The 2016 Presidential Election: Hillary Clinton.

This should be read as a direct continuation of; http://watchitdie.blogspot.co.uk/2016/11/the-2016-presidential-election-donald.html

If Donald Trump is something of the darkhorse candidate than Hillary Clinton is the candidate that we sadly know all too well.

As she never hesitates to remind us Hillary Clinton was US Secretary of State between 2008 and 2012. In the area of foreign policy in particular this gives us a pretty clear idea of what a Hillary Clinton Presidency will  look like.

Hillary Clinton cites her greatest achievement as Secretary of State the program of sanctions which were brought to an end under John Kerry in April 2015 with a deal to end Iran's nuclear program.

At current estimates Hezbollah has an arsenal of 150,000 missiles stationed in southern Lebanon pointing directly at Israel. Assuming these are all the Zalzel-2 missile and they are all fitted with the maximum 600kg (1320lb) high explosive warhead this represents a potential threat of 9 Kilotons of explosive power. If they are the smaller Fadj-5 missile all fitted with the maximum 90kg (200lb) warhead you are still talking about a potential threat of 1.3 Kilotons. 

This is more than enough to destroy a country just 21,000kmsq (12,500msq) in area with a population of just 8 million people.

These weapons are predominately supplied by Iran and Syria both via Iraq and Syria and by a range of complex smuggling routes across the Persian Gulf, the Arabian Sea and East Africa and the Mediterranean Sea. Keeping track of these weapon shipments requires a complex network of intelligence gathering involving technological surveillance such as satellite tracking and good old fashioned secret agents. Protecting particularly those human intelligence sources is itself a complex task and not one that people are happy to have discussed openly.

Also phrases such as; "A mixture of X number of Zalzel-2 missiles fitted with a combination of 600kg warheads and 400kg warheads combined with X Fadj-5 missiles with a mixture of 90kg and 40kg warheads" is not exactly a headline grabber. So when talking about Israel's security people have long found it easier to talk about; 'The Iranian Nuclear Threat!'

Sadly due to the sanctions Hillary Clinton helped impose as Secretary of State and the skilled negotiations led by John Kerry that got those sanctions scrapped the US has eliminated Iran's actual nuclear program. With the Iranian nuclear program always being more or a mirage - or 'existential' issue -  rather than a concrete threat to Israel's security all this has achieved is to force skilled diplomats to come up with new ways to talk about the conventional missile threat to Israel.

Quite apart from having an extremely negative effect both on Israel and the entire Middle-East, North Africa (MENA) region Hillary Clinton's sanctions on Iran have also had an extremely effect negative on America's economic standing in the World.

The US currently runs one of the largest national debts in the World standing at around $19.5 Trillion. The reason why the US is able to run a national debt that would drive most nations into bankruptcy is because it's currency - the US Dollar - is the global reserve currency. That means that if any nation were to call in the US' debts driving it to bankruptcy the first thing that would happen is that the value of the dollar would collapse driving all the nations that hold dollar reserves into bankruptcy. A sort of economic Mutually Assured Destruction.

The reason why the US Dollar is the global reserve currency is because back at the end of the Second World War the US did a deal with the World's largest oil producer - Saudi Arabia. In return for the US guaranteeing the security of the Saudi Royal Family Saudi Arabia agreed to only sell its oil in US Dollars. That meant that anybody wanting to buy oil had to have a reserve of US Dollars.

Obviously much like the rest of the western world the US has not purchased oil from Iran since the 1979 Revolution. However other nations - most notably China - have been perfectly happy to buy oil from Iran over the past 30 odd years. Being global the sanctions that Hillary Clinton introduced prevented those nations from buying oil from Iran forcing them to buy oil from Saudi Arabia instead.

Due to their huge demand for oil and therefore purchasing power China has not been happy about buying oil in the currency of their great economic rival. Saudi Arabia has been more than happy to oblige them and welched on its deal with the US by selling China oil in its own currency - the Renminbi (Yuan).

Despite the value of the Renminbi being set by the Chinese government rather than the value of the free market - currency manipulation in short - the increased volume of oil sales in the currency have led to the Renminbi being included in the International Monetary Fund's (IMF) Special Drawing Rights (SDR) basket of currencies. These are the types of currency that the IMF accepts and makes payments in. The Renminbi's inclusion in the SDR basket is a significant step towards eliminating the US Dollar as the global reserve currency.

