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elenatria · 5 years

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How to turn a London Con trip into a “Chernobyl” trip.

I’m home so I can finally make this post.

Where to start.

Okay-

Let’s start with “Chernobyl”. It happened a few months ago, fell on our heads like a nuclear bomb. We all loved the protagonists but Viktor Charkov, the KGB chairman, is also a memorable, creepy, hateful character who got under our skin with the cold truth of his words, the harsh reality of his behaviour. He was too real, too pragmatic to be ignored. From stories I’ve been told in person, he’s no different than the executive arms of tyrants we had here not more than forty years ago. He exists. People like him live among us.

As for the actor himself, so strange. See, there is no mention of Alan Williams’ age on IMDB or Wikipedia and that’s enough to show that, apart from his theatre, TV and film work, little is known about him. Where to find him, contact him, he’s too old to care about social media and apparently he never was too sought out, not with a “face like a bagful of donuts” as he jokes.

But I was thrilled. I wrote the first chapter of “A single bullet” after watching “Chernobyl” and I just had to show it to this elusive low-profile thespian who inspired me. Because... I don’t know, because. Just to say “Thanks for doing a magnificent job. Thanks for helping me understand evil.”

So I tried contacting his agent. I gave her my name and nationality. I thought I’d just send her the link and forget about it.

Apparently, she forgot about it too because I never heard from her.

After a month London Con was upon us, but what to do in the evenings? Plays of course. I booked a ticket for “The woman in black” and “The Hunt” with Tobias Menzies. Then I searched and searched for Alan Williams plays but, to my dismay, he had finished playing Ivan Romanovich Chebutykin in “Three sisters” at the beginning of June and his new play, “Faith, hope and charity”, wouldn’t premiere before September. Just my luck to be in London in between the two plays. No stage door queue, no autographs.

After spending a full Saturday at London Con and Sunday at the British Museum, Monday had to be a day of leisure. A free concert at St Martin-in-the-Fields before lunch was all I was capable of attending, drag my steps towards the closest bus stop that would drop me off… wherever. I didn’t care.

But then I decided to read my post from the previous day about managing to buy a ticket for “The girl on the train” at the very last minute and meeting Alex Ferns, the naked miner. The unexpected ticket, the unexpected hug.

Now how difficult would it be to meet an actor who is NOT doing a play at the moment?

Very very difficult, confirmed one voice.

He’s rehearsing for ‘Faith, hope and charity’, isn’t he? disagreed another. He must be. It’s almost August and the play opens in September. He’s at work right now. He must be!!!

I googled and googled for almost an hour. I found that “Faith, hope and charity” would be staged at the Dorfman theatre near Waterloo station so I called the stage door. I explained to the receptionist that I did not know Mr Williams in person but I was visiting London for only a few days, was a big fan of his work in “Chernobyl” and I would really love to greet him. The man on the phone was very helpful revealing that this was their first day of rehearsing (the incredible coincidence!) and they had started only… an hour ago. He asked my name and I said “Well… you can say Eleni”, I mean, who needs my complicated surname, right? The guy said he’d save my number and let Mr Williams know.

Oh god.

But I couldn’t just sit there waiting for a call, I’d never get that call, come on.

So I rushed to the Dorfman Theatre. I was breaking my brain trying to figure out how I could get the Charkov chapter of “A single bullet” printed in a district with no stationary shops whatsoever. I was hoping I could… shove it into his face I don’t know, and later imagine he’d be reading it. He didn’t really have to read it, just nod condescendingly and lie that he would, and that would be enough to put a smile on my face. Just like all those toys and drawings people give to celebs at cons that end up in the hands of volunteers, assistants or charities, if not in the trash.

When I got there I talked to a different receptionist, a very professional, very unhelpful young man. For safety reasons he wasn’t supposed to disclose neither the time they’d finish nor the time of recess. For safety reasons I had to go through Mr Williams’ agent to get to him. Outrageous, the woman didn’t even forward my story to him, let alone give me permission to meet him. I was hopeless, I was being turned down. I was being an idiot.

“But they must have a lunch break, right??” I insisted. “Can’t I just wait outside?”

That guy was a goddamn sphinx, and the helpful guy was still talking on the phone or to some lady there, I don’t remember, so I couldn’t reach out to him. Suddenly I felt unnecessarily needy as if I was sitting on the subway floor, shaking my hat to passers-by, clinging my few coins. How humiliating.

With heavy steps I exited the theatre. Why is it so complicated, why do I need someone else’s “permission”? I’m not a child. I looked around, it was a sunny day, people were sitting in coffee tables out in the patio. Some tables were empty but I didn’t care, I just sat on a column by the entrance, far enough to not be seen by the receptionists and feel like shit for lingering, close enough to catch anyone exiting.

For an hour and a half I crouched over my phone trying to figure out how to contact the agent without sounding too stalkery. I called the agency but the girl on the phone gave me the same email address where I had sent my fic. Fine. I changed the wording of my message again and again so as not to sound too needy or creepy even if I knew it wouldn’t work.

I knew I had missed my concert for no reason and I would soon have to leave because who doesn’t like giving up? It’s better to give up than stress over something that’s never gonna happen. It always is.

I was seconds away from clicking “send” and making a fool of myself to the agent for a second time when I thought I saw someone, a towering presence stopping a few meters away, looking over, hesitating, waiting.

I raised my head.

There he was, three-dimensional, bathed in sunlight. Not an image in my head anymore.

Believe me when I say that I was staring at Gandalf, Santa Claus, the Grail Knight from “Indiana Jones”, the Big Bad Wolf.

I honestly don’t know what I was staring at.

But there he was, in all his elderly silver-bearded glory. A myth in my mind, in the flesh. How did he know I was there? I didn’t tell anyone. I was supposed to be hiding.

After nanoseconds of deer-like stun I did the polite thing and jumped on my feet, ready for a handshake. I mean, I had to stand up, right? He had come out just for me.

Shit. What had I done? The nerve.

The first thing I remember noticing when I got closer were his faded blue eyes with a distinguishable light-shaded rim circling the iris. The rest was just word vomit, how we all love him on tumblr, write fics, make memes etc.

Memes?

I described to him the “Try me, bitch” edit we all love, courtesy of @two-screaming-rats.

He didn’t get it at first, then he laughed so HARD, so damn hard. You guys have to see Charkov laughing his heart out.

He said he only had a few minutes before he had to go back to the rehearsal so I decided to start the conversation with the Charkov fanfics. He was quick to apologize for not answering my email. “I’m sorry but… but I honestly don’t know what to say when someone sends me a story,” he admitted humbly. “I read all of them but… I mean I’ve been sent stories based on my characters before but I really wouldn’t know what to say.”

Okay first of all, he read my story. I don’t know if he read it a month ago when I sent it or minutes before he exited the theatre to greet me but he did.

Secondly, there are more stories about his characters? WHERE.

“I’m not a writer anyway,” I said apologetically.

The unexpected reassurance. “But you are.”

I guess one doesn’t have to be The Writer™, they just have to write. What a way to be courteous to a fan though.

Then I mentioned how we love Charkov’s trademark, his glasses, how we’re frantically looking for ‘80s-looking glasses, how we obsess over specific frames and brands.

“They’re not a brand,” he clarified, “they were specifically made for me, they’re an exact replica of Viktor Chebrikov’s glasses. Just like our clothes that were made by seamstresses who worked during that era.”

Naturally I praised the production’s attention to detail that has us ranting, how beautiful and “European” it all looked, how true the script was to Lyudmila’s story as it was described in Svetlana Alexievich’ “Chernobyl prayer”. I talked about my thoughts when I first heard there would be a “Chernobyl” TV series: the Americans made a TV show based on events that affected Europe, now that’s a new one. He mentioned Russian media admitting that they should have made that show, not the Americans. I agreed but also added “That’s the thing, it may be beautifully made, it may be the truth, but it’s still propaganda. Just because it’s true, just because the Soviet government did all those horrible things, that doesn’t mean that the show is not serving someone’s agenda.” He disagreed saying that the Soviet people were shown in a good light for their bravery and sacrifice. Well, we knew that, didn’t we.

I said how impressed I was by his portrayal of Charkov because we were told about people like him by dictatorship victims at school. People who had been tortured in the ‘70s came to us, talking about their time in underground cells, in the hands of sadists like Charkov. I told him about my uncle who was arrested and executed by the Nazis for distributing left-wing leaflets, about my grandmother who had to escape to the mountains during the civil war that followed the German occupation because she was a communist. I explained how real it felt to me, his last scene with Legasov in the kitchen. How bleak and horribly accurate.

He mentioned “You’re one of us, Legasov”. To him Charkov was just doing his job, working for the greater good and he agreed with the quote in my fic, that Charkov “couldn’t wait to retire”.

He then joked about Charkov being blasé after the committee meeting, “Meh, I’m done with arresting people, I let others do it for me”.

I assure you all those questions were answered in a couple of minutes, and I was certain our meeting was about to come to an end.

But then… he gestured toward an empty table.

Don’t let an aged man standing, was my spontaneous thought. I was reminded of my father.

Then I realized. He gestured toward an empty table.

Table. The two of us. On a sunny day.

Time, he was offering me his time.

And… oh my god, this was practically an interview, why was I not recording this, he was answering my questions so effortlessly.

No. That would be rude, that would be greedy.

Just relax and enjoy the moment and try to remember fucking everything.

I asked him what his inspiration for Charkov was, if he based his portrayal on other actors or historical figures. He paused to think and explained that the script was very strict anyway, very defined. However he did mention Charkov’s line, “I know you’ve heard the stories about us. When I hear them, even I am shocked” and how that reflected Stalin’s hypocritical quote, “What do I know, I’m just a peasant”.

His favourite line was “Trust but verify, and the Americans think that Ronald Reagan thought that up”.

“Is that really an old Russian proverb…?” I wondered.

“I… don’t know!” he laughed.

During the rest of the conversation he mentioned his friend whose job was to translate the Pravda, and his years in Canada where he met Czech-Greeks, namely Greek communists who were driven away by our right-wing government after the Second World War. Even the Soviets didn’t want them so they were sent to the Czech Republic and ended up in Canada. These people belonged nowhere.

I didn’t know that, and he didn’t know about Vladimir Gubarev, the writer of the play “Sarcophagus” and science editor of the Pravda who was the recipient of Legasov’s tapes. I quoted him saying “Why call the protagonist Legasov since that’s not how Legasov was, they could have used a character who’s a scientist and give him any other name.” Like Ulana, I added, who’s a composite character, or Chebrikov/Charkov, mostly fictional.

Our conversation was coming to an end; he asked me what plays I saw in London and he smiled when I mentioned Alex Ferns in “The girl on the train”.

It was truly overwhelming; I was torn between being swept away by the moment, focusing on nothing but the faded blue of his eyes, bathing in the calm rhythm of his voice, and actually paying attention to what he was saying. Only once did my eyes dart at his left hand spotting the unusually thick golden ring on his finger. When one’s mind plays tricks the best way to discipline is a glimpse at The Ring because if he didn’t have nearly my father’s years I’d probably be having a horribly inappropriate crush.

“Time to go,” he apologized.

We took a couple of photos and I pulled out Svetlana Alexievich’ book, asking for an autograph.

“Where should I sign?” he asked.

“Wherever you want.”

He flipped through the pages noticing my page markers, notes and underlinings. “What are these for?”

“Just… just notes. Do you want my—” I suggested grabbing my big-ass permanent marker.

Without a word he gave a knowing smile and, like an experienced conjurer, he pulled out of his jacket an elegant little sharpie. Delicate pens for delicate words.

I didn’t dare read what he wrote to me then, I could only make out his name through that intelligible doctor-like writing. Surely my name wasn’t there because I hadn’t introduced myself. Still, I thanked him from the bottom of my heart.

Time to go.

We shook hands and I said how honoured I was that he had spent time with me. I tried not to stare as he disappeared into the theatre but before I left I ran into the foyer, quickly thanked the receptionist to whom I had talked on the phone and stormed out of the building with that huge wave of adrenaline pumping violently in my ears.

As I crossed the street I was grinning like an idiot. I knew I had to stop right there and write down everything before I forgot - but it was pointless. I’m not a recorder to have to write down everything the minute it happens. It’s enough to remember the pale rimming of his eyes.

Now, two days after meeting him, I’m still torn between pride and embarrassment. What the hell was I thinking? Doesn’t a man deserve to work in peace?

But as I’m writing this and attaching his signature on the first page of “Chernobyl prayer” I dare for the first time read what he wrote to me.

Pleasure to meet you.

People say they have religious moments when meeting their favourite celebs.

Mine was poetic.

What a darling, darling man.

#chernobyl #alan williams #viktor charkov #vikor chebrikov #fan encounter #dorfman theatre #alex ferns #the girl on the train #london #kgb

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wannabe-bella · 5 years

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German Invasion!

(Detective AU series)

"Did you hear?" Comes a cheerful voice from the desk opposite the redhead's. With a questioning look, Chloe glances up to the boy.

"Hear what?" She asks while browsing through a case file.

"Beca's returning today," Says Jesse, her movements halting. After a few moments tick by, she shrugs, pretending to act uninterested.

"Whatever."

