History Repeats

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History Repeats
On Feb. 14, 1979, less than one month after the shah of Iran’s exile, the U.S. Embassy in Tehran was overrun by Iranian militants.
Within hours, it was returned to U.S. hands. Now on notice that our diplomats were stationed on a vulnerable outpost in a sea of anti-Americanism, the Carter administration considered, but rejected, closing the embassy. In October, President Carter permitted the shah – despised by Iranians and the regime that replaced his – to enter the United States. Days later, Iranians climbed the embassy gates again, took the Americans there hostage and demanded the shah’s return, beginning a 444-day crisis.
There are no do-overs in history, but there are lessons.
The 1979 hostage crisis should have taught us the importance of proactively responding to obvious threats and removing vulnerable targets — a lesson that should be applied now if there are U.S. nuclear weapons based in Turkey.
On Feb. 14, 1979, less than one month after the shah of Iran’s exile, the U.S. Embassy in Tehran was overrun by Iranian militants.
Within hours, it was returned to U.S. hands. Now on notice that our diplomats were stationed on a vulnerable outpost in a sea of anti-Americanism, the Carter administration considered, but rejected, closing the embassy. In October, President Carter permitted the shah – despised by Iranians and the regime that replaced his – to enter the United States. Days later, Iranians climbed the embassy gates again, took the Americans there hostage and demanded the shah’s return, beginning a 444-day crisis.
There are no do-overs in history, but there are lessons. The 1979 hostage crisis should have taught us the importance of proactively responding to obvious threats and removing vulnerable targets — a lesson that should be applied now if there are U.S. nuclear weapons based in Turkey.
After a faction within the Turkish military tried to overthrow the Turkish government last month, one of the many arrested for his alleged role in the attempted coup was a commanding officer at the Incirlik Air Base. That base — according to numerous media reports — is a major NATO installation hosting one of the largest stockpiles of nuclear weapons in Europe.
What if the Turkish base commander at Incirlik had ordered his troops surrounding the perimeter of the base to turn their guns on the U.S. soldiers that reportedly guard U.S. nuclear storage bunkers there?
What if anti-American Turkish protesters, believing the U.S. was behind the coup plot and that it was harboring the coup’s leader (ominously reminiscent of how Iranians felt about America and the shah 37 years ago) decided to march on Incirlik chanting anti-American and anti-Israeli slogans (as has actually happened) and taken over the base?
Leaving aside the coup, what if Islamic State were to attack Incirlik?

In March, the Pentagon reportedly ordered military families out of southern Turkey, primarily from Incirlik, due to terrorism-related security concerns.

While we’ve avoided disaster so far, we have ample evidence that the security of U.S. nuclear weapons stored in Turkey can change literally overnight. 

Now fully aware of the dangers, the Obama administration should remove any remaining nuclear weapons from Turkey – and the next president should remove all U.S. nuclear weapons from Europe.
We are in for a long stretch of political uncertainty in Turkey, exacerbated by growing anti-Americanism.
Granted, as one American analyst has pointed out, any U.S. nuclear weapons stored in Turkey “would be defended by ferociously well-trained and well-equipped American troops.
Maintaining control of the weapons would be the top priority if seizure was ever threatened, with all of America’s military power put to the task.”

Well, if that’s the case being made to President Obama, he should ask:
Why would I or any American president take that risk?
We are in for a long stretch of political uncertainty in Turkey, exacerbated by growing anti-Americanism.
Any U.S. nuclear weapons stored there are more likely to complicate than to improve the domestic political currents in play. The U.S. will (and should) remain a strong ally and friend of Turkey, and Turkey will (and should) remain in NATO. 
It is shared interests, not nuclear sharing, that will keep us together.
Nuclear deterrence does not require the U.S. to store nuclear bombs in Turkey, or elsewhere in Europe.
The U.S. has long-range “strategic” nuclear weapons to ward off hostile powers and guarantee the security of all NATO allies. 
But since the end of the Cold War, most military leaders believe that our short-range “tactical” nuclear weapons based in Europe have virtually no utility, for the simple reason that no U.S. president is likely to use them.
Some may argue that we should not remove nuclear weapons from Turkey because we don’t want to signal lack of confidence in Turkey’s stability; or that we need tactical weapons throughout Europe because we need to bolster NATO members who are worried about Russia.
Now weigh those arguments against the fact that storing tactical nuclear weapons in Turkey and in other NATO nations comes with the increasing risk of vulnerability to an evolving and more deadly terrorist threat, or to domestic unrest. In the wake of an incident at a nuclear storage site — for which the U.S. would be held accountable and suffer long-term consequences with allies — it would be difficult to explain that vulnerable targets were left in place due to a perceived need to reassure our allies.
As was the case in 1979, the warning bells are ringing.
Steve Andreasen was the director for defense policy and arms control on the White House National Security Council staff from 1993 to 2001. He is a consultant to the Nuclear Threat Initiative in Washington, D.C., and teaches at the University of Minnesota’s Humphrey School of Public Affairs.
After a faction within the Turkish military tried to overthrow the Turkish government last month, one of the many arrested for his alleged role in the attempted coup was a commanding officer at the Incirlik Air Base. 
That base — according to numerous media reports — is a major NATO installation hosting one of the largest stockpiles of nuclear weapons in Europe.

