China, Russia, North Korea reportedly have successful hypersonic missile tests on heels of America's failure . . . North Korea announced the completion of a successful hypersonic weapons test, adding to the list of agitators that continue to advance while America has stumbled in an area that has fast become the most important indicator of modern military capability. The Wednesday launch marks the second successful test of a hypersonic missile by North Korea and the second test in two months. The new test proves North Korea has no intention of backing down and disarming and will instead press on with plans to modernize its arsenal. The U.S. last completed a successful hypersonic weapons test in September, but a follow-up test in October ended in failure, adding a possible delay to full weapons testing until later in 2022, Reuters reported. Fox News

 

New defense strategy may be ‘incremental,’ but crux is implementation: Ex-officials . . .  The new National Defense Strategy planned for release early this year will probably only contain incremental, evolutionary changes that build on the 2018 version, former defense officials said. During the Atlantic Council event, Lord — joined by James Cartwright, a former Marine Corps general who was vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and David Petraeus, a retired Army four star who led US Central Command and who later became the Central Intelligence Agency director during the Obama administration — discussed their expectations for the new strategy. The new strategy, the former officials agreed, is likely to build off the 2018 strategy, which named China as the department’s biggest pacing threat.

While few specifics have been spelled out, Pentagon leaders have spoken about the importance of a concept called “integrated deterrence” when building the new strategy. “The idea of integrated deterrence means that you are integrating across your domains,” Mara Karlin, a department official who is currently performing the duties of deputy undersecretary of defense for policy, said at a CNAS event in December. “So as I’m looking at a challenge, how does cyber play into it? How does space play into it? … How do you integrate across domains? How do you integrate across the whole of government?” Breaking Defense

 

 

 

 

Kazakhstan’s president issues ‘shoot to kill’ order in push to end unrest . . . Kazakhstan’s president said on Friday that he had ordered security forces to “shoot to kill without warning”, after days of protests in the former Soviet country left government buildings destroyed and dozens dead. In a televised broadcast to the nation, Kassym-Jomart Tokayev depicted the unrest, which began with demonstrations last weekend over a rise in fuel prices, as a co-ordinated attack by a 20,000-strong army of bandits rather than a spontaneous protest. However, he said that order had now largely been restored following a “counter-terrorism operation” backed by Russian forces. “Those who do not surrender will be eliminated,” Tokayev said. “Law enforcement and the army have been given the order by me to shoot to kill without warning.” Financial Times

 

U.S. has no real leverage in Kazakhstan . . . There’s been an unspoken social contract in Kazakhstan for roughly 25 years: The populace trades in its civil liberties in exchange for economic prosperity and growth. Having a thriving middle class, even under autocratic rule, is preferable to the chaos seen within its Central Asian neighbors. But in recent years, the ruling elite broke that contract — so now the people are revolting against them, triggering a deadly response by the regime that has welcomed in a Russian-led “anti-terrorism” force. Peaceful protests erupted last weekend in western Kazakhstan over the doubling cost of liquified petroleum gas, which roughly 70 to 90 percent of regional vehicles use. That was the straw that broke the camel’s back, experts say, as the price hike in the gas-rich nation embodied the regime’s inability to fix systemic issues like welfare, corruption and economic mobility, mainly to continue lining the pockets of oligarchs. Politico

 

Supplies Still Limited More Than a Year After Monoclonal Antibodies Authorized for Treating COVID-19 . . . Despite being the only authorized outpatient medical therapy for preventing the worsening of COVID-19 symptoms in high-risk patients, there remains no steady supply of monoclonal antibodies from the federal government a year after its approval for use by medical regulators. Rolled out in the same month as the COVID-19 vaccines, monoclonal antibody therapies have not gotten the attention that vaccine treatments have after they were billed as the thing to get America out of the pandemic. Even today, President Joe Biden continues to mostly focus on vaccinating children, providing boosters to every adult, and increase testing as part of his “new actions” to combat the COVID-19 pandemic during the winter. Epoch Times

 

Exclusive: U.S. health agency may be unprepared to take over COVID vaccine program . . . The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) appears unprepared to assume full responsibility for the nation's COVID-19 vaccine program, including activities currently managed by the Pentagon, according to a draft government watchdog report reviewed by Reuters. The report cites a failure to ensure HHS has enough staff or a clear timeline for taking over those additional responsibilities. The COVID-19 vaccine program, dubbed “Operation Warp Speed,” by the Trump administration in May 2020, involved hundreds of officials from multiple agencies. The program has invested more than $30 billion to develop, manufacture and purchase vaccines that have been used to inoculate nearly 200 million Americans, as well as shots that have not been authorized for U.S. use. It continues to oversee approval and funding of other potential COVID-19 vaccines and treatments. Reuters

 

US unemployment rate drops to 3.9% giving Fed ammunition to raise rates . . . The US unemployment rate dropped significantly in December, prompting investors to increase their bets on the Federal Reserve moving quickly to raise interest rates and withdraw the stimulus it put in place to support the economy at the start of the pandemic.  Economists and investors expect the US central bank to press ahead with plans to tighten monetary policy despite unexpectedly slow jobs growth in December, when employers added just 199,000 jobs, a decline from 249,000 in November. The headline figure was well short of the 444,000 expected by economists. However, the unemployment rate fell by another 0.3 per cent last month to 3.9 per cent, putting it within touching distance of the pre-pandemic normal of 3.5 per cent. Financial Times

Trump will launch his new social media platform TRUTH on February 21 . . .  Former President Donald Trump is preparing to launch his new social media platform on February 21 - Presidents Day. One of his top lieutenants has launched GETTR, building a big following among conservatives and passing four million users on Friday. But Trump announced he was launching Trump Media Technology Group towards the end of last year, with plans for a subscription video-on-demand service called TMTG+ with entertainment, news and podcasts, as well as a social media platform. Tech writers said the platform looked very similar to Twitter, of which Trump was an avid user before being suspended. Daily Mail

 

Amid 2024 Speculation, Mike Pompeo Loses 90 Pounds . . . Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has lost nearly one-third of his total body weight since June 2021, he revealed in a Thursday interview. Shortly after weighing himself and seeing the scale near 300 pounds, Pompeo “started exercising, not every day, but nearly every day, and eating right and the weight just started to come off,” he told the New York Post. The three-term Kansas representative, who also led the CIA, has struggled with his weight throughout his life, but the problem became worse when he entered Congress in 2011, he added. To aid the process, Pompeo built a home gym in his basement. “I tried to get down there five, six times a week and stay at it for a half-hour or so. And that was nothing scientific. There was no trainer, there was no dietician. It was just me,” he said. Daily Caller

 

Have you ever thought of how your country would look if you built it from scratch? . . . In this video, Bob Henderson, father of Andrew, shares his take on this. 00:00 Start 0:25 The Western world - Australia - Canada - The USA - The UK - Safe places 1:28 Build a country from scratch - Problems in the USA - The political system in the U.S - Joe Biden - Netflix 4:17 George McGovern - Richard Nixon 5:40 Critical thinking - How To Become An Entrepreneur - Utopia Andrew Henderson and the Nomad Capitalist team are the world's most sought-after experts on legal offshore tax strategies, investment immigration, and global citizenship. We work exclusively with seven- and eight-figure entrepreneurs and investors who want to "go where they're treated best". https://nomadcapitalist.com/