Peripheral Milit_Urb 30

[Image: Baghdad From the Air [Baghdad Bureau Blog]]

Members of U.S. Army Plead Guilty to Role in Scheme to Steal Equipment from the U.S. Military in Iraq // KBR Got Bonuses for Work that Killed Soldiers // Halliburton profits down by a half [BBC] // Pratap Chatterjee, "Cleansing Halliburton" [Tomgram] // Iraqi Seizes the Chance to Make War Profitable [NYT] // As Iraq Marks ‘Sovereignty Day,’ the Violence Continues [Danger Room] // Maps of U.S. Troop Deployments in Iraq [NYT] // Michael Schwartz, "Twenty-First-Century Colonialism in Iraq" [Tomgram]


AFPAK

Kabul to give diplomats an 'ordinary life' in Baghdad-style green zone [Guardian] // Pakistani military shows off captured Taliban base // US eyes private guards for bases in Afghanistan // U.S. Weighing New Road Rules for Troops in Afghanistan [Danger Room] // Danger Room in Afghanistan: Rebuilding Bamiyan // Danger Room in Afghanistan: Have It Your Way at Bagram?


Lahore to Peshawar: the trophy-target war [open Democracy] // Obama's Pick to Lead Afghan War Linked to Abuse of Prisoners & Secret Assassination Unit // Pakistan Aid Tops Iraq, Afghanistan in War Spending Bill [Danger Room]



[Image: source]

DRONE INSURGENCY

‘Dozens of Civilians’ Killed in Afghanistan Air Raid: Report [Danger Room] // Taleban face human shields charge [BBC] // Thousands flee Pakistan valley as truce crumbles // Officials: Taliban May Have Faked Civilian Slaughter [Danger Room] // Why Isn't This on CNN? Afghan Refugee Describes Recent US Bombings // Afghan villagers get payments for battle that killed civilians [Los Angeles Times] // Villagers in Afghanistan Describe Chaos of U.S. Strikes [NYT] // U.S. Rejects Afghan Civilian Death Estimate // Eight Civilians Dead in New Afghan Airstrike [Danger Room] // Gates Promises to Reduce Afghan Civilian Deaths [NYT] // Military - US Airstrikes Likely Killed 26 Civilians [NYT] // Up to 150 Afghan Civilians Killed in US Attack on Western Province // Drone War Escalates; 365 Dead So Far in ‘09, Study Says // Killer Drones to Get Sound System
// Video: Inside America’s Drone HQ // A defence force of Terminators is almost here [The Age] // The wrong target: air strike, legal limit, human voice [open Democracy] // Training the Top Guns of drone aircraft [Los Angeles Times] // Use of drones in Pakistan and Afghanistan: deadly, but legal? [CSM] // New Use for Your iPhone: Controlling Drones

Chief Army Chaplain in Afghanistan distributes local-language Bibles, orders congregation to convert locals [Boing Boing] // Afghanistan quarantines its only pig [Los Angeles Times]

Who Are the Real Psychopaths in Afghanistan? [AlterNet] // The Cowboys of Kabul [Mother Jones] // Pepe Escobar, Pipelineistan Goes Af-Pak [Tomgram] // Afghanistan's Tipping Point [Mother Jones] // Afghanistan’s lost decade [open Democracy]

Afghan kids find skateboards the wheel deal [Los Angeles Times] // Shadowy Iranian Vigilantes Vow Bolder Action [NYT] // Kickturns in Kabul: Skateboard park to be built in Afghanistan [Architecture for Humanity] // Afghanistan's first national park waits for tourists CSM] // Army Farmers Work to Regrow Afghanistan [Danger Room]


[Image: "Palestinians sit among billboards promoting park space on land widely seen as the ancient capital of the biblical King David. Rina Castelnuovo for The New York Times. SEE PRUNED: More Spatial High Jinks 3: The Forests of Isratine and Palesrael [Pruned] .]

