Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's outburst came during a televised speech about the crisis, during which he branded it "strange" that America would offer to help while it struggles with the crisis

Given that some major U.S. media and politicians made groundless claims that the novel coronavirus originates in China, blamed and slandered China, even asked for an apology from China, then I have every reason to ask 10 questions for the United States about its origin too. Better still, unlike the U.S., I did a lot of homework and will base my questions on international media coverage of COVID-19.

Operating out of South Africa during the Apartheid era in the early 1980’s, Dr. Wouter Basson launched a secret bioweapons project called Project Coast. The goal of the project was to develop biological and chemical agents that would either kill or sterilize the black population and assassinate political enemies. Among the agents developed were Marburg and Ebola viruses.

Basson is surrounded by cloak and dagger intrigue, as he told Pretoria High court in South Africa that “The local CIA agent in Pretoria threatened me with death on the sidewalk of the American Embassy in Schoeman Street.” According to a 2001 article in The New Yorker magazine, the American Embassy in Pretoria was “terribly concerned” that Basson would reveal deep connections between Project Coast and the United States.

In 2013, Basson was found guilty of “unprofessional conduct” by the South African health council.

Operating out of South Africa during the Apartheid era in the early 1980’s, Dr. Wouter Basson launched a secret bioweapons project called Project Coast. The goal of the project was to develop biological and chemical agents that would either kill or sterilize the black population and assassinate political enemies. Among the agents developed were Marburg and Ebola viruses.

Basson is surrounded by cloak and dagger intrigue, as he told Pretoria High court in South Africa that “The local CIA agent in Pretoria threatened me with death on the sidewalk of the American Embassy in Schoeman Street.” According to a 2001 article in The New Yorker magazine, the American Embassy in Pretoria was “terribly concerned” that Basson would reveal deep connections between Project Coast and the United States.

In 2013, Basson was found guilty of “unprofessional conduct” by the South African health council.

Leave it to a major US arms defense contractor to hype the "ever-evolving threats" to US national security in a new hugely provocative video at a time the world fights an "invisible enemy" - as world leaders are calling it - in the form of the Covid-19 panemic.

A new promotional video released by Lockheed Martin simulates what appears to be a major airstrike on Russian weaponry. Taking note of the promo which features CGI footage, Russian state media described it as a "simulated first strike on Russian positions and weapons systems."

Specifically Russia’s trademark S-400 anti-air systems are among the targets of Lockheed's own systems in the simulated portion of the video, all of which touts the comany's Advanced Development Programs, also known as Skunk Works, which is an elite group tasked with working with the Pentagon on the most advanced and secretive projects.

The clip, which heaps praise on the secretive Skunk Works division, notably features mostly computer-generated prototypes of aircraft, with the problematic F-35 fighter jet being the only already-existing model.

Lockheed Martin Corp has released a promotional video that appears to show a simulated airstrike on Russian weaponry.

More than halfway into the promo, CGI footage shows strikes by Lockheed’s planes on Russia’s trademark S-400 anti-air systems and a road-mobile Topol-M intercontinental ballistic missile system, as the voice-over narrates about the “ever-evolving threats” to US security.

From conspiracy theory to geopolitical realism, the possibility to treat COVID-19 as a biological weapon has been finally accepted in the public sphere. The recent statement by the Chinese spokesman Zhao Lijian, formally accusing the US of bringing coronavirus to China, has highlighted a series of new opinions about the pandemic.

The hypothesis of biological warfare behind the global pandemic had already been raised by Russian experts some weeks ago. Like any opinion that is slightly different from the official version of Western governments and their media agencies, the thesis was ridiculed and accused of being a “conspiracy theory”. However, as soon as the official spokesman for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the second largest economic power on the planet publishes a note attesting to this possibility, it leaves the sphere of “conspiracy theories” to enter the scene of public opinion and official government versions.

As we are all collectively, as One Universe, experiencing the potential of a coronavirus infection, we have been assured that the outbreak originated in a fish market in Wuhan, China’s eighth largest city with a population of 11 million. That is the largely unchallenged conclusion since China is well known for its extensive network of high tech labs and since the SARS virus began in China last year.

At first glance, it seems a passing curiosity that the next two most extensively affected countries with corona infections, each disparate from China and each other, have extensive trade relations with China. In defiance of science, why would Italy be the most infected country outside of China?

