- North Korea: Failure To Deliver Is Not An Option

Update on the goings on in the hermit kingdom / slave labor camp that is North Korea.

“It’s not just people illegally leaving the country and never coming back, it’s also the growing number of North Koreans legally working outside the country who are “defecting”. This is a growing economic problem for the government. Apparently some of the foreign employers are not treating their North Korean workers well and a growing number of the North Koreans are running away, despite the fact that this means family members back in North Korea will be punished. The legal North Korea migrants are part of what amounts to a slave labor program that has become a major (up to $2 billion a year) source of foreign exchange for North Korea. The export of North Korean workers has gone from 60,000 men and women in 2014 to over 100,000 in 2015. The number of workers outside the country is nearly triple what it was before since Kim Jong Un took over in 2011. The government takes up to 90 percent of the wages these men and women earn outside the country (mainly in Russia and China) and holds the workers’ families hostage in case the worker does not return home when ordered. If someone does not come back, their families are sent to prison camps (a death sentence if you are too young or too old).”

“The question is how long the North Korean ruler can scrounge up enough resources to keep the security forces loyal and functional. The loss of most support from China is apparently what made the situation move from “difficult” to hopeless. As a result of that Kim Jong Un is desperate to convince the world that he has functional nukes and the senior defectors believe Kim would use a nuke against the United States if he felt he was losing control. Few of the senior officials who escaped have much detailed knowledge of the nuclear and missile programs. They can confirm that the thousands of people who work on those projects are well taken care of, and tightly guarded. Nukes and missiles get priority on imports, especially the illegal ones that have to be smuggled in at great (and increasing) expense. Foreign experts believe North Korean nuclear and missile tech is still primitive and unreliable and more bluff than reality.”

- China's new microwave weapon can disable missiles and paralyze tanks

"Generally in war, the best policy is to take a state intact; to ruin it is inferior to this. To capture the enemy’s army is better than to destroy it; to take intact a battalion, a company or even a five man squad is better than to destroy them. For to win one hundred victories in one hundred battles is not the acme of skill. To subdue the enemy without fighting is the acme of skill"

- Sun Tzu, “the Art of War”

Most public attention is focused on the development of LASERs and other types of direct energy "ray guns”, however one of the most significant weapons of the future will probably be the high-powered microwave (HPM). For less power cost than with direct energy weapons an HPM could conceivably knock out enemy vehicles, aircraft, missiles as well as command, command, control, communications and computer (C4) systems without having to physically destroy them. Given that the enemies of the West, be they insurgents, non-state terrorists or rogue nation-states, tend to use civilian populations as human shields, any weapon that will allow one to “destroy” the hostile fighting force without a resulting great loss of human life, both combatant and non-combatant, will no doubt be a desirable option with Western political and military decision makers. Regardless HPM/EMP weapons will not be completely harmless since anything that could turn off the electric power in a modern city and keep it off would likely cause great loss of life. Modern cities, unlike their 19th Century predecessors, are unlivable without electricity. Among other issues, the dwellings are relatively air tight and lack sufficient ventilation for the safe use of open flame cooking, heating and lighting sources. As it stands now most deaths occurring during hurricanes, and the inevitable power outages, are due to asphyxiation resulting from using open flame stoves and heaters and even running generators indoors. Consequently some experts predict that if the EMP high-altitude nuclear explosion or a massive solar storm destroyed the electric power infrastructure in the USA it would result in the death of some 90 percent of the country’s population after one year’s time. This is probably not an exaggeration, especially when one takes into account all the vulnerable people in society, the old, the very young , the sick and crippled, who are dependent on electric-powered devices of every sort to maintain their health and/or allow them to live independently.

- Female Marines to sleep next to male Marines in field

Of course if you’re going to have women in the field you must make sure you have enough for everyone.

The Baltic states are fearful of Russian aggression and are arming up. The Javelin fire and forget missile is quite an improvement over its predecessor the Dragon. The Dragon anti-tank missile was wire guided and had to be steered by keeping the sights on the target until the missile struck home.

“Since ATGMs first saw action in the 1970s operators (who had to guide the missile to its target) quickly discovered that in the time it took (up to 15 seconds) for the missile to reach its target, enemy troops would often shower them with machine-gun fire. In response to that most recent ATGM designs seek to deal with that using features like "fire and forget."

(Javelin Missile vs. T-72 tank)

(Anti-tank Guided Missiles in Action)