Kinaa

Actually, "left then right" is same as the "right over left" cos: When you are closing left side flap, then right side flap what you are getting is that you vill end with right side flap over left side flap. You guys speaking abouth sam thing.

I don't know what that first sentence mean? The whole reply to me is then unclear. So if you want my reply you will have to be more clear.

Ask warpedskydiver. He saw report from someone. I was replying to him.

Well, I know that the weather was crappy that day, I live in Croatia. I remember. Planes don't fall from sky here often. Edited to add: War in Dubrovnik area was over 1992, Tudjman was not anti-semitic president, and he sure was not afraid of Hag court, I don't know who would send him there?

Weather was crappy that day, raining and fog on mountains. Macedonian president died couple years ago in same area in a plane crash, that area has tricky weather changes during the winter and early spring.

Nice video, btw. Some lucky bastards in it. ;-)

For what is that glass plate that one guy is holding behind jumpers, at the base comp. that is on the last minute of the movie? Thnx.

http://www.viamichelin.com/viamichelin/gbr/dyn/controller/Driving_directions

You are judging by yourself? What that mean? That you would stay in a "elite" organization, no matter what that organization is doing? Even something illegal? If any "elite" organization is doing something morally wrong or illegal, could that organization be called a "elite" one?

And now this: http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1174649,00.html Collateral Damage or Civilian Massacre in Haditha? Last November, U.S. Marines killed 15 Iraqi civilians in their homes. Was it self-defense, an accident or cold-blooded revenge? A Time exclusive By TIM MCGIRK / BAGHDAD Posted Sunday, Mar. 19, 2006 The incident seemed like so many others from this war, the kind of tragedy that has become numbingly routine amid the daily reports of violence in Iraq. On the morning of Nov. 19, 2005, a roadside bomb struck a humvee carrying Marines from Kilo Company, 3rd Battalion, 1st Marines, on a road near Haditha, a restive town in western Iraq. The bomb killed Lance Corporal Miguel (T.J.) Terrazas, 20, from El Paso, Texas. The next day a Marine communique from Camp Blue Diamond in Ramadi reported that Terrazas and 15 Iraqi civilians were killed by the blast and that "gunmen attacked the convoy with small-arms fire," prompting the Marines to return fire, killing eight insurgents and wounding one other. The Marines from Kilo Company held a memorial service for Terrazas at their camp in Haditha. They wrote messages like "T.J., you were a great friend. I'm going to miss seeing you around" on smooth stones and piled them in a funeral mound. And the war moved on. But the details of what happened that morning in Haditha are more disturbing, disputed and horrific than the military initially reported. According to eyewitnesses and local officials interviewed over the past 10 weeks, the civilians who died in Haditha on Nov. 19 were killed not by a roadside bomb but by the Marines themselves, who went on a rampage in the village after the attack, killing 15 unarmed Iraqis in their homes, including seven women and three children. Human-rights activists say that if the accusations are true, the incident ranks as the worst case of deliberate killing of Iraqi civilians by U.S. service members since the war began. In January, after Time presented military officials in Baghdad with the Iraqis' accounts of the Marines' actions, the U.S. opened its own investigation, interviewing 28 people, including the Marines, the families of the victims and local doctors. According to military officials, the inquiry acknowledged that, contrary to the military's initial report, the 15 civilians killed on Nov. 19 died at the hands of the Marines, not the insurgents. The military announced last week that the matter has been handed over to the Naval Criminal Investigative Service (ncis), which will conduct a criminal investigation to determine whether the troops broke the laws of war by deliberately targeting civilians. Lieut. Colonel Michelle Martin-Hing, spokeswoman for the Multi-National Force-Iraq, told Time the involvement of the ncis does not mean that a crime occurred. And she says the fault for the civilian deaths lies squarely with the insurgents, who "placed noncombatants in the line of fire as the Marines responded to defend themselves." Because the incident is officially under investigation, members of the Marine unit that was in Haditha on Nov. 19 are not allowed to speak with reporters. But the military's own reconstruction of events and the accounts of town residents interviewed by Time—including six whose family members were killed that day—paint a picture of a devastatingly violent response by a group of U.S. troops who had lost one of their own to a deadly insurgent attack and believed they were under fire. Time obtained a videotape that purports to show the aftermath of the Marines' assault and provides graphic documentation of its human toll. What happened in Haditha is a reminder of the horrors faced by civilians caught in the middle of war—and what war can do to the people who fight it.... (4 pages of article are on link, I posted just first it is too long to post it here, so for the end of story visiti the link) --------------------------------------------------- I think that US forces has to rethink their military doctrine if they wan't to win the war. That is not the way to "win hearts and minds of Iraqis". There is just too many wrong things that are happening there.

