Fireballs Observations of the Day Volume 11

Vol 11  01 through 09 March 2024

ABOUT FOD:

Fireball's Observations Of The Day, (FOD) remains an experiment. It’s intended to be a short collection of my observations of the moment. Generally I’ll try to provide some historical events that occurred on the dates of the current volume, with some personal observations for context. I hope you find it entertaining and a bit informative. If you have comments or thoughts you’d like to contribute, I welcome them as well or a personal event that occurred on a specific day drop me a line. Oh and I’m just getting used to the software involved, so you may see it take some different looks as I attempt to improve the format and content. Thanks, Fireball

FOD Saying of the Day

I expect to pass through this world but once.  If, therefore there can be any kindness I can show or any good thing I can do for my fellow being: let me do it now.  Let me not defer or neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again.  – 19th Century Quaker Missionary

FOD Trivia Question 

If you fail to include a trivia question in the last volume, you need two trivia questions in the next volume. 

Trivia question 1: What is a group of ravens known as?

Trivia question 2:  Which of Newton’s Laws states that ‘for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction?

Baseball News

Shohei Ohtani seems to be in baseball news as well as general news every day.  Well he’s been taken off the market again! Baseball star Shohei Ohtani has stunningly revealed he’s married.  Ohtani wrote on 29 February on Instagram in Japanese: “The season is approaching, but I would like to announce to everyone that I have gotten married.”  He said his new wife was a “Japanese woman” without identifying her. He said he would reveal more in an interview; presumably at the Los Angeles Dodgers spring training venue.  The 29-year-old Ohtani is Japan’s biggest celebrity, and there has always been curiosity around his personal life, which he has always kept very private. His focus, and his image, has always been 100%-baseball focused — free of scandals or tabloid news.  As FOD readers are well aware, Ohtani just underwent surgery on his right elbow and will not pitch this season. He will be used as a designated hitter, and the possibility exists he could play in the field.  He moved from the Los Angeles Angels to the Dodgers in December on a record-breaking contract worth $700 million over 10 years.

Jung Hoo Lee is known more for his contact than his power, but the 25-year-old center fielder flashed some impressive pop in the Giants’ 2-1 loss to the D-backs on 29 February afternoon at Salt River Fields at Talking Stick.  Batting leadoff for only the second time this spring, Lee doubled on an 0-2 curveball from Arizona right-hander Ryne Nelson in the top of the first and then drove a 94.7 mph fastball over the right-field fence for a solo shot in the third. Lee’s first Cactus League homer left his bat at 109.7 mph and traveled a Statcast-projected 418 feet.

RHP Tristan Beck, 27, felt his hand go cold after throwing some bullpen sessions early in camp, prompting the Giants to send him back to San Francisco to be evaluated by team doctors on Feb. 27. He ended up visiting a vascular specialist at Stanford, who helped determine that an aneurysm -- an abnormal bulge or ballooning in the wall of a blood vessel -- was the source of the numbness.  Beck said he will undergo surgery at Stanford on March 4 to address the issue, which will rule him out for Opening Day and leave the Giants without their projected No. 5 starter.

It takes a lot to divert Gerrit Cole from the art of pitching, considering he spends his off hours envisioning heaters and sliders puncturing quadrants over home plate. Yet even the reigning American League Cy Young Award winner can’t help but gush about the top of the new-look Yankees lineup.  Yes, it is only the first night in March, but Juan Soto promises to create seismic change in the Bronx this summer. Soto continued to rake on Friday, blasting a double and home run, while Anthony Rizzo homered twice in an 8-4 Grapefruit League romp over the Blue Jays at George M. Steinbrenner Field.  “I knew I would enjoy watching him,” Cole said of Soto. “But, like, I love watching him. It’s a real pleasure to get to watch him. That, I’m thankful for.” 

The second inning on Friday provided an extreme example of how the Yankees envision wearing down opposing pitchers this season; DJ LeMahieu worked a seven-pitch walk, then stole second base with pitcher Juan Nunez distracted by Soto.  Nunez walked Soto on six pitches, then issued a four-pitch free pass to Aaron Judge that loaded the bases. Nunez grooved a fastball to Rizzo, who deposited it over the right-field wall for a grand slam, the stadium lights flickering as he trotted all the way back home.  In another Yankee game this Spring,  Marcus Stroman bounded off the mound at the end of the fourth inning on Saturday, applauding into the soft baby blue leather of his glove. This had been a good day at the office for the Yankees right-hander, having shifted his mechanics to enjoy immediate results.  That will be an ongoing theme for Stroman, who always seems to be adjusting something or other out there; on this afternoon, it was moving his hands slightly higher, trying to keep his delivery compact. His four scoreless innings in New York’s 7-3 Grapefruit League loss to the Orioles on 02 March, suggest that it worked, though Stroman says the world is also clicking in ways that won’t appear in any box score.  On that note, Stroman has found a kindred spirit in Yanks ace Gerrit Cole, (mentioned above) also a professional tinkerer. Their respective arsenals may differ, but Cole said that he has respected Stroman’s dedication to his craft from afar, calling him “one of the true masters of the sinker that we have in this game.”

Spencer Strider of the Atlanta Braves has a long way to go to be in Greg Maddux’s category. But along with possessing one of the game’s best arsenals, the current Braves pitcher possesses an advanced intellect, much like the one that guided Maddux through his Hall of Fame career.  “They are two completely different guys in how they pitch and with their arsenal,” Braves pitching coach Rick Kranitz said. “But the one thing that [is similar] is the way their brain works and the kinds of questions they ask. The great ones are always looking to get better.”  In 2023, Strider became the first Braves pitcher to lead the Majors in strikeouts since John Smoltz in 1996. If he does it again, he would join Warren Spahn in 1950-52 and Tommy Bond in 1877-78 as the only Braves pitchers to do so in multiple years, let alone consecutive ones.

Shota Imanaga was a quick learner in his MLB spring debut.  The Cubs left-hander sparkled at times -- striking out Freddie Freeman in a perfect first inning -- but also allowed a three-run homer by Andy Pages in an 8-5 Cactus League loss to the Dodgers at Camelback Ranch. The outing was Imanaga's first live game action as a Major Leaguer. The 30-year-old led Nippon Professional Baseball with 174 strikeouts last year with Yokohama, then signed a four-year, $53 million deal with the Cubs in January. Imanaga actually went one batter more than two innings. After Pages’ homer, the lefty struck out three straight to end the second inning. Imanaga then struck out Miguel Rojas to lead off the bottom of the third before departing.  It’s looking very promising for this rookie pitcher.

Random Thoughts

Two weeks after she broke the record for women, Caitlin Clark has become NCAA Division I basketball’s overall top scorer, period.  The Iowa Hawkeyes star went into Sunday’s game against the Ohio State Buckeyes needing 18 points to break “Pistol Pete” Maravich’s record of 3,667 career points, which stood for more than 50 years.

And with a second-quarter free throw, she became the top-scoring player — man or woman — in NCAA basketball history.  By the time the final buzzer rang out in Sunday’s game — in which the Hawkeyes beat the Buckeyes 93-83 — Clark had scored 35 points.  Clark’s Sunday total sets the new NCAA scoring record at 3,685 points.  With the scoring record in hand, Clark is now doubtless looking to lead her team, 25-4, to a national title. Last year, they made a run to the NCAA title game, where they lost to LSU.  Maravich’s NCAA men's scoring record was 3,667 points, which he set playing for LSU from 1968 to 1970.

JetBlue Airways and Spirit Airlines on 04 March said they were terminating their merger agreement weeks after losing a federal antitrust lawsuit that challenged the deal. 

A federal judge blocked the attempted merger in January after the Justice Department sued to bar the deal last year alleging the acquisition would stifle competition in the airline industry and eliminate Spirit as a discount alternative for price-conscious travelers.

A very fast car has made a very slow return.  British police said on 04 March they have recovered a Ferrari stolen from Austrian Formula One driver Gerhard Berger in Italy almost three decades ago.  The red Ferrari F512M was one of two sports cars taken while their drivers were in Imola for the San Marino Grand Prix in April 1995. 

Neither was ever found, until London’s Metropolitan Police force was tipped off by the manufacturer in January that a Ferrari in the process of being sold to a U.S. buyer by a U.K. broker had been flagged as a stolen vehicle.  The force’s Organized Vehicle Crime Unit investigated and found the car had been brought to Britain from Japan Ferrari manufactured 501 of the F512M model between 1994 and 1996. The car has a top speed of 196 miles per hour in late 2023. Officers seized the car, which the force said is valued at close to $444,000. My late friend Bob owned one of the 75 F512M produced for the US market.  I got to sit in it on three occasions, but was never offered the opportunity to drive it.  I never asked.

Astronomers have found three previously unknown moons in our solar system — two additional moons circling Neptune and one around Uranus.  The distant tiny moons were spotted using powerful land-based telescopes in Hawaii and Chile, and announced Friday by the International Astronomical Union’s Minor Planet Center.  The latest tally puts Neptune at 16 known moons and Uranus at 28.  One of Neptune’s new moons has the longest known orbital journey yet. It takes around 27 years for the small outer moon to complete one lap aAstronomers have found three previously unknown moons in our solar system — two additional moons circling Neptune and one around Uranus.  The distant tiny moons were spotted using powerful land-based telescopes in Hawaii and Chile, and announced Friday by the International Astronomical Union’s Minor Planet Center.  The latest tally puts Neptune at 16 known moons and Uranus at 28.  One of Neptune’s new moons has the longest known orbital journey yet. It takes around 27 years for the small outer moon to complete one lap around Neptune, the vast icy planet farthest from the sun, said Scott Sheppard, an astronomer at the Carnegie Institution for Science in Washington who helped make the discovery. The new moon orbiting Uranus, with an estimated diameter of just 5 miles (8 kilometers), is likely the smallest of the planet’s moons. round Neptune, the vast icy planet farthest from the sun, said Scott Sheppard, an astronomer at the Carnegie Institution for Science in Washington who helped make the discovery. The new moon orbiting Uranus, with an estimated diameter of just 5 miles (8 kilometers), is likely the smallest of the planet’s moons. 

NASA finally has counted up all the asteroid samples returned by a spacecraft last fall — and it’s double the rubble return goal.  Officials reported 22 February that the Osiris-Rex spacecraft collected 121.6 grams (4.29 ounces) of dust and pebbles from asteroid Bennu. The sample return capsule touched down in the desert on 24 September 2023.  That’s just over half a cup and the biggest cosmic haul ever from beyond the moon. 

