Mark Flynn

Post-reality survivor, cyber doomsayer, searching aimlessly for enlightenment during a recurring collapse of civilisation, until the final disruption.

[Mark Flynn @mjfly1]

Yeah still waiting for Australia’s @DefenceAust to reissue an updated 'Domestic #Fallout Shelter Guide' and associated Survival Guides because probability of #Nuclear war is rapidly increasing and our new world order of multilateral #deterrence is destined fail.

[Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Agency (FFA) @TunaFFA]

🌏🐟 "Climate change is no longer a future threat to Pacific tuna fisheries, but a growing reality already affecting the region and its people."

Pacific Island countries are strengthening efforts to respond to the growing impacts of climate change on tuna stocks, economies, and livelihoods, supported by a new Advanced Warning System designed to help countries prepare for climate-driven tuna redistribution.

Development of the Advanced Warning System is being supported through the Green Climate Fund Regional Tuna Programme (GCF RTP) under Component B of FP259, which aims to strengthen resilience to climate change impacts on tuna fisheries across the Pacific.

Read more ⤵️
https://t.co/5H921cyBqR

🤝@theGCF @spc_cps @CSIRO @MFATNZ @UNDPplanet @UNDPClimate

#PacificTuna #ClimateChange #FFA #FoodSecurity #PacificRegion #CSEPTA

[Robert E Kelly @Robert_E_Kelly]

My thought too

Trump is obviously bored by the war & wd rather talk about his ballroom. He thought the Iran War wd be a drive-by regime-change like Venezuela

Now he’s stuck & can only win w/ a ground invasion

So yeah, if you’re Israel & Iran,you’re not listening to him anymore

[Lorenzo Kamel @lorenzokamel]

Chaim Weizmann to Balfour , 4 December 1918:

"we should be able to settle in Palestine about four to five million Jews within a generation, and so make Palestine a Jewish country".

[Bureau of Meteorology, Australia @BOM_au]

No #tsunami threat to Australia from magnitude 7.8 #earthquake near MINDANAO, PHILIPPINES. Latest advice at https://t.co/Tynv3ZPROS.

[Mark Flynn @mjfly1]

@MichaelS_SAA @graham_euan Yeah, belittling people as a ‘bunch a children throwing a tantrum over not getting something in the colour they want’ isn’t an argument for this significant change to the AUKUS agreement.

[Raet Lomi @raetlomi]

Fijians for Palestine – an antidote to ‘Suva sycophancy’ over Israel https://t.co/KA2eu6D5n1 #Fiji

[Voices of WW2 @VoicesofWW2]

The idea was brilliant. The execution was catastrophic.

Allied planners knew that the men hitting the beaches of Normandy would be cut apart without armor support in those first critical minutes. The solution was the DD tank. The Duplex Drive Sherman. A standard 33-ton Sherman tank fitted with a collapsible canvas flotation screen and two small propellers bolted to the rear. Raise the screen, drop into the water, swim to shore, lower the screen, start shooting. Tanks arriving with the first wave, ahead of the infantry, suppressing German positions before the ramps even dropped.

The concept worked perfectly in testing. The designers had one requirement: waves no higher than one foot.

On the morning of June 6th, 1944, the waves off Omaha Beach were six feet high.

Nobody stopped the launch.

At 5:40 AM, the 741st Tank Battalion began dropping their DD tanks into the English Channel, six thousand yards from shore. More than three miles of open water, in seas that were six times rougher than the tanks were designed to handle. The first tank hit the water. The canvas screen, designed to hold the weight of a Sherman afloat, was immediately overwhelmed. Waves crashed over the top. Water flooded in. The tank went down.

Then another. Then another.

The canvas screens collapsed like paper bags in the swell. Tanks that had been designed to float became 33-ton anchors the moment they hit the water. Crews inside had seconds. Some got out through the hatches. Many did not. The tanks took them straight to the bottom of the English Channel.

Some crews managed to get a radio signal out as their tank went under, warning the following units not to launch. The warnings either did not get through or came too late.

29 DD tanks were launched by the 741st Tank Battalion that morning. 27 sank before reaching the beach. The entire left flank of Omaha Beach, where the 1st Infantry Division was assaulting, had five tanks to support it. Five. Against fortified German positions housing hundreds of machine guns, 88mm guns, and mortars zeroed on every inch of that sand.

The infantry arrived first. Alone.

What happened next at Omaha Beach, the 2,400 casualties, the slaughter in the first ten minutes, the near-total destruction of Company A, is inseparable from the loss of those tanks. They were supposed to be there. They were supposed to be firing at German positions while the ramps were still closed. Instead they were on the bottom of the Channel with their crews.

The story of the 743rd Tank Battalion makes it worse.

The 743rd was assigned to the western sector of Omaha Beach. Their LCT flotilla commander looked at the sea conditions that morning, looked at the waves, and made a different decision. He refused to launch his tanks into the water. Instead he drove his LCTs directly onto the beach and dropped the ramps in the shallows. The tanks rolled off onto sand.