http://tinyurl.com/lg748 As a trooper in the Special Air Service's counter-terrorist team - the black-clad force that came to the world's attention during the Iranian Embassy siege in 1980 - Ben Griffin was at the pinnacle of his military career.He had already served in Northern Ireland, Macedonia and Afghanistan as a member of the Parachute Regiment, and his sharp mind, natural fitness and ability to cope with the stress of military operations had singled him out as ideal special forces material. Born in London but brought up in Wales, Mr Griffin left school at 18 with two A-levels and six GCSEs and, although he could have become an officer, he preferred life in the ranks. Within a year of joining the elite force in early 2004 and serving as a trooper in the SAS's G-Squadron, he learnt that his unit was being posted to Baghdad, where it would be working alongside its American equivalent, Delta Force, targeting al-Qaeda cells and insurgent units. Unknown to any of his SAS colleagues at their Hereford-based unit, however, Mr Griffin, then 25, had been harbouring doubts over the "legality" of the war. Despite recognising that Saddam Hussein was a brutal dictator and posed a threat, albeit a small one, to the West, he did not believe that the case for war had been made. The events he witnessed during his three-month tour in Baghdad, and especially the conduct of the American troops, would force him into making the most difficult decision of his life. During a week's leave in March 2005 he told his commanding officer in a formal interview that he had no intention of returning to Iraq because he believed that the war was morally wrong. Moreover, he said he believed that Tony Blair and the Government had lied to the country and had deceived every British serviceman and woman serving in Iraq. Mr Griffin expected to be placed under arrest, labelled a coward, court-martialed and imprisoned for daring to air such views. Instead, however, he was allowed to leave the Army with his exemplary military record intact and with a glowing testimonial from his commanding officer, who described him as a "balanced and honest soldier who possesses the strength and character to genuinely have the courage of his convictions". In his first interview since being discharged from the SAS in June last year, Mr Griffin explained why he has decided to speak out about the war. He said: "I saw a lot of things in Baghdad that were illegal or just wrong. I knew, so others must have known, that this was not the way to conduct operations if you wanted to win the hearts and minds of the local population. And if you don't win the hearts and minds of the people, you can't win the war. "If we were on a joint counter-terrorist operation, for example, we would radio back to our headquarters that we were not going to detain certain people because, as far as we were concerned, they were not a threat because they were old men or obviously farmers, but the Americans would say 'no, bring them back'. "The Americans had this catch-all approach to lifting suspects. The tactics were draconian and completely ineffective. The Americans were doing things like chucking farmers into Abu Ghraib [the notorious prison in Baghdad where US troops abused and tortured Iraqi detainees] or handing them over to the Iraqi authorities, knowing full well they were going to be tortured. "The Americans had a well-deserved reputation for being trigger happy. In the three months that I was in Iraq, the soldiers I served with never shot anybody. When you asked the Americans why they killed people, they would say 'we were up against the tough foreign fighters'. I didn't see any foreign fighters in the time I was over there. "I can remember coming in off one operation which took place outside Baghdad, where we had detained some civilians who were clearly not insurgents, they were innocent people. I couldn't understand why we had done this, so I said to my troop commander 'would we have behaved in the same way in the Balkans or Northern Ireland?' He shrugged his shoulders and said 'this is Iraq', and I thought 'and that makes it all right?' "As far as I was concerned that meant that because these people were a different colour or a different religion, they didn't count as much. You can not invade a country pretending to promote democracy and behave like that." On another