Kevin Sites in the Hot Zone - Chapter 15: Coming HomeIn this final chapter of "A World of Conflict," Kevin Sites returns home to the U.S., only to confirm what he suspected -- that in the year that he was gone little had changed.
Kevin Sites in the Hot Zone - Chapter 14: Israel-Hezbollah WarThe war between Israel and Hezbollah shook the landscape in the Middle East.
Kevin Sites in the Hot Zone - Chapter 13: Sri LankaKevin Sites covered Sri Lanka as violence erupted between the government and Tamil Tiger rebels, pushing a nation with so much to lose back to the brink of all-out war. In rebel-held territory Sites interviewed Tiger fighters about their tactics and reported on the many effects of war still seen in the region.
Kevin Sites in the Hot Zone - Chapter 12: Nepal and KashmirKevin Sites covered Nepal during a time of sweeping political change that followed mass nationwide protests, forcing the autocratic King to cede power.
Kevin Sites in the Hot Zone - Chapter 11: Child BrideIn Afghanistan, Kevin Sites met a 12-year-old girl named Gulsoma, whose incredible story of resilience resonated with millions of people worldwide. She was only six years old when she was sold to a neighbor family in Kandahar as a child bride.
Kevin Sites in the Hot Zone - Chapter 10: AfghanistanReporting from Afghanistan in spring 2006, more than four years after the U.S.-led coalition ousted the Taliban, Kevin Sites found that war is not over in the country.
Kevin Sites in the Hot Zone - Chapter Nine: ChechnyaIn Chechnya during the winter of 2005-2006, Kevin Sites reported on a region still reeling from lingering conflict between Russia and Islamic separatists. The conflict engulfed Chechnya in the 1990s, and even now, half of the population is yet to return. Those that have eke out a living amid the rubble.
Kevin Sites in the Hot Zone - Chapter Eight: Iran
Kevin Sites in the Hot Zone - Chapter Seven: IsraelIn Israel, Kevin Sites interviewed Kinneret Boosany, a victim of a suicide bombing at a Tel Aviv cafe in 2002.
Many long-distance lovers have become experts in how tech can augment sexuality.
No commuter couple should go without Skype, Twitter and mobile phones, while sex toys can take the repetitive stress injury out of a long-distance affair.
But it's not much of a stretch to think that there's a bigger need (read: market) for "tele-amore" devices than there ever will be for teledildonics (online sex toys controlled by a lover from anywhere in the world). And yet we don't have a lot of options when we're looking for devices designed to arouse our emotions.
Not everyone is comfortable enough with both sex and computers to get internet-enabled vibrators working, but we all want to interact with our partners in special ways. Despite the frenzy around social media applications, we still don't have sensual devices that extend that functionality beyond virtual space.
All it would take is something like the Ambient Orb hooked up to a desktop dot to get my heart racing.
Joseph Kaye, a Ph.D. candidate at Cornell University studying human-computer interaction, developed the Virtual Intimate Object, or VIO, to study the effect of low-bandwidth applications on long-distance intimacy.
The VIO is a dot that sits in your system tray (Windows) or desktop (Mac) and monitors an identical dot on your partner's computer. When your partner clicks his or her dot, yours fills with color; as time goes by without a click, the color slowly fades until the circle is just an outline.
In Kaye's 2004 study (.pdf), five long-distance couples kept journals of how often they clicked the VIO and how using it made them feel. He notes that while he originally thought of the VIO as the source of intimacy, he realized that the journals quickly became an integral part of the experience for the couples.
Just as dancing leads to necking which leads to spanking and then to the oral sex, what was enough on day one was merely adequate by day five of the study.
By week's end, participants had several suggestions for additional functionality: a choice of colors, the option to play a sound, and the ability to replace the circle with their own set of graphics. They had become emotionally engaged not just with their partners, but with the application.
If you can get all that from a 2-D dot, think what you could do with an object you can touch.
Unfortunately, the closest thing I can find to that type of technology for consumers is the Nabaztag rabbit, a wireless device that connects with other Nabaztag rabbits over the internet. From a strictly romantic standpoint, they one-up the Chumby and the Tux Droid in that the rabbits can "marry" each other, so that when one partner moves their rabbit's ears, the paired rabbit's ears move the same way.
Chat acronyms, make way for the semaphore signs of love.
The Nabaztags are excruciatingly cute. I've wanted a set for years, but they weren't specifically designed for suitors. (Nor are they the seamless technical experience they claim to be, apparently: The Nabaztalk user forums provide a sobering counterpoint to the Nabaztags' slick product marketing.)
