Tag Archives: Space X

Nov 10 2023

The Ben Gurion Canal Project – Declassified Documents Reveal Truth Re-Posted Nov 10, 2023 By Martin Armstrong 


Ben Gurion Canal Project R

The US and Israel have been discussing plans to build a canal to rival the Suez Canal for over 50 years. We must look at recent history to see the motives for the war occurring today. Around 20% of all world trade moves through the Suez Canal, which is controlled by Egypt. The Suez Canal was initially jointly controlled by French investors and Egypt. Isma’il Pasha was forced to sell Egypt’s shares to Britain amid a liquidity crisis in Egypt. Former Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser reclaimed the lucrative trade route in 1956, sparking the second Arab-Israeli war also known as the Suez Crisis.

The West does not want to rely on Egypt, a close ally of Russia, for world trade. The Ben Gurion Canal Project, or Israeli Canal, has been the proposed solution since the 60s. Where would this canal be located? Part of it would flow precisely through the Gaza Strip. The passage would start by the port city of Eilat in Israel through the Gulf of Aqaba, crossing the Jordanian border and flowing through the Arabah Valley before entering the Dead Sea before heading north around the Gaza Strip.

Declassified documents reveal that the US Department of Energy was planning to take extreme measures to make this canal possible. On July 1, 1963, a plan was outlined to create the Israeli Canal by detonating 520 underground nuclear explosions throughout the Negev Desert. “Such a canal would be a strategically valuable alternate to the present Suez Canal and would probably contribute greatly to the economic development of the surrounding area,” the declassified document stated.

The document notes that 130 of the 160 miles dedicated to the canal are “virtually unpopulated desert wasteland,” but the primary issue would be relocating those from the Gaza Strip. “Another problem which has not been considered is that of political feasibility, as it is likely that the Arab countries surrounding Israel would object strongly to the construction of such a canal,” the declassified papers show.

Follow the money, always. The West does not want Egypt and, therefore, Russia to have control over world trade and the movement of goods. The plan was never executed because they knew no Arab nation would agree to such a power grab, and those 30 pesky miles of densely populated land mostly belonged to Palestine. This is all because the Neocons are hell-bent on isolating Russia but at the expense of dividing the world. Is this why Blinken is saying there will be no peace in Israel and Ukraine?

This is all tied in with Yemen, and there is so much more going on behind the curtain that would shock people on all sides. We will deal with the real complexity in a Special Report for the WEC Nov 17-19.

Israel Its Future
Nov 6 2023

Israel Shoots Down the First Missile in Space Re-Posted Nov 5, 2023 By Martin Armstrong


2023_11_05_19_45_35_In_a_first_Israel_shoots_down_a_ballistic_missile_in_space

Israel has just made an important step in warfare. Their Arrow missile-defense system has shot down a ballistic missile outside of Earth’s atmosphere, which is the first time warfare has taken place in space. This was an Iranian missile launched from Yemen by the Iran-backed Houthis, who have declared war on Israel.  This missile traveled out of the Earth’s atmosphere in hopes of avoiding all radar, and this would be a surprise attack. This flew nearly 1000 miles (1600km) over the Arabian peninsula outside the atmosphere and would then turn down targeting the Israeli port city of Eilat.

This was not one of those propaganda stories from Ukraine how they shot down six unstoppable Russian missiles in a single day. Nothing that comes from Ukraine is ever trustworthy, and certainly not from the Institute for the Study of War – Victoria Nuland’s sister-in-law who always says Russia is about to collapse..

This is the first missile to be shot down outside the atmosphere and has ushered in a new level of warfare.

Nov 1 2023

Iran Demands the Removal of Starlink – Could Governments Repel These Satellites? Re-Posted Nov 1, 2023 By Martin Armstrong



We know why Israel is upset with Elon Musk for sending Starlink services to Palestine, but now Iran is also demanding that he remove the satellites. Truth is always the first casualty in war. Governments are censoring absolutely everything to prevent the truth from spreading. Iranian journalism is non-existent and people rely on social media to receive their information through the use of VPNs. Iran has previously shutdown internet access for its own people and disabled VPN servers to prevent people from seeking the truth.

Reporters Without Borders (RSF) believes the Islamic Republic “enslaved Iran’s internet.” “The Islamic Republic’s strategy is cruel – locking its people into an empty information space and blocking all escape routes,” said Vincent Berthier, the head of RSF’s Tech Desk. “Internet shutdowns form the main barrier to information, and when the network comes back online, the government obstructs access in another way, by preventing access to VPNs. We call on the Iranian authorities to lift these oppressive constraints. Iranians have the right to access news and information freely.”