It took NASA longer than expected to pry open the sample container because of stuck fasteners. The black, carbon-rich samples — the first ever collected from an asteroid by NASA — are stored at a special curation lab at Houston’s Johnson Space Center.  Osiris-Rex returned the samples last September, three years after gathering them from the asteroid (photo above right - OSIRIS-Rex after landing). The haul for the $1 billion mission would have been greater, but rocks jammed the lid of the container following the grab and some samples floated away.  Fireball has heard a rumor NASA technicians visited their local Harbor Freight store and procured a couple pry bars and some Permatex Anti Seize Lubricant.  It’s important to pick the right tool for the job.  If your only tool is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail.  The spacecraft is now on its way to another space rock, but that will involve only a flyby with no stop for samples.

Astronomers have discovered what may be the brightest object in the universe, a quasar with a black hole at its heart growing so fast that it swallows the equivalent of a sun a day, according to AP.  The record-breaking quasar shines 500 trillion times brighter than our sun. The black hole powering this distant quasar is more than 17 billion times more immense than our sun, an Australian-led team reported Monday in the journal Nature Astronomy.  While the quasar resembles a mere dot in images, scientists envision a ferocious place.  The rotating disk around the quasar’s black hole — the luminous swirling gas and other matter from gobbled-up stars — is like a cosmic hurricane.  The European Southern Observatory spotted the object, J0529-4351, during a 1980 sky survey, but it was thought to be a star. It was not identified as a quasar — the extremely active and luminous core of a galaxy — until last year. Observations by telescopes in Australia and Chile’s Atacama Desert clinched it.  “The exciting thing about this quasar is that it was hiding in plain sight and was misclassified as a star previously,” Yale University’s Priyamvada Natarajan, who was not involved in the study, said in an email.  These later observations and computer modeling have determined that the quasar is gobbling up the equivalent of 370 suns a year — roughly one a day. Further analysis shows the mass of the black hole to be 17 to 19 billion times that of our sun, according to the team. More observations are needed to understand its growth rate.  The quasar is 12 billion light-years away and has been around since the early days of the universe. A light-year is 5.8 trillion miles.

Passengers who book a special Delta flight will have the chance to witness the total solar eclipse in April from a unique vantage point: 30,000 feet in the air.  The airline announced 21 February that it will operate a flight on April 8 from Dallas-Fort Worth to Detroit, timed to give people on board the chance to spend as much time as possible within the eclipse’s “path of totality.” 

The eclipse is expected to be a major event because it will pass over several densely populated areas of North America, crossing Mexico, the continental U.S. and a small part of eastern Canada. In the U.S. alone, millions of skywatchers from Texas to Maine will have the chance to witness the rare astronomical event.

The United States is opening an investigation into whether Chinese vehicle imports pose national security risks and could impose restrictions due to concerns about "connected" car technology, the White House said on 29 February. 

Did anyone doubt China wants to gather all data on users.  The U.S. Commerce Department probe is needed because vehicles "collect large amounts of sensitive data on their drivers and passengers (and) regularly use their cameras and sensors to record detailed information on U.S. infrastructure," the White House said.  As vehicles could "be piloted or disabled remotely" the probe will also look at autonomous vehicles.  "China's policies could flood our market with its vehicles, posing risks to our national security," President Joe Biden said in a statement. "I’m not going to let that happen on my watch."  White House officials told reporters it was too early to say what action might be taken and said there was no decision on a potential ban or restrictions on connected Chinese vehicles.  Biden called the effort an "unprecedented action to ensure that cars on U.S. roads from countries of concern like China do not undermine our national security."  However China is in negotiations with Mexican authorities to manufacture Chinese EV and other vehicles in Mexico.  As Mexican vehicles they could be imported to the US.  Chinese manufacturers are government subsidized and receive priority on battery materials, making them very cost effective against other EVs.

Nearly a year after TikTok’s CEO was grilled on Capitol Hill, House Republicans and Democrats are joining together on legislation that would force its parent company, China-based ByteDance, to divest the popular social media company or risk the U.S.’s banning it from app stores.  The bill is co-authored by the bipartisan leaders of the select committee on the Chinese Communist Party, Chairman Mike Gallagher, R-Wis., and ranking member Raja Krishnamoorthi, D-Ill., who also serve on the Intelligence Committee. Both lawmakers recently returned from a visit to Taiwan and the greater Indo-Pacific region.

Boeing Given 90 Days To Establish Plan To Improve Safety and Quality

The Federal Aviation Administration said 28 February it’s giving Boeing 90 days to come up with a plan to fix quality problems and meet safety standards for building planes after a plug door panel blew off a brand-new Boeing 737 Max jetliner last month.  The agency said the directive followed all-day meetings Tuesday with top Boeing officials at FAA headquarters in Washington.  “Boeing must commit to real and profound improvements,” said FAA Administrator Mike Whitaker. “Making foundational change will require a sustained effort from Boeing’s leadership, and we are going to hold them accountable every step of the way.” 

It’s the Fireball opinion Boeing must ensure accountability of its quality and safety procedures, but that improved attitude must extend itself to every aspect of Boeing’s manufacturing processes across all aircraft lines of production.  Boeing CEO David Calhoun said that “we have a clear picture of what needs to be done” because of company and independent reviews. “Boeing will develop the comprehensive action plan with measurable criteria that demonstrates the profound change that Administrator Whitaker and the FAA demand.”  The FAA did not indicate what action it might take if Boeing fails to meet the 90-day deadline. 

The FAA is currently completing an audit of assembly lines at the Renton, WA factory near Seattle, where Boeing builds planes all 737 Max, P-8 and in the future E-7 aircraft. (photo right - P-8) The FAA forensic Investigators of the plug door mishap say bolts that help keep the panel in place were missing after repair work at the Boeing factory by Boeing personnel.  Whitaker toured the 737 factory two weeks ago. He met with FAA inspectors who are reviewing Boeing’s operations and talked with Boeing engineers and mechanics about safety issues, according to the FAA. 

This week, a panel of industry, government and academic experts issued a report that found shortcomings in the safety culture at Boeing, which the company says it has been working to improve. (photo right - B-7A Wedgetail) Earlier this month, Boeing replaced the executive who had overseen the 737 program since early 2021 and said it was increasing inspections at the 737 plant in Renton, Washington.  In yet another development, the Justice Department has started a criminal investigation into the Alaska Airlines incident where a door panel blew out mid-air two months ago, The Wall Street Journal reported Saturday.  The newspaper, citing documents and people familiar with the matter, said investigators have contacted passengers, pilots and flight attendants on Flight 1282 on Jan. 5 heading to Ontario, California from Portland, Oregon, where the plug door came off the incident aircraft forcing the crew to make an emergency landing.  The investigation would help the DOJ it’s in review of whether Boeing complied with an previous settlement of a federal investigation into two fatal 737 Max crashes in 2018 and 2019, the Journal said.

Boeing In Talks To Reacquire Spirit AeroSystems

In another Boeing story, Boeing is in talks to buy back Spirit Aerosystems, which makes fuselages for Boeing’s 737 Max jets, according to a person familiar with the matter, as both companies scramble to stamp out manufacturing flaws on the top-selling plane.  Boeing in 2005 spun off operations in Kansas and Oklahoma that became the present-day Spirit Aerosystems. About 70% of Spirit’s revenue last year came from Boeing, and about a quarter comes from making parts for Boeing’s main rival, Airbus.  The repurchase talks were first reported by the Wall Street Journal.  Boeing has disclosed several production problems and quality flaws on the fuselages that Spirit makes, including incorrectly drilled holes and incorrect spacing on some fuselage components, problems that slowed deliveries of new jets to airlines.

American Airlines Orders 260 New Aircraft Including Boeing 737 MAX 10s

American Airlines said on 04 March that it is ordering 260 new narrow-body jets, including dozens of Boeing’s long-delayed 737 Max 10.  The order includes 85 of Boeing’s 737 Max 10 planes and 85 of the Airbus A321neo, aircraft it says will help it upgauge on domestic and short-haul international routes.  The Fort Worth, Texas-based airline is also ordering 90 Embraer E175 planes. 

American’s order is a vote of confidence for Boeing, which is struggling with a series of production flaws and certifications of new planes that have taken years longer than originally expected. Scott Kirby, the CEO of rival carrier United Airlines, said earlier this year that his airline has been weighing fleet plans without its Max 10s because of the delays.  American said it would also convert orders for 30 Boeing 737 Max 8 planes, a model that is already a staple of its fleet, into the larger 737 Max 10s.  American is planning to grow its first class on some of its narrow-body planes, the carrier also said Monday alongside its first investor day in more than six years. Starting in 2025, it will revamp its older Airbus A320 and A319 planes to increase the number of first-class seats.  Airlines have been grappling with high demand for first class and other premium seats as more customers rack up points with credit cards and appear willing to shell out for more space on board.

Jack Teixeira Will Plead Guilty in Massive Leak of Documents

Massachusetts Air National Guard member Jack Teixeira pleaded guilty on 04 March to leaking highly classified military documents about the war in Ukraine and other national security secrets under a deal with prosecutors that calls for him to serve at least 11 years in prison. Teixeira, of North Dighton, Massachusetts, pleaded guilty to six counts of willful retention and transmission of national defense information under the Espionage Act nearly a year after he was arrested in the most consequential national security leak in years.  Just days before federal prosecutors on 29 February filed a motion notifying the judge Teixeira intended to change his earlier plea of not guilty. Teixeira was accused of using his top-secret security clearance to access classified government computer networks on an Air Force base in Cape Cod, where he worked with a unit providing intelligence support to the military. A Washington Post investigation revealed that, while Teixeira was serving in the Massachusetts Air National Guard, he shared hundreds of classified documents as well as his own summaries of classified reports on Discord, an online chat platform popular with video gamers.  Teixeira’s leaks revealed information about the Russia-Ukraine war, China’s development of hypersonic spy drones, North Korea’s nuclear weapons development, conflicts in the Middle East and the Ukrainian sabotage of the Nord Stream natural gas pipeline.  Teixeira, 22, was arrested last April and charged with six counts of illegal retention and transmission of national defense information. If he had been found guilty at trial, he would have faced a prison sentence of 30 years to life, according to federal sentencing guidelines. A guilty plea suggests Teixeira will serve substantially less time.  It’s the Fireball opinion life without the possibility of parole would be a better sentence and send a message to others who might consider betraying their country.

