February 2005

The Washington Post reports that the USAF has been overflying Iran with drones, apparently in an effort to reconnoitre Iranian air defences. Apparently the first flights took place in April, 2004, and an extended effort began in December. This surge in activity led to the operation’s becoming public after Iranian civilians repeatedly spotted mystery aircraft.…

Abu Aardvark reports on spending a night with three different Arabic TV channels, Al-Jazeera, al-Arabiya, and the US-funded al-Hurra (who, of course, had a journalist shot in Basra last week). It’s worth reading, even if some of the methodology leaves something to be desired (“p.s. the jazeera and arabia presenters are WAY hotter than any…

The public prints have it that the Indian minister of oil and natural gas is off to Moscow to discuss buying into a chunk of Yukos’s assets. This comes at the same time as the intrigues surrounding exactly how the Yuganskneftegaz/Rosneft deal (and the subsequent Rosneft/Gazprom deal) was financed, and specifically what the involvement of…

Le Monde reports rioting in Togo after the semi-coup that installed the old dictator’s son. They go on to speculate that the Nigerian-led Economic Community of West African States might apply sanctions: interestingly, a source in the area told me last night that he expected ECOWAS intervention as the Nigerians had pointedly not been invited…

Back in November, I blogged on a curious incident during the French intervention in the Ivory Coast. Recapping, when the French army there moved into Abidjan after the Ivorian air-raid on one of their outposts, they established an HQ and registration point for evacuees in the best hotel in town. There they discovered that someone…

Starting with the admin, please note that the comments service is unavailable. I have been promised that it will soon return. G2: There’s some follow-up on the Ivory Coast/Israel arms story we covered over at Ha’aretz. More semi-results have appeared from the Iraqi elections, we shall be having a look to see if the prediction…

Hear that clattering of keyboards racing in from the east? See the blackly glittering screens? It could only be the Kossacks charging after a story. And, of course, they got one. The whole sorry tale about “Jeff Gannon”, the pseudonymous conservative who mysteriously got a White House press pass in his false name whilst working…

Well, after an intense squabble, a wedge of Treasury files on the 1992 sterling crisis, “Black Wednesday”, have been released. The most interesting feature, though, would seem to be the incredible psychological rationalisations of the participants. Let us recap. At the time the pound sterling was under a fixed exchange rate with respect to the…

Right, I’ve decided to have more structure in day-to-day bloggage here, so we’ll begin today with a short briefing. G-1 (Admin/Personnel): Work begins today on another new Ranter template option. When complete it will be on my testblog for user comments. The first one has now been definitively junked after unfavourable feedback. G-2 (Intelligence): Is…

Soj appears very pleased that the government of Romania has taken the step of permitting foreigners to hold bank accounts denominated in local currency. The reason is instructive: because otherwise, Soj’s US dollars were depreciating in real terms. Strange days, these, when the Romanian lei is a safer bet than greenbacks…remember this post?