EXPLODING MUNITIONS FACTORIES… AGAIN

If you've been hanging around this website for a spell, you might recall that I've blogged years ago (about five years in fact), about all those mysterious explosions happening "coincidentally" (of course) in Russian munitions plants and storage dumps. A few trickled over into Iraq and so on, and there was that infamous explosion at the Chinese chemical plant in Tianjin, followed by another chemical plant in Rouen, France. Here's those blogs, in case you've forgotten:

What all of this added up to - at least to me - was that we were looking at a covert war that was being waged among the great powers, and perhaps with a little push and nudge here and there from "non-state actors", of which there are a plenty in today's modern world. I even speculated that we might be looking at the use of some exotic technology in some of these events. For example, when the Tianjin chemical plant exploded, one look at the narrow and deep crater it left suggested to me that we might possibly and  actually be looking at the first modern known use of a "rod of God" technology. (I still maintain that possibility in the absence of any confirming or denying video evidence immediately prior to the explosion. Such kinetic bombardment weapons have been theorized for a long time - going back to World War Two and immediate postwar studies by the likes of the Rand corporation. And one must remember the strange comments made by an American general in a press conference to a reporter who asked - loudly - if "all options on the table" during the most recent North Korean provocation included "kinetic weapons", to which he responded with a simple "yes.")  In the case of exploding munitions plants, such accidents do occur, and they can be made to occur by a variety of methods: infiltration and sabotage, or the use of some exotic means of exploding a plant, and so on.

My problem back then was the sheer number of plants and installations that seemed to be suffering from convenient "accidents".  As the old saying goes, two is a coincidence, and three is a pattern. With the above examples, we were well past coincidence and deeply into pattern territory.

Well, the pattern has returned, in case you haven't noticed. There have now been explosions in British and American munitions plants making 155 millimeter shells for the artillery systems that the Ukrainian army uses (western systems all; stories and articles courtesy of K.M., J.Q., the first at a munitions plant in Scranton, Pennsylvania, "president" Bai Den Dzhao's home town (no message there):

Fire Breaks Out at US Plant Producing Shells for Ukraine - Reports

The day after this, at a munitions plant in the United Kingdumb (as one of our members likes to call it), a 155 millimeter projectile actually exploded, but fortunately we're told no one was hurt. This plant was actually the "filling" and not the milling plant, i.e., this was the place they fill the projectiles with the explosives that makes them explode:

Explosion rocks UK's only munitions filling factory, day after US shell plant bursts into flames

Witnesses say BAE Systems weapons factory explosion felt like an earthquake' when blast rocked Britain's only ammunition factory as 'shell exploded'

What is interesting to note is the fact that this plant is, apparently, the only munitions filling plant in the entirety of the United Kingdumb. Ah, the wonders of financialized "economies"... we're a long way away from the good old days of Armstrong, Vickers, Whitworth when the idea of one munitions plant in all of Britain would have been met with derisive laughter...

Now there's no doubt in my mind that one can situate these recent munitions plant explosions in the context of the wider covert war that I believe has been going on for a long time now. Even if all the previous instances were merely unfortunate coincidences, these two munitions plant explosions take on a very different character in view of the recent statements coming from the Russian leadership about "horizontal escalation" and about the old "immunities" no longer applying. An article about ammo dumps in Scranton, Pennsylvania exploding, and then being carried  in Sputnik magazine's online site, in my opinion clearly qualifies for more not-too-subtle message-sending. And if you can't figure out who the message was intended for and what the message was, then you're just not paying attention. Not to worry, though, because he for whom the message was probably intended wasn't paying attention either because he can't, and his "handlers" are too busy explaining why his reference to cannibals having eaten an uncle during World War Two was really just his way of explaining that no one really knew what happened to his missing uncle. Sure. I can buy that. Whenever someone  doesn't show up for an appointment with me or any member of my family, my very first thought is that they might have encountered cannibals.

As I finish this blog, there are already stories out there about Germany arresting Russian spies who may have been planning similar actions on American military bases in that country, or against German munitions factories. Those stories, as yet, are unverified. Unverified too are the allegations about Israel having actually launched a nuclear electromagnetic pulse weapon against Iran, and the Russians shooting it down in order to prevent a dangerous escalation. Frankly, I tend to discount the story for the moment. Not because the regimes in Tel Aviv and Tehran are not completely nuts - because they are - but because the wider pattern is suggesting slow and very deliberate "horizontal escalation."

I suspect the next phase, if there is to be one, will be an escalation into wet works against leaders (don't forget that nasty car accident in Moscow some years ago involving Mr. Putin's chauffeur) with bombs exploding, drones dropping, and the sudden and inexplicable disappearance of some "leaders" from the stage as they are suddenly taken ill and "in the hospital".

See you on the flip side...