The human-computer interaction folks at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology seem to understand the connection between technology and emotion, but their clever projects -- like the Lover's Cups that light up when a far-away partner takes a sip or the Mutsugoto interactive art bed -- have yet to break free of academia and museums.
Gadgets like teledildonics and sex machines that stimulate the body but shouldn't be used at work or in public only go so far. Sex tech doesn't have to be explicit to be effective: If you and your distant partner have been together long enough, you realize that tech that fosters intimacy, playfulness and common experiences has a much greater impact on the quality of your union than just having orgasms now and then.
I want to glance at the shelf and see an object glowing warmly because someone special sent me a message. I want to let someone know I'm thinking about him, simply by stroking my fingers over a smooth surface.
I know I'm not the only one who wants to interact through something sensual and swoopy and erotic that has no connection to business, chores or taxes.
I want my ambient intimacy object. Are you listening, developers? There's a mountain of money to be made keeping long-distance lovers connected in our increasingly complicated world.
See you in a fortnight,
Regina Lynn
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Regina Lynn is the author of Sexier Sex: Lessons From the Brave New Sexual Frontier. She blogs at reginalynn.com.
1776: The Declaration of Independence is signed. It will take 117 years before someone gets around to saying, "Hey, maybe we should preserve this thing."
The Declaration of Independence can be fairly said to stand alongside the Magna Carta and Bill of Rights as the most important documents in the history of democracy. Its significance was understood from the moment it was signed, so one is left to wonder why its preservation was ignored for so long.
During the Revolutionary War, the Declaration of Independence was rolled up and toted around like a Thomas Bros. map, although, given the vicissitudes of war, that's perhaps understandable. Less understandable is what came later. Water was spilled on it while it was being copied in 1823. Then it was tacked up on the wall at the U.S. Patent Office for about 40 years, where it was subjected to a strong northern light.
Finally, the suggestion was made in 1903 that maybe it shouldn't be exposed to sunlight and, oh, by the way, maybe it should be kept dry, too. The latter turned out to be a bad idea because the Declaration, which was written on parchment, actually needs a bit of moisture to keep from cracking.
It wasn't until 1951 that the first modern preservation efforts began. The document was sealed inside a bronze, bullet-proof glass case at the National Archives building in Washington, D.C. Humidified helium replaced oxygen to prevent further erosion, and the glass was filtered to cut down on light exposure.
Beginning in 1987, using camera equipment developed for the Hubble Space Telescope, preservationists were able to monitor the Declaration for even the most minute signs of fading or flaking ink.
The measures proved effective, so much so that the Declaration outlived its original protective case. After undergoing careful inspection for further erosion in 2003, the document was resealed in a titanium casement filled with inert argon gas. Similar preservation techniques are used to protect the Bill of Rights and Constitution.
The Declaration of Independence remains on display in the rotunda of the National Archives, where it is seen by roughly 6,000 tourists every day. At night, when the crowds have all gone home, the case is lowered 22 feet into a vault.
That's almost as much protection as the French give to Napoleon.
Source: History.com
Former congressman Curt Weldon is helping broker deals between Russian and Ukranian weapons suppliers and the Iraqi and Libyan governments as part of his new job with a private American defense consulting firm, Wired.com has learned.
Weldon, who is currently being investigated by the FBI over alleged corruption during his time in office, visited Libya in March to discuss a possible military deal, according to a letter describing the trip from Weldon to Defense Solutions CEO Timothy Ringgold. In May, Weldon, together with Ringgold and another company representative, traveled to Moscow to discuss working with Russia's weapons-export agency on arms sales to the Middle East.
Both trips were part of the company's effort to tap into the growing -- and often legally murky -- market for selling weapons from former Eastern Bloc countries to the Middle East and Afghanistan.
The Russians want to sell weapons to Iraq directly, but "must go slow on Iraq because of political reasons" and want to work with an "intermediary" like Defense Solutions, CEO Ringgold subsequently wrote to colleagues. "They have not spoken with any American company that can offer the quid pro quo that we can or that has the connections in Russia that we have," he boasted.
A few years ago, an American company proposing to sell weapons to Libya might have triggered a congressional hearing. So, too, would have a proposal to conduct arms deals with Russia, which the United States has accused of selling high-tech weapons to Syria and Iran.
However, U.S. government efforts to rapidly equip countries like Afghanistan and Iraq -- which have largely Soviet-origin weapons -- have created legal ambiguities and loopholes in export controls that didn't exist in years past and given rise to a new class of arms trade middlemen. So, even though both Libya and the Russian arms export agency are on official U.S. blacklists, government officials and analysts involved in weapons sales say the rules have become unclear as the push to equip allies in the global war on terror has blazed new but uncertain legal ground.