The worldwide fear of a hitherto unknown but supposedly highly contagious and weapons-grade virus means that many people feel paralysed, public life in several states is crippled by governments, at the same time fundamental civil liberties are “honed” or severely restricted and also the military is brought into readiness. What is going on here?

The former Soviet head of state Mikhail Gorbachev recently described the current political situation as extremely worrying. According to “Sputnik News” of 12.03.20 he wrote: “War is in the air.”

by Patrick Cockburn, theindependent.uk.co

The political consequences of the Covid-19 pandemic are already vast because its advance, and the desperate measures taken to combat it, entirely dominate the news agenda and will go on doing so for the foreseeable future, although it is in the nature of this unprecedented event that nothing can be foreseen.

History has not come to a full stop because of the virus, however: crucial events go on happening, even if they are being ignored by people wholly absorbed by the struggle for survival in the face of a new disease. Many of these unrecognised but very real crises are taking place in the Middle East, the arena where great powers traditionally stage confrontations fought out by their local proxies.

Maybe it was a plan that went horribly wrong, something they could no longer control. Was the Corona virus or COVID-19 spread intentionally? What if this virus was used against China as a weapon of choice to destabilize China’s economy and push back against China’s growing influence? We don’t know for sure, but it is possible. Investigations are ongoing. Nothing has not been confirmed. But what has been confirmed is what history has taught us given the facts on how the use of biological warfare for various purposes, against many peoples and nations has been happening for some time.

The priorities of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in the area of bacteriology have been “catastrophically re-ordered” by emphasizing bioweapons research over non-bioweapons research, a prominent authority states.

I’ll throw my 2 cents in here. I have zero proof other than my gut feeling that this is a bioweapon. I do have 40 year of biodefense research experience behind me and worked at Fort Detrich on bacterial vaccines where I developed my own aerosol infection routes and developed multi-species models of pathogenesis to establish correlates of immunity. Because I was a one-stop shop doing everything including animal care, aerosol exposures, sample analysis, necropsy, and histopathology, etc. plus I had research programs in endemic areas studying the immunopathological response in human populations to establish immune correlates of protection for candidate vaccines all for the Biological Defense Research Program (BDRP).

A number of interesting developments here in the United States and in China suggest that there is something very strange going on regarding the coronavirus and the US government.

We are now hearing from the Chinese government itself, as well as from Chinese social media, which is normally restricted, but in this case, it's actually seems that people are being encouraged to post the same kinds of questions that we just heard from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Geng Shuang, who suggested that the United States military brought coronavirus to China.

The US is expanding its nuclear capability with new types of low-yield weapons, and Moscow believes US strategists now consider launching a nuclear strike as a viable option in a conflict.

The US has made adjustments to its nuclear posture and has been introducing low-yield nuclear warheads to its arsenal, including those that can be launched from submarines. Russia sees such developments with great concern, the spokesperson for the Russian Foreign Ministry Maria Zakharova told journalists on Friday.

The developments make Moscow believe that the American leadership “has made a decision to consider a nuclear conflict as a viable political option and are creating the potential necessary for it.”

An American academic and analyst has suggested that “Zionist elements” in the US or Israel have exploited the global coronavirus epidemic to create and spread a deadlier strain of the virus in Iran as a form of “biological warfare” against Iranians.

“I believe that what is going on is, under the cloak of the alleged coronavirus epidemic, that biological warfare is being conducted against Iran by Zionist elements who are taking advantage of the situation,” said James Fetzer, a retired professor of philosophy at the University of Minnesota.

“This is why Iran appears to be hit so severely; in other words, the coronavirus is being used as a smokescreen to conceal the fact that the real enemies of Iran are deliberately targeting the Iranian people,” Fetzer told Press TV on Thursday.

An Iranian military leader has suggested that the coronavirus is not a naturally occurring disease, and that it is a manmade bioweapon cultivated and released against China and Iran by a ‘hostile state’.

Brigadier General Gholam Reza Jalali, an Iranian officer in charge of the country’s Civil Defense Organization claimed Tuesday that “A study of the consequences of the virus in terms of tolls or the extent of the epidemic and the type of media propaganda over this issue that is aimed at increasing fear and panic among people strengthens the speculations that a biological attack has been launched against China and Iran with economic goals.”

Strongly hinting that the the virus is a bio-attack by the US, Jalali told Iranian Fars News Agency, state media, that he is seeking “laboratorial investigations and comparing the genome of the primary virus and the new genomes” to confirm his theory.

