Doomscroll News

Category: Security

  • A Note on the Record

    During the Biden administration, I experienced a deeply unsettling encounter with a fighter jet that resembled an F-16. The incident occurred in Medford, Oregon, right near where the “No Kings” protests are now held in 2025. While I was walking outdoors in what I understand to be United States airspace. The aircraft approached and flew directly over my position at an extremely low altitude, which I estimate to be no more than 80 to 90 feet. It slowed its speed dramatically to approximately 15-20 mph, effectively hovering above me. The jet was visibly armed with rockets mounted on its wings, although their operational status was unknown to me. While positioned directly overhead, the aircraft opened its bomb bay doors. I was able to see that the bay was empty. Immediately after this action, the pilot engaged the afterburners, and the jet accelerated rapidly, disappearing from view without landing at any local facility. Although I have been told that this type of maneuver could be considered a “touch-and-go” training exercise, the deliberate and targeted nature of the event felt inconsistent with that explanation. I possess high-resolution photographs of the event but never filed a formal report, though I did recount the experience to a tow truck driver.

    That experience has been gnawing at me, but now, it truly scares me. I just heard the news from a few days ago, on October 10, 2025, that U.S. Secretary of War Peter Hegseth announced a deal to build a Qatari Emiri Air Force Facility at the Mountain Home Air Base in Idaho. Idaho is right next door to me here in Oregon, and I can’t make sense of this, especially after what I saw. The announcement, made alongside the Qatari Defense Minister, was framed as a way to “enhance our combined training, increase lethality, [and] interoperability.” But the whole thing seems mired in confusing statements.

    Secretary Hegseth had to go on social media to clarify, stating, “to be clear, Qatar will not have their own base in the United States—nor anything like a base. We control the existing base, like we do with all partners.” Apparently, this is a standard arrangement, but it doesn’t make me feel any better.

    What unnerves me the most is the fact that this has a long history. It wasn’t a sudden decision. It goes all the way back to Qatar’s 2017 decision to buy F-15QA aircraft, with discussions about a U.S.-based training facility starting soon after. They even did a formal environmental assessment for the expansion at Mountain Home that started around 2020 and finished in 2022. That multi-year timeline proves this was a deliberate, long-term plan. The fighter jet came after me in 2023. Was what I saw related to this long-term plan?

    Seeing this controversy erupt over a secretively planned, long-term military partnership right next door makes my very personal, terrifying experience feel like a small piece of a much larger, more disturbing puzzle. This encounter has left a lasting impression and leads me to question the nature of publicly discussed aerial phenomena. When officials speak about Unidentified Aerial Phenomena (UAPs) or UFOs, I wonder if they are referring to highly unusual and intimidating encounters such as this.

  • The Bucksnort Disaster: An Investigative Analysis of the Accurate Energetic Systems Explosion

    This report provides a comprehensive investigative analysis of the catastrophic explosion at the Accurate Energetic Systems facility. The incident occurred in Bucksnort, Tennessee, on October 10, 2025.¹

    The purpose of this document is to move beyond initial reporting. It examines the incident’s context, its probable causes, and its significant strategic implications for the United States defense industrial base.

    This analysis synthesizes available evidence on the company’s operational history, regulatory compliance, and internal safety culture. It seeks to provide a clear assessment of the factors that led to the disaster and to offer actionable recommendations to prevent a future recurrence.

    Executive Summary

    On October 10, 2025, a massive explosion occurred at the Accurate Energetic Systems (AES) facility in Bucksnort, Tennessee.² The blast destroyed a production building and killed 18 employees.¹ It also triggered a multi-agency investigation involving the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).³, ⁴ The event included secondary detonations, which highlighted a catastrophic failure of the plant’s safety systems.⁵, ⁶

    Key findings reveal that AES, a certified Women-Owned Small Business (WOSB), served as a critical supplier of foundational energetic materials for the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD).⁷, ⁸ These materials included Trinitrotoluene (TNT).⁸ The company was fulfilling a $119.6 million sole-bid contract for the U.S. Army.⁹, ¹⁰ This underscores its strategic importance as a chokepoint in the national defense supply chain.⁹

    The company’s history shows a pattern of significant safety lapses that foreshadowed the disaster. This includes a fatal explosion on its property in 2014.¹ Additionally, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) cited AES in 2019 for multiple “Serious” violations related to fundamental failures in safety protocols and training.¹¹, ¹² This record points to a deeply rooted, negative safety culture.

