This is a horrible tragedy for the unit involved in this accident at Ft. Hood. With that said there had to be some serious lack of risk assessment and leadership to allow something like this to happen:
A motorist passes through a low-water crossing near New Braunfels, Texas, on Thursday, June 2, 2016. ERIC GAY/AP
Five soldiers were killed and four were missing after an Army troop carrier was washed from a low-water crossing and overturned Thursday in a rain-swollen creek at Fort Hood, the Texas Army post said.
Three soldiers were found dead shortly after the 2½-ton truck was toppled by the swift current of Owl Creek during a morning training exercise. Two more bodies were found late Thursday night, according to a Fort Hood statement. Three soldiers were rescued and were hospitalized in stable condition.
No further details were provided in the statement, but spokesman Chris Haug said the search continued for the four soldiers who remain missing. Army officials planned a briefing early Friday to provide an update. [Stars & Stripes]
You can read more at the link, but hopefully they can find the four missing soldiers. It is just amazing the amount of bad things that seem to happen at Ft. Hood.
This is just an example of why Korean youth have such a hard time finding employment when retirees over 60 with no job training are given jobs they have no skills for:
Seoul Metro, which has been outsourcing maintenance work to reduce costs, pressured subcontractors to hire its own retirees at triple the salary of regular mechanics.
And many were hired to do mechanical work for which they had no training.
The influx of untrained Seoul Metro retirees over the age of 60 resulted in the real mechanics being forced to work alone, as was a teenaged maintenance worker who was killed by an arriving train at Guui Station on May 28.
Internal records of Eunsung PSD, the subcontractor who employed the 19-year-old accident victim, showed that Seoul Metro has been pressuring such subcontractors to hire its retirees. (……..)
“The situation today is no different to and perhaps worse than the social hierarchy of the Joseon Dynasty,” said the Saenuri Party’s floor leader Chung Jin-suk. “How is it possible that a 19-year-old young man receives 1.44 million won while a Seoul Metro retiree rakes in some 4 million won per month?”
The history of so-called revolving door appointments – the finding of cushy jobs for people retiring from government corporations – between Seoul Metro and the subcontractor does not end there. [Joong Ang Ilbo]
It will be interesting to see how this plays out because it appears that the Chinese are all in, in regards to their South China Sea claims, is the US and its regional allies all in as well to deter them?
As a rising power, China is roughly charting the same course the Americans and Soviets did 50 years ago. China has land-based missiles, bombers, and missile submarines. And China is establishing its own bastion — in the South China Sea. This sea grab is a logical response to China’s strategic dilemma.
China’s coming submarine deployment is allegedly in response to the deployment of the American THAAD anti-missile system in South Korea. While it is true that the U.S. is deploying THAAD on the Korean peninsula, the system can only be used against missiles targeting South Korea — coming from China’s ally, North Korea. China’s explanation is designed to make Beijing look like the victim. But China, which has its main submarine missile base adjacent to the South China Sea, has been preparing to sail its missile submarines there for years.
China’s aggression in the South China Sea is not likely merely for aggression’s sake, or the result of a rising power feeling its oats. China is acting out of strategic necessity, something even more dangerous because it feels it is doing something because it must, not simply because it can. The ruling Chinese Communist Party has made the calculation that the strategic benefits — having a safe location for its nuclear missile submarines — outweighs the negative attention the country is receiving worldwide.
What does that mean? It means that Beijing is not going to back down. Chinese nuclear weapons, which are the ultimate guarantor of Communist Party rule, are involved, and anything crucial to the survival of the regime is non-negotiable. Barring a new nuclear strategy — perhaps one that rules out submarines and relies on land-based missiles hidden in tunnels — controlling the sea is a must. Beijing has access to other stretches of the Pacific, but they can be easily accessed by traditional rivals including Taiwan and Japan. The South China Sea, for example, is adjacent to a number of relatively poor, weak states. [The Week]
Foreigners plants rice in a paddy at Changdeok Palace in Seoul on June 1, 2016. The event was arranged so they could experience a Joseon Dynasty (1392-1910) ritual, in which kings plant rice to see how the annual rice farming fared. (Yonhap)
The United States has announced more financial sanctions will be implemented on North Korea:
The United States on Wednesday designated North Korea a “primary money laundering concern,” its newest way of freezing it out of the international financial system to curb its nuclear and missile programs.
South Korea quickly lauded the move, predicting it will have a more “far-reaching effect” than previous financial sanctions.
The U.S. Treasury Department prohibited certain U.S. financial institutions from opening or maintaining correspondent accounts with North Korean financial institutions. It also prohibited the use of third-country U.S. correspondent bank accounts to process transactions for North Korean financial institutions working on behalf of the Kim Jong-un government and state-controlled corporations. [Joong Ang Ilbo]
You can read more at the link, but according to ROK Drop favorite One Free Korea these sanctions are “the single most powerful sanction the United States has ever imposed on North Korea.” That is the good news, but it does make me wonder why did it take this long to finally implement them on North Korea? For those looking for the details on how these sanctions will be implemented I highly recommend reading One Free Korea’s posting. Hopefully these financial sanctions are vigorously enforced considering how skilled North Korea is at avoid past sanctions. If so these sanctions really could hit the Kim regime hard.
Some may say this is victim blaming, but I think it is just common sense to not get drunk alone with people you just met in a foreign country you know nothing about, unless of course they used a date rape drug against her which is an entirely different story. With that said lets hope these three guys are vigorously investigated by Korean authorities which have a well established track record of poorly handling sexual assault cases like this:
Three Korean males have been arrested on charges of gang-raping a Swedish tourist they met at a nightclub in Hongdae, Seoul, police said Wednesday.
The men, in their 20s, allegedly asked the woman to go out the club, saying they would “show her Korean nightlife” on May 14, according to investigators.
The tourist and the men drank until the next morning, resulting in the victim becoming very drunk. The men then allegedly took her to a house, where they raped her and photographed her naked body.
The victim complained to the Swedish Embassy, which asked police to investigate the matter.
The three were arrested on May 24 after police viewed surveillance camera recordings and photos of the suspects left on the woman’s mobile phone, according to Mapo Police Station. [Korea Times]
The Chinese television commercial shows a black man apparently doing painting work inside a home covered in paint. He begins to whistle at the Chinese woman in the house who is flirting wth him. The Chinese woman puts a laundry detergent pack in his mouth before grabbing the black man and throwing him into the washing machine. Afterwards she opens the washing machine and instead of a black man coming out a clean handsome Chinese man comes out. You can watch the video below:
This doesn’t surprise me, but the laundry detergent company said they intentionally made this advertisement to be provocative:
Xu Chunyan, an agent for Qiaobi based in the Suzhou, China, told the Times that the ad was meant to be provocative.
“We did this for some sensational effect,” she told the newspaper. “If we just show laundry like all the other advertisements, ours will not stand out.” [Miami Herald]
For those not familiar with China racism is not a big issue with them and this commercial is definitely racist. However, in the age of the Internet commercials like this can no longer just remain with a domestic audience. With that said what affect will the blowback on the Internet really have any affect on the company if they are strictly targeting the Chinese audience? Since their goal was to stand out to their domestic audience, the controversy on the Internet is probably only going to help their sales if anything because of the increased attention. Plus I just don’t expect a big movement with China to develop as a backlash against this company that would impact their sales any way.
Welcome to Korea Finder. The way this contest works is that each week a new image is posted and the first reader to accurately describe or locate the image gets a point. At the end of the year the reader with the highest amount of points will win a Korea related book of their choice.
For this week who can tell me where this location is?:
