US to Boost Nuclear Missile Defence to Counter N Korea Threat

 

 

 

 

 

 

Chuck Hagel: "The American people should be assured our interceptors are effective"

The US plans to bolster its missile defences on the west coast to counter the threat from North Korea, Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel has announced. He said the US would add 14 interceptors, which can shoot down missiles in flight, to 30 already in place in California and Alaska by 2017.
 

But the final phase of the US European Missile Defence programme is being scrapped to partly fund the project. Due to begin in 2022, it would have sited interceptors in eastern Europe. Mr Hagel cited a "series of irresponsible and reckless provocations" recently by North Korea. Pyongyang carried out a third nuclear test last month.

A statement in North Korean state media last month also threatened the US with a pre-emptive nuclear strike.  However, analysts say the regime is years away from producing a missile capable of carrying a nuclear warhead to the US.

"The US has missile defences to protect us from limited ICBM [Inter-Continental Ballistic Missile] attacks," Mr Hagel told Friday's press conference. "But North Korea in particular has recently made advances in its capabilities and has engaged in a series of irresponsible and reckless provocations." The defence secretary said the US needed to "stay ahead of the threat".

 

 

 He said the additional 14 interceptors would be deployed to Fort Greely in Alaska at a cost of about $1bn. As part of the strategy, the US will also deploy a radar-tracking station in Japan. The Pentagon will shift some of the funding away from the missile defence programme it has been setting up in Europe.  Mr Hagel said US commitment remained "ironclad" to the European shield, and that missile batteries would be established in Poland and Romania by 2018. But he said that another part of the plan had been shelved.
 

James Miller, Principal Deputy Under Secretary for Policy at the Department of Defence, later clarified that the final phase of the missile defence programme had been dropped.

"The prior plan had four phases. The third phase involved the deployment of interceptors in Poland. And we will continue with phases one through three," Mr Miller told reporters.

"In the fourth phase, in the previous plan, we would have added some additional type of interceptors - the so-called SM-3 IIB would have been added to the mix in Poland.

"We no longer intend to add them but will continue to have the same number of deployed interceptors in Poland to provide coverage for all of Nato in Europe," he added.

President George W Bush first proposed a defence shield in Europe, which incensed Russia.

His successor Barack Obama rolled back on the plans, announcing a much smaller deployment.

Friday's announcement represents a further toning down of the plans.

The Pentagon said its top North Korea official would be visiting Russia and Germany next week.

The Alaska and California sites were built during the presidency of George W Bush as protection from a possible strike by North Korea. Technical difficulties with the interceptors slowed their installation. When asked about the "poor performance" of interceptors during recent trials, Mr Hagel said further tests would be carried out this year.

"We have confidence in our system," he said, "and we certainly will not go forward with the addition of the 14 interceptors until we're sure we have the complete confidence we need."

Titanic band leader's violin is authentic, say experts

 

A violin thought to be the one played by the band leader of the Titanic as it sank is genuine, according to a seven-year investigation by auctioneers.  Wallace Hartley and his orchestra famously played on as the ship sank in 1912 and were among the 1,500 who died.

In 2006, Titanic specialist auction house Henry Aldridge and Son in Wiltshire were approached by the violin's owner who wanted to sell it. Experts commissioned by the auction house confirmed it was Mr Hartley's.

Auctioneer Andrew Aldridge said they had spent the last seven years gathering the evidence and were confident that "beyond reasonable doubt this was Wallace Hartley's violin".
"When we first saw the violin we had to keep a lid on our excitement because it was almost as if it was too good to be true," he said.

"The silver fish plate on the violin along with the other items it was with suggested it was either authentic or an extremely elaborate hoax.
"Everything needed to be researched properly and the correct experts had to be commissioned."

The tests were carried out by a range of specialists including the government Forensic Science Service which concluded the "corrosion deposits on it were considered compatible with immersion in sea water".

 

Wallace Hartley died at the age of 34 and came from Colne in Lancashire

Wallace Hartley's body was recovered about 10 days after the doomed liner sank but the violin was not listed among the inventory of items found with him. Several newspaper reports from the time said he had been found "fully dressed with his violin strapped to his body".

