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For the last several years, and with no particular purpose other than a desire to meander through reflection, I have taken the period between Christmas and New Years Eve to produce a summary of the slice of the year to which I paid attention through epigrams and aphorisms. It follows an end-of-year tradition I started in 2016 (for those see here), 2017 (for these see here), 2018 (for those see here), 2019 (for those see here); 2020 (for those see here); 2022 (for those see here); and 2023 (for those see here).
2024 was the year of transformation. If 2023 was the year in which belief matured into conflict, 2024 saw that conflict escalate and move decisively toward its end games. At the start of this year I noted, in passing on the Annual Oracle of the Ifa practitioners of Cuba, that this was to be the year of Eleggua/Oya (The Orishas Speak: The 2024 Letter of the Year of the Yoruba Association of Cuba (Letra del Año para el 2024 de la Asociación Yoruba de Cuba) and My Preliminary Interpretation).
The Divination for 2024 appears to speak to authority and disruption, that is to revolving or revolution. The key elements are distilled from the ruling or reigning Orisha: Eleggua and Oya. The reigning Orisha provide the interpretive framework through which the specifics of the Oddu cast, and their supporting text can be interpreted. In semiotics, they serve as the grounding normative basis through which interpretation, perception and meaning that is meaningful, is possible. Ellegua and Oya are a powerful combination--powerful in the sense of the power of combustion. Things are set to explode, things, people, relationships, are coiled tight and ready to spring. There is no suppressing it, and there is no protection from or in its release.
And 2024 did not disappoint. It took the explosions that had erupted in 2023 and augmented them in every conceivable way. There was war, of course; but also the explosive transformation of war where the legal battlefields upended warfare on the ground. There was the transformation of a former American President from the object of multiple actions against him by state organs, and a faction of the political establishment, to President elect. There was a transformation in electoral politics in which the masses could no longer trust the organs of state and their apparatus enough not to lie to pollsters. Explosions everywhere and with them transformations started, in progress, or completed.
And
it is in that spirit of explosion, of explosions that reveals,
transforms, dissipates--in the spirit of 2024--that the epigrams and
aphorisms that follow are offered.
Each aphorism links to a essay or news story written during and about
the events occurring during the year. This second set focuses on the things that go pop! 2024 appears to have been the year of transformation for the way in which collective combat is understood and applied, and all against a backdrop of an increasingly theatrical space in which the old regulatory structures are themselves converted into tools that go pop!--literally and otherwise.
Links to the 2024 Year End Ruminations here:
Part 1: The Transformative Power of Facts;
Part 3, The Subjectivity of Combat
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| Pix credit here: "How did Cain kill Abel? |
1. Social collectives have long aspired to an age where they "beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks" and where "nations shall not learn war anymore" (Isaiah 2:4); modernity has taught these collectives that it is still possible to kill persons with plowshares and to main others with pruning hooks changing the way one can engage in combat without without waging war.
On Sept. 17, after Israel and the terrorist organization Hezbollah had been in an escalating war for nearly a year, the Israeli spy agency Mossad launched one of the most daring and sophisticated deceptions in the history of counterintelligence: the pager plot, a modern take on the Trojan horse. Mossad created a bomb in a pocket – and tricked Hezbollah fighters into unwittingly wearing these devices on their bodies. The repercussions of the plot have been dramatic, including aiding in the fall of the Assad regime in Syria, the weakening of Iran, and the decimating of the target of the plot: Hezbollah. (Lesleye Stahl, 'Former agents from Israel's Mossad detail how they built and sold explosive pagers to Hezbollah terrorists,' CBS News 22 October 2024).
