Wednesday, February 21, 2007
dans le métro, entre Cambronne et Nation, un vieux monsieur monte et commence à questionner les passagers à portée d'oeil. Quel est ton nom demande-t-il, et peu habitués à ce genre d'intérogatoire la personne répond, personne, ah c'est nemo alors dit le monsieur, sachant que son interloctueur ne comprend pas le latin.
21 /2/07
from the 21/2/07 New York Times:
"The Russian missile commander, Gen. Nikolai Y. Solovtsov, speaking of the Czech Republic and Poland’s consideration of the American plan, said, “If the government of Poland, the Czech Republic and other countries make this decision — and I think mutual consultations that have been held and will be held will allow avoiding this — the strategic missile troops will be able to have those facilities as targets."
My commentary:
After aiming various ICBM batteries at the Czech Republic and neighboring Poland, Russian officials were concerned by the fact that the missiles appeared pointed down at Russian soil itself since due to the proximity of their former Warsaw pact allies the normal geodesic calculation using great circle routes was no longer valid and that in fact the shortest distance to the new intended targets in these countries would be “as the crow flies”. Straight lines would carry the missiles off into space so technicians compensated by directing them at an angle that would drive them through the earth with the predestined emergence point being the targeted missile defense sites in the neighboring countries. This explanation seemed to reassure all concerned on the Russian side except the farmers whose beet fields would be seriously churned up if not destroyed.
Various ecological and fresh air groups whose negligible membership in Putin’s authoritarian state claimed that the proximity of some of the detonations - after all Poland has more than 1000 kms of common borders with either Russia, the Ukraine, Belarus and other not too-hostile-to-Russia sites and the Czech Republic has a common frontier with Poland - or thermonuclear explosions if you prefer might just drift back across the border, Chernobyl-style, unless Russia manages the French feat of erecting a "Ligne Imaginot" which putatively protected this country from all effects of the Ukrainian reactor explosion in 1986 while all neighboring countries were blanketed with a fine radioactive dust.
The Ligne Imaginot is the residue of the famous defensive line, the Ligne Maginot, along the eastern front of France supposed to stave off even the thought of a German invasion. The Germans simply invaded from the north...
from the 21/2/07 New York Times:
"The Russian missile commander, Gen. Nikolai Y. Solovtsov, speaking of the Czech Republic and Poland’s consideration of the American plan, said, “If the government of Poland, the Czech Republic and other countries make this decision — and I think mutual consultations that have been held and will be held will allow avoiding this — the strategic missile troops will be able to have those facilities as targets."
My commentary:
After aiming various ICBM batteries at the Czech Republic and neighboring Poland, Russian officials were concerned by the fact that the missiles appeared pointed down at Russian soil itself since due to the proximity of their former Warsaw pact allies the normal geodesic calculation using great circle routes was no longer valid and that in fact the shortest distance to the new intended targets in these countries would be “as the crow flies”. Straight lines would carry the missiles off into space so technicians compensated by directing them at an angle that would drive them through the earth with the predestined emergence point being the targeted missile defense sites in the neighboring countries. This explanation seemed to reassure all concerned on the Russian side except the farmers whose beet fields would be seriously churned up if not destroyed.
Various ecological and fresh air groups whose negligible membership in Putin’s authoritarian state claimed that the proximity of some of the detonations - after all Poland has more than 1000 kms of common borders with either Russia, the Ukraine, Belarus and other not too-hostile-to-Russia sites and the Czech Republic has a common frontier with Poland - or thermonuclear explosions if you prefer might just drift back across the border, Chernobyl-style, unless Russia manages the French feat of erecting a "Ligne Imaginot" which putatively protected this country from all effects of the Ukrainian reactor explosion in 1986 while all neighboring countries were blanketed with a fine radioactive dust.
The Ligne Imaginot is the residue of the famous defensive line, the Ligne Maginot, along the eastern front of France supposed to stave off even the thought of a German invasion. The Germans simply invaded from the north...
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