RUDE HARASSMENT Japan increased the maximum time for new soldiers from 26 to 32 in 2018 in an effort to stop the collapse. The July report suggested that using more autonomous aircraft in the air, on property, and at sea is another option. According to reports, the army is evenContinue Reading
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A blackmail scam is using instant loan apps to entrap and humiliate people across India and other countries in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. At least 60 Indians have killed themselves after being abused and threatened. A BBC undercover investigation has exposed those profiting from this deadly scam in India and China.
Astha Sinhaa woke up to her aunt’s panicked voice on the phone. “Don’t let your mother leave the house.”
Half-asleep, the 17-year-old was terrified to find her mum Bhoomi Sinhaa in the next room, sobbing and frantic.
Here was her funny and fearless mother, a respected Mumbai-based property lawyer, a widow raising her daughter alone, reduced to a frenzied mess.
“She was breaking apart,” Astha says. A panicked Bhoomi started telling her where all the important documents and contacts were, and seemed desperate to get out of the door.
Astha knew she had to stop her. “Don’t let her out of your sight,” her aunt had told her. “Because she will end her life.”
Astha knew her mother had been getting some weird calls and that she owed somebody money, but she had no idea that Bhoomi was reeling from months of harassment and psychological torture.
She had fallen victim to a global scam with tentacles in at least 14 countries that uses shame and blackmail to make a profit – destroying lives in the process.
The business model is brutal but simple.
There are many apps that promise hassle-free loans in minutes. Not all of them are predatory. But many – once downloaded – harvest your contacts, photos and ID cards, and use that information later to extort you.
When customers don’t repay on time – and sometimes even when they do – they share this information with a call centre where young agents of the gig economy, armed with laptops and phones are trained to harass and humiliate people into repayment.
At the end of 2021, Bhoomi had borrowed about 47,000 rupees ($565; £463) from several loan apps while she waited for some work expenses to come through. The money arrived almost immediately but with a big chunk deducted in charges. Seven days later she was due to repay but her expenses still hadn’t been paid, so she borrowed from another app and then another. The debt and interest spiralled until she owed about two million rupees ($24,000; £19,655).
Soon the recovery agents started calling. They quickly turned nasty, slamming Bhoomi with insults and abuse. Even when she had paid, they claimed she was lying. They called up to 200 times a day. They knew where she lived, they said, and sent her pictures of a dead body as a warning.
As the abuse escalated they threatened to message all of the 486 contacts in her phone telling them she was a thief and a whore. When they threatened to tarnish her daughter’s reputation too, Bhoomi could no longer sleep.
She borrowed from friends, family and more and more apps – 69 in total. At night, she prayed the morning would never come. But without fail at 07:00, her phone would start pinging and buzzing incessantly.
Eventually, Bhoomi had managed to pay back all of the money, but one app in particular – Asan Loan – wouldn’t stop calling. Exhausted, she couldn’t concentrate at work and started having panic attacks.
One day a colleague called her over to his desk and showed her something on his phone – a naked, pornographic picture of her.
The photo had been crudely photoshopped, Bhoomi’s head stuck on someone else’s body, but it filled her with disgust and shame. She collapsed by her colleague’s desk. It had been sent by Asan Loan to every contact in her phone book. That was when Bhoomi thought of killing herself.
We’ve seen evidence of scams like this run by various companies all over the world. But in India alone, the BBC has found at least 60 people have killed themselves after being harassed by loan apps.
Most were in their 20s and 30s – a fireman, an award-winning musician, a young mum and dad leaving behind their three- and five-year-old daughters, a grandfather and grandson who got involved in loan apps together. Four were just teenagers.
Most victims are too ashamed to speak about the scam, and the perpetrators have remained, for the most part, anonymous and invisible. After looking for an insider for months, the BBC managed to track down a young man who had worked as a debt recovery agent for call centres working for multiple loan apps.
Rohan – not his real name – told us he had been troubled by the abuse he had witnessed. Many customers cried, some threatened to kill themselves, he said. “It would haunt me all night.” He agreed to help the BBC expose the scam.
He applied for a job in two different call centres – Majesty Legal Services and Callflex Corporation – and spent weeks filming undercover.
His videos captured young agents harassing clients. “Behave or I will smash you,” one woman says, swearing. She accuses the customer of incest and, when he hangs up, she starts laughing. Another suggests the client should prostitute his mother to repay the loan.
Rohan recorded over 100 incidents of harassment and abuse, capturing this systematic extortion on camera for the first time.
The worst abuse he witnessed took place at Callflex Corporation, just outside Delhi. Here, agents routinely used obscene language to humiliate and threaten customers. These were not rogue agents going off-script – they were supervised and directed by managers at the call centre, including one called Vishal Chaurasia.
Rohan gained Chaurasia’s trust, and together with a journalist posing as an investor, arranged a meeting at which they asked him to explain exactly how the scam works.
