A sinister tale from Iraq. But does anyone else find the scariest bit that the mystery voice who threatened her identified itself as the “Kata’eb al-Jihad”? Yes, that’s Kata’eb as in the Lebanese Phalange’s Arabic name. Not that the originals would have had any truck with jihad, but it strikes me that it’s a great…
Read More We are the goonsquad and we’re coming to townTwo items on Wired make me think. In the first, our attention is called to a project at Loughborough University that’s making robots build houses, spraying concrete and gypsum on formers. The encapsulated air makes for very high insulation R-values. But what it reminds me of is my dad, who once said one of the…
Read More This is the house that hack builtIt’s been little reported anywhere that the appointment of Admiral Fallon as CINCCENTCOM has been matched by the Iraqi Government. They have, over US objections, chosen as commandant of Baghdad an officer who used to be..a sailor. Does this mean war with Iran is imminent? Meanwhile, I think the blogospheric Iran-talk is getting to me.…
Read More Iraqi Command Shift Signals Attack on IranTony Blair doesn’t deserve to be allowed aboard one of HM Ships, let alone use one of them to speechify. Some of the press amused themselves by labelling photographs of Devonport Dockyard with the ships awaiting disposal. This wasn’t, perhaps, fair – the two biggest are Fearless and Intrepid, the two assault ships (LPDs) built…
Read More Blair: just an embarrassmentWent to the David Hockney exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery on Saturday. Worth it, for one – a lot of stuff that doesn’t get out too often. Some points. Hockney’s always struck me as one of few painters who are funny. Not comical, but humour is part of the language. Looking at his Rake’s…
Read More Freeman of BradfordWell, who else saw Sean Langan’s film from the mission down to Garmser last year? Still can’t stop thinking about it. A small advisory/training team and a company or so of Afghan police were sent down from Camp Bastion to Garmser in the far south to establish a government presence on roads leading in from…
Read More to all of those men..What to do when your RepRap is finished? Run off a few shot glasses, of course, so as to celebrate properly.
Read More A tradition is bornMy hunt for a readable Sunday paper goes on. The Fisk, Cockburn and Watkins Journal is OK, but they insist on including a lot of other stuff that’s nowhere near as good. The Obscurer would be good if it could finally puke and call off the pony hunt for a secular Blairite democracy in Iraq,…
Read More The orange ape that walks like a manThe US Uniform Code of Military Justice now applies to civilian employees, and a damn good thing too. Various people at BoingBoing wonder whether journalists might also be affected. Curiously, P.W. Singer is quoted as saying that “the Iraq war was the first where journalists could formally embed”. Really? I’m sure, completely so, that those…
Read More Contractors, and Journalists?Right, so there’s been even more change in the US high command. Not only has Abizaid been replaced by Admiral William Fallon, and Casey by Petraeus, General Peter Schoonmaker has got the push as Army Chief of Staff, in favour of Casey. To answer some readers’ questions, what the hell does it mean? I first…
Read More Changing of the guard