Eagerly stepping into that virgin territory is Defense Solutions, a Pennsylvania-based company that is carving out a small but lucrative niche in a new international arms bazaar. The firm boasts as its advisors a number of influential Washington insiders, such as retired General Barry McCaffrey, the former White House drug czar.
Helping the firm make key connections is Curt Weldon, a former Republican congressman from Pennsylvania at the center of an FBI investigation into alleged conflicts of interest during his time in office. Weldon, now a key executive at Defense Solutions, is working with the company to set up these weapons deals.
It's an unusual, if not an entirely unexpected chapter for Weldon, whose time in office included frequent trips to Russia. As an influential member of the House Armed Services Committee, Weldon pushed for multibillion-dollar defense programs, like ballistic missile defense, and earned a reputation as a foreign policy gadfly, boasting of his contacts with officials in nations labeled by the administration as "rogue states" such as Libya and North Korea. Weldon's wild claims about a 9/11 cover-up and his sensationalist book warning of an Iranian terror plot, sometimes earned him official scorn and public ridicule, but it was accusations that he steered contracts to Eastern European businesses linked to his daughter's lobbying firm that drew the government's attention.
Weldon was voted out of office in 2006 just weeks after the FBI raided his daughter's home, and that of one of her associates.
Weldon did not respond to e-mails and phone requests to be interviewed or comment for this article. But in a 2006 interview, before the FBI probe was public, Weldon spoke enthusiastically about setting up a "front company" to work with the Russian arms agency, Rosoboronexport. Weldon hoped this company could sell weapons to the Middle East, and other regions, particularly to countries where the U.S. has strained relations. He claimed the director of Rosoboronexport approached him to work with "an American company that would act as a front for weapons these nations want to buy."
Weldon called the proposal an "unbelievable offer."
The administration, he acknowledged at the time, did not welcome the idea of an American company selling Russian weapons to potentially unfriendly countries. But two years later, Weldon, now a private citizen and chief strategic officer for Defense Solutions, appears to be working on precisely that sort of deal. And whether illegal or not, Defense Solutions' business represents a new phenomenon in the international arms trade business.
In years past arms brokers -- firms or individuals who serve as middlemen to facilitate weapons sales between countries -- were largely the stuff of spy thrillers. Unlike traditional American defense companies, like Lockheed Martin or Boeing, which typically sell weapons directly to NATO countries or other governments regarded as friendly to the United States, brokers are often small outfits run by people with sometimes questionable experience and reputations they will sell to anyone. One of the most infamous arms brokers, a Russian named Viktor Bout, is charged by the United States, United Nations, Interpol and others of funneling arms to terrorists and rebels around the world. He was recently arrested in Thailand. The United States is requesting his extradition on charges of supplying arms to a terrorist organization.
But ironically, Iraq has fueled a new market for these professional middlemen; the United States is funneling billions of dollars into modernizing Iraq's army so that the country's government can fend for itself after coalition troops withdraw. And Iraq's largely Soviet-equipped military is a natural market for Eastern European countries brimming with old or out-of-date equipment they would like to unload. The middlemen, in these cases, serve a key role by allowing the U.S. government to do business with an American company, which in turn buys equipment from Eastern Bloc countries in deals worth hundreds of millions of dollars, much of it financed with U.S. taxpayer dollars.
One of Defense Solutions' sales -- a deal to sell Hungarian-owed T-72 tanks to Iraq in 2005 -- was typical of these new foreign military sales. But on the more questionable side is the company's plans to work with Rosoboronexport, which is barred from doing business with the U.S. government, and Libya, which is still on the State Department's arms embargo list.
The Eastern European-Middle East arms-brokering business, while in some cases sanctioned by the U.S. government, has run into problems, including outright corruption and quality. Defense contractor Dale Stoffel, the president of Wye Oak Technology, and another American were gunned down in Iraq in December 2004 after Stoffel alleged that the Iraqi Ministry of Defense was involved in a kickback scheme. Like Defense Solutions, the company Stoffel worked for was refurbishing the Iraq's army Eastern Bloc equipment.
Another problem is quality. Weapons from the former Soviet Bloc, which the U.S. military euphemistically calls "nonstandard equipment," have been flagged as substandard, acknowledges Brigadier General Charles Luckey, who is in charge of security assistance at Multi-National Security Transition Command-Iraq. In an interview from Iraq, Brigadier General Luckey said: "One of the frustrating things about buying nonstandard [weapons], is that I'm the guy who has to deal with the fact that some broker I've never heard of allowed weapons to get to Iraq before they were inspected."
