Wrong Button
ABC News reports an [emergency alert notification] (http://wnep.com/2018/01/13/wrong-button-pushed-during-shift-change-blamed-for-false-hawaii-missile-alert/) sent out on Saturday claiming a “ballistic missile threat inbound to Hawaii” was a false alarm caused by an employee pressing the “wrong button” during a shift change, according to Hawaii Gov. David Ige.
“BALLISTIC MISSILE THREAT INBOUND TO HAWAII. SEEK IMMEDIATE SHELTER. THIS IS NOT A DRILL,” the initial emergency alert read.
False Alarm Timeline
“I know first-hand how today’s false alarm affected all of us here in Hawaii, and I am sorry for the pain and confusion it caused. I, too, am extremely upset about this and am doing everything I can do to immediately improve our emergency management systems, procedures and staffing,” said Gov. David Ige.
Synopsis
- 8:05 a.m. – A routine internal test during a shift change was initiated. This was a test that involved the Emergency Alert System, the Wireless Emergency Alert, but no warning sirens.
- 8:07 a.m. – A warning test was triggered statewide by the State Warning Point, HI-EMA.
- 8:10 a.m. – State Adjutant Maj. Gen. Joe Logan, validated with the U.S. Pacific Command that there was no missile launch.
- Honolulu Police Department notified of the false alarm by HI-EMA.
- 8:13 a.m. – State Warning Point issues a cancellation of the Civil Danger Warning Message. This would have prevented the initial alert from being rebroadcast to phones that may not have received it yet. For instance, if a phone was not on at 8:07 a.m., if someone was out of range and has since came into cell coverage (Hikers, Mariners, etc.) and/or people getting off a plane.
- 8:20 a.m. – HI-EMA issues public notification of cancellation via their Facebook and Twitter accounts.
- 8:24 a.m. – Governor Ige retweets HI-EMA’s cancellation notice.
- 8:30 a.m. – Governor posts cancellation notification to his Facebook page.
- 8:45 a.m. – After getting authorization from FEMA Integral Public Alert and Warning System, HI-EMA issued a “Civil Emergency Message” remotely.
- 9:30 a.m.: Governor makes initial media notification.
- 9:34 a.m.: Governor’s message posted to his Facebook and Twitter accounts.
Retraction
At 8:45 a retraction was issued.It took another 15 minutes for the Governor to make a media notification.
Somehow it takes “authorization” from FEMA to issue a retraction but anyone is capable of pushing the wrong button during a routine shift change.
Panic
Some people panicked following the announcement. A video of parents putting their kids in a storm drain has gone viral.
Ho Hum
https://twitter.com/Ian56789/status/952330462663409666
https://twitter.com/ggreenwald/status/952568472986406912
https://twitter.com/ggreenwald/status/952568472986406912
Civilian Terror from Obama’s Drones
As we reflect on the “horrors” of people putting their kinds in storm drains in Hawaii, we should also reflect on a New Stanford/NYU study that documents the Civilian Terror from Obama’s Drones.
Noting that even funerals of drone victims have been targeted under Obama, the report documents that the US has “made family members afraid to attend funerals”. The result of this tactic is as predictable as it is heinous:
“Secondary strikes have discouraged average civilians from coming to one another’s rescue, and even inhibited the provision of emergency medical assistance from humanitarian workers.”
All the way back in 2004, the Rumsfeld Pentagon commissioned a study to determine the causes of anti-US terrorism, and even it concluded: “Muslims do not ‘hate our freedom,’ but rather, they hate our policies.” Running around the world beating your chest, bellowing “we’re at war!”, and bombing multiple Muslim countries does not keep one safe. It manifestly does the opposite, since it ensures that even the most rational people will calculate that targeting Americans with violence in response is just and necessary to deter further aggression.
Recall the words of the attempted Times Square bomber, Pakistani-American Faisal Shahzad, at his sentencing hearing when the federal judge presiding over his case, Miriam Goldman Cedarbaum, asked incredulously how he could possibly use violence that he knew would result in the deaths even of innocent children — as though she were literally unaware that her own government continuously does exactly that:
“‘Well, the drone hits in Afghanistan and Iraq, they don’t see children, they don’t see anybody. They kill women, children, they kill everybody. It’s a war, and in war, they kill people. They’re killing all Muslims’ . . . .
“‘I am part of the answer to the U.S. terrorizing the Muslim nations and the Muslim people. And, on behalf of that, I’m avenging the attack. Living in the United States, Americans only care about their own people, but they don’t care about the people elsewhere in the world when they die.’”
US Drone Policy
Glenn Greenwald wrote that article in September of 2012.