When a customer takes out a loan, he explained, they give the app access to the contacts on their phone. Callflex Corporation is hired to recover the money – and if the customer misses a payment the company starts hassling them, and then their contacts. His staff can say anything, Chaurasia told them, as long as they get a repayment.
“The customer then pays because of the shame,” he said. “You’ll find at least one person in his contact list who can destroy his life.”
We approached Chaurasia directly but he did not want to comment. Callflex Corporation did not respond to our efforts to contact them.
One of the many lives destroyed was Kirni Mounika’s.
The 24-year-old civil servant was the brains of her family, the only student at her school to get a government job, a doting sister to her three brothers. Her father, a successful farmer, was ready to support her to do a masters in Australia.
The Monday she took her own life, three years ago, she had hopped on her scooter to go to work as usual.
“She was all smiles,” her father, Kirni Bhoopani, says.
It was only when police reviewed Mounika’s phone and bank statements that they found out she had borrowed from 55 different loan apps. It started with a loan of 10,000 rupees ($120; £100) and spiralled to more than 30 times that. By the time she decided to kill herself, she had paid back more than 300,000 rupees ($3,600; £2,960).
Police say the apps harassed her with calls and vulgar messages – and had started messaging her contacts.
Mounika’s room is now a makeshift shrine. Her government ID card hangs by the door, the bag her mum packed for a wedding still lying there.
The thing that upsets her father the most is that she hadn’t told him what was going on. “We could have easily arranged the money,” he says, wiping tears from his eyes.
He’s furious at the people who did this.
As he was taking his daughter’s body home from the hospital her phone rang and he answered to an obscenity-laden rant. “They told us she has to pay,” he says. “We told them she was dead.”
He wondered who these monsters could be.
Hari – not his real name – worked at a call centre doing recovery for one of the apps Mounika had borrowed from. The pay was good but by the time Mounika died he was already feeling uneasy about what he was part of.
Although he claims not to have made abusive calls himself – he says he was in the team that made initial polite calls – he told us managers instructed staff to abuse and threaten people.
The agents would send messages to a victim’s contacts, painting the victim as a fraud and a thief.
“Everyone has a reputation to maintain in front of their family. No-one is going to spoil that reputation for the measly sum of 5,000 rupees,” he says.
Once a payment had been made the system would ping “Success!” and they would move on to the next client.
When clients started threatening to take their own lives nobody took it seriously – then the suicides started happening. The staff called their boss, Parshuram Takve, to ask if they should stop.
The following day Takve appeared in the office. He was angry. “He said, ‘Do what you’re told and make recoveries,'” Hari says. So they did.
A few months later, Mounika was dead.
Takve was ruthless. But he wasn’t running this operation alone. Sometimes, Hari says, the software interface would switch to Chinese without warning.
Takve was married to a Chinese woman called Liang Tian Tian. Together, they had set up the loan recovery business, Jiyaliang, in Pune, where Hari worked.
In December 2020, Takve and Liang were arrested by police investigating a case of harassment and released on bail a few months later.
In April 2022 they were charged with extortion, intimidation and abetment of suicide. By the end of the year they were on the run.
We couldn’t track down Takve. But when we investigated the apps Jiyaliang worked for, it led us to a Chinese businessman called Li Xiang.
He has no online presence, but we found a phone number linked to one of his employees and, posing as investors, set up a meeting with Li.
With his face shoved uncomfortably close to the camera, he bragged about his businesses in India.
“We are still operating now, just not letting Indians know we are a Chinese company,” he said.
Back in 2021, two of Li’s companies had been raided by Indian police investigating harassment by loan apps. Their bank accounts had been frozen.
“You need to understand that because we aim to recover our investment quickly, we certainly don’t pay local taxes, and the interest rates we offer violate local laws,” he says.
Li told us his company has its own loan apps in India, Mexico and Colombia. He claimed to be an industry leader in risk control and debt collection services in South East Asia, and is now expanding across Latin America and Africa – with more than 3,000 staff in Pakistan, Bangladesh and India ready to provide “post-loan services”.
Then he explained what his company does to recover loans.
“If you don’t repay, we may add you on WhatsApp, and on the third day, we will call and message you on WhatsApp at the same time, and call your contacts. Then, on the fourth day, if your contacts don’t pay, we have specific detailed procedures.
“We access his call records and capture a lot of his information. Basically, it’s like he’s naked in front of us.”
Your phone is private. Or is it? A BBC investigation exposes the blackmail scam causing misery across India.
Promising easy money, loan app scammers collect personal data from customers’ phones and then use that information to threaten or humiliate people into repayment. BBC Eye goes undercover to take you inside the loan app scam, and to expose the people making money from misery, fear, and shame.
Watch on iPlayer (UK only)
Bhoomi Sinha could handle the harassment, the threats, the abuse and the exhaustion – but not the shame of being linked to that pornographic image.
