Over 50 years and still no word. Maybe it is safe to say that aliens snatched up US nuclear weapons since no other explanation has found the missing war heads, or at least none we, the public, know about.

This is one of about 16 nuclear weapons that the US claims to have lost over the years, go figure, these people can find a drop of blood within a block of a crime scene to solve it but still can not find massive multi ton bombs encased in metal the size of a truck?  Below is only one of them.

Nukes disappear into the air

March 10, 1956. A B-47 carrying two nuclear weapon cores from MacDill Air Force Base in Florida to an overseas airbase disappeared during a scheduled air-to-air refueling over the Mediterranean Sea. After becoming lost in a thick cloud bank at 14,500 feet, the plane was never heard from again and its wreckage, including the nuclear cores, was never found. Although the weapon type remains undisclosed, Mark 15 thermonuclear bombs (commonly carried by B-47s) would have had a combined yield of 3.4 megatons.

More about nuclear weapons and atom bomb tests in the 50’s - Bikini Atoll

WASHINGTON – Sophisticated submarine-like boats are the latest tool drug runners are using to bring cocaine north from Colombia, U.S. officials say.

Semi-submersible boats used to smuggle drugs are gaining in quality, the Coast Guard says.

Although the vessels were once viewed as a quirky sideshow in the drug war, they are becoming faster, more seaworthy, and capable of carrying bigger loads of drugs than earlier models, according to those charged with catching them.

“They tend to be one of a kind,” U.S. Coast Guard Commandant Thad Allen said. “They cost up to a million dollars to produce. Sometimes they are put together in pieces and then reassembled in other locations. They’re very difficult to locate.”

The boats are built in the Colombian jungle. They sail largely beneath the surface of the water but cannot submerge completely like a true submarine.

But they are the latest escalation of a tactical race between smugglers and the U.S. Coast Guard.

In the past three months the Coast Guard has learned of more semi-submersible vessels smuggling drugs than it did in the previous six years, when there were 23 cases, officials said.

U.S. Coast Guard intelligence officers predict 85 cases this year and 120 next year.

In some instances, the semi-subs are towed behind other vessels and are scuttled if they are detected, Allen said. Authorities are investigating reports that some semi-subs are unmanned and are operated remotely, he said.

Diplomatic agreements give the U.S. Coast Guard drug-interdiction jurisdiction in partner countries’ waters.

Read the rest of this entry »

Reading a watchdog site called Citizens for Ethics, I found a story that should have shocked me, but, unfortunately it didn’t. You see over the course of the war in Iraq, the militry overspending issues, greedy contractor scandals, corruption and plain lies, It’s something I came to expect…. The government overpaying for shit to support contractors.

What should have shocked me here is that in this case, the crap they paid $74 million of our tax dollars for, does not even work correctly and is a military safety item.  Sadly, it’s something I guess I came to expect, government putting the interests of its contractors before human safety and the lives of soldiers.

Here is the story… To no one’s surprise anymore, when the government finds out a product is substandard… what do they do? well, they buy more quickly before anyone finds out.

From citizens for ethics

At a time when a new acronym, TBI (Traumatic Brain Injury), has entered the American lexicon because of injuries sustained to troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, the New York Times reports that not only are many combat helmets being given to our troops substandard, and not only was there a lawsuit about it, but the government actually placed an order with the same company for more helmets just days before the suit was settled.

Reports the Times:

A North Dakota manufacturer has agreed to pay $2 million to settle a suit saying it had repeatedly shortchanged the armor in up to 2.2 million helmets for the military, including those for the first troops sent to Iraq and Afghanistan.

Twelve days before the settlement with the Justice Department was announced, the company, Sioux Manufacturing of Fort Totten, was given a new contract of up to $74 million to make more armor for helmets to replace the old ones, which were made from the late 1980s to last year.

The issue at the heart of the suit were two former employees of the company who maintained (and never were disproved) that Sioux was not weaving their Kevlar at the mandated 35 by 35 thread per square inch count, but 34 by 34, and making up the weight difference by just applying more hardened resin. I think in anyone’s book, that would be considered reason enough to never place a contract with the same company again. But, what’s worse, that extra resin makes the helmets more brittle, which doesn’t give the necessary head protection to the troops.

In the suit, it seems like everyone at the company knew what they were doing:

In the evidence in the suit were hundreds of daily inspection records showing repeated violations of the weaving standards, as well as tape recordings of six managers and employees’ admitting covering up violations.

In a conversation Mr. Kenner secretly taped, Rhea Crane, quality assurance officer, worried “if we ever had someone get killed, and they decided to investigate because they thought maybe the helmet wasn’t any good.”

“If we ever got audited,” she said, “you know what they would do to us. Shut us down and fine us big time. Probably never see another government contract.”

Oh, you think so, Mrs. “Quality Assurance Officer?” Well, lucky for you all at Sioux Manufacturing, the Bush administration is on the scene, where substandard products for the troops are awarded with MORE contracts! We’ve truly entered the Bizarro World.

Thankfully, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) has taken up the case and written to Congress to investigate this matter. We at VoteVets.org fully support their call for an investigation, and we’ll be doing more in the coming days to support their efforts.