Iran has blocked the Apple App Store and Google Play to deter people from downloading a VPN to bypass censorship. WhatsApp and Signal have been blocked as they do not allow people to communicate. Internet shutdowns often occur regionally as the Iranian government will simply revoke all internet communications at whim. A company called Arvan Cloud has assisted Iran’s Information and Communications Technology Ministry in developing the National Information Network (NIN) to block the people from free communication. Ironically, the US placed sanctions on the company in June 2023. The US government prefers to discreetly block information rather than turning off the internet entirely.

2022_12_03_Musk_Says_Twitter_Orderd_by_Government 300x285

Now in comes Elon Musk. He recently said he plans to make X (formerly Twitter) an all-purpose app that allows calls and messaging. He is permitting everyone to post to his social media channel and it has become the top spot for government officials to send the public instant alerts. His Starlink technology will ensure that people can access X and the internet. Starlink satellites operate at an altitude of 340 miles and would be extremely costly to shoot down and only a few countries have anti-satellite technology. It’s also not like Musk is sending one satellite as they launch a stack of them at once.

There is a reason Putin did not attempt to shoot down Starlink over Ukraine. First of all, it is extremely costly and a waste of resources. Secondly, these devices are technically American assets and attempting to remove them could be seen as an act of war. Third, they could not shoot these down without causing orbital debris and angering the international community. Russia or China could spend countless resources on anti-satellite technology, but Musk could simply send more. The only way to close them would be to attack the ground station, a move that could only be done by the West.

Oct 23 2023

Russia Invests Heavily in Egypt – Sun City – Nuclear Power


Armstrong Economics Blog/War Re-Posted Oct 23, 2023 by Martin Armstrong

Russia poured $7 billion into Egypt in 2021 to create the Russian Industrial Zone (RIZ), the nation’s first industrial zone outside of Russia. Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi developed a relationship with Russia in 2014 amid the Crimea crisis and the Ukrainian Revolution. Russia has been investing heavily in Egypt ever since and is currently pouring $4.6 billion into Egypt’s Suez Canal zone to create “Sun City,” an industrial zone covering 2,000 hectares.

Around 20% of all world trade moves through the Suez Canal. This is extremely strategic for Russian manufacturing and trade, and also explains Egypt’s refusal to support the West in its mission to escalate the Israel-Palestine war. Sun City is expected to bring 35,000 jobs to the Egyptian economy.

Egypt has become Africa’s leading destination for investment. It dethroned South Africa in 2017 to claim the title. The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) stated that Egypt “supported by a large increase in Chinese investment across light manufacturing industries and wide-ranging economic reforms, such as financial liberalisation, which is basically the establishment of higher interest rates that equate the demand for, and the supply of savings.” China’s Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) spiked 75% in 2017, providing Egypt with a large boost. The UAE, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia have also invested heavily in Egypt, especially in real estate and development.

There is nothing that the West can provide to Egypt to surpass what Arab and Eastern nations have done for its economy. The Egypt-Russia Trade and Investment Summary (YTD) 2022 indicates that Moscow and Cairo will continue to strengthen its relationship. A key to this report is that Russia is helping Egypt produce its first nuclear power plant, financing 85% of the project. El Dabaa Nuclear Power Plant will be positioned 320 kilometers from Cairo. But this deal initially began in 2015 when Russia promised to finance the project, and signed preliminary contracts in December 2017. The total project is set to cost $28.7 billion. Egypt will repay Russia the remaining 15% in installments with a repayment period of 22 years and an interest rate of 3%.

So basically, the plant will become Russia’s nuclear power in Africa and among the Arab world. They are anticipating completion in 2026 and it is safe to say that the West is going to do everything in its power to prevent this from happening. Look at the map above to see how strategic the positioning of this plant will be for Russia in not just Africa and the Arab nations but a stone’s throw away from Europe as well.

Sep 25 2023

Sunday Trivia – Did You Ever Notice The Lyrics


Posted originally on the CTH on September 24, 2023 | Sundance 

R.E.M is a band from Georgia.  This song was written in 1987.  Did you ever notice the lyrics?

That’s great, it starts with an earthquake,
Birds and snakes, an aeroplane
Lenny Bruce is not afraid.

Eye of a hurricane,
Listen to yourself churn
World serves its own needs,
Regardless of your own needs.
Feed it up a knock, speed,
Grunt no, strength no.
Ladder structure clatter with fear of height, down height.
Wire in a fire, represent the seven games
In a government for hire
And a combat site.
Left her, wasn’t coming in a hurry with the furries
Breathing down your neck.
Team by team reporters baffled, Trump, tethered crop.
Look at that low plane!
Fine then.
Uh oh, overflow, population, common group, but it’ll do.
Save yourself,
Serve yourself.
World serves its own needs,
Listen to your heart bleed. Tell me with the rapture and the
Reverent in the right
Right.
You vitriolic, patriotic, slam, fight, bright
Light, feeling pretty psyched.

