While Pakistan is technically run by an elected government, that government cannot do anything the military disagrees with. The Pakistani military has a foreign policy towards Afghanistan that supersedes anything the politicians come up with or agree to.

The Pakistani military has always seen Afghanistan as an unstable region that posed a potential threat to Pakistan. Historically this was true. Massive invasions and tribal raids have been coming out of Afghanistan and into India (and Iran) for thousands of years. While India was always a potential (and unlikely) invader of Afghanistan, the threat from Afghanistan was real and constant. Most Pakistanis recognized this threat and there was never a lot of popular opposition towards the Pakistani military’s actions towards Afghanistan. That continues to the present. For the Afghan Taliban, it means they are very dependent on the goodwill of the Pakistani military to survive.

[b]The drug gangs and Taliban survive because of support from the Pakistani military. That support included allowing essential chemicals (for converting opium into heroin) into Afghanistan and allowing most of the heroin to be exported via Pakistani ports (naval and air) to world markets. [/b]The Taliban provides the muscle while Taliban leaders maintained their 1990s relationships with the drug gang leaders and the Pushtun tribes. The Pakistani military and ISI profit from the support they provide the drug gangs, as does the Taliban.

The possibility of American forces withdrawing has Afghans seeking replacement allies. Iran is a popular choice with many Afghans openly developing relationships with Iran, and the Afghan government is doing the same. While Iran has a hostile relationship with the United States, such is not the case with Afghanistan.

This is nothing new and the two nations have been developing better economic relations for over a decade. Afghanistan backed this to get free from economic dependence on Pakistan, whose two border crossings have long handled most Afghan exports and imports. Since 2001 and the arrival of the Americans, Pakistan often used access to these two crossings as an economic weapon against any hostile moves by the Afghan or American governments.

Back in 2015, Afghanistan began discussions with India and Iran over a solution. That led to the 2020 completion of a railway giving Afghanistan access to world markets. This was the direct result of a 2017 agreement that had Iran and India finance and build a 1,300-kilometer-long rail line from Iran's Chabahar port near the Pakistan border to the Afghan border in the north, and then inland to Herat in Afghanistan. The last link is actually an earlier (2007) project to build a rail line from the Iranian city of Khaf to the Afghan city of Herat. Most (77 kilometers) of the railroad is in Iran with the other 62 kilometers in Afghanistan. This is all part of a larger Afghan project to build their first national railroad system. The Iran link will eventually be 220 kilometers long with over 90 percent of that in Afghanistan. In 2016 the first direct rail link to northern neighbor Turkmenistan was completed and that connection will eventually become part of an Afghan national rail network.

India provided over two billion dollars to upgrade the port of Chabahar and build new roads and railroads to Afghanistan and Central Asia. For Iran, the Central Asia link is the most valuable one. But for Afghanistan having another way to move most of their imports and exports is a major achievement because Pakistan and Iran will have to complete and that will keep costs down for Afghans and reduce the use of closing the border, which Pakistan has done frequently, to coerce the Afghans.

Iran maintains good relations with Pakistan because they both see the Americans and Israel as archenemies. At the same time, Pakistan is on good terms with the Gulf Arab oil states while Iran is at war with them. Pakistan is in a delicate situation here and has to tolerate Iran becoming close to Afghanistan economically and in many other ways.

Iran does not want Afghanistan to become a narcostate controlled by Pakistan. While the Pakistani military controls, supports, and profits from the Afghan Taliban and drug gangs, Iran despises the drugs and the Taliban. While Pakistan responds helpfully to Iranian complaints of Sunni Islamic terrorists killing Pakistani Shia, there is no such cooperation when the Taliban kill Shia, especially before 2001. Since then, the situation has changed. Fifteen percent of Afghans are Shia and most reside in central Afghanistan.

Shia also dominates several neighborhoods in Kabul and these are where most of the IISL attacks on Shia occur. Since 2015 the Afghan Taliban have been denouncing attacks like this. Since ISIL showed up in 2015 the Taliban saw an opportunity to repair their relationship with Iran. Since then, anti-Shia violence has been monopolized by ISIL, even though in the past the Taliban killed a lot of Shia. Now, however, the Afghan Taliban is receiving support from Iran, a Shia majority nation that is hostile to groups that kill Shia unless those groups make themselves useful to Iran. [/b]This puts the Taliban in a difficult situation because Pakistan tolerates the heroin trade and Iran never would.

[b]The difference is that the military is running things in Pakistan while Iran has a religious dictatorship that keeps its own military in check. Heroin and opium from Afghanistan is unpopular in all three countries because of the millions of addicts that have been created. The Pakistan military and Taliban don’t care but everyone else does.

With all that in mind, it should be no surprise that Iran and Afghanistan are close to completing negotiations for a comprehensive strategic cooperation agreement that will officially give Afghanistan a new economic and military ally against the Taliban and the Pakistani military. The last item being negotiated is the security aspects. Apparently, this item is not a roadblock but is subject to a fair amount of haggling.