There have been various theories about what happened to the instrument which range from it floating away to being stolen by someone involved in handling the bodies of the deceased.

A violin was returned to Wallace Hartley's fiancee Maria Robinson, in Bridlington in East Yorkshire, and a transcript of a telegram dated 19 July 1912 to Canada's Provincial of Nova Scotia was found in her diary. It said: "I would be most grateful if you could convey my heartfelt thanks to all who have made possible the return of my late fiance's violin."

Craig Sopin, 55, who lives in Philadelphia, US, and owns one of the world's largest collections of Titanic memorabilia, said: "Popular belief is that the violin was lost or ferreted away but sometimes miracles happen and it has here.
"As far as Titanic memorabilia is concerned it is the most important piece that has ever come up and that includes artefacts recovered from the seabed such as the crow's nest bell."

The violin, thought to be worth a six-figure sum, is the property of an unidentified individual in Lancashire. It is due to go on display at the Belfast City Hall in April.

No date has yet been set to auction it.

Cern Pretty Sure They Found Higg's

Scientists are confident that they have discovered the long sought after Higgs boson, known as the “God particle”, which holds the physical fabric of the universe together.

 

 

 

CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, announced today that after extensive testing it was “looking more and more” like the particle which they discovered last year was the Higgs boson.Finding the Higgs plugs a gaping hole in the Standard Model of physics, the theory that describes all the particles, forces and interactions that make up the universe.

Today the collaborating scientists from ATLAS and CMS announced their results at the Moriond Conference, in La Thuile, Italy, further confirming the “magnificent” discovery. “The preliminary results with the full 2012 data set are magnificent and to me it is clear that we are dealing with a Higgs boson though we still have a long way to go to know what kind of Higgs boson it is.” said CMS spokesperson Joe Incandela.

It remains an “open question” whether this is the Higgs boson of the Standard Model of particle physics, or a more exotic particle - possibly the lightest of several bosons predicted by other theories.Although CERN says that discovering what type of Higgs it is could take some years, it is believed to be the Standard Model particle predicted by Edinburgh professor Peter Higgs 50 years ago.

"The beautiful new results represent a huge effort by many dedicated people. They point to the new particle having the spin-parity of a Higgs boson as in the Standard Model. We are now well started on the measurement programme in the Higgs sector," said ATLAS spokesperson Dave Charlton.

Whether or not it is a Higgs boson is demonstrated by how it interacts with other particles, and its quantum properties. A Higgs boson should have no spin, and in the Standard Model its parity – a measure of how its mirror image behaves – should be positive.

The latest set of experiments tested both the spin and parity, and showed that there was no spin and positive parity. This, coupled with the measured interactions with other particles, strongly indicates that it is a Higgs boson, CERN believe.  But refusing to announce that they are 100 per cent sure they have found the missing link the scientists say that they need to return to the Large Hadron Collider to carry out further tests.

They will now measure precisely the rate at which the boson decays into other particles and compare the results to the predictions. They announced last July that they had discovered a new particle matching the description of the Higgs boson

However, despite being 99 per cent certain that it was the Higgs boson, the CERN scientists said that further research was needed to characterize it properly. But extensive testing has now proved that the Higgs-like particle also behaves like the elusive God particle, which is linked to the mechanism that gives mass to elementary particles. The particle has proved impossible to pin down since the 1960s.

The CERN scientists used the LHC to smash together protons at almost the speed of light and scoured the debris for traces of particles that sprang into existence for just a fraction of a second before disintegrating. The particle they discovered in the process has now undergone extensive testing, and analyzed two and a half times more data, leading to them confirming their beliefs.

 



The Pope Begins Making His Mark

Pope Francis has warned the Catholic Church would become "a compassionate NGO" without spiritual renewal. In a Sistine Chapel Mass with cardinals on his first day as Church leader, the pontiff said: "If we do not confess to Christ, what would we be?
"We would end up a compassionate NGO. What would happen would be like when children make sand castles and then it all falls down."
Francis is the first Latin American - and the first Jesuit - Pope. The 76-year-old has already been swift to stamp his style on the papacy.