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Ukraine's intelligence agencies rarely claim explicit credit for assassinations, but Kirillov's is the latest in a string of high-profile killings "designed to weaken morale and punish those Kyiv regards guilty of war crimes", said Euractiv. Ukraine, which says Russia's war poses an existential threat to the country, "has made clear it regards such targeted killings as a legitimate tool". Ukraine's tactics were underlined earlier this month when its intelligence service claimed it had assassinated Mikhail Shatsky, deputy director of a Moscow-based ballistics engineering unit. Speaking to The Kyiv Independent, a Ukrainian defence source said: "Anyone who is involved in the development of the Russian military-industrial complex and support of Russian aggression in Ukraine one way or another is a legitimate target." Indeed, "few doubt the increasingly competent signature of its security services", which is thought to have targeted dozens of figures considered enemies by the Ukrainian state, said The Economist. (Sorcha Bradley, 'Ukraine assassinations: what is Kyiv hoping to achieve?' The Week (December 2024)).
2. Favored combat has drifted toward its edges--on the one side is the assassin and the creed of deeply personal elimination and the imaginaries of personal combat; on the other is the remote warrior (missiles, planes, remote devices applied on a larger scale) and its transposition from the imaginaries of gaming and virtual realities--both grounded in the fundamental premise of endless gaming; the center has collapsed, collective armed combat now occupies the margins--except as high stakes end-gaming strategies in a world that craves endless leveling up.
In July 2024, CNN reported that American and German intelligence agencies had thwarted a Russian plan to kill Armin Papperger, the chief executive of Rheinmetall, a company known as “the largest and most successful German manufacturer of the vital 155mm artillery shells that have become the make-or-break weapon in Ukraine’s grinding war of attrition.” This followed other revelations that an ancient tool of statecraft—assassination—is increasingly being used to influence world affairs. * * * These instances are not unique. In the 21st century, assassination has risen repeatedly in the context of the shadow conflict between Iran and its proxies and Israel and the United States. * * * On September 19, 2024, Israel announced the arrest of an Israeli citizen who had been recruited by Iranian intelligence to conduct espionage and assassinate either the Israeli Prime Minister or the head of Shin Bet as “revenge for the killing of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Teheran.” * * * A clear acknowledgment—even a degree of public acceptance—of such activity is perhaps best represented by the creation of Tehran, an Apple TV+ television show about undercover Mossad agents who carry out operations in Iran, including assassination. Other States have reportedly carried out or plotted attacks against opponents either internationally or internally, including Ukraine (see here, here, here, and here), Rwanda (hereand here), Pakistan (here and here), Saudi Arabia (here), and China. (Ken Watkin, 'State Practice in Assassination: What is Old is New Again,' Lieber Institute (10 October 2024)).
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Iran unleashed a major airstrike targeting sites across Israel on Tuesday night, while Israel's air defenses shot down most of the 180 incoming missiles, according to Israeli officials. The Iranian attack marked the latest escalation in fighting that now stretches into several countries in the region, with warnings that more fighting is likely. Israel found itself fighting on three separate fronts on Tuesday — with Hamas in Gaza to the south, with Hezbollah in Lebanon to the north and with the Iranian missile strike from the east. (Hadeel Al-Shalchi and Greg Myre, 'Iran carries out a massive missile attack on Israel, expanding the Middle East conflict' NPR (1 October 2024))
Using unorthodox and imaginative tactics, Ukraine's irregular warriors are notching stunning gains. Sea drones sink modern warships in the Black Sea. Aerial drones evade Russia's best air defenses to strike oil facilities in St. Petersburg. Saboteurs blow up trains and paralyze Russia's longest rail tunnel in the Far East. Officials and turncoats in Russian-occupied areas are routinely assassinated. (Philip Wasielewski and William Courtney, 'Bolstering Ukraine's Irregular War Against Russia,' Rand (18 March 2024))
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Beyond hypotheticals, conflicts in Ukraine, Nagorno-Karabakh, and Yemen show that drones are quickly becoming a central area for development and innovation in warfare at all levels of technological sophistication. Drone defenses are moving fast, too. The Department of Defense (DOD) planned to spend over $700 million on counter UAVs (c-UAVs) in fiscal year 2023 alone, almost all going to research and development.4 The global c-UAV market is forecast to grow to about $5 billion in 2029.5 C-UAV and drone defense may minimize the effects of drones in high-intensity conflict; however, if counters to drone defenses are developed that mitigate their ability to threaten, drones could retain their utility. The evolving interaction among drones, drone defenses, and counters to drone defenses will be critical in determining the net effect of drones on global security. (Zachary Kallenborn and Marcel Plichta, Breaking the Shield: Countering Drone Defenses, Joint Force Quarterly p. 113 et seq (July 2024))
3. Human populations are the prize of conflict, the productive value of which must be protected; human populations are consumables the greatest productive value of which is in the strategic management of their killing by others.