Nine tanks were knocked out by German fire during the assault. But they were there. They were fighting. The infantry had armor.

At Utah Beach, the sea was calmer, protected from the prevailing winds. 28 of 32 DD tanks launched there made it ashore. The infantry had support. Utah Beach cost 197 casualties. Omaha cost 2,400.

The sunken tanks of the 741st Tank Battalion still lie on the bottom of the English Channel off Omaha Beach. They have never been raised. Divers have visited them. Inside some of the wrecks, they found what they expected.

They are still there today, 82 years later, three miles off the coast of Normandy, on the bottom of the sea.

Today is June 6th.

Remember them.

[ORF @orfonline]

The South Pacific is even more vulnerable, from #PNG to Solomon Islands, #Fiji, Tonga & Marshall Islands. Limited capital and dependence on external #financing make cable choice a strategic, not just technical, decision: Er. Kritika https://t.co/oyhCU2hk1Y

[Reuters @Reuters]

North Korea reaffirms nuclear status a day before Chinese president's visit https://t.co/gZdYd5bwLp https://t.co/gZdYd5bwLp

[Bill Madden @maddenifico]

Trump has just destroyed the US beef industry. No country in their right mind is going to import US beef.

After Trump cut funding for Screwworm monitoring programs, the dangerous flesh-eating parasite has been found in US cattle for the first time since 1966.

[Mark Flynn @mjfly1]

@SkinnerPm Yeah, not without much better leaders, across the board.

[Patrick Skinner @SkinnerPm]

On this remembrance of D-Day more than any other, I wonder and worry if there is anything, literally anything, that Americans would unite over, and fight for.

[Tom Nichols @RadioFreeTom]

https://t.co/Ei31LuRqFq

[Andrew Zammit @Andrew_Zammit]

Blog post on recent terrorism incidents and alleged plots in Australia, and why after many years of saying "this isn't new" I find myself saying "this feels like unfamiliar territory": https://t.co/QyJTBEZnBL

[Johnny Blades @J_Blades_]

Whatever the PNG parliament decides, Bougainville’s President Ishmael Toroama has already said that Bougainville will declare independence in 2027. 5/5

[Johnny Blades @J_Blades_]

PNG PM James Marape hinted at a possible middle way for Bougainville, citing the examples of autonomous Catalonia within Spain; the Cooks’ relationship with NZ; and the four countries within the UK. Finally he said the parliament would decide on August 30th. 4/5

[Johnny Blades @J_Blades_]

Earlier, North Bougainville’s Francesca Semoso called on other MPs to have courage, stop wasting time and be accountable for doing the right thing by Bougainvilleans who have overwhelmingly and peacefully opted for independence. 3/5

[Johnny Blades @J_Blades_]

The most aggressive PNG argument against saying yes came from Belden Namah who attacked Bougainville’s autonomous govt, saying it has not complied with the Agreement’s requirements on arms disposal and governance. 2/5

[Johnny Blades @J_Blades_]

PNG’s Parliament has started debating whether to ratify Bougainville’s 97.7% vote for independence (the non-binding referendum was held in 2019 in the autonomous PNG region, as provided for in 2001’s Bougainville Peace Agreement which followed the Bougainville conflict). 1/5

[Volodymyr Zelenskyy / Володимир Зеленський @ZelenskyyUa]

More than 500 personnel of the State Emergency Service have been involved in dealing with the aftermath of Russia’s overnight attack on our cities and communities. The main strike was on Kyiv, where dozens of residential buildings and other purely civilian infrastructure were damaged again. Tragically, four people have been reported killed. My condolences to all their families and loved ones. At this moment, 38 people are in hospitals in the capital, and all of them are receiving the necessary care.

In Dnipro, a search and rescue operation is ongoing at the site of a four-story apartment building. Part of the building was essentially demolished. Nine people were killed in this attack, including a child. Thirty-five people were injured in the city. The fate of six more people remains unknown. The search for them will continue for as long as necessary.

The Russians also struck energy facilities in the Kharkiv region and critical infrastructure in Kharkiv. Kyiv, Mykolaiv, Zaporizhzhia, Poltava, Sumy, Chernihiv, and Khmelnytskyi regions also came under attack.

In total, overnight Russia launched 656 attack drones and 73 missiles of various types at our people – ballistic, cruise, and anti-ship missiles. A large-scale attack and an absolutely clear statement from Russia: if Ukraine is not protected from ballistic and other missile strikes, these attacks will continue. Europe needs its own anti-ballistic defense so that this war can finally be brought to an end. And assistance from the United States in supplying missiles for Patriot systems is absolutely necessary. We are counting on the support of our partners and on effective responses to today’s attack.

And I thank all Ukrainian men and women for not ignoring air raid alerts.

Glory to Ukraine!