“That message actually stripped me naked in front of the entire world,” she says. “I lost my self-respect, my morality, my dignity, everything in a second.”
It was shared with lawyers, architects, government officials, elderly relatives and friends of her parents – people who would never look at her in the same way again.
“It has tarnished the core of me, like if you join a broken glass, there will still be cracks on it,” she says.
She has been ostracised by neighbours in the community she has lived in for 40 years.
“As of today, I have no friends. It’s just me I guess,” she says with a sad chuckle.
Some of her family still don’t speak to her. And she constantly wonders whether the men she works with are picturing her naked.
The morning that her daughter Astha found her she was at her lowest ebb. But it was also the moment she decided to fight back. “I don’t want to die like this,” she decided.
She filed a police report but has heard nothing since. All she could do was change her number and get rid of her sim card – and when Astha started receiving calls her daughter destroyed hers too. She told friends, family and colleagues to ignore the calls and messages and, eventually, they all but stopped.
Bhoomi found support in her sisters, her boss and an online community of others abused by loan apps. But mostly, she found strength in her daughter.
“I must have done something good to be given a daughter like this,” she says. “If she hadn’t stood by me then I would have been one of the many people who’ve killed themselves because of loan apps.”
We put the allegations in this report to Asan Loan – and also, through contacts, to Liang Tian Tian and Parshuram Takve, who are in hiding. Neither the company nor the couple responded.
When asked for comment, Li Xiang told the BBC that he and his companies comply with all local laws and regulations, have never run predatory loan apps, have ceased collaboration with Jiyaliang, the loan recovery company run by Liang Tian Tian and Parshuram Takve, and do not collect or use customers’ contact information.
He said his loan recovery call centres adhere to strict standards and he denied profiting from the suffering of ordinary Indians.
Majesty Legal Services deny using customers’ contacts to recover loans. They told us their agents are instructed to avoid abusive or threatening calls, and any violation of the company’s policies results in dismissal.
Additional reporting by Ronny Sen, Shwetika Prashar, Syed Hasan, Ankur Jain and the BBC Eye team. Thanks also to the undercover reporters who cannot be named for their safety.
The most important lessons that Israel can learn from the horrifying Hamas problems over the past weekend is that terrorists cannot be controlled. & nbsp,
Israel collaborated for many years with Hamas and the Palestinian Authority( PA ) by fusing incentives with restrained military actions. Big assaults, such as rockets from Gaza last May, led to revenge, typically with heat energy, and a cease-fire that was frequently broken by Egypt.
The Israel Defense Forces( IDF) carried out on-the-ground operations in Jenin and Nablus when Iranian-sponsored armies set up arms in the West Bank.
Israel granted the US permission to mediate a maritime boundary semi-deal with Hezbollah last year, enabling Lebanon to pump natural gas and benefit financially from the deal, which will benefit the latter and be used to move the Beirut government.
All in an effort to put out fires that might start a large fire.
The plan was made up of several parts. The first is” world mind,” specifically American state viewpoint, which may turn against Israel if it didn’t respond to terrorism in a way that was consistent with clearly Western standards. Israel thought that any military action needed to be swift in order to prevent retaliation from allies and friends as well as from adversaries.
Israel has also generally thought that there will be a political option at some point. Israeli leaders, such as Hamas or the PA, may have been upset with Israeli leadership, but they also spoke to them, provided them with subsidies, ignored language that veered into Nazi trope, and actually invited them to breakfast. & nbsp,
The logical response to evil was to avoid using excessive force and to pursue specific terrorists, not the management, as much as possible, often leaving the door wide open for further discussion.
Israel also believed it may eliminate enemy assets using its long-range capabilities, particularly airpower. This occasionally served as a form of revenge, but it was never able to stop the large buildup of Iranian-financed and supplied weapons, including missiles and weapons.
No six months after the Spring jet wars, Hamas recently proved this by launching thousands of rockets into Israel and destroying its heat defenses.
Israel was even aware that the US and Europe, in addition to Iran and its allies like Qatar, provided billions of dollars to the Palestinians. Violence and anger were greatly fueled by it, both directly and indirectly. & nbsp,
Israel itself provides fresh water and gas in addition to food assistance and Jewish work permits. Before the trip, 2 million Gaza Palestinians entered Israel every moment, totaling 18, 000. In some ways, it was done to aid the populace. It was intended to appease or lower Hamas, according to another.
It was no closer to being true than the Obama and Biden administrations’ offers of US economic assistance for Iran, which either appeased or moderated Tehran’s mian program.
Israelis have grown accustomed to weapon attacks from Gaza, according to a highly experienced Jewish expert who wrote about the intellect loss andnbsp that allowed Hamas attack preparations to go unnoticed. In other words, Israel built up some defenses, retaliated, and then believed it was in control of the situation while actually losing the larger war.