US Military Airdrops Humanitarian Aid Into Gaza

US military C-130 cargo planes dropped food in pallets over Gaza on Saturday in the opening stage of an emergency humanitarian assistance authorized by President Joe Biden after more than 100 Palestinians who had surged to pull goods off an aid convoy were killed during a chaotic encounter with Israeli troops.  On 05 March a second airdrop delivered more than 36K MREs dropped on beaches in Gaza.  The Fireball opinion is this action has been delayed to the detriment of innocent people in Gaza.  If you want to get more aid into Gaza, Mr. President, start throttling back military aid to Israel.  A new poll released 05 March shows that a sizable majority of voters who backed President Joe Biden in 2020 oppose weapons shipments to Israel, the latest sign that Israel’s offensive in Gaza remains a political liability for the president’s reelection campaign.  The Fireball opinion is Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will be removed as Prime Minister once the fighting in Gaza stops.  He presided over Israel when the October attacks by Hamas occurred and there is evidence Israel had knowledge the Hamas attack plan well in advance of the actual attacks. The US continues to push for a two party peace plan when neither Israeli nor the Palestinians favor or support a two party plan. Three planes from Air Forces Central dropped 66 bundles containing about 38,000 meals into Gaza on 02 March. The bundles were dropped in southwest Gaza, on the beach along the territory’s Mediterranean coast, one U.S. official said. The airdrop was coordinated with the Royal Jordanian Air Force, which said it had two food airdrops Saturday in northern Gaza and has conducted several rounds in recent months.  “The combined operation included U.S. Air Force and RJAF C-130 aircraft and respective Army Soldiers specialized in aerial delivery of supplies, built bundles and ensured the safe drop of food aid,” U.S. Central Command said in a post on “X”, formerly known as Twitter.  The airdrop is expected to be the first of many, U.S. Central Command said.  President Joe Biden on Friday announced the U.S. would begin air-dropping food to starving Gazans after at least 115 Palestinians were killed and hundreds more wounded in the Thursday attack as they scrambled for aid, the Health Ministry in Hamas-ruled Gaza said.  Hundreds of people had rushed about 30 trucks bringing a predawn delivery of aid to the north. Palestinians said nearby Israeli troops shot into the crowds. Israel said they fired warning shots toward the crowd and insisted many of the dead were trampled.  Firing “warning shots” toward a crowd IS shooting into the crowd.  White House national security spokesperson John Kirby said Friday that the airdrops were being planned to deliver emergency humanitarian assistance in a safe way to people on the ground. The United States believes the airdrops will help address the dire situation in Gaza, but they are no replacement for trucks, which can transport far more aid more effectively, though Thursday’s events also showed the risks with ground transport.  Again Mr. President, the way to get more aid in is to decrease military support for Israel.  Kirby said the airdrops have an advantage over trucks because planes can move aid to a particular location very quickly. But in terms of volume, the airdrops will be “a supplement to, not a replacement for moving things in by ground.”  The Air Force’s C-130 has been used in years past to airdrop humanitarian into Afghanistan, Iraq, Haiti and other locations and the airframe is used in an annual multi-national “Operation Christmas Drop” that air drops pallets of toys, supplies, nonperishable food and fishing supplies to remote locations in the Federated States of Micronesia and the Republic of Palau (mentioned later in another FOD article below).  Since the war began on Oct. 7, Israel has barred entry of food, water, medicine and other supplies, except for a trickle of aid entering the south from Egypt at the Rafah crossing and Israel’s Kerem Shalom crossing.  The United Nations says one-quarter of Gaza’s 2.3 million people face starvation. Aid officials have said that airdrops are not an efficient means of distributing aid and are a measure of last resort. Comments desired.

AI Likely To Create More Jobs Then Originally Thought

Friends of FOD have seen numerous pieces of information about how powerful Artificial Intelligence (AI) can be and some of the unanticipated consequences unbridled AI could bring.  We know that throughout history, there have been concerns that new technologies would lead to widespread job displacement. In 2013, Oxford researchers estimated that 47% of US jobs were vulnerable to automation. Fast forward a decade, and the unemployment rate is still not that high, with 3.8% unemployment in the US and 9.6 million job openings, defying those dire predictions. More recent studies indicate that AI tools such as DALL-E and ChatGPT could automate a large portion of the US workforce, affecting up to 80% of jobs.  According to a report by Goldman Sachs, AI  has the potential to replace approximately 300 million full-time positions, accounting for about a quarter of work tasks in the US and Europe. However, this shift may also lead to new employment opportunities and a 7% boost in the annual global production of goods and services. Hence, we see why some experts believe that technology tends to create more jobs than it eliminates. For instance, ATMs initially reduced the number of bank tellers and lowered branch operating costs.  However this led to more branches and, consequently, more bank teller jobs. On the other hand, while spreadsheets reduced the need for bookkeepers, they increased the demand for financial managers and accountants, resulting in a net job gain. However, there is also no denying that AI is disrupting industries and jobs, which will certainly change the nature of work and wages for employees and, in some cases, hurt job growth initially.  We must then realize losing one’s job doesn’t mean the end of working.  Humans and particularly Americans don’t just stop working if they lose their job.  They work at getting a new job with a different company or organization where their talents can lead to greater incomes and enhanced job satisfaction.  I lost a job as a senior test pilot, safety officer and flight test plan manager when the company I worked for declared bankruptcy.  I spent every day for six months looking for another pilot position.  My job was to get a job!  It wasn’t easy, but the experience taught me important lessons regarding interview techniques, how to summarize past successes and be able to discuss disappointments, what you learned from the experience and how you rebounded from them.  Friends of FOD recall my recommendations regarding NVIDIA Corporation and their successes regarding chip computer chip development and performance.  NVDIA has achieved remarkable progress in the field of AI, particularly in the development of AI workstations equipped with NVIDIA Corp. Ada Generation GPUs and AMD Ryzen Threadripper PRO processors.  These work stations bring data-center level AI computing capabilities to professionals’ desktops enabling them to efficiently handle resource intensive AI workflows locally. 

They can train smaller AI models and support local inference while reducing the load on data centers and the cloud, ultimately saving on costs.  Furthermore, the devices facilitate advances visual workflows, making them suitable for content creation, industrial digitations, simulation and design.  While promising for AI development and growth, these developments also have the potential to disrupt and impact jobs across different industries.  As AI becomes more accessible on personal workstations, the demand for specialized AI professionals to perform tasks traditionally done in data centers may decrease and could potentially displace workers who lack the necessary AI skills. On the other hand NVIDIA has introduced an exciting AI system called Eureka, which has the potential to teach robots to do complex tasks automatically.  Moreover, it allows engineers to provide feedback and suggestions for enhancing the robot’s reinforcement methods.  Eureka has outperformed human-written code in more that 80% of tested robot actions with a 52% boost in robot performance.  NVIDIA has demonstrated by the exceptions performance of its AI systems, tasks previously performed by humans may now be automated by these intelligent robots, potentially leading to a reduction in certain types of jobs.  To exemplify how companies have responded to the growth of AI, consider the recent announcements by International Business Machines (NYSE: IBM).  IBM, where my Dad worked for 35 years plans of halting hiring as it aims to replace approximately 7800 jobs with AI in the near future.  The hiring freeze will mainly impact back-office roles, such as those in human resources, with a projection that 30% of non-customer-facing positions could be automated within five years.  Realizing how deeply integrated AI is everywhere, IBM has decided to address the global AI skills gap by aiming to train 2 million individuals in AI within three years, focusing particularly on underrepresented communities. As highlighted in a recent International Business Machines Corp, Institute of Business Value study, 40% of surveyed executives foresee reskilling their workforce due to AI and automation, especially those in entry-level roles. To achieve its ambitious goal, IBM will extend its partnerships with universities worldwide and offer faculty and students access to AI education resources, including certificates for completion. Furthermore, IBM’s SkillsBuild program will introduce a new generative AI course roadmap with free courses in machine learning and AI-enhanced chatbot support. These courses will allow participants to earn IBM-branded digital credentials recognized by potential employers.  IBM’s dedication builds on its existing objective to upskill 30 million people by 2030 and is a response to the urgent workforce needs in the face of AI and digitalization. Since 2021, over 7 million learners have enrolled in IBM’s courses. To list the positions AI will create, Fireball followed some credible sources like the World Economic Forum, Forbes, the Guardian and Linkedin.  Examples include, but are not limited to:

AI Instructors needed to educate and upskill employees in AI applications.

Virtual Store Sherpas are expected to grow exponentially due to the increase owing to the growing popularity of virtual and augmented reality technologies in retail.  As business embrace these immersive shopping experiences, there will be a greater need for experts to guide shoppers and troubleshoot technical issues.

Advisory AI Consultants

AI Content Creators

Man-machine Teaming Managers

Sentiment Analyzer:  Analyzing blogs, posts, ratings, and other content with generative AI to gauge customers' sentiment and their perception of your products and services can

be quite challenging due to the lack of contextual understanding in these tools. To extract meaningful insights, a human with emotional intelligence and a deep understanding of context will be required to interpret the collected content. 

AI Data Annotators

AI Product Manager: individuals responsible for conceiving, developing, and managing artificial intelligence-driven products. They will define product strategy and collaborate with cross-functional teams while overseeing the product development lifecycle. 

AI Ethicists are individuals more concerned with the broader ethical implications of AI technology. They focus on the moral and philosophical aspects of AI, such as bias, fairness, transparency, accountability, and the impact on society.  Their role is theoretical and advisory in nature and becomes very important if Congress doesn’t step up to the plate and set guidelines of AI development and utilization.  FOD sees an overall increase in jobs, but Congress must establish limits and guidelines for users and firms who employ AI. 

