Foreign correspondent. Contributing writer, Rolling Stone. Former NYT, FT & Jane’s Defence Weekly. Int’l affairs, conflict & security. Marine infantry veteran.

Out and about
Joined January 2011
There’s a story which may well be apocryphal: at an art exhibition in the 1880s the Russian painter Vasily Vereshchagin took General Helmuth von Moltke (the elder) on a tour of the gallery. There he led the general in front of his painting, “The Apotheosis of War,” (1871).
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And the greeting card says:
"University researchers built a satellite that tracks people from low Earth orbit and dispatches a 5 kg payload to within .1 meter of their position, traveling at Mach 25 to anywhere on Earth in under 5 minutes. They suggest it could be used to deliver greeting cards."
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Mac William Bishop retweeted
"Oil has fallen to $115 on signs of de-escalation" is a sentence I just read.
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Maybe we should allow people to call it the Department of War and name themselves the Secretary of War. But only if they actually win a war, that is actually declared by Congress.
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Mac William Bishop retweeted
Hello @elonmusk, Hitler historian here, having researched & written about Hitler for 22 yrs & being a fellow of the Hoover Institution - not exactly a hotbed of far left ideas. This doesn’t add up. It is predicated on the false assumption that collectivism only exists on the Left
Hitler was a far left socialist. Literally in the name of his party!
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Mac William Bishop retweeted
Oct 26 (Reuters) - Russian President Vladimir Putin will hold meetings with Iranian President Massoud Pezeshkian and the Emir of Qatar Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani in Moscow on Tuesday, the Kremlin said.
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Mac William Bishop retweeted
Regarding Russian conscripts, this is not the case. The overwhelming percentage of Russian forces fighting in this war are men well over 30 who accepted service contracts for money. They were not conscripted, or mobilized. For more on this topic: warontherocks.com/a-return-t…
Replying to @skscartoon
The endless slaughter of Ukrainian and Russians must stop. We should some sympathy for the poor Russian conscripts too. Those kids have no choice but to fight and die in drone strikes.
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Mac William Bishop retweeted
Report: In ‘unprecedented confrontation,’ IDF chief resisting carrying out military action ordered by Netanyahu relating to Iran timesofisrael.com/liveblog_e…
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Mac William Bishop retweeted
Israel's Channel 12 Reporting (English translation of their report:) Breaking news in this edition An unprecedented confrontation between the Chief of Staff and the Prime Minister has reached a critical—or perhaps disastrous—turning point over the last 24 hours. At the heart of the matter: the Iranian issue. There is concern on the part of [Chief of Staff] Zamir that Netanyahu and the political leadership might trigger a scenario of miscalculation vis-à-vis Iran, just ahead of the elections. A defense official states that the action in question could lead to a rapid confrontation with Iran at a highly sensitive and dramatic moment, potentially resulting in a miscalculation. Sources familiar with the details indicate that the military leadership fears an attempt to exploit the Iranian issue for political gain—a claim that political figures deny, labeling it an outright lie. Regardless, two sources tell me that the situation has escalated to the point where, during a visit to the Palmachim Airbase today, the atmosphere in the discussion was extremely tense. In recent days, Zamir received a directive from the political leadership but requested an in-depth discussion before taking any action. He also demanded formal, signed legal authorization from the political echelon for the proposed move. A senior defense official remarked: "History will not forget the role Zamir has played here over the last few days." In short: an exceptionally intense confrontation between Zamir and Netanyahu regarding the Iranian issue, occurring just before the elections. It should be noted: all details in this report have been approved by the Military Censor. Yaron Avraham
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Mac William Bishop retweeted
It‘s absurd to make a competitive sport of bread and butter, but the cafes and bakeries in Copenhagen have done that. The latest gastronomic sensation there is bread and butter with a slice of cheese. This in a city where the best restaurants serve foraged food. Moss, ants, fermented things, objects from intertidal zones etc. It’s called bolle med ost (bun with cheese). There’s warm sourdough with a dark crust you can hear across the table. And an interior of irregular chambers to accommodate butter. Butter we thought we knew. We’d bought it for decades, sometimes made it. This is different, whipped into folds. It’s a different physical state of fat. The cheese (usually Gammel Knas, that takes more than two years to mature) is for the salt and the nutty finish. My wife and I became quiet whenever we ate the BMO. Married people will recognise this as one of the better sorts of silence. Neither party is in trouble. Copenhagen’s bakers have been competing over this kind of stuff: flour, fermentation, seeds, the precise condition of butter, the moment when cheese is to be sliced. We’ve now begun to resent all the bread and butter we’ve previously eaten.