After vegetables and stones failed, there is no turning back. Israel needs to change its strategy as more media attention reveals the shocking wickedness of Hamas terrorists when they discovered Jewish and even international civilians to rape and kill — people were burned alive and babies were beheaded.
Some Israeli citizens have lost faith in their political institutions as a result of internal political unrest there. Although there is some temporary 1 as a result of the Gaza War and it is obvious that soldiers are loyal to the IDF, that won’t be enough. & nbsp,
Israel needs a new security approach and an inner political alternative. A strong surveillance part in the unity government would be an important step forward.
According to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, he wants to” love Gaza.” What does that think, though? As some victims held in Gaza will be released by Israel, who will also take in the military. Then Israel will pursue when some Hamas frontrunners as it can get, but many of them will probably attempt to cross the Egyptian border.
Who will be in charge of the Gaza Strip if and when Hamas is removed from power? Israel was theoretically retake it, but there would be a heavy load and internal threats. Additionally, it runs the risk of retaliation from Israel’s typical allies and friends, a social issue with security ramifications.
There aren’t many reasons to be optimistic about the situation. There is still some sliver of hope for an international answer until new Palestinian leadership emerges, despite the fact that the UN created an global military coalition to partially control Haiti in the lack of a national Haitian government and the face of terrible gang rule.
if it is even possible.
Stephen Bryen held the positions of Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Policy and Staff Director of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee’s Near East Subcommittee.
Shoshana Bryen serves as editor of & nbsp, inFOCUS Quarterly, and senior director of The Jewish Policy Center.
GOING WALLETLESS HAS Gains
When was the last time you actually needed to use your actual Circuit? Pull out your wallet right away.
And for those of you who claim that you need your IC to buy beer and watch specific movies, allow me to ask you another problem: Doesn’t our electronic device( which can be accessed at any time and place ) perform the same tasks as our physical device, which can cost up to S$ 300 to replace?
Of all, there will be times when a real Circuit is required( such as when sending official papers or going to the bank ). However, in those circumstances, it is still safer to send just your IC rather than your full budget.
This now examine your funds and coins. & nbsp,
I can use them at the stall center, you’re definitely saying.
You are correct, too. Despite having the highest implementation rate of contactless payments in Southeast Asia, many of these locations only accept cash. I don’t charge them individually. They still have to help older people who are less likely to live without money.
Do we actually have as little money on us, though?
Personally, I think having my funds in my bank account has more advantages than not. Your income is generally healthy and you get to earn interest. E-scams are undoubtedly on the rise, but at least the majority of banks will assist you if you are the target of one.
Try locating a lender that will pay back the$ 400 in income you lost.
Additionally, paying S$ 8.80 via PayLah at Gong Cha makes much more financial sense than paying with a S$ 10 word and receiving S$ 1.20 in change. That change is essentially money gone because these days, what can you actually get with Mho$ 1.20?
Lastly, take a look at all the memories you’ve tucked away in your wallet’s several pockets. In every sense of the word, those ticket receipts, pictures, and like records are unique. What will you do if your finances disappears and those keepsakes turn into remote memories?
IT ALL HAS TO DO WITH HOW MUCH YOU’RE REASONABLE TO Hazard
I am aware that my telephone and credit cards are also vulnerable to theft, of training. But, replacing two products is much simpler than replacing the gold treasure of priceless things kept in a bag. & nbsp,
In the end, it’s up to you whether or not to throw away your budget, but I’ll just say that the last ten centuries have been easier for me. Now that my hands are lighter, I only need to watch my cellphone when I’m out, and I always have to worry about misplaced priceless items. & nbsp,
Daring gets have been made by some patients. A group of 60 Taiwanese people left a game in Bavet city, in the province of Svay Rieng, Cambodia in September of last year. This came shortly after a group of 40 Vietnamese swam across the valley to Vietnam’s An Giang territory after breaking out of tainted Chinese-run game in the state of Kandal in Cambodia. The waters officially carried some of them away.
There are now many efforts at recovery. According to reports, Thailand intended to free up to 3, 000 Thais who were reportedly being held in Cambodia.
But, as businesses grow, gangs begin to draw people from countries other than Southeast Asia. 11 Indian citizens were rescued from the Golden Triangle in November of last year. Authorities in Lao were following an advice from the American embassy after victims were persuaded to operate as IT specialists in Dubai, Singapore, and Thailand by offers of well-paying jobs and pre-arranged flights, visas, or passports.
According to the UNDOC report,” foreign NGOs have identified over 40 nationalities of smuggling victims in con compounds in Southeast Asia … targeted because of their English and Italian language skills, as well as their acquaintance with social media and bitcoin.”
The impact of local warriors in the area appears to have grown after the 2021 revolution in Myanmar, with little influence being held by the central government to combat crime. The pro-junta troops are frequently the ones who commit crimes.