 Use Russian Seized Assets to Honor Navalny and Empower Ukraine

President Joe Biden announced more than 500 sanctions on Russia on 23 February over its war in Ukraine and the death of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny two weeks ago in prison — the largest tranche since the conflict began, the administration said.  Fireball is disappointed the sanctions were not stronger.  Russia and Putin only respect power and money. These sanctions will be salutary but not determinative in cutting off Putin’s ability to fund his aggression in Ukraine.  February 24th marked the beginning of a third year since Russia invaded Ukraine.  We must recognize this is a bigger picture than just Russia and Ukraine.  We are at an important moment in history where the US must stand and lead the world against totalitarianism while supporting the rule of law, freedom and democracy in the world order.  What can the US and our allies do?  The US must lead in a move that international law permits and that morality demands.  There are approximately $7 billion of the Russian Central Bank’s frozen reserves sitting idle in US banks and approximately $325 billion frozen in other banks worldwide.  Alexei Navalny's horrific murder in a Russian penal camp represents a profound loss for the cause of free speech, democracy, and human rights around the world.  Navalny's determined battle against corruption and authoritarianism in Russia made him an emblem of resistance against President Vladimir Putin's regime. It also made him a target, as Fireball mentioned in a previous blog edition.  As he has done to silence other critics, Putin had Navalny poisoned with Novichok nerve agent in August 2020.  Then, once healthy enough to travel, Navalny courageously returned to Russia, only to have Putin throw him into prison on bogus charges.  Navalny's demise was reported in terms not even Orwell could invent, as "sudden death syndrome."  It reminds Fireball of an event from my youth in a Mafia driven town where some soul was murdered and there were seven bullet holes in the car trunk where he was found.  The local police commenting it was the worst case of suicide they had ever seen.  Whatever the immediate technique that caused Navalny's death, Putin is responsible and must be held accountable. But, more than mere condemnation, his killing demands action—action that aligns with the principles Navalny embodied and undermines the tyranny he fought, the same tyranny Ukrainians have valiantly resisted since Russian forces first invaded their country.  President Biden, having warned Putin in 2021 that there would be "devastating consequences" for Moscow if Navalny died in Russian custody, now faces a pivotal moment. His leadership of the global response to this outrage must be swift and strong.  It is widely accepted that when the President declared the crisis in Ukraine to be a national emergency in March 2023, the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) automatically gave him full legal authority to transfer frozen Russian assets to aid Ukraine. Such seizure and strategic reallocation of those frozen assets offers a potent tool in American law to penalize the Kremlin while bolstering Ukraine's defense against Russia's ongoing aggression.  House Speaker Mike Johnson's unconscionable refusal to take up a bipartisan aid package in the House that would pass with overwhelming support makes it clear that waiting for Congress makes no sense. President Biden should not expect the Trump led House republicans to offer up any supplemental aid for Ukraine.  (Trump is still angry Ukraine didn’t/wouldn’t open an internal investigation regarding Hunter Biden when Trump was president.)  Among other things, even if the Speaker relents and advances supplemental appropriations as he surely ought to do, U.S. aid alone could not fully meet the over $450 billion cost of rebuilding Ukraine's cities from the carnage of the Russian onslaught.  With the afore mentioned $7 billion of the Russian Central Bank's frozen reserves sitting idle in U.S. banks, we have a unique opportunity to redirect Russia's ill-gotten gains toward repairing and redressing the damage inflicted by Russia's ongoing illegal invasion of Ukraine, a step we know is fully consistent with the international law of proportionate countermeasures.  European leaders as well as those in the U.K. have begun to take steps along these lines. By doing so, they are making vital progress toward transferring the over $325 billion in frozen Russian assets held in banks abroad, under the control of democracies that recognize the existential threat that Ukraine's collapse under Russia's lawless assault would pose to the free world. But they are holding back, waiting for us to make clear that the United States will step up to the plate.  The meeting two weeks ago of the G7 Foreign Ministers missed the opportunity to advance this initiative. U.S. leadership at this inflection point in history can and should be an important catalyst both for broader collective action by the G7 countries in seizing frozen Russian assets, and for ensuring that transfers to Ukraine are transparent and effective in supporting the Ukrainian people's struggle for their democracy. Additionally these actions would send a strong message to China regarding their efforts to overrun Taiwan.  China likewise has billions of dollars in US and western banks.  Should Russia seize private capital to retaliate, it would only hasten its own economic collapse as foreign investors flee their already-crumbling economy. In any event, as FOD readers recall the legacy of Munich Agreement of 30 September1938, the US and our allies must realize that letting the aggressor's threats deter essential action is the path to catastrophe.  Referring to the Munich Agreement upon his return to Britain in 1938, PM Neville Chamberlain delivered his controversial "peace for our time" speech to crowds in London.   Within months Europe was embroiled in a world war.  There could be no better way to honor the legacy of the martyred Alexei Navalny than to use the corrupt wealth of the Kremlin to advance the values he championed. Ukraine hangs by a thread while Republicans in Congress vacation and dither. The least the Biden Administration can do is release assets that the Russian bear will never be able to reclaim in order to defend the nation it has vowed to swallow.  While we mourn Alexei Navalny's death, while tragic, and it must not be in vain. His cruel and criminal assassination is a call to action for the global community to stand firmly for the right to dissent and hold corrupt autocrats accountable. To hesitate is to let Ukraine suffer at Putin's hands in the same way Navalny did and the same way the Munich Agreement provided for the German annexation of part of Czechoslovakia called the Sudetenland, where more than three million people lived.  Let us seize this moment to reaffirm our commitment to democracy, human rights, and the rule of law. By acting decisively, we can turn a dark moment into a beacon of hope and solidarity and honor Alexei Navalny's memory through action. The US must lead in a move that international law permits and that morality demands. FOD reader comments are solicited and appreciated. 

Defeated President Trump’s Vision for the Military In His Second Administration: Hunting Cartels, Patrolling US Cities, Quelling Dissent

“Military officials,” Donald Trump told a crowd at a rally in Iowa this past October, are “some of the dumbest people I ever met in my life.”  It wasn’t the first time the Republican front-runner and former defeated president offered his opinions on those who have served. During his first presidential campaign, Trump famously belittled John McCain, who was shot down during a bombing mission over Vietnam in 1967, and spent more than five years as a prisoner of war.  “I like people that weren’t captured, OK?” he said. Later, after McCain died, Trump reportedly complained to his aides about half-masted flags. “What the fuck are we doing that for?” he asked. “That Guy was a fucking loser.”  As president in 2018, he is also documented as saying veterans buried in military cemeteries “losers” and referred to the 1,800 Americans who died at Belleau Wood, the famous 1918 Marine Corps battle, as “suckers.”  And in 2020, after he contracted Covid, Trump suggested that Gold Star families he had recently met with were to blame.  At the same time, Trump also clearly relished the pomp and circumstance of the military during his time as president. He understood the value of an institution still highly respected in American society, and its utility as a tool to get things he wanted accomplished.  At the height of the Black Lives Matter protests in 2020, Trump had Gen. Mark Milley, then the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, accompany him as he walked across Lafayette Square for a photo op, while local and federal law enforcement dispersed protestors with tear gas, rubber bullets, and flash grenades. Milley quickly apologized, saying he believed he was going to be reviewing National Guard troops at the square.  He threatened military force against North Korea. He sent thousands of active-duty troops to the U.S. border with Mexico, augmenting National Guard units there. He diverted billions of dollars of Pentagon funding to help build his radically unsuccessful border wall.  He floated other ideas, too—shooting civilian protestors, for instance, which he asked then-Defense Secretary Mark Esper about, according to Esper’s memoir. Reporting from The New Yorker and other outlets has detailed how Esper, Milley, and other officials intervened to prevent the military from being overtly politicized in the run-up to the 2020 election and Jan. 6. In January 2021, all 10 former living defense secretaries wrote a public letter urging the peaceful transfer of power amid Trump’s false insistence that the election was stolen.  So what have Trump and his loyalists said about how they might use the military in a second term? The War Horse reviewed campaign and policy videos, speeches by Trump, and other reporting that addresses the question. Here’s what we learned.  If he says he’s going to it – he will!

1. USE MILITARY FORCE AGAINST DRUG CARTELS

In a policy video released in December, 2023, Trump said that, as president, he would declare drug cartels “foreign terrorist organizations” and order the defense department to use “Special Forces, cyber warfare, and other overt and covert actions to inflict maximum damage on cartel leadership, infrastructure, and operations.”  Last spring, Rolling Stone reported that Trump had asked advisers for military options to “attack Mexico” if he’s reelected. One policy paper from The Center for Renewing America, a think tank staffed by Trump administration veterans, lays out justifications for “waging war” on drug cartels. Esper, the former defense secretary, also revealed that Trump had asked about the possibility of launching missiles into Mexico to target drug labs during his first term.  Trump has suggested he would convince the Mexican government to support such military action—obviously a tough sell. “Armed foreigners cannot intervene in our territory,” then-President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said after Trump first suggested designating cartels as terrorists, in 2019.  Trump has also proposed using Navy and Coast Guard ships to stop the flow of drugs on the water. In 2020, Trump increased the number of U.S. military ships and aircraft in the Caribbean; his campaign video promises a “full naval embargo” of the cartels.  Christopher Fettweis, a political science professor at Tulane University, says that’s unlikely, and that such actions would essentially stop trade with Mexico.  “You can try to hide fentanyl precursor chemicals in a lot of different ways.  Are we going to go through every cargo ship going into Mexican ports? There’s no way.”  Further, certain military actions Trump has suggested might be illegal, and any larger-scale operations run the risk of pulling U.S. military resources into another lengthy quagmire—“then it’s about essentially a guerrilla war against a criminal organization,” Fettweis says. “If your primary tool is a hammer, everything’s going to look like a nail. But it’s not the case that every problem can be solved through military force.” 

2. RID THE MILITARY OF “MARXISM” AND “COMMUNISM” 

It’s no surprise that Trump has promised to reinstate the ban on transgender people serving in the military that he rolled out during his first term. And he has said he would bring back service members removed for failing to adhere to the Covid vaccine mandate “with an apology” and back pay.  Trump’s failed Covid policy is responsible for unwarranted deaths of American citizens while at the same time encouraging top health officials to study the injection of bleach in the human body.  Trump and those in his orbit have also been hinting at broader ideological screening in the military. References to Marxism and communism are increasingly used as dog-whistle references to diversity, equity, and inclusion programs, which Trump has repeatedly promised to end throughout the military and the federal government at large. “We have to get political correctness out of our military,” Trump said at a campaign rally in 2022.  “The woke generals should be fired immediately.”  In the Heritage Foundation’s most recent Mandate for Leadership—a blueprint for Republican governance it has published prior to every presidential administration since 1981—the chapter on the military calls for “rigorously review[ing]” all flag officer promotions to see if officers have prioritized things like climate change or “social engineering.”  Military candidates already undergo a battery of screening—medical, mental health, physical fitness, “moral character” assessments. The Pentagon also screens for evidence of gang-related and extremist behavior.  “There’s already ideological screening within the military,” says Rachel VanLandingham, a former military lawyer who teaches national security law at Southwestern Law School. “Congress has told the Department of Defense to, for example, look for gang-related symbols, because we don’t want extremists within the military. But then it becomes, ‘What is the definition of an extremist?” Trump would also likely reinstate an executive order implemented during his final weeks in office in 2020.  Known as Schedule F, it could reclassify tens of thousands of career civil servants who deal with policy issues throughout the federal government, stripping them of long-standing protections, and making them easier to fire and replace with Trump loyalists. Axios, which reported extensively on the plan in 2022, has said it could affect the intelligence community, civilian defense employees, and the justice and state departments. Trump said as much in a 2022 rally in South Carolina. “We will pass critical reforms making every executive branch employee fireable—fireable, by the president of the United States,” he told the crowd there, to cheers.