The Head of the World Health Organization has said hospitals had ‘once again’ become battlegrounds and the health system is under severe threat. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said people in Gaza need access to health care and humanitarians need access to provide health aid. He also called for the immediate release of Hussam Abu Safiya, director of Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza, who was detained by Israeli forces. Last week, the Israeli army completed a ‘targeted operation’ against a suspected ‘Hamas command centre’ located within Adwan Hospital. The army reported the detention of more than 240 Hamas and Islamic Jihad operatives, some of whom – the IDF claimed - allegedly tried to disguise themselves as patients. However, hospital operations were disrupted, and the building was severely damaged.(Nathan Morely, Gaza hospitals are ‘battlegrounds,’ says WHO chief Vatican News (30 December 2024)).
DW analyzed over a hundred attacks, most of which were reported by Ukrainian authorities on Telegram. Between last September and July 2024, they counted over a hundred strikes that left nearly 130 reported civilians injured and 16 dead in Beryslav and its surrounding villages and settlements. Apart from an in-depth open-source investigation, DW's investigative team also conducted dozens of interviews with Ukrainian officials, war analysts, drone experts, NGOs on the ground, and survivors of drone attacks. They all point to one thing: Russian military may have used drones indiscriminately and systematically against civilians. * * * It might not be possible to prove who actually ordered and carried out the attacks on civilians and civilian infrastructure in Beryslav. The findings, however, point in the direction of these three units. DW was able to verify that the 10th Special Purpose Brigade, the 205th Motorized Rifle Battalion and BARS-33 units have operated drones in the area. Furthermore, it is certain that a new domestic Russian drone is being tested in the Kherson region. As drone survivor Lyubov Kindrat recalls, they "trained on the local population." Several other sources DW spoke to have independently testified that Beryslav has effectively been used as a training ground for Russian drone operators to improve their skills. (Esther Felden, Julett Pineda, Nina Werkhäuser, and Igor Burdyga, Russia: Targeting civilians in Ukraine with drones, DW (27 August 2024)
4. Belief is the most powerful explosive in the arsenal of conflict combat--it is not merely that one can believe only what one wants to believe, it is that the rationalizations of perception and the critical importance of perception premises make it impossible to see things except in ways that fulfill and reinforce the core perception premises through which the world is understood and therefore must be made to operate
Israel's parliament has voted to pass legislation banning the UN's Palestinian refugee agency (Unrwa) from operating within Israel and occupied East Jerusalem, accusing the organisation of colluding with Hamas in Gaza. Contact between UNRWA employees and Israeli officials will be banned within three months, severely limiting the agency's ability to operate in Gaza and the Israeli-occupied West Bank. Co-operation with the Israeli military - which controls all crossings into Gaza - is essential for UNWRA to transfer aid into the territory. It is the main UN organisation working on the ground there. Several countries, including the US and the UK, have expressed serious concern about the move. * * * Presenting the legislation, Yuli Edelstein, the chairman of the Knesset's foreign affairs and security committee, accused Unrwa of being used as a "cover for terrorist actions"."There is a deep connection between the terrorist organisation (Hamas) and Unrwa, and Israel cannot put up with it," he said in parliament. (Gaza aid fears as Israel bans UN Palestinian refugee agency, BBC (29 Ocober 2024); Anchal Vohra, 'Opinion: The Real Reason Israel Wants to Ban UNWRA,' Foreign Policy (221 November 2024);On the Semiotics of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) as Object, Signifier, Lebenswelt, and Facade).