So although this is quite a technical and not exactly headline grabbing issue this is one of the structural pillars of the US economy and American power that Hillary Clinton has merrily been taking a sledgehammer to throughout her time as Secretary of State.

If Hillary Clinton's approach to Iran was the result of almost Autistic naivety then her own attempts to counter the rise of Chinese power belie an almost nihilistic recklessness. As Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was instrumental in the formation of the US' "Pivot Towards the Pacific" policy.

This has been intended to contain the rise of China by bringing nation's in the South-East Asia/Pacific region out of China's sphere of influence and into America's. This has really been a two-track process involving both economics and security.

The economic track has been focused on increasing trade between the US and South East Asian Nations (SEAN) that the US had previously been at war with or refused to trade with such as Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia and Myanmar (Burma).

The US' only interest has been to open up new low wage economies to outsource to in order to depress wages in both the US and China in order to prevent China shifting to consumer economy. In this race to the bottom the US has suddenly been happy to do business with nations with absolutely appalling human rights records. In the space of just 8 years the US went from supporting popular protests to overthrow Burma's military dictatorship to inviting members of that dictatorship to the White House.

It is on the security track though that this Pivot Towards the Pacific policy has been at its most dangerous.

Here the US has focused on building up the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK/North Korea) into a nuclear armed regional bogeyman. With any potential collapse of the DPRK risking a mass refugee crisis to its immediate neighbour China the US has obviously been more free to use inflammatory rhetoric to condemn the DPRK and call for ever tougher economic sanctions. The thinking being that this will convince nations in the region to move away from China and look to the US to protect them from the DPRK.

Although my focus is on the MENA rather than the Pacific region this plan does not seem to be working.

Back in 2014 Japan announced that it was amending its post-war constitution to allow it to play a more active role in its own defence rather than relying on the US. Following the recent September 2016 DPRK nuclear test the Republic of Korea (RoK/South Korea) announced that it was drawing up its own plans to pre-emptively attack the DPRK and kill its leader Kim Jong Un before the DPRK can destroy the RoK.

In the run-up to the US Presidential election the RoK has been engulfed in a political scandal of its own.

This centres around a woman called Choi Soon-sil who is often described as the right hand of the President Park Geun-hye. Choi is accused of using her longstanding friendship with the President solicit large donations to a charitable foundation she runs. President Park herself stands accused of improperly storing classified and secret government documents by sharing them with Ms Choi.

It seems to me that the only difference between that scandal and the scandal currently engulfing Hillary Clinton and her own right-hand woman Huma Abedin is that the South Koreans have decided to prosecute.

It's almost as if amid the extremely high stakes of nuclear confrontation the US' traditional regional allies no longer view it as reliable and competent partner.

As Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was also one of the main architects of the US-led attack on Libya that resulted in the overthrow of the government of its longtime President Muammar Qaddafi in 2010. Alongside NATO airstrikes this was achieved by training and equipping Islamist militia's in places such as Tunisia to fight on the ground.

Following the overthrow of the Libyan govt in 2011 the nation rapidly plunged into chaos taking it to the brink of becoming a failed state. All the different Islamist militias that the US trained and armed almost immediately starting fighting each other over territory, smuggling routes and Libya's vast oil reserves. Into this security vacuum has emerged the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). As with so much else a large part of John Kerry's tenure as Secretary of State has been spent trying to tidy up this mess.

Hillary Clinton's decision to overthrow the Libyan government not only plunged that nation into chaos but also many other nations in the region.

Fuelled by weapons and fighters from Libya in January 2012 an Islamist terror group - the Movement for Oneness and Jihad in West Africa (MOJWA) - established a self-proclaimed Islamist Caliphate in an area of northern Mali roughly the same size as France or twice the size of the US state of Texas. In January 2015 a small French force intervened in Mali and swept this terrorist Caliphate aside in just six weeks.

Unfortunately many of the fighters from Mali fled to near-by Nigeria where they joined the Boko Haram group which has now affiliated itself with ISIL. Since then Boko Haram have waged war against not only Nigeria but neighbouring states such as Cameroon, Chad and Niger. However Michelle Obama did once post a social media picture of herself holding a sign saying; "Bring Back Our Girls" so I'm sure that's all fine.