A new town in Myawaddy, southeast Myanmar’s Kayin ( Karen) state, close to the Thai border, is called Shwe Kokko, which in the local dialect means” Chinatown.” The Karen Border Guard Force, which is affiliated with Myanmar’s Tatmadaw military, now controls it.
A local casino boss supports transboundary crimes in the Kokang Special Administrative Zone, which is governed by the Tatmadaw-allied Border Guard Forces( BGF ) and borders China’s Yunnan province, according to a US Institute of Peace report.
The onslaught work in the area have grown stronger. A gambling power was detained in Bangkok in June, and Thailand’s Electricity Authority turned off energy to a Shwe Kokko casino at its request. and a sizable group of Chinese citizens who were reportedly involved in crime just returned home.
But these are small ways. There is no established local plan to eliminate South Asian con operations.
Jitsiree & nbsp, Thongnoi is a freelance journalist based in Bangkok who focuses on China’s role in Southeast Asia, the Mekong region, and Thailand as well as political and economic development in Thailand. This remark first appeared on The Interpreter, a blog run by Lowy Institute.
MANILA: On Tuesday, October 10, the defense commander of the Philippines dismissed a claim made by China’s coast guard that it had chased away an Indian army gunboat from around an unresolved shoal in the South China Sea as” propaganda.” The beach guard of China was present and issued aContinue Reading
The WHO is emphasizing the general proper to good mental health on Mental Health Day this time. & nbsp;
Everyone has the right to enjoy the highest attainable requirements of emotional wellbeing, according to Dr. Bruni, who added that his organization is working to maintain mental health is promoted and protected. & nbsp;
However, people with mental wellness problems continue to experience a wide range of human rights violations all over the world, including in the Southeast Asia region, and many of them are excluded from society and the community.
A person’s mental health condition should not be used as an excuse to deny them their individual rights or prevent them from participating in society. ”
According to the United Nations health organization, as of 2019, nearly one billion people worldwide — roughly one in eight — have a mental health condition.
In light of recent world stressors like the COVID-19 epidemic, the Russia-Ukraine discord, and the continued climate crisis, experts believe that the figure is now significantly higher.
There is still a imbalance in terms of funding in mental health services, according to Dr. Bruni, despite numerous studies on high return on investment for mental healthcare.
It’s crucial to put more money into emotional wellbeing. “”
The joint Main Ground Combat System ( MGCS ) project between France and Germany aims to revolutionize tank warfare while acting as a test case for European defense cooperation.
According to multiple media sources, France and Germany are working on the MGCS project to replace the Leopard 2 tanks in Germany and the Leclerc in France by 2040 – 2045. The defence officials of both nations have reaffirmed their commitment to the program despite prior setbacks and difficulties.
Important industry players like KNDS, a joint venture between Germany’s Krauss-Maffei Wegmann ( KMW ) and France-based Nexter, are involved in the project. Rheinmetall, a European tank manufacturer, is also included.
A flexible program with manned and integrated platforms is what the MGCS is designed to be. The project, however, encounters a number of difficulties, such as disagreements over the tank’s primary gun caliber, competing business objectives, and conflicting corporate objectives.
France insists on a necessarily new growth, while Germany has expressed interest in modernizing the current Leopard 2 type, in part due to high demand following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. While the project’s greatest success will require overcoming difficult complex and political challenges, funding and social approval are also significant obstacles.
The task serves as an example of German security cooperation in a setting characterized by elevated security concerns brought on by the Ukraine War. The divergent strategic priorities and industrial interests of France and Germany reveal their respective fantasies for the MGCS.
Leopard 2 vehicles currently control the European market, and exports are rising in the wake of the Ukraine crisis. In contrast, France sees the MGCS as a means of reviving its manufacturing lines after ceasing to produce the Leclerc in 2008. In 2024, deals are anticipated to get signed.
Once the project details are finalized, another EU nations may join the initiative; Italy and the Netherlands have expressed interest in becoming observers.
Although the specifics of MGCS are unknown, European Security and Defense notes in an article from January 2023 that the system will have a hybrid engine system, offer environmental benefits, and offer operational advantages like shorter operational distances, greater operational range, lower ecoustic and thermal signatures. It also has” silent view” capabilities.
According to the article, it will have weight-saving features like smaller crew sizes, lighter composite armor, and increased reliance on active protection systems ( APS ). The main vehicle’s hull will also serve as the foundation for support vehicle variants.
The MGCS does have a large caliber major gun with improved performance compared to the 120 cm weapons used on the Leclerc and Leopard 2, according to an article in the European Security and Defense. It states that Nexter is suggesting the newly created 140 mm Autoloaded and Scalable Outperforming Gun( ASCALON ) as the primary weapon for the unit. Users can select from a variety of desired end effects thanks to ASCALON’s versatility in munitions.
