Who's Your Daddy? Part 2

Vladimir Putin & Qassam Soleimani

From a story on IHS Jane's 360:

However, Moscow currently appears to be bolstering - rather than downgrading - its defence ties with Tehran. It has already agreed to supply S-300 long-range air defence systems, although the deal has yet to be finalised. In another sign of improving relations, two Russian Buyan-class patrol boats arrived at the Iranian Caspian Sea port of Bandar Anzali on 10 August.
Iran's General Qassem Soleimani reportedly visited Russia in July to meet Putin and Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu. The Kremlin has denied the visit took place: an unsurprising move given that it would have violated the UN travel ban imposed on Gen Soleimani.
Gen Soleimani commands the Qods Force, which supports Iranian-allied groups across the region, so might be interested in acquiring more Russian guided anti-tank missiles that can be transferred to Iraqi Shia militias to be used against Islamic State vehicle suicide bombs and to Yemen's Ansar Allah group so it can knock out more Saudi armoured vehicles on the border.

General Soleimani is a VIP in realpolitik terms, not in your celebrity media sense. From a 2013 story in The New Yorker:

“The battlefield is mankind’s lost paradise—the paradise in which morality and human conduct are at their highest,” he says. “One type of paradise that men imagine is about streams, beautiful maidens, and lush landscape. But there is another kind of paradise—the battlefield.”

Who's Your Daddy? Part 1.

Big Bang

Smoke rises from the debris after the explosions at the Binhai new district in Tianjin, China, August 13, 2015. Two massive explosions caused by flammable goods ripped through an industrial area in the northeast Chinese port city of Tianjin late on Wednesday, killing 17 people and injuring as many as 400, official Chinese media reported. All the cars in the foreground were burnt to a crisp. REUTERS/China Daily

When I read that these explosions were large enough to be measured on the Richter Scale, I thought they had to be pretty big. But then I read that there had been another industrial explosion last year, and I thought, well, typical Chinese business. When you push too hard and too fast mistakes are bound to happen. 

     Today I decided to check to see just how bad it was. It was bad enough to make Wikipedia's Top 100. The last big bang was the Canadian oil train fire in 2013. Also in 2013 there was the fertilizer plant explosion in West, Texas, and it was only half as big as this one in China.

Post about the Houston Ammonia Truck Explosion. Not big enough to make Wiki's list.

Pic of the Day

Azores

I suspect this image has been photoshopped. I don't know how else it could have been made. Still a very cool pic.

Postwar Tokyo set to Music

Boogie Belgique - Ms. Yutani
Film was shot in postwar Tokyo. Found on Rocket News 24, via Brent Newhall.

Polar Star by Martin Cruz Smith

An American crewman rides the catch over to a Soviet processing vessel (1983).
Photo by Tony Allison.

The story starts off pretty simple: Arkady is working on a Soviet factory ship cleaning fish on the fish disassembly line until they find one of the women crew members dead. Then things start to slowly get more complicated. First we have politics in the form of the Political Officer and his henchmen. Then Soviet Naval Intelligence makes an appearance, and wherever you find them, the CIA can't be far away, and they aren't. And don't forget the Russian mafia, trading central Asian hashish for cocaine. Some aspects of the story are a little far-fetched, but truth is often stranger than fiction, and people are complicated, more so when the situation is constrained, and this one certainly is, so I'm gonna give it a 'plausible'. As always, it's the details about life that make the story, and this one does a good job of it.

Goodreads page: Polar Star by Martin Cruz Smith

Wicked

We went to see Wicked, the Broadway Musical, at Keller Auditorium in downtown Portland last night. It was an odd experience for me. Musicals aren't really my cup of tea. They are entertaining enough and my wife really likes them, so I go.
       I had read the book a few years ago and enjoyed it thoroughly, so I still had a sketch of the story in my mind. The musical follows the plot well enough. I don't remember the Arrow character at all, but that's okay.
    The odd part was I could not understand the words to most any of the songs. I'd pick up a word here or there, but mostly it was just women singing ... something. In between the songs there would be a bit of acting, and these little snippets of conversation managed to carry the story along. It could be that the singing and dancing contributed to the atmosphere, which I am learning is a large part of what can make a show great instead of just good.
     The show has a few points to make about the way we treat people. The Wizard's song Wonderful has a few points of his own:

{Spoken:}
Wizard: You See, I Never Had A Family Of My Own, So I Guess I Just Wanted To Give The Citizens Of Oz Everything.
Elphaba: So You Lied To Them.
Wizard: Elphaba, Where I Come From, We Believe All Sorts Of Things That Aren't True. We Call It History.

{Sung}: Wizard:
A Man's Called A Traitor
Or Liberator. A Rich Man's A Thief
Or Philanthropist. Is One A Crusader
or ruthless invader? It's all in which label
is able to persist.
There Are Precious Few At Ease
With Moral Ambiguities, So We Act As Though They Don't Exist.

Was I able to pick up more of this song because it was sung by a man (lower timbre)? Or because the words meant something to me?

The Honourable Woman - BBC Television Series 2014

Maggie Gyllenhaal as Nessa Stein in The Honourable Woman (BBC)

Maggie, sister of Jake, who we recently saw in Nightcrawler stars as the head of a giant Israeli arms manufacturer, except that now they have turned their sights on more peaceful business pursuits, like fiber optics for the poor, and she is running a big part of her business in Britain. But you know, because she's an Israeli, she probably has a handgun tucked in her knickers, and the defense armaments business in Israel is probably still going full steam.
    The show is mostly an espionage thriller with a little bit of family life stirred in. Nessa goes around attending high profile events and saying a few words here and there. At one point she tells us that terrorism is rooted in poverty, and that by bringing high speed internet communications to the Palestinians she is helping to rid the world of terrorism. I don't know, that might work. Eventually.
    But right now terrorism is rooted in the belief system of the radical musselmen, and that's what they are teaching their kids from the get go. A subsistence level job, or shoot, even a decent paying job, when they get to be 20 years old is not going to overcome 20 years of indoctrination. The only way we are going to stop the perpetuation of this madness is if everyone stops buying oil from the Arabs, and that is not going to happen. Well, we could stop paying the Arabs for their oil. That would stir the pot a little.

     We do have one troublemaking five year old boy. He can't sit still, which is typical of the breed, but he manages to escape his minders (parents, nanny, security guys) which leads the first time to finding him in kitchen eating carrots with the help and the second time running away with his kidnappers. My immediate reaction was 'what's wrong with these people (the adults)? Can't they keep track of one five year old brat?' But now that I've had time to reflect on it I recall that, yes, there were times when I lost track of one or more of my kids for a couple of minutes. But then I was never a target like this family obviously is. And an extremely level of vigilance would probably have given me a heart attack. You can't be vigilant all the time. At the very least you have to sleep sometimes.