    The official investigation is ongoing. However, the preponderance of evidence strongly suggests the explosion was an industrial accident precipitated by systemic negligence, not a random event. There is no direct evidence linking the disaster to NATO munitions, the conflict in Ukraine, or foreign sabotage.

    The most probable cause was a catastrophic failure made possible by a long-standing, deficient safety culture where documented risks went unaddressed. An electrostatic discharge (ESD) event is the likely immediate trigger.¹³ The destruction of this facility exposes a critical vulnerability in the defense supply chain. This demands urgent policy action from the DoD to secure its lower-tier suppliers and prevent a similar tragedy.

    Table of Contents

    1. Reconstructing the Disaster: Timeline and Analysis
    2. Corporate Dossier: Accurate Energetic Systems, LLC
    3. A Legacy of Hazard: Prior Incidents and Regulatory Scrutiny
    4. Inside the Gates: A Review of Internal Safety and Quality Protocols
    5. The Human Element: Management, Personnel, and Labor Environment
    6. A Critical Node: Supply Chain and Logistics Assessment
    7. Assessing the Cause: An Evaluation of Plausible Scenarios
    8. Conclusions and Strategic Recommendations
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  • A Comprehensive Vulnerability Assessment of the Lattice AI Platform: An Analysis of Technical, Operational, and Strategic Weaknesses

    A Comprehensive Vulnerability Assessment of the Lattice AI Platform: An Analysis of Technical, Operational, and Strategic Weaknesses

    Executive Summary

    This report provides a comprehensive vulnerability assessment of a “Lattice-like” AI-powered command and control platform. Such a platform is an advanced, software-defined operating system designed to fuse sensor data and coordinate autonomous military assets. This analysis moves beyond isolated technical flaws to present an integrated view of the platform’s weaknesses across technical, operational, systemic, human, and strategic domains. It argues that the platform’s core strengths—speed, autonomy, and data fusion—are also the source of its most profound and interconnected vulnerabilities.

    Key Findings

    • Algorithmic and Data-Centric Vulnerabilities: The platform’s AI core is susceptible to data poisoning, adversarial deception, and inherent bias. These can corrupt its decision-making integrity at a foundational level. The reliance on a complex software supply chain, including open-source components, creates additional vectors for compromise. ³⁴ ¹⁰⁸
    • Operational and Network-Layer Threats: In the field, the system is vulnerable to electronic warfare, sensor spoofing (particularly of GNSS signals), and logical attacks on its decentralized mesh network. These attacks can sever its connection to reality and render its algorithms useless or dangerous. ⁵⁴ ⁹⁷
    • Systemic and Architectural Flaws: The platform’s hardware-agnostic and multi-vendor design, while flexible, introduces “brittleness” and critical security gaps at integration “seams.” This was demonstrated by the real-world deficiencies found in the Next Generation Command and Control (NGC2) prototype.¹ ¹⁵ ⁴⁵ ⁶¹ ⁷⁵ ¹⁰⁹ ¹⁴² ¹⁴⁹ The system’s complexity can also lead to unpredictable and dangerous emergent behaviors.²² ¹⁰³ ¹¹⁶
    • Human, Ethical, and Legal Failures: The system’s speed and opacity challenge meaningful human control by inducing automation bias, a phenomenon implicated in historical incidents like the 2003 Patriot missile fratricides.³⁰ ⁷² ⁹⁵ ⁹⁶ ¹⁰⁵ This creates a legal “accountability gap” and poses significant challenges to compliance with International Humanitarian Law.⁴ ⁵ ²⁴
    • Strategic and Dual-Use Risks: The core surveillance and data-fusion technologies are inherently dual-use. This poses a risk of them being repurposed for domestic oppression.³¹ ⁵⁶ The proliferation of such advanced autonomous capabilities also risks triggering a new, destabilizing global arms race.²³ ⁵⁵ ⁸⁸ ¹¹² ¹²⁴ ¹²⁶ ¹⁷⁷ ¹⁸⁶