Pope Francis will deal with the problems of his Church first of all prayerfully rather than as a CEO coming in with a new broom. But the fact that the new Pope will meet the media before anyone else at a special audience on Saturday morning shows a vivid awareness that prayer may not be enough to deal with the situation facing the Catholic Church at this critical moment in its long history.

 

Francis is a Jesuit, a member of perhaps the most powerful and experienced religious order of the Catholic Church. The Jesuits are expert communicators and it is significant that one of the first people summoned to meet the new Pope this morning was Father Federico Lombardi, head of Vatican Radio (run for many years by the Jesuits) and the Vatican Press Office.  Under Pope Benedict, Father Lombardi was a mere functionary who had no direct access to the Pope. He could not pick up the phone and talk things through quickly - he just received orders from the Vatican Secretariat of State. That has now changed overnight.

Pope Francis is regarded as a doctrinal conservative, but he is also seen as a potential force for reform of the Vatican bureaucracy, analysts say. On Wednesday night, Pope Francis endeared himself to the crowds in St Peter's Square - and underlined his reputation for humility - when he asked them to bless him before blessing them in return from the balcony of the basilica.

The Vatican's account of his first hours in the top job on Thursday also emphasized Pope Francis's humility, describing how he shunned a special car and security detail provided to take him to the Vatican, travelling instead on a bus with the other cardinals.  Following his first outing as pope to the Rome basilica on Thursday, Francis went back to the clergy house in a city centre side street where he had been staying ahead of the conclave that elected him on Wednesday.
"He packed his bags and then he went to pay the bill for his room so as to set a good example," said Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi.

He also broke tradition by remaining standing to receive cardinals' acts of homage after his election, instead of sitting in the papal throne. On Friday, Pope Francis will meet all the cardinals, including those aged over 80 who did not take part in the conclave. On Saturday he will meet the world's media at a special papal audience, an opportunity perhaps to set out some of his global vision.

A visit to his predecessor Benedict XVI at his retreat at Castel Gandolfo outside Rome is also planned, but will not take place in the next couple of days, Father Lombardi said. The visit to Benedict is important, as the existence of a living retired pope has prompted fears of a possible rival power.

Francis will be installed officially in an inauguration Mass on Tuesday March 19th.

Bolshoi cast defend dancer arrested over acid attack

Pavel Dmitrichenko has admitted to discussing an attack on Sergei Filin, but denies ordering the use of acid

 

More than 300 members of Russia's Bolshoi Ballet have come out in defence of a dancer accused of masterminding an acid attack on the artistic director.In an open letter to President Vladimir Putin, theatre staff said the idea that soloist Pavel Dmitrichenko was behind the crime was "absurd".

The dancer has admitted to discussing an attack on Sergei Filin, but denies ordering the use of acid.
Mr Dmitrichenko was arrested with two others earlier this month. Police said they believed Mr Dmitrichenko had paid 50,000 roubles ( $1,600) for the attack on Mr Filin.

The artistic director's eyesight was damaged when a masked attacker threw sulphuric acid in his face in January. After a series of operations on his eyes, the 42-year-old has been moved to Germany, where doctors have expressed hope that further treatment may be able to restore good vision.
'Strong pressure'

 Sergei Filin - before and after

• 1970 - born in Moscow
• 1988 - began dancing at Bolshoi
• Winner of Russian and international awards
• Performed abroad, including at Covent Garden, London
• 2008 - dancing career ends
• March 2011 - takes over as Bolshoi artistic director

After initially admitting to masterminding the attack, Mr Dmitrichenko later changed his testimony to saying that he had not known acid would be used in the assault. Bolshoi theatre staff - including dancers as well as choir, orchestra and stage members - said Mr Dmitrichenko's confession had seemed forced.
"For everyone who knows Dmitrichenko, the very idea that he could have thought of and ordered this crime - committed in such a brutal manner - is absurd," read their open letter.
"The conclusion made by the investigation seems premature to us, the evidence unconvincing and Pavel's confession itself, which was later changed, the result of strong pressure."
A copy of the letter was published on Russian websites.