How can this be possible? Where is the international outrage? Its absence is a license to disregard the United Nations and opens the door to impunity and chaos. If we tolerate such attacks in the context of Israel and the occupied Palestinian territory, we cannot uphold humanitarian principles in other conflicts around the world. This assault on the United Nations will further diminish our tools for peace and defense against inhumanity around the world. It must not become the new norm. * * * There is no question that individuals accused of criminal acts, including the deplorable assault on Israel, must be investigated. This is exactly what the United Nations is doing. Those individuals must be held accountable through criminal prosecution and, if found guilty, punished. * * * But we must distinguish the behavior of individuals from the agency’s mandate to serve Palestinian refugees. It is unjust and dishonest to attack UNRWA’s mission on the basis of these allegations. (Philippe Lazzarini, UNRWA Commissioner-General, UNRWA: Stop Israel’s Violent Campaign Against Us (30 June 2024) )
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5. The chain of causation has no beginning and no end; everything is, in a cognitive sense necessarily connected to everything else--concepts of facilitation, then, can make causation pop! in the service of desire.
Pix credit here Weichai Power Co Ltd [a Chinese company] has been excluded from investment by the GPFG due to an unacceptable risk that the company is contributing to the sale of weapons or military materiel to states that are subject to investment restrictions on government bonds. The Council considers that there is an unacceptable risk that the company is contributing to the sale of military materiel to the authorities in Russia and Belarus. [The company "produces engines and power trains for heavy vehicles" ; see Section 3.2 of the Ethics Council Recommendation]. The Council's recommendation may be accessed HERE (https://etikkradet.no/weichai-power-co-ltd-2/
Adani Ports & Special Economic Zone Ltd (APSEZ) [an Indian company] be excluded from investment by the GPFG due to an unacceptable risk that the company is contributing to serious violations of the rights of individuals in situations of war or conflict. APSEZ is an Indian logistics company that engages, among other things, in the operation of ports and port services. APSEZ is part of the Adani group of companies. As per the Council’s recommendation, APSEZ has been under observation since March 2022 due to its business association with the armed forces in Myanmar. The Council's Recommendation may be accessed HERE (https://etikkradet.no/adani-ports-special-economic-zone-ltd-4/Evraz Plc is excluded from the Fund’s investments due to an unacceptable risk that the company is contributing to serious violations of fundamental ethical norms. The Council considers that the risk that Evraz PLC is providing critically important steel to Russian weapon production to be unacceptable. Evraz PLC is listed on the London Stock Exchange with a major presence in Russia where the company, inter alia, produces steel. The Council`s inquiries have shown that Evraz PLC may be linked to the Russian defense industry as a supplier of steel which enables Russia to continue its unlawful war of aggression against Ukraine. The Council has therefore contacted Evraz PLC numerous times with questions concerning the company`s engagement with the Russian defense industry. The company has failed to reply to the Council`s queries. On this basis, and in light of the cases described, the Council considers that the risk that Evraz PLC is providing critically important steel to Russian weapon production, is unacceptable.The Council’s recommendation here.
Bezeq The Israeli Telecommunications Corp is excluded from the Fund’s investments due to an unacceptable risk that the company is contributing to serious violations of the rights of individuals in situations of war or conflict. Bezeq is an Israeli company that supplies telecommunications services to businesses and private individuals in Israel and the Israeli settlements in the West Bank. (Ethics Council Recommendation). In this case however this ritualized invocation becomes an essential element of the way in which the Norwegian state attempts to undertake, or better put, justify, a balancing that, in its own mind in aid of Palestinian liberation as they see it, they also are willing to tolerate a bit of Palestinian suffering. All for a good cause--to make the lives of demonized so-called settlers more uncomfortable (ibid., Section 5).
6. Chains of causation makes linkages plausible; plausibility is a belief in the unalterable character of links in the chains of causation forged on the anvil of cognitive imperative; plausibility goes pop!.