With Islamist violence and instability across Africa's Sahel belt hundreds of thousands of people have been forced to flee their homes to live as refugees. Prior to 2010 the majority of these refugees would settle in rich and stable nations close to their homelands such as Libya. However with Hillary Clinton plunging Libya into chaos many more of these refugees are being forced to cross the Mediterranean to seek shelter in Europe.

Just in 2015 1.02 million refugees attempted this crossing with 3,771 being killed in the process. Already in 2016 327,800 have made the crossing with 3,800 being killed. Sadly this is considered a marked improvement.

The pressure that this migration crisis is placing on Europe is threatening to tear the European Union (EU) apart. Italy where most of these migrants land is threatening to veto the EU budget if other member states to not do more to help. Nations such as Hungary and Poland have erected barbed wire fences and are refusing to help nations such as Italy. Far-right and downright Nazi political parties are on the rise across the EU and Britain has already voted to leave.

In September 2016 the British Parliament published the results of its inquiry into the overthrowing of the Libyan government. Despite not exactly being a pro-Qaddafi lobby group the British Parliamentary inquiry was absolutely stinging in its criticism.

It's main finding was that the main justification for launching military action - to protect civilians - was entirely false. Singling out Hillary Clinton in particular it found that far too much emphasis was placed on the often theatrical public statements of Muammer Qaddafi and those comments were selectively edited in an attempt to fabricate evidence of a threat to civilians.

In short the British Parliament found that the war against Libya was undertaken on the basis of a lie that was just as, if not more, serious than the dodgy dossier with it's claims of Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) being launched in just 45 minutes that was used by the US to invade Iraq in 2003.

The Iraqi dossier was of course presented to the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) by former US Secretary of State Colin Powell. Hillary Clinton seems quite proud of the fact that despite being a Republican Colin Powell has endorsed her for the Presidency.

The British Parliamentary inquiry into the war against Libya also singled out an almost complete lack of planning for the country following the overthrow of its government.

As far as I can tell the only preparation made for Libya following the overthrow of its government was to raid the nation's arsenal and scoop up as many weapons and Islamist terrorists in order to transport them to Syria.

The idea being to use those Islamist terrorists to mount an equally illegal attempt to overthrow the Syrian government.

Next Part to Follow.

13:20 on 5/11/16 (UK date).

The 2016 Presidential Election: Donald Trump.

With Gary Johnson representing the Libertarian Party and Jill Stein representing the Green Party there are actually four candidates in the US Presidential race.

However here I will concentrate on the candidates for the two main Republican and Democrat Parties; Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton.

The most obvious thing that qualifies Donald Trump for the Presidency is that fact that he has won the nomination for the Republican Party. In order to do this he had to beat out 17 other candidates in the most competitive race for a party's nomination in modern political history. Trump achieved this despite stiff opposition from the Republican establishment.

The reason why the Republican establishment are so opposed to Donald Trump is that despite all the bravado he is actually the most moderate and mainstream Republican candidate certainly since George H. Bush back in 1988.

Take for example Trump's signature policy of building a wall along America's border with Mexico. This is a policy that has been in every successive Republican Presidential manifesto since the 1990's. It has actually been the law of the land since 2006 when it was voted for by a certain Hillary Clinton, Senator for New York.

What has been preventing this law being put into practice is that successive Congresses have refused to fund the completion of the wall that is already in place across much of America's border with Mexico. So it seems the nuance of this discussion of getting Mexico to pay for the wall has been lost on a lot of people who aren't particularly knowledgeable on the subject.

Then of course there is Trump's plan to ban all Muslims from America. The important thing to remember about this is that Trump never said it. Instead it was something the Hillary Clinton campaign just made up and in this brave new world of post-reality politics not a single journalist bothered correct them on.

In the wake of the December 2015 terror attack in San Bernardino, California Trump did propose a temporary ban on Muslim's entering the country until the US could figure out and fix the problems with it's visa system. One of the San Bernardino attackers - Tashfeen Malik- was born in Pakistan and lived in Saudi Arabia before entering the US on a spousal visa.