"And as Beca's future Best Man, I need to arrange a welcome back party-" Jesse's goes to explain but it's quickly cut short by the elevator door dinging and low and behold... the one and only Beca Mitchell steps out before making her way in.

"Well..." He awkwardly trails off, "I guess no welcome back party. So, I'm just gonna have to improvise this bitch." Standing, he climbs onto his chair before screaming an obnoxiously loud,"WELCOME BACK!" making the entire police squad glance at him.

Some grimace.

Some hold their hands to their ears.

And one may have cried before bolting out of the room.

Stopping in her tracks, Beca's grip on her carrier bag falters as her gaze lands on him. Her mouth gaping open a few times before saying anything.

"I could not be more ashamed of you than I am right now." She deadpans before moving over to her desk. Setting her bag beside the computer, she sees that he's still on top of the chair.

"Dude, sit down."

"Oh," He whispers before glancing around to the staring eyes. "Sorry." He apologizes, slowly climbing back into his chair.

Beca's eyes follows his movements and she shakes her head with an amused smile. "You're like an overly excited puppy. I hate it." Her attention then falls back to her desk.

Her empty desk.

"Ugh."

Grabbing her bag, Beca zips the side open before putting a hand through. Reaching around, she finds what she needs and pulling it out, she sets the documents aside as well as a notepad. Booting up the desk computer, she lazily taps at the wooden table as she waits for it to load.

"Well, well, well, if it isn't one Beca Mitchell." Comes the sickly-sweet voice of Chloe Beale.

Beca can only sigh as she glances over towards the girl. She tips her head, "Beale."

"Mitchell," Chloe throws back, standing from her desk. She makes her way over towards the girl and leans on the monitor. "I'm surprised they let you back this early."

Beca's scrunches her face up, "But my 3 months are up-"

"Which is just a travesty-" Chloe interrupts in a sing-song voice, added with a smirk. Trying to act tough, she leans further over the desk, but her arm slips from the monitor, ending with the screen tumbling over.

Beca stares dead ahead wondering why she chose to come back.

"Mitchell!" Suddenly comes from the Captain's office, causing her to glance over – and making Chloe straighten up her posture, as Gail makes an appearance. "In my office." She says, motioning behind her. Her eyes then flicker towards Chloe, who- for lack of better words, looks as though she has a stick shoved up her ass- stands staring ahead. "Beale, fix that mess." Gail gestures towards the, almost broken, monitor.

"Yes, Captain!" Chloe flinches, grabbing at the computer screen so fast that it almost drops out of her butter fingers.

"Sweet Jesus," Beca mumbles on her way towards the office.

20 minutes later...

"Who... are they?" Chloe voices from her desk as two, very tall, very intimidating looking, people enter the station.

There's a dark-haired man, tall, slim, around his early 30's stood next to a very gorgeous blonde. Their eyes lock and the woman sends her a wink.

"Damn..." Jesse whistles as they saunter through the desks towards the Captain's office. Suddenly Beca's scuttering out from the door, almost running into the gorgeous blonde amazon woman. She halts barely before colliding with her, cursing profanities, "Watch it you- oh my god..." Beca's eyes land on the woman's face.

Chloe watches from afar, her jaw slacked. "Is she-"

"Drooling?" Jesse askes from beside her, "I think she might be." He chuckles.

"Pieter," Comes the woman's weirdly attractive voice, oh and with an accent, "Tell ze elf to move."

"Move elf," Pieter says, beckoning her away.

Beca's eyes don't stray from the woman as she struts past, getting a whiff of her intoxicating perfume, before entering the office. But then she gets her grips about her back and makes her descent towards her desk.

Sitting at said desk, her mouth lays open. But it's suddenly closed as a soft hand shuts it for her and glancing up she finds Chloe by her side.

"How is she even human?" Is all Beca asks, dreamily, and for whatever reason leaves a bad taste in the redhead's mouth as she glares down the office doors.

XxX

"What?!" Beca's eyebrows shoot to the top of her head.

"Don't make me repeat that, Mitchell," Chloe spits back, grabbing her beer and taking a sip from it. The pair are sat at the bar in which 3 months ago, had lead them to-

...never mind.

Anyways, Chloe dragged the stubborn brunette here, only getting her to agree by persuading her with free pizza and beer.

She honestly thought Beca would have put up more of a fight.

"So, let me get this straight," Beca takes a gulp from her beer before picking up a slice of pizza, "You brought me here to ask me to be your partner?" She asks, taking a large bite from the slice... very ungracefully I might add.

"Ew," Chloe scrunches her face up as the girl gets tomato sauce on the side of her mouth. "Yes." She then says, her foot tapping along the wooden bar floor. "Look, please, Beca."

Beca rolls her eyes, "Why?"

Shaking her head, Chloe huffs, "Cos' we can't just have two German's come in and... and steal our jobs!" Is what she goes with.

"But they aren't?" Beca tries.

Sighing Chloe slouches back. With one last gulp from her beer, she stands to leave, "Forget it, I'll ask someone els-"

"Wait." Beca says, reaching out for the girl's wrist only to accidentally grab her hand. Pulling Chloe back, "I'll do it," She says before ushering her back to her chair.

"Really?" Chloe asks, her eyes lighting up like a kid on Christmas.

Rolling her eyes once again, Beca lets out a small smile, "Yes."

Squealing, Chloe suddenly jumps up from her chair to bring Beca into a bone-crushing hug, almost falling into the girl's lap.

They fail to notice the others in the bar stare over at them.

"Woo!" One screams out, "I think we just got ourselves an engagement!"

And boy does that make the girls pull away.

"Oh, we're not-"

"Shush," Chloe hushes, leaning in to Beca's ear, "This could get us free drinks all night."

"Are you serious, Beale?" Beca exclaims in a whisper. And when she finds Chloe nodding, she gives in. "Fine." When she glances past the redhead, she finds the people in the bar staring at them as they wait for an answer. So, with a sigh, she puts on her best fake smile and-

"She said yes!"

The bar erupts in a fit of cheers and drinks are bought all round for them.

Guess Chloe was right, eh?

XxX

"When you asked me to do this, I thought it was like an actual case..." Beca states as her and Chloe currently, sneak, their way behind a wall to catch a glimpse at the two German's. "Not some spy mission." But then pausing, Beca twists around to face the girl, "Not that I'm complaining."

"That's a first." Chloe pipes back, laughing at Beca's faux hurt look. Shoving her on the shoulder, she tips her head, "Come on, let's keep moving."

"You're so rough, woman-" Beca halts once more, and sighs, "You ever say something in which you immediately wish you could take back?"

"Oh, plenty of times- oh god, move!" Chloe exclaims out of nowhere, her eyes widening as Pieter and- after listening through the hearing devices they're equipped with- Kommissar make their way over to where they're at, or better yet, hiding.

Beca and Chloe decided to follow the German duo after their shift, finding them pulling into a sushi restaurant.

Safe to say, they think something fishy is up. Haha.

Anway, Chloe from the get go had been feeling iffy towards the new pair. And had even scouted out Gail to ask why they were here. Turns out, they were sent over to investigate a case. Now why they needed European soil for that is something beyond her.

Besides... this whole operation, "German Invasion," is totally not because Chloe saw Beca flirting, and by that she means the poor girl getting all worked up, with the blonde goddess of a woman.

Would also like to mention that Beca and Chloe are currently dressed in wigs. Yes, you heard that correctly.

Fucking. Wigs.

Which were Beca's exact words when Chloe threw a pair of dark sunglasses at her along with a black wig.

She honestly looks like she's been summoned by a witch, or is a witch, with the dark veil of hair added with her pale complexion. Whereas Chloe looks- in Beca's opinion, not that she'll ever admit it out loud- freaking hot in a blonde wig.

In a panic, Chloe looks around for where they can go as the German's near them. "Oh, my god, oh my god-" She flails about as Beca looks on hopelessly.

Suddenly an idea sparks in Chloe's head.

As Beca glances over the side of the wall, she's basically face to face with the German's, "Oh fuc-"

Before she can finish, she hears a faint, "Hey babe!" before her head is being tilted to the side and soft lips colliding into hers.

Beca's eyes go wide in shock, but they quickly close over.

"Ugh..." Kommissar tuts, "Filthy Americans..." She scoffs before continuing through a sketchy looking door.

Chloe pushes further into Beca, backing her up against the wall, completely forgetting why they're currently in the position that they're in. But she isn't complaining, considering Beca flips their positions.

But pulling back for air, Chloe bites her lip as her eyes flutter open. And when they do, they widen as she catches a glance over Beca's shoulder.

"What the hell?" She voices, making Beca's eyebrows furrow.

"What's wrong?" The brunette asks, stepping out of the embrace to glance over. "Oh, shit."

Through the glass window of the sketchy looking door, stands both Kommissar and Pieter. Who seem to be stashing their jackets with jewellery.

Diamonds to be exact.

Side note, why out of all places to hide jewellery would someone place it in a damn sushi restaurant? It doesn't make any sense.

"Are they..."

"Committing theft?" Chloe finishes.

"I- I think so." Beca says, still in shock. "We should stop them, right?"

"Right." Chloe says, with a nod. "So, how should we go about this-" Before she can even complete the sentence, Beca bounds away from her, bursting through the door-

"BPD, you're under arrest!"

Later that night...

"Not only did you follow Detective Kommissar and Detective Pieter, while they were on duty, but you also tried to arrest them, is that correct?" Gail asks from her seat in her office as Beca and Chloe stand at the front of the desk, wigs of shame held in their hands.

"In our defence," Beca begins, making the Captain sigh. "We thought they were stealing. Not retrieving..." She shrugs.

"I'm very close to cutting you off, Mitchell." Gail states, catching Beca off guard. She's pissed and the brunette can tell. "You just returned from a suspension and god give me strength if it weren't for you being a somewhat good detective, I would have had you fired long ago."

Beca can only run a hand through her hair. She falls into the chair behind her with a sigh.

Chloe watches with a dejected look as she fiddles with the wig (of shame) in her hand. "It was my fault," She announces catching Beca and Gail's attention. "I asked her to come along. You should be blaming me, not Beca." She says to the Captain who only shakes her head.

"I'm disappointed in you, Detective Beale." Pushing the glasses up on her nose, Gail points to the door, "You're both dismissed. Don't let me see anything like this happening again."

"Holy shit..." Beca sighs once they're out of the office. She glances over to Chloe to find her staring at the ground below. "Hey..." She reaches out to place her hand on the girl's shoulder. "It's okay."

"I shouldn't have made you come along." The redhead says, and it sounds like she's almost in tears.

"You didn't. You asked and I said yes. There's a difference there." Beca says. "How about we go get a drink at the bar? On me."

Nodding, Chloe shrugs, "Okay..." As they're walking out, she suddenly halts. "Beca?" She calls out just as they near the elevator.

"Hmm?"

"You wouldn't have a ring, would you?"

"A ring? Why would you need a ring-" But then Beca's face goes blank. "Oh fuck."

XxX

RAISE YOUR WIGS OF SHAME!

So yeah, I finally updated this and added a new one shot. This one was honestly ridiculous. But then again, this entire series is. Anyways, I hope you all are liking this so far.

P.S. Do you think this is the end for Kommissar and Pieter, or will they return? Hmmmm...

#bechloe #Pitch Perfect #Detective AU

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perfectirishgifts · 3 years

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Fed Can Be NASA Of Money, Diem Can Be Space-X

New Post has been published on https://perfectirishgifts.com/fed-can-be-nasa-of-money-diem-can-be-space-x/

Fed Can Be NASA Of Money, Diem Can Be Space-X

Locking the stablecoin door after the source has bolted

You’ll remember Libra, the global currency proposed by Facebook a while ago? It met with some pretty negative reactions from central banks, regulators and many other stakeholders. Visa Inc. V , MasterCard MA and PayPal PYPL dropped out of the initial group of Libra Network members and things went a bit quiet. Then the Libra Association produced a revised version of their Libra White Paper, adding “stablecoins” in national currencies to the original plan for a single Libra currency based on a basket of currencies.

That white paper contains an interesting offer from the consortium to the world’s central banks. It says that the consortium hopes that “as central banks develop central bank digital currencies (CBDCs), these CBDCs could be directly integrated with the Libra network, removing the need for Libra Networks to manage the associated Reserves”. Well, the Libra Association has rebranded as the Diem Association and plans to launch its first USD dollar “stablecoin” early in 2021 so it’s time to consider that offer.

There’s no need to waste resources of your own on CBDC, Libra was telling them. If a couple of billion people around the world are going to store their digital currency in Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp wallets, then why build an alternative? Use us. You set the policies on inclusion and so on, we’ll do the heavy lifting. You can be the NASA of money and we’ll be the Space-X.

A member of the European Central Bank (ECB) board, Fabio Panetta, referred to the issue of such stablecoins at a recent Bundesbank-convened event about the future of payments noting that if the risks of such coins were to be minimised by insisting on a reserve in central bank money, that something like a Facebook would be “tantamount to outsourcing the provision of central bank money”. But why is that such a bad idea? As my good friend Simon Lelieveldt (an expert on electronic money) pointed out to, we tend to assume that the EBC would be the issuer of a CBDC but nowhere is that written into their mandate: it is a political decision, a point we will return to below.

