Tag: perpetual war

Gulf Allies Warn US Not To Launch Strikes On Iran From Their Territory

America’s Gulf allies say they don’t want to get caught in the crossfire of any potential US/Israel and Iran shooting war. The United States has made it clear that it is ready to assist Israel in any potential response to Iranian attack. Tehran is poised to imminently retaliate for the April 1st Israeli airstrikes on its embassy in Damascus.

The Arab Gulf countries are worried that the US could launch attacks on Iran from their territories or airspace. Middle East Eye (MEE) reports, “Gulf monarchies are urging the US not to use American military bases on their territories to strike in response to any potential Iranian attack on Israel,” according to security sources.

“The US’s Gulf allies are working overtime to shut down avenues that could link them to a US reprisal against Tehran or its proxies from bases inside their kingdoms, according to a senior US official who spoke with MEE on condition of anonymity,” the report continues. 

This is to include warplanes, as the US Air Forces utilizes various airbases in the region. US allies said to have expressed serious concern include Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Oman and Kuwait.

Naturally, these countries are worried that Iran could strike back directly on their territories in response to any potential US strikes.

MEE writes that these have “raised questions about the intricate details of basing agreements that permit tens of thousands of US troops to be stationed across the oil-rich peninsula.” Further, “They are also moving to prevent US warplanes from flying over their airspace in the event the US conducts a retaliatory strike on Iran.”

Rumors have persisted throughout Friday that some countries have even warned that US troops could be banned from their territories should the US carry out aggression against Iran from out of the Gulf region, but such specific threats of shuttering bases have not been confirmed.

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Google Contract Shows Deal With Israel Defense Ministry

Google provides cloud computing services to the Israeli Ministry of Defense, and the tech giant has negotiated deepening its partnership during Israel’s war in Gaza, a company document viewed by TIME shows.

The Israeli Ministry of Defense, according to the document, has its own “landing zone” into Google Cloud—a secure entry point to Google-provided computing infrastructure, which would allow the ministry to store and process data, and access AI services.

The ministry sought consulting assistance from Google to expand its Google Cloud access, seeking to allow “multiple units” to access automation technologies, according to a draft contract dated March 27, 2024. The contract shows Google billing the Israeli Ministry of Defense over $1 million for the consulting service. 

The version of the contract viewed by TIME was not signed by Google or the Ministry of Defense. But a March 27 comment on the document, by a Google employee requesting an executable copy of the contract, said the signatures would be “completed offline as it’s an Israel/Nimbus deal.” Google also gave the ministry a 15% discount on the original price of consulting fees as a result of the “Nimbus framework,” the document says.

Project Nimbus is a controversial $1.2 billion cloud computing and AI agreement between the Israeli government and two tech companies: Google and Amazon. Reports in the Israeli press have previously indicated that Google and Amazon are contractually barred from preventing specific arms of the Israeli state using their technology under Project Nimbus. But this is the first time the existence of a contract showing that the Israeli Ministry of Defense is a Google Cloud customer has been made public. 

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Top US General Spotted At Central Israel Airbase Just As Iran Attack Looms

At a moment US intelligence has indicated that Iran could strike Israeli soil in the next 24 to 48 hours, a top US general was spotted at an airbase in central Israel on Friday. US Central Command (CENTCOM) chief Gen. Michael Erik Kurilla met with Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant at Hatzor Airbase “a short while ago,” according to Times of Israel military correspondent Emanuel Fabian.

The two defense officials discussed “readiness for an Iranian attack against the State of Israel, which may lead to regional escalation,” an official statement of the visit by Gallant’s said. Given it could be “bombs away” at any moment, is it a good idea for America’s top regional general to be hanging out at one of the very bases which could be directly targeted?

“Our enemies think that they can pull apart Israel and the United States, but the opposite is true, they are bringing us together and strengthening our ties. We stand shoulder to shoulder,” Gallant’s statement continued.