IS/PAL

Parks Fortify Israel’s Claim to Jerusalem [NYT] // Israel 'using tourist sites to assert control over East Jerusalem' [Guardian] // Another roadblock for Jerusalem Museum of Tolerance [Archinect] // An Infrastructural Lifeline for Palestine and Israel [InfraNet Lab] // Dilemma of Palestinian settlement builders [BBC]

The Contested Landscape of Jerusalem [Complex Terrain Laboratory] // Life in Nu'man land [Guardian] // Israeli military occupation 'severely compromises Bethlehem' [Guardian] // Working the West Bank checkpoints [BBC] // UN: Israeli buffer zone eats up 30 percent of Gaza's arable land [CSM] // Amos Guiora on Israeli Administrative Detention [The Complex Terrain Laboratory] // How Israel's naval blockade denies Gazans food, aid [CSM] // Hamas Shifts From Rockets to Culture War [NYT] // New U.S.-Israeli Crime Ring Detailed [NYT] // Spies’ Roots Reach Deep in Lebanon [NYT]



[Image:
Gallery: Inside Alaska’s Answer to Area 51 Photo: Department of Defense.]

INSIDE THE DANGER ROOM

Construction Crew Severs Secret ‘Black Line’ [Threat Level] // Pentagon’s Black Budget Grows to More Than $50 Billion (Updated) // DARPA 3D reasoning engine to identify urban threats // Darpa’s Simple Plan to Track Targets Everywhere // Inside the Military’s Secret Terror-Tagging Tech // Google Earth Project Maps the Fallen in Iraq and Afghanistan

U.S. Cyberattack Console Aims to Turn Grunts into Hackers // Inside America’s (Mock) Attack on North Korea

Sweat = Threat? Army Looks at ‘Abnormal Perspiration’ as Sign of ‘Harmful Intent’ // Army Orders Bases to Stop Blocking Twitter, Facebook, Flickr // Future Warbot Powered by Xbox Controller

UK Anti-Terror Technology: 007 or 1984?
CIA’s ‘Black’ Helicopters Land in Court //


[Image: The gates of Malibu - The gates of Malibu [Los Angeles Times]

HOMELANDISTAN

The Mega-embassy That Wasn’t [Voltaire] // Buildings watchdog Cabe calls for fortress-like US embassy plan in London to be rejected [Guardian] // Everyday is Doomsday in Washington [Tomgram] // Barack Obama faces 30 death threats a day, stretching US Secret Service [Telegraph] // Robot negotiates with mentally ill man who threatened White House (UPDATED) [Boing Boing] // The Case of the Missing H-Bomb: The Pentagon Has Lost the Mother of All Weapons [AlterNet] // Federal Courts Says D.C. Police Checkpoints Were Unconstitutional [Washington Post] // Staples Center at core of wide security cordon in downtown L.A. [Los Angeles Times] // Man who drove into City Hall gets 10-year sentence [Boing Boing] // When Glass Acts Like Concrete and Steel [NYT] // High school mixes algebra, homeland security [Los Angeles Times] // Cheney’s New House Is CIA Adjacent [Wonkette] // Lawmaker Defends Imprisoning Hostile Bloggers [Threat Level] // White House declines to release scary photos of N.Y. flyover [Los Angeles Times] // Night chopper flights over L.A. are tied to military training [Los Angeles Times] // Homeland Security Is Not Statistics Driven [Armchair Generalist] // Terror law used to stop thousands 'just to balance racial statistics' [Guardian] // The Ultimate Lock Picker Hacks Pentagon, Beats Corporate Security for Fun and Profit // At Last: US Rethinking Color-Coded "Threat Level" Terror Warning System [AlterNet]

Swine flu: There is no known antidote for panic [The Guardian] // Martial Law and the Militarization of Public Health: The Worldwide H1N1 Flu Vaccination Program

Senate measure would allow loaded guns in national parks [MiamiHerald] // Shotguns, AK-47's and Your National Parks // Report: militia activity on the rise in US [CSM] // Pastor Invites Flock to Bring Their Guns to Church [NYT] // Concealed guns law rejected in close Senate vote