What if the Turkish base commander at Incirlik had ordered his troops surrounding the perimeter of the base to turn their guns on the U.S. soldiers that reportedly guard U.S. nuclear storage bunkers there?

What if anti-American Turkish protesters, believing the U.S. was behind the coup plot and that it was harboring the coup’s leader (ominously reminiscent of how Iranians felt about America and the shah 37 years ago) decided to march on Incirlik chanting anti-American and anti-Israeli slogans (as has actually happened) and taken over the base?
Leaving aside the coup, what if Islamic State were to attack Incirlik? In March, the Pentagon reportedly ordered military families out of southern Turkey, primarily from Incirlik, due to terrorism-related security concerns.
While we’ve avoided disaster so far, we have ample evidence that the security of U.S. nuclear weapons stored in Turkey can change literally overnight. Now fully aware of the dangers, the Obama administration should remove any remaining nuclear weapons from Turkey – and the next president should remove all U.S. nuclear weapons from Europe.
We are in for a long stretch of political uncertainty in Turkey, exacerbated by growing anti-Americanism.
Granted, as one American analyst has pointed out, any U.S. nuclear weapons stored in Turkey “would be defended by ferociously well-trained and well-equipped American troops. Maintaining control of the weapons would be the top priority if seizure was ever threatened, with all of America’s military power put to the task.” Well, if that’s the case being made to President Obama, he should ask:
Why would I or any American president take that risk?
We are in for a long stretch of political uncertainty in Turkey, exacerbated by growing anti-Americanism.
Any U.S. nuclear weapons stored there are more likely to complicate than to improve the domestic political currents in play.
The U.S. will (and should) remain a strong ally and friend of Turkey, and Turkey will (and should) remain in NATO.
It is shared interests, not nuclear sharing, that will keep us together.
Nuclear deterrence does not require the U.S. to store nuclear bombs in Turkey, or elsewhere in Europe.
The U.S. has long-range “strategic” nuclear weapons to ward off hostile powers and guarantee the security of all NATO allies. But since the end of the Cold War, most military leaders believe that our short-range “tactical” nuclear weapons based in Europe have virtually no utility, for the simple reason that no U.S. president is likely to use them.
Some may argue that we should not remove nuclear weapons from Turkey because we don’t want to signal lack of confidence in Turkey’s stability; or that we need tactical weapons throughout Europe because we need to bolster NATO members who are worried about Russia.
Now weigh those arguments against the fact that storing tactical nuclear weapons in Turkey and in other NATO nations comes with the increasing risk of vulnerability to an evolving and more deadly terrorist threat, or to domestic unrest. In the wake of an incident at a nuclear storage site — for which the U.S. would be held accountable and suffer long-term consequences with allies — it would be difficult to explain that vulnerable targets were left in place due to a perceived need to reassure our allies.
As was the case in 1979, the warning bells are ringing.
Steve Andreasen was the director for defense policy and arms control on the White House National Security Council staff from 1993 to 2001. He is a consultant to the Nuclear Threat Initiative in Washington, D.C., and teaches at the University of Minnesota.

How can we solve climate change?

