As US deploys anti-missile system, China warns of nuclear arms race (Source wsws.org) US has begun the installation of its Terminal High Altitude Area Defence (THAAD) anti-ballistic missile system in South Korea, provoking an angry reaction from China, which warned that it could trigger a nuclear arms race in the region. The provocative move will heighten the already tense situation on the Korean Peninsula as the US and South Korea engage in huge annual war games.
Two trucks, each mounted with a THAAD launch pad, were landed aboard a C-17 cargo plane at the US military’s Osan Air Base, south of Seoul, on Monday night. According to South Korean military officials, more equipment and personnel will arrive in the coming weeks. The THAAD battery installation is likely to be completed as early as May or June. US officials exploited North Korea’s test launch of four ballistic missiles on Monday morning as the pretext for commencing the THAAD installation. However, the final go-ahead for the THAAD deployment, which was agreed by South Korea last July, occurred last week when the South Korean government acquired the planned site in a land swap deal with the conglomerate Lotte.
The THAAD system is designed to intercept incoming ballistic missiles at high altitude. It consists of a powerful X-band radar system to track missiles at long range, linked to truck-mounted interceptors designed to destroy a hostile missile in flight. In the event of war with China, the THAAD system would not only protect key US military bases in South Korea and Japan. Its X-band radar could detect and track missile launches deep inside the Chinese mainland. Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Geng Shuang yesterday reiterated Beijing’s opposition to the THAAD deployment. Geng warned that China would “take necessary measures to defend our security interests and the consequences will be shouldered by the United States and South Korea.” Russia also condemned the THAAD installation. Victor Ozerov, who chairs Russia’s Federal Defense and Security Committee, branded the deployment as “another provocation against Russia” aimed, if not at encircling Russia, “then at least to besiege it from the west and the east.”

U.S. ship changed course toward Iranians on Saturday: Iran commander (Source Reuters) A U.S. Navy ship changed course toward Iranian Revolutionary Guard vessels in the Strait of Hormuz on Saturday, a guard commander was quoted as saying on Wednesday while issuing a warning. A U.S. official told Reuters on Monday that multiple fast-attack vessels from the Revolutionary Guard had come within 600 yards (550 meters) of the USNS Invincible, a tracking ship, forcing it to change direction. But guard commander Mehdi Hashemi said the incident, the first of note between the countries’ navies in those waters since January, was the fault of the U.S. ship, telling the Fars news agency: “The unprofessional actions of the Americans can have irreversible consequences,” Years of mutual animosity eased when Washington lifted sanctions on Tehran last year after a deal to curb Iran’s nuclear ambitions. But major differences remain over Iran’s ballistic missile program and conflicts in Syria and Iraq. Iranian president Hassan Rouhani, without referring to the Hormuz incident, also gave a warning on Wednesday.
“If Iran’s ignorant enemies think about invading Iran they should know that our armed forces are much stronger than 1980 when Iraq attacked,” he said in a speech broadcast live on state TV.
While still a U.S. presidential candidate in September, Donald Trump vowed that any Iranian vessels that harassed the U.S. Navy in the Gulf would be “shot out of the water.” Trump’s administration said on Tuesday it would show “great strictness” over restrictions on Iran’s activities under the nuclear deal with major powers, but gave little indication of what that might mean. The last serious naval incident was in January when a U.S. destroyer fired three warning shots at four Iranian fast-attack vessels near the Strait after they closed in at high speed and disregarded repeated requests to slow down.
Pentagon spokesman Captain Jeff Davis said in Washington on Monday that dangerous interactions were of concern because they could lead to a “miscalculation or an accidental provocation.”

North Korea missiles ‘drill for strike on US bases’ (Source AFP)
Nuclear-armed North Korea said Tuesday its missile launches were training for a strike on US bases in Japan, as global condemnation of the regime swelled. Three of the four missiles fired Monday came down provocatively close to US ally Japan, in waters that are part of its exclusive economic zone, representing a challenge to US President Donald Trump. In a phone call, Trump and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe warned that the threat from North Korea had “entered a new stage”. The UN Security Council scheduled an emergency meeting for Wednesday after a request by Washington and Tokyo to discuss additional measures following the launch. Under UN resolutions, Pyongyang is barred from any use of ballistic missile technology, and the US ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley, said on Twitter that the world “won’t allow” North Korea to continue on its “destructive path”. But six sets of UN sanctions since its first nuclear test in 2006 have failed to halt its drive for what it insists are defensive weapons. Kim Jong-Un gave the order for the drill to start, the North’s official Korea Central News Agency (KCNA) reported. “Feasting his eyes on the trails of ballistic rockets”, he praised the Hwasong artillery unit that carried it out, it said. “The four ballistic rockets launched simultaneously are so accurate that they look like acrobatic flying corps in formation, he said,” the agency added, referring to Kim.
The military units involved are “tasked to strike the bases of the US imperialist aggressor forces in Japan in contingency”, KCNA said.
But a US defence official told AFP that North Korea had launched five extended-range Scud missiles on Monday, with one crashing somewhere over the Korean peninsula. Seoul and Washington last week began annual joint military exercises that always infuriate Pyongyang. Kim Jong-Un ordered his military “to keep highly alert as required by the grim situation in which an actual war may break out anytime”, KCNA reported, and to be ready to “open fire to annihilate the enemies” when ordered.