Stablecoins are coming. Whether provided by Diem or others, the cat is out of the bag, the genie is out of the bottle, the horse has bolted. Now the question for the world’s central banks is not whether there should be digital currencies or not but what is the best way to deliver them. In which context, outsourcing is a viable option. Recall the Mondex experiment of the 1990s: it was the Bank of England that controlled the issuing of the digital currency, but the Mondex system itself and the Mondex cards issued to consumers were provided by commercial banks.

It looks as if the outsourcing is about to begin again, but not with banks. With the Diem Association’s plans to launch a USD “stablecoin” (I will insist on calling it the Facebuck) shortly – contingent on obtaining a variety of licences and permissions – it is time to speculate about what the impact of such a stablecoin might be.

Personally, I can see the attraction of using such a stablecoin. The ability for me to send money to a cousin in Australia by sending a few Facebucks directly from my Facebook Novi wallet to her Instagram Novi wallet would be useful and convenient. The ability for me to buy shareware from a Swedish software developer and pay instantly by transferring Facebucks by WhatsApp would stimulate trade and the economy. Joking aside, with a good user interface, a good customer experience and a good API to satisfy regulators, Novi and Diem together could indeed provide a viable global alternative to SWIFT.

Dollars and Dominance

Perhaps more importantly, though, US dollar stablecoins — whether provided by central banks themselves as in China, by banks or mobile operators, or by other organisations such as the Diem Assocation — would also reinforce the global dominance of the US dollar ahead of digital competitors (including everyone’s favourite unstablecoin, Bitcoin) in the post-pandemic world where online transactions are the new normal.

The German Minister of Finance calls Diem “a wolf in sheep’s clothing”. If you look at it though, what Diem propose to do is basically that same as is already allowed under European electronic money regulation. Provided that Diem segregate the customer deposits and hold them in the form of bank deposits and other appropriate asset classes, then issuing a digital dollar (or euro or or pound) is no big deal. What the Minister and others are presumably concerned about is the loss of monetary sovereignty if European citizens opt to shift their cash holdings from euros to dollars whether intermediated by Diem, Circle or anyone else.

If you want to understand some of the bigger picture around currencies, competition and what the eminent historian and Hoover Institution senior fellow Niall Ferguson refers to as “Cold War 2”, then you should take the time to listen to this conversation between Ferguson and CoinDesk’s Michael Casey. As the author of one of the best books on the history of finance, The Ascent of Money, Ferguson has a very wide and well-informed perspective on the issues and I have quoted him more than once in my book on the topic.

In this conversation, Ferguson observes that one of the lessons of history is that with globalisation comes a tendency for a particular currency to become the dominant currency, the Prime Currency, for transactions for trade. In the 19th century it was the British Pound, in the 20th century it became the US Dollar, and in the 21st century it will be… well, who knows but as globalisation moves into a period of obvious crisis it is being talked about as it wasn’t before. Ruchir Sharma, Morgan Stanley Investment Management’s chief global strategist, recently wrote that only five currencies had been top dog in post-medieval times: those of Portugal, Spain, the Netherlands, France and our United Kingdom. Those reigns lasted 94 years on average, by which measure the dollar is overdue for overthrow.

Public or Private? Local or Global?

Many people think that the only thing keeping it in place is the lack of a successor. Ferguson points toward China as the place where the new world may be forged, saying that “if I’m right and that trend continues and they become more dominant in not just domestic consumer payments in China but increasingly in payments around the world” then we may start to see a shift in the “tectonic plates of the international monetary system” and I couldn’t agree more.

Ferguson also refers to former Bank of England governor Mark Carney’s call for a synthetic hegemonic currency (SHC), which he rates as more plausible than Diem as the future of the international financial system. It would be a victory for John Maynard Keynes from beyond the grave. Keynes, as you will recall, was in favour of an SHC (the “bancor”) from the very beginning of the current international monetary regime and (correctly) reasoned at the time of Bretton Woods that the lack of such an international reserve currency would deliver control to the United States (at the expense of the United Kingdom).

In Ed Conway’s excellent book on Bretton Woods “The Summit” (New York Times review) he talks about how the dollar becoming top dog gave America what the recently-deceased former French President Valery Giscard d’Estaing called the “exorbitant privilege” of borrowing in its own currency. But finance is not the only reason why the coming currency Cold War is of vital importance to the US (and to the West as whole) and control over currency is important.

Former French President Valery Giscard d’Estaing attends a so-called “German-French Young Leaders … [] Conference” in Berlin on May 11, 2017. (Photo by TOBIAS SCHWARZ / AFP) (Photo by TOBIAS SCHWARZ/AFP via Getty Images)

Currency competition is about politics, because the use of the dollar to settle global transactions gives the US unparalleled lever of “soft power”. As Ferguson puts it, “I think we probably mostly underestimate how extraordinarily effective this lever has been, it’s actually been a much more effective weapon of US foreign policy than the boots on the ground of the U.S. Army and Marine Corps”. Hence an e$ (whether a NASA Digital Dollar or a Space-X Facebuck) should be an important policy discussion in the United States right now and a priority for the incoming administration just as an e€ should be for Europe and an e£ should be in post-Brexit Britain.

Ferguson finishes the conversation with Casey by quoting the ending of Hillaire Belloc’s famous poem “Jim” to ask listeners this: you may not like a financial system in which the US is the dominant player, but imagine an international monetary and financial system in which China is the dominant player. What happens when transactions around the globe are potentially under the control of the Communist Party of China?

Whatever your politics, it is worth thinking about. Will a future US administration with a global perspective accept the compromise of an SHC as a means to retain some control or can they launch a digital dollar into global orbit first?

From Social Media in Perfectirishgifts

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sonofhistory · 7 years

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mediocre jobs are ok and did robert gould shaw get good grades or no?

Robert Gould Shaw’s education:

When Robert Gould Shaw was a boy, he studied and attended school in West Roxbury where he was influenced by the humanitarianism of Brook Farm intellects. He no longer attended school there by the time he turned nine as he family moved and settled in the north end town of West new Brighton. During this age, it became time for Robert to advance to more challenging studies, his uncle Coolidge Shaw talked his parents, Francis and Sarah into sending the boy to the preparatory school of St. John’ College in Forham, New York. Coolidge felt that a Catholic schooling would be good for his nephew.

However, Robert’s first letter home in June of 1850 reflects a very different take on what he was experiencing. “I wish you hadn’t sent me here … for I hate it like everything.” In September, Robert continued in his rage “I hate Fordham” and added a note about his professor: “My old teacher scolded me today because I didn’t do something he didn’t tell me to do, I hate him.” He confided that his homesickness embarrassed him when he cried in front of his classmates. There is no evidence he was punished by “Father Regnier” or known as the one “who ships the boys” but he did run away twice and told his parents in October, “I’d rather do anything than stay here.”

Nevertheless, he remained at Fordham for the entire semester studying French, Spanish, Latin and Greek while also continuing his lessons on the violin. While Robert attended to his schooling, his parents planned an extended tour of Europe for the entire family. In January, 1851, Robert thankfully said goodbye to Fordham forever and sailed from the New York harbor.

For the next five years, Robert studied, and developed a “wanderlust” he never lost, and lived through the years of thirteen and eighteen while there. Beginning in October of that year, he was sent to the boarding school of Monster and Madame Roulet in Neuchatel, Switzerland. Still, while he enjoyed his time here, he usually homesick tendencies caught up to him and he began to miss his parents. He was pleased that “M and Mme. Roulet are very kind … “ but wrote “I hate to be here. I keep thinking what you are all doing.” During his time there he built a close relationship with Mr. Roulet whom he regarded as a friend.

Roulet administered a rigorous curriculum. Weekly, Robert studied geometry, algebra, and geology as well as six languages–he concentrated on French and German. He took parts in student theater productions and kept up his usually lessons on the violin and piano. In good weather, he would be taking with his teacher on tours in France and Switzerland. Roulet nurtured his students though he fostered a nasty temper occasionally. Shaw told his mother, “Roulet hardly ever gets mad about the lessons, but only when we break some of the rules, or are impolite. But when he does get angry he’s just like the wolf.” Robert never saw him punish anyone and rather, “he only scolds.” Robert resented having to explain where and when and why every time he wanted to go for a walk or take a horseback ride or visit town. After a year of explanations, Robert remarked, “I shall be very glad to have more freedom when I leave here.”

During his next two years in the city, Robert struggled. He had grown up around ardent abolitionist but now he began to evaluate whether he could live up to the level of his parent’ dedication to the social reform. Robert read while in the school Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin. Robert questioned his parents on comparative studies and statistics concerning number of blacks and whites in the South. Shaw responded after finding out of the “Fugitive Slave Law” that he hoped Russian would read Uncle Tom’s Cabin and that is will “help them set their slaves free.” He inquired into whether the royalists of Rome would ban the book because of its republican principals. He resigned himself for the time with a frank sentence, “I don’t see how one man could do much against slavery.”

Robert also questioned religion. He received a letter from one of his St. John’s teacher priests who feared for his education at Roulet’s and expressed hope that Robert would go to school in Italy. Robert scoffed back that “He meant that he’s afraid I won’t be converted to Catholicism, because he hopes I’d be left in the clothes of the Jesuits at Rome, and would become catholic right off.” Roulet attempted to convince Robert that he should take religion classes and attend church regularly, but he fired back angrily to his parents that it was not Roulet’s business if he were “good or bad” and that those students who do go are not “any better than me and that’s what I told them.” Robert never ended up devoting himself to religion or a church.

Robert also began to take up career goals. He did not want to be a reformer. He did not mention gaining an education at Harvard and instead, to his parents, in one verse while most likely caused them a little concern, said: “I think I should like to go to West Point.” HIs mother replied of her disapproval and he commented, insisting that “I think I should like it and what else can I do? I can’t think of any thing else, for I don’t want to be a Merchant, or Doctor, or Minister, or any thing like that.”

During the summer of 1855, Shaw traveled with Roulet throughout Switzerland and bid farewell as school began again in September. He spent the next ten months with his family at their rented house in Sorrento on the Malfi peninsula south of Naples. The family also toured Rome, Florence and Heidelberg. After celebrating the Fourth of July with his family, Robert took a trip with his father to Hanover, Germany where he continued his education for two years via private tutors. The first time of freedom in his life caused him to be rather reckless as he was not homesick and commented to his mother “how big inside I’ve got since I’ve been here. I’m at least five years older then when I came.” In his impulsiveness, he spent all of his allowance and had to ask his mother for more. In an arrogant statement he said, “I have no taste for anything excepting amusing myself!” and that he’d rather be a chimneysweep then a merchant.

Despite this, he kept up his studies. From nine in the morning the two in the after family he studied with an occasional late afternoon class. Most nights he was in place for the seven in the evening curtain at the theater, opera or concert. He loved literature and music. He also became a regular at “fancy-balls where he made friends. Sometimes he drank too much champagne and said “its almost impossible not to drink a good deal, because there is so much good wine here.” He took a trip to Norway by himself as well with other students he knew and only informed his parents once he returned. Often he said that his purse was “getting hollow cheeks again.” He sugar coated it, however, and thought his mother’s scoldings were a bit too harsh as he commented to his father.

Robert finally decided on Harvard and reassured his parents that his studies were going well. Over confident, he thought he would have no trouble passing the entrance examinations in the fall of 1856. He hoped he might be able to enter as a junior but would enter no lower than a sophomore. His parents suggested his might want a tutor to push him through his intensive studies in the summer before examinations. Robert returned to America in may of 1856 and passed the Harvard entrance examinations which he rated as “very easy.” Spoiled by his elaborate European education, he found everything “horridly stupid here and just like a school.” He said he had to again “ask if he wanted to go anywhere.”

By October he discovered he had not prepared well for Harvard’s academic demands and threatened to leave school to “go into a store” if “at the end of the year I stand very low.” His dislike of discipline transferred over, “I hate Cambridge,” he said. He considered switching to Columbia or New York University but did not. Robert stayed in school but never pulled himself academically to the top half of his class. He reported the Class of 1860 to the staff was “the latest class they have had for a long while.”

He excelled, however, in extracurricular activities. he enjoyed playing “football” but with fifty to seventy men on a team all engaged at once, he was beaten up regularly by older players. In his second year he joined about club and participated in rowing raced with other clubs. He took boxing lessons and played the violin well enough to join a musical group, the Pierians, who played twice a week. he was always inclined to music. He lavished in the social hour and other societies sponsored. His best friend at Harvard was his cousin Harry Russell. Shaw roomed with the football and rowing champion, Caspar Croninshield. He would also skip school on the weekends to sneak off with his friend’s uncle.

#thatgirlgrace97 #flood pressles box

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carterthornton · 7 years

Text

The Third Wave | Chapter One: A Change In Routine

A ray of light surpassed the narrow gap between Aiko’s curtains, shining down upon her face and rousing her from her slumber. Her eyes fluttered for but a moment as her vision straightened out, and with a grunt, Aiko lifted her tired head, sitting at the edge of her bed. She started staring at herself in the mirror just a few feet away that she had propped right next to her door. Every morning she would gaze into the mirror, studying her face and eyes as if they were brand new, and she had done this since she was no older than five. Her mother had always told her to do so, insisting it was, “to accept the way you look” and, “to face yourself before you face the world”. She didn’t really understand it when she was younger, and now that she was eighteen, the reasoning behind it never really mattered. All she knew was her daily routine: get up, get in the shower, get dressed, then find some shred of excitement to make the day seem less repetitive.