The notion that you would impose a temporary ban on something until clear security problems had been resolved is far from an outrageous one. For example on October 31st 2015 (31/10/15) a civilian passenger jet was bombed out of the skies over Egypt. Many European nations responded to that terror attack by banning their citizens from travelling to that Muslim nation.

While Donald Trump was calling for a temporary ban on Muslim's entering the US that is exactly what the US government under President Barack Obama was doing. In the weeks following the San Bernardino attack a number of British Muslims found that their visas to travel to the US had suddenly been cancelled.

The two cases that spring to my mind are the Mahmood family and Farrokah Sekaleshfar. Of course it emerged that the Mahmood family's visa had been cancelled because the eldest son had been liking and sharing Al Qaeda propaganda on Facebook. Rather raising the question of why he was given a visa in the first place?

How mainstream and sensible Trump's calls for improvements to the visa system actually are became clear when he laid out his policy in detail - the so-called "Extreme Vetting." Suddenly the chorus of disapproval from the Democrats changed from; "He's a Hitler!" to; "He's Just Copying Obama!"

Then there is the issue of abortion. Ever since the Supreme Court of the United States SCOTUS upheld the right to abortion in Roe V Wade (1973) this has been a major fault line within US politics. Traditionally the Democrats support the right to abortion while the Republicans oppose it.

Donald Trump however sits firmly in the centre ground on the issue leaning towards pro-choice. This has made it extremely hard for the Democrats to attack him on an issue they traditionally use to distinguish themselves from the Republicans.

The best the Democrats have been able to do is point to an interview in which Donald Trump was asked if in a world where abortion had been made illegal women who have illegal abortions should be punished. Trump said that he thought that they should. However you'll notice that at no point has Trump said that he would like to see a world where abortion is illegal.

The principle that a society decides that certain activities are unacceptable so passes laws against them and then punishes people who still continue to engage in those activities is not a new one. I would like to say that it's been in place since America was born as a nation. However it actually goes back much further than that. 

Although I'm not a particularly religious man I think the concept of crime as a moral wrong was introduced when Moses brought the ten commandments down from Mount Sinai and was further codified by the Deuteronomic Codes back in 1406 B.C

So saying that for the good of society people who break laws that society has passed should be punished is not an outrageous statement. I can see though why Hillary Clinton would have a problem with it.

The problems that Trump's moderate stance on things like abortion are causing him with the Republican base were clearly on display in the third and final Presidential debate hosted by Fox News.

Here Donald Trump in particular was asked what he would do if SCOTUS overturned Roe V Wade. 

Rather than trying to undermine his support amongst swing voters this was intended to damage Trump in the eyes of the Republican base by making it clear that he does not support a ban on abortion. I think that Trump actually did rather well in dealing with this aggressive line of questioning by pointing out that it would then fall to individual states to make their own decision.

What is very worrying is that the Democrats then tried to spin this answer it into evidence that Trump was some sort of abortion banning dictator. That showed a complete lack of understanding on their part of the role of a Supreme Court in a Constitutional democracy.

The role of a Supreme Court and a written Constitution is to provide a check or limit on the power of the Executive branch - the President. If the Supreme Court rules that a law or policy of the President is unconstitutional there is nothing the President can do about it.

The outrage that Hillary Clinton and the Democrats showed at the notion that the President has to abide by rulings of the Supreme Court is one of those warning signs that you are being faced with a looming dictatorship. The Law & Justice (PiS) attempts to overrule the Supreme Court in Poland particularly over the issue of abortion has caused widespread alarm.

Although American politics is still stuck in the two party system the old split of the Capitalist Right and the Socialist Left really no longer exists. The Cold War has ended, the Soviet Union has collapsed and even China is now really only Communist in name only.

Now we've all more or less agreed that Capitalism is the only way forward the new split is between Libertarian Capitalism and Authoritarian Capitalism. This new split cuts across the traditional political parties.

A prime example of Authoritarian Capitalism at work is modern China. Here you have massive State Owned Enterprises (SOE's) that are owned by the government and are responsible for all economic activity. The government then sets all aspects of social policy such as education, planning, healthcare and employee rights to benefit the SOE's.

The model of Authoritarian Capitalism that is emerging in America and the rest of the western world is perhaps even more alarming.