It’s the end of the world as we know it.
It’s the end of the world as we know it.
It’s the end of the world as we know it and I feel fine.

Sep 21 2023

Neuralink Brain Implant Trials Begin


Armstrong Economics Blog/Disease RE-Posted Sep 21, 2023 by Martin Armstrong

Elon Musk’s Neuralink received approval to begin a six-year trial to study the effects of brain-computer interface (BCI). A specialized surgical robot will be used to implant the devices into participants’ brains. The company’s mission: “Create a generalized brain interface to restore autonomy to those with unmet medical needs today and unlock human potential tomorrow.” Participants in the first trial must have a disability such as blindness, quadriplegia, paraplegia, deafness, or major limb amputation. Permitting those with disabilities to live a normal life seems noble, but Musk has stated he dreams of expanding the Neuralink’s availability to everyone.

The non-human trials failed miserably, resulting in 1,500 dead animals since 2018. Some past employees have criticized Musk for rushing his research, but not illegal acts were committed as it is common, if not expected, for at least some animal test subjects to die. Numerous errors could have been avoided if not for human error, according to those familiar with the studies.

“The PRIME Study (short for Precise Robotically Implanted Brain-Computer Interface) – a groundbreaking investigational medical device trial for our fully-implantable, wireless brain-computer interface (BCI) – aims to evaluate the safety of our implant (N1) and surgical robot (R1) and assess the initial functionality of our BCI for enabling people with paralysis to control external devices with their thoughts,” Neuralink states on its website. It would be an unbelievable feat if this device gave someone the ability to walk or see for the first time. It would make all the testing worthwhile. Musk stated himself that the chip will work. “As miraculous as it may sound, we’re confident that it is possible to restore full body functionality to someone who has a severed spinal cord.”

However, Musk has loftier goals and said that the Neuralink will be for everyone. Musk stated that he personally plans to have a brain chip installed once available. Neralink is not beholden to shareholders as Musk owns the company outright. The company claims it will not sell data to third parties. However, Neuralink’s third-party affiliates, regulatory boards, and research partners will have access. Time will tell how this six-year trial goes, as I expect we will hear much more about the new technology once the trial begins.

Sep 2 2023

AI – The Reality of Complexity


Armstrong Economics Blog/AI Computers

Posted Sep 2, 2023 by Martin Armstrong

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COMMENT: You are always ahead of the curve. Today AI is the buzzword – with most of the AI being machine learning, where you were developing Socrates with real AI in the 70s and 80s.

Lynne

REPLY: I fooled around with neural nets when they first began. The problem with this approach is that you expect a machine to develop a human instinct as if you are playing a poker game. It is a gut feeling you might have about a person to alert you if he is bluffing or real. That cannot be coded, nor will a computer with machine learning be able to acquire such a “gut feeling,” which is an entirely different game than chess.

Socrates is NOT a neutral net. I had to teach it how to trade. I put my instincts into the system. Creating a neural net, throwing in all the data, and praying it will learn how to trade is more or less like a monkey throwing darts at the Wall Street Journal regarding what stock to buy in a bull market. Raven, a six-year-old chimpanzee, became the 22nd most successful money manager in the USA after choosing her stocks by throwing darts at a list of 133 internet companies. The chimp created her own index, dubbed MonkeyDex, and in 1999 delivered a 213 percent gain, outperforming more than 6,000 professional brokers on Wall Street.

Attempts to use a neutral net with machine learning have not beaten Raven in funds management. The level of complexity is monumental. On top of all of that, it will never discover the nonlinear structure of the world by dumping in a chunk of data and praying for the best.

Aug 8 2023

AI & Self-Awareness


Armstrong Economics Blog/AI Computers Re-Posted Aug 8, 2023 by Martin Armstrong

QUESTION: You do not see AI as actually becoming conscious? There are so many claiming that is the future. Are you hiring programmers in machine language?

LK

ANSWER: Let me explain something. Most generative AI models today are being trained and run in the cloud. These models are language-oriented, generating text. They are often at least 10 times to 100 times bigger than older AI models. ChatGPT is learning from the question people are asking. While this is impressive to the average person, there is no real economic value other than adding to the search function. This has resulted in a boom along with an insatiable appetite for running large language models at this point in time.

Even dogs have personalities. My little one will take a pill covered in peanut butter. The older one takes the peanut butter and spits out the pill. Just like having two children, they are not the same. What causes one to have a personality that is different from the other? I’m afraid I have to disagree with this theory that if you throw in enough data, suddenly, the computer will become self-aware. My little dog was just 11 weeks old. She is still exploring her environment, displaying curiosity, so she has a distinct personality BEFORE acquiring knowledge of her environment. This PROVES beyond a shadow of a doubt that this theory of a computer becoming self-aware is just nonsense. We do not teach our children how to be self-aware. They are born that way.