Our high-level drone strike efficiency is about 2% according to the report. That was an acceptable percentage for Obama and presumably for Trump as well.
Is it any wonder people hate the US? If you lost your 3-year old son or daughter to a US drone wouldn’t you hate the US too?
Most in the US does not know what terror is. Nor do US citizens know how much terror and hatred worldwide is a direct result of US foreign policy.
Instead, we are shocked at the thought of putting kids in storm drains over false alarms.
Mike “Mish” Shedlock
Japan just had a similar “error”.
@stuki
You hit the nail on the head with that – good job…
Agreed Mish. Our foreign policy is awful.
Thanks for saving me the trouble Stuki
“Another fine example which proves that governments everywhere have been completely over-run with imbeciles, psychopaths and crooks.”
Overran has nothing to do with it. Any government ever; past, present and future, cannot even theoretically be ran by anyone other than the above three. That’s all any possible government can ever aspire to. They should be sized accordingly.
Mish – one of your best posts ever. BTW, I have been reading a long time.
“you r just kind to people, bow to them and show them respect they will begin to love you and the world will all come together and we will all live happily ever after.” Well maybe not, put pointing a gun at someone’s children for years on end is definitely not going to make them want to leave you alone.
Psyops precursor to military adventure in Korea.
When the Soviet Union pulled out of East Germany and eastern Europe, Secretary Baker Told Gorbechev that NATO would not take one step east. NATO is now well more than one step east, it is on the Border of Russia. Clinton meddled in the 1996 Russian election, to ensure that Yeltsin got re-elected. Several years later Yeltsin suddenly resigned and Putin became in charge and has been since.
Our government is playing Empire. That was not what the purpose of the U.S. Constitution was about. At the time Britain was playing Empire. The colonists reacted to that. In 1990, American troops moved into Saudi Arabia, to remove Saddam from Kuait. After the war all the troops didn’t leave Osama Binladin’s Holy Land, so he decided to make war against the U.S.
“Mish I’m afraid you r starting to drift off into the foreign policy of John Lennon who sang “all we are saying is just give peace a chance”.” I don’t see Mish as saying that.
Another fine example which proves that governments everywhere have been completely over-run with imbeciles, psychopaths and crooks.
Very well said Mish. It is almost as if there were no lessons at all to learn from the 9/11 attacks (certainly the maladroit Bush “war on terror” against the non-involved did not help educate people) and we might predict that none will be learned from any similar repeat that should of course be expected.
I am not sure whether this fire of hatred can ever be put out.
Sometimes war cannot be helped (e.g. WW II – Hitler) (Goebbels link… http://www.elise.com/quotes/hermann_goering_-_the_people_can_always_be_brought_to_the_bidding_of_the_leaders) Along with being the richest and most powerful country comes the need for being most responsible. The US by forgetting that – “Our currency, your problem” is one way of expressing it in economic matters and meddling in the political affairs of the middle east, has created a boiling cauldron. I am not sure
Put these 2 statements together – Mahatma Gandhi said, “An eye for an eye makes everyone blind” and Goebbels ““Why, of course, the people don’t want war. Why would some poor slob on a farm want to risk his life in a war when the best that he can get out of it is to come back to his farm in one piece. Naturally, the common people don’t want war; neither in Russia nor in England nor in America, nor for that matter in Germany. That is understood. But, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy or a fascist dictatorship or a Parliament or a Communist dictatorship… ” you can easily understand the inner workings and also where it will lead to. A war leads to loss on both sides and the loss is inflicted on people who had nothing to do with it.
NK/china has Hawaii ringed with ballistic missile subs,keep pacific fleet at bay while the norks move to take seoul and beijeng launches operation to take japan
“…the drone hits in Afghanistan and Iraq, they don’t see children, they don’t see anybody. They kill women, children, they kill everybody…” – Faisal Shahzad
I doubt the Hawaii incidence was just an emergency worker’s mistake but the outrage that many Americans are exhibiting over the ‘horror’ of putting children into storm drains is illustrative of their ignorance. Americans simply have no idea what crimes against humanity they are accessories to just by voting and paying taxes to support the regime Washington. Mainstream news doesn’t tell us anymore. We only have people like Mish to keep us informed of things our delicate ears shouldn’t hear.
Some speculate that it wasn’t a false alarm. The military needed to do a real test and you can’t do one if everyone knows it’s a test. Thankfully a majority of people showed that deep down we are decent people. The worst of us rule us.
Thank you Mish! This is such an important message that sadly is lost on most people in the US. It’s really hard to see so many “caring” people not caring at all about the US caused suffering and death outside of our country, and instead are caught up in the non stop Trump hate rhetoric.
Bravo Mish.