Here rather than SOE's we have massive service companies such as G4S, Mite and Veiloa who perform the traditional roles of government such as running the prisons, schools and refuse collection. With these private companies being able to cripple society what's left of the government is forced to serve these corporations with social policies that strip away things like traditional employee rights and environmental protections.

Unlike SOE's which officially at least are run from the greater good of the nation private service companies Mite and G$S are run exclusively for the benefit of their small group of already extremely rich shareholders and directors.

Libertarian Capitalism is essentially the system we have now. The private sector is allowed to do pretty much as it likes with the exception of certain areas such as workers rights where we the people - through our elected government - impose restrictions in the form of laws for the greater good of society.

Therefore the Republicans who have decided to oppose Donald Trump and support Hillary Clinton fall into two broad camps.

The largest of these are the Republicans who are backed by big business to promote Authoritarian Capitalism. With her hedge fund backers and speeches to the likes Goldman Sachs those Republicans see Hillary Clinton as their natural ally.

Then of course there is the Evangelical Christian wing of the Republican Party. Through his refusal to oppose abortion they view Donald Trump as nowhere near extreme enough to represent them.

Therefore they are supporting Hillary Clinton in the hope that she will be such an absolute disaster as President it will cause people to flock to the Republican Party in droves. 

The thinking being that combined with defeat for Trump this will allow them to kill off the centre ground within the Republican Party once and for all. They will then get to have their extremist President in four years time and every four years until Judgement Day.

Donald Trump is of course a candidate of limited political experience. Instead his background is in the world of business.

Normally this is something that I would say counts against a candidate. In business parties get together and do deals because it is in their mutual interests. Politics and in particular diplomacy is often much more about getting people to do things that run contrary to their best interests.

So in business after shaking hands on a deal people will go off and do their best to make that deal a success. In politics after shaking hands on a deal people will often go off and do their best to get out of the agreement. This can present a steep learning curve for business leaders who are new to politics.

However Donald Trump is much more than just another businessman. For the past 30 years he's been the Chief Executive of the Trump Organisation. This is a multinational holding company operating in more than thirty nations. This gives Donald Trump huge experience in dealing with foreign nations, their laws and political systems.

In effect Donald Trump has long been operating his own State Department. This gives him a wealth of experience and a number of advantages.

Back in June 2016 the UK voted to leave the European Union (EU). This is one of the biggest events to affect the continent since the end of the Cold War. As just one of its consequences it has triggered speculation that Scotland could leave the UK and attempt to rejoin the EU as an independent nation.

Donald Trump of course owns and operates the Trump International Golf Links golf course and resort in Scotland. On the day the referendum results were announced this allowed him to be on the ground in the UK talking to local people, political leaders and journalists. I think Hillary Clinton was taking a nap.

One of the big challenges the next President of the United States will face is the current war against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). One of the key nations involved in this is Turkey. They have taken to discussing the issue by issuing terrorist threats against US interests inside of Turkey. Just on October 29th (29/10/16) the US Embassy in Istanbul was forced to evacuate the dependents of its staff.

One of the key US interests in Turkey is the Trump Tower complex in Sisli, Istanbul. This itself was (lightly) bombed on April 9th 2016 (9/4/16). So I think it's pretty clear who Turkey's Islamist and increasingly dictatorial President Erdogan is endorsing for US President.

This summer of course has seen the Olympic Games in Rio de Janerio, Brazil. As is always the case preparations for those games have been accompanied by a mass of infrastructure building and urban regeneration. The centre piece of Rio's regeneration has been the "Marvellous Port" project. At the heart of that construction there is a Trump Tower hotel.

Aside from Turkey the Trump Organisation operates a number of business in majority Muslim, Gulf Arab states such as the United Arab Emirates (UAE) for one. So while Hillary Clinton warns US voters who will probably never see a Muslim in real life that Trump is an Islamaphobic dictator Donald Trump actually knows a lot of Muslims and has worked with them for a good number of years.

The main skill that I think his years of business will have taught Donald Trump is that of delegation.Obviously the job of President is too complex for one person do alone. So they have to appoint trusted deputies to manage specific areas in detail and then report back.

You only need to look at who he appointed as Secretary of State back in 2008 to realise that this is a skill President Obama has taken a painfully long time to learn.