operation, Mr Griffin recalls his and other soldiers' frustration at being ordered to detain a group of men living on a farm. He said: "After you have been on a few operations, experience tells you when you are dealing with insurgents or just civilians and we knew the people we had detained were not a threat. "One of them was a disabled man who had a leg missing but the Americans still ordered us to load them on the helicopters and bring them back to their base. A few hours later we were told to return half of them and fly back to the farm in daylight. It was a ridiculous order and we ran the risk of being shot down or ambushed, but we still had to do it. The Americans were risking our lives because they refused to listen to our advice the night before. It was typical of their behaviour." Mr Griffin said he believed that the Americans soldiers viewed the Iraqis in the same way as the Nazis viewed Russians, Jews and eastern Europeans in the Second World War, when they labelled them "untermenschen". "As far as the Americans were concerned, the Iraqi people were sub-human, untermenschen. You could almost split the Americans into two groups: ones who were complete crusaders, intent on killing Iraqis, and the others who were in Iraq because the Army was going to pay their college fees. They had no understanding or interest in the Arab culture. The Americans would talk to the Iraqis as if they were stupid and these weren't isolated cases, this was from the top down. There might be one or two enlightened officers who understood the situation a bit better but on the whole that was their general attitude. Their attitude fuelled the insurgency. I think the Iraqis detested them." Although Mr Griffin has the utmost respect for his former colleagues and remains fiercely loyal to the regiment, he believes that the reputation of the Army has been damaged by its association with the American forces. "I had reservations about going out to Iraq before I went, but as a soldier you just get on with what you are ordered to do. But I found that when I was out in Iraq that I couldn't keep my views separate from my work without compromising my role as a soldier. "It was at that stage that I knew I couldn't carry on. I was very angry, and still am, at the way the politicians in this country and America have lied to the British public about the war. But most importantly, I didn't join the British Army to conduct American foreign policy." Mr Griffin said that although he was angered by many of the events he witnessed in Iraq, he waited until he returned to Britain on leave before making his views clear to his commanders. "I didn't want to say anything when I was in Baghdad because I still have great respect and loyalty for the soldiers I served with. I didn't want to cause any unnecessary pressure or discomfort by voicing my opinions. "When I returned to the UK for a week's leave I asked for an interview with my commanding officer and told him that what I thought was going on in Iraq was wrong, not just legally but operationally as well. "Initially, he suspected that I had been offered a job by a private military company in Iraq but when it became clear that was not the case he was very understanding. It was a big decision for me. I put a lot of effort getting into the SAS, so this wasn't a decision I made on a whim. "He understood my point of view and his attitude was brilliant, in fact everyone was brilliant about it. I didn't know what was going to happen. I thought I might be charged or end up in Colchester [the military prison] for refusing to soldier." Mr Griffin, who lives in London, denies being a peace activist or a member of any political party, or having an agenda designed to bring down the Government. But he said: "I do believe passionately in democracy and I will speak out about things which I think are morally wrong. I think the war in Iraq is a war of aggression and is morally wrong and, more importantly, we are making the situation in the Middle East more unstable. It's not just wrong, it's a major military disaster. There was no plan for what was to happen after Saddam went, no end-game." • Mr Griffin did not ask for or receive any payment for this interview. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Sorry if it is repost. Outstanding soldier Benn Griffin is. And cool reacton from his co's.