According to the article, it will also accommodate future intelligent tank munitions that can engage targets at ranges beyond line of sight / non-line-of-sight( BLOS / NLOS ).
Directed energy weapons ( DEW ), hypersonic guided missiles, indirect fire weapons for BLOS / NLOS targets, machine guns or automatic cannons for counter-drone and air defense roles, and an electronic warfare suite are additional MGCS weapons. Additionally, the pond will have a stable military system, highest application of artificial intelligence, and digitization.
However, France and Germany appear to be advancing rival container models. The French-German KNDS Enhanced Main Battle Tank ( EMBT ) and Germany’s KF51 Panther were two competing tank concepts that were displayed at the Eurosatory 2022 arms expo, according to German news outlet Stern.
According to the report, the KNDS EMBT had to do without its main weapon, a 140 mm Autoloaded and Scalable Outperforming Gun ( ASCALON ) main gun, while the full KF51 Panther was on display with its autoloading Rh – 130 L / 51 130 millimeter smoothbore gun. Instead, it had an installed 120 MM gun and 30-mm autocannon.
The KF51 Panther’s main gun, which can only hold 30 rounds as opposed to 42 for the Leopard 2, is also noted in the article as being 50 % more effective than 120 mm guns. The KF51 Panther, however, compensates for that with better picture accuracy.
Stern points out that although the KF51 Panther has a staff of three, it is capable of supporting an additional staff member who can operate drones, loiter munitions, or even an autonomous bodyguard tank. According to the source, the KF51 Panther’s hull incorporates components from the Leopard 2 and has the Top Attack Protection System( TAPS ), which can deflect top-attack missiles.
Stern claims that the 140 mm ASCALON won’t be ready for the KNDS EMBT until 2025 because tower modifications are required to building the larger weapons. Additionally, it claims that the Leopard 2 serves as the foundation for its ship and that its chassis is capable of driving by wire, which is necessary for autonomous operation.
The Ukraine War has rekindled discussion about the value of tank in contemporary war, with some analysts arguing in favor of and against their applicability. Curtis Buzzard and other authors contend that the ship’s present concept did hold true on upcoming battlefields in an article published in August 2023 by the US Army University Press.
According to Buzzard and others, tanks are essential for military combined arms maneuvers, national power projection, and operational flexibility. They contend that included training, corporate flexibility, and the ability to maintain combat power are necessary for armored teams to be effective against antiarmor systems.
Additionally, they claim that Russia’s enormous tank losses in Ukraine are more due to its poor strategy and planning, which includes inadequate training and a lack of combined arms enablers than to technical flaws in the tank.
Buzzard and others emphasize the warning power of tanks, pointing out that during the Cold War, NATO’s armored formations served as national defense commitments for Europe, and that today, the countries most at risk from China or North Korea, like South Korea and India, still have some of the largest tank fleets in the world.
They place a strong emphasis on the importance of tanks in floor war, allowing commanders to direct and direct the conflict. They claim that tanks are crucial for battle success despite their higher costs and logistical requirements because they can offer fight power at crucial moments and locations.
Peter Suciu, on the other hand, contends that the ship’s time may come to an end as Russian deficits in Ukraine increase in a March 2022 post for 1945. According to Suciuu, Western anti-tank weapons that were supplied to Ukraine, such as the FGM-148 Javelin shoulder-fired missile and the Next Generation Light Anti-Tank Weapon( NLAW ), have been so successful that they appear to be weapons from another era.
Suciu notes that despite advancements in pond technology, they continue to encounter many of the same issues that hindered their ability to engage in combat during World War I, noting that container barriers and mud are also problematic today, just as they were more than a century ago. According to him, the development of new guided missiles and drones may have rendered the tank’s present function outdated.
According to him, tanks will need to develop with more security, but this could lead to size and weight issues that would impair sustainability and flexibility. He emphasizes that today’s tanks will probably be smaller as current guided-missile destroyers took the place of large battleships.
Suciu predicted that tanks in the future could function freely, without a crew, and be controlled remotely. He claims that they might be outfitted with technology to keep their crew safe and generally used for holding soil more than advancing on it.
The Ukraine conflict has brought in enormous profits for the wings industry. According to Reuters, Rheinmetall increased its sales projections for 2025 as a result of the Ukraine War’s increased demand for weapons and urged Berlin to move quickly on large-ticket orders to overhaul its armed forces.
In June 2023, Reuters even stated that Rheinmetall anticipates a rise in the company’s stock market value as result of the Ukraine war and increased defense spending in Europe.
” Our operating income in 2025 should be around 1.5 billion euros( US$ 1.6 billion ), possibly even 1.7 billion. Multiply that with a component of 11 or 12 to get an accurate assessment. That gives you an order of magnitude. According to Rheinmetall CEO Armin Papperger, who was cited by Reuters, a rating of 17 billion dollars is reasonable for the company over the choice name.