There is something there that creates the personality, and it appears from birth in dogs and humans. My dogs clearly think dynamically. If I get up with a coffee cup, they know I am going to the kitchen and heading there. Not all animals have that ability. So why are dogs capable of looking for patterns and anticipating my next move, and a hippo, snake, or alligator is not?

I do not believe we are anywhere close to comprehending those differences, and as such, we cannot create a true cognitive machine that is self-aware when we do not understand what makes us self-aware.

To build Socrates, I had to study intensely how we actually think. Let’s say you met the person who is your soul mate. You went to dinner. Your mind is actually recording every aspect of that evening, and you are totally unaware of what it is recording. Years later, you return to that same restaurant, and that memory involuntarily comes rushing to the forefront of your mind. Or there was music playing that night, and suddenly you hear that same song, and that memory again involuntarily comes to mind. Perhaps it is the food. The point is that memory is stored, but any of our senses can access it. The complexity is enormous.

My oldest dog does not like going to the Vet. She even knows her surroundings. Miles from the place, she knows where I am going and begins to tremble. She is aware of her surroundings miles from home, which astonished me. It was not a capability I assumed a dog would have. A dog stayed with a two-year-old girl who went missing and always protected her.

There is a lot more hidden within us and many animals that cannot be explained or recreated by a computer.

Just be careful with claims suddenly of people coming up with AI trading programs. It took me 17 years to build Socrates. You cannot create an AI trading program in a few weeks. As for hiring, yes, of course. We always have projects under development.

Aug 5 2023

Understanding REAL AI


Armstrong Economics Blog/AI Computers Re-Posted Aug 4, 2023 by Martin Armstrong

QUESTION: Mr. Armstrong, I attended your 2011 conference in Philadelphia. A friend of mine insisted and paid for the ticket, telling me your computer has been incredible on forecasting long-term that nobody can come close. I confess I thought your forecasts at the event were out there. You put up the war cycle and said it would all begin in 2014. That was three years in advance. There were cameramen there filming what later became the film The Forecaster. I hear they are doing a sequel to show all the forecasts you made ten years ago have come true. I also hear they are doing a Holywood film on you, like the Big Short.

You have accomplished what nobody else has done, and you are even a legend in markets and were even a speaker at the American Hackers convention in computers. With all the craziness going on about Artificial Intelligence, some people call it a threat to humanity, and others seem to be hinting that AI might take over everything. So there is no better person to speak about this than you. Are we at risk from AI, or is the hype some excuse claiming AI starts the war, not the people, as a cover-up?

DS

ANSWER: ChatGPT has dazzled the world and led everybody to think that AI will be something like the movie Terminator or The Matrix. I will dig out the old program I wrote in the early 1980s for my children. It was a simple program where I taught the computer to have a conversation. I would ask a question like – Do you have a dog? My daughter would reply yes. Of what is their name? She would then say the name. It stored all that info so the next time she went to the computer; it would ask: How is your dog Buttons? One day she came home from school and saw I had the computer apart, and she started crying, saying I killed it.

Back then, I worked with Dragon Systems. They produced hardware that you plugged in a board in the slot of an old IBM XT, and the computer would speak. She would bring over her girlfriends to prove to them her computer talked to her.

The point is that such a program is not really AI in the sense that it is self-aware to the point it will take over the world. With the introduction of the internet, such a program that has free reign to search can provide astonishing answers. Nevertheless, this is by no means self-aware.

The theory behind these wild claims entirely rests upon this theory that there is no God, we have no soul, and our entire existence is no more than a biological supercomputer. Therefore, they presume that if you through in enough data, some miracle will emerge, and it will become conscious just as a living being. That may make a great movie, but I think I am pretty well advanced in AI, and aside from disagreeing with this theory, I can write code that will make you think it is alive, but that is just mimicking human interaction. I do not know of any possible way to create a fully conscious AI system. It is only theory.

As far as Socrates is concerned, I poured myself into the program. It is NOT a neural net that you hope for the best. I taught Socrates how to analyze and know history, so I did not hardwire relationships. That is why it has discovered things and can do long-term forecasting beyond anything out there. As I have said, we are all connected. You cannot forecast a single market in isolation – you will always be wrong caught by the wildcard from an external market. They lost in Russia in 1998 and needed cash in the middle of a liquidity crisis. So they started selling assets everywhere to raise money to cover their losses in Russia. You would never have seen that coming just by looking at a single market.

Jul 31 2023

The mystery if Pi – Full Version


Armstrong Economics Blog/ECM Re-Posted Jul 30, 2023 by Martin Armstrong

COMMENT: Hi Mr. Armstrong,
Here is the full version of that short video you posted about Pi. In it, he makes the statement “Where ever there is Pi, there is a hidden circle.” Interesting thought in regards to Pi and the ECM.

Joel

REPLY: Thank You. It is fascinating.