And you can almost see offheading that is coming.

I can't believe there is even talk about people paying him respect. Why? Didn't you read the article? "...Serbia's ultra-nationalist Radical Party, currently the most popular political party in Serbia..." Their political program is same as before - "Great Serbia", program that caused war and atrocities. BTW, he died innocent. Thirteen years after the ICTY started working. Five years after he was captured and taken to Hague. Who is guilty for that?

This was our product. But little smaller caliber. Caliber: 20x110mm Hispano Operation: manual operated, bolt action Barrel: 920 mm Weight: 19.2 kg with scope and bipod Length: 1330 mm Feed Mechanism: single shot, manual loading Maximum effective range: about 1800 meters The RT-20 was developed in the Croatia in the mid-1990s as a pure anti-materiel and anti-armor rifle. The RT-20 name means "Rucni Top, 20mm", that is "Hand Canon, 20mm". It is one of the most powerful anti-materiel rifles fielded by any army in the world today - the only others design roughly comparable to this monster in the terms of the caliber and effectiveness are the South-African NTW-20 rifle and the Finnish Helenius APH-20 (will be posted at this site later). The RT-20 had been successfully deployed during the war in the former Yugoslavia in the second half of the 1990s. It is manufacture by the Croatian company RH-Alan and is officially adopted by Croatian army. The RT-20 is built around the very powerful 20mm ammunition, originally developed for Hispano Suiza HS404 anti-aircraft round of WW2 vintage. This ammunition is still used in anti-aircraft guns in some countries for AA guns and generally available in HE (explosive) and AP (anti-armor) loadings, both suitable for anti-material roles. The AP loading also can be successfully used against infantry fighting vehicles and armored personnel carriers. The 20x110mm round fires the 130 gram (2000 grains) projectile at muzzle velocities about 850 meters per second. This results in high terminal effectiveness but also imposes a serious problem of excessive recoil forces. The 20mm Hispano round generates about 4 times more recoil when fired from 20 kg rifle, compared to .50BMG (12.7x99mm) round, fired from 10kg rifle (such as Barrett M95). To make the recoil more or less bearable by the average shooter, the Croatian designers developed a quite interesting counter-recoil system, that uses a reactive principle. The system consist of the large reactive tube, located above the barrel. The forward end of this tube is connected to the barrel at about its middle point. The rear part of the tube forms the reactive nozzle. When gun is fired, some hot powder gases are fed from the barrel to the reactive tube and back, forming a back-blast with reactive force that cats again the recoil forces. The large muzzle brake further helps to decrease the recoil. This reactive system, once popular in large caliber (about 80 - 100 mm and bigger) recoilless rifles, almost never had been used in such relatively small weapons. This system, while effective in counter-recoil, has some disadvantages, First, it requires some special firing techniques for shooter to avoid damage from backblast. Second, due to the same reason, it hardly can be fired in confined spaces like the small building rooms, and the RT-20 cannot be fired with structures, such as walls, in close proximity to the rear.. Third, the backblast can create additional spots for enemy, giving away the position of the rifle. The rest of the system is relatively simple. The rotating bolt locks the barrel by three massive lugs. RT-20 is a single-shot rifle and thus have no magazine. The shoulder rest and the pistol handle with trigger are located under the barrel, so rifle is obviously a bullpup. The RT-20 has no open sights, instead it had an telescope optical sight, mounted on the barrel and offset to the left.

Thanks guys!

Friend asked me to post a qestion about gear price. He is selling skydiving rig and he don't know what would be a fair price for it. The rig is: Wings (freefly handle, hip rings) DOM 2002 Atair Quick reserve 135sqft DOM 2000 (0 jumps, packed one or two times) Atair Cobalt 135sqft Rig has 60-70 jumps. Thanks in advance!

"Imagine" by GWB! http://ns1.clev15.com/~waxaudio/Mediacracy_07_Imagine_This_192kbps.MP3 Peace!