“I am certain that the world sees the true face of Iran, the terrorist body that incites terror attacks across the Middle East, and funds Hamas, Hezbollah, and additional forces [proxies], and now also threatens the State of Israel,” the Israeli defense chief added. “We are prepared to defend ourselves on the ground and in the air, in close cooperation with our partners, and we will know how to respond.”

It goes without saying that if top US military officials are currently on the ground and find themselves in the attack path when Iranian missiles are launched, it could be a direct trigger for massive regional war, given Washington wouldn’t hesitate to respond in a big way against Tehran in that scenario.

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US General Says NATO Could Surge Troops into Eastern Europe

A top US commander told Congress that NATO was prepared for a massive troop surge into Eastern Europe. The alliance has already positioned thousands of troops in its most eastward states. 

Gen. Christopher Cavoli, head of US European Command, told Congress on Wednesday that NATO is prepared to triple its troop deployments to Eastern Europe. “In the immediate aftermath of the invasion, NATO took the decision to establish new battlegroups on a standing basis,” he said. “By design, they can all go up to brigade size at a time of need. And a number of nations have already elected to go up to that.”

After Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, the North Atlantic alliance engaged in a massive eastward buildup, adding l battle groups in four additional countries it dubs its “eastern flank.”

NATO now has battlegroups consisting of at least 1,000 soldiers in each country. Generally, a brigade is 3,000 to 5,000 soldiers, meaning the NATO deployments could be more than tripled. The general explained that the deployments are a part of “a definite shift eastward.”  

The US now has over 100,000 troops in Europe. Other countries, such as Germany, have also moved troops eastward. Earlier this week, Berlin announced it had permanently moved troops into Lithuania for the first time since World War II. 

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Military chiefs scramble to rush UK’s new laser ‘death ray’ into service amid fears over Russian missiles and drones – with hi-tech DragonFire system to be fitted to Royal Navy warships

Military chiefs are to rush devastating laser guns into service to meet the threat posed by Russian drones and missiles.

Royal Artillery troops will test the revolutionary ‘DragonFire’ weaponry, which burns holes through incoming enemy ordnance, during the summer.

The sudden urgency to roll out a suite of ‘directed energy weapons’ follows the Kremlin’s alarming effective use of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) in Ukraine.

British soldiers will also experiment with radio frequency weapons capable of firing magnetic pulses at enemy targets thereby cutting off their power supplies.

Last night, UK Defence Secretary Grant Shapps boasted that Britain is leading the world in the development of these breakthrough technologies.

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Bipartisan Bill Would Give the Philippines $2.5 Billion in Military Aid

On Wednesday, Senators Bill Hagerty (R-TN) and Tim Kaine (D-VA) introduced a bill that would give the Philippines $5 billion in military aid over five years as the US is boosting military ties with Manila as part of its strategy against China in the region.

The legislation would give Manila $500 million over five years through to the 2029 fiscal year. The aid would be in the form of Foreign Military Financing (FMF), a State Department program that gives foreign governments money to purchase US weapons.

The Philippines is already the largest recipient of US military aid in the Asia Pacific. From 2015 to the end of 2021, Manila received $1.14 billion in military assistance from the US, including $475 million in FMF.

Hagery and Kaine introduced the bill on the eve of the first-ever trilateral summit between the leaders of the US, Japan, and the Philippines, which President Biden is hosting in Washington. The three nations are expected to announce new forms of cooperation, including joint patrols in the South China Sea, where tensions are soaring between the Philippines and China.

Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. has taken a much harder line against China’s claims to the South China Sea than his predecessor, Rodrigo Duterte, who was much more friendly and diplomatic toward Beijing. The US has emboldened Marcos with new military support, and there has been a spike in confrontations between Chinese and Philippine vessels near disputed rocks and reefs.

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US Could Launch Joint Retaliatory Strikes With Israel If It Is Attacked By Iran: Official

Upping the ante, a US official has told Al Jazeera that the Pentagon could intervene militarily if there is an Iranian attack launched against Israel.

According to a translation from Al Jazeera Arabic, the US source said, “We do not rule out launching joint retaliatory strikes with Israel if it is attacked by Iran or its agents.”