Former New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg on Monday pledged to support Israel’s security and constrain Iran’s nuclear program at the annual pro-Israel AIPAC summit in Washington, while also criticizing Sen. Bernie Sanders for boycotting the annual event, which has been a lightning rod in the 2020 Democratic primary.

Bloomberg was the only 2020 Democratic presidential candidate to attend the American Israel Public Affairs Committee Conference in Washington, a move criticized by progressives and some Democrats not aligned with the group's views.

“I can’t tell you how glad I am to be at AIPAC,” he said. "Israel is small, we know, but resilient, and surrounded by adversaries. And if you caught the last couple of presidential debates you know that I can empathize."

MORE: Bloomberg criticizes Trump’s response to coronavirus as he launches campaign blitz ahead of Super Tuesday

The military commander of entire NATO doesn't mind lobbing nukes first

The US has declined an invitation to hold a formal meeting to discuss the legal details of extending the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START), which is due to expire in a year, a senior Russian diplomat has said.

Washington has decided to ditch important talks on the bilateral treaty's fate, the Deputy Director of the Foreign Ministry's Non-Proliferation and Arms Control Department, Vladimir Leontyev, told a strategic arms-themed event in the Russian parliament on Thursday.

We offered a meeting between our legal experts to make sure that we're on the same page and to negotiate a common understanding of the technical side of the extension [of the treaty], but a few days ago the Americans officially declined that offer.

When the Commander of NATO says he is a fan of flexible first strike at the same time that NATO is flexing its military muscle on Russia’s border, the risk of inadvertent nuclear war is real.
US Air Force Gen. Tod D Wolters told the Senate this week he “is a fan of flexible first strike” regarding NATO’s nuclear weapons, thereby exposing the fatal fallacy of the alliance’s embrace of American nuclear deterrence policy.

The coronavirus could be up to 1,000 times more infectious than SARS because it plagues the body in the same way as HIV and Ebola, scientists warn.

Experts initially presumed the spread of COVID-19 would follow the same trajectory as the SARS outbreak in 2002/3, because the viruses are almost identical genetically.

But they have discovered the way it binds to cells in the human body is akin to far more aggressive diseases like HIV and Ebola.

This makes it '100 to 1,000 times' more efficient at infecting people than SARS, according to researchers from Nankai University in Tianjin, northern China.

The statement was made during a hearing devoted to the US plans to modernise American weapons and to possible ways the US can respond to the new cutting-edge weapons Russia rolled out in last two years.

US Navy Admiral Charles Richard has admitted that existing American air defences were not designed to counter modern hypersonic glide weapons, like the one recently deployed by Russia, and currently developed by China, and hence these weapons "challenge" the US, during an open hearing at the US House Subcommittee on Strategic Forces. He added that the Pentagon even has trouble determining the capabilities of modern weapons, although it still can make a reliable guess on what threat these weapons pose.

If you asked the Pentagon, they would tell you in no uncertain terms that the US is not engaged in any sort of nuclear arms race. At the same time, the US is spending heavily on new nuclear weapons, and is particularly scrambling to get weapons designed to target Russia.

UNITED NATIONS, February 27. /TASS/. Moscow expects the United States’ response to its proposal on extending New START (Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty) without preconditions, Russian Permanent Representative to the United Nations Vasily Nebenzya has said.

"The calls on Russia to extend New START are sent to the wrong address. Russian President Vladimir Putin has offered the US to extend New START without preconditions," Nebenzya told the UN Security Council’s meeting on preparing for the 2020 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference.

New START treaty
The Treaty between the United States of America and the Russian Federation on Measures for the Further Reduction and Limitation of Strategic Offensive Arms (the New START Treaty) was signed in 2010 and it entered into force on February 5, 2011.

While tangible evidence is not available, the new Coronavirus, (2019 Novel Coronavirus (2019-nCoV) one in a line of many that could have been produced by man in laboratories, is affecting almost exclusively the Chinese at this point. This has seemingly opened the floodgates to speculation as to its exact origin. This virus has unique characteristics that have happened before with SARS and MERS, and has genetic material that has never been identified, and is not tied to any animal or human known virus. This should be troubling to all, because if this is manmade, it was manufactured as a weapon of war. So who is responsible for its release in China? It is possible that this virus was created in China and was “accidentally” released into the population, but that does not sound credible at any level. Do any think that the Chinese government would create a Chinese race specific virus and release it in their country?

