TALK OF RUSSIA USING NUKES IS MUSHROOMING: This week, Russian President Vladimir Putin said in an interview on state TV that he is ready to use nuclear weapons if he perceives a threat to the existence of Russia. But so far, he says “there has never been such a need.” And a new book by CNN anchor Jim Sciutto, The Return of Great Powers (reviewed in The Cipher Brief) reports that in late summer and early fall of 2022, U.S. leaders were far more concerned about the possibility of Russia using tactical nuclear weapons in Ukraine than was previously known. American officials initially dismissed rumors of possible use of tactical nukes ordered by the Kremlin as very unlikely – and Sciutto reports that at no time did the U.S. collect intelligence that Russia was actually mobilizing forces to conduct such an attack. But officials were troubled by concerns that they might not pick up such warnings until it was too late and if Moscow felt it was losing too much territory – there was no predicting what Putin might do. Russian officials and lackeys seem to savor the uncertainty. Last Friday, Putin pal and Russian TV talking head Vladimir Solovyov said on his broadcast that Western cities should be among the first targeted with nuclear strikes – and he compiled a list. According to the video captured by Moscow Media Monitor Julia Davis, among Solovyov’s top choices were: Paris, Marseille, Lyon, Hamburg, Munich or Garmisch-Partenkirchen or just about anywhere in the USA. We get Paris and the USA…but Garmisch-Partenkirchen? Solovyov must have had a bad experience on the ski slopes there once or something.
MY HEAVENS: But don’t worry about that – we are advised that Russia is getting good oversight. In another video captured recently, Vladimir Putin appeared on TV and told an audience that “Russia is a country that is directly governed by God.”
THE GODS ARE WATCHING: The folks at Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty report that, Oleg Tarasov, a Russian university student, recently was sentenced to ten days in the slammer for naming his WiFi network “Slava Ukraini” (Glory to Ukraine.) The charge was “displaying extremist symbols.”
WHERE IN THE WORLD IS WILMER PUELLO-MOTA? OK, we hear you asking first: who is Wilmer Puello-Mota? At one point he was a City Councilor in Holyoke, MA and also a member of the Massachusetts Air National Guard. That was before he was arrested in 2020 in Rhode Island on charges of possession of child pornography, forgery and obstruction of justice. The wheels of justice apparently grind slowly – because it wasn’t until January of this year that he was scheduled to appear in court. But Puello-Mota didn’t show up. Now there are suspicions that not only has he skipped town – but that he may have defected to Russia to join in the fight against Ukraine. Some video surfaced on social media of someone in uniform – with their face blurred out – planting an American flag in a Ukrainian city and saying how we need to support Russia. Former colleagues say the voice sounds like Wilmer and a Facebook page apparently that of Puello-Mota lists his current residence as Moscow, Russia. The Facebook page (which like Puello-Mota may now have disappeared) said that Wilmer now works at the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation.
WHO NEEDS SPY BALLOONS? A recent Congressional investigation has turned up evidence that many Chinese-made cargo cranes found at ports and shipyards throughout the U.S. may be loaded with communications equipment unnecessary for cargo operations – but might be useful relaying info to Beijing. According to a story in the Wall Street Journal, cranes built by ZPMC, a Chinese-based company, account for nearly 80% of the ship-to-shore cranes used in the U.S. Whether the cellular modems and other equipment found on the cranes are intended to send information back to China, foster efforts to disrupt crane use during a time of tension or something else, is unknown.
WE’VE FOUND NO EVIDENCE OF ALIENS OR ALIEN COVER UPS: Last Friday, the Pentagon popped the balloon of a lot of UFO (or UAP if you prefer) conspiracy theorists when it released a report saying that after an extensive investigation, they found “no evidence that any [U.S. government] investigation, academic-sponsored research, or official review panel has confirmed that any sighting of a UAP represented extraterrestrial technology.” Naturally, a lot of theories were bandied about what really was behind those unnatural sightings. For example, Wired suggests perhaps the mysterious objects were not extraterrestrials but the work of terrestrial sources like China, Russia or Iran. Or maybe they were U.S. government vehicles, and the Pentagon is just covering that up. We’re not letting the conspiracy theories go just yet.
BUT WE FOUND SOME CRAZY STUFF: Late last week, a Federal judge in New Mexico sentenced five people to life sentences in a plot that is so bizarre it is hard to summarize. Even after reading the Justice Department’s press release, we are struggling to figure it out. The defendants reportedly kidnapped a three-year-old boy in Georgia in 2017 and took him to a compound they built in New Mexico from which they planned to engage in a war against what they saw as corrupt entities like the CIA, FBI and U.S. military. When the child (who was the son of the group’s leader, Siraj Wahhaj) died shortly after arriving at the site, Wahhaj prophesied that the boy would be resurrected and lead them in battle. Unsurprisingly, he has not.
POCKET LITTER: Dead Droplets and bits and pieces of interesting /weird stuff we discovered:
INTEL COMMUNITY GOT THEIR HOMEWORK IN EARLY: This week, Director of National Intelligence, Avril Haines and five other intelligence community leaders ran the gauntlet in two public Congressional oversight hearings. On Monday, the group appeared before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI) and the next day, they went before the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI) to deliver the Annual Threat Assessment of the IC. They responded to questions, allegations and theatrical performances by some of the members. If you are really into this stuff, you can watch all 2 hours and 38 minutes of the SSCI hearing here and the just under three hours of the HPSCI hearing here. Or, to save time, for an excellent summary of the first day’s event, check out Cipher Brief managing editor Tom Nagorski’s piece published on Tuesday. As is traditional, in addition to opening statements and questions and answers – the IC also released their written assessment. This year’s was 40 pages long. We were surprised to note the document was dated on the cover February 5, 2024, and on the inside in the Introduction it was stated that “Information available as of 22 January was used in the preparation of this assessment.” Which got us wondering: how come the info is seven weeks old? In this fast-paced world – a lot of stuff can happen in that amount of time. Fortunately – if any of the data was dated – the assembled leaders were present to bring it up to date.
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