One item to work out is the need for Afghanistan to continue working with the United States against international terrorist groups, like al Qaeda and ISIL, that still maintain a presence in Afghanistan. Iran has long provided some support to al Qaeda as long as that connection improved the chances of carrying out successful attacks on Americans or Saudi Arabia and other Arab oil states. One generally ignored aspect of Iranian politics is that the religious dictatorship in Iran is well aware that they have a potential Ikhwan problem of their own because their IRGC (Islamic Republican Guard Corps) is in danger of going full Ikhwan and becoming a lethal threat to the senior Shia clerics who run Iran. This is one thing the Islamic rulers of Iran and Saudi Arabia have in common. The Ikhwan factor is taken for granted by most Iranians in or outside Iran but most Western media cannot or will not comprehend the “Ikhwan problem.”

Good day guys, please am in need of a car owner to partner with.

I Reside in the Badore axis of Ajah on the island.

Worked for the Ministry of defense and as a contractor in varying capacities.

mail is mikesandy983 at gmail dot com

In late 2020 the Nigerian Air Force revealed that it would be receiving 19 new aircraft in 2021. These include twelve Brazilian A-29 Super Tucano turboprop counterterrorism aircraft, three Pakistan JF17 jet fighters, one M-171 helicopter, and three maritime surveillance aircraft for NIMASA (Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency).

The Nigerian Air Force does not have many combat aircraft. Currently, it has eight recently acquired Chinese J-7 jet fighters. These are Chinese built MiG-21s. Although a 1950s design, the J-7 is much updated and adequate to deal with neighboring air forces. There are also about a dozen French/German Alpha Jets. These 7.5-ton twin-jet planes entered service in the 1970s as a trainer/ground attack aircraft. They are armed with a 23mm autocannon and carry about two tons of bombs, rockets, and missiles. Nigeria bought 24 in the 1980s and used them heavily for two decades until most were inoperable. In the last five years, 14 of their Alphas have been refurbished and most of that work is done. The problem is that the elderly Alphas have been hard at work as the only counterterrorism aircraft available. The J-7 and Alphas are the only combat aircraft Nigeria has, aside from about a dozen armed helicopters. The Super Tucanos are eagerly awaited in part because they are a more effective counterterrorism aircraft than the Alpha jets,

The A-29s are the most important new acquisition because these have already proved themselves as effective counterterrorism aircraft. Several other African nations have received or are awaiting Super Tucanos. These include Burkina Faso, Mali, Mauritania, Senegal, and Ghana. Nigeria needs the Super Tucano to cope with Boko Haram Islamic terrorists in its northeast.

The Super Tucano is a single-engine turboprop trainer/attack aircraft that is used by eighteen nations. The armed version carries two internal 12.7mm (.50 caliber) machine-guns and can carry up to 1.5 tons of bombs and rockets. It can stay in the air for up to 6.5 hours. It is rugged, easy to maintain and cheap. You pay $15-20 million for each Super Tucano, depending on how much training, spare parts, and support equipment you get with them.

Super Tucano can be equipped to carry over a half dozen 120 kg (250 pounds) SDB GPS smart bombs (or half a dozen dumb 500-pound bombs), giving it considerable potential firepower if rigged to handle smart bombs. The Super Tucano comes equipped with a GPS navigation system. Max altitude is 11,300 meters (35,000 feet) and cruising speed is 400 kilometers an hour. Naturally, this aircraft can move in lower and slower than any jet can. Super Tucano is also equipped with armor for the pilot, a pressurized cockpit, and an ejection seat. Not bad for an aircraft with a max takeoff weight of 5.4 tons.

These "trainer/light attack aircraft" can also operate from crude airports or even a stretch of highway. Aircraft like this can carry systems to defeat portable surface to air missiles. One of the options is a FLIR (infrared radar that produces a photo-realistic video image in any weather) and a fire control system for the bombing. Several nations are using the Super Tucanos for counter-insurgency work. The aircraft is also used for border patrol by the United States.

The Super Tucano can double as trainers. It's easier to train pilots to use the Super Tucano, cheaper to buy them, and much cheaper to operate them. It costs less than a tenth as much per flying hour to operate a Super Tucano compared to an F-16. This is why the U.S. Air Force uses Super Tucano (as the A-29) as a trainer for training pilots of allies that have or are receiving the Super Tucano.

Most African nations have Cold War-era warplanes, usually jets that have been inoperable for years. Many of these were acquired in the 1960s and 70s and were not adequately maintained. African military leaders have long wanted some basic, easy, and cheap to operate aircraft for training and reconnaissance. That is what the Super Tucano does, plus carry out ground attack if so equipped.

Then there is the JF17, which is an odd bird, literally. It is basically a low-cost equivalent of the American F-16. Nigeria is one of only two (so far) export customers for the JF17. Nigeria was apparently offered attractive terms for the three ordered in 2016 and arriving in 2021. If these prove useful enough Nigeria may buy as many as twenty.

Nigeria is receiving the Block 2 version of the JF17. In 2006 the first Block 1 JF17s were built in China and entered service in 2007. The Block 1s was, by Chinese standards, simple aircraft and sold for about $15 million to build. Fifty Block 2 aircraft, with inflight refueling, improved electronics, and digital data link, began production in 2013 and twelve more were ordered and completed by 2017. The Block 2s cost about $25 million each.

