The Wire - May 21, 2024

this is wire for 1700 Zulu May 21st 2024 president's routine information cut off of 1600 bottom line up front ICC considers arrest warrants for Israeli and Hamas officials details of Iranian Hilo crash remain contradictory beginning with international events in Iran details continued to become contradictory following the helicopter crash that killed Iranian president Ibrahim RI new Iranian press statements have indicated that at least two other helicopters were involved in the incident to some degree the collection of VIPs were not traveling in one lone helicopter as initially claimed by Iranian media and some Western sources however it's not clear as to if these helicopters were flying as an assembled flight or if there was some separation of time between each of the aircraft's transit South through the valley to T breze in the ha the lead prosecutor for the international criminal court or ICC has recommended the issuance of arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and Def Minister Galant as well as Hamas commander in Gaza Yaya senoir the IC will now hear evidence to determine if arrest warant shall be issued in Singapore one passenger was killed and many others injured during an extreme turbulence event on a routine flight between London and Singapore Singapore Airlines flight SQ 321 experienced substantial turbulence as the Long Haul flight neared the coast of Thailand following the extreme turbulence the aircraft made an emergency landing in Thailand analyst comment as the turbulence occurred unexpectedly little warning was given to passengers causing at least 30 passengers to suffer varying injuries to include a few cases of severe blunt force trauma this incident did result in one fatality but it is not clear as to if this occurred as a direct result of trauma due to the kinetic turbulence or due to an underlying medical issue the deceased passenger has not yet been identified by the airline in New Caledonia Australia and New Zealand have reportedly begun repatriation flights for their citizens located on the former French Colony violence continues as France deploys increasing numbers of forces to the region to maintain order in the Democratic Republic of the Congo overnight congales forces allegedly halted a coup attempt arresting possibly two Americans who allegedly plan to support and coordinate the efforts of a local Guerilla group analyst comment so far it's too soon to tell if this is a legitimate coup attempt or something else entirely two people are unlikely to overthrow anyone single-handedly but this would also not be the first time that a spy got caught engaging in Espionage nor would it be out of the question for the local Warlords of the DRC to grab a Wester and fabricate a story to consolidate power as there are far too many variables and far too few reliable information sources in the region the truth of this incident is unlikely to come forth for the time being on the home front in South Carolina the South Carolina Port Authority has announced that yesterday's software issue has been resolved and all terminals are resuming operations no further details have been provided as to the specific cause of this outage in Washington DC house resolution 8445 has been introduced in Congress this bill would amend us title 38 and the service member civil Relief act to expand eligibility of all military service member benefits to any American citizen serving in the Israeli Defense Forces per the text of the bill as provided by the bill sponsor quote the service of a citizen of the United States in the Israeli Defense Forces shall be treated in the same manner as service in the uniform services end quote analyst comment this appears to be the first and only time at least in US history whereby a nation is considering granting military service benefits to those in the military service of a foreign Nation as such it's not certain how the situation will develop or if other factors such as the United States uniform code of military Justice law of armed conflict Rules of Engagement or other legalities will apply to these select IDF soldiers as well anal commas for this wire as the discrepancies with the official Iranian helicopter crash story began to mount it is important to consider the commonality of the events that took place to result in this disaster on the one hand Iran officials revealing that two additional aircraft were involved makes sense but prompts the question of how the only aircraft with the president on board could be the one that crashed and the other two aircraft had no idea anything happened at all as insinuated by Iranian media putting together the timeline of events is challenging and results in any number of scenarios or theories as to how this incident could have occurred it's possible for one aircraft out of three to become separated from the others it's also possible for the other two aircraft to have departed several minutes before or after the president's helicopter those crucial minutes resulting in tragedy though completely speculative considering the lack of data available it also wouldn't be unheard of for a VIP to delay a departure personally urging the other two aircraft also carrying VIPs to head back with the intent of catching up in route alternatively the president could have been late for another meeting and flew ahead of the other two with disastrous results it is also possible that extreme weather conditions restricted visibility to the point that the formation broke up with each pilot managing their own aircraft out of the valley this is not entirely uncommon but also causes additional questions to arise such as how or why the two additional aircraft did not hear any radio distress calls or note any transponder data nonetheless considering all factors none of which are completely definitive by any means the Oddity of losing the most important aircraft in a formation of three does increase the likelihood of either nefarious action or a more serious and embarrassing for Iran accident as with most Aviation accidents the nuts and bolts of how tra stry strikes is a long chain of causation with sometimes hundreds of events lining up perfectly for a disaster to occur considering the current International tensions either a consolidation of power foreign assassination mechanical failure sheer ignorance incompetence or bad luck any one of these theories likely means the same for Iran's future more tension via the inevitable election season wo along with tamping down International embarrassment and Iran always trying to save face in the international Arena whatever the cause of this accident and most Nations around the world seem to implicitly blame either United States or Israel for the crash if this accident was indeed purely an accident The Diplomatic complexities of Iran trying to save face in the wake of the attack that never was probably will cause domestic problems for the iatola as well regarding the recent activities at the ha the recent events involving potential arrest warrants probably don't mean much at all in the long run however the second order effects and responses to this development are worthy of note as a reminder 12 Republican Senators signed a letter directed to the icc's lead prosecutor on April 24th this letter contained openly threatening language stating quote if you issue a warrant for the arrest of the Israeli leadership we will interpret this not only as a threat to Israel's sovereignty but to the sovereignty of the United States end quot the letter also contained threatening language towards the prosecutor personally to include his family stating quote Target Israel and we will Target you if you move forward with the measures indicated in the report we will move to end All American support for the ICC sanction your employees and Associates and bar you and your families from the United States you have been warned end quote language such as this is not only openly threatening but also contradictory currently the charges brought forth to achieve arrest warrants are not with regards to Israeli kinetic targeting practices but those regarding the deliberate starvation of the Palestinian population in Gaza Israel has openly admitted to deliberately withholding International Food Aid and the United States building a naval Logistics Hub and continuing to airdrop food is a deao admission to this deliberate starvation as well perhaps most importantly it is unclear as to how the IC potentially investigating Israel has any bearing on the national sovereignty of the United States as directly stated in the letter this minor footnote may be a tased admission of a reality that the American people are not yet ready to rationalize this concludes the wire for 1700 Zulu May 21st 20124