Xi articulates srategic stability with Chinese characteristics. Sounds very much like a definition that facilitates China's rise while managing the risk of war, rather than standard military-balance and status-quo-oriented version. www.ft.com/content/6693...

what

As Trump boarded Air Force One to leave Beijing on Friday, the paltry set of deliverables underscored the rushed and chaotic planning for the trip.

the thing about military victories is that unless they accomplish some larger objective they are just shooting for the sake of shooting

it is not a tomahawk alternative. really the only similarities are warhead size and range, but there's a lot more to a cruise missile

to be fair I think most, maybe all, of swift's audience is extremely aware of what's going on despite her not writing an explicit protest song

yeah, I think it is *very* important to be clear eyed about this. china wants influence and to be seen as a great power but has zero interest (and somewhat limited ability) in intervening anywhere militarily, no matter how friendly the country

so this is going to be a disaster, right? certainly seems to be a ripe field for rivals to emphasize: "Your choice, not theirs" that kind of thing

if you aren't following the jaded east asia/china journos and academics on this site you really should be

I believe it was sun tzu who once wrote: war is just public relations by other means www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

What was a moment in world history where the book burners were the good guys

Many people have a vested interest in pretending otherwise, but the US research university is globally dominant to an almost unbelievable degree. The typical state university is a football team stapled to a R&D lab with a budget bigger than the entire nation of Belgium.

I think the problem is that some criticism (especially on social media, which let me reiterate is dumb and bad) is more like scolding. the difference between "I didn't enjoy that" and "no one should enjoy that"

my tired eyes first read this as "an ACC" and it was like yeah but getting past duke and north carolina is never easy

what people in p.r. think stratcom means and what I think stratcom means are two different things

time to play: are we talking about a football match or national politics?

I always find it fascinating that this device, which allows control of the u.s. nuclear arsenal, is allowed inside a not-exactly-friendly nation

yeah, like, I think it would be very bad for the uk to become super cold for most of the year. it is good to be able to grow crops and not die of exposure

incredibly depressing that the reimposition of jim crow districts across the entire south is getting nothing more than generic horse race coverage

And it's all cool. College chooses a graduation speaker. Students who don't like the choice have every right to bitch about it—even an obligation to do so. School has no obligation to respond by retracting the invitation. The only ones out of line here are those who think this is newsworthy.

tl;dr (I mean, do read it, but): scud hunting is and always has been very hard

we have a great chart on our homepage

so are we doing clear and present danger now

normal people call this "teaching" or "coaching," but sure

not the first to say this, but wow this story would make a great movie

the next time I go to cover an airshow I'm going to see if I can expense an f-35

the "simply sailing lots of warships through the strait won't actually open the strait" concept is not that difficult tbh you have to reduce risk to shipping to zero. repeated sailings doesn't, you know, do that. whether it's the u.s., or all of nato, or space battleship yamato

reupping for the u.s. morning crowd

Tbh I’m growing annoyed that people say Biden was unpopular because he didn’t sell his agenda well enough. I don’t doubt it was popular, I just think it’s cope about how it couldn’t possibly be that voters care more about cheap gas and eggs than they do how many semiconductor factories there are.

[searching hard for something to get canceled over] our family policy for dinner at home since the kids could eat on their own was that we all got the same meal. they can eat it or not eat it but there's no subbing in a hot dog or whatever

this is fair. I guess one data point in the opposite direction is that despite a whole bunch of potential opportunities to restart hostilities in response to iranian action, trump has chosen to do nothing

Reminded once again today that basically all social media at its core is designed to trick you into thinking the time you spend staring at your computer or phone is being spent accomplishing something important

I, for one, welcome the future earth-swallowing micro black hole

honestly my biggest issue with this take is: who cares, it's social media and all of it is dumb my second biggest is there is no point in playing a rigged game, which is what engagement-via-twitter is third biggest is that steeping one's self in far-right takes is unhealthy

the u.s. also learned this lesson, or at least experienced it, with the yemen campaign last year. "scud hunting" is very hard

china doesn't talk much about its missile production. so we combed through more than 10 years' worth of company records to put together this report, which shows 2025 was china's biggest missile production year in a long time--maybe ever (free link) www.bloomberg.com/graphics/202...

in december. that’s right www.bloomberg.com/graphics/202...

oh hey, you know who else came up with a $1.2 trillion price tag? www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

burn it all down

but this is also an abdication of editorial judgment. the classic example is stories about water-skiing squirrels. you don't *have* to write junk just because people like reading it. and you *do* have to write important stuff that people don't read enough of if you do it often maybe readers change

the guy could speech a little, huh

this is sort of an oblique way that ai makes people dumber: by creating the assumption that knowledge simply isn't necessary, you come up with insane ideas about what it can do

not great, bob otoh, having just lit an enormous pile of money on fire for our usual trip to see family in the u.s. during the summer--it will be our most expensive vacation ever I think--costs sure seem like a high barrier alongside everything else

What you write in an “editor’s note” at the end of a story when you are definitely a credible news outlet running reporting by a legitimate journalist

a breakdance battle is the only way forward

what the DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Kuwait accuses Iran of sending an armed Revolutionary Guard team to attack an island in the Middle East nation.

as a tangent to this, I was at an arcade with my son a few weeks ago and... the games sucked! like they are obviously all much more technologically advanced but it felt like gameplay was either shoot (with a light gun), drive, or both. no variety or surprises

Spirit’s collapse left dozens of bright yellow jets scattered around the country. Picking them up is the job of repo men with a special set of skills.