More Supply Chain Stories
A guy who makes Programmable Logic Controllers (PLCs) writes about his problems getting parts and the impact on his customers. He describes a PLC as:
…a computer that runs actual stuff. Not things like a washer and dryer but how about the water that comes into your house, the water that leaves, the drawbridge that needs to go up, the MRI you desperately need. Almost everything you touch that is manmade uses one of these controllers at some point in the process.
Lots of comments, many of them from people talking about their own supply chain experiences.
Is the Biden regime creating a “Wag the Dog” scenario with Ukraine ?
There is considerable talk in the media right now about Russia and Ukraine. Russia has moved troops close to the Ukrainian border. The Biden regime, which has no interest in the US southern border, has expressed alarming determination to stop a Russian invasion of Ukraine. Why are they so interested in a corrupt country that has no strategic importance to us ? Certainly the Biden family has profited from Ukraine. Hunter Biden, who seems to be the family bagman, was paid $50,000 a month by the Ukraine Burisma gas company.
It was in April 2014 that Hunter became a board member for Burisma with at least $50,000 per month compensation, and $83,000 by some accounts.
The board appointment for someone who had no experience in the energy industry or in Ukraine came just months after Hunter was discharged from the U.S. Navy Reserves after testing positive for cocaine.
Burisma’s board chairman, Alan Apter, said, “This is totally based on merit.” Apter added: “The company’s strategy is aimed at the strongest concentration of professional staff and the introduction of best corporate practices, and we’re delighted that Mr. Biden is joining us to help us achieve these goals.”
Recently, the president of Ukraine, in a phone call from Biden, is alleged to have told Biden to “calm down.” The transcript of the call has not been released.
Why the threats, including moving 8500 US troops to eastern Europe ? Back in the 1990s, there was a movie called “Wag the Dog.” The plot was “Shortly before an election, a spin-doctor and a Hollywood producer join efforts to fabricate a war in order to cover up a Presidential sex scandal.” Is that what is going on now ?
Gallipoli, China, and the Snapping Shrimp
An article in the Proceedings of the US Naval Institute says that a major factor in the Gallipoli disaster of WWI was the great effectiveness of the Turkish minefields, which checkmated the power of the Allied (British, French, and Russian) navies and prohibited a seapower-only passage through the Strait of Dardanelles. The authors argue that China’s intensive production of naval mines could result in a similar strategically-critical threat in a future conflict.
Several approaches to reduce the minefield threat are discussed…one rather surprising angle is to exploit the characteristics of the snapping shrimp…these crustaceans generate extremely loud sounds when they close their claws, and American submarine commanders in WWII would sometimes hide in snapping shrimp colonies to mask their acoustic signatures from enemy hydrophones. These creatures are especially and conveniently dense, it seems, in the East and South China Seas, and it is suggested that arrays of sensors, backed by considerable computing power, could process the returns from the noise generated by the shrimp and hence locate the enemy mines.
Stranger things have happened…I guess.