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Ryan Cooper

How can we solve climate change?
One option is obvious, if a bit strange: If dumping carbon dioxide into the atmosphere is the problem, then we could always suck it back out.
If you think that sounds tricky, congratulations, you're correct. However, scientists are increasingly relying on just this idea to construct workable future scenarios where global warming does not spin out of control. And the reason is that governments around the world have not been remotely equal to the task of keeping overall warming below 2 degrees Celsius, the level at which climate change becomes unacceptably risky according to the international Paris climate accords.
As a result, scientists crunching the numbers on how humanity might achieve this goal are increasingly leaning on outlandish assumptions about pulling billions of tons of carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere. The math checks out — but the science is not guaranteed to work, and it would be a lot easier to just implement proper climate policy right now.
Here's the basic shape of climate change. In order to stay below 2 degrees, humanity can emit a sum total of roughly 1 trillion tonnes of carbon dioxide for all time. Emissions in 2014 were about 32 billion tonnes. We're headed towards that limit at high speed — so to stay below it (without pulling anything out of the air) humanity must cut its emissions very fast, very soon.
Now, world emissions may have actually declined slightly in 2015 — an encouraging sign, but a temporary one. Renewable energy has been advancing fast, but it's massive structural change and economic chaos in China alone that is responsible for the decline, not any sort of worldwide systematic attack on use of fossil fuels. What's more, developing countries — particularly India — are projected to emit a lot more as their economies grow. As I noted two years ago, even if 2014 were to be a permanent emissions peak, staying under 2 degrees would require a crash course of decarbonization never seen in history outside of economic collapse.
So the only escape hatch is to pull carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere. In a new paper in Geophysical Research Letters, Benjamin M. Sanderson, Brian O'Neill, and Claudia Tibaldi examined what it would take to achieve the targets contained in the Paris climate accords — and most of their plausible future scenarios involve a years-long period of immense carbon dioxide removal. One plausible scenario for this involves biofuels (which would grow by pulling carbon out of the air, like any plant), and then sequestering the emissions far underground after the fuel is burned.
Staying under 2 degrees can happen if we get to net zero emissions on a fairly moderate course by 2085, for example — but it would require a long-term effort taking some 26 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere every year.
This sort of thinking is becoming more and more common as climate policy remains woefully insufficient. A pseudonymous scientist notes:

What I think is interesting is that negative emissions and temperature overshoots seem to now [be] becoming part of the narrative. One obvious reason for this is that we’re on the verge of leaving it too late to achieve these targets without them. We could still do so, but it would probably require drastic emissions reductions starting now... [And Then There's PhysiHow can we solve climate change? One option is obvious, if a bit strange: If dumping carbon dioxide into the atmosphere is the problem, then we could always suck it back out.

If you think that sounds tricky, congratulations, you're correct. However, scientists are increasingly relying on just this idea to construct workable future scenarios where global warming does not spin out of control. And the reason is that governments around the world have not been remotely equal to the task of keeping overall warming below 2 degrees Celsius, the level at which climate change becomes unacceptably risky according to the international Paris climate accords.
As a result, scientists crunching the numbers on how humanity might achieve this goal are increasingly leaning on outlandish assumptions about pulling billions of tons of carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere. The math checks out — but the science is not guaranteed to work, and it would be a lot easier to just implement proper climate policy right now.
Here's the basic shape of climate change. In order to stay below 2 degrees, humanity can emit a sum total of roughly 1 trillion tonnes of carbon dioxide for all time. Emissions in 2014 were about 32 billion tonnes. We're headed towards that limit at high speed — so to stay below it (without pulling anything out of the air) humanity must cut its emissions very fast, very soon.
Now, world emissions may have actually declined slightly in 2015 — an encouraging sign, but a temporary one. Renewable energy has been advancing fast, but it's massive structural change and economic chaos in China alone that is responsible for the decline, not any sort of worldwide systematic attack on use of fossil fuels. What's more, developing countries — particularly India — are projected to emit a lot more as their economies grow. As I noted two years ago, even if 2014 were to be a permanent emissions peak, staying under 2 degrees would require a crash course of decarbonization never seen in history outside of economic collapse.
So the only escape hatch is to pull carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere. In a new paper in Geophysical Research Letters, Benjamin M. Sanderson, Brian O'Neill, and Claudia Tibaldi examined what it would take to achieve the targets contained in the Paris climate accords — and most of their plausible future scenarios involve a years-long period of immense carbon dioxide removal. One plausible scenario for this involves biofuels (which would grow by pulling carbon out of the air, like any plant), and then sequestering the emissions far underground after the fuel is burned.
Staying under 2 degrees can happen if we get to net zero emissions on a fairly moderate course by 2085, for example — but it would require a long-term effort taking some 26 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere every year.
This sort of thinking is becoming more and more common as climate policy remains woefully insufficient. A pseudonymous scientist notes:

What I think is interesting is that negative emissions and temperature overshoots seem to now [be] becoming part of the narrative. One obvious reason for this is that we’re on the verge of leaving it too late to achieve these targets without them. We could still do so, but it would probably require drastic emissions reductions starting now... [And Then There's Physics]