Aiko sighed as she marvelled at her own face. Many had told her it was her most prominent feature, but after so many years she had almost become desensitized to it. She got her narrow blue eyes from her mother and father, the former being Japanese, the latter being of mixed Haida First Nations descent. Many had told her that her eyes were so mystifying and that they contrasted her complexion in such a beautiful way. All Aiko saw were two broad, blue eyes with epicanthic folds that made it look like she was perpetually tired. Her shoulder length ebony hair would often be brushed to the left, partially concealing that side of her face. Her chestnut skin was her father's— a mishmash of Haida and European –and its colour was so alien to her noticeably round face, which she inherited from her mother. Aiko often thought back to her birth certificate when on the topic of her skin. Under the race category, it read, ‘mixed’, which she always thought was just the politically correct way of saying 'who the hell knows?’.

She was not the tallest girl in the world, but Aiko— to her relief —was not too short. She was around five foot nine, and she sported an hourglass build with sizeable hips and a fairly generous chest; she had the women on her father’s side to thank for that. Though, Aiko always believed her feet were far too large and oafish for a woman of her form; most of her shoes she bought in sizes far too small, wishing to hide the feet she so detested.

Aiko stretched, yawning as she grabbed the cup of water off of her nightstand. She took a long drink from the glass, relieving the harshness in her voice, then with a long groan, she walked across the hall to the bathroom where she would have her morning shower. Her shower session ranged from five to seven minutes on average, and her shorter hair was to thank for that. There was a time in her mid-teens that she would take almost twenty to get out, to which her father would often give her a lecture about saving water. It wasn’t until her father actually made her pay a water bill when she was thirteen that the message really sank in.

After drying her hair, Aiko put on her work clothes, or in her case, day-to-day clothing; a white tank top with her usual brown leather jacket overtop, coupled by a pair of dark blue jeans. Though it wasn’t very fashionable clothing, she always felt comfortable in it. As she sat down on her bureau, she applied a little blush and some eyeliner, leaning over to take a peek at herself in the detached mirror by her door. She was not the kind of woman who enjoyed attention from most— not because she didn’t care, but because she lacked the time and patience to deal with such trivial matters. Besides, most of whom that were interested in her weren’t her type anyway. Admittedly, she wasn’t even certain what her type was. But if she did have a type, she definitely knew it wasn’t anything like the kind of people who would pop in and out of the convenience store where she worked.

Checking the time on her phone, Aiko descended the spiral staircase down the hall on her right, entering her living room. It was 6:34, work wouldn’t be for another hour or so. Aiko moseyed over to the kitchen, waving to her father, who was sprawled out on the couch watching the news as she poured herself some cereal.

With a low grunt, Aiko’s father lifted himself off his seat and shuffled over to the kitchen as well, setting up a toaster on the island right next to Aiko’s cereal for his usual BLT. “Hey, Koko, how was your sleep?”

Her father was the same as ever. Rain or shine he would wear the same Hawaiian shirts and tan cargo shorts as if he were some kind of beach volleyball referee. His face was taller and a little darker than Aiko’s, and his nose came at more of a point than a rounded end like hers. His jaw was pronounced and his chin was somewhat sharper, but his eyes were narrow, though, not quite like Aiko’s. He was very large, a little more than a head taller than her, and he was well-built, getting most of his bulk from his German side. And like a vast majority with German blood in their veins, like Aiko, he had striking blue eyes. He would often call their eyes 'The Schmitt Gaze’, as his father, and his father before him all shared this trait.

"Pretty good,“ Aiko replied as she crunched on a spoonful of Cheerio’s.

"Any dreams?” Her father asked.

"Nah, nothing tonight…“ Aiko sighed as her eyes gravitated to the clock above the refrigerator on her right.

"Again?” He scoffed, grabbing a tomato from the windowsill above the kitchen sink. “Man, you really need a little excitement now and then, Koko. You’ll start gettin’ nightmares if ya keep dancin’ to the same tune all the time.” Aiko silently scooped another spoonful of cereal into her mouth. “All I’m sayin’, Koko, is that you need to spice it up now and then. Yeah, you’re takin’ this first year off to learn a little about yourself, but you can’t do that if all you do is work, sleep, and eat. You can get into any university ya want, but you’re still undecided. Try to live a little if you want to learn somethin’ about yourself.”

"So what do you want me to do?“ Aiko had heard the speech hundreds of times.

"You can’t get hung up on the past, Koko. You gotta let go.”

"The same way you let go of mom…?“ Aiko muttered under her breath.

"What was that?” He said as he raised an eyebrow at her.

"Nothing, dad…“ Aiko shook her head as she placed her bowl in the dishwasher. "Are you off work today?”

"Yeah, they give me Saturdays off now, remember?“

"Oh, right…” Aiko nodded as she grabbed some orange juice from the fridge and filled a short glass to the brim. As she downed the glass, her attention was grabbed by the television still yammering in the living area about the recent Mark-user incidents in Victoria.

"Marcusologists are still baffled by the recent anomaly on Vancouver Island, and the population of Mark-users is growing at an alarming rate. In response, The League of Thirty has made their decision in Geneva to send in our own Canadian IMOP Task Force just this morning. Meeting with them will be Canada’s top IMOP agent, Victoria’s own Northstar.“ The anchorman on television reported.

"Northstar?! Damn, this must be serious. I was still in university last I heard of an anomaly like this, but I never thought there’d be one on our own island.” Aiko’s father munched on his sandwich as he turned down the TV. “What do you figure, Koko?”

"I think this recent spike in new Mark-users will bring some old ones out of the woodwork…“ Aiko ruminated on the idea. "Maybe-.”

"Oh no, don’t get any ideas, Koko. We talked about this before. You aren’t going to that academy. You have no Mark of your own.“

"Dad, why can’t you let me go?! Mom-!”

"Please, don’t bring her into this, Koko. I know what happened to her.“ Aiko’s father set his hands on the island to prop himself up, bowing his head and he took a deep breath. "This is what I meant by fixating on the past. You can’t keep sitting in your room reading those books of yours studying Mark-users. I won’t have you go to that academy. You’re out of your league.”

"But I want to help people, dad!“

"And you can do that doing some other job, Aiko! I won’t lose you like I lost her!” Her father exploded, resting his head on the table as his rage fizzled. “It’s-… check the time. You’ll be late for work here quick.”

"Yeah. Sorry, dad…“ Aiko hid the quivering in her lip as she marched over to the door, squeezing into her red runners and slinging her satchel around her shoulder. "I’ll see you later.”

****

Aiko walked down the same path her mother always took to the city; she called it the “Sukoshi Path”, after a similar road she would take to school when she was a young girl living in Okinawa. She often shared stories on their long walks down the winding road through towering spruce and arbutus trees, stories about Japan, about life before the Marks showed up. Aiko would laugh and sing with her mother as they made their way down the hill, watching as ravens flew in the treetops and deer pranced about in the thickets. She felt so much older now; it had been four years since their last walk together from the cabin. Solitude and time had whitewashed those beloved stories, and she only retained fragments of them, like loose shards of stained glass left behind after a pane had been shattered.

Aiko eventually reached the bottom of the hill and turned onto the highway, adjusting her satchel; the added weight from the heavy books inside had dug into her shoulder, to which she would often switch shoulders to combat the discomfort. Eventually, she just gave up and held the bag in her arms, keeping it close to her chest. Since high school, she had always kept a journal and marcusology encyclopedia close at hand to study and identify all the various Mark users that popped up around Vancouver Island. She had become an expert of sorts, though, she never really shared her knowledge on the subject with anyone else besides her mother.

Work wasn’t very far at all— just some dinky convenience store just a mile down the road on the right side not too far from Port Renfrew, a fairly touristy town a few hours north of Victoria. The shop wasn’t too lively in the winter; only the occasional drifter or trucker would come by, maybe for a pack smokes or some junk food, typical items one would buy at such a place. In the summer one would see more tourists than anything else; perhaps a few local hippies here and there looking for a place to rest before they headed out to China Beach for some surfing. Aiko greatly preferred winter over summer in terms of business, but in the case of weather, Aiko despised the eternal grey sky of a Vancouver Island winter.

The exterior of the convenience store wasn’t all that pleasant to look at. It was mostly made of sun-bleached wood, and the windows, though clean thanks to her diligent care, were somewhat scratchy and translucent from age. There was only one Helium 3 pump by the parking lot about the size of an air compressor— a replacement for the old gasoline pumps that had all but vanished just a few years ago. Fusion power had become all the rage since the U.S had set up mining operations on the Moon. However, all the rage or not, with rumours of a Third Wave of Marks approaching, Marked One incidents made everything else seem like old news. What news could possibly top superpowered humans attacking a school or a governmental building?

Aiko opened the ancient wooden door, cringing a little as it let out its horrific creak, like one of those doors you would see in a bad horror movie with exaggerated sound effects. Aiko sighed as she looked to her workspace on the right, stepping into the tiny cashier’s booth. She set her satchel on the desk behind her, grabbed the large encyclopedia out of it, then sat down on her stool, placing her elbows on the front desk as she opened up the book.

"Aiko? Are you here?“ A voice called out to her a few meters away, right next to the soft drink fountain— in the right corner of the store, concealed by a shelf full of protein bars and other health food for the hippies.

"Yeah, Sal. I’m here.” Aiko replied, flipping through her encyclopedia as she checked the cash register.

"Nice to see ya, niña. I was wonderin’ when you’d show up.“ Sal said with a usual grumble to his tone, replenishing the shelves with new product. "How’ve you been?”

Salvador was from Spain, and he bought the store off of the previous owners a few years prior, when Aiko started working. Salvador was a thin man with olive skin, and he was around an inch shorter than Aiko. He was totally bald, and he sported a clean shaven, black goatee. His usual attire consisted of mainly classic rock t-shirts or flannel button-down shirts. In this instance, he was wearing a black “Pink Floyd: Dark Side of the Moon” shirt with the signature beam of light through the triangular prism, forming a rainbow on the other side. Along with the shirt, he wore a pair of blue jeans and red loafers. He was your average classic rock fanatic, and he would often play Led Zeppelin or Rush on the old as dirt CD player he had set up on a chair in the corner of Aiko’s booth.

"I’m alright, Sal…“ Aiko nodded unconvincingly, still looking through her textbook.

"I dunno. You’re lookin’ a little edgy today, eh?” Sal said, playing air guitar as his favourite riff in Kashmir came on. “C'mon, cheer up! Listen to the sweet sounds of Jimmy Page!”

"Geez, Sal…“ Aiko chuckled as she watched Sal ham it up, strolling over to the second aisle of the store, stocking the shelves with beef jerky and other road food, still strumming an imaginary guitar. "You’re lucky no one is here to see that.”

"The only one who’ll get embarrassed is you.“ Sal snickered as he ceased his miniature performance, returning to his work. "So, you’ve got any plans yet?”

“I’m working on it…” Aiko shrugged her shoulders as she flipped to the section on Mark types.

"Ah, you thinkin’ of bein’ a marcusologist?“ Sal looked over the counter at Aiko’s reading material. "You always read those books of yours.”

"Yeah, well… not really. I dunno…“ Aiko shook her head as she continued reading.

"Ah, you’ll figure it out, Koko. Don’t fret.” Sal insisted as he turned over the 'closed�� sign on the window to read 'open’. “Another day…”

"Yep…“ Aiko muttered to herself.

After around a half hour of meagre activity, it was clear that it was going to be a very slow day. Barely any cars stopped on their way to Port Renfrew, and Salvador became anxious like he always did in the winter. He’d occupy himself with crosswords or counted the tiles on the floor to pass the time; he was somewhat like a child. Perhaps that was why she stuck with him after so many years. He knew how to let loose once in a while, and Aiko had lost that part of her. She had always been so tense and introverted, it was hard being without her high school friends, and Sal was sort of their replacement. Although, Aiko knew this little world of hers couldn’t last. She was eighteen, she had a plan for the future, but it seemed so distant and impossible. Whether she had a dream or not, Aiko knew she had to leave Port Renfrew at some point. She just needed to find a way to get back up on her feet.

"Hey, Koko. Can you pass me my water bottle? I think I left it under the desk there.” Sal gestured over to Aiko’s booth as he walked over, avoiding the arrangement of potato chips on the cardboard shelf by the front door— all stacked in a neat display. “Should be on the top shelf down there.”

"Huh?“ It took a moment for his instructions to echo in Aiko’s head. "Oh, yeah. No problem.”

Aiko got off her stool and crouched down, searching for the bottle. She leaned over a bit, going down on her knees to get more comfortable. There was a mess of other junk under the desk; CDs, cassette tapes, all old junk only Sal would have. After a minute or so of rummaging around, her hand touched something plastic. Aiko moved the old newspapers out of the way and grabbed the plastic container, placing it on the desk. However, Aiko paused before she got back on her feet.

