Using GIS and Geotechnology to Hunt Terrorists

There is a great article from GeoWorld (PDF) about using geotechnology to hunt terrorist in Iraq. In 2005 this was a new application of geoprofiling. Geoprofiling has been used in the past to study crime patterns and even solve individual cases.

Today's world of asymmetric warfare allows for greater application of geoprofiling. Many terrorist cells are local and territorial. They refuse to leave there small little havens and tend to favor easily accessible attack points from which they can retreat from. Geography skills allows us to understand, identify, and stop these attacks.

America Looks Beyond Gender

The map above comes from reader's blog Nat the Dem. Nat takes a look at states where the governor, lieutenant governor, or the sole state representative is a woman. It is pretty clear that woman have gone along way from the days when only the egalitarian interior West would elect them.

Culture as a Military Weapon

I know there is more to military geography than cultural terrain but understanding culture has proven to be an important section of today's military counterinsurgency operations.

The blog JIOX has a link to the long paper Culture: The New Key Terrain, Integrating Cultural Competence into Joint Intelligence Preparation of the Battlespace (PDF) by Major O. Kent Strader. The paper argues that it is possible to weaponize culture and understanding and exploiting culture will allow for better military operations. It is a long paper but the summary does a good job while using few words for those who do not have the time.

Iowa Caucus Results

The last Iowa Caucus post, I swear! For Saturday look forward to some military geography!

Whenever one has elections one has maps! The Politico has a flash map which shows results by county meanwhile Google (does it strike anyone odd that a search engine is now a leader in geography?) has a map showing county results.

On the Republican side Huckabee won big. Romney manged to win the Sioux City-Council Bluffs corridor and the more populous, industrial Mississippi River coast area.

For the Democrats Edwards won the blue farmers (populists who love their farm subsidies) in the south, Obama won the more youthful votes in the east, and Clinton pulled away the suburban west and north.

Political Geography of the Iowa Caucus Campaign

The Washington Post has a great interactive map on the Political Geography of the Iowa Caucus. Each candidate is studying the geography of Iowa in order to try to win the state.

Mike Huckabee: Huckabee is focusing on the rural, conservative northwestern section of the state. Christian conservatives are more concentrated here (anyone who knows that region knows it is filled with 'Dutch').

Mitt Romney: Romney is going where the votes: Des Moines and Cedar Rapids. He has been in the state for along time and hopes his ground network can suppress the Huckabee insurgency.

Barak Obama: Obama's campaign of "hope and energy" is focusing on youth. In particular Obama is focusing on the university towns of Ames (Iowa State University), Cedar Falls (University of Northern Iowa), and Iowa City (University of Iowa). This may be a smart strategy because the students at these universities will be on break and spread all throughout the state. Obama may have his own missionaries engage in fifth generation warfare (5GW).

John Edwards: Edwards is a union man and has centered his energy around Des Moines and the industrial and populist farmer town of Newton. His energy here has cost him somewhat with possible support from other blue-collar areas like the Mississippi River Coast and Sioux City.

Hillary Clinton: Clinton is focusing on the middle class, (sub)urban woman. The natural environment in Iowa for these women is Des Moines. Attention here has cost here with other caucus voters elsewhere in the state.

Webcams Around the World

Fox News surprsingly has a link to webcams of major cities and cultural sites around the world. Catholicgauze likes the Vatican and the Great Pyramids.

The Story Behind the Sugar Bowl

Going around the internet is an AP story of sugar's relation to Louisiana and the Sugar Bowl. The crop was in the French colony for a while but it took a slave rebellion in present-day Haiti to cause a surge in production with plantation owners moving operations from the island to the mainland.

In the 1920s the sugar industry in Louisiana was nearly destroyed but importing of Asian varieties of the cane allowed the crop to come back. The proposal of the Sugar Bowl was meant to emphasize that sugar was back and its importance to the state.

Today America's sugar industry in Louisiana, Florida, and Hawaii is doing well but under false preeminence. Tariffs keep the cost of foreign sugar high eliminating much foreign competition. This not only makes drinks like Pepsi and Coke use corn syrup instead of sugar, it also limits the marketability of sugar-based ethanol.