    The report concludes that these weaknesses are not isolated. They exist in a causal chain where a failure in one domain can cascade and lead to catastrophic outcomes. To mitigate these risks, this assessment proposes a series of strategic recommendations. These include mandating continuous adversarial testing, investing in operationally-focused Explainable AI (XAI), enforcing a Zero Trust architecture, overhauling operator training to focus on cognitive skills, and reforming acquisition processes to prioritize holistic security and reliability. The report also highlights the challenges associated with implementing these mitigations and suggests areas for future research, emphasizing the need for continuous adaptation to the evolving threat landscape.

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  • Project Babylon: An Intelligence Assessment of the Iraqi Supergun Program

    Project Babylon was a confirmed, state-sponsored weapons development program initiated by the government of Iraq and active between 1988 and 1990. The program’s objective was the design, clandestine procurement, and construction of the largest conventional artillery pieces ever conceived. Contrary to some popular misconceptions, the technology was based entirely on established ballistic principles and chemical propellants, not on theoretical electromagnetic or railgun systems. The program was the brainchild and life’s work of the brilliant but controversial Canadian artillery engineer, Dr. Gerald Bull, who found in Iraqi President Saddam Hussein a patron with the ambition and resources to fund his vision.   

    The program’s stated purpose was dual-use: to provide Iraq with a cost-effective, independent capability to launch satellites into low Earth orbit, while also possessing an inherent, undeniable potential for strategic long-range bombardment. This dual nature was a source of significant international concern, as the weapon’s theoretical range placed key regional adversaries, including Israel and Iran, within its reach.   

    Project Babylon successfully produced and test-fired one functional, sub-scale prototype known as “Baby Babylon”. However, the full-scale weapon, “Big Babylon,” was never completed. The program was abruptly and decisively neutralized in the spring of 1990 through a sophisticated, multi-pronged counter-proliferation effort. This effort culminated in two key events: the assassination of Dr. Gerald Bull in Brussels in March 1990, which decapitated the project’s technical leadership, and the subsequent coordinated seizure of critical gun components by customs authorities across Europe in April 1990.   

    Following the 1991 Persian Gulf War, the government of Iraq admitted to the existence of the program. All remaining hardware, including the completed prototype and the unassembled components of the full-scale gun, were located, documented, and systematically destroyed under the supervision of the United Nations Special Commission (UNSCOM). The existence, technical specifications, and ultimate fate of Project Babylon are not matters of speculation or conspiracy theory; they are a thoroughly documented chapter in the history of unconventional weapons proliferation. This report provides a comprehensive assessment of the program, from its conceptual origins to its final dismantlement.  

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  • Why Cryptocurrency is a House of Cards

    In late April 2025, an elderly investor in the United States became the victim of a devastating social engineering attack. The prize for the hackers: 3,520 Bitcoin, worth over $330 million. What happened next was a masterclass in modern money laundering. The stolen funds were rapidly funneled through at least six different exchanges and swapped for Monero (XMR), a cryptocurrency famous for its promise of privacy. The massive purchases caused Monero’s price to surge by a verifiable 8.2% in just two hours, triggering such extreme volatility that some illiquid markets saw temporary intraday spikes as high as 50%.