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/09/10/AR2005091001577.html "Pentagon document would alter nuclear weapons plan Reuters Saturday, September 10, 2005; 9:55 PM WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Defense Department has written a draft revision of its nuclear operations doctrine that outlines the use of nuclear weapons to pre-empt an enemy's attack with weapons of mass destruction, according to a copy of the document available online on Saturday. The draft "Doctrine for Joint Nuclear Operations," dated March 15, revised the "discussion of nuclear weapons use across the range of military operations." According to the document, combatant commanders could request approval from the president to use nuclear weapons under a variety of scenarios, such as to pre-empt an enemy's use of weapons of mass destruction against the United States, multinational or alliance forces or civilian populations. Commanders could seek approval to use nuclear weapons in the face of an enemy's imminent biological weapons attack that "only effects from nuclear weapons can safely destroy," the document said. The draft also envisioned nuclear weapon use in attacks on enemy installations containing weapons of mass destruction, among other scenarios. A Defense Department spokesman told Reuters the document had not yet been given to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. It is due to be signed within the next few weeks by the director of the Joint Staff, the spokesman said. The unclassified document was available on numerous Web sites such as GlobalSecurity.org, a defense policy Web site. A Pentagon site, however, listed the document as unavailable. Other scenarios envisioned in the draft doctrine include nuclear weapons use to counter potentially overwhelming conventional forces, for rapid and favorable war termination on U.S. terms, to demonstrate U.S. intent and capability to use nuclear weapons to deter enemy use of weapons of mass destruction, and to respond to the use of weapons of mass destruction supplied by an enemy to a "surrogate." The document said "numerous nonstate organizations (terrorist, criminal)" and about 30 countries have programs for weapons of mass destruction. "Further, the possible use of WMD by nonstate actors either independently or as sponsored by an adversarial state, remain a significant proliferation concern," the draft said." --- And another link: http://msnbc.msn.com/id/9289875/ By Walter Pincus The Washington Post Updated: 5:36 a.m. ET Sept. 11, 2005 The Pentagon has drafted a revised doctrine for the use of nuclear weapons that envisions commanders requesting presidential approval to use them to preempt an attack by a nation or a terrorist group using weapons of mass destruction. The draft also includes the option of using nuclear arms to destroy known enemy stockpiles of nuclear, biological or chemical weapons. The document, written by the Pentagon's Joint Chiefs staff but not yet finally approved by Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, would update rules and procedures governing use of nuclear weapons to reflect a preemption strategy first announced by the Bush White House in December 2002. The strategy was outlined in more detail at the time in classified national security directives. At a White House briefing that year, a spokesman said the United States would "respond with overwhelming force" to the use of weapons of mass destruction against the United States, its forces or allies, and said "all options" would be available to the president. Story continues below ↓ advertisement The draft, dated March 15, would provide authoritative guidance for commanders to request presidential approval for using nuclear weapons, and represents the Pentagon's first attempt to revise procedures to reflect the Bush preemption doctrine. A previous version, completed in 1995 during the Clinton administration, contains no mention of using nuclear weapons preemptively or specifically against threats from weapons of mass destruction. Titled "Doctrine for Joint Nuclear Operations" and written under the direction of Air Force Gen. Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the draft document is unclassified and available on a Pentagon Web site. It is expected to be signed within a few weeks by Air Force Lt. Gen. Norton A. Schwartz, director of the Joint Staff, according to Navy Cmdr. Dawn Cutler, a public affairs officer in Myers's office. Meanwhile, the draft is going through final coordination with the military services, the combatant commanders, Pentagon legal authorities and Rumsfeld's office, Cutler said in a written statement. Congressional reluctance A "summary of changes" included in the draft identifies differences from the 1995 doctrine, and says the new document "revises the discussion of nuclear weapons use across the range of military operations." The first example for potential nuclear weapon use listed in the draft is against an enemy that is using "or intending to use WMD" against U.S. or allied, multinational military forces or civilian populations. Another scenario for