A subtle noise emanated from the empty space where the bottle once sat, drawing her closer. She listened carefully, perceiving them as muffled whispers of some sort. Aiko squinted, peering into the deep shelf to see what the source of the disturbance was. Hidden within the darkness was an odd symbol that shone a grey light. The symbol appeared to have two parts; the first looked a lot like a pedestrian one would see on road sign, however, behind it was the next piece— a larger, much more rigid humanoid. The whispers faded as she reached for the strange rune, and it vanished suddenly. Aiko recoiled in response, feeling a sharp sting on the back of her right hand; it felt like it had been doused in boiling water.

"Ah!“ Aiko grimaced as she inspected her hand, her eyes going wide with shock. On it was the same exact symbol she had just examined. And sure enough, as she checked underneath the desk, the symbol had disappeared.

"What? What is it, Koko?” Sal moved closer, checking to see if she was alright.

"N-nothing! I’m fine! I-… I just thought I saw a rat is all. Must’ve just been my imagination…“ Aiko lied as she hid her right hand behind the desk, quickly flipping backward through her encyclopedia as she deterred Salvador from coming any closer.

"Alright…” Sal nodded slowly as he took his water and walked to the row of coolers at the back of the store, assuming Aiko just had a moment.

"If I’m right… then…“ Aiko assessed what had just happened, recalling every detail of the experience as she came to the page in her textbook on 'Mark Acquisition’. ”Here it is!“

CHAPTER ONE: MARK AQUISITION

Based on information gathered from interviews with Mark-users, Marks will typically etch themselves into any conceivable surface in order to be noticed by a human. Once visual contact is established with a Mark, it will vanish from its point of origin and instantly latch itself onto the viewer’s skin.(It is unknown if the area on the body in which the Mark appears contributes to the power of the Mark in any way). While the true nature of mark acquisition has yet to be revealed, marcusologists have narrowed down possible contributing factors that may lead to a person obtaining a Mark.

Factors:

#1: The parent of the new Mark-user was also a Mark-user. (This scenario has been proven to occur almost 80% of the time amongst children of Mark-users).

#2: The new Mark-user has recently experienced psychological trauma (This has been known to yield extremely powerful and volatile Marks).

#3: Danger is imminent, and the Mark appears to protect its new user.

#4: A Mark-user is in close proximity.

Starting with number one on the list, Aiko began to calculate. ”Alright. I know my dad isn’t a Mark-user, but mom was in the IMOP, though, she didn’t have one.“ She then came to the second bullet on the list. ”No… I haven’t experienced any real trauma recently. That fight with my dad wasn’t anything close to a trauma.“ Then she moved down to the third and fourth bullet. ”These two are both equally likely. Maybe it’s both. If a Mark-user is close, then perhaps they’re the imminent 'danger’.“

Aiko closed her book as the front door swung open, ringing the bell hanging right above it, alerting Salvador. The stranger looked homeless; he wore a torn red sweater with the hood done up, sported a shabby beard, and he seemed to drunkenly shuffle towards her booth, grabbing a pack of cigarettes from the basket on the desk. Without paying, he tore into the pack with his unusually long and sharp fingernails, dropping shreds of plastic and cardboard on the floor. Aiko spoke up after a few minutes had passed, clearly seeing the concern in Salvador’s eyes. If this man was a Mark-user, she had to handle the situation herself. She couldn’t let Salvador close to him. Quickly Aiko raised her hand to halt Salvador, insisting that she had the situation under control.

"E-excuse me, sir… you haven’t paid for those…” Aiko swallowed nervously, watching the shifty man snarl, gnashing a set of razor sharp canines as he tossed the cigarettes on the table. He scratched the wood countertop as a threat, indicating he had no intention of paying. “S-sir, I’ll call-. Sal, no!” Aiko was too late. Before Sal could knock him on the back of the head with his elbow, he reacted, slashing Salvador across the chest with his right claw, knocking him into a nearby shelf with a savage backhand. “Sal!”

"You should’ve let me have a smoke, girl! You ain’t callin’ the cops! I ain’t goin’ back!“ The man’s claws extended even more, and excess hair began to grow around his eyes as he took a swing at Aiko.

”Those claws! He must be a Cellularum-type Mark of the Beast Class! Predatory Beast Subclass!“ Aiko’s eyes widened as she ducked, shimmying under the counter to the other side of the booth. ”These guys are prone to irrational thoughts and actions! The most violent of all Mark-users! There’s no way this guy can be reasoned with now that he’s pissed off! I’ve got to deal with him now or he’ll kill us both!“

Aiko grabbed the in-case-of-emergency mace from under her desk, waiting for the right moment. Then, as the raging man sliced through a section of her desk with his claws, Aiko sprung into action. She let out a spray of burning liquid from the can of mace into the man’s face as he let his guard down, blinding him.

"Arraaghhh!” The man growled as he slashed wildly in Aiko’s general direction, smashing her booth to pieces with his supernatural strength.

Aiko vaulted over her desk before she was caught in the flurry of claws, making her way over to Sal to make sure he was still breathing. Luckily, he hadn’t sustained too severe of a laceration, but he had been rendered unconscious by the beast man’s brutal follow-up. Switched into survival mode, Aiko grabbed Sal and dragged him into the back room, letting the blind beast growl and roar by himself. Though she was given enough time to get Sal to safety, the homeless man began to pick up on Aiko’s scent in the air, using his nose to see. Realizing this, Aiko moved away from Salvador, running into the middle aisle, right in front of the glass door of one of the various drink coolers at the back of the store.

"C'mon! I’m right here!“ Aiko shouted over to the man, a rush of adrenaline coursing through her. "Come and get me!”

Annoyed by her confidence, the man charged forward, lunging at Aiko. But at the last second, Aiko strafed to the right, letting him run right into the glass door, shattering it to pieces. Though he was now grievously injured, the man still removed himself from the fractured remains of the cooler, his rage heightened to an even greater extent. He ran at Aiko while she was on the ground, glass lodged in face and chest, claws extended even further. This time Aiko was helpless, and in a last ditch effort, she brought her fist up, attempting to punch her attacker. To her surprise, she was not claimed by his claws. Aiko didn’t feel her fist connect at all, and yet the man was thrown back with such force that he flew through two aisles, stopping only once he impacted the drink fountain, launching liquids around the room in wild, sticky geyser of browns, oranges, and reds.

Utterly speechless, Aiko’s mouth hung wide open as she found out just what had hit the beast-man. It was an arm about the size of her own, perhaps a bit larger. Its fist was clenched tightly like her own, and the whole arm appeared to be composed of the same material as the floor; tough ceramic tile and hardened grout.

"Whaa….?“ Aiko gawked as the fist retracted back into the floor, returning the ground to its normal state. The Mark on her hand flashed brightly before fading back to its more tattoo-like form, indicating its power had subsided. "That was… my Mark’s ability?”

2 notes · View notes

danaslewis · 4 years

Text

TRUMPS “STRATEGIC INCOHERENCE”. Drawdown of U.S. troops Germany

https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/u-s-troop-drawdown-germany-trumps-strategic-incoherence/id1512445640?i=1000477969872

Speaker 1: Ambassador Nichols Burns

Chancellor Merkel all said, we don't want to bring Russia back into the [inaudible]. This open defiance and disagreement with the United States is really unprecedented.

Speaker 2: Dana Lewis - host

Hi everyone. I'm Dana Lewis in London, and welcome to backstory. While you were rightly concerned about police violence in America and trying to cope with a pandemic, don't feel bad if you didn't notice this curve ball, president Trump, just

Speaker 3:Dana

through NATO and specifically Germany, the white house is not so quietly leaking a decision to pull a third of America's 35,000 soldiers out of Germany, and it appears Trump is doing it because well, he's never gotten along well with German chancellor, Angela Merkel. And she just said she wouldn't attend a G seven meeting in June, especially since Trump want to do invite Russian president Putin. But Trump has never gotten along with Merkel, just listened to a small portion of his rent about Germany buying its energy supplies from Russia.

Speaker 4: Trump

But Germany is totally controlled by Russia because they were getting from 60 to 70% of their energy from Russia and a new pipeline. And you tell me if that's appropriate because I think it's not. And I think it's a very bad thing for NATO

Speaker 3: Merkel

and Angela Merkel. Who's clearly frosty towards Trump, took a veiled swipe at him during a speech last year at Harvard

Speaker 5: 1:24

tear down walls of ignorance and narrow mindedness for nothing has to stay as it is,

Speaker 3: Dana - host

but reducing America's force in Europe and NATO has serious consequences and it sends the wrong message to an aggressive Russia. And to explain all this, you can't hear more eloquent, wiser words from ambassador Nicholas Burns and our second guest, the former commander of U S military in Europe, former Lieutenant general, Ben Hodges. First Nicholas Burns. Our ambassador Nicholas Burns was in the foreign service for 27 years and he was the us ambassador to NATO. And he is currently professor of diplomacy and international politics at Harvard's John F. Kennedy school of government. Thank you for joining us, mr. Ambassador.

Speaker 1: 2:10

It's a pleasure to be with you. Thank you so much.

Speaker 3: 2:13

Ambassador president Trump apparently wants to pull about one third of American troops out of Germany. Good idea. Terrible idea.

Speaker 1: 2:22

Not in the interest of the United States. The American trips are in Germany, obviously to help protect Germany and other European countries, but mainly because it's in the interest of the United States in two respects, it's a way that the United States can, uh, within NATO contain Putin and contain Russian aggression in Eastern Europe. It's also been the jumping off point, uh, for the United States into North Africa. As we say, we help the French try to contain the terrorist threat in places like Mali and Nisha air. And it was a jumping off point for our major Wars that we fought in Iraq and Afghanistan of the extraordinary infrastructure that we have built up with Germany over the last several decades, Ramstein airbase, for instance, being the major air base the United States uses. So this is, um, this is penny wise, pound foolish. It's it's also a part of, in my view of the strategic incoherence of what president Trump is trying to do with Europe. He's been very weak on Europe.

Speaker 3: 3:22

Is this more about his personality than, than strategy? Because he was angry at Angela Merkel for not wanting to attend the G seven. I mean, is this personality or is this him going back to NATO contributions and all of that?

Speaker 1: 3:35

It's not strategic. It appears to be spite he has had it out for Angela Merkel from the beginning of his presidency. I think he's been more critical of her publicly and privately than just about any world leader. He never breathed a word of, uh, of, um, disrespect or disagreement with shisha and ping or Putin or Kim Jong on, but he's been a consistent critic occurs. And he was apparently furious that she decided not to attend, uh, his plan G seven meeting in Washington at a time when, uh, it's difficult for leaders to travel because of the Corona virus. We still have high infection rates here in the United States. And I think, um, for a president of the United States to pull 9,500 American troops out of Germany, because he's upset with a German chancellor is not strategic, it's foolish.

Speaker 3: 4:22

So will Congress allow them to do it?

Speaker 1: 4:25

It's going to be interesting to see. I mean, there is, I think a movement in Congress right now, uh, to assert itself, uh, perhaps to pass a resolution against this decision, uh, or to try to delay it. Congress does hold the purse strings. One of the other reasons why we've expanded the American true presence in Germany just over the last five years was after Putin's annexation of Crimea and his, his placement of Russian troops inside Ukraine in 2014 and 15, the Obama administration and the Trump administration have effectively rebuilt the U S armored presence in Europe that had been hollowed out to fight the Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. It's part of a strategic effort to make deterrent stronger against Putin as he threatens the Baltic States and Poland. And as he, of course, is active illegally in both Georgia and Ukraine. So it's a very important strategic move. Congress in both parties had funded a fairly substantial buildup, multibillion dollar buildup of American armored presence. And now the president is going to counteract that he appears not to have had any major discussions inside the administration with the state and defense departments. And of course, the fact given Donald Trump's record, he didn't let the Germans now ahead of this announcement. This is,

Speaker 3: 5:44

he wants to bring Russia back into the G seven. He talked about doing that. Is that in America's interest right now?

Speaker 1: 5:51

No, I was part of the effort to bring Russia, to expand the [inaudible] to the, to include Russia back in the 1990s, when I was special assistant to president Clinton for Russia and Ukraine affairs. But that was the 1990s when president Yeltsin was in power, we were partners with Russia. Um, potent is an adversary of the entire NATO Alliance. He has a next Crimea, which is at flagrant violation of international law. That's why sanctions were placed by the EU Canada and the United States on Putin. And the idea you'd invite them back to the G seven is anathema to all the other G seven leaders you saw it's extraordinary a week last week when prime minister Trudeau prime minister, Boris Johnson, chancellor Merkel all said, we don't want to bring Russia back into the [inaudible]. This open defiance and disagreement with the United States is really unprecedented in my, uh, 40 years of participation and observation of these events,

Speaker 3: 6:51

dangerous times we live in, I mean, we are seeing a number of treaties that president Trump has walked away from open skies. Uh, and now start, as you know, is supposed to be renewed next year. And it looks like president Trump is saying, we're not going to renew start. And, uh, the Russians are encouraging America to do so. The, I spoke the other day to Rose the Mueller who was the main chief negotiator for the U S and she talked about how, yes, you could bring China in later on, but in the meantime, you need to extend that treaty and not let it expire. We are entering into a new arms race. Does it worry you, when you start adding up all of these treaties we're walking away from and where that leaves us in terms of the dangerous to a nuclear exchange possibly with Russia and others?