I will address that in morning tomorrow. If the Internet permits me.

12:15 on 4/11/16 (UK date).

Operation Featherweight: Month 28, Week 2, Day 4.

Since October 17th (17/10/16) combined Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) and Iraqi Kurdish Peshmerga have been moving into a position to plan an operation to liberate Mosul. This northern Iraqi city has been under the occupation of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).

As part of their preparations the combined forces have been moving to encircle Mosul on three sides - the north, the east and the south.

Since October 24th (24/10/16) the eastern front has emerged as the most advanced. This was the day that the Peshmerga secured the town of Top Zawa just 8km (5 miles) from Mosul. This is as far as the Peshmerga will advance towards Mosul on that front. Amid either a collapse or a tactical withdrawal by ISIL on the following day (25/10/16) the ISF element entered and secured the town of Bazwaia which sits just 2km (1 mile) from Mosul. From there the ISF elite Counter Terrorism Force (CTF/Golden Division) have been launching raids into Gogjali which for all practical purposes in within Mosul.

On Monday (31/10/16) the CTF launched an operation to liberate Gogjali. Technically Gogjali sits outside of Mosul. However as within many other cities if you were wandering about on the ground it is unlikely that you would notice the administrative boundary unless you were already aware of it. Today the CTF have declared they have liberated the Gogjali district along with the State TV building that sits at the edge of parkland between Gogjali district and Qazah district which sits directly to the west. In literally the last hour or so the ISF have also announced that they have entered the Judaydat al-Mufti district which sits directly to the south of the Qazah district.

This is all consistent with a frontal assault on Mosul from east to west. This is the same tactic that the ISF deployed in the  May-June 2016 Battle of Fallujah with disastrous results. Although the ISF do not publish official casualty figures I was hearing lots of rumours of over 100 killed on the first day. That was the price of simply standing still. The success of this tactic in Mosul is entirely dependent on ISIL sticking to their agreement with the US and only mounting a symbolic defence of the city while the majority of their forces escape west along the Falls Road into the heartlands around the city of Raqqa in Syria.

On Saturday (29/10/16) the Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMF) who are part of the ISF opened up a new front from Qayyarah to the south of Mosul to the town of Tal Afar to the west of Mosul. The intention being to establish a defensive line cutting the Falls Road and preventing ISIL from escaping Mosul. That obviously makes it impossible for ISIL to stick with their deal with the US and only mount a symbolic defence of Mosul.

Although I accept that my information may be a little out of date the PMF seem to have only advanced as far as the village of Abu Hujaira which is around 40km (25 miles) south-east of Tal Afar. This means that the PMF are roughly only around two thirds of the way to their objective.

In protest the US-led coalition - Combined Joint Task Force: Operation Inherent Resolve (CJTFOIR) - is refusing to provide air support on the western front. Meanwhile Turkey has begun massing tanks on its border with Iraq in Silopi which is around 90km (55 miles) north of Tal Afar. The implicit threat being that Turkey will invade Iraq to keep the Falls Road open.

So at this point the Mosul operation is neither one thing nor the other. A dog's dinner, a pigs ear. A whore's c*ntfest. The barely translatable metaphors really write themselves.

To the north of Mosul the Peshmerga have made some progress fully securing some of the villages they had only previously strong-pointed. Crucially though this does not include the major town of Bashiqa & Bhazani.

Despite this on Monday (31/10/16) the ISF did launch operations against Hay Saddam and Hay Karkoukli. As with Gogjali these are both districts that technically fall just outside of Mosul between the M2 Motorway and the Mosul - Bashiqa Highway. Although it seems that every location in and around Mosul has at least 12 different names it appears that the ISF have today been able to declare those districts liberated.

On the southern front there appears to have been no progress since Saturday. On the Gwer Front to the south-east the most forward position continues to be Nimrud while on the south-western Qarrayah Front the most forward position appears to be Ayn Nasr 25km (15 miles) to the west.

It appears that neither the ISF nor the Peshmerga are in control of the town of Hamman al-Alil just 8km (5 miles) north of the Ayn Nasr - Nimrud line. However much of the focus in that area has gone on opening up the western front to Tal Afar.

17:25 on 1/11/16 (UK date).