Only today did the notion occur to my conscious mind those are large swaths of dying trees that my vision has lingered on for a while. I had vague thoughts about that for a while now but I probably shrugged it off in my mind as the effects of shadows from clouds above in the sky.
I have noticed before that around the end of the summer the foliage on the ridges is very brown especially compared to this spring when the snow melted off completely to reveal green where I usually observed brown.
That peak with the radar dome is labeled as Mica Peak and Google Maps tells me the distance measured is about 8 miles from me. How Google calculates that distance I'm not certain. I would want to know the straight-line point-to-point distance and they might calculate over-the-ground distance but I doubt that is how it works because the changes in elevation would add a lot of distance to that result. A very long time ago I could tell you the distance to the horizon at sea.
Looking back at images I captured previously during this time last year I see nothing but green where I now to see a lot of brown.
I wondered if those were hardwood trees changing colors with the season but those seem, I guess, to be evergreens dying from drought or disease.
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http://www.e-reading.org.ua/bookreader.php/79701/Clancy_-_Red_Storm_Rising.txt
Red Storm Rising (1986)
Tom Clancy
6 – The Watchers
Lowe's uniform blouse hung in the comer. Toland sipped at his coffee and surveyed its four rows of decorations. There were three repeat pips on his Vietnam service ribbon. And a Navy Cross. Dressed in the olive-green sweater affected by Marine officers, Lowe was not a big man, and his Midwest accent gave evidence of a relaxed, almost bored outlook on life. But his brown eyes said something else entirely. Colonel Lowe was thinking along Toland's lines already, and he was not the least happy about it.
"Chuck, if they are really preparing for some action-action on a large scale, they just can't mess with a few colonels. Something else will start showing up. They'll have to do some work at the bottom, too."
"Red Storm Rising"
"Yeah, that's the next thing we have to look for. I sent a request into DIA yesterday. From now on, when Red Star comes out, the attach??? in Moscow will send a photo-facsimile to us via satellite. If they start doing that, it'll sure as hell turn up in Kraznaya Zvesda. Bob, I think you've opened a very interesting can of worms, and you're not going to be alone examining it."
Toland finished his coffee. The Soviets had taken an entire class of fleet ballistic missile submarines out of service. They were conducting arms talks in Vienna. They were buying grain from America and Canada under surprisingly favorable terms, even allowing American hulls to handle 20 percent of the cargo. How did this jibe with the signs he had seen? Logically it didn't, except in one specific case-and that wasn't possible. Was it?
SHPOLA, THE UKRAINE
The crashing sound of the 125mm tank gun was enough to strip the hair off your head, Alekseyev thought, but after five hours of running this exercise, it came through his ear protectors as a dull ringing sound. This morning the ground had been covered with grass and dotted with new saplings, but now it was a uniform wasteland of mud, marked only with the tread marks of T-80 main battle tanks and BMP armored infantry fighting vehicles. Three times the regiment had run this exercise, simulating a frontal assault of tanks and mounted infantry against an enemy of equal strength. Ninety mobile guns had supplied fire support, along with a battery of rocket launchers. Three times.
Alekseyev turned, removing his helmet and earmuffs to look at the regimental commander. "A Guards regiment, eh, Comrade Colonel? Elite soldiers of the Red Army? These tit-sucking children couldn't guard a Turkish whorehouse, much less do anything worthwhile inside of it! And what have you been doing for the past four years commanding this rolling circus, Comrade Colonel? You have learned to kill your whole command three times! Your artillery observers are not located properly. Your tanks and infantry carriers still can't coordinate their movements, and your tank gunners can't find targets three meters high! If that had been a NATO force holding that ridge, you and your command would be dead!" Alekseyev examined the colonel's face. His demeanor was changing from red-fear to white-anger. Good. "The loss of these people is no great penalty for the State, but that is valuable equipment, burning valuable fuel, shooting valuable ordnance, and taking up my valuable time! Comrade Colonel, I must leave you now. First I will throw up. Then I will fly to my command post. I will be back. When I come back, we will run this exercise again. Your men will perform properly, Comrade Colonel, or you will spend the rest of your miserable life counting trees!"
- posted by H.V.O.M - Kerry Wayne Burgess 4:10 PM Pacific Time Spokane Valley Washington USA Tuesday 25 October 2016