Russian MP calls Disney’s ‘Beauty and Beast’ gay propaganda (Source AFP) An ultra-conservative Russian lawmaker on Saturday urged the culture ministry to check Disney’s upcoming film “Beauty and the Beast” for possible breaches of a law banning “gay propaganda”.
In a letter to Culture Minister Vladimir Medinsky seen by RIA Novosti state news agency, MP Vitaly Milonov called the film “blatant, shameless propaganda of sin and perverted sexual relationships.”
Bill Condon, the director of the film due for release in Russia on March 16, has revealed that it will contain Disney’s “first exclusively gay moment”, although some critics have said it is less than overwhelming. Milonov urged the culture minister to hold a special screening of the film ahead of the premiere and to “take measures to totally ban the showing of this film” if he found “elements of propaganda of homosexuality”. Milonov became a member of the national parliament for the ruling United Russia party last year after serving as a regional lawmaker in his home city of Saint Petersburg. He became notorious as one of the chief instigators of Russia’s law banning “gay propaganda”, signed by President Vladimir Putin in 2013. The law which prompted international condemnation bans distribution of information that could interest those under age 18 in “non-traditional sexual relationships.” It has been used as a pretext to ban gay pride events. With ultra-conservative views on morality, Milonov has attacked everything from Facebook to the Eurovision Song Contest and called for the creation of a morality police to fine people who violate “traditional values”.

Russia’s developing 100 megaton dirty Tsunami Creating submarine drone bomb (Source nextbigfuture.com)
“The Russian government daily Rossiyskaya Gazeta reported that to achieve ‘extensive radioactive contamination’ Russia ‘could envision using the so-called cobalt bomb, a nuclear weapon designed to produce enhanced amounts of radioactive fallout compared to a regular atomic warhead,'” . Retired Air Force Gen. Robert Kehler, former commander of the U.S. Strategic Command, has said development of the underwater nuclear strike vehicle is one element of a “troubling” Russian strategic nuclear buildup. 
Rep. Mike Rogers (R., Ala.), chairman of the House subcommittee on strategic forces, has said that the Russians assert the nuclear drone submarine will be used to target coastal areas and inflict “unacceptable damage to a country’s territory by creating areas of wide radioactive contamination that would be unsuitable for military, economic, or other activity for long periods of time.”
 pentagon-confirm-russia-submarine-nuke Russia calls the system “Ocean Multipurpose System ‘Status-6,” and it is allegedly capable of traveling underwater to distances of to 6,200 miles. It can submerge to depths of 3,280 feet and travel at speeds of up to 56 knots. The Pentagon has confirmed that a new Russian nuclear delivery drone is real. The undersea drone, which carries an enormous nuclear warhead to destroy coastal cities and military bases, was tested late last month. Reports from Russia indicate the bomb could be armed with a “salted bomb”, or one that “salts the Earth” with the dangerous isotope Cobalt-60. Such a bomb could spread such high levels of radioactivity it would prevent anyone from using the attack zone for approximately 100 years. The seminal work in the field of nuclear ocean waves is ? Water Waves Generated By Underwater Explosions, a 400-page report produced for the Department of Defense by Bernard Le Mehaute and Shen Wang. The report outlines how when a nuclear weapon goes off underwater, it produces a cavity of hot gasses, which then collapses. If the explosion happens near the surface, it can create some pretty big waves—under some circumstances, they can be hundreds of feet high near ground zero.

Trump Team’s Ties To Russia Face Sharper Scrutiny Amid New House Probe And Explosive Reports (Source huffingtonpost.com)
A series of bombshell revelations Wednesday night cast new light on  Donald Trump’s potential ties to the Russian government during the course of the presidential campaign and seem likely to escalate calls for a special prosecutor to investigate the matter.
The New York Times reported that intelligence officials working for the Obama administration had grown so concerned about the scope of Russia’s meddling in the elections and the evidence of ties to Trump’s operation that they began to leave a breadcrumb trail of clues for future investigators to follow. Among those data points that had them spooked were a series of meetings that affiliates of the Trump campaign and the Russian government allegedly held in European capitals ― meetings that the Trump White House has consistently denied ever took place. About an hour later,  security/sessions-spoke-twice-with-russian-ambassador-during-trumps-presidential-campaign-justice-officials- The Washington Post published its report that U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions spoke twice last year with Russia’s ambassador to the United States and failed to disclose it to lawmakers during his January confirmation hearing. Sessions had been a top surrogate for the Trump campaign and a senior member of the influential Senate Armed Services Committee. The newspaper noted that no other member of that committee could recall speaking to the Russian ambassador.