The JF17 was an unsuccessful Chinese project that was in development for over two decades. The Chinese air force did not want it but the Pakistanis did if they could assemble them in Pakistan and call them “made in Pakistan.” To make this work Pakistan had to agree to buy over a hundred JF-17s and Pakistan initially said it wanted 150 of them. All this came about because Pakistan could not get modern fighters from anyone else, and turned to China. At the time, China had nothing comparable to the early model F-16s Pakistan already had. Currently, Pakistan owns about a hundred JF17s and plans to obtain as many as 300.

China tried to find export customers for the JF17 as an inexpensive alternative to American and Russian fighters. So far, only Burma and Nigeria have ordered any. Burma bought 16. Both of these export sales were more diplomacy than just selling jet fighters. Chinese air force commanders consider the JF-17 inferior to other fighters they are building. The Chinese developer and manufacturer consider the JF17 a financial success but mainly as an export item and mainly to Pakistan, which may ultimately buy more than 300. That plus export sales add up to a significant amount of business.

The low-end JF-17 is little more than a day time interceptor. The most capable F-16 model in service is the F-16I, used exclusively by Israel. It's basically a modified version of the F-16C/D Block 50/52 optimized to deliver smart bombs anywhere, at any time, in any weather, and despite dense air defenses. The F-16I costs about $70 million each. At the moment the proposed Block 3 will come close to the F-16I capabilities and the JF-17B Block 3 will cost less than half what the F-16I does while having some of the capabilities. What China is really touting here is the availability of a jet fighter that is cheap and performs somewhat like an F-16. For many countries, this is an attractive option. The only problem is that there are hundreds of second-hand (and very well maintained) F-16s on the market, selling for less than the bare-bones JF-17.

The 13-ton JF-17 can carry 3.6 tons of weapons and uses radar-guided and heat-seeking missiles. It has a max speed of nearly 2,000 kilometers an hour, an operating range of 1,300 kilometers, and a max altitude of nearly 18,000 meters (55,000 feet). China says it does not want to use the JF-17 itself because its own J-10 (another local design) and J-11 (a license-built Russian Su-27) are adequate for their needs. The J-10, like the JF-17, did not work out as well as was hoped, but that's another matter. Meanwhile, Pakistan has several squadrons in service and more being formed. The JF-17, along with the American F-16s Pakistan has long used, were both used against Islamic terrorists in the tribal territories where both aircraft performed well using guided and unguided bombs.

The Nigerian Air Force is handling the purchase of the three NIMASA aircraft because two of these are twin-engine business jets equipped for maritime surveillance. These are needed by the navy and coast guard which are busy dealing with the growing piracy problem off the Nigerian coast. The air force already has airbases and training infrastructure to prepare pilots and maintainers for the maritime patrol aircraft. The third NIMASA aircraft is another helicopter for the coast guard.

merits:
Ok

She's holding the soldering iron wrongly, that metallic part will burn and fry her fingers.

RUSSIA'S CURRENT MOVE IN AFRICA

RUSSIA’S COUNTERINSURGENCY MODEL

Russia aspires to become a counterinsurgency leader in Africa. Since Russia embarked on its military intervention in support of Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad in September 2015, the Kremlin has advertised its ‘Syrian model’ of counterinsurgency to African countries struggling with political violence.

This model emphasizes state-to-state cooperation between Russia and African governments and presents authoritarian stability as the most effective antidote to extremism. As the unilateralism that underpins US counterterrorism efforts in Somalia and Washington’s frequent attachment of human rights conditions for military assistance have frustrated African leaders, Russia’s alternative counterinsurgency model has become increasingly attractive in Africa.

In April 2016, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov stated that Somalia desired Russian equipment to aid its counterterrorism operations and Somalia subsequently requested Moscow’s assistance in upgrading its military preparedness.

US wavering commitment to African security and France’s counterinsurgency struggles in the Sahel have increased the appeal of Russia’s counterterrorism model in West Africa.

Nigeria’s Ambassador to Russia Steve Ugbah argued in October 2019 that ‘We’re sure that with Russian help we’ll manage to crush Boko Haram’ and cited Russia’s defeat of the Islamic State in Syria as proof for this statement. In November 2019, large-scale anti-French and anti-UN protests erupted in Mali’s capital Bamako calling for Russia to vanquish Islamists in Mali like it did in Syria.

MERCENARIES AND MINERALS
Although Russia has touted its supposed attractiveness as a counterinsurgency partner as proof of its rising status in Africa and emphasized counterterrorism at the landmark October 2019 Russia–Africa Summit in Sochi, Moscow has been selective in its embrace of binding military commitments in Africa.

Russia has deployed Wagner Group private military contractors (PMCs) to Libya and Mozambique for ambiguously defined ‘counterterrorism purposes.’ However, Russian PMCs have struggled to turn the tide of Libya National Army chieftain Khalifa Haftar’s ill-fated offensive against Tripoli and succumbed to a calamitous Islamic State ambush in Mozambique in October 2019, which resulted in the deaths of 7 Russian personnel.

Russia also signed 19 military cooperation agreements with African countries between 2014–18. In the Horn of Africa and the Sahel, these agreements are strictly confined to counterterrorism training. Russia has notably refrained from deploying PMCs or active duty forces to the two African regions that are most severely impacted by transnational terrorism.