According to the report, Rheinmetall’s profits are anticipated to increase between 11 and 12 billion dollars in 2025, an increase from the 10 to 11 billion euro mark from November of last year.
With an operating revenue of 754 million dollars in 2022 and a stock market value that has tripled since December 2021, Rheinmetall is currently valued at about 10.5 billion dollars, according to Reuters.
Tesla and its CEO Elon Musk have been tinkering with entering the Indian industry for a while.
Powerful individuals like Coordinating Minister for Maritime Affairs and Investment Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan & nbsp will visit Tesla’s manufacturing facility in Texas in April 2022 to encourage investment options in Indonesia. The Malaysian government, led by President Joko Widoo, has made attempts.
Musk was interviewed by Anindya Bakrie, CEO of Bakerie and Brothers, on the outside of the 2022 G20 conference in Bali and said he was” optimistic” about Indonesia. Despite these feelings, Tesla hasn’t done much for the nation. & nbsp,
Given that Tesla opened a sales company in Malaysia and will open another store andnbsp in Thailand, this lack of progress definitely stings slightly more. Indonesia may be starting to question whether it is being ignored by Tesla and the rationale behind this choice.
The second factor to take into account is Tesla’s goals in Indonesia and the incentive for working with Tesla there. The market for electric vehicles is not already dominated by Indonesia. The national highway system is still in its infancy, and there aren’t many paying facilities. & nbsp,
Government incentives intended to promote the adoption of electric vehicles have been the subject of intense discussion. In the short term, Indonesia is more likely than electric vehicles to be a larger client of electric scooters, which Tesla does not produce.
Tesla appears to think Malaysia is a more alluring business if the objective is to buy four-wheeled electrical vehicles in Southeast Asia in the near future.
Due to Malaysia’s higher per capita money, more people are likely to have the means to purchase a Tesla. Malaysia even has better road network and has a plan in place to install 10,000 charging stations for electric vehicles by 2025.
Indonesia, on the other hand, wants to contribute to production by producing the batteries and battery packs for Tesla automobiles in addition to being a business for the company. Indonesia seeks to advance its value chain in order to meet and manufacture Tesla vehicles, either for home use or trade.
The Shanghai Gigafactory, Tesla’s local production gateway in Asia, is the main barrier to these strategies. For many years, the firm has sourced its capacitors from Panasonic in Japan. This means that while it is not difficult for Indonesia to join Tesla’s production network, doing so will present a problem because the manufacturer now has well-established supply chains and reliable providers.
Indonesia is never always the most likely member, even if Tesla were planning to establish a manufacturing gateway in Southeast Asia. Thailand continues to lead the region in exporting automobiles, despite Indonesia’s mechanical production sector expanding due to domestic demand. Also if Tesla thought it needed another manufacturing hub in Asia, Indonesia may face fierce Thailand competition for such a venture.
Indonesia is most likely to meet into Tesla’s habitat in the form of batteries. Indonesia has been investing in downstream industries by taking advantage of its control over & nbsp, the world’s largest supplier of nickel. This covers the production of batteries using refined metal and metal smelting. & nbsp,
Chinese battery tycoon CATL has committed to & nbsp, investing billions of dollars in Indonesian battery production along with the state-owned Indonesia Battery Corporation. Tesla has begun obtaining batteries from CATL, opening the door to possible supply chains for Tesla.
However, there are difficulties in this area as well. A clause in the US Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 prohibited energy cars made in Indonesia from being eligible for tax credits and nbsp here.
For the time being, automakers like Tesla face an additional level of uncertainty when integrating Indonesia into their supply chains. The Indian government is looking into ways to get around this, for example through a bilateral deal package.
Additionally, it’s important to note that Tesla isn’t the only or even the biggest sport in existence. Toyota and Hyundai, two South Korean and Japanese automakers, now have sizable manufacturing facilities in Indonesia, as well as decades of experience and ties to the nation’s economy. Automobiles are now made in Indonesia by Chinese companies like Wuling. & nbsp,
These manufacturers are in a prime position to create energy vehicles using batteries and essential minerals made in Indonesia. Since they don’t have to construct features from scratch, they can probably level up more quickly than Tesla.
It would be unexpected if Tesla and Indonesia not conduct business together. However, the nature of this relationship is probably going to go beyond Indian people purchasing Tesla cars. These vehicles are likely to be produced in Indonesia as well, with the use of batteries, Indian nickel, and nbsp being the most likely entry point.
James Guild is an alternative brother at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore’s S Rajaratnam School of International Studies.
This post, which was originally published by the East Asia Forum, has been republished with a Creative Commons license.
The state of China’s market has come to the forefront of global attention due to sluggish growth and rising doubt. China’s economic activity has strongly fallen short of expectations after a solid start to 2023.
