Greece's new minister of interior, former far-right activist Makis Voridis. Not "allegedly" and without a hint of exaggeration.

/thread/ It has been almost 2 months since the end of the 2020 Nagorno Karabakh war and after observing it from the start and talking about it with (or listening to) some really smart people, here are IMO important lessons (new or old) from that conflict:

1. Even in smaller conflicts, U(C)AVs are making achieving air superiority, or at least denying it to the opponent, a lot more important than it used to be.

2. Effective distribution of real-time data from U(C)AVs (and loitering munitions, which can be launched to perform recon when other assets are not available) can significantly increase the effectiveness of even relatively old artillery systems.

3. While airpower is getting incredibly deadly and can quickly inflict massive material damage, you still need units on the ground with a strong will to fight despite taking casualties (and political will to accept that in serious modern wars, significant losses are inevitable).

4. Soldiers need to be aware that on a modern battlefield there are not really any "safe areas" and TTPs (tactics techniques procedures) need to be changed to reflect this.

On this day in 2007, the bomb blasts in Samjhauta Express killed 68 people including 44 Pakistanis. The immediate investigations revealed irrefutable evidence about the masterminds. In this thread, I would share some Indian newspaper clips which covered the investigations.

1. Lt Col Prasad Purohit, a serving Indian army officer, was arrested for terror conspiracy in the Malegaon blast case. He was the co founder of Abhinav Bharat, a right wing Hindu organisation. He admitted that he was the mastermind.

(The Times of India, Pune, 7 November 2008)

2. Lt Col Purohit met Pragya Thakur on 5 Oct 2008 to tell her that "Our People" had carried out the killings in Orissa, burnt down two churches and also carried out the Malegaon blast.

(The Indian Express, Pune, 24 Nov 2008)

Ironically, Pragya is BJP's MP today.

3. During his narco analysis test, Lt Col Purohit told officers that Praveen Togadia was responsible for the “Samjhauta Express Blasts”. He asked me to find out from Dr Dev, how much RDX was remaining after the blast.

(Pune Mirror, 19 Nov 2008)

4. In his narco analysis test, Lt Col Purohit gave sensational information that he supplied explosives for Ajmer and Malegaon blasts at the instance of Mahant Dayanand Pandey.

(Sakal, Pune and Pudhari, Pune, both of 15 Nov 2008)

An explanation of what is going on with the Salmond enquiry.

Alex Salmond was the leader of the SNP and was first minister of Scotland, but he stepped down from this position after the SNP failed to secure the Scottish Referendum.

Nicola Sturgeon took his place.

Nicola was basically Salmonds underling and he was her mentor. They were very close.

Everything after this point is all speculation/allegations, so take everything with a pinch of salt until the facts come out.

If the SNP ever allow them to come out.

A rift had been growing for many years between Salmond and Sturgeon as he felt she was not progressing enough towards an independent Scotland, probably because the party focuses mainly on woke bullshit and hate crime laws for memes.

Salmond hinted a return to the party.

Around about this time, with very convenient timing, Salmond got MeToo'd by several women within the SNP, this resulted in a massive police investigation, seriously huge, with the cops interviewing around 400 people.

Salmond was charged with several counts of sexual assault.

The case goes to trial, which results in Salmond being aquitted of all charges.

This is usually where such things would end, but it turns out this exposed everyone to a rabbit hole of alleged corruption within the SNP at it's highest levels.