In spite of its military setbacks and cautious counterterrorism policy, Russia has capitalized on anti-Western sentiments and effective branding of its Syrian model of counterinsurgency to secure arms deals and economic contracts.

Russia is the leading arms vendor to Africa, as it supplied 49% of North Africa’s weapons and 28% of Sub-Saharan Africa’s weapons between 2014–18, and numerous African states struggling with insurgencies have requested Russian weaponry. After human rights concerns prevented the US from selling advanced aircraft to Nigeria in 2014, Abuja struck a deal with Moscow to purchase Mi-35 and Mi-17 fighter jets. Nigeria’s reliance on Russian aircraft in its struggle against Boko Haram resulted in its agreement to purchase another 12 Mi-35 fighter jets from Russia in October 2019. [/b]Russia has also supplied light weaponry to Mali, the Central African Republic, and Sudan, as all three countries grapple with varying degrees of isolation from international arms markets.

Russia has also presented itself as a counterinsurgency partner in order to expand its access to the continent’s mineral deposits. [b]Russia’s PMC deployments in support of Central African Republic’s President Faustin-Archange Touadera against Seleka rebels are closely intertwined with its desire to profit from the country’s vast diamond reserves. Russia has spearheaded efforts to lift export restrictions on diamond sales from the Central African Republic and leveraged its counterinsurgency campaign to profit Lobaye Invest, a mining company with close ties to Yevgeny Prigozhin. Russian media outlets and think tanks often assert that US and French counterterrorism campaigns in the Sahel are aimed at securing hegemony over the region’s vast uranium stockpiles.
However, Russia’s civilian nuclear energy giant Rosatom’s forays into Nigeria and aspirations to enter Niger’s uranium market are undoubtedly strengthened by the positive impact of counterinsurgency cooperation on Moscow’s bilateral relationships with West African countries.

THE LONG-TERM PERSPECTIVE
Looking beyond economic factors, Russia’s rising profile in the counterinsurgency arena in Africa has strengthened its relationship with France but engendered potential tensions with China. In spite of its opposition to French proposals for tighter sanctions against Mali and competition with Paris for leverage in the Central African Republic,[b] France and Russia have bonded over their shared belief that authoritarian stability can rein in armed insurgencies. [/b]This common perspective has inspired Franco–Russian cooperation in support of Haftar in Libya and motivated Russia to secure military cooperation agreements with France’s authoritarian partners in the Sahel, such as Chad’s President Idriss Deby. Therefore, cooperation on West African security adds a marginal layer of depth to broader France–Russia outreach efforts.

Although Russia’s counterinsurgency campaigns ostensibly support China’s desire for stability near its Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) projects in Africa, Moscow’s military interventions and PMC deployments to Africa could sharpen frictions with Beijing. former US Ambassador to Ethiopia and Burkina Faso David Shinn argued that Wagner Group activities in Sudan and the Central African Republic could undermine Chinese interests. This conclusion is plausible as Russia’s resolute support for fragile authoritarian governments in Sub-Saharan Africa contrasts with China’s greater adaptability to regime changes on the continent.

In Libya, Russia’s support for the LNA’s purported counterterrorism efforts clashes with China’s desire to integrate the UN-recognised Government of National Accord into the BRI. These disagreements have not caused a major rift in Russia–China relations but could impede Moscow and Beijing’s prospective transition from tactical cooperation to strategic alignment in Africa.

Russia’s counterinsurgency strategy in Africa hinges on supporting fragile authoritarian regimes and selling its Syrian model to countries struggling with political violence. In spite of Russia’s ambiguous commitment to African security and poor track record of military success in Africa, Moscow will likely continue highlighting its counterinsurgency credentials to secure economic contracts, bolster its cooperation with France, and assert its great power status.

Africa has long been a geopolitical battleground among the great powers, with the Cold War representing an especially intense round of this struggle. From the archives of Russia’s SVR comes an overview of the KGB First Chief Directorate’s intelligence, covert action, and political influence operations in Africa during the 1960s and 1970s.

In the postwar period, the USSR tasked the Soviet foreign intelligence in conducting operations in Africa, they had to work on an African continent almost unknown to it up to that time.

In the 1950s, Soviet intelligence’s interest in Africa was conditioned mainly by the acquisition of information on the plans and intentions of Western countries. At that time many air and naval bases of NATO member nations were situated in Africa. Their interest in the continent was rooted not only in strategic reasoning: Africa was rich in food and mineral resources, and her depths preserved deposits of materials necessary for modern industry, such as uranium, cobalt, wolfram, copper, nickel, oil, and many others.

To what measure did the NATO countries seek to use the African continent in their confrontation with the Soviet Union? Soviet intelligence service was looking for answers to that question. To meet these objectives it had earlier mainly utilized its possibilities in Western nations. In Africa itself, Soviet foreign intelligence’s positions were more than modest. There were small residencies only in Egypt and Ethiopia, and by the end of the 1950s, residencies had also opened in Sudan, Ghana, and Guinea.

Soviet intelligence began its real work in Africa starting in the year 1960, when the process of African countries’ decolonization began to gain strength. 17 independent states immediately appeared on the map of the African continent. The UN declared 1960 the Year of Africa.

Within Soviet intelligence there was established an African department. Its tasks could be summarized as the following:

-Facilitate the quickest liquidation of remnants of the colonial system.