In one high-profile case, Iraqi officials alleged that a corrupt firm sold them $400 million in shoddy helicopters from Poland. More recently, a company led by a 21-year-old and a former masseur was offered a U.S. government contract worth nearly $300 million to sell ammunition to Afghanistan. The ammunition turned out to be outdated and of dubious origin and several people connected with the company have been indicted. A congressional investigation concluded that the company, which was on a State Department watch list, was able to take advantage of regulatory loopholes by using middlemen.
For those concerned about illicit arms trade, this new wave of weapons deals is rife with the potential for corruption and abuse, but for companies eager to pursue markets once regarded as dubious, it represents a lucrative business opportunity. The problem in these cases, according to those familiar with arms sales, is that it's no longer clear what's legal and what's not.
Rachel Stohl, an expert on international arms trade and a senior analyst at Center for Defense Information, says that in many ways, the rush to equip Iraq has led the United States to throw caution to the wind. She points to a report by the Government Accountability Office last year that found that some 190,000 weapons sold to Iraq have gone missing. "I think the reality is we won't know, until way after the fact, about all of these irregularities with the Iraq weapons provision program," she said. "We were providing them all these assault rifles that have gone missing. Why? They were not following the standard procedures that were in place."
But Iraq and Afghanistan aren't the only markets available to arms brokers like Defense Solutions. The gradual normalization of relations with Libya opens another door into a quasi-legal area of sales.
Like Iraq, Libya has a substantial arsenal of Soviet-origin military weapons, offering a potential market for brokers working with Russia and other former Soviet states. But even when there's not an outright ban, sales to the Middle East are often fraught with controversy, particularly to countries like Libya, which was under international sanction for more than a decade. Even as sanctions against it have been lifted, European companies proposing to sell arms to Libya have faced steep criticism, particularly since the country is still ruled by dictator Muammar Gaddafi, who took power in a military coup in 1969.
While the United States lifted Libya's "state sponsor of terrorism" designation in 2006, other restrictions, such as on the sale of arms, remain in place. A State Department spokesperson confirmed that exports of "lethal munitions" to Libya, such as tanks or related equipment, are still banned, although sales of nonlethal equipment are now allowed on a case-by-case basis.
In late March, Weldon traveled to Libya for a weeklong trip at the invitation of the Gaddafi Foundation, a group run by the son of Libya's leader, and the chairman of Libya's foreign affairs committee, according to the report he sent to Defense Solutions (.pdf), a copy of which was obtained by Wired.com. The trip reports states: "Agreement reached for Weldon to quickly return to Libya for meetings with son [of Libyan leader Gaddafi] Morti regarding defense and security cooperation."
A document dated April 16, just two weeks after Weldon's trip, outlines Defense Solutions' proposal to Libya to refurbish the country's fleet of armored vehicles, including its T-72 tanks, BMP-1 infantry fighting vehicles, and BTR-60 armored personnel carriers. A copy of the sales proposal, also provided to Wired.com, is on Defense Solutions' letterhead, appears to bear the signature of company CEO Timothy Ringgold, and is addressed to Libya's defense procurement council. "Defense Solutions is committed to delivering a full end-to-end solution to its clients," the proposal states. "Besides refurbishing these vehicles, we are capable of providing a full logistics support package, including a two year supply of spare parts, maintenance and repair services, and operator, maintenance, and repair training."
In an interview with Wired.com, Ringgold admitted that he's interested in doing business in Libya and confirms receiving Weldon's trip report from Libya, but denies drafting or signing an arms-sale proposal. "I've never made such a document to Libya," Ringgold insisted, after being read the proposal, and told that his signature is on it.
In addition to the Libyan arms-deal document, Wired.com has also reviewed copies of e-mails from Ringgold discussing the Libyan deal.
While Ringgold denies proposing an arms sale to Libya, he is open about speaking with Rosoboronexport, which has been on a U.S. government sanctions list since 2006, after the Russian state agency allegedly violated the Iran and Syria Nonproliferation Act. An April e-mail provided to Wired.com describes Ringgold, Weldon and Stephan Minikes, a senior advisor to Defense Solutions and a former ambassador, meeting with Rosoboronexport. The conversations included a number of potential deals, including supplying Mi-17 helicopters to Afghanistan and spare parts for Iraq's infantry fighting vehicles. Ringgold wrote to colleagues following the visit, describing the meetings as a "spectacular success," saying the Russian agency "has the ability to undercut all cost proposals from brokers."
Ringgold confirmed those discussions and said that his