If we procrastinate much longer, it's going to be nearly impossible to stay under that 2 degree limit. Meanwhile, climate change itself marches on.
The last year has shattered temperature records across the globe, and seen multiple disasters of the sort predicted by climate models.
The most powerful El Niño ever recorded has caused the worst recorded instance of coral bleaching, particularly hammering Australia's Great Barrier Reef and the Maldives. Roads are buckling across Alaska as permafrost melts. Record heat in Siberia led to an anthrax outbreak among humans and reindeer.
The politics of climate change always seem tough. But it should be noted that it will be vastly easier to head the problem off now than it will be to fix it after we've let it fester for another couple decades. Carbon dioxide emissions are the product of several gigantic industries today. Creating a brand new industry to reverse the damage of other massive industries will be a terrifically expensive logistical nightmare.
And there's also no guarantee that it will work on the scale required! Technologies to scrub carbon from the atmosphere are still in the early development stage. Historically, human ingenuity has solved such problems — but there's no guarantee it will happen, especially if it needs to be done very fast. It's completely possible we'll run into unsolvable technical bottlenecks, and be forced to rely on hugely risky Hail Mary geoengineering efforts like partially blotting out the sun with sulfur dioxide.
Don't think of technology predictions 70 years out as a promise. Acting to prevent climate change as soon as possible is always going to be the smart move.
If we procrastinate much longer, it's going to be nearly impossible to stay under that 2 degree limit. Meanwhile, climate change itself marches on. The last year has shattered temperature records across the globe, and seen multiple disasters of the sort predicted by climate models. The most powerful El Niño ever recorded has caused the worst recorded instance of coral bleaching, particularly hammering Australia's Great Barrier Reef and the Maldives. Roads are buckling across Alaska as permafrost melts. Record heat in Siberia led to an anthrax outbreak among humans and reindeer.
The politics of climate change always seem tough. But it should be noted that it will be vastly easier to head the problem off now than it will be to fix it after we've let it fester for another couple decades. Carbon dioxide emissions are the product of several gigantic industries today. Creating a brand new industry to reverse the damage of other massive industries will be a terrifically expensive logistical nightmare.
And there's also no guarantee that it will work on the scale required! Technologies to scrub carbon from the atmosphere are still in the early development stage. Historically, human ingenuity has solved such problems — but there's no guarantee it will happen, especially if it needs to be done very fast. It's completely possible we'll run into unsolvable technical bottlenecks, and be forced to rely on hugely risky Hail Mary geoengineering efforts like partially blotting out the sun with sulfur dioxide.
Don't think of technology predictions 70 years out as a promise. Acting to prevent climate change as soon as possible is always going to be the smart move.

Planet and Plans

Planet and Plans

I have written an enormous amount of scientific stuff (not proclamations but predictions) over the past 15 years, it is prudent to summarize few facts without figures.

Figures can be manipulated or changed or doctored by American and British scientific forums but facts emerging are worrisome.

1. Global warming is happening alarmingly fast and it cannot be reversed.

2. The scientists knew this from early sixties but under pressure by “fossil fuel lobby” and BP reality was kept under their iron thumb.

3. The agreement on “fossil fuel protocol" was deliberately delayed by USA.

4. Sixth mass extinction is well underway.

5. Strangely aliens (strictly humanoids) have visited us to warn on other issues but Americans suppressed the information for 70 years.

6. The Vatican was preview to most of this information and kept it in their archives for posterity.

7. I am not sure what was the status of Israel (proxy) on all these issues but their priority was water.

This is written with alien visitation in mind and I try to make prediction not so outrageous.

In spite of many planets in the universe humanoids are very few.

Their (humanoid) evolution goes into billion of years but earth is the youngest of all.

Why?

I do not know but my observations (not scientific by any means) are a forerunner for future investigations with the help of alien technology.

Earth is the only planet with abundance of water in the whole universe.

The abundance of biodiversity (not god's creation by the way) is not seen anywhere in the whole universe.

That the my crunch point of view.

We are polluting of our water resources including the ocean.

All industrial countries are dumping their waste from faeces to lead to mercury to nuclear waste to the ocean.

In time to come biodiversity (including fish) in the ocean will disappear.

Eating sea fish will be poisonous.

Nuclear industry with few more accidents will tip the balance of nature.

The sixth extinction is man made catastrophe.

The seventh extinction is man made but final.

The five or so humanoid who are trying to contact us want to help us come out of this crisis.

But we are not ready for galactic brotherhood or corporation due to bizarre religions.

The cosmic rules prevent from worthwhile dialogue unless we lift our mental agility (one may cal lit spiritual ability).

My biggest and the real fear is aliens who are not humanoids are with the American Scientists to spoil the soup.

That is why they are keeping Roswell incident under cover.

These aliens want us to destroy ourselves, so that they reap benefit and occupy the earth as their new territory.

The Americans got it wrong.

I hope Russia and President Putin would fill the vacuum.

Russians does not believe in any religions.

China is not ready and woken up lately. 

Obama or next Us President cannot since, the evangelists won't let it happen.