With news of the antics of Lebanese "government" hackers, one can't help but look back a bit. We're not that organised. . something else is at work here. The hackers supposedly stole hundreds of gigabytes, from thousands of people, and did so all over ...
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  1. Caracalla's Dunce
  2. Legacies...
  3. Brave new world
  4. Hallow Presidency...
  5. Breaking Tripoli?
  6. More Recent Articles

Caracalla's Dunce

With news of the antics of Lebanese "government" hackers, one can't help but look back a bit. We're not that organised... something else is at work here. The hackers supposedly stole hundreds of gigabytes, from thousands of people, and did so all over the planet. The tools appear similar to the Kazakhstan guys, suggesting the same "contractor" was at work...
Image result for lebanon old computers in government IT

Indeed, something else is at work here. 

What strikes me is the time-line, this was initiated about 5 years ago, It was around the time the top security chief Wissam El-Hassan was killed (Oct 2012). Not sure if this was related to the earlier assassination of internal security's IT Specialist, Captain Wissam Eid was killed (Jan. 2008). Both were linked, politically, to Hariri and his "Future" movement. 
Around that time, a clown was in charge of the Ministry of Interior (July 2008 to May 2011). During his tenure, a few IT specialists were also disappeared, but he was too busy chasing after "valet parking" offenders... 

Nothing happens in a vacuum.  And it doesn't happen overnight. 


   

Legacies...

Ah, the legacies of our (many) mistakes... 
...so little has changed, really... except for, the economy. That has changed

It got worse. 

A divided country with a debt-to-GDP ratio around at least 140% and no revenues. Any shock can shake it, especially now that we've pissed off Saudi Arabia, loaded our banks's balance-sheets with 12%-15% in low-performance real-estate assets
And 2018 may be a year of economic shocks, regardless of all the high-priced consultants' and their "talk-talk".

March 2018:

Russian "Election": The United States may potentially extend sanctions to cover Russian sovereign debt → Bond sell-off on Russian Bonds → Rouble downturn. Not sure how this will play out in Syria

or-234_1.jpg
Italian Election: Berlusconi’s Forza Italia is in the lead, in part thanks to a coalition partner who's eager to tell the European Union to "go fuck itself"... It won't be much more polite if the "5-Star" movement wins, anyway... let's see what the Euro does. Not sure how our backers will like it. 

May 2018:

Lebanon "election": The Saudis are hinting at new sanctions against a major Bank. Maybe even the central bank. The US is reviving "Project Cassandra", and may not renew the "Iran deal" past May. So much for Obama's "legacy"...
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...beyond... all bets are off. 

...Oh, one more thing. That high Debt-to-GDP ratio? Well, for our remittance-based economy, it's likely even worse, much worse. Unserviceable, even. Consider one key parameter: real-estate plays an excessively central role in the computation. It accounts for 20% of GDP, but is worth much lower... er...non-performing
   

Brave new world

It's been a while...

...but there had been nothing really, fundamentally new; Lebanon was on its path to a renewed civil war, and the world was just watching. 

Now, Change is Happening... Finally


http://asendos.deviantart.com/art/General-Michel-Aoun-Caricature-318839950

Lebanon is still on its path to a renewed civil war, but the world is no longer just watching. 

It's Getting Crazier

In the US, an ignorant lunatic has just succeeded an arrogant amateur... At the very least, we can be in no doubt the US legacy of failure in the Middle East is secure; it did not start with Obama, and seems set to continue under Trump



If he makes it that far... The "president-elect" is already embattled; the election is barely over that there is already talk of hacking in some key states while his "base" is starting to revolt against him. In the meantime, the neo-cons are clawing back their position in the administration, and the media's getting ready to pin on him the upcoming Trumpcession and Trumpflation.

Yes, Obama prepared him quite the "shit-sandwich", but he helped it make it so much worse.

But Who Cares? 

We all do; what they do in the US affects the rest of us, in many ways, and there is little we can do.  O, for the emergence of a multi-polar world; we'd have some checks and balances to one country's ignorant arrogance. 
Joy.