Speaker 1: 7:36

Well, I think it's the most dangerous time in terms of nuclear weapons, proliferation and instability. In the last half century, since president Kennedy and president Johnson began arms control with the Soviet union back in the depths of the cold war, I would not blame it, obviously all on president Trump. I think the Russians are largely to blame. They're the ones who violated the intermediate nuclear forces treaty that subsided as you know, uh, more than a year ago. And all of NATO was opposed to that. Uh, the Russians have introduced, um, SU um, supersonic missiles and other strategic

Speaker 6: 8:16

[inaudible].

Speaker 1: 8:16

I played both strategic and intermediate range, um, Accords. And so I think the Russians are at the heart of this problem, but I, I agree that, uh, open skies for the United States to leave that that was very much in our interest start, uh, start renew, start renewal February one, 2021. It's a difficult issue because I think there's an argument to be made that you should, we should seriously consider extending it to provide for stability and strategic nuclear arms. But I do think the Trump administration has a point that China is absent from all of these arms agreements. China's now without any question, a greater military power than Russia, uh, all told. And I think the United States, and I hope Russia, as well as the NATO allies will pressure China to agree to limits on its nuclear program. And so the, the Trump, uh, strategy here is not, uh, irrational. They're trying to convince the Chinese leverage the Chinese, uh, that they have to make. Uh, they have to be part of the arms control regime itself.

Speaker 3: 9:21

Can I just talk to you very briefly, but what's happening in America? Uh, it is, it is troubling everywhere. And, um, how does this allow the U S to preach to others now about human rights and democracy? You mean largely I've spent my career, and I know you spent your career watching other nations and, and, and talking to other nations about the way government should work and democracy should work in America has been that great leader in that. And suddenly now, um, that the shine is off, isn't it. And it's compromising, it's troubling for the rest of the world. And where does it leave America in terms of its diplomacy?

Speaker 1: 10:05

Well, we live in a glass house. Race has been a curse on our history. We've never gotten it right. We've never done right by the African American community, going all the way back to 16, 19 Dana, when the first slave ship arrived in Virginia, and it's been the seminal event, an issue in our history, and I think millions of Americans, and you can see this and those demonstrating and speaking out, feel heartbroken over the murder of George Floyd, the systemic racism, the, the police mistreatment of young African American men. There's so many examples of it and the racism that exists in our society. And until we get a grip on this until we truly make progress, it's going to be difficult for the United States to be as to be totally credible on the issue of human rights. When we lecture the Chinese, as we should, frankly, on their deficiencies, in Hong Kong, on their attitudes, towards Taiwan, on their apparent treatment of the weaker population of shungite province, the Chinese come right back at us with this charge, we'll look at your own house. And so I think we're at a point in American history where our greatest weakness globally are the dysfunctions in Washington, the political dysfunctions, the racism in our country, the, the red blue divide we're at a time we need to heal America so that in part of America can be more effective and honest in our global policy.

Speaker 3: 11:33

Are you confident that you're in a healing process or are you just entering something more dangerous than that?

Speaker 1: 11:39

It's interesting. I, I'm confident that I've never seen the American public more engaged on race than it is right now. Uh, African Americans have always been engaged. They have to be engaged. They're the victims, white Americans taking to the streets and speaking out in a way that I never thought was possible. And I'm old enough to have been 12 in 1968 during the most terrible year in our modern history with the assassinations of Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy and the Vietnam war and, and the violence in our streets. And I think if there is a silver lining in this very dark cloud, it is that people are really standing up here, uh, and holding the government to account and the opposition to what president Trump tried to do, which was to bring the military into the streets to deny the first amendment rights. A peaceful protest is fundamental to the entire history of the country and the idea of America.

Speaker 1: 12:34

It's inspiring to see for former chairs of the joint chiefs of staff, all speak out against what president Trump tried to do. People are standing up, we've just got to keep it going. And I'm going to be very, in a sense partisan by saying, we have to defeat Donald Trump on November 3rd. I'm a advisor to Joe Bob. I've been supporting him for 14 months. And he, I think leadership is the key here in the white house, in, in governor's mansion in city halls, in our communities. We need to take back the America that we love. And that is so important, I think, to the rest of the world, to that democratic human rights oriented America. And that's the one you're talking about Dana. And I think this is, this crisis is the most profound crisis we've faced the racial crisis

Speaker 7: 13:20

best of the burns. Thank you so much for your, your wise thoughts. And it's always an honor to talk to you and thank you very much,

Speaker 1: 13:27

Dana, thank you. Honored to be on your program. Thanks so much.

Speaker 8: 13:34

[inaudible]

Speaker 7: 13:35

all right. Joining me now, Ben Hodges, a Lieutenant general is a retired United States army officer who served as commanding general United States army Europe. And he is currently the purging chair in strategic studies at the center for European policy analysis. And he's talking to us from Frankfurt Germany. So that's important, I think because he understands exactly both sides of the pond on these issues with NATO and troops in Europe. And if I can start off, I mean, president Trump as you're well aware has reportedly ordered the U S military to remove 9,500 troops from Germany. Uh, the move could reduce the U S contingent to 25,000. Can I get your reaction on it?

Speaker 9: 14:15

Well, Dan, first of all, thanks for the opportunity. Even people in the Pentagon and at NATO and other headquarters are referring all questions to the white house, which tells me that, you know, this is not tied to any sort of a strategic analysis, and this is a purely a political calculation. If it's true, then I think it's a colossal mistake, um, because of the damage it does to the cohesion of the Alliance, as well as a significant reduction to actual capability. That's here in Europe

Speaker 7: 14:49

when you're saying it's political, not, I mean, that plays into the idea that president Trump got angry with the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, and said, fine, you're not coming to the [inaudible]. We're going to take some troops out of Germany and penalize you. I mean, can you imagine an American president making a decision on something structure so strategic as military interests in Europe on the basis that he's just angry about a conference at [inaudible]

Speaker 9: 15:14

the timing of this leaves it open to question. I mean, the fact that you've asked that, and then I've seen that from others as well, um, is a reflection of the, uh, damage relationship between the United States and Germany. The fact that somebody, you know, uh, professional journalists and others would automatically connect chance to America saying she's not coming to the [inaudible] to a response by the American president like that. Uh, I believe that this is something that, um, the former ambassador, uh, Richard Grinnell has been encouraging for several months. Um, I don't know what caused the president to, um, if he said this, I don't know what caused it to happen right now, but certainly, um, the timing, um, is not helpful, uh, with regards to the, uh, uh, relationship now to her credit chancellor miracle. Um, of course, you know, has had pretty, uh, tough measures in place here in Germany, as far as closing down businesses, stopping, uh, gatherings. And so for her to then appear in Washington in a, in a closed group kind of setting, um, you could, you could see that's a difficult position for her. Like it would be for any other, uh, political leader that has imposed restrictive measures. So, um, I think it was, it was almost impossible for her to, to accept the, uh, the invitation.

Speaker 7: 16:38

You're saying that the ambassador Grinnell, the former ambassador was pushing this to draw down American troops in Germany. Why?

Speaker 9: 16:45

Uh, I think, uh, the ambassador, um, has, um, wow from day one, actually, even before he arrived to take office as our ambassador in Germany, he was already advocating for, um, Germany needing to do, um, Germany needs to do a lot more, um, as part of its role inside the Alliance. And for sure, every president has said that our European allies needed to do more, but there was a, a particular, uh, edge, um, to the ambassador's approach, um, that I actually always felt was counterproductive. And so, um, over the last few months he has advocated for this. Um, but it reflected in my view, a misunderstanding or a lack of appreciation for why we have troops in Germany, and they're not here to protect Germans. They're forward stationed, just like us air force. It's based in the UK. It's not there to protect the UK it's forward stationed for our interests.

Speaker 9: 17:49

How, how and our interests, I mean, how does that serve our interests? So, well, number one, our interests are best protected by a strong cohesive Alliance, NATO, uh, not perfect, but still the most successful Alliance in the history of the world. And so, um, our contribution to NATO, whether it's air forces, land forces, Navy, uh, intelligence, missile defense, um, that's our contribution to the collective defense effort of NATO. So you've got 30 nations committed to each other that protects America's interests. Secondly, in a more practical way, um, having bases like Ramstein, for example, in Germany, uh, allows us to project power or to support operations and support presence in Africa in the middle East, uh, the hospital at lunched Hill. Another example of soldiers who were wounded in Afghanistan, Iraq were flowing back into Lonsdale, no telling how many young men and women's lives were saved by having a very large capable medical center here in Germany. Uh, the number of troops that are in Germany about 34,000 army and air force, I mean, that would not fill up half of a major football stadium in America. So we're talking about actually a very small number of people, but they give us infrastructure a footprint that allows us to project power, as well as demonstrate commitment to the rest of the allies.

Speaker 7: 19:16

When you were the commanding general of, of us, uh, army in Europe, obviously

Speaker 9: 19:24

part of what your,

Speaker 7: 19:27

the, the drills you're running, the strategy, you're looking at constantly as a threat from Russia. Um, and I know that you were probably quite involved in dealing with Ukraine as well, and the Russian incursion into Ukraine and the seizure of Crimea. And how important are those troops, uh, in Germany, in our presence in Germany and our contribution to NATO in terms of holding the line, if you want to call it that Eastern Europe against a president poop.

Speaker 9: 19:57

So the deterrence is all about having capability and demonstrating the capability and demonstrating the wheel to use the capability. That's the whole theory of deterrence. Um, and so if you don't have actual capability there, then obviously you don't have determined. So if you don't demonstrate that you have that capability, you don't have effective deterrence. Uh, unlike in the cold war, when I was a Lieutenant a very long time ago, and we had almost 300,000 troops, you know, the expectation was that, uh,

Speaker 7: 20:28

three, sorry, 300,000 troops. And now you're down to 34,000.

Speaker 9: 20:34

Yeah. So basically when I was a Lieutenant, you know, we had 300,000, the mission was to deter the Soviet union, protect American interests and assure America's allies. Uh, today we have about 30,000 troops and the mission is to deter Russia, protect America's interests, and, uh, assure America's allies. So that presence is an important part of that. But unlike during the cold war, when the Soviet union clearly had intentions to, um, conquer, to invade West Germany, we know that from the cold war, starting the plans and so on now, uh, Russia, the Kremlin does not have the capability to do that, but they also don't have the desire to do that. What they want to do is anything they can to undermine the cohesion of the Alliance. So they use cyber, they use disinformation and, uh, frequently they'll talk about the use of nuclear weapons. So to put in the mind of all political leaders, that if they launched a short, quick attack into say, Lithuania or Romania or Estonia, and then they stop and they say, do you really want to get into a nuclear war over Lithuania?

Speaker 9: 21:46

And, and of course, if the Alliance doesn't respond to that and they have effectively wrecked NATO and undermined our life, and they also use, um, what their support for the Assad regime in Syria and Libya, which is only made possible because we have not competed effectively in the black sea, from their basis in Ukraine, that has put more than 3 million refugees on the road, out of Syria, into Turkey and the rest of Europe, which obviously undermines the European union, their support for general haftorah and Olympia. Um, potentially there's another million refugees coming across the Mediterranean into Europe. This is not accidental. This is weaponization of refugees by the Kremlin. So competing in the Ukraine, not in the Ukraine, competing in Ukraine is important because, uh, without Crimea, uh, without Russia's, uh, illegal annexation of Crimea and this bridge, they built across the Kurt Strait, which chokes, uh, Ukrainian ports on Sierra dissolve. Uh, this gives Russia the opportunity to dominate in the black sea and use it as their launching pad for all the malign activity they're conducting in the middle East.

Speaker 7: 23:03

So what do you, how do you analyze the wisdom then a president Trump flirting with the idea of normalizing relations with Russia and maybe even suggesting he could have gone to that [inaudible] meeting with Angela Merkel?

Speaker 9: 23:15

Well, even the, even the European allies that are, that tend to be more open to engagement, uh, with the Kremlin, uh, are, were astounded that the president would offer, uh, an invitation to president Putin to come to the [inaudible]. I mean, then they all said that this was completely unacceptable. And, uh, I, an invitation like that, just like, uh, I proposal to reduce by almost a third American troops in is a gift to the Kremlin that they've done nothing to merit, such a, a reduction or an invitation, if anything, that's continued to kill Ukrainian troops in the Donbass every week, they've continued their disinflation efforts, their cyber attacks and their illegal claims to territorial waters and exclusive economic zone around the Crimea. Um, why in the world would we offer them? Uh, I mean, that's the opposite of the integrate a negotiator.

