Dear U.S. What Are You Going To Do (Now)?

Fire burn, and cauldron bubble by the pricking of my thumbs. Something wicked, wicked, wicked! Something wicked, this way comes.

One day after former, if not future, U.S. President Donald Trump addressed an adoring crowd at the 2024 Republican National Convention sporting a maxi-pad on his right ear, U.S. company CrowdStrike distributed a faulty update to its Falcon Sensor security software. The resultant massive and widespread outage caused problems with Microsoft Windows computers running the software. Approximately 9 million systems crashed and were unable to properly restart. Some systems are still malfunctioning and others had to be manually restarted. The event has been called the largest “outage” in the history of information technology.

I distinctly recall an associate that was looking forward to rendezvous with a former workmate to embark on a cruise together. She’d not seen her friend in years and flew from Los Angeles to Miami where they were to sailaway from port. Her friend was flying in from New York to Miami. As her friend boarded the plane in New York to meet her the outage struck, the flight was scrubbed and my friend took a cruise by herself. Unfortunate, but not deadly.

The outage wrought havoc with virtually everything imaginable consistent with modern life including businesses and governments around the world. Airlines, airports, banks, hotels, hospitals, manufacturing, stock markets, broadcasting, gas stations, retail stores, governmental services (such as emergency services), intranets and websites immediately became paralyzed. Most disturbing was the impact on healthcare systems as electronic health record software collapsed forcing providers to cancel or delay a plethora of procedures and services. Imagine the same scenario during the recent Covid pandemic. To make matters worse, Emergency-911 systems became dysfunctional across the United States.

This was a global event. The worldwide financial damage has been estimated to be at least 10 billion dollars and counting. Peripheral damage may never be calculated and, in the grand scheme of things, it could have been much, much more catastrophic.

Three days after the event, the U.S. House of Representatives Homeland Security Committee sent a letter to CrowdStrike CEO George Kurtz “urging” him to testify regarding the global tech outage. They gave him a week to schedule; that was over three weeks ago. The hearing has yet to be scheduled. Basically, CrowdStrike told them to pound sand with the curt public response: "CrowdStrike is actively in contact with relevant Congressional Committees. Briefings and other engagement timelines may be disclosed at members' discretion," a company spokesperson said.

CrowdStrike was co-founded in 2011 by George Kurtz (CEO), Dmitri Alperovitch (former CTO), and Gregg Marston (CFO, retired) all of whom are purportedly Jewish. Each of them “worth” billions of dollars. Irony of ironies, CrowdStrike is a cybersecurity company. Given the current state of affairs in Palestine and the Middle East, CrowdStrike’s quite intimate business relationships with Israel are fascinating. At least, to me.

One thing I am certain of, the Homeland Security Committee would not have sent “a letter” to my brown posterior “urging” a damned thing under the same circumstances. I would have had red dots on my upper torso and I have supreme confidence that it would have been so. I bet you do, too. Now, let us delve into the unavoidable underworld unpleasantries likely to come.

The Thumb Prick: The Sly, The Slick and The Wicked

Pursuant to the preamble of this disquisition, some genius will indict me as a “conspiracy theorist.” The fact that I have in no way, shape or form suggested such be damned. I most certainly possess the linguistic dexterity, cognitive command and intellectual courage to articulate exactly what I desire to articulate. Further, there is not a soul in this galaxy that will ever accuse me of not meaning exactly what I utter (a quality that is of equal virtue and peril). Nonetheless, I will state that I have always believed that the only valid conspiracy theory that exists is that there are no conspiracies.

Is it possible the CrowdStrike event was a deliberate attack or a “terrorist” event by foreign or domestic actors? Was it a beta test for a much larger (and deadly) rollout? Do you really believe the government would disclose such an attack to the public? If you do, I have some beachfront property in Nebraska I can give you a deal on.

What happens if voting machines are cyberattacked on November 5, 2024? What happens if water treatment facilities are reprogrammed to dispense more chemicals (or less) to municipalities nationwide? What happens if major cities lose power for days; especially heavily populated areas as it is a known fact that the U.S. electrical grid system is akin to a Teradactyl. What happens if TRACON (Terminal Radar Approach Control Facilities) goes dark while thousands of aircraft are at 30,000 feet? Remember how cell phones became totally useless on 9/11?

Many years ago, I worked as a subcontractor for what was then the largest defense contractor on the planet (and may still be). Oddly enough, you probably have never heard of them and that is not an accident. The company is massive, it is highly secretive and rather spooky. The company is called SAIC but those of us captive to the organization affectionately called it “psych.” (SAIC)

My contract involved two projects. One called SecureGate and the other called C.A.T.S. My function there is unimportant, but I will disclose this: CATS was an acronym for Catastrophic Alert Tool Set. The U.S. government has been planning for a mass casualty event for decades and it knows it is going to happen; it just doesn’t know how. Any mediocre chess player knows that the element of attack…is surprise.

At the risk of being redundant, the United States, “The Island”, is no longer protected by its oceans. The average nerdy, scientifically inclined 13 year-old can weaponize a drone with items she can purchase at the local hobby store. The United States is geopolitically isolated and its belligerence towards the majority of the world will not be forgotten by those who have suffered as a result of it. Technology, the tiny microprocessor, is deadlier than a thousand five megaton nuclear warheads. Thusly, an enemy of the United States can be in Punjab, or Topeka, and kill thousands of “Americans” with a 600 dollar computer.

All the while, there are international cauldrons in the Middle East, Alkebulan, Venezuela, Ukraine, Russia, Taiwan and maritime troubles in the Pacific. Domestically, there is a good chance there will be more political violence; in fact it is a certainty. Imagine not another “attempt” but an assassination be it SCOTUS, POTUS or a dude named Otis. Throw in the equivalent of two guns for every single man, woman and child in the United States alongside an ancient, crumbling infrastructure and you, Mein Freund, are in deep shit.

What are you going to do now, America?