At least, we have a new president in Lebanon. He may be the first "made in Lebanon" president for a long time, but he will be the last Lebanese President, if he fails to deliver. Much depends on how he works (or doesn't) with Hariri and his patrons, but more depends on how or if he can ensure the Lebanese Army is the only army in Lebanon...
 
http://www.asendos.com/president-next/

   

Hallow Presidency...


   

Breaking Tripoli?

Is the Syrian War spilling into Lebanon? No. Will Tripoli burn, as Homs and Hama did? Lilkely.

What kind of Yes/No answer is this? Well, there are, indeed, some very obvious actors and actions... But the marionettes are never the only
consideration here. There are two considerations; one "fundamental", and one "immediate".

First, the Fundamentals:

No, Syria's war is not spilling into Lebanon. Rather, the war in Lebanon has spilled over into Syria.The Syrian regime fell the day it left Lebanon, in 2005. It endured for a while, but the Assad Dynasty's needed the resources of Lebanon to survive as Masters of Syria. In their struggle to regain power, they made things worse for themselves:
The Syrians will miss those supports on the long run, since few Americans can now seriously consider “engagement” as an option. And as they look for alternatives, pity the neighbourhood, and its weakest link; Lebanon
This has always been a regional war among tribes and city-states. The veneer of nation-states that was applied over us was just that; a veneer. Nothing more. And the faulat was not merely in Lebanon. To be sure, Lebanon has many faults. But it was all in the open, "warts and all", contrary to all the hypocrites who surround us. While we struggled in the face of those contradictions, nearby dictatorships and pseudo-theocratic pseudo-democracy had fun with us... But now their chicken are all coming home to roost.  Yet, rather than focusing on their own ills, they did their best to kill of the Canary in the coalmine...
And as they did so, they were putting nails into their own coffins. Ensuring Lebanon's war could spill over at their first sign of weakness.

Second, the Immediate:

We're on our way to a divided Syria. One in which Bashar will be lucky if the Alawites keep him in charge of their little Canton... But for now, the immediate aftershock will likely be felt in Tripoli. 
Why? It all depends on how crassly sectarian this conflict will be... In Syria's current sectarian perspective, much of the Alawite elite needs to secure its coastal enclave around Lattaqieh. This enclave has three vital economic links; Northward, towards Turkey, Eastward, though Homs, and South, towards Lebanon and through Tripoli. So it has three priorities:
1- The North is closed off by the Turks, who do not want to see any linkages with Antioch... They may smarten up as the Kurds reassert themselves, but this will be a while. 
2- The East is closed off by the takeover of the rest of Syria by Salafis and Ikhwans. But the control of Homs would allow them to split the rival cities of Aleppo and Damascus, and act as spoilers in the new "Syria".
3- The South links them to their Shiite Allies is closed off by Tripoli. So, to secure a Alawite stronghold, the Tripoli lock needs to be broken. It must break. It may well break ...
And this brings in an "interesting" sectarian sub-plot; as ever, the Christians are "in the way". ; the Christians are divided between Aoun and Geagea. Having failed to assassinate Geagea, will the Alawite Elite jettison Aoun and reconcile themselves to Geagea?
Some notes / perspective:
This blog is not inactive... But it is not "reactive". Rather, it is just tracking events from a perspective of history, not the news. I am no journalist, no political analyst who follows the "news schedule", nor do I listen to news much. I am just someone who's tired to see "big white chiefs" lecture us on how to live, and I have the arrogance to think I have something more meaningful to contribute to the understanding of the region... I just know enough history to see when it repeats itself, or when it rhymes.

And for now, history rhymes
And, If/when Tripoli falls, we will soon see epic fights among the Walis of Damascus, Aleppo, and Lattaqieh/Antioch... Time will tell how the Mohafaza of Jabal Loubnan will react, and if the Wali of Acca-Jerusalem decides to grow a brain.
   

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