Town bans hoods, hats, shades in banks [Boing Boing] // Professor Gets 4 Years in Prison for Sharing Drone Plans With Students [Slashdot] // LA cop union buys stake in newspaper, demands critical writers be fired [Boing Boing] // Florida town orders employees to wear underwear and cover wounds [Boing Boing]

Obama Continues Bush-Era Secrecy: No Release of Transcripts for Destroyed "Torture Video" Tapes [Boing Boing] // Democrats Say C.I.A. Deceived Congress [NYT] // Who is the CIA allowed to kill? [Salon] // Group Plans Lawsuit To Unveil the CIA’s ‘Pentagon Papers’ [Threat Level] // Bush’s Secret NSA Spying May Have Tainted Prosecutions, Report Warns [Threat Level] //
"Community Security" Mission Creep at Homeland Security [CIP Americas Program]



[Image: By Nick Sowers, via The Wonders of White Sands [Archinect]]

IMPURE WAR SPACE

Australia Launches Anti-Terror Operation [NYT] // Russian Subs Patrolling Off East Coast of U.S. [NYT] // Learning For Life [NO CAPTION NEEDED] // New Desert City [Archinect] // Russia-China war games battle extremists, separatists [CSM] // Strange New Air Force Facility Energizes Ionosphere, Fans Conspiracy Flames // Obama Seeks $46 Million for Military Base in Colombia // New Military Base in Colombia Would Spread Pentagon Reach Throughout Latin America [CIP Americas Program]

Chalmers Johnson, "Dismantling the Empire" [Tomgram] // Threat Convergence: Subversion, Destabilization and Insecurity // US needs 'digital warfare force' [BBC] // Taking the Politics Out of Insurgency [The Complex Terrain Laboratory] // Scientists in Moral Panic: Debating ‘Mercenary Anthropology’ « Africa: Politics and Societies South of the Sahara // A new security paradigm: the military-climate link [open Democracy] // Hacking The Deep Ecology of War [The Complex Terrain Laboratory]

Government Experiments on U.S. Soldiers: Shocking Claims Come to Light in New Court Case | Health and Wellness [AlterNet] // US war zone troops 'can smoke' [BBC]

Blackwater Founder Implicated in Murder [The Nation] // US Still Paying Blackwater Millions [The Nation] // Bill Moyers: The Rise of Private Armies -- Mercenaries, Murder and Corruption in Iraq and Afghanistan [AlterNet]

In the U.S. Military, Energy-Saving Projects Proliferate // Army Starts Solar Plant; Next Step: Care About Cilmate Change [Danger Room]

Cadets Trade the Trenches for Firewalls [NYT] // Plan to teach military robots the rules of war [New Scientist] // BMW Builds the Ultimate Security Machine [Autopia] // American Sikhs Run Billion-Dollar Security Firm [NPR] // Women at Arms - G.I. Jane Breaks the Combat Barrier as War Evolves [NYT] // How Baida Wanted to Die - [NYT]



[Image: Fake DHS "photography license" for fake no-photos laws [Boing Boing]]

SURVEILLATOPIA

1,000 surveillance cameras = 1 solved crime in the UK // Giant sphere attracts attention in Stead // Inside the ‘James Bond Villain’ Data Center [Data Center Knowledge] // London cops catch and search a potential terrorist every three minutes [Boing Boing] // British cops deliver Catch 22 to photographers: you're not allowed to know which areas you're not allowed to photograph [Boing Boing] // Shield Law Overturns Warrant for Student Photographer [Raw File] // CCTV schemes in city and town centres have little effect on crime, says report [The Guardian] // Google Threatened With Sanctions Over Photo Mapping Service in Germany [NYT] // Stores paint ads on roofs for satellite map services // Airport security bares all, or does it? [CNN] // Judge Tosses Telecom Spy Suits [Threat Level] // Suit Seeks Records on Planned Surveillance Network [City Room Blog] // Twitterers defy China's firewall [BBC] // Lancaster, Pa., keeps a close eye on itself [Los Angeles Times] // Corridors of Power [BLDGBLOG] // Utah will host new $1.9 billion NSA spy center [Desert News] // Keeping an Eye on License Plates [Planetizen] // Thousands of Crimes Not Displaying on LAPD Crime Map [Planetizen] // Britain will subject everyone who works with kids to multiple, repeated police-checks [Boing Boing] // FBI Lab Processes 600 Billion Fingerprint Sets a Day (Update: actually, more like 200,000) |[Threat Level] // Subway Train Under Full Surveillance [Planetizen] // Canadians vow mass-mooning of US spy-blimp [Boing Boing] // School's CCTV 'Big Brother-ish' [BBC]