3. DEPLOY THE MILITARY AGAINST CIVILIAN PROTESTORS 

Last year, the Washington Post reported that Trump loyalists were drafting plans to potentially mobilize the military against demonstrators as soon as his first day back in office. The justification would ostensibly come from the Insurrection Act, a law that traces its roots to the earliest days of the republic and allows the president to use the military or federalize the National Guard “whenever the President considers that unlawful obstructions, combinations, or assemblages, or rebellion against the authority of the United States make it impracticable to enforce the laws of the United States.”  “The Insurrection Act essentially gives the president unilateral authority to make those determinations,” says Gregory Foster, who teaches courses in civil-military relations at the National Defense University.  Since its inception more than 230 years ago, U.S. presidents have invoked the Insurrection Act 30 times. The first was George Washington, who used it to suppress the Whiskey Rebellion, a violent protest by Pennsylvania grain farmers against the newly imposed “whiskey tax.” Most recently, in 1992, President George H.W. Bush employed the act to call up 400 soldiers and Marines to supplement National Guard units deployed in the aftermath of the 1992 riots in Los Angeles.  During the 2020 protests over George Floyd’s death, Trump administration officials reportedly drafted a proclamation to invoke the Insurrection Act to use federal troops to clear protestors, but did not use it. “I think one of the implicit assumptions that we make about sound civil-military relations [is that] it’s predicated on the notion that it involves a commander in chief who acts in good faith as a responsible agent of the state, and employs the military prudently and judiciously in the public interest on matters of necessity,” Foster says. But there’s nothing in the law that makes any of that assumption a precondition for invoking it. “He could view anything that causes him discomfort or seems to stand in the way of what he wants to accomplish as a proper basis for employing the military,” Foster says.

4. USE THE MILITARY TO BUILD DETENTION CAMPS AND NATIONAL GUARD TROOPS TO ROUND UP MIGRANTS FOR MASS DEPORTATIONS.

Reporting from New York Times last fall revealed that military troops are integral to immigration plans Trump allies are developing.  Troops at the southern border aren’t that unusual—both Republican and Democratic presidents, including Biden, have sent units, as have multiple governors, including some whose states are far from border states.  But Rolling Stone has reported that Trump allies are talking about hundreds of thousands of troops.  Military troops—including the National Guard, when mobilized by the president rather than a state governor—are subject to posse comitatus, the statute that largely bars the military from acting in a domestic law enforcement capacity. “[If] they’re just putting up concertina wire and providing logistical support to fly a helicopter from X to A to B, then that’s fine,” VanLandingham says.  The Stafford Act similarly permits states to request federal troops to assist with disaster relief. Those troops are also subject to posse comitatus.  But Trump might not need to call up the Guard himself. When troops are mobilized by a state governor, they can act as law enforcement—like the new Texas Tactical Border Force.  “I think the Guard is attractive because [Trump] can get governors to relinquish guard units to deal with a situation,” Foster says.

5. DEPLOY THE NATIONAL GUARD INTO AMERICAN CITIES STRUGGLING WITH CRIME AND MENTAL ILLNESS

In a 2022 speech at the America First Policy Institute Summit, Trump said he was unwilling to wait for governors to mobilize the National Guard in cities where he sees problems. “We shouldn’t be doing that anymore,” he told supporters. “When governors refuse to protect their people, we need to bring in what’s necessary anyway. We have to go beyond the governor.”  Such authority would ostensibly come, again, from the Insurrection Act. “It allows for federalized troops, the Guard or the standing U.S. military to be used for law enforcement purposes within the United States,” VanLandingham says. The only real guardrail, she says, is that those troops would theoretically be required to respect other fundamental rights.  “The Insurrection Act does not suspend the rest of the Constitution,” she says.  In his speech at the America First Policy Institute Summit, Trump seemed to push for an expanded definition of law enforcement, lumping homeless and mentally ill people in with criminals. He said the government had a duty to use whatever tools at its disposal to “clean out the mess.”  In a video released on TruthSocial last spring, Trump said, “When I’m back in the White House, we will use every tool, lever, and authority to get the homeless off our streets.” Homeless people, Trump said, would be arrested and relocated to “large parcels of inexpensive land.”  Of course, political candidates say all sorts of things to rile up their base—Trump himself raised plenty of ideas in his first political run that did not come to fruition. On the other hand, many did.  “It deserves public scrutiny,” VanLandingham says of Trump’s comments about the military generally. “If someone tells you that’s what they’re going to do, you should believe them.”  FOD readers are invited and encouraged to comment.

European States Gather Soviet-Style Artillery Rounds for Ukraine

Let’s face it – Ukraine has retained a rather large stockpile of Soviet-Era arms.  Several European nations have sourced hundreds of thousands of Russian 122-millimeter artillery rounds from abroad to donate to Ukraine, a move that experts say will help bridge Kyiv’s ammunition shortage against invading Russian forces during this critical time of the war.  The artillery pieces themselves are not nearly as capable nor do they possess the interoperability of western, particularly US howitzers.   The latest military package bound for Ukraine, announced this month by the German government, included over 120,000 artillery projectiles of the Soviet-standard caliber. The Berlin government specified that the deliveries were coming from industry stocks financed with public funds.  Local newspaper Der Spiegel reported that rounds were ordered from Bulgaria, a key producer of this type of ammunition in Europe.  “Most of Ukraine’s artillery is still from the Soviet era – standards were 122mm, 130mm and 152mm, so getting more of this caliber ammunition for Kyiv is valuable,” Mark Cancian, senior adviser for the International Security Program at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies, said.  Ukrainian forces still rely on older equipment, including the D-30 or 2S1 Gvozdika howitzers, which can only fire non-NATO rounds.  At the Munich Conference, the President of the Czech Republic, Petr Pavel, said his government was also able to source nearly one million rounds from abroad, including 800,000 of the 155mm type and 300,000 of the 122mm type.  He added that the ammunition could be sent swiftly to the embattled country if funding was secured from other allies.  “Buying ammunition on the world market makes a lot of sense because of limits on what Europe and the U.S. can produce – Washington has done a lot of that already, having provided 200,000 152mm, 40,000 130mm, and 40,000 of 122mm type,” Cancian said.  A recent report by the CSIS think tank noted that shortages of Soviet-standard shells – 122mm and 152mmm – have gradually decreased the value of Soviet-era artillery. While the United States has scouted the globe to buy this type of ammunition, Cancian says that some states may just be more inclined to sell it to nations other than the U.S.  “There are likely some countries who will sell to the Czech Republic but not the U.S. and who may also want to remain anonymous,” he said.  Nick Reynolds, research fellow for Land Warfare at the London-based RUSI think tank, said Ukraine should still strive to convert its artillery equipment to the NATO standard over time, as newer munitions are superior in explosive power, range and accuracy.  But, he added, “the scale of the war and the material requirements are enormous. Ukraine is firing 155mm shells and wearing out 155mm barrels far faster than either can be produced in Europe.”

Three Island Nations Show How US is Failing To Stand Up To China

The Biden administration has supposedly set priorities for Pacific Island nations to be able to unite against the Chinese creeping into every nation in the Indio-Pacific region. But words are not enough.  Action is required and now!  As Congress dithers on numerous issues that appear daily in the news cycle; small but very meaningful appropriations are also risking US resolve to support our allies abroad.  As Congress continues to struggle to pass national security funding, there’s plenty of concern about the impact for Ukraine and Israel. But Asian and Pacific allies are also watching anxiously as Washington dithers. For three small but important island countries in the northern Pacific, U.S. neglect could be a push into China’s waiting arms.  Most Americans don’t spend a lot of time thinking about the Marshall Islands, Micronesia and Palau.  Although these countries have less than 1 million residents put together, they make up hundreds of islands that span a strategic and increasingly contested part of the Pacific Ocean.  Their importance was demonstrated during World War II, when U.S. troops fought to free them from Japanese control. After they became independent, they struck agreements with Washington, called Compacts of Free Association, whereby the United States gives them economic assistance and provides for their defense.  The Biden administration wisely negotiated renewals of these COFA agreements last year. But Congress has yet to appropriate the roughly $2 billion needed to fulfill the terms of the new 20-year deals — and by September, all three of the previous agreements will have expired (two have expired already). Ambassador Joseph Yun, who led the negotiations as a special envoy for the State Department, has stated the delay is undermining U.S. relationships at the worst possible time.  “For all three of them, they know the benefits of having a relationship with us, they want the relationship with us, but they are quite frustrated,” Yun, now retired, said in an interview. “Every day we don’t do this, our credibility takes a hit.”  Meanwhile, China is expanding its influence in the Pacific islands using various tactics, such as financing local politicians, offering military support and pushing development projects with strings attached. Last year, Beijing signed a security cooperation agreement with the Solomon Islands. In January, China convinced Nauru to dump its diplomatic recognition of Taiwan. Just this week, Chinese police were reportedly spotted operating in Kiribati, one of the Pacific islands closest to Hawaii.  “China has been very aggressive in the Southern part of the South Pacific … and now they have started playing in our backyard,” Yun said. “We must not take our eyes off of what we are trying to do in the Indo-Pacific.  Our attention is drifting.” The president of Palau told senators this month that China is eagerly waiting for Washington to stumble. The Chinese government has promised to “fill every hotel room” in the country and provide other financial incentives, if Palau switches allegiances. When economic incentives fail, Beijing turns to uglier tactics. The president of the Marshall Islands wrote to senators that after his previous stance to oppose Chinese encroachment, Beijing bribed members of his parliament to attempt to topple his government.  The US funding has broad bipartisan support in Congress. Forty-eight members of the House wrote last week to Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), urging him to include the funding in the next possible legislative vehicle. “Failing to ratify these agreements negotiated in good faith would be the most self-destructive gift the United States could give to the PRC in the Pacific,” the letter said.  The Pentagon’s top Asia official, Ely Ratner, said this month that securing COFA funding was one of the most important things the U.S. government must do this year in the region. “This is something that matters,” he said. “We just have to get it done.” The Australian and New Zealand ambassadors to Washington also wrote to congressional leaders last week, warning that failure to pass the funding “would have severe consequences” in the region.  If everyone in the U.S. government and both congressional parties agrees that this is important, what explains the delay?  Conversations with several lawmakers, administration officials and congressional staffers revealed an all too familiar story of Washington bureaucratic intransigence.  The administration initially tried to add the money to the emergency supplemental bill now slowly moving through Congress, which already has billions of dollars earmarked for the Indo-Pacific. But Republicans wanted the money to come from the regular appropriations part of the budget and wanted it offset by other spending reductions. The standoff persisted for months.  Now, as Congress scrambles to avoid another government shutdown, supporters of the funding are working behind the scenes to include it in whatever legislation emerges from negotiations. If that doesn’t work, it could mean months more of delay.  Democrats and Republicans both supposedly agree that the strategic competition with China is the United States’ top long-term priority, but examples like this show a lack of follow-through where the rubber meets the road, according to Michael Sobolik, senior fellow at the American Foreign Policy Council.  “The burden of proof is on Washington to demonstrate that our system is actually better,” he told me. “Failing to renew economic assistance and services to COFA partners in the Pacific does the opposite.”  Without swift action, Congress risks abandoning long-standing partners, weakening the U.S. strategic position in Asia and inviting Beijing to expand its influence. In short, Washington will have done Xi Jinping’s work for him. FOD is asking for comments and opinions.  And write your Congressional representatives regarding this important issue!