Imports are no longer profitable. While inflation has stabilized and the unemployment rate has risen, use, production, and investment have all decreased. Concerns about the local economy caused the Chinese yen to fall to new highs in August and September 2023.
According to Larry Summers, a former US Treasury Secretary,” folks are going to look back at some of the financial forecasts about China in 2020 in the same way they looked up to financial projections for Russia that were made in 1960 or for Japan in 1990.” He also made menacing similarities between China, Russia, and Japan.
The evolving economic outlook is being influenced by continuous and fundamental aspects, as usual. Scars from the Covid – 19 pandemic, declining balance sheets, an ailing real estate market, and a constrained economic policy response are among the seasonal factors.
As concerns about regulation, security, and political stability continue to grow, architectural pressures are weighing on confidence.
The balance sheets of homes, businesses, and local governments have been stretched after three centuries of pandemic strain. In contrast to the United States, China’s government did not distribute sizable subsidies to households and businesses during the Covid-19 epidemic. Without that demand-side input, Chinese consumption has been stagnant.
China’s biggest financial concerns are related to the real estate market. The effects of this sector’s decline would become extremely negative.
However, one distinction between China’s situation and, for instance, the US subprime crisis of 2007 – 2008 is the absence of any discernible negative equity in Chinese real estate. This is as a result of China’s high lower payments, which typically range from 60 to 90 % for second or third home buying. & nbsp,
The property sector may contribute less to the risk of a financial crisis than the United States did during the global economic crisis, even though the ensuing losses in terms of household wealth and financial growth could still be significant. However, property prices haven’t yet decreased significantly in most areas.
Both during and after the worst stages of the Covid – 19 pandemic, China’s present problems have received moderate fiscal and monetary reactions. This is true even though, in contrast to the United States and Europe, China is more at danger from recession than from inflation. & nbsp,
True interest rates have remained largely unchanged since late 2020, also rising over a period of time when the consumer price index dropped more quickly than the plan level. Current policy goals are reflected by the lack of overall relief. Demand-side considerations in policy wondering have largely been dominated by supply side reforms.
Additionally, there are fundamental constraints on Chinese expansion. Not the least of them are regulatory actions that significantly reduced business confidence, particularly among tech firms and foreign-invested businesses.
While some of these policies were put into place to address issues with regional security, others were aimed at reputable regulatory issues like customer protection and fair competition. They reflect the government’s willingness to pay more as a result of the growing importance safety issues are given.
The government has taken action to mitigate some of these detrimental effects of coverage. It has announced new guidelines as a part of its broader plan mix intended to boost confidence and support private business, foreign-invested firms, and use. & nbsp,
The government’s 31-point plan & nbsp, which was published in July 2023, emphasizes the significance of the private sector and fair competition, removing entry barriers, safeguarding property rights, and involving private businesses in national initiatives.
However, the market is negatively impacted by the shifting geopolitical environment. Fears about national protection that affect trade and investment are becoming more and more important in both China and the US.
Assistance to address the problems caused by modernization is possible because both nations have similar concerns, though not always the same meanings of social stability and national security. More discussion is first necessary for for assistance. Yet or especially when the social landscape is difficult, dialogue is important.
Next events can also be crucial in establishing a stable environment. The & nbsp, the” de – risking” strategy used by the European Union, even if it only involves partial decoupling by another name, is a good illustration. Regional relations can play a stabilizing role in Asia, particularly with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations ( ASEAN ).
Has China’s financial mystery come to an end? Since no miracle lasts long, the answer is definitely yes. Great incomes and the higher work costs they entail, worsening external conditions, and an aging population all pose significant long-term obstacles to high growth.
However, neither Japan nor the Soviet Union existed in the 1960s or 1990s in China. For China, industries like engineering platforms, electric vehicles, clean energy, and electronics are then andnbsp, thriving sources of growth and innovation. & nbsp,
A significant economic crisis, similar to a collapse of the real estate market, is however improbable. Artificial intelligence and the modern economy may partially offset the financial effects of demographic changes.
Although some businesses have been negatively impacted by regulatory shifts, China’s ability to regular above 9 % growth for 40 years suggests that some flexibility still exists. The new legislation package’s current announcement also shows that policymakers do react to economic challenges.
In July 2023, economic engagement most likely experienced its previous significant decline. According to statistics from August, the market is slowly but surely bottoming out. According to routine observations, September saw the start of the financial recovery.
However, the geopolitical fog is unlikely to rapidly dissipate. Many of the difficulties China faces, such as maintaining development while security concerns are rising, are on a global scale. & nbsp,
Navigating the difficulties away will require figuring out how to address these issues within international frameworks that encourage open trade and investment.
Yiping Huang is a teacher and assistant professor at Peking University’s National School of Development as well as the director of the Institute of Digital Finance.
This post, which was previously published by the East Asia Forum, has been republished with a Creative Commons license.