As reported earlier, Air Mobility Command’s C-17A Globemaster III arrived at Incerlik AB, Turkey from Sicily, Italy on February, 20 as part of US-led exercise Defender Europe 2020, Air Mobility Command officials said.

Five more C-17A Globemasters III arrived to Incerlik AB from Ramstein Air Base on February, 21. Our sources at Incerlik AB confirm that the presence of five additional transport aircraft is a clear evidence of getting the whole bulk of nukes (that are currently stored at Incerlik AB amid tensions in Syria) out to Germany, Poland and one of the Baltic states. Five nuclear bombs are to be transported to Poland and one of the Baltic states accordingly with the rest of the stock to be delivered to Germany.

SOURCE: SUBMITTED BY SPIRO SKOURAS

In this interview, the Author of the US Biowarfare Act, Professor Francis Boyle uncovers four separate studies which he claims confirm as ‘smoking gun’ evidence the Wuhan Coronavirus known as COVID19 was in fact weaponized.

Professor Boyle also discloses where he believes the true origin of the virus originated and the extent that the US government was involved.

This is a must see interview as Professor Boyle also reveals never before disclosed information.

Links Study: The spike glycoprotein of the new coronavirus 2019-nCoV contains a furin-like cleavage site absent in CoV of the same clade https://www.sciencedirect.com/science...

Study: SARS-like cluster of circulating bat coronavirus pose threat for human emergence https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/arti...

Study: Angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2) proteins of different bat species confer variable susceptibility to SARS-CoV entry https://link.springer.com/article/10....

Today we bring you an important article about Prof. Francis Boyle, authored by Sherwood Ross. This article / interview ties together the coronavirus outbreak with the bioweapons program run by the NIH and funded by U.S. taxpayers, mostly without their knowledge.

I am currently scheduled to interview Francis Boyle this Wednesday, Feb. 26th, at noon central time, on InfoWars.com. Be sure to tune in to InfoWars to catch that interview (I’m hosting the first half of the show, followed by Alan Keyes who takes over).

We are reprinting the article with permission:

As of 2019, the U.S. Department of Defense maintained an estimated stockpile of 3,800 nuclear warheads for delivery by more than 800 ballistic missiles and aircraft. Roughly 1,300 warheads are actually deployed, while most of the remaining inventory is either held in reserve (as a hedge against “technical or geopolitical surprises”) or is destined to be dismantled.

These weapons are thought to be stored across 11 U.S. states, with the vast majority residing in New Mexico, Washington, and Georgia.

Given the history of the United States government and its military industrial complex concerning biological and germ warfare, the use of these agents against large populations, and the desire to create agents that are race specific strains, these powerful entities have become compassionless purveyors of death to the innocent. Manmade viruses meant for warfare, whether for economic destruction, starvation, or mass death, are the workings of the truly evil among us. Predation at this level is relegated to those in power; a president for example, could give the order to wipe out millions due to his inability to control a problem he caused and perpetuated, and then lay blame on the victims.

The US Army regularly produces deadly viruses, bacteria and toxins in direct violation of the UN Convention on the prohibition of Biological Weapons. Hundreds of thousands of unwitting people are systematically exposed to dangerous pathogens and other incurable diseases. Bio warfare scientists using diplomatic cover test man-made viruses at Pentagon bio laboratories in 25 countries across the world. These US bio-laboratories are funded by the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) under a $ 2.1 billion military program - Cooperative Biological Engagement Program (CBEP) - and are located in former Soviet Union countries such as Georgia and Ukraine, the Middle East, South East Asia and Africa.

The Defense Department is asking for tens of billions of dollars this year to maintain and modernize U.S. nuclear capabilities, while at the same time checking in with personnel at the remote bases maintainers and operators call home.

In recent years, issues like cheating on exams and marijuana use have plagued Air Force bases in Montana, North Dakota and Nebraska, calling into question whether the quality of life in those areas was taking a toll on troops.

On Friday, the Pentagon reported that it had staged a “mini-exercise” in which Russia dropped a low-yield nuke on a European NATO member. The drill followed a recent House Armed Services Committee hearing in which a senior Pentagon official said that the US needed a plan to be able to “fight and win” wars in a nuclear-contaminated environment.

Russian lawmakers have reacted to the Pentagon’s fantastical scenario involving Russia’s alleged plans to use low-yield nukes on the battlefield, calling the exercise outrageous and offering various ways that Moscow can respond.

