It looks like the North Koreans are trying to make these planes a little bit harder to spot:
North Korea has changed the camouflage colors for the AN-2 low-altitude infiltration aircraft. The belly is now sky blue, the same color as a drone that crashed on Baeknyeong Island last year, and the upper body a pattern of dark green, pale green and red, according to analysis of a South Korean military intelligence agency.
The North has about 300 of the planes.
“The North’s unveiling of the new AN-2 last Wednesday is an apparent threat to infiltrate the South with aircraft carrying special troops,” a military officer here said Sunday. [Chosun Ilbo]
Who knows in regards to the accuracy of this report, but there is probably a grain of truth to the report:
North Korean authorities are apparently recruiting fresh members of the so-called “pleasure squad” of female entertainers for leader Kim Jong-un after disbanding the group that used to entertain his father.
One source said officials fired the women who used to work at Kim Jong-il’s summer villas. They are currently staying at the Koryo Hotel in Pyongyang undergoing security training.
The women were apparently made to sign a pledge of secrecy in return for money and gifts.
Women who worked as maids got US$2,000 and home appliances and entertainers double that amount.
Kim junior apparently shunned the summer villas before he came to power but developed a taste for them and the pliable maidens that come with them when he was being treated for gout last year. [Chosun Ilbo]
Here is another example of South Korea becoming more like the US where despite smoking less the population is becoming increasingly unhealthy:
More Koreans are smoking less but also exercising less, recent government data showed Tuesday.
According to the Health Ministry, the smoking rate among Korean men dropped from 49.2 percent in 2008 to 45.3 percent last year. Yet the number of Korean men who regularly exercise by walking also dropped from 50.6 percent in 2008 to 37.5 in 2014.
Meanwhile, Korean men who considered themselves to be obese increased from 21.6 percent in 2008 to 25.3 percent. The number of heavy drinkers stayed about the same from 2008 to 2014 at around 18 percent.
Data also showed that only one-third of Korean men don’t smoke, avoid heavy drinking and exercise regularly all at the same time. Seoul, Daejeon and Incheon had the highest number of people who regularly exercise and avoid smoking and drinking. [Korea Herald]
Lts (jg) L. Ron Hubbard and Thomas S. Moulton in Portland, Oregon in 1943 [Via Wikipedia]Wright says that one of the most interesting parts of the meeting came when he asked Davis about L. Ron Hubbard’s medical records. Hubbard, the founder of Scientology, had maintained that he was blind and a ‘hopeless cripple’ at the end of World War II — and that he had healed himself through measures that later became the basis of Dianetics, the 1950 book that became the basis for Scientology.
“I had found evidence that Hubbard was never actually injured during the war. … And so we pressed [Tommy Davis] for evidence that there had been such injuries and [Hubbard] had been the war hero that he described,” says Wright. “Eventually, Davis sent us what is called a notice of separation — essentially discharge papers from World War II — along with some photographs of all of these medals that [Hubbard] had won. … At the same time, we finally gained access to Hubbard’s entire World War II records [through a request to the military archives] and there was no evidence that he had ever been wounded in battle or distinguished himself in any way during the war. We also found another notice of separation which was strikingly different than the one that the church had provided.”
Furthermore, says Wright, the notice of separation that the church provided was signed by a man who never existed. And two of the medals that Hubbard supposedly had won weren’t commissioned until after Hubbard left active service.
“There were a number of different discrepancies on there that make it clear that [the Scientology document] wasn’t an actual record,” says Wright. “In the 900-odd pages of Hubbard’s war records, there were numerous letters from other researchers from over the years. One of them had inquired about [the name on Hubbard’s notice of separation]. And the archivist at the time said they had thoroughly researched the rolls of Navy officers at the time and there was no such person.”
Wright says he’s not sure what impact — if any — his article will have on the Church of Scientology.
“It’s hard to measure, because we’re dealing with a religion,” he says, “and people are drawn to it because of faith. And if it were simply a matter of reason, then one could put this [document about Hubbard’s service] down in front of you and say, ‘Here is conclusive proof that the founder of Scientology lied about his military record and lied about his injuries and lied about the fundamental principles out of which he created the Church of Scientology. But that may not matter to people who are involved in it, who may feel they are gaining something from their experience — either because they feel like the truths of Scientology enhance their lives or because the community of Scientologists that they live among is something like their family. So they intentionally shield themselves from knowing these types of things.” [NPR via This Ain’t Hell]
You can read more at the link, but L. Ron Hubbard reminds me a lot of Kim Il-sung who aided by his Soviet handlers used fictitious events to include lying about his military accomplishments during the Japanese occupation of Korea to start the cult of Kim that put him in power. The cult he constructed has been powerful enough to keep two generations of his family in power as well. Fortunately Scientology doesn’t control a country with a million man army and nukes. Could you imagine how strange a place a Scientology led country would be? It may even make the strangeness of North Korea seem tame in comparison.
