Israel now has more than 300 cybersecurity companies, exports totaling $6 billion, and 20 percent of the world’s private cyber investment dollars. Cybertech 2016 convened this week in Tel Aviv, and I was in the audience for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s plenary address, courtesy of the America-Israel Friendship League and the Israeli Foreign Ministry. Israel has an ambitious…
Category: Military History
The World’s 20 Most Impressive Fortresses
Mighty military strongholds from ancient castles to modern innovations. A fortress protects and gives military personnel a safe harbor from the enemy. But not all fortresses were created equal. And they certainly weren’t all created the same. We look over time and distance to find the 20 most impressive fortresses from around the world and…
Cold War Files: The Cuban Army Abroad; Castro’s Foreign Cold Warriors
“Throughout the 60s, 70s and 80s, Castro was only too eager to export revolution to the Third World. Often this support even came in the form of combat troops to lend a hand to various Marxist uprisings.” AMERICA WAS STILL REELING from its humiliation in Vietnam in 1976 when hawks within the administration of President Gerald Ford were pushing for the United…
Espionage Files: From Pacifist Sheep Farmer to One of Britains Greatest Secret Agents
Occupied France, 1944. Francis Cammaerts stepped from a train onto the railway station platform in Avignon. Almost immediately, German security forces at a checkpoint became suspicious and asked for his papers. The son of a Belgian poet and English actress, he was everything you would never expect in a secret agent. Cammaerts had been a pacifist and conscientious objector…
Range 15: A Movie by Vets for Vets!!
Before you write off this movie, which is UBER Goofy and Full of bad language and corny jokes know that it stars Medal of Honor Recipients Leroy Petry and Clint Romesha. Plus fellow Texan Marcus Luttrell makes a cameo…..nuff’ said. -SF The ‘Range 15’ trailer is everything you expect and deserve from a film made…
Military History: The Easter Offensive 1972, A Failure to Use Intelligence
This article was originally published in the Military Intelligence Professional Bulletin, 1998. It was not Intelligence (evaluated information of the enemy) that failed. The failure was [that of] the commanders and certain G2s, who did not act on the intelligence they had. –Colonel Robert S. Allen, on The Battle of the Bulge1 Like the Battle…
Chinese Military Revamps Cyber and Intelligence Capabilities
This story reminds me of Paul Newman’s famous line in the scene from Cool Hand Luke where the “Road Boss” with the Mirror sun glasses Shoots a bird flying with a rifle with one shot: “That man don’t say much, but I think he just said something right there….” The Chinese are continuously making statements…
Preparing for the Next BIG War
As a footnote to this this list I would add the ability for our Military and Intelligence Agencies to Operate within the same parameters as the Russian, Chinese and Iranian Military operates; in a “hybrid” 4th Generational Capacity, where war is waged against your adversary in every facet of their society; Financial, Social, Political, Religious…
Mean Streets: The Clash of Technology and Terrain and Urban Warfare
In urban environments, the playing field is levelled between the conventional armies and insurgents BE IT ALEPPO or Damascus, Mosul or Ramadi, or even Eastern Ukraine, combatants in today’s conflicts are frequently fighting in and over urban areas. The decision to wage war in cities is driven in part by modern military technology. Frequently,…
6 Things You Probably Never Knew about Black Hawk Down
The 2001 movie about the Battle of Mogadishu is a modern-day classic war movie. The 2001 blockbuster “Black Hawk Down” is a favorite among service members and veterans alike. Depicting the 1993 raid to capture Mohamed Farah Aidid and subsequent Battle of Mogadishu, “Black Hawk Down” provided a pro-soldier narrative, a look into what happens…