US Defense Secretary Mark Esper played himself in a drill at the US Strategic Command HQ in Nebraska, which featured a bizarre scenario of America nuking Russia in response to its own nuclear strike against a ‘NATO ally’.

US military exercises simulating various crises are not that uncommon, yet, out of all plausible scenarios, this particular drill apparently simulated a highly unrealistic one. The classified exercise conducted at Offutt Air Force Base near Omaha on Thursday focused on an imaginary nuclear conflict between the US and Russia in Europe.

Britain’s biggest arms manufacturer, BAE Systems, has come under a hail of fire on social media after proudly announcing the “greatest increase” in dividend profits in eight years as part of their 2019 financial results.
BAE Systems tweeted a video on Thursday in which their chief executive Charles Woodburn gleefully revealed that 2019 had been a “good year” for the world’s fourth largest defense company.

BAE’s announcement triggered an avalanche of criticism on Twitter, with many commenters hammering the company for its boastful theme and questioning whether providing bombs that have led to deaths around the world should be something to be proud about.

One person simply tweeted: "Death dividend," while another sarcastically wrote: "So glad killing people has brought you a nice dividend."

In recent weeks, concern over the emergence of a novel coronavirus in China has grown exponentially as media, experts and government officials around the world have openly worried that this new disease has the potential to develop into a global pandemic.

As concerns about the future of the ongoing outbreak have grown, so too have the number of theories speculating about the outbreak’s origin, many of which blame a variety of state actors and/or controversial billionaires. This has inevitably led to efforts to clamp down on “misinformation” related to the coronavirus outbreak from both mainstream media outlets and major social media platforms.

© Photo: Flickr / EU2018BG
It is intriguing but almost inevitable that examination of so many European policies must begin with reference to the United States. The reason is that the US is majestically (and the word is used advisedly) important to Europe, and no matter what opinions may be held of Washington’s policies under the erratic Trump, these will always have influence in Europe’s capitals.

One major Europe-US consideration is the Trump administration’s decisions on nuclear strategy which have an enormous impact that will be likely to shape international relations indefinitely.

Just out of a milestone nuclear missile accord, the US is about to deploy short- and intermediate-range missiles in Europe and Asia, prompting Moscow to engage France and other partners to preserve security on the continent.

"In order to agree on specific solutions, we need multilateral talks and multilateral consultations involving, of course, the United States, who destroyed the treaty," Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Monday, referring to the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty.

This knowledge hasn’t been a secret for a long time. In a classified 1948 report by the Pentagon’s Committee on Biological Warfare, the main selling point was that:

“A gun or a bomb leaves no doubt that a deliberate attack has occurred. But if … an epidemic slashes across a crowded city, there is no way of knowing whether anyone attacked, much less who”, adding hopefully that “A significant portion of the human population within selected target areas may be killed or incapacitated” with only very small amounts of a pathogen. (1) (2)

The Saudi News Agency quoted the Arab Coalition spokesperson Turki Al-Malki as saying on Saturday that one of their Tornado fighter jets was shot down over northern Yemen on Friday night.

“At 23:45 P.M. on Friday, February 14, 2020, a Tornado fighter plane of the Royal Saudi Air Force crashed while on a mission of close air support to units of the National Army,” Malki said.

Houthi forces announced on Friday evening that their air defense troops shot down the fighter jet over the Al-Jawf Governorate after it carried out airstrikes on several sites in northern Yemen.

“The air defenses shot down the coalition war plane with an advanced surface-to-air missile supported by modern technology. The sky of Yemen is not for a walk and the enemy must count a thousand time for that,” the Ansarallah-affiliated Yemeni Army (Houthi) spokesperson, Brigadier General Yahya Sare’a, said on Friday evening.

Trump proved he’s more a deal breaker than maker, abandoning international obligations instead of observing them — notably the landmark JCPOA and INF Treaty, based on Big Lies.

Is New START next to go? It’s the only remaining arms control treaty remaining between Russia and the US.

According to nuclear expert Helen Caldicott, Russia and the US have around 94% of the world’s nuclear arsenal between them, adding:

“(W)e are closer to nuclear war now, (early in) the twenty-first century than we’ve ever been before, even during the height of the Cold War” — because of US rage for dominating other nations by whatever it takes to achieve its objectives.