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Mac William Bishop retweeted
Shocking text. “We think it’s safer to wait for the Russians (...) Stay safe". That was the French ambassador in Kyiv, writing to the European ambassadors’ Signal group on 24 February 2022, as explosions were already going off in the city. Lots of EU States participated in this most important diplomatic, military and analytical blunder of this age). For 3 months Dutch intelligence kept telling Prime Minister Rutte that an invasion was “unlikely". The agencies relied on a "trusted source" near the Kremlin who turned out to know nothing, because Putin shared the plan with maybe 10 people. USA put the Russian attack plan on the table. Western EU dismissed it. 12 hours before the tanks crossed the border, Russian forces had already changed how they communicated. But the official Dutch assessment still said war was merely “possible". The head of Germany’s BND was asleep in a Kyiv hotel when bombing started. Fled in a panic. Kept his job.
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Mac William Bishop retweeted
This is not just a story about one community. It's about all communities, and how immigration enforcement is changing their relationships with their police departments. It begs the question: what have we, as a society, signed up for?
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Mac William Bishop retweeted
This is demonstrably true. Previously, each Vatnik Soup thread received between 300k and 5M impressions. Now, we're lucky if we get 100k. Our annual views have dropped from 700M to 280M. Posts about Ukraine shared by accounts with millions of followers barely get any traction, whereas our more generic posts about AI, for example, can get millions of views. Ukraine is still one of the hottest topics on this platform, yet voices supporting the country are being throttled, just like Starlink/Starshield was.
Elon Musk has done to x what he did to starlink. That’s why pro Ukraine posts get almost no coverage
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Mac William Bishop retweeted
The regime's security forces are being deployed at various key locations throughout Belgrade, including the electoral commission and public television. Looks like Vucic has no intention of leaving peacefully. This will be a difficult night for Serbia.
As the Serbian people take to the polls in historic numbers, I am deeply concerned by reports that the government is potentially preparing to use violence against citizens aimed at obstructing the voting process. Such attacks are totally unacceptable. I urge Serbia to remain peaceful!
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The fact that bitter-enders on this stupid app are trying to retcon "Saddam Hussein's Cheesecake Factory" into "Obama is attacking the holy Cheesecake Factory!" is even funnier than the original comment, tbh
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Mac William Bishop retweeted
So, 10 days after Starlink/Starshield was limited over Ukraine, Musk has finally crafted his story and decided to break cover with an emotional explanation. Many will argue it exonerates him, I think it poses more questions than answers. Let’s see what’s missing here. 🧵1/6
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Mac William Bishop retweeted
This would seem a great story. But puzzling anyone would take the word of Putin's close Stasi buddy on Putin's claimed willingness to withdraw from regions he just annexed over the view of US government, & give such weight to Putin's nuclear sabre-rattling ft.com/content/dcb57f30-bbfe…
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Mac William Bishop retweeted
Culture is DNA man. Millennia after Alexander, they still drill the same way.
ништо нема да го надмине ова ремек-дело на македонската полиција:
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Mac William Bishop retweeted
Absolutely insane that one incredibly unstable man should wield this power over life and death in a war about which he knows little and understands far less.
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