-Help national liberation movements in remaining colonies.

-Track the policies of former and current colonizers: Britain, France, Belgium, and Portugal;

-Make sense of US policy in relation to Africa;

-Analyze the situation in each African country – will it remain in the orbit of the old system or take a new path?

-Acquire friends and allies among Africans.

To that were added security issues for Soviet diplomatic colonies, embassies, and other Soviet institutions.

The 1960s proved themselves to be a “hot” decade both for young African nations and Soviet foreign intelligence. African countries that had just been liberated immediately encountered harsh confrontation with their former metropoles, who sought to maintain political and economic positions in their former colonies. In a number of cases this led to the emergence of crisis situations, such as in the former Belgian Congo, for instance.

Coups d’etat that occurred with the interference of Western powers and their intelligence services, accompanied by internecine conflicts, tribal feuds, and civil wars, became a habitual phenomenon.

In every concrete situation, information from Soviet intelligence was required on who came to power, what forces carried out the coup, and along which path they were intending to lead the country. To answer all these questions was not easy. At times the participants in the events themselves didn’t know.

Soviet African operational stations, just formed and usually composed of young officers, couldn’t give exhaustive answers to all these questions. But in good faith they sent information directly from the scene of events, information that was useful to Moscow since it allowed the leadership to see and evaluate events more clearly.

But then complications in reaching mutual understanding with Africans turned out to be a complete surprise to the majority of soviet intelligence officers. Africans had a totally different mentality, habits, and mores. Naiveté and the hope for quick assistance combined with irritability and distrust. Colonial times had accustomed them to not trust the white man, and deceiving him was considered merited. All these particularities of the post-colonial African character had to be overcome by our officers, and not without hard work.

The process of decolonization was a natural and historically inevitable phenomenon that depended little upon the will of the Soviet Union and Western colonial powers. However, in the conditions of the Cold War and confrontation between the two world blocs, this process itself became an object of the confrontation.


The loss of colonies weakened the bloc of Western powers. That answered to the interests of the Soviet Union and strengthened its foreign policy positions. The Soviet Union, therefore, supported African nations’ struggle for their own political and economic independence.

The United States and colonial countries, in their turn, sought to hinder this process by any means, including the use of their intelligence services. In such a manner, the African continent turned into an arena of ideological and political confrontation for the two blocs.

And so the African peoples’ struggle for their liberation became an object of great-power rivalry. Such was the logic of the Cold War era.

Soviet intelligence conducted work in government and political circles of young African countries with a progressive orientation with great caution, limiting matters, as a rule, to confidential relationships. Therein was one of the most important particularities of its work in Africa: it wasn’t directed against African countries, but rather, was objectively answering to the interests of fighting to strengthen their own political and economic independence and their sovereignty. The interests of African nations liberated from colonial dependence and those of the Soviet Union coincided on these questions.

Soviet foreign intelligence were made to search out new techniques and methods of work. Processing open-source information such as various publications, directories, the press, radio and television, for example, acquired great significance. Of course the main weapon, however, remained confidential ties in political and social circles.

Such work demanded good political training, a knowledge of the problems, and great professional mastery. Political and social figures, government servants of various ranks, right up to the highest, all enthusiastically came to establish contacts. Usually these relationships were built and developed on a commonality of political or ideological interests. However, the intelligence officer’s art was to lend these relationships a certain direction, gradually, and in a natural way make them less noticeable to the surrounding public, bringing them to such a degree of privacy that one could count on receiving the confidential information required.

In a number of African countries viewed by the Soviet leadership as progressive in orientation, such as Algeria, Guinea, Ghana, Congo (Brazzaville), Somalia, Ethiopia and an whole set of others,soviet operational stations were tasked with a mission quite unique for intelligence – w[b]ith its specific assets, it was to facilitate the development and strengthening of these countries’ relations with the Soviet Union. [/b]

Diplomacy and intelligence operations conducted by world powers are usually used to undermine relations between world powers and African countries, it usually involves cultivating and buying off African leaders, use of intelligence agent networks, and disseminating disinformation that represented in distorted form the policy and intentions of world powers in Africa. Alongside that, of course, they used mistakes and miscalculations of each other to further their interest.

Soviet foreign intelligence subjected all circumstances connected to the problems of relations with African countries to thorough analysis, and then reported their proposals to the leadership in Moscow.

The Soviet leadership often used intelligence possibilities to convey intelligence of a delicate character to the leaders of African nations. And so, for example, the Soviet leadership informed Algerian president Boumediene through intelligence channels on the activity of Western agent networks in the highest echelons of the Algerian leadership.

KGB cooperation with the security services of a number of young African countries played an important role in the development of friendly relations between them and the Soviet Union and strengthening their sovereignty, with this partnership enacted mainly through foreign intelligence. This cooperation basically amounted to the exchange of information that presented a mutual interest, the short-term training of personnel in Moscow and locally, and assistance through operational hardware. Certain Soviet aid was also rendered in the structuring and organization of work for African countries’ security services. Advice and recommendations were given, but the Africans took decisions, which far from always corresponded with what was recommended by our advisors. Overall, cooperation between the security services of young African countries with the USSR’s special services helped them to build their state apparatus.