Last Thursday, Mr Dmitrichenko appeared in court with Yuri Zarutsky, who is suspected of carrying out the assault, and Andrei Lipatov, accused of driving a getaway vehicle. Mr Dmitrichenko said he had told Mr Zarutsky about corrupt practices at the Bolshoi Ballet.
He added: "When he said: 'OK, let me beat him up, hit him over the head', I agreed. But that is all that I admit to doing. It's not true that I ordered him to throw acid at Filin."

The court ruled that the three would remain in custody pending a trial. They were later formally charged with grievous bodily harm.

 

Footage from the Moscow court shows dancer Pavel Dmitrichenko speaking of his "shock" over the attack. Mr Dmitrichenko has been with the Bolshoi Ballet since 2002. He is a leading soloist, one level down from the very senior male dancers known as premiers.

He has been performing the lead role in Sergei Prokofiev's Ivan The Terrible. The attack spurred a round of vicious recriminations among some of the leading lights of the theatre.

Suspicions were cast on dancer Nikolai Tsiskaridze, who was accused by Bolshoi manager Anatoly Iksanov of inspiring the attack, if not being behind it. Mr Tsiskaridze was questioned, but denied any involvement and has not been charged.

ASK MAXY

Dear Maxy,
I am unable to develop feelings of love for my husband of eight years . In fact , deep inside, I despise him .
This is my second marriage , his fourth . In our early years together, I began to notice obvious signs of his having an intimate relationship with another woman . He always refuted this vehemently and became angry with me for even saying such a thing . But the evidence I've accumulated is enough proof for me . I even saw this woman multiple times and the looks she gave me were of the "cat that ate the canary" variety.
My husband has no idea that I have evidence, although I am now positive that he has stopped seeing this woman . My problem is that my heart has a layer of cement around it because he has insulted and disrespected my intelligence by continuing to lie about it . I cannot trust someone who is unable to be truthful .
If my husband would only come forward and admit his guilt, as hard as it would be , I would be able to go through the process of forgiving his betrayal . But he is unwilling . It saddens me that he is still robbing us both of a better marriage . Any advice ?
Heart of Stone
Dear Heart of Stone,
Your heart isn't cement . You care a great deal and are trying to protect yourself from the pain of being hurt .
It's possible that your "proof" doesn't tell the whole story . Your husband may have been less involved than your evidence would indicate, in which case , he doesn't believe he has anything to admit . Please don't play games with your marriage .
If you have proof , show him . Tell him you are willing to forgive if he comes clean and that not disussing it honestly could destroy your relationship .
If this still doesn't help you find the reassurance you need , please consider counselling , with or without him .
Maxy

Dear Maxy,
As a geriatrician , I know how thrilled patients are when they are released from the hosiptal and how upsetting it is to be readmitted a few weeks , or even just days later .
One in five older patients is readmitted to the hosiptal within 30 days of leaving it . Each year , these repeat visits add billions of dollars to national health care costs. Fortunately , there are things people can do .
Patients and their family members should question their doctors , nurses and pharmacists about anything they don't understand . If questions aren't answered , miscommunication or misunderstandings can lead to complications . Patients should repeat the instructions back to the doctor and nurses . That demonstrates whether or not they understand what to do .Most important, patients should leave the hosiptal with a written plan that includes information on how to take care of their condition, when their follow-up visits will be , what mediciations to take and complications to watch for .
We've put together a patient checklist and care transition plan that anyone can download at www.CareAboutYourCare.org . Thank you for sharing this information and helping people stay well .
Risa Lavizzo-Mourey , MD , President and CEO , Robert Wood Johnson Foundation
Dear Dr.Lavizzo-Mourey ,
Thank you so much for sharing this practical and worthwhile information with our readers .Everyone going to the hosiptal should take this information with them .
Maxy