SOURCE: THE GRAYZONE
Facing accusations that it issued a doctored report alleging a chemical attack in Syria, the OPCW has released an inquiry attacking two whistleblowers as rogue actors. Leaked documents obtained by The Grayzone reveal serious distortions in the OPCW inquiry as well as a campaign of intimidation against internal dissenters.

BY AARON MATÉ
For the past year, the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) has been roiled by allegations that it manipulated an investigation to falsely accuse the Syrian government of a chemical weapons attack. An OPCW report released in March 2019 lent credence to claims by Islamist militants and Western governments that the Syrian military killed around 40 civilians with toxic gas in the city of Douma in April 2018. The accusation against Damascus led to US-led military strikes on Syrian government sites that same month.

The Syrian Army is making major gains inside Idlib in a military offensive condemned by Turkey and the United States, over the weekend capturing the key town of Saraqib from al-Qaeda linked Hayat Tahrir al-Sham.

Amid the military advance, the Syrian and Russian governments say they've recovered proof of US support for the anti-Assad al-Qaeda insurgent terrorists, publishing photographs of crates of weapons and supplies to state-run SANA:

Syrian Arab Army units have found US-made weapons and ammunition, and medicines made in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait at the positions and caches of terrorist organizations in the towns of Mardikh and Kafr Amim in Idleb southeastern countryside after crushing terrorism in them.

Via The Strategic Culture Foundation,

The Pentagon confirmed this week that it has, for the first time, armed some of its submarines with long-range nuclear missiles which have a lower destructive power compared with existing warheads. These so-called “mini-nukes” represent – despite the diminutive-sounding name – an increased risk of nuclear war.

The newly deployed W76-2 warhead fitted to the Trident missile system is reported to have an explosive yield of five kilotons, or about 1 per cent of the existing W76-1 weapon. The supposed lower-yield weapon is nevertheless an instrument of immense mass destruction, equivalent to approximately a third of the power of the bomb the US dropped on Hiroshima in August 1945 which killed tens of thousands of people. That puts in perspective the seemingly more usable “mini-nuke” missile.

However, with Dr Strangelove-type logic, Pentagon official John Rood, claimed

Written largely by the most prestigious British scientist of his day, this official report, containing hundreds of pages of evidence about the use of US biological weapons during the Korean War, was effectively suppressed upon its original release in 1952.

Courtesy of researcher Jeffrey Kaye, INSURGE now publishes the report in text-searchable format for the first time for the general public, with an exclusive, in-depth analysis of its damning findings and implications.

The report provides compelling evidence of systematic violation of the laws of war against North Korea through the deployment of biological weapons — a critical context that is essential for anyone to understand the dynamics of current regional tensions, and what might be done about them.

One year ago in January, a Chinese robot landed on the dark side of the moon. Since then, the Chang’e 4 probe and the Yutu-2 rover it carried onboard have been busy photographing and scanning minerals, growing yeast, hatching fruit-fly eggs, and cultivating cotton, potato, and rapeseeds in the moon’s low gravity, according to the Daily Beast.

Now, China’s National Space Administration is quietly planning to launch yet another probe into space. Chang’e 5 could blast off as early as this year.

Last year, TMU reported that the Yutu-2 rover came across a strange “gel-like” substance which the Chinese began to study extensively.

The Chinese space agency has continued to work on its Tiangong 3 space station and is planning on testing a new manned spacecraft for deep-space missions. That permanent station will reach orbit aboard the country’s new Long March 5B rocket in the first half of 2020, AFP reported. The mission will not be associated with the International Space Station.

But one fact many may not know about San Francisco’s fog is that in 1950, the US military conducted a test to see whether it could be used to help spread a biological weapon in a “simulated germ warfare attack.” This was just the start of many such tests around the country that would go on in secret for years.

But after over the past two years both Russia and China have hyped their own advancing programs (Putin has touted that his Avangard hypersonic missile as “invincible”), which many analysts believe could be further along than the US program, the more pressing worry is how to defend against the nearly impossible to stop high-tech weapon. Hypersonic missiles, such as the kind Russia has lately tested, “are hard to stop, they can maneuver, they’re unpredictable” and “hard to detect” so “you don’t have a lot of time” to respond — Mike White, the Defense Department’s assistant director for hypersonics was quoted this week as saying.

Toward this end, the Pentagon is pursuing experimental interceptor technology designed to take out possible incoming hypersonics.