Speaker 7: 24:19

It's interesting in terms of timing that Russia, because you mentioned the nuclear threat and, you know, as scenario where they might try to seize the Stony or a lot of via Lithuania, Russia has just come out and published its doctrine. Um, not accidentally, they've made it quite known that they might see a limited nuclear exchange or use of a nuclear device in relation to a conflict with NATO. Uh, Trump has said he won't renew the start nuclear treaty. He's abandoned the open skies he's walked away from the inf the intermediate range treaty, uh, th these treaties, I mean, a lot of critics will say steered us away from a nuclear war limited or otherwise. Cause a lot of people don't think he can have a limited exchange anyway, that they have steered us away from a nuclear conflict with Russia. And now we are in a new arms race with SuperDuper missiles and to quote president Trump and other things. Are you worried about the direction that we're heading in and very rapidly? So,

Speaker 9: 25:17

so, uh, I'm worried on a, on a couple of levels first, uh, when it comes to these treaties, all of them have flaws because they're all the result of a compromise and negotiation. So they, all of them will have some flaw, but, um, as you state, uh, the arms control protocols and efforts over the past decades have kept us, even though both sides had thousands of nuclear weapons, we've managed to reduce the, the risk as well as the numbers. I mean, something like 80% reduction in nuclear weapons, overall 90% reduction of nuclear weapons that were based in Europe. This is, this is not inconsequential. Uh, I would much rather that we stay inside treaties as well as international and multilateral organizations and fix them, uh, versus walking away from them. I, I would, I would prefer that the United States lead not leave now. Uh, our allies could behave much better.

Speaker 9: 26:18

Um, Germany, France, UK, others, uh, for example, an inf they knew for years that Russia was in violation of inf of they've known for years, that Russia was in violation of open skies, treaty. Um, those countries instead of criticizing the United States for walking away from them, should have been putting big pressure on the Kremlin to live up to it. And the United States, if we were, uh, had been thinking more strategically should have been working with Germany in particular, uh, to put pressure on the Kremlin. I think Germany is the only country that can actually influence criminal behavior because of its economic power and its leadership inside the European union and the same, by the way, with the Chinese communist party. So a better approach in my view. And it's very difficult obviously, but to work closely with those allies that can bring to bear the right kind of economic leverage on the Kremlin and on the Chinese coming as party. Now, how do you, sorry, I was just gonna say it's, um, I'm not opposed to, uh, the administration's desire to get China, uh, involved in, uh, in the, uh, arms control process. And of course the Chinese coming as party right now has zero incentive and, and zero desire to be a part of it. So, um, there is, there is a strategic challenge for the United States that we can't keep our hands tied here while the Chinese develop unlimited capabilities. Uh, that, that is a concern. And for sure, um,

Speaker 7: 27:57

well, you don't necessarily have to make a choice. Do you, I mean, you could extend start with Russia and then pursue negotiations with China. And that was always if you can comment on it, but that was always, the idea was when you're having 30, 40,000 nuclear weapons on either side of, of the Soviet union and America, you can start talking to people who have nuclear weapons, that number a few hundred. So what you need to do is get the base down to 1500 as president Obama's negotiations data on start to, uh, and then work from there towards a thousand, and then bring in the other, other nuclear powers and try to get them then to sign on to these declarations as well. But you don't have to abandon one to pursue the others.

Speaker 9: 28:38

No, absolutely not. Uh, I've read with you. I'm just saying that, uh, that's the, the challenge is trying to figure out how do you, uh, put pressure on the Chinese while still maintaining or continuing a process. And, and without honestly, without Germany and other countries bringing pressure, I don't, I don't think we're going to be successful.

Speaker 7: 29:01

Ben, I've known you since you were a brigade commander for, for some 20 years now. I think we're getting close to 20 years anyway, and I know the military well, because I've been embedded a number of times and I would not normally ask you a political question cause I know you wouldn't answer it. None of you, when you look at what's going on in America right now, your colleagues never before have they stepped up and stepped out and spoken out against the use of military by the administration, uh, James Maddis to Colin Powell to dozens of commanders now have come out and said the Trump should not deploy the military in the United States. I'd like your comment on that. Why does it go against what

Speaker 9: 29:42

you believe? I assume it does. Yeah, of course. Um, you know, I, uh, I, I keep a copy of the constitution. Uh, I've had this for decades actually. Uh, cause we all would take an oath to the constitution all the time. Every time there's a reenlistment or promotion or it's something that is so ingrained in our fiber from the time you go through your officer training, um, throughout your entire career. So that's why, um, you see, uh, a real, uh, anxiety by officers, including retired officers about, um, what, what we see we, the respect for civilian authority is so ingrained the, the respect for, uh, our fellow citizens and not using force against fellow citizens is so anathema to everybody in the military. And particularly when we understand the difference between national guard and regular army, that there's a reason for that when we grow up in that.

Speaker 9: 30:47

Um, so you can, you can see professional, uh, officers have all the services really wrestled with, with this idea. Um, just like we also hate seeing, you know, uh, monuments in Washington D C being defaced and violence. So there's a, uh, a, uh, it was a struggle. Um, I think that, uh, when, uh, when I think about in 1957, when president Eisenhower deployed soldiers from the three 27th infantry regiment of the a hundred first, now the reason I'm so familiar with this is because the three 27th entry of course is the core of first brigaded on her first. That's my, my regimen. And we have a Memorial and the brigade headquarters there to when our soldiers were sent to little rock Arkansas, um, to, uh, protect nine young black children trying to go into a high school that the governor of Arkansas, um, had used the Arkansas national guard to prevent from happening.

Speaker 9: 31:48

And so president Eisenhower in order to protect these nine young kids, but also because the image of the United States was so terrible, um, as, as race riots were happening, um, the president felt it was appropriate to use the military at that time. And I would completely agree. Um, I've seen nothing in this situation that would warrant the use of the regular, uh, of regular military in a, in any kind of a federal role. I think there's so much more that could be done. And, um, you know, part of the, um, the negative reaction is also because of the language. I mean, when the secretary of defense talks about dominating, battlespace when we're talking about American cities is to everybody. And, and so, um, I'm certainly a, would agree with the, uh, um, criticisms of dramatic Admiral Mullen and others.

Speaker 7: 32:53

What would you have advised the president if you had been with him? And he had said clear Lafayette park, I want to go for a walk. And we were going to use tear gas and rubber bullets to do that

Speaker 9: 33:05

well. Um, first of all, uh, I am very sure that Mark Milley, the chairman of the joint chiefs, um, pushed very hard against the president on using the insurrection act and bringing in the regular army. I there's no doubt in my mind that he fought back against that very hard. Um, of course I was not in the room when the decision, when the president says, Hey, let's go walk over to the church. I believe Mark Milley. When he says, um, we thought we were going to visit the guardsmen that were out there, which makes perfect sense. I mean, that's what a commander duck course his chairman. He's not the commander, but that's what a leader does you go see for yourself, the conditions. And especially if the president is turning to you to give advice about using military, it would seem completely inappropriate to, um, go see for yourself what's going on out there.

Speaker 9: 33:57

What the unfortunate part is this turned into this, uh, uh, photo op that was not, uh, impromptu by the president, but I think it was a total surprise to, uh, chairman Millie. Um, and you know, obviously he, he exited the scene immediately. I think in hindsight, they should have been more savvy to what might happen here. And, um, they probably was wrong. Yeah, there's thing that was wrong. Yeah. And nods in hindsight, I think he probably wishes that he, they had, they should have been more attuned to what this president would do. And I guess that this is the point that the president will use the military and he's talked about it so much. And the language coming out of the white house is just not appropriate. And so, um, I think, uh, every officer and you've seen it probably, you know, every one of the services has reminded everybody about our constitutional responsibilities, legal orders. And, um, uh, there's no doubt in my mind that Mark Milley, I've known him for a very long time that there have been some serious, uh, uh, heated debates and pushback by him, uh, on the civilian leadership. And, um, he will, uh, I have great confidence in him and his judgment.

Speaker 7: 35:23

I just pursue it with one last question and then let you and wrap this up. But philosophically, are you not on a short string to the white house and the president or, or philosophically, what is the command chain there in terms responsibility

Speaker 9: 35:38

to the U S military and commanders like yourself? Well, of course I am retired, so I'm never retired. Um, it's in your blood, you never retired, but indeed you are retired. So in the constitution, article one lays out the responsibilities of the Congress. Article two, lays out the responsibilities of the president. That's not an administrative act accident. Article one. So priority is to the legislative branch of government. Article two is where it says the president is commander and chief, but the military has a responsibility to the Congress also. And that's why our, um, Oh, this is to support, defend the constitution of the United States. Now, you know, when that excellent article by Anne Applebaum, where she talks about how do people, uh, how, how do really good people become complicit with behavior? And, you know, there's rationalization and now maybe I can still kind of control it and influence it, or, you know, there's different ways that people try to try to deal with that.

Speaker 9: 36:38

Um, for me, there's no doubt in my mind, I, I would have no problem telling him mr. President, I'm obviously not your guy, cause there's no way I'm going to do that. Now. It's easier for me to say that here in the safety of my retirement, but I am very confident in three years ago, if I had been asked when I was commander of us army, Europe, um, to do something that I knew I'm going to, uh, undermine our constitutional authority and also the credibility of the army, um, as a protector of the people that the America, in fact, I've always bragged to my friends and how you can be sure the American people never worry that the guys with all the guns, the military are going to take matters into their own hands in the United States. And so that's, that's part of the culture in that. No doubt I would have lived up to that

Speaker 2: 37:30

and whatever the consequences would have been Ben hunches, a great pleasure to talk to you, sir. You're, you're the purging chair of strategic studies at the center of European policy analysis. Also fluent in Germany and you're based in Frankfurt. It's a, it's a great gift to be able to get your views on all this, and thanks very much for what you're doing and thanks for the opportunity. And that's another edition of backstory, please, wherever you listen to backstory, subscribe and share I'm Dana Lewis, talk to you soon.

Speaker 8: 38:08

https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/u-s-troop-drawdown-germany-trumps-strategic-incoherence/id1512445640?i=1000477969872

Episode is Live

Published: Jun. 14, 2020 @ 3PM Edit

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courtneytincher · 5 years

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Europe Tried To Trust Trump. But That’s Becoming Impossible.

