CIA’s legacy of torture lives on in Thailand’s ‘black site’
"There has never been an investigation into the Thai officials or agencies involved in the CIA’s covert detentions, which continued until at least 2004 and probably violated national laws."
Duterte tells Philippine soldiers to shoot female rebels in their vaginas
"Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte last week told soldiers to shoot female rebels in their genitals, the latest in a series of violent, misogynistic remarks. Since he came to power on a promise to kill all the country's drug users and dealers, thousands of Filipinos have been shot dead, prompting the international criminal court to open a preliminary examination."
Here’s what war with North Korea would look like
"More than a dozen former Pentagon officials, CIA analysts, US military officers, and think tank experts, as well as a retired South Korean general who spent his entire professional life preparing to fight the North, have all said variants of the same thing: There is a genuine risk of a war on the Korean Peninsula that would involve the use of chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons. Several estimated that millions — plural — would die."
Jacob Hornberger: Why the Korea Crisis Matters
"f war breaks out in Korea, it will not be anything like the U.S. wars on Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Libya, Panama, or Grenada. It will instead be a pivotal and devastating event in U.S. history and world history. As tens of thousands of millennials are suddenly being trained to kill and die in a faraway land in Asia, it will finally sink into them as to why they were made to register for the draft when they became 18."
Media Floats Pentagon’s ‘Father of All Bombs’ Planned For North Korea
"The Defense Department is preparing for possible preventive attacks on North Korean nuclear and missile facilities, supposedly intended to prevent the Kim Jong-un regime in Pyongyang from developing an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) capable of delivering nuclear warheads to the continental United States. There are many indications that the Pentagon is putting in place the means to conduct such an attack—and recent enhancements to the GBU-57 bomb are among the most alarming of those."
Jacob Hornberger: Political Gamesmanship at the Olympics
"So, why is Vice-president Mike Pence attending the Winter Olympics in South Korea? Is it because he’s a sports fan who just wants to enjoy the quadrennial spectacle of the Olympic games? Unfortunately, no. Pence is going to the games for political purposes. He intends to use them as an opportunity to level a propaganda attack against North Korea, the communist regime that the U.S. government has long been committed to regime-changing."
Nomura “Sincerely Apologizes” For Blowing Up Investors
"Overnight, realizing it is facing an avalanche of lawsuits even though it explicitly laid out the possibility of the ETN getting 'terminated' should VIX explode, Japan's biggest brokerage issued an apology after investors in its $300 million vol-linked ETN were all but wiped out during this week’s stock-market turmoil."
Bank of Japan Panics At Surging Rates, Offers To Buy Unlimited Debt
"As global bond yields break ever higher, it appears The Bank of Japan is realizing it is losing control of its yield curve and today unleashed a double-whammy to stifle the bond bears... Whammy 1 - BoJ offers to buy unlimited 10Y notes at 11bps. Result - a 0.5bps drop in the JGB yield!!"
Trump’s North Korea Rhetoric: Carbon Copy of Bush On Iraq 15 Years Ago
"Anyone who was paying attention during George W. Bush’s State of the Union addresses in 2002 and 2003 would have found Trump’s statements frighteningly familiar: Trump used exactly the same justifications for war with North Korea as Bush had for war with Iraq when standing at the same podium."
Media reports US stealth bombers in Guam preparing for nuclear strike
"Not only will the B-61's new modification make it ideal for destroying dug-in bunkers, the kind in which North Korean leader Kim Jong Un might hide during a conflict, but it has an adjustable nuclear yield that could limit harmful radioactive fallout after a nuclear attack."