A very crucial function carried out by Soviet intelligence in Africa was to maintain ties with the liberation movements of countries not yet free from colonialism.

They were extended different types of assistance – political, financial, and political, as well as through training cadres and providing advisors and specialists. This help was directed along various channels: both through the state and social, humanitarian, and international organizations.

Assistance along intelligence lines was usually carried out clandestinely. And so the United States long managed to conceal their support for the Union of Peoples of Angola (UPA), headed by Holden Roberto, support that was realized through the CIA.

The majority of liberation movements were underground, and the intelligence services of the metropolitan countries worked actively against them. They tracked liberation organizations not only in their colonies, but also in third countries where they had their bases and representative offices, hunting down their leaders; executing terrorist acts; infiltrating their agents; intercepting communications channels; and detecting the contacts of these organizations with the outside world and their sources of obtaining support.

The CIA was also engaged in similar work on these organizations. The Americans sought to infiltrate the liberation movements and take them under their control in order to assert their positions in these young states after their liberation.

in general the leaders and representatives of the liberation movements were full of an earnest desire to wage the most decisive struggle for the liberation of their countries. Others were cautious and chose allies from the outside world while hedging their bets. The third group, oriented toward Western assistance, made contact with us to find out the Soviet position and tease out to whom, how, and through what channels the USSR was extending aid.

There were also those who played at politics; speculated on the liberation struggle; lived on the assistance provided to the liberation movements; acquired luxurious villas and automobiles; jetted around to international conferences and congresses; vacationed and went to hospitals on the invitation of foreign states; and gave an endless number of promises, thinking least of all about their country’s liberation struggle.

Soviet intelligence didn’t make a hard ideological choice among movements. It sought to encompass as wide a circle of liberation organizations as possible and analyze their real possibilities in the struggle for national liberation. And so in the Angolan liberation movement, along with Aghostino Neto’s MPLA, Soviet intelligence service attempted to arrange relations both with Holden Roberto’s Union of Peoples of Angola (UPA) and Jonas Savimbi’s National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA).

analyzing the theories popular among the African intelligentsia, such as Kwame Nkrumah’s Pan-Africanism, negritude, and the African socialism of Leopold Senghor. These leaders preached the uniqueness of the African people’s historical path of development and how common laws of historical development were inapplicable to Africa. Our liaisons wanted to know how correct these theories were and what we thought of them; we had to learn while improvising.

The anti-colonial liberation process in Africa was a historically inevitable phenomenon. The colonial powers didn’t want to lose their positions and defended them at first by force – through military or terrorist methods, and then, under the influence of events, in a growing measure through political means. They viewed Soviet policy in Africa as a threat to their interests, the USSR’s attempt to spread influence in Africa and a communist threat to the African continent. And on the African continent there were both objective and subjective underpinnings for a confrontation between intelligence services.

As we moved into the 1980s, computers were added to the Internet at an increasing rate. These computers were primarily from government, academic, and research organizations. Much to the surprise of the engineers, the early popularity of the Internet was driven by the use of electronic mail (see sidebar below).

Using the Internet in these early days was not easy. In order to access information on another server, you had to know how to type in the commands necessary to access it, as well as know the name of that device. That all changed in 1990, when Tim Berners-Lee introduced his World Wide Web project, which provided an easy way to navigate the Internet through the use of linked text (hypertext). The World Wide Web gained even more steam with the release of the Mosaic browser in 1993, which allowed graphics and text to be combined together as a way to present information and navigate the Internet. The Mosaic browser took off in popularity and was soon superseded by Netscape Navigator, the first commercial web browser, in 1994. The Internet and the World Wide Web were now poised for growth. The chart below shows the growth in users from the early days until now.

Web 2.0
In the first few years of the World Wide Web, creating and putting up a website required a specific set of knowledge: you had to know how to set up a server on the World Wide Web, how to get a domain name, how to write web pages in HTML, and how to troubleshoot various technical issues as they came up. Someone who did these jobs for a website became known as a webmaster.

As the web gained in popularity, it became more and more apparent that those who did not have the skills to be a webmaster still wanted to create online content and have their own piece of the web. This need was met with new technologies that provided a website framework for those who wanted to put content online. Blogger and Wikipedia are examples of these early Web 2.0 applications, which allowed anyone with something to say a place to go and say it, without the need for understanding HTML or web-server technology.

Starting in the early 2000s, Web 2.0 applications began a second bubble of optimism and investment. It seemed that everyone wanted their own blog or photo-sharing site. Here are some of the companies that came of age during this time: MySpace (2003), Photobucket (2003), Flickr (2004), Facebook (2004), WordPress (2005), Tumblr (2006), and Twitter (2006). The ultimate indication that Web 2.0 had taken hold was when Time magazine named “You” its “Person of the Year” in 2006.

When the personal computer was created, it was a great little toy for technology hobbyists and armchair programmers. As soon as the spreadsheet was invented, however, businesses took notice, and the rest is history. The spreadsheet was the killer app for the personal computer: people bought PCs just so they could run spreadsheets.

The Internet was originally designed as a way for scientists and researchers to share information and computing power among themselves. However, as soon as electronic mail was invented, it began driving demand for the Internet. This wasn’t what the developers had in mind, but it turned out that people connecting to people was the killer app for the Internet.