Bloomberg/GettyBRUSSELS—What the last few days of Trumpian summitry have established beyond a reasonable doubt is the U.S. president’s inclination to confuse photo-ops (including what look like family photos) with policy. The most recent example was the chaotic minuet at the DMZ with North Korea’s tyrant Kim Jong Un, which has rewarded Kim with the prestige of a presidential visit without demanding he first get rid of his nukes.That was preceded at the Osaka G-20 by backslapping bonhomie with Saudi Arabia’s crown prince, accused by U.S. intelligence of ordering a journalist’s butchering, and a few yucks with Russian President Vladimir Putin about his meddling in U.S. elections and the need to get rid of reporters. Not really all that funny when you think more than 20 journalists have died violently since Putin’s been in power. Kim, Putin, Mohammed bin Salman, Xi Jinping, and Donald J. Trump all smiled for the cameras like salesmen pushing timeshares and telling you to trust them.Trump Smirked as He Surrendered Western Values to Putin at the G-20 Summit in OsakaBut here’s the problem, and a growing one, for America’s traditional allies. How is it possible to trust the current president of the United States, when he aligns himself so comfortably with these authoritarian characters, aping their anti-democratic world view for the cameras?The dilemma presented itself in bold relief at a conference over the weekend in Brussels, home to the European Union and NATO headquarters. The German Marshall Fund’s Brussels Forum, an annual gathering meant to cement transatlantic relations, more recently has been devoted to lamenting the Trump presidency—and looking for ways to survive it. U.S. officials here find themselves in an almost impossible position, trying to reassure allies that Trump doesn’t really mean his tweets, and that there’s some kind of grand strategy in his mad rush to embrace monstrous authoritarians around the world. But that’s wearing thin, and the spectacle can be worse than disconcerting. I asked NATO’s Supreme Allied Commander in Europe, U.S. Air Force Gen. Tod Wolters, if his troops would defend NATO member Latvia from Moscow. The obvious answer, the necessary answer, by treaty and by common sense, should be a straightforward yes. But Wolters danced around it as if second-guessing his commander-in-chief.“All you have to do is go back and take a look at what unfolded in 9/11 with respect to the attack on the homeland of the United States, and look at the response that occurred on behalf of NATO,” he said. “Those are obviously the comforts, if you will, of the world's greatest alliance.”That wasn’t direct enough for the U.S. ambassador to NATO, Kay Bailey Hutchison, who, unprompted, offered more direct assurances.“If Latvia is invaded by Russia, we will be there. There is no doubt about it,” she told the audience. “If Russia invades Latvia, that's not the only place they're going. They have a plan, and it's going to go far beyond that, and we are going to stop it before it spreads.” She added that the U.S. still had a chance to negotiate a healthier relationship with Beijing, but Moscow? Not so much. “I don't think we have a chance with Russia,” she said, a statement that seemed at odds with the chummy Trump-Putin meeting that unfolded just a day later in Japan.“It’s highly disturbing,” said one senior diplomat Saturday, sympathetic toward Hutchison’s awkward position. “What we see in Washington, D.C., and hear here, it doesn’t fit together. The NATO ambassador has to … try to calm things down,” something she apparently has to do regularly.“‘Actions, not words’ has been their talking point for a year and a half,” a senior European official griped to me. She said European trust in the “this too shall pass” defense “is eroding.”Multiple European officials spoke sotto voce about their exhaustion trying 24/7 to decipher the significance of the latest midnight presidential tantrum in screaming capital letters that seems to upend agreed upon Syria policy, or China trade policy, or Iran policy that their local U.S. ambassador or general had tried to rationalize.Trump has played bad-cop-good-cop rolled into one crazy cop, showing fangs one minute, fawning the next, so often that his own team doesn’t really know what to believe. Is he pulling troops out of Syria? Sanctioning half of China’s trade? Obliterating Iran? European officials have gone bleary-eyed from the constant tea-leaf tweet-reading they and their American counterparts rely on to figure out which way the hot air is blowing out of the Oval Office.“Top advisors say one thing, the president says another thing. There are reverses of course by the president on a daily basis,” said European Parliament Member Marietje Schaake, from the Netherlands, empowered to speak more freely as she wraps up her final week after a decade in government. “There are a lot of strong words but there is also a lot of flip-flopping…. I worry that the credibility of the United States is declining very rapidly in Europe.”Another senior European official called Trump’s smirking "don't meddle in the election” moment with Putin “absolutely cynical,” and an insult to his closest allies, some of whom are under constant cyber attacks and propaganda assaults from Moscow’s security services. “By making light of Russia's interference in our democracy, the president is undermining efforts to deter Russia's attacks—including the executive order that Trump himself signed last fall warning of consequences for such activities,” added Laura Rosenberger, a former Obama administration official, and a director of the German Marshall Fund’s Alliance for Securing Democracy program. Her team released a report on countering authoritarian interference just a day or so before the Trump-Putin laugh-in.And as much as the Europeans decry Trump’s Putin/dictator fixation, and his mercurial decision making style, they are just plain confused by his rejection of using alliances to pressure adversaries.“What we don’t understand is why Trump isn’t making an effort to build a global coalition on China,” a senior European diplomat said. “We have some of the same issues with Huawei, but when we reach out to work together, we get pushed back,” he said. Trump’s G-20 turnaround on the Chinese company that Trump’s national security team had portrayed as an international pariah left the senior European official gut-punched, wondering what he’s going to tell other officials and companies at home, as he had been fighting to get his country to step away from Huawei’s 5G. “It will be very hard for Europeans to be convinced...to have the utmost concern about Huawei if we’ve just heard that Americans are selling their technology to the same company,” agreed parliament member Schaake.When you combine that dynamic with Trump’s threats to sanction E.U. companies doing the same thing, the overall conclusion is, the enemy of the enemy is my friend, the senior European diplomat said. “We get pushed closer to China,” or at the very least, European companies do.And if Trump changed his mind on one-half of the U.S. ban on Huawei this week, what’s to say he won’t drop it all next week in order to do a China trade deal? The European politician just shook his head.“He’s very direct, there’s no ambiguity,” Trump’s representative of the European Union explained to me in a sitdown a couple weeks earlier at a gathering of Central European leaders in Bratislava–though I was not able to reach him from reaction to the G20. Trump Becomes First Sitting American President to Step Into North Korea—a Win for Kim Jong Un“For all the griping you say you hear, I hear an equal amount of ‘he’s great, he finally makes things happen,’” Sundland said. “We are like an old married couple. We’re never getting divorced but we have some issues to hash out.”“Our bluntness about them does not change our unshakable alliance,” he said.But one of the senior European officials countered with the dire prediction of German scholar Constanze Stelzenmüller of Brookings Institute, who warned at an Intelligence Squared debate at the conference that Trump’s attacks on his allies, the press, the coddling of dictators like Putin were leading to a “silent spring” that is shredding international relations.“We can last another year or so,” she said. But if Trump is elected again, “Europe will no longer see the United States as the shining bastion of democracy, human rights and freedom.” They won’t try to emulate Americans, or rely on them.Read more at The Daily Beast.Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast hereGet our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.

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theinvinciblenoob · 6 years

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Few would equate human life with battery life, but for many migrants escaping war or famine, a single percentage point of battery can mean getting the right information at the right time – or not surviving at all.

Smartphones today have become an integral part of a forced migrant’s journey. From navigating mountains in Central Asia using Google Maps to staying connected with family back home via WhatsApp, smartphones have transformed the migrant experience – though not always for the better.

No electron spared

In Eastern Europe, many migrants pushed back from Hungary stay along the border on the Serbian side in abandoned buildings. Volunteers visit these sites to bring supplies, including repurposed car batteries that migrants use to charge their phones.

At one abandoned building less than a mile from the Hungarian border, migrants huddle around one car battery to charge their phones, and they all agree about the importance of battery life to them. Many asked for a power bank to enable them to charge their phone when outlets are not available. Between each other, they constantly compare notes on what apps use up the most battery power, and remind each other to close apps when not in use.

Nashid, a migrant from Pakistan taking shelter in this building, says one of his primary needs at this remote outpost is for a way to charge his phone. With no regular access to electricity, he depends on the visits of volunteers to be able to charge his battery, concocting all sorts of ways to keep it alive until their next visit. Some of his strategies include making sure his phone is turned off when he sleeps at night or if he naps during the day, as well as using the lowest brightness level possible. He swears that taking out a dead battery and shaking it repeatedly provides him with a few extra minutes of phone use.

For many migrants traversing Eastern Europe to get to Western Europe, the Hungarian-Serbian border presents the final frontier. Once in Hungary, migrants will have entered the Schengen Area, the 26 EU-member zone with no border controls, making their destination countries in Western Europe significantly easier to reach. Increased security though has made this border crossing significantly harder – with many migrants being beaten and pushed back into Serbia dozens of times before they eventually make it across.

Nashid has been trying to cross into Hungary from Serbia for the past eight months. He left his family, including a wife and two kids, back in Pakistan before setting out to Europe. He says he uses WhatsApp to keep in touch with them and to stay connected to his cousin in Paris – his ultimate destination. He admits, battery constraints aside, that his phone also provides him with a reprieve from long hours spent idly waiting every day. He tries to sneak a song or two, or watch a couple of Urdu-language videos on YouTube.

One journey, a million apps

Over the last few years, Serbia has taken on the role of a major transit point for migrants trying to make it to Western Europe. The Refugee Aid Miksalište Center in the Serbian capital Belgrade, a drop-in center open 24 hours a day, is staffed by NGOs that provide services to migrants in transit. As soon as you enter the Center, you again see migrants gathered around extension cords, charging their phones and using the Center’s free Wi-Fi to access their social media and Skype with friends and family back home.

Migrants in Serbia huddle around a power strip to charge their smartphones (Photo by Ziad Reslan)

The same scene seems to repeat wherever migrants congregate. The nearly 70 million forced migrants across the world today have had to travel thousands of miles to get to a place of refuge. More than half of these migrants come from just three countries: Syria, Afghanistan, and South Sudan. Syrians, the single largest forcibly displaced population, have to traverse on average more than 1,400 miles just to get to Serbia’s border with Hungary on their long trek from Aleppo to Western Europe.

From getting directions, to learning languages, to simply accessing entertainment, smartphones have become vital for migrants on these grueling journeys that can last for months – if at the very least to get some emotional support by talking to loved ones they leave behind.

At the height of the European refugee crisis in the summer of 2015, when nearly a million Syrian refugees crossed into Europe to escape a brutal civil war, Facebook and WhatsApp chat groups sprung up to let migrants know of real-time developments on the road, which smugglers to trust, and what rates to negotiate. Dropped GPS pins and Google Maps turn directions into practical routes migrants can take. In some cases, migrants on sinking boats in the Mediterranean have helped coast guards find them by sending GPS signals from their smartphones.

Migrants download German, French, English, and other language learning apps on their phones to aid them in acculturating to their eventual destination while they’re still on the move. They use Google Translate to understand road signs in Bulgarian, Serbian, and Hungarian. And with migrant journeys breaking up families, smartphones have become migrants’ only way to stay connected.

In recognition of the importance of connectivity to forcibly-displaced migrants, the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) – launched “Connectivity for Refugees” in mid-2016. The initiative advocates for migrants’ right to connectivity; enables access through negotiated data rates for refugees, subsidized device prices, and internet access centers; and provides training to ensure migrants are able to fully take advantage of their smartphones. Two years in, the UNHCR plans to increase the initiative’s staffing and roll out connectivity programs beyond the current pilot countries of Jordan, Greece, Chad, Malawi, Tanzania, and Uganda.

Startups, for their part, have also been ramping up efforts to help migrants. Two Columbia architecture students, Anna Stork and Andrea Sreshta, cofounded LuminAid. A startup that makes the PackLite Max 2-in-1 Phone Charger, a solar-powered phone charger and light source that the cofounders have given away to displaced migrants. With the UNHCR estimating that up to a third of a forced migrant’s income is spent on connectivity, Phone Credit for Refugees has taken on providing migrants with free data access. Others, like GeeCycle, have instead focused on collecting used smartphones from around the world and distributing them to refugees fleeing conflict.

The challenge of misinformation

NGOs like Save the Children Serbia operate out of the Refugee Aid Miksalište, a drop in center with free WIFi and available plugs. (Photo by Ziad Reslan)

For all of their benefits though, smartphones have not always improved the journeys of forced migrants. The reliance on anonymous sources on social media to navigate routes has left migrants vulnerable to smugglers and traffickers looking to take advantage of their misfortune. Even information obtained from relatives can turn out to be erroneous – with heart-wrenching consequences.

Jelena Besedic, an Advocacy Manager for Save the Children Serbia, says that the spread of misinformation has been part of the reason for the rise of unaccompanied children traversing the Balkans from Afghanistan. Parents of kids as young as eight now stuck in Serbia were falsely told that, if their kids arrive safely in Western Europe, they’re entitled to bring their parents.

Misinformation of this sort about the ease of the asylum process can lead migrants to take on increasingly dangerous journeys, only to be disappointed with the reality once they reach their destination countries. This misinformation has led organizations, like the International Organization for Migration, to start information campaigns at source countries to better educate would be migrants about the dangers of setting out west. In addition, increasingly nationalist governments, like Hungary and Italy, have started campaigns targeting the smartphones of migrants with text messages and online ads to dissuade them from coming to their countries in the first place.

Familial pressure on migrants may have always been a reality, but access to smartphones has made that pressure incessant and instantaneous. Stuck at the border between Serbia and Hungary, Nashid says he would never have made the trek if he knew what he would have to face on his more than 4,000-mile journey from Pakistan to France. But while he was still in Pakistan, he had received messages non-stop from his cousin in Paris telling him how easy it was for him to get there and how plentiful jobs are in France. Once Nashid left Pakistan, messages from his wife and two kids constantly asking whether he’d arrived in Paris have made the idea of going back home impossible.

Nashid ends our conversation by asking me to confirm a rumor he’s heard on WhatsApp. Is it true, he asks, that there are now personal battery banks that one can charge like a phone that extend a smartphone’s battery life by up to 100 hours? A charger like that, he stresses, would make a world of a difference to him out here miles away from the nearest plug.

via TechCrunch

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fmservers · 6 years

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When battery life saves human life

No electron spared

One journey, a million apps

Migrants in Serbia huddle around a power strip to charge their smartphones (Photo by Ziad Reslan)

The challenge of misinformation

NGOs like Save the Children Serbia operate out of the Refugee Aid Miksalište, a drop in center with free WIFi and available plugs. (Photo by Ziad Reslan)

Via Danny Crichton https://techcrunch.com

#TechCrunch

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todaynewsstories · 6 years

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EU ′can no longer rely on US,′ says France′s Macron | News | DW

French President Emmanuel Macron on Monday said his government would unveil proposals “in the coming months” to boost security across the EU, in a bid to diminish the bloc’s reliance on the US for its defense needs.

“Europe can no longer rely on the United States for its security,” Macron said during a speech to French diplomats and lawmakers. “It is up to us to guarantee European security.”

Macron said the EU needed to “take new initiatives, build new alliances” to ensure its preservation. “I want us to launch an exhaustive review of our security with all Europe’s partners, which includes Russia,” he added.

Differences on defense

Macron’s remarks come as the White House continues to question US relations with Europe. US President Donald Trump has repeatedly cast doubt on Washington’s commitment to the NATO military alliance, saying the US pays far more for defense than other member states.

In 2014, NATO nations agreed to stop cuts to defense spending and pursue a target of 2 percent of GDP by 2024. But Trump has called for alliance members to reach the goal sooner or see the US “moderate” its commitment.

Although their relationship has been dubbed a “bromance,” French President Emmanuel Macron has criticized US President Donald Trump’s decisions to pull out of the Iran deal and impose tariffs against EU steel and aluminum

‘Counterweight to the US’

But defense spending isn’t the only problem straining EU-US relations. Brussels has criticized the US for pulling out of the Iran nuclear deal and reimposing sanctions against the Islamic Republic.

Meanwhile, European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker last month managed to avert a trade war by negotiating a deal with Trump after Washington imposed tariffs on steel and aluminum exports against its economic ally, the EU.

Read more: When does a trade spat become an actual trade war?

Last week, German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas made similar remarks to Macron’s in a guest article for German business newspaper Handelsblatt, saying Europe must “take an equal share of the responsibility” and “form a counterweight to the US.”

“If we go it alone, we will fail in this task,” Maas said. “The outstanding aim of our foreign policy is to build a sovereign, strong Europe. Only by joining forces with France and other European nations can a balance with the US be achieved.”