Europe
SOURCE: The Washington Times
It may be Russia’s most successful military export since the Kalashnikov — at least at driving a wedge between the U.S. and some key allies. The S-400 advanced missile defense system, which has been a linchpin protecting Moscow’s military bases on the battlefields of Syria, is attracting renewed interest from countries such as India and Turkey — pitting Russia against the Trump administration’s drive to boost competing U.S. defense sales.
Since entering the Russian arsenal in 2007, the S-400 Triumph air defense system, which is also known by the NATO moniker SA-21 Growler, has quickly assumed the mantle as Moscow’s premier anti-aircraft missile system. Continue reading
SOURCE :Reuters
The U.S. military and European operators of the radar-evading F-35 fighter jet have agreed to work together more closely to help lower the cost of operating the new warplanes as growing numbers arrive in Europe, officials said.
Operating costs were a big issue when senior military officials from the United States, Israel and F-35 user nations in Europe – Britain, Italy, Norway, Denmark, Turkey, the Netherlands – met in Germany last week, they said.
SOURCE: NATIONAL INTEREST
The American development and deployment of Fifth-Generation stealth aircraft like the F-35 Lightning is one of the central stories of today’s security zeitgeist. But behind the scenes, several countries are already looking ahead to the design of a Sixth-Generation jet.
The relentless pace of research is arguably driven less by combat experience—of which there is little—and more by a sober assessment that development of a successor will take multiple decades and is better started sooner rather than later. Continue reading
SOURCE: ECONOMIST
ONLY a few months ago, Canadians were earnestly debating whether or not the country’s Liberal administration was right to go ahead with executing a $12bn contract to deliver armoured vehicles to Saudi Arabia. The government said it would, but acknowledged its critics’ concerns by agreeing to adopt a version of an international treaty that limits arms sales to rogues .
However, things took a different turn. It was the Saudis who plunged the deal into uncertainty. After Canada’s foreign minister urged the release of some political prisoners on Twitter, the Saudi government declared that all new business with Canada was suspended. This left Canadians unsure if the kingdom still wants the arms deal. And if the Saudis do walk away, plenty of other countries will be happy to supply armoured cars. “They could get their combat vehicles from Turkey, South Korea or Brazil,” says Pieter Wezeman, a researcher at SIPRI, a Stockholm-based think-tank. Continue reading
SOURCE: THE GUARDIAN
Kofi Annan, the former United Nations secretary general, has died at the age of 80 after a short illness, his family and foundation announced on Saturday.
The Ghanaian was the seventh secretary general of the UN between 1997 and 2006 and won the Nobel peace prize for his humanitarian work. Continue reading
SOURCE: ENS
Strava, the fitness-tracking app which relies on the smartphone GPS to track a user’s exercise sessions, which includes cycling, running finds itself the subject of a controversy. According to reports, a heat map shared by Strava, which shows the exercise activity of its users across the world, has ended up revealing secret military bases for the US and other countries as well. The app lets users post their activities on the social network and also follow others, who are into the same fitness activities on the app.
The map, which was first shared by the company in November 2017, includes? a total of one billion activities from all Strava data through September 2017. The heat map also shows 3 trillion latitude and longitude points and includes around 10TB of raw input data, according to the company’s original post. Continue reading