There was no further elaboration, or an indicator whether a US joint response with Israel would include offensive strikes against Iran, or if this would just be defensive, for example – anti air measures. However, Axios has the following details which appears to confirm the Al Jazeera reporting:

The senior U.S. military commander in charge of the Middle East is expected to go to Israel Thursday to coordinate around a possible attack on Israel by Iran and its proxies, two Israeli officials said.

…The commander of the U.S. military central command (CENTCOM) Gen. Erik Kurilla is expected to meet senior Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) officials and Israeli defense minister Yoav Gallant.

Yesterday, Israeli officials threatened that Iranian nuclear sites could be targeted, in one of the biggest strike threats to date. The region is on edge awaiting an ‘imminent’ response by Iran following the April 1st deadly attack on Iran’s embassy in Damascus. US intelligence has said it believes a revenge attack from Tehran is coming soon.

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German Troops Arrive in Lithuania for First Permanent Deployment Since WWII

On Monday, Germany began deploying troops to Lithuania, where they will be stationed permanently, marking the first deployment of its kind for the German military since World War II.

Only two dozen German soldiers have arrived in Lithuania so far, and the force will increase to 4,800 by 2027. Germany already leads a NATO deployment in Lithuania with 1,000 troops, but the new force will be permanent.

“This is the first time that we have permanently stationed such a unit outside of Germany,” German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius said at a farewell ceremony in Berlin, according to The Associated Press. He said the deployment was “an important day for the German army.”

Lithuania shares a border with Kaliningrad, the Russian Oblast on the Baltic Sea that’s separated from the Russian mainland. The country also borders Belarus, a treaty ally of Russia that now hosts Russian nuclear weapons.

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MICROSOFT PITCHED OPENAI’S DALL-E AS BATTLEFIELD TOOL FOR U.S. MILITARY

MICROSOFT LAST YEAR proposed using OpenAI’s mega-popular image generation tool, DALL-E, to help the Department of Defense build software to execute military operations, according to internal presentation materials reviewed by The Intercept. The revelation comes just months after OpenAI silently ended its prohibition against military work.

The Microsoft presentation deck, titled “Generative AI with DoD Data,” provides a general breakdown of how the Pentagon can make use of OpenAI’s machine learning tools, including the immensely popular ChatGPT text generator and DALL-E image creator, for tasks ranging from document analysis to machine maintenance. (Microsoft invested $10 billion in the ascendant machine learning startup last year, and the two businesses have become tightly intertwined. In February, The Intercept and other digital news outlets sued Microsoft and OpenAI for using their journalism without permission or credit.)

The Microsoft document is drawn from a large cache of materials presented at an October 2023 Department of Defense “AI literacy” training seminar hosted by the U.S. Space Force in Los Angeles. The event included a variety of presentation from machine learning firms, including Microsoft and OpenAI, about what they have to offer the Pentagon.

The publicly accessible files were found on the website of Alethia Labs, a nonprofit consultancy that helps the federal government with technology acquisition, and discovered by journalist Jack Poulson. On Wednesday, Poulson published a broader investigation into the presentation materials. Alethia Labs has worked closely with the Pentagon to help it quickly integrate artificial intelligence tools into its arsenal, and since last year has contracted with the Pentagon’s main AI office. The firm did not respond to a request for comment.

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Israel ‘preparing to strike Iranian NUCLEAR facilities’ amid tense wait for revenge attack and soaring WW3 fears

ISRAEL is preparing to strike Iranian nuclear plants if faced with a revenge attack for the death of a top Tehran commander last week.

Netanyahu‘s war cabinet has been locked in crunch meetings over fears that Iran will launch an assault as Middle East tensions threaten to boil over into all-out war.

Now a Western security official has revealed that Israel will respond to any attacks by striking Iran‘s nuclear targets directly.

Israeli forces have been conducting secret air force drills in preparation for the dangerous escalation, Elaph News reports.

Iran is home to several nuclear sites – including power plants, uranium mines and research reactors.

A targeted attack against one of them could mark an unprecedented escalation in the melting pot of Middle East conflict.

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