Germany and France endorse multi-speed Europe (Source euobserver.com) Germany and France will push for a multi-speed EU, in which some countries integrate more deeply than others, at a summit in Rome later this month. “We must find means to better take into account member states’ different levels of ambitions so that Europe can better address the expectations of all European citizens,” the countries’ foreign affairs ministers said in a joint statement on Wednesday (1 March). Sigmar Gabriel and Jean-Marc Ayrault said that should be done “without calling into question all that we achieved.” The statement could be seen as a reassurance to countries with a lower “level of ambitions” that they will not lose the EU’s benefits, as well as a warning to countries who would like to take back powers from EU institutions. The EU “is founded on common values, solidarity and the rule of law,” they added, in a reference to the most divisive issues between a core of member states and some countries such as those in the Visegrad group – Poland, Hungary, Slovakia, and the Czech Republic. Visegrad countries have refused to take asylum seekers and migrants despite EU demands for solidarity.

The Most Desirable Passports On Earth Don’t Include America’s (Source Bloomberg)
A passport allows one to be a citizen of the world—but some think it should also work for you. As in, if you’re wealthy and well-traveled, it should be a bit like an exclusive invitation-only credit card: lots of benefits, lots of perks, lots of points. That’s the view of Nomad Capitalist, a firm that recently ranked 199 countries corresponding to their “value of citizenship.” In addition to visa-free travel options, this  3-eu-west-1.Nomad-Passport-Index-2017.pdf” ranking uses a weighted approach that considers the amount of taxes a country levies on citizens who live abroad, along with the nation’s overall global reputation, civil and personal freedoms, and the ability to hold multiple passports simultaneously. And no, America, you’re not even in the top 20.

Atop the list is Sweden, followed by a bevy of other European Union nations. A Swedish passport allows visa-free travel to 176 countries or territories, just one fewer than world leader Germany. Moreover, Swedish expats can easily “get out of the high taxes in Sweden and go live somewhere else where there are lower taxes without a lot of headaches,” says Andrew Henderson, the veteran traveler, entrepreneur, and blogger who founded Nomad.
Ranking: 1.Sweden 2.Belgium 3.Italy 4.Spain 5.Ireland 6.Finland
7.Germany 8.Denmark 9.Switzerland 10.Luxembourg

European Parliament votes to end visa-free travel for Americans (Source independent.co.uk)
The  “EuropeanParliament” European Parliament has voted to end visa-free travel for Americans within the EU. It comes after the US failed to agree visa-free travel for citizens of five EU countries – Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Poland and Romania – as part of a reciprocity agreement. US citizens can normally travel to all countries in the bloc without a visa.
The vote urges the revocation of the scheme within two months, meaning Americans will have to apply for extra documents for 12 months after the  “http://www.independent.co.uk/topic/european-commission” European Commission implements a “delegated act” to bring the change into effect. The Commission discovered three years ago that the US was not meeting its obligations under the reciprocity agreement but has not yet taken any legal action. The latest vote, prepared by the civil liberties committee and approved by a plenary session of parliament, gives the Commission two months to act before MEPs can consider action in the European Court of Justice. Australia” Australia, Brunei, Japan and Canada were also failing in their obligations, but all four have lifted, or are soon to lift, any visa restrictions on travel for EU citizens. The Commission is legally obliged to act to suspend the visa waiver for Americans, but the European Parliament or the Council of the European Union have the chance to object to the “delegated act” it uses to do so.
In December, MEPs pressed for the move in order to “encourage” Washington to play its part, according to a statement by the parliament.

North Korea Threatens ‘Merciless Attack’ As U.S. and South Korea Conduct Drills (Source Newsweek)
North Korea warns of unleashing a “merciless” response if South Korea and America conduct military drills that overlap its borders. The threat of attack is not unusual, but, taking North Korea’s recent successful missile attempts into account, it’s one that is being taken more seriously. The U.S. and South Korea would respond “overwhelmingly” if such an attack were to occur,
The war games between Seoul and Washington annually frustrate North Korea, who considers its military activities a sign of aggression. The manoeuvres began Wednesday and usually involve hundreds of thousands of troops from South Korea and the U.S. practising drills in an operation called Foal Eagle. “The value of training like this is key to our mission to be ready to ‘fight tonight’ if called upon,” Maj. Jared Nichols, the battalion’s executive officer,  ” told Yonhap News Agency, South Korea’s News Agency. The two countries plan to conduct Key Resolve practice in March, a computer-simulated exercise, the South Korean Defense Ministry told  Jim Mattis, U.S. defense secretary, and South Korea’s Defense Minister Han Min-Koo had a phone conversation in which the U.S. expressed commitment to its Asian ally. “Secretary Mattis said that the United States remains steadfast in its commitment to the defense of [South Korea]. He further emphasized that any attack on the United States or its allies will be defeated, and any use of nuclear weapons will be met with a response that is effective and overwhelming,” a statement from Pentagon spokesperson Captain Jeff Davis read,  as cited by Yonhap.