Dear Maxy ,
Two years ago , I married my best friend . I've been with her for 10 years . She has two teenage children from a previous marriage . When we all moved in together nine years ago , there were a few struggles, but I felt they were not unusal and we could overcome them .
But now it's worse . I believe part of the problem is that my wife does not provide enough structure in the children's lives. She would rather be a friend than a parent and as a result , they do not respect either of us . My wife is defensive when it comes to criticism or suggestions about her kids . She always take their side.
Last week , my 17-year-old stepson asked for an expensive item . When he heard me say "no" he flipped out . He was full of rage and it was obvious that he has pent-up anger toward me . I have raised this kid half his life and have provided for him when his own father wouldn't . I don't have the finances to provide luxury items and while this has caused tension in the past , I don't deserve to be spoken to that way and said so .
I gave him an ultimatum . I told him to say everything he needs to in order to clear the air and after that he will be no longer welcome in our home . He should live with his father .
My wife has essentially told me that I'm the bad guy here . Am I wrong to believe in old-fashioned discipline ?
Stepdad
Dear Stepdad ,
I agree your wife should be dealing with this in a more effective manner . But you cannot give ultimations to your wife's children unless she backs you up .
You are overstepping your authority . If she is forced to choose between you and her children, you will lose .
Please check out the National Stepfamily Resource Center (stepfamilies.info) for information and suggestions .
Maxy

Large Eyes Caused the Demise of Neanderthals

 

The eyes have it: The Neanderthal skull (L) has larger eye sockets compared with a modern human skull (R). Consequently, the now extinct species used more of its brain to process visual information

A study of Neanderthal skulls suggests that they became extinct because they had larger eyes than our species.

As a result, more of their brains were devoted to seeing in the long, dark nights in Europe, at the expense of high-level processing. By contrast, the larger frontal brain regions of Homo sapiens led to the fashioning of warmer clothes and the development of larger social networks.

Neanderthals are a closely related species of human that lived in Europe from around 250,000 years ago. They coexisted and interacted briefly with our species until they went extinct about 28,000 years ago, in part due to an ice age.

The research team explored the idea that the ancestor of Neanderthals left Africa and had to adapt to the longer, darker nights and murkier days of Europe. The result was that Neanderthals evolved larger eyes and a much larger visual processing area at the backs of their brains.

The humans that stayed in Africa, on the other hand, continued to enjoy bright and beautiful days and so had no need for such an adaption. Instead, these people, our ancestors, evolved their frontal lobes, associated with higher-level thinking, before they spread across the globe.

Eiluned Pearce of Oxford University decided to check this theory. She compared the skulls of 32 Homo sapiens and 13 Neanderthals. Ms Pearce found that Neanderthals had significantly larger eye sockets - by an average of 6mm from top to bottom. Although this seems like a small amount, she said that it was enough for Neanderthals to use significantly more of their brains to process visual information.
"Since Neanderthals evolved at higher latitudes, more of the Neanderthal brain would have been dedicated to vision and body control, leaving less brain to deal with other functions like social networking," she explained.
"We infer that Neanderthals had a smaller cognitive part of the brain and this would have limited them, including their ability to form larger groups. If you live in a larger group, you need a larger brain in order to process all those extra relationships," he explained.

The Neanderthals' more visually-focused brain structure might also have affected their ability to innovate and to adapt to the ice age that was thought to have contributed to their demise. 
There is archaeological evidence, for example, that the Homo sapiens that coexisted with Neanderthals had needles that they used to make tailored clothing. This would have kept them much warmer than the wraps thought to have been worn by Neanderthals. So, Neanderthals' tool invention ability was less developed.

 All these factors together might have given our species a crucial advantage that enabled us to survive. A  better ability to react quickly, to rely on their neighbours to help them survive and to pass on information - gave the edge to Homo sapiens over Neanderthals, and that may have made a difference in survival.That difference might have been enough to tip the balance when things were beginning to get tough at the end of the last ice age.

 

Up until now, researchers' knowledge of Neanderthals' brains has been based on casts of skulls. This has given an indication of brain size and structure, but has not given any real indication of how the Neanderthal brain functioned differently from ours. The latest study is an imaginative approach in trying to address this issue.

Previous research by Ms Pearce has shown that modern humans living at higher latitudes evolved bigger vision areas in the brain to cope with lower light levels. There is no suggestion though that their higher cognitive abilities suffered as a consequence.

Studies on primates have shown that eye size is proportional to the amount of brain space devoted to visual processing. So the researchers made the assumption that this would be true of Neanderthals.