What Makes the Black Sea Critically Important?

FOD has reiterated the simple fact is Russia under whatever government it has had has traditionally always sought a warm water port from which to project power both regionally and beyond.  Ukraine is important to Russia it that it borders the Black Sea.  Additionally Ukraine is the breadbasket of Eastern Europe which has traditionally fed Russia even prior to the Soviet Union.  Those crops of wheat, barley and corn are now flowing to other nations in Europe and China.  An increased presence is a competitive advantage designed to project power regionally over one’s neighbors. It’s a scenario for which Russia has been laying the groundwork for years. Ukraine has been training to defend against such an event since its naval fleet was decimated in 2014 after Russia took Crimea, the peninsula that separates the Sea of Azov from the larger Black Sea.  But an attack from the sea was something Ukraine was particularly vulnerable to — even if Russian forces have so far relied primarily on sending land forces across borders to attack Ukrainian cities.    Ukraine said Tuesday it had sunk a Russian patrol ship off the coast of occupied Crimea, claiming another victory over the Kremlin's forces in the hotly contested waters of the Black Sea.  Moscow did not confirm the claim, which would represent the latest blow to its naval power as Kyiv strikes targets deep behind the war's front lines, even as its army suffers setbacks on the battlefield.  Ukraine’s military intelligence agency said that it had used high-tech sea drones in an overnight attack on the large patrol ship Sergey Kotov near the Kerch Strait, which separates the annexed peninsula’s eastern coast from mainland Russia.  Ukraine has dealt Russia's Black Sea Fleet a number of costly blows in the last year, despite an unsuccessful counteroffensive on the ground.  Just last month, Ukraine claimed it sank the Caesar Kunikov landing ship off the coast of Crimea. Two weeks before that, its military intelligence claimed to have sunk the corvette Ivanovets, also off the peninsula’s coast. Those attacks were never acknowledged by Russia.  There’s only one way in and out of the Black Sea. Russia regularly sends its ships and submarines in and out of the sea, surging forces there or sending its Black Sea Fleet into the Mediterranean Sea for power projection and routine operations. Ukraine, unlike Russia, has no other fleets elsewhere, so there’s no backup coming from outside the Black Sea.  Which leads to the question: Who else may come and go from the Black Sea?  Due to Montreux Convention rules regarding the Bosporus and Dardanelles that connect the Black Sea to the Mediterranean Sea, countries that sit on the Black Sea have unlimited access.  Nonresident countries may only send ships in for short stints and are limited by ship size. So although NATO is not intervening militarily on Ukraine’s behalf, the Black Sea was always going to be a vulnerable spot for Ukraine.  In other words, if there were ever a body of water well suited for bullying your neighbor, it would be the Black Sea.  Pursuing all these lines of effort would connect Russian-held areas in such a way that Putin’s forces could easily resupply themselves from the sea, whereas Ukraine would be cut off from maritime commerce and military opportunities. It would also give him nearly half the Black Sea coastline and allow him to claim significantly more area as territorial waters.  Part of Putin’s advantage in the Black Sea is that his ships can come and go as they please, when few other navies have the right or ability to do so.  Ukraine’s ambassador to Turkey asked that the NATO member close the pair of straits to Russian ships to prevent Moscow from bolstering its Black Sea Fleet.  Under the Montreux Convention, Turkey manages the movement of commercial and military ships in and out of the Bosporus and Dardanelles.  Turkey said it cannot stop Russian ships accessing the Black Sea due to a clause in the rules that allows vessels to return to their home base, according to Reuters. Turkey has opposed sanctions on Russia, and has been calling for NATO and Russia to tone down their rhetoric. While building close cooperation with Russia on defense and energy, Turkey has also invested in the Ukrainian defense industry. It has also sold sophisticated drones to Ukraine and signed a deal to co-produce more, angering Moscow.  FOD doesn’t see Turkey taking any action to restrict Russia’s access to the Black Sea in either direction.  The country has carefully implemented the Montreux Convention of 1936, which is a critical component of Black Sea security and stability, for more than seven decades. While the convention governs the transit regime across the straits, the most important aspect is defining the principals of military ships transiting the straits and deploying to the Black Sea.  The convention adds to Russia’s advantage there because it prohibits non-Black Sea states’ aircraft carriers and submarines from passing through. Only submarines from bordering, or riparian, states are permitted to pass through the straits, either to rejoin their base in the Black Sea for the first time after construction or purchase, or to be repaired in dockyards outside the Black Sea.  However, though Russia has bent these rules in the past to deploy its Black Sea Fleet submarines to Mediterranean waters off Syria and elsewhere. 

The Montreux Convention also limits non-riparian states’ naval power in the Black Sea in terms of deployment duration and armada tonnage. Non-riparian states may have a maximum aggregate tonnage of 45,000 tons in the Black Sea. (photo right- Sergey-Kotov Missile boat) In this regard, one non-riparian state may have a maximum aggregate tonnage of warships in the Black Sea of 30,000 tons. Furthermore, warships from non-riparian countries are not permitted to stay in the Black Sea for more than 21 days.  While the convention generally promotes freedom of navigation through the straits, Turkey retains the right to close the straits to warships from belligerent countries in the event of war or the threat of war.  In wartime, Turkey is required by Article 19 of the treaty to close the straits to belligerent warships: “In time of war vessels of war belonging to belligerent Powers shall not, however, pass through the Straits except in cases arising out of the application of Article 25.”  Turkey arguably has the authority to close the straits under the principles outlined in the convention. However, there are some political issues. Turkey holds the convention in high regard and has carefully implemented regime rules because it regards the convention as an important component of the security and stability of the Black Sea.  As a result, if Turkey agreed to Ukraine’s request, Russia could make requests of its own, or even accuse Turkey of breaching its neutrality and retaliate.  According to Reuters, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu argues the country can’t stop Russian warships from coming back to their home base — meaning it could stop Russia from sending ships into the Mediterranean, which is a non-issue right now, but it couldn’t stop Russia from flowing more ships to the Black Sea in the name of sending them back to their home port.  Russia could also further bolster its Black Sea Fleet by sending its Caspian Flotilla through the Don-Volga waterway. Because closing the straits is likely to have little impact on Russian capabilities in the Black Sea but would put Turkey at risk of retaliation, or at least lose the appearance of neutrality, it’s unlikely Turkey will take action under the rules of the Montreux Convention.

Abraham Lincoln’s First Inaugural Address

Abraham Lincoln's first inaugural address was delivered on Monday, March 4, 1861, as part of his taking the oath of office for his first term as the sixteenth President of the United States. The speech was primarily addressed to the people of the South, and was intended to succinctly state Lincoln's intended policies and desires toward that section, where seven states had seceded from the Union and formed the Confederate States of America. 

Written in a spirit of reconciliation toward the seceded states, Lincoln's inaugural address touched on several topics: first, his pledge to "hold, occupy, and possess the property and places belonging to the government"—including Fort Sumter, which was still in Federal hands; second, his argument that the Union was undissolvable, and thus that secession was impossible; and third, a promise that while he would never be the first to attack, any use of arms against the United States would be regarded as rebellion, and met with force. The inauguration took place on the eve of the American Civil War, which began soon after with the Confederate attack on Fort Sumter.  Lincoln denounced secession as anarchy, and explained that majority rule had to be balanced by constitutional restraints in the American system of republicanism:  “A majority held in restraint by constitutional checks and limitations, and always changing easily with deliberate changes of popular opinions and sentiments, is the only true sovereign of a free people."  Desperately wishing to avoid this terrible conflict, Lincoln ended with this impassioned plea: “I am loath to close. We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection.  The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.”  While much of the Northern press praised or at least accepted Lincoln's speech, the new Confederacy essentially met his inaugural address with contemptuous silence.  The Charleston Mercury was an exception: it excoriated Lincoln's address as manifesting "insolence" and "brutality," and attacked the Union government as 'a mobocratic empire.  The speech also did not impress other states who were considering secession from the Union. Indeed, after Fort Sumter was attacked and Lincoln declared a formal State of Insurrection, four more states—Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee and Arkansas—seceded from the Union and joined the Confederacy.  Modern writers and historians generally consider the speech to be a masterpiece and one of the finest presidential inaugural addresses, with the final lines having earned particularly lasting renown in American culture. Literary and political analysts likewise have praised the speech's eloquent prose and epideictic quality.

FDR’s First Inaugural Address

The first inauguration of Franklin D. Roosevelt as the 32nd President of the United States was held on Saturday, March 4, 1933. The inauguration marked the commencement of the first four-year term of Franklin D. Roosevelt as President and John Nance Garner as Vice President. It was the last inauguration to be held on the constitutionally prescribed date of March 4; the 20th Amendment, ratified in January 1933, moved Inauguration Day to January 20. As a result, Roosevelt's first term in office was shorter than a normal term (as was Garner's) by 43 days.  The inauguration took place in the wake of Democrat Roosevelt's landslide victory over Republican incumbent Herbert Hoover in the 1932 presidential election. With the nation in the grip of the Great Depression, the new president's inaugural speech was awaited with great anticipation.