There have been many, many things wrong with how the wars have been waged. I don’t think I need to go through a litany of them. But, to me, there is no issue more tragic than how Donald “The Army You Have” Rumsfeld, and this administration have been absolutely and totally irresponsible - indeed wreckless - in how they go about protecting our troops at the most basic levels, from body armor, to Humvee armor, and now, to helmets.

I am sure everyone knows about this this video of government spending and corruption within military contracts, but just in case anyone missed it, here it is again.

This is a clip from “Iraq for Sale”. The video talks about the problem of government spending in the Iraq war. It seems that every time I open the paper I see another company “investigated” for ripping off the tawpayers. Recently, security contractors were in the news for billing for security gaurds they apparently never had.

War always brings out the “profiteers” it seems. And why not? The government is handing out billions. right?

Military over-spending and plain government overspending has always been an issue. I used to work for them. I remember a time when they wanted to have a barbaque for employees (about 100 people at that office or less). They went out and got a barbaque grill that they needed for 1 day only. The grill looked like any other you would get at the store except this one cost in excess of 50K.  Yes, the office spent 50,000.00 for a barbaque grill for a 1 hour lunch.

Seems sick? When I worked there the daily joke was what percentile everyone was in for the day… you see, the government office said that 20% of the people do 80% of the work on any given day.

Working there, I remember when voters, voted against salary increases for everyone… But no one was worried or cared because no increases just means bigger yearly bonuses. Yep, they voted against the 6% increase so the office authorized a 15% year-end bonus because bonuses were not in question and would not look like an increase on paper.

I really do wonder why anyone even has to vote for such things, in the end they get what they want anyway and throw in some extra for that F.U.

I have a friend who was in the military. He tells me that there were times when they threw expensive equipment… like brand new 100k bulldozers and stuff off planes into the ocean. Why? well, so they could say they used them and did not come back with the brand new unused equipment. If it came back, they would get less money in their budget.

The spending is SICK, especially when taxpayers are footing the bill for the bulldozers swimming in the Pacific.

I have figured this out… every single day I give $65 to the US government (split between sales tax, gas tax, property tax, income tax, etc.) as do the rest of us to fuel excessive spending…. I mean those overseas contractors do need to make a living, why have 1 mansion when my 65 daily + millions of others will contribute to 2 or 3 mansions…  maybe even in the Bahamas. Why have 1 Jaguar, when you can get a fleet? hmmm?

This story just makes me sick, for a few reasons.

1. The US soldiers are supposed to be the Good Guys

2. The terrorists are supposed to be the insane killers

3. It puts us on thier level of hatred

4. Not one of the American soldiers stopped it and they all went along with killing 2 children for no reason other than hatred.

5. The US media tends to overlook these stories and we rarely hear of them at all, but when an Iraq native murders a US soldier, we hear about it for months.

So here is the Story
14-year-old Iraqi girl who lived in the village of Mahmoudiyah southeast of Baghdad. She was gang-raped and killed by American troops. Hamza, her parents and her younger sister were shot and killed in their home in Mahmoudiyah on or around March 12, 2006.

Steven D. Green, was arrested and charged on July 3, 2006 with raping and killing Hamza and killing her father Qassim Hamza Raheem, 45, her mother Fakhriya Taha Muhasen, 34, and her seven-year-old sister, Hadeel Qassim Hamza.

In court, Cortez (another soldier involved) admitted the plan was hatched as they played cards and that the girl had been targeted because there was only one male in her house, making it an easy target.He said: “During the time me and Barker were raping Abeer, I heard five or six gunshots that came from the bedroom.

“After Barker was done, Green came out of the bedroom and said that he had killed them all, that all of them were dead.”

Paul Cortez added: “Green then placed himself between Abeer’s legs to rape her. When Green was finished, he stood up and shot Abeer in the head two or three times.”

The entire crime took about five minutes and the girl knew her parents and sister had been shot while she was being raped, the hearing heard.

All five belonged to the 101st Airborne Division based at Fort Campbell, Kentucky, which is also where the hearing took place. Military investigators believe that Green and as many as four other soldiers were involved in the commission of the murders while on active duty. A criminal affidavit filed in U.S. federal court states that Green and one other participant raped Hamza and that Green killed all four individuals himself. Abeer’s uncle, Ahmad, says he has “no faith” in the Court Martial, requesting that the Americans “hand the criminals to us, to an Iraqi Court. We don’t trust their justice, they should be tried here in Iraq.”

Iraqi insurgents kidnapped two American troops whom they later killed, claiming that the killing was retaliation for Abeer’s rape^.

Army Sgt. Paul Cortez was sentenced February 22, 2007 to 100 years in prison for his participation in the rape and murder. Cortez, 24, also was given a dishonorable discharge. Cortez wept as he apologized for the crimes, saying he could not explain why he took part.

But here is the odd part… the men involved all got different sentences from 5 years to 110, a few of them got a slap and a discharge for rape and 1st degree murder.

from a comment on another site

The impression I’m getting is that when it comes to war crimes committed by US military the average sentence is about 1/4 of what it’d have been if the same crime had been committed in the USA - except for one random guy in each case who gets the book thrown at him.

If you read closely he is able for parole in 10 years. He won’t serve more than that I assure you. The 110 year thing was just for the Media and politics.

Again.. this is not something I have seen on the news much

hmm… if anyone knows more, please let us know!