MPJ

Before the start of the Great War, the prevailing sentiment in most, if not all, European countries was that victory in any major military conflict was guaranteed only if it was fought with a large, durable, well trained and modern army. The dawn of the 20th century established the environment in which countries entered the race to mobilize the largest part of the qualified population, to create faster motorized transport for troops and logistics, to use state of the art communications and the greatest range of artillery as well as to use various new drugs in medical treatments like morphine and even a cocaine to boost the troops and fuel their fighting mood. Comparing to 19th century wars, new warfare was revolutionized and upped to the next level. By June 1914, the stage was set and only a spark was needed to fire off the conflict. But was it really inevitable? Was the military race alone enough to cause the conflict in which 20 million died and many more wounded? Or did it need a pl...

It is definitely not easy to answer this simple question with a word or sentence. Perhaps the best and only answer I could think of is that "it would make perfect sense" for the imminent future of humanity in 21st century and beyond. However within current world order we are living in today, it is far from being applicable for one 'teeny-tiny' reason - it would require canceling of what is well rooted today. The political system of Nation-State governmental polity that in one form or another exist almost everywhere on the planet. To cease that from existence is one of those Sisyphean tasks that is almost unimaginable to achieve. In simple words, in order to make City-State the only governmental polity we would have to nullify countries and to erase borders from the maps. Not only that, it also means the politics and politicians would have to reduce its influence and their numbers significantly which is also a task comparable to the impossible efforts from the mythical...

My first encounter with Intelligence Quotient, aka IQ, was 25 years ago during my preliminary exam for the mandatory military service. In those years Serbia was part of a former socialist federation of Yugoslavia along with couple of more countries and avoiding army service was impossible. Everybody had to go to serve the "time" for one whole year and they used those preliminary tests to better fit you into suitable unit and doing a form of an IQ test was part of it. They didn't give us the result, but I probably did it pretty well since they put me to be main operator of a ground-to-ground missile unit. At least my little bit higher intelligence than average "soldier" spared me from the mud, dirt, long marches, carrying heavy weaponry and other meaningless activities of the service. So I spent most of the time in a classroom surrounded with state of the art simulators, playing video games made specially for practicing real time guidance of the missile in simula...

Some years are more memorable than others and there's no doubt that this is one of those subjective feelings if we are looking to the past solar cycle from individual point of view. Some are forgettable and disappointing by using the same perspective. If I had to judge about 2016, I would say its one of those forgettable ones. Perhaps not really because of what happened badly or poorly during past twelve months but rather of what didn't happen again. Perhaps it was me, who once again made a mistake and had higher expectation from the humanity and ended in sort of letdown once more. Obama & Medvedev at Ray's Hell Burger in 2010 Actually if we want to get into disappointment fast, it's easy, the only thing we need to do is to have a glimpse or two to the worldwide politics and worldwide affairs. But it wasn't always like that. Every now and again we got ourselves into illusion that things can be perfect, or better to say the least. Ever since Barack Obama...

Lately I was watching current stream of war related news and Syrian migrant crisis and I thought of what would I say on the blog about actual, continuous and devastating warfare in Europe, Africa and Middle East and stupidity of literally inexplicable background of who is fighting whom in all those conflicts and what cause would justify the aftermaths in form of devastated cities and long refugee-columns... Or even what words should I use to describe foolishness of the new cold war between nuclear powered "super countries" and what that will mean for our children and theirs in the future... Then I realized that reacting to meaningless affairs and worldwide political absurdity in a world so divided by racial, structural, governmental and religious diversity is also meaningless. I also realized that I said enough in the past. There is nothing new to be added or said. There will always be people who will think that rifle is not a rifle if it never fires a bullet. And to use a ...

I remember that scene from the movie "The Blues Brothers" with Jake and Elwood hiding from who-knows-who in the super tiny apartment next to skytrain or railway tracks, shaking every now and again and every time when a train is passing by the neighborhood. I always felt sympathy for all those people who are actually living next to those high trafficking high or rail ways with heavy tremors in the air in form of high decibels of various noises all around them. Guess what? Our own neighborhood is now getting similar feeling. Actually, similar is understatement. It is way worse. The new tracks are placed just couple of dozens of meters above our house. In recent months and years, the local airport are getting more and more traffic and the runway position is actually crossing our street almost to the single angle. I couldn't do much about it except to took the camera as soon as I heard the noise and 'shot' their underbellies. So here are couple of those taken in previ...

Do you remember United Nations? The worldwide organisation created just after the sunset of World War Two with mainly one goal - to prevent global warfare in the future and to deal with our planet outside the boundaries of it's members? United Nations Security Council* Yes, it still exists, somewhere on the island of Manhattan, with its powerless debates and Security Council decisions without much responsibilities for those who signed them as well as for those affected in any way. Sadly, the power of global government never actually made to UN, despite all the good efforts throughout the years and it always staid with those in individual countries, or groups of them, either politically or geographically or ideologically divided. The truth is that there was no big decision in the history of the mankind, either good or bad, that is made by some mutual organisation of any kind. Those are all made by either one man alone in some sort of dictatorship, or by a small group of li...

Recently, every time when I am trying to shut down our Xbox 360, loud laughter fills our living room as my wife is every time equally entertained by my heavily accented "turn off" command, especially in all those times when I am repeatedly saying it again and again with different levels of enthusiasm until the poor thing finally understands what I really want it to do. I don't mind, even though the laugh is on my account, I am positive that voice commands are the most effective way to shutdown the Xbox. Alternatives are either to use its motion sensor and in series of waves force it to turn off or to find the controller (which is always located under the last pillow in the farthest corner of living room) and in a series of clicks do the same. But this is also not the only reason I like to use voice commands. The main reason is that I really like to try and use new features in nowadays computers simply because no matter how rudimentary they are they surely represent the fu...

I have a small challenge for you in a form of a quick quiz question: You must use just one word in order to describe following paragraph: "You sleep in small rooms with other people usually on bank-beds and everyday you must get up and be out of bed exactly at 5 hundred hours and go outside to do physical exercises where you are usually forced to sing songs with no significant meanings. Three times a day you wait in line in order to eat or you don't get any food. You have to wear the same clothing like all others, take weekly showers in large mutual bathrooms and in other parts of the day you have to work on assigned jobs or learn how to survive fight with other people similar to you." I don't know but I've been told So what is it? I am sure there are several words with different meanings that easily fits the description but in relation to what I am going to write in this post the chosen word is: The Army. In this particular case, there is no room for a...