Broadcast nationwide on several radio networks, the speech was heard by tens of millions of Americans, and set the stage for Roosevelt's urgent efforts to respond to the crisis.  The swearing-in ceremony took place on the East Portico of the United States Capitol, with Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes administering the oath of office. Roosevelt wore a morning coat and striped trousers for the inauguration, and took the oath with his hand on his family Bible, open to I Corinthians 13. Published in 1686 in Dutch, it remains the oldest Bible ever used in an inaugural ceremony, as well as the only one not in English, and was used by Roosevelt for his 1929 and 1931 inaugurations as Governor of New York as well as for his subsequent presidential inaugurations.  After taking the oath of office, Roosevelt proceeded to deliver his 1,883-word, 20 minute-long inaugural address, best known for his famously pointed reference to "fear itself" in one of its first lines:  “So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is...fear itself — nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance. In every dark hour of our national life a leadership of frankness and of vigor has met with that understanding and support of the people themselves which is essential to victory. And I am convinced that you will again give that support to leadership in these critical days.”  Addressing himself to the causes of the economic crisis and its moral dimensions, Roosevelt placed blame squarely on the greed and shortsightedness of bankers and businessmen, as seen in the following excerpts:  “...rulers of the exchange of mankind's goods have failed through their own stubbornness and their own incompetence, have admitted their failure, and have abdicated. Practices of the unscrupulous money changers stand indicted in the court of public opinion, rejected by the hearts and minds of men.  The money changers have fled from their high seats in the temple of our civilization. We may now restore that temple to the ancient truths. The measure of the restoration lies in the extent to which we apply social values more noble than mere monetary profit.  Recognition of the falsity of material wealth as the standard of success goes hand in hand with the abandonment of the false belief that public office and high political position are to be valued only by the standards of pride of place and personal profit; and there must be an end to a conduct in banking and in business which too often has given to a sacred trust the likeness of callous and selfish wrongdoing.  Restoration calls, however, not for changes in ethics alone. This Nation asks for action, and action now.”

F-104 Starfighter’s First Flight

4 March 1954: Lockheed test pilot Anthony W. LeVier takes the prototype XF-104 Starfighter, 53-7786, for its first flight at Edwards Air Force Base in the high desert of southern California.

The airplane’s landing gear remained extended throughout the flight, which lasted about twenty minutes.  The Lockheed F-104 Starfighter is a single-engine, supersonic interceptor aecraft which later became widely used as an attack aircraft. (photo right - Lockheed XF-104 prototype, 53-7786, photographed 5 March 1954. (Lockheed Martin))) It was originally developed by Lockheed for the United States Air Force (USAF), but became widely used by US Allies around the world, and produced by several other NATO nations. One of the Century Series of fighter aircraft, it was operated by the air forces of more than a dozen nations from 1958 to 2004.

Its design team was led by Kelly Johnson, (previously mentioned in the most recent addition of FOD) who went on to lead or contribute to the development of the Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird and other Lockheed aircraft.  The F-104 set numerous world records, including both airspeed and altitude records. Its success was marred by the Lockheed bribery scandals, in which Lockheed had given bribes to a considerable number of political and military figures in various nations in order to influence their judgment and secure several purchase contracts; this caused considerable political controversy in Europe and Japan.

When I was a young pup, flying F-8 Crusaders at NAS Miramar, Lockheed test pilot Darryl Greenamyer showed up one day with a modified F-104 Starfighter "Red Baron" (N104RB) built from parts he had collected, many from salvage yards over a 13-year period.  The cockpit side panels and some control column bearings of the Red Baron came from the very first production F-104A, which crashed in Palmdale, California 22 years earlier. The tail of the Red Baron, minus stabilizers, came from a junkyard in Ontario, California. The stabilizers and some nose wheel parts were from scrap piles in Tucson and Homestead, Florida. The idler arm for the elevator controls, the ejection seat rails and some electrical relays came from an F-104 that crashed and burned at Edwards Air Force Base on the edge of the Mojave Desert. Greenamyer got his throttle quadrant from a Tennessee flying buff he met at the Reno National Air Races. The trunnion mounts for the nose gear, some of the cooling-system valves and a few relays on the Red Baron came from a 25-ton pile of junk that Greenamyer bought at Eglin Air Force Base. In a swap with NASA, he obtained the nose of a Lockheed NF-104A, with its reaction controls. The all-important J79-GE-10 engine was obtained from the US Navy.  The Red Baron, first flew in 1976. On 2 October 1976, trying to set a new low-altitude 3-km speed record, Greenamyer averaged 1,010 miles per hour (1,630 km/h) at Mud Lake near Tonopah, Nevada. A tracking camera malfunction eliminated the necessary proof for the official record. On 24 October 1977 Greenamyer flew a 3 km official FAI record flight of 988.26 miles per hour (1,590.45 km/h).  On 26 February 1978, Greenamyer made a practice run for a world altitude record attempt. After the attempt, he was unable to get a lock light on the left wheel; after multiple touch-and-go tests at an Edwards Air Force Base runway, he determined that it was not safe to land. He ejected, and the N104RB crashed in the desert.  There was always speculation that perhaps there was an insurance motive involved.  I always wanted to fly the Zipper, but never had the opportunity. 

Masssacre in Boston 1770

The Boston Massacre, known as the Incident on King Street by the British, was an incident on March 5, 1770, in which British Army soldiers shot and killed people while under attack by a mob. The incident was heavily propagandized by leading Patriots, such as Paul Revere and Samuel Adams, to fuel animosity toward the British authorities. 

British troops had been stationed in Boston, capital of the Province of Massachusetts Bay, since 1768 in order to protect and support crown-appointed colonial officials attempting to enforce unpopular Parliamentary legislation. Amid ongoing tense relations between the population and the soldiers, a mob formed around a British sentry, who was subjected to verbal abuse and harassment. He was eventually supported by eight additional soldiers, who were subjected to verbal threats and repeatedly hit by clubs, stones and snowballs. They fired into the crowd, without orders, instantly killing three people and wounding others. Two more people died later of wounds sustained in the incident.  The crowd eventually dispersed after Acting Governor Thomas Hutchinson promised an inquiry, but reformed the next day, prompting the withdrawal of the troops to Castle Island.  Eight soldiers, one officer, and four civilians were arrested and charged with murder. Defended by lawyer and future American president John Adams, six of the soldiers were acquitted, while the other two were convicted of manslaughter and given reduced sentences.  The men found guilty of manslaughter were sentenced to branding on their hand.

“…An Iron Curtain has descended across the Continent…”

As we view today’s current events aimed at the evil that is Russia’s government, it’s worth revisiting the thoughts of Winston Churchill.  Winston Churchill's "Sinews of Peace" address of 5 March 1946, at Westminster College, used the term "iron curtain" in the context of Soviet-dominated Eastern Europe:   “From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic an "Iron Curtain" has descended across the continent.  Behind that line lie all the capitals of the ancient states of Central and Eastern Europe. Warsaw, Berlin, Prague, Vienna, Budapest, Belgrade, Bucharest and Sofia; all these famous cities and the populations around them lie in what I must call the Soviet sphere, and all are subject, in one form or another, not only to Soviet influence but to a very high and in some cases increasing measure of control from Moscow.” 

In addition, Churchill mentioned in his speech that regions under the Soviet Union’s control were expanding their leverage and power without any restriction. He asserted that in order to put a brake on this ongoing phenomenon, the commanding force of and strong unity between the UK and the US was necessary.  Churchill, who had actively pursued a course of negation with Stalin with regard to who would control vast expanses of countries that had existed prior to WW II was now just realizing Stalin’s overall goal was to rule as much of Europe as possible.  Churchill had only recently been defeated at the polls for reelection as British Prime Minister.  Much of the Western public still regarded the Soviet Union as a close ally in the context of the recent defeat of Nazi Germany and of Japan. Although not well received at the time, the phrase iron curtain gained popularity as a shorthand reference to the division of Europe as the Cold War strengthened.  The Iron Curtain served to keep people in and information out, and people throughout the West eventually came to accept and use the metaphor.  He expressed the Allied Nations’ distrust of the Soviet Union after the World War II. In the same year September, US-Soviet Union cooperation line collapsed due to the disavowal of the Soviet Union's opinion on the German problem in the Stuttgart Council, and then followed the U.S. President Harry S. Truman’s announcement of enactment of hard anti-Soviet Union, anticommunism line policy. Since then, this phrase became popular and was widely used as anti-Soviet Union propaganda term in the Western countries.

Spitfire’s First Flight

5 March 1936: At 4:35 p.m., Vickers Aviation Ltd. chief test pilot Captain Joseph (“Mutt”) Summers took off on the first flight of the prototype of the legendary Supermarine Spitfire, K5054, at Eastleigh Aerodrome, Southampton, England. Landing after only 8 minutes, he is supposed to have said, “Don’t change a thing!”  The Vickers-Supermarine Type 300 was a private venture, built to meet an Air Ministry requirement for a new single-place, single-engine interceptor for the Royal Air Force. The Spitfire was built in many variants, using several wing configurations, and was produced in greater numbers than any other British aircraft. It was also the only British fighter to be in continuous production throughout WW II.  Many variants of the Spitfire were built, using several wing configurations, and it was produced in greater numbers than any other British aircraft. It was also the only British fighter produced continuously throughout the war.  The Spitfire continues to be popular among enthusiasts; about 54 remain airworthy, while many more are static exhibits in aviation museums throughout the world.  During the Battle of Britain, from July to October 1940, the Spitfire was perceived by the public to be the main RAF fighter, though the more numerous Hawker Hurricane shouldered a greater proportion of the burden against the Nazi German air force, the Luftwaffe. Spitfire units, however, had a lower attrition rate and a higher victory-to-loss ratio than those flying Hurricanes because of its higher performance. Spitfires in general were tasked with engaging Luftwaffe fighters (mainly Messerschmitt Bf 109E series aircraft which were a close match for the Spitfire) during the Battle of Britain.  After the Battle of Britain, the Spitfire superseded the Hurricane to become the backbone of RAF Fighter Command, and saw action in the European, Mediterranean, Pacific and the South-East Asian theatres.

Much loved by its pilots, the Spitfire served in several roles, including interceptor, photo-reconnaissance, fighter-bomber and trainer, and it continued to serve in these roles until the 1950s. The Seafire was a carrier-based adaptation of the Spitfire which served in the Fleet Air Arm from 1942 through to the mid-1950s. Although the original airframe was designed to be powered by a Rolls-Royce Merlin engine producing 1,030 hp, it was strong enough and adaptable enough to use increasingly powerful Merlins and, in later marks, Rolls-Royce Griffon engines producing up to 2,340 hp,as a consequence of this the Spitfire's performance and capabilities improved over the course of its life.  A neighbor of mine in Camarillo and friend of FOD Steve flies Spitfire XIVe NH749 of the Commemorative Air Force, based at Camarillo airport, Southern California, seen with period-dressed crew members in 2011.

Major Robert M. White Becomes First Man to Exceed Mach 4

Back in the very heady days of rocket plane flight, the X-15 was the aircraft to fly.  On a beautiful California sunny day on March 7, 1961, Major Robert M. White, USAF is dropped from Boeing NB-52B Stratofortress carrier, 52-008, "Balls 8" over Silver Lake, a dry lake bed near the California/Nevada border, at 10:28:33.0. 