    This single, dramatic event is more than just another crypto-theft headline. It’s a key that unlocks the door to the crypto ecosystem’s most surprising and misunderstood secrets. It peels back the curtain on the popular narratives and reveals a far more complex—and often contradictory—reality. What follows are five critical truths, drawn from academic research, leaked data, and strategic analysis, that challenge everything you think you know about digital currency.

    1. The World’s Most “Untraceable” Coin is Shockingly Easy to Trace

    For criminals and privacy purists alike, Monero (XMR) is the holy grail: a digital currency advertised as completely untraceable. It is the preferred medium of exchange on darknet markets and the ransom currency for sophisticated cybercriminal gangs. Its core promise and entire reason for being is “untraceability.”

    But a groundbreaking academic paper, “A Traceability Analysis of Monero’s Blockchain,” revealed a shockingly different reality. In a real-world analysis of Monero’s public ledger, researchers uncovered devastating flaws in its privacy protections.

    • The Zero Mix-in Flaw: Monero’s privacy relies on “mix-ins,” which are decoy transactions used to hide the real sender. The analysis found that a staggering 65.9% of all Monero inputs used zero mix-ins. Without any decoys, these transactions were trivially traceable.

    • The Cascade Effect: Each of these easily traced transactions created a domino effect. As researchers identified the real sender in one transaction, they could use that information to eliminate it as a decoy in other transactions. This “cascade effect” allowed them to de-anonymize other, seemingly protected transactions.

    The final conclusion was stunning: a passive adversary—meaning someone with access only to the public blockchain data and no special hacking tools—could trace a conclusive 88% of all Monero inputs. This massive gap between theory and practice hasn’t gone unnoticed by authorities. The U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has awarded contracts to blockchain analysis firms like Chainalysis specifically to develop Monero-tracing tools, proving that the world’s most “private” coin is anything but.

    But if the privacy is an illusion, what about the price itself? The data reveals an even more fragile foundation.

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  • TIL: National Security Entry-Exit Registration System (NSEERS)

    Dec 22, 2016

    Obama Administration Scraps Post-9/11 Immigrant Registry: In a move to preemptively block its use by the incoming administration, President Barack Obama’s administration officially dismantled the regulatory framework for the National Security Entry-Exit Registration System (NSEERS). The program, which had been dormant since 2011, had required registration and tracking of male immigrants from predominantly Muslim countries.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Security_Entry-Exit_Registration_System

  • The Art of the Missile

    I have a hunch about something I call ‘the art of the missile,’ and it makes me question if tariffs alone are a durable solution to our debt. It’s a feeling that we are underestimating how fragile our entire economic system is in the face of modern warfare tactics.

    My concern is that the strength of tariffs depends entirely on a functioning economy with intact infrastructure like ports, power grids, and manufacturing hubs. What happens to the power of those tariffs when the Axis of Evil decides to use a few well placed Zircon cruise missiles or a swarm of advanced drones? They have these weapons stockpiled and ready to mobilize. If Putin or another adversary starts shooting, not necessarily at people, but at our critical economic infrastructure, the entire tariff structure could collapse overnight. Your solution to the debt would be gone in an instant.

    Beyond that direct military threat, you cannot deny there seems to be a significant media cover up suggesting things are not what they seem on the world stage. How do we explain the reports where Ukrainians and their helpers conveniently evacuate a key area right before it gets hit, or when the Russians do the same thing before a major strike on one of their important targets? It points to a level of coordination or information control hidden from the public. It all feels managed, especially when you see players like JP Morgan lining up with Biden to talk about rebuilding everything afterward. It suggests the conflict itself is just a phase in a larger economic plan for the global elite.

    This is why when people bring up other solutions, like AI and technological dominance saving us, that argument feels way too pie in the sky for me. So much of that future hinges on one single company in one of the most volatile places on earth, TSMC in Taiwan. That one company is both the crown jewel of the modern world and its most glaring Achilles’ heel. Any project or economic model that relies so heavily on that single point of failure is not a serious plan, it is a fantasy.