We are seeing this again today with social networks, specifically Facebook. Many who weren’t convinced to have an online presence now feel left out without a Facebook account. The connections made between people using Web 2.0 applications like Facebook on their personal computer or smartphone is driving growth yet again.

Many times, the terms “Internet” and “World Wide Web,” [/b]or even just “the web,” are used interchangeably. But really, they [b]are not the same thing at all! The Internet is an interconnected network of networks. Many services run across the Internet: electronic mail, voice and video, file transfers, and, yes, the World Wide Web.

The World Wide Web is simply one piece of the Internet. It is made up of web servers that have HTML pages that are being viewed on devices with web browsers. It is really that simple.

Got two emails on why the whole process of talking on geography when its security related issue.

Well the motive is to make everyone understand and appreciate the importance of environment when it comes to engaging an enemy and how various technology can be employed.

We have for some months conducted viability of area surveillance via make shift drones on certain forest areas and came to conclude it's impractical due the canopy of trees present, e resolution of attached camera and flight hour of drones.

These limits creates more avenue to employ more options to meet the situation at hand. Its for this reason we publicizing the training.

Because with more innovative minds some of those limits can be eliminated.

Currently the use of sensor nodes are showing great potential due to certain parameters. This is how we engage our trainees.

Our belief is the more individuals engage the wide the collective society gains because things learnt can then be replicated and commercialized.

Nigeria is bigger than any person its the reason we must safe guard her via intelligence and knowledge and act as an auxiliary to mandated institutions.

Thank you

May our officer's continue to have the courage to contain this cancer called bandit.

Chaos is always an opportunity to make something out of nothing.

In the architecture of security not all are mandated to carry weapons... But there are brains behind those who carry weapons.

They work round the clock to ensure every details is processed and converted to action.

You can be part of the pool of brain that engage technical, electronic and signal tools in helping in safeguarding our community and aiding security apparatus.

mikesandy983 at gmail.... com

Join our training on how to conduct reconnaissance on destination routes before setting out on any road journey.

Get maps of what's known as dark and kill zones. Zones where by possible ambush attack are surrounded with ditch on the side of road and on the road itself. Making any maneuver by vehicles impossible.

These bandits operates in such gray areas using intelligence such as proximity to police checkpoints, military checkpoints and none coherent vigilante patrol.

The forest is their domain once in with their victims the chances of recovery reduces drastically, due to zero footpath and no sense of direction.

Once they cover more distance further chances of using radio foot print via telecommunications mast reduces drastically.

We may not have all the answers but there is nothing as valuable as been prepared mentally for different elements of surprise.

Understanding The Dynamics Of Crime And Protecting Yourself(GEOGRAPHY)

why bandits operate and whys difficult to contain their activities across Nigeria

Geographical terrain determines the pace at which resources are deployed in an event of a crisis. The crisis could be in form of a natural disaster or armed conflict.

A very good yardstick of understanding this is by analyzing how disaster relief materials are deployed in an event of a natural disaster, especially those disasters that have taken place across Africa, Central America, South America, and Asia.

-These continents are prime examples because they can be used to simulate our targeted topic of focus.

-They are roughly similar in size, similar geographical features, and similar weather conditions.

-And they recorded better success than the Africa continent, even tho been classified as developing or third world continents.

Our basis for listing those points is for a better understanding of how successes were gained and what caused their failures.

Geography

Cities or towns develop from rapid deforestation programs mandated by authorities of various nations of the world.

Our assumption is that every forest area is always twice the size of all developed cities or towns located in the same geographical space. and size expands based on the landmass. If you were to take an aerial view of towns and cities you would realize how cities and towns envelop forest areas.

A good example for comparison is the middle east, all development is carried out in areas close to water leaving a vast wasteland in the middle.

Other assumptions are the military and security industrial complex have better information on their country geographical space because they follow a principle of understanding your battlefields in order to efficiently defend and protect it.

Lets skip the in-depth analysis which is reserved for those who are interested in the training.
[i][/i]

Our security apparatus seems to be overwhelmed by pockets of challenges across the nation due to none permanent factors such as under utilization of technology.

The simulated scenario of trained personnel of army, DSS, police and paramilitary personnel tend to be very limited. Because it mostly happens in controlled environment instead of uncontrolled one.

Assuming such training was taken into account from the onset, then every apparatus would have a dedicated division such as forest rangers found in USA,UK,china,russia etc. They would also be sub forest divisions in paramilitary outfit such as ndlea,customs, immigration and civil defence.

south America is a good example of having forest units of every military and paramilitary organization. This was born out of the need to crush the drug lords who operated from within the forest.

Please note these countries with such units in their security apparatus are not made up of superhumans. rather the utilization of technology made them very effective and lethal.

The various regions are standing up to the challenges by establishing local forest units, but this must be augmented with technology, its on this front this thread came to existence.

security is a collective efforts, trained individuals with available technology goes a long way in probing up the overall protection.

reach out to us for more information on via mikesandy983 at gmail dot com


In the multitude of counselors, there is safety'

Networking communication is full of some very technical concepts based on some simple principles. Learn the terms below and you’ll be able to hold your own in a conversation about the Internet.