Even though I do not find it plausible that the military operation is being conducted with
genocidal intent, I voted in favour of the measures indicated by the Court. To indicate those measures, it is not necessary for the Court to find that the military operation as such implicates plausible rights of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. My decision to vote in favour of the measures indicated rests on the plausible claim by South Africa that certain statements by Israeli State officials, including members of its military, give rise to a real and imminent risk of irreparable prejudice to the rights of Palestinians under the Genocide Convention (see paragraphs 50-52 of the Order). (Nolte, J., Declaration, APPLICATION OF THE CONVENTION ON THE PREVENTION AND PUNISHMENT OF THE CRIME OF GENOCIDE IN THE GAZA STRIP (SOUTH AFRICA v. ISRAEL))
Today’s order was, in my view, largely a foregone conclusion. The conditions for the indication of provisional measures laid down in the Court’s jurisprudence can easily be met in a situation as harrowing as the one in Gaza. All, that is, but one – the plausibility of the rights (or violations) alleged by the parties. (Marko Milanovic, ICJ Indicates Provisional Measures in South Africa v. Israel (EJIL: Talk!)
7. A thing is not a thing if it appears to be another thing and appearances are all that matter; one knows that a thing is not a thing but some other thing but one's rules make one incapable of seeing other than what one is directed to see even when that thing goes pop!
Western officials have long been concerned about Moscow’s so-called shadow fleet, an assemblage of aged tankers created to covertly carry Russian crude oil around the world. Since Russia invaded Ukraine, the worry primarily concerned the use of such off-the-books ships to circumvent Western sanctions and generate revenue to fuel the Kremlin’s war machine. But Russia’s shadow fleet may now present a more pressing danger to the West. This week, Finnish commandos boarded an oil tanker that officials suspect had cut through vital underwater cables in the Baltic Sea, including one that carries electricity between Finland and Estonia. The ship, the Eagle S, bears all the hallmarks of vessels belonging to Russia’s shadow fleet, officials said, and had embarked from a Russian port shortly before the cables were cut. If confirmed, it would be the first known instance of a shadow fleet vessel being used to intentionally sabotage critical infrastructure in Europe — and, officials and experts said, a clear escalation by Russia in its conflict with the West. (Michael Schwirtz, Has Russia’s Shadow Fleet, Built to Evade Sanctions, Added Sabotage to Its List?;Russia has assembled a fleet of hundreds of vessels to covertly ship its oil. With so many ships at sea, the idea of using some to cause havoc may be proving irresistible to the Kremlin.New York Times (28 December 2024)
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8. Nature "loves disguising her weaknesses as strengths;" What appears to be the greatest strength of a thing or process can also suggest its point of greatest vulnerability; Very strong things (bridges, in this case) appear to be quite fragile when stressed in just the right way; Pathways that appear to be robust are also fragile to the extent that they are an aggregation of choke points; The concept of "losing control" has acquired a broader meaning. One can
lose control because mechanical systems fail; but one can lose control
when computer assisted and programmed control structures fail. . . . or
are hijacked.
The operators of the Dali cargo ship issued a mayday call that the vessel had lost power moments before the crash, but the ship still headed toward the span at “a very, very rapid speed,” Maryland Gov. Wes Moore said. The 985-foot-long (300-meter-long) vessel struck one of the 1.6-mile (2.6-kilometer) bridge’s supports, causing the span to break and fall into the water within seconds. Six construction workers who were filling potholes on the bridge are presumed dead. Jeffrey Pritzker, executive vice president of Brawner Builders, said they were working in the middle of the span when it came apart. * * * The ship is owned by Singapore-based Grace Ocean Private Ltd., which said all crew members, including the two pilots, were accounted for and there were no reports of injuries. The ship’s warning enabled authorities to limit vehicle traffic on the span. Plus, the accident occurred at 1:30 a.m., long before the busy morning rush. The bridge carried an estimated 30,800 vehicles a day on average in 2019. . . The collapse will almost surely create a logistical nightmare for months, if not years, in the region, shutting down ship traffic at the Port of Baltimore, a major shipping hub. The accident will also snarl cargo and commuter traffic. The port is a major East Coast hub for shipping. The bridge spans the Patapsco River, which massive cargo ships use to reach the Chesapeake Bay and then the Atlantic Ocean. The Dali was headed from Baltimore to Colombo, Sri Lanka, and flying under a Singapore flag, according to data from Marine Traffic. (What we know about the Baltimore bridge collapse)
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