Artist’s concept of a hypersonic vehicle. DARPA Image.
The military analysis site Defense One explains of the developing program, still in its infancy:

BY WHITNEY WEBB VIA THE LAST AMERICAN VAGABOND
DARPA recently spent millions on research involving bats and coronaviruses, as well as gene editing “bioweapons” prior to the recent coronavirus outbreak. Now, “strategic allies” of the agency have been chosen to develop a genetic material-based vaccine to halt the potential epidemic.

WASHINGTON D.C. – In recent weeks, concern over the emergence of a novel coronavirus in China has grown exponentially as media, experts and government officials around the world have openly worried that this new disease has the potential to develop into a global pandemic.

When the mainstream media writes about war, even critically, the image that often comes to mind for me is an infant wrapped in plastic. That infant is naked reality, a.k.a., the present moment, suffocating and screaming for its life; the plastic smothering it are the journalistic euphemisms by which murder and terrorism turn into abstract acts of national necessity.

Thus, the recent news that the United States clobbered war-torn Afghanistan with a record number of bombs and missiles in 2019 came to us via Stars and Stripes in language protecting all concerned from raw awareness and flying shrapnel:

American aircraft released 7,423 munitions in the country in 2019, according to figures published Monday by U.S. Air Forces Central Command. Coalition aircraft flew nearly 8,800 sorties during the period, over a quarter of which carried out strikes.

Trump's policy rollback is a step toward the past, like many of his other decisions, and sends exactly the wrong message to those working to rid the world of the scourge of landmines."

President Donald Trump is reportedly preparing to roll back established constraints on the U.S. military's ability to use landmines overseas despite the weapons' long history of killing and maiming civilians around the world.

CNN, citing multiple anonymous Defense Department officials, reported Thursday that the Trump administration is expected to loosen landmine restrictions in the coming days by rescinding a 2014 order by former President Barack Obama that limited U.S. landmine use to the Korean Peninsula.

"Trump's landmine move would be in line with all of his other moves to undercut arms control and disarmament in a world much in need of them."
—Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Jody Williams.

French President Emmanuel Macron has routinely boasted about the creation of a powerful EU Army, but Macron's 'Napoleonic' ambitions may have run into a major issue with the German military falling apart.

The latest report exposes how a major war exercise, which started last Thursday across Europe, had German troops using their own vehicles because of a shortage of infantry tanks as many were in disrepair.

By KEITH GRIFFITH FOR DAILYMAIL.COM

The F-35 Lightning II's problems include hundreds of software vulnerabilities and guns that don't shoot straight, according to a new Pentagon report on issues with Lockheed Martin's $428 billion program.

Air Force models of the F-35 use an internally mounted 25mm Gatling gun that has 'unacceptable' accuracy due to 'misalignments,' according to an upcoming report from the Pentagon's test office obtained by Bloomberg.

The mounts on the guns are also cracking, forcing the Air Force to restrict use of the gun, the report says.

The Marine and Navy versions of the Joint Strike Fighter use an externally mounted version of the gun that does not have the same issues, according to the report.

Jan. 17 (UPI) -- A military training exercise scheduled for this weekend could jam GPS signals in the Southeast and Caribbean, according to the Federal Aviation Administration.

An FAA advisory warns pilots could experience "unreliable or unavailable GPS signal" during a training exercise scheduled for Jan. 16 through Jan. 24.

The U.S. Navy's Carrier Strike Group Four will be conducting GPS testing exercises off the coast of Georgia, causing likely disruptions as low as 50 feet above ground level within 207 miles of the test location -- and as high as 40,000 feet within 460 miles.

"The Global Positioning System (GPS) constellation is provided by the Department of Defense (DoD). Routine testing is conducted on the GPS," an FAA representative told Military Times. "The FAA issues advisories to inform operators that they may experience interference with or disruption of their GPS navigation systems in the vicinity of the testing."

Following successful tests, the US Army has decided to use the Israeli Spike missile on its attack helicopters until a domestic replacement can be produced.

The Spike Non-Line-of-Sight (NLOS) missile, made by Israel-based Rafael Advanced Defense Systems, will be temporarily appearing in US rotary wing arsenals, following a recent decision by an Army Requirements Oversight Council.

Brig. Gen. Wally Rugen, who heads the Army’s Vertical Lift Modernization team, made the announcement on Wednesday, Defense News reported. Rugen did not say how many Spike NLOS missiles would be procured.

The Army tested the Spike several times last year at its Yuma Proving Ground in Arizona as well as in Israel, Sputnik reported, settling on the weapon due to its range and maneuvering capabilities.