Packet: The fundamental unit of data transmitted over the Internet. When a device intends to send a message to another device (for example, your PC sends a request to YouTube to open a video), it breaks the message down into smaller pieces, called packets. Each packet has the sender’s address, the destination address, a sequence number, and a piece of the overall message to be sent.

Hub: A simple network device that connects other devices to the network and sends packets to all the devices connected to it.

Bridge: A network device that connects two networks together and only allows packets through that are needed.

Switch: A network device that connects multiple devices together and filters packets based on their destination within the connected devices.

Router: A device that receives and analyzes packets and then routes them towards their destination. In some cases, a router will send a packet to another router; in other cases, it will send it directly to its destination.

IP Address: Every device that communicates on the Internet, whether it be a personal computer, a tablet, a smartphone, or anything else, is assigned a unique identifying number called an IP (Internet Protocol) address. Historically, the IP-address standard used has been IPv4 (version 4), which has the format of four numbers between 0 and 255 separated by a period. For example, the domain Saylor.org has the IP address of 107.23.196.166. The IPv4 standard has a limit of 4,294,967,296 possible addresses. As the use of the Internet has proliferated, the number of IP addresses needed has grown to the point where the use of IPv4 addresses will be exhausted. This has led to the new IPv6 standard, which is currently being phased in. The IPv6 standard is formatted as eight groups of four hexadecimal digits, such as 2001:0db8:85a3:0042:1000:8a2e:0370:7334. The IPv6 standard has a limit of 3.4×1038 possible addresses. For more detail about the new IPv6 standard, see this Wikipedia article.

Domain name: If you had to try to remember the IP address of every web server you wanted to access, the Internet would not be nearly as easy to use. A domain name is a human-friendly name for a device on the Internet. These names generally consist of a descriptive text followed by the top-level domain (TLD). For example, Wikepedia’s domain name is wikipedia.org; wikipedia describes the organization and .org is the top-level domain. In this case, the .org TLD is designed for nonprofit organizations. Other well-known TLDs include .com, .net, and .gov. For a complete list and description of domain names, see this Wikipedia article.

DNS: DNS stands for “domain name system,” which acts as the directory on the Internet. When a request to access a device with a domain name is given, a DNS server is queried. It returns the IP address of the device requested, allowing for proper routing.

Packet-switching: When a packet is sent from one device out over the Internet, it does not follow a straight path to its destination. Instead, it is passed from one router to another across the Internet until it is reaches its destination. In fact, sometimes two packets from the same message will take different routes! Sometimes, packets will arrive at their destination out of order. When this happens, the receiving device restores them to their proper order. For more details on packet-switching, see this interactive web page.

Protocol: In computer networking, a protocol is the set of rules that allow two (or more) devices to exchange information back and forth across the network.

Introduction
In the early days of computing, computers were seen as devices for making calculations, storing data, and automating business processes. However, as the devices evolved, it became apparent that many of the functions of telecommunications could be integrated into the computer. During the 1980s, many organizations began combining their once-separate telecommunications and information-systems departments into information technology, or IT, department. This ability for computers to communicate with one another and, maybe, more importantly, to facilitate communication between individuals and groups, has been an important factor in the growth of computing over the past several decades.

Computer networking really began in the 1960s with the birth of the Internet, as we’ll see below. However, while the Internet and web were evolving, corporate networking was also taking shape in the form of local area networks and client-server computing. In the 1990s, when the Internet came of age, Internet technologies began to pervade all areas of the organization. Now, with the Internet a global phenomenon, it would be unthinkable to have a computer that did not include communications capabilities. This chapter will review the different technologies that have been put in place to enable this communications revolution.

In the Beginning: ARPANET
The story of the Internet, and networking in general, can be traced back to the late 1950s. The US was in the depths of the Cold War with the USSR, and each nation closely watched the other to determine which would gain a military or intelligence advantage. In 1957, the Soviets surprised the US with the launch of Sputnik, propelling us into the space age. In response to Sputnik, the US Government created the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA), whose initial role was to ensure that the US was not surprised again. It was from ARPA, now called DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency), that the Internet first sprang.

ARPA was the center of computing research in the 1960s, but there was just one problem: many of the computers could not talk to each other. In 1968, ARPA sent out a request for proposals for a communication technology that would allow different computers located around the country to be integrated together into one network. Twelve companies responded to the request, and a company named Bolt, Beranek, and Newman (BBN) won the contract. They began work right away and were able to complete the job just one year later: in September 1969, the ARPANET was turned on. The first four nodes were at UCLA, Stanford, MIT, and the University of Utah.

The Internet and the World Wide Web
Over the next decade, the ARPANET grew and gained popularity. During this time, other networks also came into existence. Different organizations were connected to different networks. This led to a problem: the networks could not talk to each other. Each network used its own proprietary language, or protocol (see sidebar for the definition of the protocol), to send information back and forth. This problem was solved by the invention of transmission control protocol/Internet protocol (TCP/IP). TCP/IP was designed to allow networks running on different protocols to have an intermediary protocol that would allow them to communicate. So as long as your network supported TCP/IP, you could communicate with all of the other networks running TCP/IP. TCP/IP quickly became the standard protocol and allowed networks to communicate with each other. It is from this breakthrough that we first got the term Internet, which simply means “an interconnected network of networks.”


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