On this the first flight for the number two North American Aviation X-15 hypersonic research rocketplane, 56-6671, capable of producing a rated thrust of 57,000 pounds, the flight plan called for a burn time of 116 seconds, which according to profile predictions would take to X-15 to 84,000 feet.  The actual burn time extended to 127 seconds with a slightly reduced altitude of 77,450 feet, but with some additional smack (speed).  56-6671, reached a speed of Mach 4.43 (2,905 miles per hour ) and 77,450 feet becoming the first pilot to exceed Mach 4.

The total duration of the flight, from the air drop to touchdown at Edwards Air Force Base, was 8 minutes, 34.1 seconds.  MAJ White was designated the Air Force's primary pilot for the North American X-15 program in 1958.  He made his first test flight of the X-15 on April 15, 1960, when the aircraft was fitted with two interim, 16,000 lbf (71 kN) XLR-11 thrust rocket engines. Four months later, he flew to an altitude of 136,000 feet (41.5 km) above Rogers Dry Lake.  White would have participated in the Air Force's Man In Space Soonest program, had it come to fruition.  White was the first human to fly an aircraft at Mach 4 and later Mach 5 over the next eight months.  On November 9, 1961, White flew the X-15 at 4,093 mph (6,590 km/h), making him the first pilot to fly a winged craft at six times the speed of sound (Mach 6). President John F. Kennedy used the occasion to confer the most prestigious award in American aviation, the Robert J. Collier Trophy, jointly to White and three of his fellow X-15 pilots: NASA's Joseph A. Walker, Commander Forrest S. Petersen of the U.S. Navy, and North American Aviation test pilot Scott Crossfield. 

A day later, Air Force Chief of Staff General Curtis E. LeMay awarded White his new rating as a Command Pilot Astronaut.  On July 17, 1962, Major White flew the X-15 to an altitude of 314,750 feet (59 miles, 96 km).  This qualified him for USAF astronaut wings, becoming the first "winged" astronaut, and one of a few who have flown into space without a conventional spacecraft. Major Bob White was featured with a cover story in the August 3, 1962, issue of Life magazine, detailing his July 17 flight.  Pilot Robert White commented on his high altitude X-15 flights:  “My flights to 217,000 feet and 314,750 feet were very dramatic in revealing the Earth's curvature ... at my highest altitude I could turn my head through a 180-degree arc and wow!—the Earth is really round.  At my peak altitude I was roughly over the Arizona/California border in the area of Las Vegas, and this was how I described it:  Looking to my left I felt I could spit into the Gulf of California; looking to my right I felt I could toss a dime into San Francisco Bay.” In May 1967, during the Vietnam War, Colonel White was assigned as Deputy Commander for Operations of the 355th Tactical Fighter Wing, an F-105 unit based at Takhli Royal Thai Air Force Base, Thailand.  He flew 70 combat missions over North Vietnam, including leading an attack against the Paul Doumer Bridge in Hanoi on August 11, 1967, for which he was awarded the Air Force Cross.  I had heard the rumor several times that in honor of his achievements, the Scaled Composites White Knight spacecraft launch plane was named after White and fellow X-15 pilot Pete Knight.  But as with all seemingly good stories, Space Ship One and White Knight pilot/astronaut Brian Binnie (21 years in the United States Navy as a naval aviator flying the A-7 Corsair II, A-6 Intruder, F/A-18 Hornet, and AV-8B Harrier II) reports this is not true.  I know him from SETP and around the Navy, so I’ll have to believe him on this one.

The Bridge at Remagen

The Bridge at Remagen was in early March 1945 a critical remaining bridge across the river Rhine in Germany when it was captured during the Battle of Remagen by United States Army forces during the closing weeks of World War II.  A report from the Omaha World Herald summarizes the leadership of one US soldier.  On a rainy German afternoon 76 years ago, 2nd Lt. Karl Timmermann stood on a hill and peered through wet haze at the bomb-battered railroad bridge he and his men had to find a way to cross.  This span at Remagen, alone among the Rhine River bridges in these last days of World War II, somehow had survived strafing by Allied bombers, and hadn’t been dynamited by retreating Nazi forces. 

Timmermann and his soldiers knew the enemy must have wired it for demolition. German batteries had their guns trained on it.  Crossing the rickety bridge more than three football fields long, right under the enemy’s nose, was a fool’s errand, a virtual suicide mission.  But it had to be done. They had orders. Timmermann, (photo left) a quiet, sturdy Nebraskan, knew his troops would follow him.  “What’s holding up the show?” he shouted, waving at his soldiers. “Get goin’, you guys, get goin’!”  So the men of Company A dashed across the bridge even as it was strafed by gunfire and rocked with explosions. They were the first invading soldiers to cross the Rhine since Napoleon.  “God was surely smiling on Karl Timmermann and his men that day,” wrote Ken Hechler, an Army historian and onetime speechwriter for President Harry Truman who chronicled the battle.  He described it as “a brilliant stroke of military daring.”  Gen. Dwight Eisenhower said taking the Remagen Bridge March 7, 1945, shortened the war in Europe by six months. The Nazis surrendered just two months later.  The Remagen miracle sparked worldwide headlines, bringing renown to Timmermann, 22, of West Point, Nebraska, in his home state and far beyond. He was one of several soldiers in his unit awarded the Distinguished Service Cross, the Army’s second-highest award for valor.  His heroism was later celebrated in Hechler’s popular 1957 book, “The Bridge at Remagen,” and a 1969 Hollywood movie of the same name.  Karl Timmermann joined the Army within a month of graduating from high school in 1940.  Karl served as an enlisted soldier for three years before being commissioned as an officer in 1943. His unit, the 27th Armored Infantry Battalion of the 9th Armored Division, landed in France in August 1944, and engaged in months of heavy fighting. Timmermann was wounded by shrapnel during the Battle of the Bulge later that year. The night before the bridge engagement, he was named company commander despite his rank because senior officers had been wounded.  Neither Timmermann nor his men were eager heroes.  When one of his men asked what they should do if the Germans blew up the bridge while they were on it, he said, “Swim.” Timmermann assembled three platoons to accomplish the task, and put himself with the first one.  As he gave instructions, a massive explosion nearby sent timbers and steel flying through the air. 

German defenders on the other side had set off a charge in hopes of destroying the bridge.  They blew a large hole in the road leading up to it, but the bridge remained standing.  Then it was Timmermann’s turn.  “Let’s go,” he said.  German machine guns opened fire, but Timmermann and his men kept going.  One soldier, Sgt. Joseph Delisio of New York City, climbed a three-story tower at one end of the bridge and captured three German gunners who had some of the Americans pinned down. Delisio’s buddy, Sgt. Al Drabik, was the first across.  Karl Timmermann held the distinction of being the first officer across, only a few steps behind.  The men of Company A secured the bridge and fought off pockets of German resistance on the other side. Over the next 10 days, 25,000 American troops crossed it.  Then, finally, weakened by bomb damage and too much heavy traffic, the bridge collapsed into the Rhine. At least 20 soldiers were killed. On the 50th anniversary of the bridge crossing. A monument was erected in his honor, too, calling him the “Hero of the Rhine.”  If you take a cruise on the Rhine River you can still see the supports on either side of the river where the bridge used to be. 

Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 

Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 was a scheduled international passenger flight operated by Malaysia Airlines that disappeared on 8 March 2014 while flying from Kuala Lumpur International Airport to its destination, Beijing Capital International Airport.  The crew of the Boeing 777-200ER aircraft last communicated with air traffic control (ATC) around 38 minutes after takeoff when the flight was over the South China Sea. 

The aircraft was lost from ATC radar screens minutes later but was tracked by military radar for another hour, deviating westwards from its planned flight path, crossing the Malay Peninsula and Andaman Sea. It left radar range when 200 nautical miles northwest of Penang Island in northwestern Peninsular Malaysia.  The search for the missing airplane, which became the most costly in aviation history, focused initially on the South China and Andaman seas, before analysis of the aircraft's automated communications with an Inmarsat satellite identified a possible crash site somewhere in the southern Indian Ocean. After a three-year search across 120,000 km2 (46,000 sq mi) of ocean failed to locate the aircraft, the Australian based Joint Agency Coordination Centre heading the operation suspended its activities in January 2017.  Nothing was found although some pieces of aircraft debris have been recovered.  A new search is underway after a decade of data analysis and ocean scans by numerous underwater vehicles by private contractor Ocean Infinity. Ocean Infinity, a seabed survey and ocean research company is based in the United States  On 04 March 2024, days before the tenth anniversary of the disappearance, Malaysia said it would consult with Australia about collaborating on another expedition by the Ocean Infinity team.  No money will be paid to Ocean Infinity unless MH370 is found.  Ocean Infinity plans to use their new Armada vessel, reportedly a full capability deep water Autonomous Underwater Vehicle.  Fireball supports all efforts to uncover one of the greatest aircraft mysteries of modern times.  l capability deep water Autonomous Underwater Vehicle ll capability deep water Autonomous Underwater Vehicle

Volkswagen Type II Begins Production

The Volkswagen Type 2, known officially (depending on body type) as the Transporter, Kombi or Microbus, or, informally, as the Bus (US) or Camper (UK), is a forward control light commercial vehicle introduced in 1950 by the  German automaker Volkswagen as its second car model.  Following – and initially deriving from – Volkswagen's first model, the Type 1 (Beetle), it was given the factory designation Type 2. 

The first generation of the Volkswagen Type 2 with the split windshield, informally called the Microbus, Splitscreen, or Splittie among modern fans, was produced from 8 March 1950 through the end of the 1967 model year. From 1950 to 1956, the T1 (not called that at the time) was built in Wolfsburg; from 1956, it was built at the completely new Transporter factory in Hanover.  Like the Beetle, the first Transporters used the 1100 Volkswagen air-cooled engine, an 1,131 cc, DIN-rated at 24 bhp, air-cooled flat-four-cylinder boxer engine mounted in the rear. This was upgraded to the 1200 – an 1, in 1953.  A higher compression ratio became standard in 1955; while an unusual early version of the 40 bhp engine debuted exclusively on the Type 2 in 1959. Any 1959 models that retain that early engine today are true survivors.  Since the engine was totally discontinued at the outset, no spare parts were ever made available.  And VW has announced the successor to the original VW bus will go into production.  It was reviewed at the recent Detroit Auto Show.  Like many new vehicles coming out, it is an EV supporting lines of the old as well as new ones.