[Image: Daniel and Geo Fuchs’ STASI – Secret Rooms [Prison Photography].]

RESIDUAL LANDSCAPES

The Sludge Threat [Planetizen]

Excavation begins at WWI mass graves at French village [Los Angeles Times] // Wal-Mart Proposed Near Civil War Site Angers Historians // Border bunker battle // Relics of once-mighty Maginot Line dot France's border with Germany, Italy

Flight 93 memorial plan makes progress [BBC] // Post-9/11 Realities Warp Plan for a Manhattan Transit Hub [NYT] //

South Korea's abandoned airports [BBC] // WWII Stalingrad diorama photos [Boing Boing] // Memorial war [Honolulu Weekly] // The battle to defend military history [The Jakarta Post] // Nazi college to become museum [The National] // Underground Cities and Bunkers: Living Down Below [Dark Roasted Blend] // Daniel and Geo Fuchs’ STASI – Secret Rooms [Prison Photography] // Foreclosures Add to Hurricane Hazards [NYT] // The Reclamation of Governors Island [Archinect] // Europe trains' history of intrigue isn't over [Los Angeles Times] // TOPOTEK 1 Selected for Imperial War Museum North Exterior [Bustler] // A Tour of America's Nuclear History [Planetizen] // A tense yet colorful tour of Korean DMZ [Los Angeles Times] // Afghan War’s Buried Bombs Put Risk in Every Step // Iraq Suffers as the Euphrates River Dwindles [NYT] // Search and Rescue: Squad Leader Musters Robots to US Disaster Zones // Berlin's Invisible Wall: Little Is Left Today of the Cold War's Most Famous Monument [SPIEGEL] // Port Covington: The Ghost of the Masterplan in Tinkerer's Paradise [sevensixfive] // On Hitler, Hadrian, bunkers and bananas [(New) Babylon Reloaded] // Architecture and Design 101: Where is the only brick artillery fortress built on the West Coast? // Legacy of War - Fake Work at the Vietnam Fine Arts Museum [NYT] // Tsonjin Boldog Journal - Genghis Khan Rules Mongolia Again, in a P.R. Campaign [NYT] // Photos from inside an abandoned Titan missile silo [Boing Boing]



[Image: A Modern Ozymandias, NYT. Photo by Richard Mosse.]

'OTHER' TERRAINS

Of Trees and Neighbors [The Brooklyn Rail] // Positions in Flux - Panel 1: Art goes politics - Hans Bernhard from UBERMORGEN.COM [we make money not art] // A hostage to hallucination [Mind Hacks] // Autopsies of War Dead Reveal Ways to Save Others [NYT] // Emanuel Licha's War Tourist series at LOOP [we make money not art] // 'Gangsta gene' identified in US teens [New Scientist] // UCLA law students help taco truck operators overturn L.A. ordinance [Los Angeles Times] // Designing The Friendly Skies [a456] // Sewer Zeppelins for the Era of Infrastructural Anarchy & Other Roman Tales [Pruned] // Live Stage: The Torture Memos [Second Life] [Networked_Performance] // ATMs that spray attackers with pepper-spray [Boing Boing] // Countering Riots, China Rounds Up Hundreds [NYT] // Art History? No, a Master’s in Art Crime in Amelia, Italy [NYT] // In Brazil, judge holds city accountable for stray bullets [CSM]

[Earlier peripherals ... 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29]