a possible nuclear preemptive strike is in case of an "imminent attack from adversary biological weapons that only effects from nuclear weapons can safely destroy." That and other provisions in the document appear to refer to nuclear initiatives proposed by the administration that Congress has thus far declined to fully support. Last year, for example, Congress refused to fund research toward development of nuclear weapons that could destroy biological or chemical weapons materials without dispersing them into the atmosphere. The draft document also envisions the use of atomic weapons for "attacks on adversary installations including WMD, deep, hardened bunkers containing chemical or biological weapons." But Congress last year halted funding of a study to determine the viability of the Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator warhead (RNEP) -- commonly called the bunker buster -- that the Pentagon has said is needed to attack hardened, deeply buried weapons sites. The Joint Staff draft doctrine explains that despite the end of the Cold War, proliferation of weapons of mass destruction "raises the danger of nuclear weapons use." It says that there are "about thirty nations with WMD programs" along with "nonstate actors [terrorists] either independently or as sponsored by an adversarial state." To meet that situation, the document says that "responsible security planning requires preparation for threats that are possible, though perhaps unlikely today." Used to deterrence To deter the use of weapons of mass destruction against the United States, the Pentagon paper says preparations must be made to use nuclear weapons and show determination to use them "if necessary to prevent or retaliate against WMD use." The draft says that to deter a potential adversary from using such weapons, that adversary's leadership must "believe the United States has both the ability and will to pre-empt or retaliate promptly with responses that are credible and effective." The draft also notes that U.S. policy in the past has "repeatedly rejected calls for adoption of 'no first use' policy of nuclear weapons since this policy could undermine deterrence." Rep. Ellen Tauscher (D-Calif.), a member of the House Armed Services Committee who has been a leading opponent of the bunker-buster program, said yesterday the draft was "apparently a follow-through on their nuclear posture review and they seem to bypass the idea that Congress had doubts about the program." She added that members "certainly don't want the administration to move forward with a [nuclear] preemption policy" without hearings, closed door if necessary. A spokesman for Sen. John W. Warner (R-Va.), chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said yesterday the panel has not yet received a copy of the draft. Hans M. Kristensen, a consultant to the Natural Resources Defense Council, who discovered the document on the Pentagon Web site, said yesterday that it "emphasizes the need for a robust nuclear arsenal ready to strike on short notice including new missions." Kristensen, who has specialized for more than a decade in nuclear weapons research, said a final version of the doctrine was due in August but has not yet appeared. "This doctrine does not deliver on the Bush administration pledge of a reduced role for nuclear weapons," Kristensen said. "It provides justification for contentious concepts not proven and implies the need for RNEP." One reason for the delay may be concern about raising publicly the possibility of preemptive use of nuclear weapons, or concern that it might interfere with attempts to persuade Congress to finance the bunker buster and other specialized nuclear weapons. In April, Rumsfeld appeared before the Senate Armed Services panel and asked for the bunker buster study to be funded. He said the money was for research and not to begin production on any particular warhead. "The only thing we have is very large, very dirty, big nuclear weapons," Rumsfeld said. "It seems to me studying it [the RNEP] makes all the sense in the world." ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Should rest of the world be concerned?

Nothing that good PR can't fix.

There is a video of that at skydivingmovies. Do a search for Felix (da RB house cat) Baumgartner.

Russia and PRC will do that in the future, I suppose.

I was late to work today, because I could not stop reading, so I thought it would be nice to share.

Yes, the first page of that thread don't have great pics. Best ones are at page 4.

Some cool photos from that exersise can be found here. Pretty impresive.

Well, did you hear about "comanders responsybillity"? It is thearm that is used at UN ICT for war crimes. Numerous high rank officers (and even one president of state) were prosecuted for war crimes (that they did not commited personaly) because of "comanders resp." (failure to prevent crimes that someone comited under their command or crimes that was comited on the territory that they controled. Luckilly, USA did not sign agreement that their soldiers can't be prosecuted at ICT WC. Sorry on bad English. I.P.